Candy Hearts, Vol. 2

Chapter 4

CHAPTER 4

It was still snowing.

It was Sunday morning, and Owen had to get to his house for clothes, his lesson plans, to get ready for tomorrow. He crawled out of bed to pee, because that was an urgent thing these days.

He wasn’t due until the first of March, but his daughter was heavy enough to make him have to pee a thousand times a day.

“Babe?” Jeb sounded pretty alarmed. “Where are you going?”

“Got to pee, and I have to get home at some point.” He needed his bag.

“It’s snowing.”

“I know.” He chuckled. “But I don’t have anything else to wear.”

“Okay. I can take you today to get your stuff.”

“Do you mind? It’s a long walk, and I—” He stopped and ran for the bathroom.

Jeb came to the bathroom door, peering in. “Just that pee urge?”

“Uh-huh.”

“I’ll go make— is coffee okay for me? What would you like?”

“Cocoa? Please?” That sounded amazing, honestly — sweet and warm.

“Absolutely.” He grinned, then wandered off, whistling.

Goofy man. Jeb seemed relaxed in a way Owen had ever seen before. It didn’t make sense, but maybe it didn’t need to. He washed up, then went to put on some of Jeb’s clothes because he was freezing. He was tickled that Jeb wanted him to get his stuff and come back to the house.

He didn’t know if he should play hard to get, or just let things happen as they ought to…

But then again, his power went out so often when there was a bad storm… Maybe he shouldn’t look a gift horse in the mouth.

Or a gift house.

A gift alpha?

He headed into the front room, drawn to Jeb like a moth to a flame.

“Mmm. I like how you look in my clothes, baby.”

“I was cold. Thank you for letting me borrow them. So comfy.”

“No problem at all.” Jeb handed him a cup of cocoa and a bag of marshmallows.

“Thanks. Smells so good. She likes chocolate. A lot.”

“She does, hmm? I mean, I do too.”

“I know! I blame you.” Owen winked.

Jeb laughed, and it felt really good -- good enough to be a worry. What if Jeb was just...in baby love?

Jeb sipped his coffee, still smiling over the cup at him. “What do you want to do for breakfast?”

“I want—” No. You can have something simple . “Do you want me to make eggs?”

“Baby.” Jeb gave him a knowing look. “What do you want?”

“Beans, bacon, and crispy potatoes with chips and salsa.”

“Well, I happen to know a place where we can get all that. The truck stop will be open. We’ll swing by there before we come back here.”

“Oh, you don’t mind? I would love that.” He had to admit that this baby wanted what she wanted, and bacon, potatoes, and beans? That was up there with chocolate. Not quite on the same level as chocolate, but it was up there.

Jeb smiled at him. “I’ll totally do that. I honestly don’t mind. I have to make sure that everybody gets well fed. Besides that, I could totally go for a breakfast burrito, you know? One of the big ones filled with sausage and covered in chile con queso?”

Jeb kept grinning at him, and he couldn’t decide if it felt so good or if it hurt. What if this joy, this happiness, was all because of the baby? Like Thanksgiving -- everyone had welcomed him in, hugged him, patted his belly. No one had screamed, like the fact that he was pregnant explained everything.

He knew he’d screwed up -- in so many ways. Part of him worried that there was no way that all this estrangement of the last five months could be repaired.

Another part of him was pointing out that Jeb had been the one who had tried to call and come over, and Owen was the one who had ghosted everybody. Owen was the one that had walked away; he had been scared and pregnant. Really pregnant.

“What are you thinking about, baby?” Jeb’s voice was so gentle, and he didn’t deserve it.

“How stupid I am.” Owen chewed on his bottom lip, his heart aching. “I wasted so much time, but I was so scared that you would tell me that you didn’t want me, that you wouldn’t want this baby. I just freaked out. I was on birth control. I swear to you, Jeb, I wasn’t trying to get pregnant. And all of a sudden I was in a position where you’d said you didn’t want forever, and I’d somehow I’d fucked up and now...Now it’s forever.”

Jeb sat them down, gaze serious as a heart attack. “First, let me tell you this. You did not fuck up. You are not solely responsible for our baby. I know how babies are made. And yes, there was birth control, but I also am a grown up. Alphas make babies, and it’s always a risk. Mistakes happen, accidents happen, babies happen.” Jeb grabbed his hand. “This isn’t on you; this is on us. We made a baby together. Yeah. I was all about ‘I don’t wanna have forever’. That was self-defense to protect my heart. You’re everything I ever wanted in a lover and a partner and a friend. It scared me. I never thought that I’d fall in love. And then suddenly I was in love with my kindergarten teacher omega.”

“You are?” Owen held on tight. “I want more than co-parenting, or sharing custody, or you being my baby daddy. I want you, Jeb. Like, really.”

“I want you too. So bad. Can we work on this? I know it will be hard to trust me to begin with. I protested. A lot.” Jeb’s smile turned wry. “And I bet you think, ‘What if this is just because of the baby?’”

He stared into Jeb’s eyes even as he nodded. “It crossed my mind.”

“Well, it’s not. But I know you’ll need time to believe it. But it was the kick in the ass I needed to come get you back.”

“Yeah. We can work on it. Promise.” After all, Jeb was saying what he needed to hear. “You gonna forgive me?”

“Of course I am. I have to tell you though, I need to be involved with all the rest of it. I want to see the ultrasound pictures and go to the birthing center with you. And I want to talk names. I want to feel her move. I want to help with building a crib and painting a nursery.”

Owen couldn’t help when he chuckled and rolled his eyes. He had a one bedroom walk up. There wasn’t going to be a nursery. There was going to be a bassinet where she slept beside him in his bed.

“You can come help me pick out a car seat, too. The clothes that she’s gonna come back to the condo in, the whole thing.”

Jeb nodded. “Whatever you want, baby.”

Owen wasn’t one hundred percent sure that Jeb was all about him staying in his little condo, but they weren’t at a place yet where that was going to be an issue. Even if he had already given his notice for his lease. He hadn’t given notice at work. God, what did that say about him?

Jeb kissed him hard enough to derail his train of thought. “Oh, love. You’ve got to stop stressing. It’s Sunday. Let’s go have beans and bacon and potatoes. We’ll go get some stuff from your condo. Maybe do a little bit of shopping for Christmas decorations.” Jeb grinned at him. “Next Christmas we’re going to have a little girl. That’s pretty exciting.”

“It’s wild, isn’t it? Come on.” He grinned over at Jeb, his emotions swinging right back up to joyous. He was so tired of being on this hormonal ride, but it was easier now with Jeb just being here.

“Is it gonna be okay with you if I tell my parents?”

One of Owen’s eyebrows winged up. “Are you trying to suggest that your sister hasn’t already done that?”

Jeb shook his head. “She thinks it ought to come from us. I do too. They’re going to be grandparents after all. What do your parents think?”

Owen’s cheeks started to burn then. “They think I’m an idiot for being in love with her daddy and not telling him I was pregnant. They’ve been really good though. Excited for me. I wish they weren’t so far away, but...” He shrugged. “They both have lives still. And LA is a long way off. They want to come out if I have a baby shower, though.”

“If? Oh, honey, if you think for a minute that my sister won’t take that bull by the horns, you’re out of your mind. She lives for shit like this.” Jeb snorted, and he had to laugh.

“Okay, when, then.”

“Yep. You just need to tell her when you want it.”

“Okay. I’ll check my calendar and stuff...” His belly snarled ferociously. “So can we go? Do you want food or to go get some stuff from my place first?”

Jeb grinned and stood, helping him up. “Food, of course. Then we’ll go back across the river. It’ll be good. I do want to head to Montrose or something, buy some Christmas lights.”

“Do you have a tree?”

“A little one, but I think it’s time to get a grown up one; what do you think?”

They bundled up and headed out of Jeb’s glorious old Victorian. The road where the house stood was filled with families. He could see Kynan, out there playing with his babies in the fresh snow.

He had a little boy and girl, and the rumor was that his omega, Andrew, was pregnant again with their third. Andrew had two babies less than a year apart it seemed like, and so they’d waited a good few years before they tried for the third.

Jeb grinned at him, nodding toward Kynan. “I’ll tell you what, there’s not a happier alpha that I’ve ever met than Kynan in there.”

“Yeah?” They loaded up in Jeb’s truck, and he snuggled into the seats as Jeb started the engine and the seat warmers.

“Yeah, I mean it. He loves it. He loves being at home with the kids. And he works, you know, obviously he’s a contractor. But he’s just having a ball.” Jeb chuckled and headed for the truck stop. “When they got close to having Troy start kindergarten, they decided they were going to try for one more baby, give Kynan another little one to raise. Tell you what, that is some passion there.”

“What about you?” This was a question Owen was desperate to know the answer to, because Jeb worked from home. He was a software designer, and he did very well, but Owen loved his job. He loved the kids, and he intended to go back to work.

He was obviously going to have to take pregnancy leave when the baby was born in March, so he’d miss two months of school and then start back again in September. But he was going back.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean. Let’s say that--I don’t know, let’s say we share custody or we are living together or we have some arrangement. When the baby’s bigger, and I go back to work, are we going to want to put the baby in daycare with Saul? Or are you going stay home with her?” He held his breath, waiting for the answer.

“Well, yeah. I mean, I work from home, right? It makes sense that I would stay home with the kids.” Jeb chuckled. “I’m not even a Zoom guy, so I don’t have to worry about someone listening to babies cry or crazy things crashing when they start being mobile.”

They. Jeb was saying they for kids. Plural.

“Oh. I think…I think that Saul is amazing, but I think parents are the best for little ones.”

“Yeah. I mean, Saul is so cool, but I would just want to use him if we had to.” Jeb beamed. “Look at us, agreeing on the first major thing.”

“Right?” Okay. Okay, that was comforting. The first thing. That meant there would be more things to agree on.

They talked about everything and nothing on the way to the truck stop, Jeb driving carefully on the icy roads. It was sweet, because really Jeb usually kind of tore around.

The restaurant was packed — filled with families and couples — and he bumped shoulders with Jeb. “Everyone’s tired of Thanksgiving leftovers, huh?”

“I bet. I mean, that’s a lot of remains.” Jeb winked at him, teasing hard. “Not that we didn’t have tons of options this year, and it was great, but I’m so ready for something not turkey involved.”

“Oh, I get that.” Owen greeted people as they waited. It was hard not to know everyone. Being one the town’s two kindergarten teachers made it inevitable.

He met all the kiddos as they funneled through.

They got seated relatively quickly, and he had to chuckle because they ended up sitting next to the owner of the town’s hotel, his family, and the town’s librarian and his family.

Who were all, obviously, having some sort of an outing.

Jeb winked at him. “That is a lot of babies, man.”

Owen nodded. It was, and he’d had Gwennie, Gawain, and Elizabeth Ann already in his class. Elizabeth Ann was his student now.

Gwennie was the spitting image of her tattoo artist father, and she was the possibly the smartest little girl he’d ever met. While her brother Gawain was this easy going, silly boy to the core kind of child.

Elizabeth Ann, on the other hand. Elizabeth Ann might just -- well, she was either going to become president or a serial killer. There was no real way to tell at this point, although he was going to warn her first-grade teacher about her, because damn.

“Mr. Rogers. Mr. Rogers.” Gwennie waved at him from her side of the booth and smiled, book in her hand. “How are you?”

Owen found a smile for them because to be honest, they were all great kids, and he remembered how exciting it had been to meet a teacher outside of school. “Hi, guys, how are you? How school going?”

Elizabeth Ann blinked at him. “Mr. Rogers. We’re on Thanksgiving break. We go back to school tomorrow.”

Her father Jack chuckled softly, while her other father simply rolled his eyes.

“Sorry man. Kids, you have to leave Mr. Rogers alone. He’s not teaching today. He’s just having breakfast like the rest of us.”

Gawain nodded. “We’re having pancakes, and then we are going to go to see reindeers.”

“Reindeers? Really?”

Gwennie nodded. “Uncle Jack found us a place that has reindeers. He’s going to buy one for Elizabeth Ann for Christmas. I told him that we didn’t need one, but we could come visit and feed it corn.” She glanced over at Jack. “You know, if he gets one for every one of his babies, he’s going to have a herd.”

“Gwennie!” Tim stared at her.

“What? It’s true. Uncle Chase is a baby making machine.”

The other dad, who must be Chase, winked broadly. “Nice to know I’m good for something. But really, Uncle Saul has me beat.”

Owen cracked up. “Oh, yes well you know, he needs to just make sure that he doesn’t try again.”

Poor Saul had started with one. His second had pregnancy resulted in a twins, and the third had found them with triplets. So what they had hoped was going to be a family of two or three, then possibly four, was now a family of six. And while they were all incredibly happy, the rumor was that the chief of police had gone and gotten himself fixed.

Everyone was terrified that Saul would end up with quadruplets.

They all started laughing, even the little ones, who had no idea what was going on.

They ordered their drinks -- one cup of coffee for Jeb and a glass of milk for him, and Jeb leaned forward across the table. “You really do know everybody, don’t you?”

He nodded. He did. “It’s part of the job. I’m the first contact between public school and families. I’m the one who sets the tone, a lot of times for a whole school career. We’re there at the beginning. We teach them about all of the weird little socializations and about how to start to learn to function in something that is not a family unit. That’s a huge deal, and in a weird sort of way I am a part of the family, especially when we’re in the class. I’ve had Tony, Saul’s oldest. I’ve had Gwennie, I’ve had Gawain. Elizabeth Ann’s in my in my class now.” Owen shrugged, suddenly embarrassed. “I suppose it’s silly to you, but it’s true.”

Jeb raised an eyebrow. “Why would it be silly to me, baby? I think you’re amazing. I always have. And I know you love your job.”

“Oh, you know I do. So much.” But right now, he wasn’t being a teacher. Right this second, he was very busy being Jeb’s lover. “So what kind of Christmas lights do we want? You. What kind of Christmas lights do you want?”

Jeb beamed at him. “I was thinking, rainbows. Like sparkling. All the colors, all the twinkles. I want my house to look as happy as I feel right now.”

Owen’s cheeks burned with a deep, hot blush. “Oh. I think that sounds...heavenly.”

If only it would last.