Game Changer

Chapter 22

"Happy birthday, Beautiful girl!" I said walking into Piper's room.
I heard Nadia going into Owen's room, "happy birthday, little man!" She said to him.
We brought the two of them down the hallway to the living room. There were helium balloons on the ceiling, their ribbons were hanging down to the floor, we had two breakfast "cakes" made out of stacked pancakes that were all rainbow.
Piper's favorite part was that when she walked into the kitchen, Emma, Mike and Janie were all standing there. "Happy birthday Piper and Owen!" They shouted. Piper started jumping when she saw Emma and Owen was clapping.
We put Piper and Emma on big girl chairs and put Owen in his high chair. "Who wants cake?" Nadia asked, all three kids started clapping. We gave Piper and Owen their rainbow "cakes" and the rest of us had regular pancakes.
"Do you know what we're doing today?" I asked Piper. Her eyes brightened. "We're going to the new museum!" Piper started jumping up and down.
Every time we drove by the new children's museum that just opened, Piper wanted to go. Now that they're officially open, we figured it would be the best birthday party for her. They even had things for kids Owen's age.
•••
When we got to the museum, each kid, --even the babies-- got to make an ID with their picture. The girls and Owen decorated the other side of their ID cards with stickers.
When we finished with the ID cards, we started through the museum.
We weren't very far through the tour when Ava started crying. "It must be a twin thing, because every time one of them starts crying, the other one does, too." I said to Mike.
"Here Nadia, you two take the girls and Owen, we'll go take these two." Mike said, taking Asher from Nadia.
"Aw, thanks Mike. You're a doll." Nadia said.
"We'll be back in a bit!" I said and We left.
Mike and I walked out to the van and as soon as we got in, I realized we had forgotten to bring bottles for the babies.
"Shit. I need to call Nadia, do you want to run home with me?" I asked.
"May as well!" Mike said.
I called Nadia to let her know and we took off.
•••
We were back to the museum in an hour, and the girls were already done. We packed them all in the vehicles, and we got ready to go. I stepped outside with Nadia, "we got all of the machines out when we were at the house, and everything is ready for her party. Mike called all of their friends, and they're bringing their kids. Some are piper's age and some of them are Owen's age."
"Really?" Nadia asked.
"Really!" I said. I got back in the van, and Nadia got in the car with Janie and we drove back to the house.
•••
Within a half an hour of being home again, people started to arrive. I had just gotten done making cotton candy, and the hot dogs were almost ready.
Everything else was ready to eat, and everyone was so excited.
Nadia walked over to me once everyone was playing in the back yard. "How does everyone had presents at such last minute?" She asked.
"Me and Mike planned this a week ago." I told her "it was still close to last minute, but we wanted to make sure Janie didn't pop."
"That's so sweet!" Nadia said. "Thank you, baby." Nadia kissed me on the cheek and walked over to Janie. I cold tell she was telling her all about what we had done. Janie put her hands over her mouth, and I saw her say 'Aww'. It was cute seeing Nadia so happy. I loved it.
"So," I heard Mike say. "The girls are pretty happy." He started laughing.
"I guess so!" I said. "They seemed it!"
"Maybe we should make more cotton candy!" Mike suggested.
I looked over to the cotton candy machine and realized that all twenty bags were gone. "Holy." I said. "Yes, we should!"
Mike and I made more cotton candy and the kids went crazy. The parents looked less than enthused.
"We should roll some more pretzles, too." I said.
We finished everything up, and Nadia walked over to me. "What is this truck in the front yard for?" She asked.
"Oh shit!" I said, "Mike! It's here!"
Mike and I ran to the front yard.
"What's here?" I heard Nadia yell. I just kept going.
We signed the paper, and unloaded the truck. We carried the boxes out to the back yard and got everyone to go inside for cake.
Everyone went in, and we opened the box.
"Oh my god, you got a bouncy castle." I heard Nadia say, "and there was no cake.
"Nah, that was a lie to get everyone out of the way." I said. "Now who wants to bounce?" I yelled.
I saw kids and parents running to the castle in the back yard. "So when does this need to be returned?" Nadia asked me.
"Well, I bought it." I said. "There's a few more coming this week, they were from a rental company who shut down, I only paid five hundred dollars for eight different ones." I told Nadia.
Her face looked stunned, "you paid five hundred dollars?" She asked.
"For eight of these, though." I explained.
"That is still a lot, Greg."
"It's okay, Nadia!" I said. "It'll be fine!"
"You have a shopping problem." Nadia said. "We need to invest in something, we can't just go and spend all of our money."
"Let's talk about this after the party, ok?" I asked her.
"Fine." Nadia said and walked off. She went and found Janie and they sat together at a picnic table.
•••
After the party, Mike and I cleaned everything up while the girls put the kids down for a nap. They were all exhausted and sugar filled.
We started walking inside when I heard Nadia and Janie talking. "I just wish I was pregnant again." I heard Nadia say.
"Why don't you ask Greg about having another one?" Janie suggested.
"We have the twins, and they're so little. I just feel like since these two are growing up so fast, I'm going to miss it. I mean, the twins are only a month old, but it's just different this time because they're not mine, you know?"
"I see what you mean." Janie said. "Just talk to Greg about it, hun. It can't hurt."
"Well, I don't want to freak him out." Nadia whispered.
I silently closed the door and shooed Mike back outside. "Too late. She already freaked me out." I said. "What am I going to do?" I asked Mike, I started speaking really fast. "Do I tell her that I heard them or do I just go on like I didn't hear anything and make myself awkward? What happens if I tell her and she gets mad? What happens if I don't tell her and it eats at me, so I tell her and then she gets mad that I waited to tell her?" Mike put his hand on my shoulder.
"Greg, calm down." He told me
"I can't calm down." I said. "What do I do?"