Thanks and Giving #4
And with that they skedaddled. By the time Allegra poked her head out of the bedroom, her blow-dried hair back in a soft ponytail, to say she was going to bed, there were two packed bags next to the doorway.
One was a baby bag covered with rosebuds, because girl or boy, Allegra had fallen in love with it, and the other was a soft duffel, with a pair of maternity pajamas as well as Luca’s sweatshirt and some maternity sweats to wear home—with lots of maternity underwear for accidents.
Apparently Isaac had been paying more attention than Luca, because when Luca asked about the larger clothes, Isaac had explained patiently that Allegra wasn’t going to be anywhere close to her old sizes for at least six weeks.
“Oh God,” Luca muttered. “Where was I when the nurse was telling us those things?”
“Asleep,” Isaac told him, amused. “Baby, we’ve both been going balls-out to get ready for this, you know?”
They were sitting on the couch, leaning back exhaustedly. The TV was off, and Isaac wasn’t even fondling his knitting, although he had packed what Luca thought of as his “knitting go bag” and had set it next to Allegra’s bags by the door.
Luca smiled and then turned his head toward the nice man who still liked to knit out on the porch in the evenings, only now with Luca’s sister next to him, and sometimes, when Luca got home early from work, with Luca sitting on the Adirondack chair Isaac had quietly set out after Luca had spent a couple of sweet September evenings leaning against the porch railing so they could all talk.
“What?” Isaac asked, his eyes half closed.
“Six months ago,” Luca murmured. “Six months ago, I never would have guessed this would be us. That we’d be a team.
That we’d be a family. That you and me would be helping Allegra do this huge, important thing.
That we’d be welcoming a whole new human being into our home—not your house, but our home.
God, Isaac. I’m so lucky to have you in my life.
I mean, Allegra and I are lucky, but… but you are such a good partner.
You are so good at just being there for people.
It’s your superpower. I don’t know how you’ve gone about unworshipped for so long, but you deserve all the big noise and celebration, you know that? ”
Isaac’s eyes were no longer half closed—but they were a little damp.
“Has it only been six months?” he mused.
“It feels like….” He frowned a little, like he was trying to do math.
“That’s so odd,” he said. “That time I spent with Todd feels so… small. Like a footnote. This time with you and Allegra, being your family, having a noisy, happy home—it feels like my real life. Isn’t that odd? ”
Luca felt the hugeness of having an Isaac in his heart. “No,” he murmured. “Not strange at all.”
Isaac reached for his hand and squeezed. “We’ll go to bed in a minute,” he murmured as Euclid hopped up on the couch and spread out between them, purring. The warmth and vibration of the cat only added to the somnolence of the moment.
“Just as soon—” Luca yawned. “—as you’re ready.”
They were still there, on the couch, Isaac leaning on Luca, Luca leaning on the arm of the couch, the cat asleep between them, three hours later when Allegra came down the hallway, leaning on the wall.
“Hey, guys?” she said, and Luca choked on his own snore and tried to focus.
“’Llegra?” he slurred, while Isaac grunted and rubbed his eyes. Painfully, Luca tried to twist his body so he could see his sister.
“Those back pains… they’re… they’re getting really strong. They’re waking me up, like, every eight minutes or so. Is that… is that bad?”
“No,” Isaac said on a yawn. “But it is getting close. You got any other signs of labor?”
“Labor?” Allegra repeated, sounding stunned. “Is this… is this labor?”
Luca untangled himself from the cat and his boyfriend, stood up, and balanced one hand on the arm of the couch so he could collect himself. “Yeah. Sorry, sweetheart. Don’t worry about it. We packed your bags and everything. When you get to, like, five, six minutes apart, we’ll go to the hospital.”
“But….” To his horror, he watched her lower lip wobble. “But tomorrow’s Thanksgiving! We planned! You and Isaac cooked, and we’ve got company, and—”
“Shh, shh, shh….” Luca hugged her close, standing a little to the side to make room for her tummy.
Even as he held her, he felt her stiffen, watched in fascination as her stomach, pushing tight against her sleepshirt, rippled in hard, dramatic waves.
When it was done, he saw a tiny little “pop” of an agitated foot against a home that had gotten far too small.
“Whoa,” he said, voice hushed in awe. They’d all seen the baby moving under her skin, but that was the first time he’d seen it done with that sort of controlled violence. “This kid is getting pissed. Yeah, I think it’s definitely coming today.”
“But I’m not ready!” Allegra wailed, and Luca had to hold her some more, trying to calm her down, until the next contraction—seven and a half minutes, Isaac told them—rippled over her where she stood and almost brought her to her knees.
“Isaac!” she cried, after Luca helped her to her chair. “Isaac, make it stop! You can do anything—make it stop! Make the contractions stop! I’m not ready!”
“Allegra!” Isaac said sternly, in what Luca had come to recognize was his teacher voice.
“Allegra, stop this. No—no, don’t argue.
Stop this. You are grown, sweetheart. You are strong.
You knew this was coming. You’ve got—” He checked his Fitbit.
“You’ve got five minutes to prepare for the next contraction.
You need to breathe, just like the class taught you, and find that calm space inside yourself. You remember that space?”
“Isaac…,” she whimpered.
“You know we love you, honey,” he said, still stern, “but you are going to help nobody if you freak the fuck out. Now look at you. You’ve decorated your room and the nursery.
You’ve trained someone at work so you don’t have to go back for three months.
You’ve already gone out and found day care for when you need it.
That was a lot of grown-up shit you did to get ready for this baby, and you know we’re here to help.
But the next part of this is all you. Luca and I can hold your hand and tell you you’re pretty, but you need to look in your heart and remember who you’re doing this for. ”
“My baby,” she whispered, her breathing much quieter.
“Who?” Isaac demanded.
“My baby!” she said, and she sounded stronger this time.
“That’s right. Now breathe. Get all the oxygen you can. Calm yourself down. Wait for the next one. Okay?”
“Okay.” They locked eyes, and she nodded with Isaac, and for a few minutes, there was only the sound of them breathing.
All too soon, her breathing quickened, and Isaac was checking his Fitbit, and the next contraction was on.
BY EIGHT in the morning, it was time to call the hospital and take their show on the road.
By eleven, with Luca on one side and Isaac on the other, Allegra grabbed her thighs, spread her legs and heaved, and the new baby emerged into the world, squalling and healthy and red and wrinkled and perfect.
Allegra wept, giving her hands to Luca and Isaac, and whispered, “How is she?”
“How’d you know it was a she?” Luca asked, smoothing her hair from her brow.
“Don’t know,” she laughed tiredly. “Maybe it was ’cause I thought Brian deserved the foot rub.”
Luca chuckled and kissed his sister’s cheek. “I promised Roxy I’d lie. First person on the phone wins.”
“Later,” Isaac said, watching the baby’s progress from the cleanup station to the eyedrop station to the swaddling station. “Let’s meet her first.”
For a moment there was more pain and more panting as Allegra finished the messiness of delivering a child, and then she was washed up and blanketed, and the swaddled little creature was placed in her arms.
Allegra held the baby to her chest, and the tiny thing scowled back, and Luca was enchanted.
“Does she eat now?” he asked.
“You really did sleep through Lamaze, didn’t you?” Allegra shot back.
“All she has to do now is exist,” Isaac told him. “She’s doing great, aren’t you, sweetheart?”
Tentatively, Isaac reached out a gentle finger to soothe a wrinkled red cheek, and the baby closed its eyes and seemed to lean into the touch.
“Oh, see,” Allegra murmured. “Uncle Isaac’s the favorite already.”
“It’s a family requirement,” Luca said, taking the three of them in. Unexpectedly, he felt his eyes grow hot. “Oh my God, Allegra. Our family—look at it.”
“It’s so beautiful,” she murmured, although her eyes seemed to be exclusively on her daughter. Fair enough, Luca thought, but as Isaac leaned in, as in love with their new member as Allegra was, Luca remembered their dreamy, exhausted conversation on the couch.
Their family. It was as miraculous as he’d always imagined.
TWO HOURS later, Luca left Isaac knitting by Allegra’s bed so he could go settle everybody in for Thanksgiving, as well as tell them all the good news.
He’d been torn as to whether to stay by Allegra and have Isaac do that, or go himself, but in the end he had to concede that it was his grandparents and his friend and coworker, and he should probably be the one to go give details and tell stories and, in the end, put together care packages of Thanksgiving dinner to bring so Allegra didn’t have to settle for hospital food on Thanksgiving.
His grandmother insisted on serving him while he regaled everybody at the table with the gory details. This included Roxy, who was getting picked up by her husband shortly, since she’d arrived to start putting things in the oven.
“So?” Roxy said, waiting while he finished a heavenly mouthful of stuffing and gravy. “Isaac already blabbed that it was a girl—and way to drop the ball on getting me the foot rub, by the way.”
Luca gave her an unrepentant grin. “Your husband will give you a foot rub anytime you want one and you know it,” he teased fondly.
“Yeah, but stolen foot rubs feel better,” she retorted. “And you’re dodging out on the question. What did she name the baby?”
Luca’s smile stretched his cheeks as he remembered Isaac holding the baby while his sister slept. “Blessing,” he said. “Blessing Noelle, because, you know, so close to Christmas.”
Sophia clapped her hands, and Geordie hugged his wife in excitement. “Perfecto!”
“Blessing Noelle,” Roxy said, staring. “’Cause that won’t get the little darling beat up on the playground ever.”
Luca cocked his head. “Your husband named your children after birds.”
Roxy chuckled. “Yeah. Falcon Justice will protect her. It’ll be fine.” She yawned—as she should, since she’d pretty much worked on two Thanksgiving meals that day. “So, how’s Isaac in all of this?”
Luca closed his eyes, the contentment on Isaac’s face suffusing him with joy. “Thrilled,” he said, struggling to open his eyes for the people in front of him. “Happier than I’ve ever seen him.”
“Good,” Roxy said, reaching out to take Luca’s hand. “You guys, hold on to each other as long as this lasts. Family, good family, is exactly like that baby. A blessing. A true, real blessing.”
Luca’s arms ached to hold his lover, to feel the truth of that, but today, in the midst of this hectic, magical maelstrom, he knew that he had to hold it all in his heart.
“Truth,” he said happily. “So much truth.”
ROXY AND his grandparents sent him up to his room for a two-hour nap before he got to bring food back to the hospital. When he arrived, Allegra was nursing the baby—who was eating like a champion now—and Isaac was practically sleep-knitting in the corner of the room.
After thanking him for the food and catching up on how Thanksgiving was going, the conversation lulled, falling into exhausted patterns of comfort topics while the three of them recovered from a quite unrestful night.
It was Allegra who drew attention to what Isaac was knitting.
“Wait a minute,” she said. “Isn’t that the yarn? The brown stuff—pretty for brown, but you kept shoving it into the back of the stash.”
Isaac smiled a little and held up what was obviously a hat. “Yeah,” he said. “I’m using it in my student hats this year. It’s got so many hidden colors in it—it really works well as the background for colorful designs. And this way I can get rid of it without….” He shuddered.
“Having to make a crap-brown sweater with nothing but plain stitching,” Luca filled in, remembering that one fateful day.
Isaac gazed sleepily into his eyes. “Not all brown is bad,” he said. “This yarn has some good properties. It’s time it found a place where it can be used and loved. I think the kids are really going to like these hats.”
Luca stared at the fanciful colorwork and had no doubt.
And then he took in his lover’s pleased expression as his fingers worked nimbly on what Luca knew wasn’t a simple project at all, and he realized that, much like it hadn’t been a sweater that Isaac hadn’t wanted to make, this wasn’t merely a hat that he did want to finish.
Isaac’s love was all in the present now, Luca realized. The ghost of his ex, while perhaps always a flicker of light and shadow in Isaac’s heart, was now a ghost of the past, and not of the here and now.
The baby at Allegra’s breast broke off feeding and emitted a tiny cry as Allegra put her little body against her shoulder and started to pat. That teeny little person emitted the most amazing burp, and the adults in the room laughed.
“Blessings,” Luca said softly, “come in all forms.”