I stood anxiously at her side, with a glass of water in my hand. "Zac! Come on! You have 2 younger sisters, aren't you a bit old for this?" I whined. "Hurry up, we need you out there! You're absolutely necessary for monkey in the middle! You can see Mom 24 hours a day!"
He sat up and frowned. "I want it to be a boy so I can torment him like Isaac and Taylor torment me!"
My mother laughed, and her laughter sounded like bells. I pushed Zac out of the way and pressed my ear to her tummy, listening for the second heartbeat. I didn't hear anything, but when a sudden kick came through her skin against my hand I felt an instant rush. Zac had run off when Isaac started chasing him, but I couldn't leave my mother's side for a moment.
"Did you feel that, Taylor? The baby's kicking."
I nodded and stared up at her, resting my chin on her tummy. "It's the most amazing feeling I've ever felt."
The day she told me I was laying in the grass enjoying a cigarette, watching the movies in the clouds. I was thinking about nothing at all, and listening to the soft sounds of footsteps going by. When she approached I didn't notice until she sat down beside me, smiling. I grinned, then noticed Theo wasn't with her.
"Where's the little terrorist?" I asked, my eyebrows creased.
"Baby sitter."
"Why'd you get a baby sitter?" I said, "You could have just brought him here..."
"Well, I had some news." She smiled, and I sat up on my elbows, raising my sunglasses to look her in the eye. "Then I thought maybe we'd take the afternoon and celebrate."
"News? How? We don't do anything."
She hit my arm, "Aw, Tay. You're so absent minded! I would have thought it would be obvious!"
"Well, what is it?" I asked, anxiously.
She laughed, then pushed me back down in the grass. She crawled over and moved her face close to me and whispered, "I'm going to have a baby."
"No way!" I shouted excitedly, grabbing her face in my hands and planting a firm kiss on her lips. "A baby? Our baby? No way!"
"Yes way." She responded, and the biggest grin spread across her face. I pushed her down on the grass and jumped on top of her tossing my cigarette away and kissed her all over.
"You are a goddess. You are a fucking goddess."
She laughed, and I don't think either of us had ever been so happy. We were like two children in the grass, giggling, slaphappy. I stood up and picked her up with me, suddenly I had the strength of a thousand men. I spun her around and we laughed until our sides hurt, clinging to each other with tears streaming down our faces. "I'm gonna be a Daddy! I'm really gonna be a Daddy!"
We embraced for a lifetime, laughing and crying. I felt like the most wonderful person alive, I felt like singing, I felt like dancing, I felt on top of the world in the truest sense.
"You brighten my life like a polystyrene hat
But it melts in the sun like a life without love
But I've waited for you so I'll keep crying out
Without You"
The words rang in my own ears, and I realized that people were watching us, and laughed again. "We're having a baby!" I announced, and squeezed Alex one more time.
"Tay, stop," She laughed, "You're going to squeeze it out prematurely!"
"We're going somewhere special tonight. Anyplace you want to go - anything. Dinner... everything."
"Surprise me," She whispered, and took my hand.
"Put on your nicest dress."
She gripped my hand and we went home to change. I called a few places and made reservations for the night, space was nearly impossible so I casually dropped my name and I heard a flurry of, "Oh, yes Mr. Hanson's" and "Why of course, Mr. Hanson's." We asked the baby sitter if she could stay for the night. She swooned at me, and I reminded myself to lock the bedroom door before we left. We kissed Theo goodbye, and watched the sunset from our building as we waited for the bus. Alex laughed when we got on in our eveningwear, surrounded by people in their work clothes.
"Where are we going?"
"Stop asking!" I covered her eyes, "You're not allowed to look out the window for the rest of the ride."
I got off at a stop two blocks down from the restaurant, and walked her cordially to our destination: the nicest restaurant in San Francisco. Expensive, by all means, but the food was absolutely superb. Alex deserved it. We each had a glass of California wine, and she looked up at me with a smile as she stared at the prices on the menu.
"You're insane."
"Honey, I didn't go multi-platinum for no reason."
We ordered our meals, and had an absolutely fantastic dinner. I picked up the bill for the table next to us, and to thank the staff lay down a few thousand dollars to buy them each a bottle of champagne. We popped one open and I made a toast to Alex, but she drank soda and twirled her wedding ring in circles on her finger.
"You're the best thing in my life."
We kissed and our dinner soon faded into a walk along the Pacific shores on the outer edge of San Francisco, eveningwear and all. It was a scene taken straight out of a movie, the city lights illuminating the sky as we ran along recklessly on the beach, dirtying our clothes and hardly caring. Holding hands and talking softly, kissing tentatively, like it was our first date.
We returned home gripping each other and kissing each other as we walked into the house. I forgot entirely about the baby sitter and had Alex propped up against the counter when she entered the room. I pulled away, surprised, and blushed a little.
Alex laughed at me and I looked at her face. It was evident - the red lipstick smeared all around our mouths. I got out my wallet and handed the sitter $200.
"Thank you, was he alright?"
She smiled, politely, and I wiped my mouth with an, 'I'm trying to hide my smile' look on my face. "We watched some Disney, and then I played a game with him and he got tired around 8:30, and I put him off to sleep. I basically just watched some TV all night, he was an Angel."
"Good, I'm glad he wasn't too crazy."
"No, not crazy at all."
"Great, well, you can head off now. We appreciate it."
She shoved the folded bills in her pocket and made her way to the door, "Goodnight Mr. and Mrs. Hanson."
"Goodnight," we called and listened for the click of the door and her footsteps down the stairs. Once we heard the front gate shut I swept Alex up into my arms and carried her to our bedroom. In an effort to create romantic scenery I lit tea lights all around the room, while she waited in bed for me.
"I wonder if she saw my huge boner," I said with amusement in my voice.
"I doubt she missed it." She laughed, "I think she knew what we're going to do."
"You think?" I giggled, "It's just so easy to have a boner around you." I said and crawled on top of her on the bed. "You're a Goddess, how can I not be turned on?"
Our lips connected, and we sunk into the sheets and the world we made in the confines of our four-post bed. My hands slid underneath the slit in the side of her dress and touched her nylon covered thighs as we kissed. When our lips finally parted she let out soft sighs as I pulled at her thigh highs and left butterfly kisses on the milky skin. Her hands gripped the skirt of her dress frantically and I carefully tore the small strings that held her panties to her body. She suggest that she could have worn them more than once if I had taken them off in a more economically wary manner - but her voice was broken and breathy as I moved my tongue, in sloppy wet kisses, over her womanhood. I was sure she didn't care one bit, at that moment, if there was someone in the world without underwear because I had just wasted hers.
I played with her clit, taking it in-between my lips and sucking hard, but losing grip because of her bucking hips. When I got tired I ran my tongue up to her belly button and she calmed, though her hips were still aching for fulfillment. I pushed her dress down and she pulled me toward her aggressively, taking off of my jacket and unbuttoning my shirt. I stroked her thigh with my feet and she slid the shirt off my shoulders. My feet traced the contours of her legs and she laughed.
"How could I forget about your foot fetish?" She pulled her knees to her chest and pushed me up with her feet. I was sitting upright and she moved her feet down my chest to the bulge in my pants. She reached forward and unbuttoned my pants and I yanked aside all of the fabric. I watched with intense pleasure as her feet touched me. I was moaning and I slid up her thigh, toes clenching at the intensity of the feeling in the pit of my stomach. As soon as my toes touched her mound I felt them clench and I involuntarily blew my load all over Alex's foot.
She looked disappointed for a second, but I wasn't done yet. "More time for you," I whispered and lapped up the come on her foot. As I licked her ankles she lifted her skirt, exposing herself to me. I pulled away from her and she turned around. I undid the zipper in the back for her and began to push the dress slowly off. Underneath the dress she wore a slip, which she slid out of over her head, her wet pussy pressed against me and I began to get hard again. Once her bra was off she was completely naked and she turned to look at me, propping her elbows on her knees.
She laughed at me, shirtless with my junk hanging out of the front of my pants, and then assisted me in taking them off.
"Aw, Tay. Perk up." She said, touching me with her hands, and roving my body with her tongue. "I'm so hot for you." She squirmed as I gained more leverage against her tongue. When she was ready she turned away from me on her hands and knees, exposing her hot twat to me. She rested on her elbows and waited expectantly, but before I moved toward her I reached in the nightstand for her vibrator and teased her clit with it. When I finally entered her she was already peaking. I held onto her tight as her body quaked around me and she screamed into a pillow. She began propping herself up again, but I wasn't done with her yet. I grabbed her hips and began pushing myself into her harder, clenching my teeth, and I was surprised to feel her collapse again. Her second orgasm pulsed through her and I felt my abdomen tighten, a gasp escaping my throat with my own.
For a second we didn't move, and then I wrapped my arms around Alex and we both collapsed straight into the bed. I moved the mass of long red hair aside and kissed the back of her neck, and our laughter was the only noise I could hear, her bare skin against my own bare skin. We lay side by side talking softly, feeling the euphoria, until the candles went out.
In the dark I traced hearts on her stomach with my fingers. She giggled, and with a weary voice told me that it tickled, but didn't tell me to stop.
"Do you want me to stop?"
"No," She whispered, "I want you to keep her happy."
Well I've been afraid of changing
'Cause I've built my life around you
But time makes you bolder
Even children get older
And I'm getting older, too
-Fleetwood Mac/Stevie Nicks; "Landslide"
Lyrics in chapter (c) Silverchair; "Without you"