Chapter 34 #2
Ben helped Ella out of the wheelchair. She gingerly leaned over the glass bed to see her sleeping tiny infant son.
He was wearing only a diaper and looked like a wrinkled little peach.
Wires and blinking lights covered him. Ella fought back tears as she gently ran a finger along his cheek.
She was unsure if she was even allowed to touch him.
Somewhere, she had read that it was bad to touch preemies because their skin is so thin.
Looking around for guidance, Ella spotted a pretty young nurse whose nametag said Alice Ann.
She was busily checking John’s numbers and clicking different knobs and controls.
Ella had no idea what any of them did. For a person with a ridiculously high IQ, she had never felt more inadequate in her life.
Catching the nurse’s eye, she asked, “Can I touch him?”
“Of course. He is your baby. I was just about to change him. Would you like to do that?”
Ella nodded, then wiped away the tears that were rolling down her cheeks with the back of her hand.
With the nurse’s help, Ella changed John’s diaper.
It was much harder than when she had changed her younger siblings because he was connected to so many wires and he was so small.
His diaper looked like the doll diapers her sisters had played with years ago.
Once John was changed, the nurse placed him in Ella’s arms.
“You know, he really needs to do some skin to skin.” Pointing to Ben, Alice Ann said, “Dad here has been doing it, but since you are here, you might want to give it a try. We can pull the curtain to give you some privacy. You will need to open your shirt and place your baby on your chest.”
Ella could not wait to hold her son next to her heart and snuggle him.
Ben helped her get back into the wheelchair.
She quickly unbuttoned her blouse. Nurse Alice Ann carefully laid baby John against her chest, then settled the wires so he could continue to be monitored and get oxygen.
Then she drew the curtain around them and left Ben and Ella alone to bond with their baby.
Ben stood by and watched his beautiful wife officially meet their son for the first time.
Ella reached for Ben’s hand. Drawing him close she said, “This. This is everything. I know you wanted to wait until after John was born to make any future plans. I just want you to know that I have thought about it, and all that matters to me is being with you and him. Being away from you both the last few days nearly destroyed me. You two are my nonnegotiables. I can go to school anywhere as long as you two are there. So it is settled. We will stay here, and I will go to UALR online.”
Ben wiped away his tears, then cupped Ella’s cheek and said, “No. No, it is not settled. I have also been doing a lot of thinking. You and John are my nonnegotiables. I would have told you that the other night if you had not insisted I wait. I never needed any time to think about it. You two are it for me. If that means we go to Michigan, fine. I want you to have everything you want.”
“What I want is right here,” replied Ella gesturing to John and him.
Leaning down to give Ella a passionate kiss, Ben asked, “Well, we are not going anywhere, at least not anywhere without you. And since we both agree that we are each other’s nonnegotiable, how do we figure out what to do in the future?”
Ella did not miss a beat as she said, “We already answered the hard question when we chose each other. As long as we are together and both of us are putting the other’s needs first, we have already figured out our future. The rest really doesn’t matter after that, does it?”
“Nope it doesn’t,” replied Ben as leaned in for another kiss.
The next few weeks, Ben and Ella’s focus was on helping their son grow. The day he was released from the hospital, Ella hugged nurse Alice Ann. They had become close during the three weeks John had spent under her care.
As for the future, Ben and Ella planned to spend the next several weeks enjoying their son and getting all the pieces in place for the next step in their lives.
Together, they made some key decisions about the immediate future and agreed that it would be wrong for Ella to give up on her dream of attending Michigan.
So it was decided that she and Sophia would move to Ann Arbor in August. Sophie would help with the baby Ella’s first semester.
Ben would remain in Little Rock helping until the campaign was over.
Then he would join Ella and baby John in Michigan.
In January, Sophie would fly to Germany to be with Paulo.
Once Ella graduated, she and Ben would move back to Little Rock to attend law school.
Luckily, because of the outstanding job Ella had done on the soil project, Blesson offered her a position working with him remotely.
They had yet to tell their families all of their plans.
Life had taught them plans were just overblown hopes, and changes happen even in the best of time.
What was important was they had made decisions about their futures with a lot of compromise, each willing to give up something they thought they wanted to get something they actually needed much more, each other.
The End