Baby For My Grumpy Chef, page 19
She hasn’t said a word since we got in the car.
To be fair, neither have I - what do you even say about something like this? Amelia is gentle, sweet, yes, but she’s always been independent, capable of taking care of herself. When the doctor laid out the rules of bedrest for her, I watched her, not him.
And I saw her eyes getting wider, more panicked, like an animal realizing it’s been trapped. Chloe is the only person she has, after all - Chloe, and me.
I knew without a doubt that I would take care of her. I mean, let’s be real I decided on that months ago, when I moved from my home in LA to that little second bedroom. Or maybe I decided it even farther back in our history, when I finally agreed to teach her self-defense.
Regardless, I can feel my mind racing, putting together a task list like I would in the kitchens before a rush. We’ll need supplies - probably some extra pillows, maybe a wheelchair just to be safe-
“What are you thinking about?”
Amelia’s voice barely carries over the hum of the car engine, soft and hesitant. I glance at her, but it’s too dark to see her face when it’s angled down at her feet.
“Everything I’ll need to do tomorrow.” I answer honestly, my voice coming out scratchier than I’d expected. Maybe this rattled me too, a little.
A little more than I’d like to admit to myself, at least.
How can you explain how it feels to hear the woman you love, the mother of your unborn child, screaming your name? To realize that she is absolutely terrified, in pain, that she needs you?
And then…opening that door, seeing her there, I felt utterly helpless.
She was frozen in place, sobbing, streaks of dark red on her raised hands. In the waiting room, I noticed that my light gray shirt now has a few faded red fingerprints on it, bloodstains from Amelia’s hands clutching at my shoulders when I carried her.
The idea made me sick. Not the blood, believe me I’ve seen plenty of it, and not just in the army. Kitchens are one of the most dangerous workplaces you can find, full of hot stovetops, honed stainless steel knives, boiling oil, and even more medieval terrors. Once I thought I’d chopped my damn finger off slicing carrots, but somehow, the doctor managed to stitch it back up.
No, what’s so nauseating to imagine is her, pale and scared and teary-eyed, looking at me as if I could somehow…save her.
God, I wanted to save her.
“Oh.” Amelia says in a small voice, and I realize that at least thirty seconds have passed since I spoke. “That’s…all?”
“No.” I open my mouth, let out a soft sigh, and try again. “I…are you alright? You were…”
Maybe I shouldn’t say ‘bleeding a lot.’
Amelia makes a quiet noise of affirmation as I pull into the pharmacy drive-through. Apparently, there are some medications Amelia needs to start on to help the baby develop, and to keep those pains from bothering her while she tries to get through the rest of the pregnancy.
The next three months are going to be rocky, I finally register. We’re going to spend most of the time waiting to make sure Amelia doesn’t suddenly have an emergency.
Amelia goes quiet again as we pick up her prescriptions, but the second I’ve rolled my window up after we pull away, I hear her whisper something. “What was that?”
She glances up at me, her face pale in the moonlight coming through the windshield, and looks down again. “I just wanted to say…Thank you.”
“For taking you to the doctor? Anyone would have done that. I’m just big enough to carry people without dropping ‘em.” I try to chuckle, but the sound catches in my throat and sticks there. I guess I’m not in the laughing mood, whether I like it or not.
Amelia shakes her head. “No. It was…you…you did more than that.” She struggles to find the words, a stubborn kind of tone in her voice.
I’m not entirely sure what to say back. “I…well, I wasn’t going to just leave you there.” I finally reply, the words gruffer than I’d like them to be. “I’m here to be a dad. Whatever you need me for, that’s what I’ll do. And right now, you need me on bed rest duty.”
Amelia groans, leaning back and placing a hand over her forehead. “I almost forgot about that. God…”
“It’ll be fine, Peppermint.” We pull into the driveway and I put it in park, plunging us into silence as I turn off the engine. And then, taking an impulsive chance, I reach across and settle a hand on hers. “I’ve got you.”
At first, she’s so still that I wonder if I’ve offended her. I’ve touched her before, but not this closely, aside from that terrible moment earlier tonight. We aren’t together, I remind myself for the thousandth time, even if it’s so easy to forget. And comforting her on the way to the hospital was an exception to the rule. What if she-
My thoughts buzz into static when Amelia moves. Her hand turns over, palm sliding against mine, and she threads our fingers together. “Thank you.” She murmurs.
I shouldn’t do it. I know I shouldn’t. But feeling her hand, so much smaller than mine, her fingers cold against the heat of my own skin, I can’t help it. Almost without realizing, I find myself drawing her knuckles up to my lips and press a soft kiss to them, hearing her breath catch in the dark quiet of the car. “Like I said,” I murmur, my voice barely audible in the still air between us, “I’ve got you.”
Amelia is motionless, and I can just catch a glimpse of her eyes, wide and fixed on my face. My own eyes flick down to her hand, the way her fingers are entwined with mine, so that you can barely tell where I end, and she begins.
I let go of her like I’ve been burned, dropping my hand to my thigh and swallowing hard. “Sorry-”
“No.” Amelia cuts me off, more strength in that single word than she’s had all evening. “No don’t, let’s just go inside.”
Is she angry? I can’t tell.
She doesn’t seem like it, allowing me to help her into the house, although she refuses to be carried again. “Hi, guys.” She greets a mortally offended Cricket and a very upset Goat, who are alternating between wails, barks, and intensive sniffing of the hospital socks Amelia put on at the ER. “Sorry about earlier.” She continues, a tiny, worn smile on her face.
Goat stretches up on my leg and digs his claws into my thigh hard enough to sting, getting a hissed curse out of me, but when I hear Amelia’s soft laugh, I don’t mind too much.
I get her set up on the couch, even though I’d much rather tuck her into bed, with a blanket and a pillow to hold on her lap. I doubt Goat or Cricket would try to jump directly on her stomach, but better safe than sorry. They settle on either side of her couch cushion, glaring at me as if to say, Do you think we’re stupid? We know she’s hurt. We love her, too.
I blink hard and turn back to the kitchen. Now I’m just tired and projecting onto a scruffy little dog and a fat cat. “Are you hungry?”
“No.”
“....I’m making you food anyway.” I catch a glimpse of Amelia’s amused grin as I turn away, taking a deep breath and letting it out slowly. Alright. No accusations about flirting or taking advantage of a charged moment, hopefully that little incident in the car has already been forgotten about.
Most of what I made earlier in the day has to have gone bad by now, sitting out on the table for nearly seven hours while we were in the ER. I scrape all of it into the trash, relieved to find that neither of the animals decided to eat anything poisonous, and open the fridge to see our options.
“Sebastian?” Amelia calls, a certain meekness entering her voice.
She wants something. “Yeah?”
“Do, um…do you think we could actually order something?”
I walk back over to the living room entrance, leaning against the doorsill. “It’s past midnight, Peppermint. Is anyone open?”
Amelia smirks. Somehow, the sleep-deprived shadows under her eyes make that clear hazel stand out even more, shades of pale green and dappled brown. “No one up to your standards, Mr. Cauliflower and Chicken.”
She says it while making air quotes, and I frown. “Why’d you say it like that? I did make cauliflower and chicken.”
After a few minutes of debating whether or not the meal I made was accurately described, we’ve ordered burgers and put on some cheesy sitcom that we pay no attention to. Amelia lights up when the food gets here, and our conversation lulls for awhile as we eat.
I don’t really notice when I start drifting off, my head lolling back against the couch while a laugh track plays from the tv. But when I feel a soft weight slide onto my lap, every nerve in my body jolts to alertness, and I slowly, painstakingly look down.
Amelia’s eyes are half-open, fixed on the screen. As she lays down, the animals readjust themselves, Cricket tucked up against her arm and Goat curled in the space between her bent knees and the couch.
She doesn’t say a word as I carefully tug down one of those blankets on the back of the couch, draping it over her. “Should you be sleeping here?” I quietly ask.
“It’s fine.” Amelia sighs, curling up a little more with something like contentment on her face. “I just have to be on my side.”
I swallow, staring down at her. Without daring to breathe, I reach forward and comb her hair back behind her ear, fingers tracing little lines through the dark, soft strands.
At first, she tenses, and I brace myself for a request to stop.
And then she lets out a slow, long breath, her eyes drifting closed, and all of the tightness leaves her body. She practically melts into me, into the couch, and I tuck that blanket a little more securely around as much of her as I can reach. “This…feels nice.” She whispers.
“I can stop if you want me to.” The words tumble out, the guilt building in my chest getting to be too much. “I know you said we were staying apart.” Not that we’ve been doing a very good job of it, now that I live with her and will be taking care of her while she’s stuck on bed rest.
Which apparently includes playing with her hair and cuddling with her on the couch.
“This isn’t that, Sebastian. Not unless you make it.” Amelia mumbles back. “I-” She breaks with a jaw cracking yawn, my fingers resuming their soft stroking over her hair.
“I am about to pass out?” I finish the sentence for her, feeling her little body move with an exasperated laugh.
“I trust you.” She’s quiet for a long time and so am I, without any reply I could possibly give to that.
“You…trust me?” I echo, dumbfounded.
“I know.” She sighs, tucking a little further into my side, if that’s even possible. “It’s stupid of me to do that. But I do. And…and it was really scary, today. I needed you.” Her voice has dropped to a breath, barely loud enough to hear as the protagonist of our sitcom cracks a one-liner.
I struggle to clear my head. What do I even feel right now? Terrified about her condition, obviously, that one’s up top.
The rest of it? Who knows. I can’t decide if I’m nervous, comfortable, happy, devastated, hopeful, or dreading whatever happens next.
Whatever. I’ll deal with it later.
But I don’t have to work hard to find the right thing to say. The words are already there, appearing at my lips as if I’ve been waiting to say it all night.
“I understand. I need you, too.”
27
AMELIA
“Ifucking hate this!” I pull a pillow over my face and yell into it as loud as I can without straining myself, because for the past month, I’m not allowed to do anything that requires too much effort.
“I know, honey, I know.” Chloe puts a hand on my shoulder, but I can’t see her through the pillow. Good. I don’t want to have to see anyone right now.
Just then, there’s a light knock on the door. “You two good in there?” Sebastian’s concerned, gruff voice trickles through.
“Yeah!” Chloe calls. “Just some…release of emotion. She’s fine.”
Right. Because even though he said ‘you two’, what Sebastian really meant was, ‘Has Amelia worked herself up too much?’
I guess they were probably expecting it. Chloe comes by almost every day, and Sebastian has been the perfect caretaker. He still makes all of my meals, but now he cleans the house, scoops Goat’s litterbox, does all of the most unsexy, gross, menial chores that I’m not allowed to touch anymore.
And dammit, I have never been this attracted to him and I’ve been very, very attracted to him before now.
It’s not like it matters. Even if I was going to slip up and ruin my life by sleeping with him, I couldn’t. Part of my ‘bed rest’ orders, no sex until after the baby comes.
Which is great, because every day, I go through the torture of watching Sebastian walk through the house shirtless and looking like some risen Greek god. Since he moved to San Jose, his skin has tanned a little darker, streaks of his hair lightening as he spends more and more time in the sun. There was sun in Los Angeles, of course, but he spent all of his days inside, working in the restaurant.
Now, he gets more outside time, for instance, when he takes me to the doctor. I had my follow-up appointment today.
It was…disappointing.
“I’m happy to tell you that your baby is growing healthily.” Good news, wonderful news, in fact, but then-
“However, I’m still recommending bed rest for the remainder of your pregnancy.”
And there’s the other boot. I knew this was going to be a challenge for me. I just don’t think I was ready for how much of a challenge it was going to be.
My days now consist of lying in bed, watching movies or reading books, putting puzzles together. Sebastian actually got me a puzzle board just for that, which was sweet, even if I’m considering burning it once this is all done. In the evenings, Sebastian will help me walk into the living room and sit down for awhile, lay on the couch, whatever.
I can tell that my friends are trying to keep me happy. Chloe and several other coworkers have stopped by to visit, bringing flowers, books or stories about when they had similar experiences.
None of it makes me feel much better. The only things that really help are Goat, Cricket, and occasionally this little dark chocolate mousse thing that Sebastian makes.
Hot tears drip sideways down my face, down to where my cheek is pressed into the sheets. I ignore the damp spot that starts to form, trying to keep my breathing even, but I can’t fool Chloe.
“Are you crying? Oh, Amelia-”
“I’m not crying!” I snap, only to then swallow back a sob at how guilty I feel. I try to croak out an apology for being so rude when she’s trying to help, but then her arms wrap around me in a hug, and all I can do is cry harder.
When I get the breath to try and speak again, I whisper, “I just, I thought maybe-”
“I know,” Chloe soothes, stroking my hair. “I know.”
“And it’s so disappointing-”
“It is. But you’re doing so well.”
Finally, I sit up, red-eyed and sniffing. “I don’t feel like I’m doing well.” I mumble thickly, tugging at the covers. “I feel like I’m lying around getting grumpier by the second.”
“Of course you are.” Chloe snorts. “You’re pregnant and stuck in bed all day.”
“She still doesn’t come close to your level, though.” Sebastian can walk so quietly sometimes. I didn’t even notice him enter the room with two small glass bowls in one hand, stained a navy blue and decorated with little gold leaves. He stole them from The Indigo Eatery. Although, can he really steal from his own restaurant? And now they’re topped up with that chocolate mousse he makes, tiny spoons sticking out from the top. In his other hand, he has a mixing bowl with a serving spoon sticking out of it.
Chloe snatches her bowl before he even gets a chance to offer it to her. “I wouldn’t be so grumpy if my best friend wasn’t having a baby with a douchebag.”
“Yeah, well, let the douchebag know how much whipped cream you want.” Sebastian holds up the mixing bowl, and once again, I wonder how he could ever get more attractive.
“A lot, please.” Chloe answers immediately, holding out her bowl. He dollops a healthy amount, about twice as much whipped cream as there is mousse on top, and she digs into it.
Chloe and Sebastian’s relationship has…is improved the right word?
Developed. That’s a better phrase for it.
Chloe doesn’t act like she wants to gut Sebastian all the time, and he keeps her nut allergies in mind when she comes over for dinner. It’s a peaceful compromise, although I think they only worked it out when Chloe realized Sebastian wasn’t going anywhere. After I went on bed rest, they had to work together to fill the space I left at the clinic and at home.
“Just a little for me?” I request, trying to hide that I’ve been crying, but Sebastian isn’t fooled. He raises an eyebrow clearly unimpressed, but I look away as soon as I’m able to start eating. That man sees through me too easily, and I know he wants to say something once we’re alone.
Fortunately, I have Chloe here as a shield.
Unfortunately, she can’t stick around forever. An hour later, after we’ve eaten and moved out to the living room, she says her goodbyes and walks out the front door and finally, it’s just me and Sebastian.
I fiddle with the puzzle set out on my lap, moving pieces around without paying much attention to what I’m actually doing. Sebastian clears his throat. I ignore him.
Finally, he says, “Good news today, huh?”
“Yeah.”
“But I know you wanted to get back to work.”
I sigh softly. “...yeah.”
The couch dips, and I glance over to see Sebastian sit down next to me. Goat immediately slinks out from behind the couch and curls up on his shoulders, which he’s so used to by now, he doesn’t even move his eyes off me. “I’m sorry, Peppermint. That’s gotta be disappointing.”
