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by
Lita Reena
started at 1:27am 03-01-06
It was oddly cold that evening, but the chill didn't keep a shivering Aiden Carmichael from running down the street to return to St. Mungo's. He'd gone for a walk and the attending healer had assured him that Annaliese would be fine until he returned. Still, the odd and sudden sharp pain in his side told him that things weren't okay--or maybe it was just the sudden movement of him going from a slow walk to a quick sprint. As he raced back to the hospital, a thought crossed his mind.
Upon arrival, he sped up to the room he'd left just minutes before, watching as his young wife threw her head back over a pillow, her breathing laboured and her hands on the swollen belly that held their child. He smiled brightly, a thought of care and concern for the beautiful woman lying before him. A grin crossed his face as he recalled the night when she had told him that they were expecting. He'd been waiting nine long months for this night.
Aiden quickly crossed the room to stand at Annaliese's bedside.
"Are you all right, darling?" he asked her, his hand reaching lightly over to rest on top of one of hers.
She raised her head from the pillow and managed to shoot a weak smile at him before squeezing her eyes shut as another contraction came over her. A sharp intake of breath and then a few longer ones were the only sounds in the room as Aiden waited for his wife to speak.
"Just fine--sweetheart," she managed to get out before she needed to start the methodical breathing again. A light chuckle suddenly escaped her lips, which were dry and slightly cracked from the excess of air that was crossing them, as she began to breathe normally again. She sighed heavily and then smiled at Aiden. "How did you know?" she asked quietly, a mysterious sparkle in her crystal blue eyes as their gazes locked. He smiled back at her, an equally mysterious sparkle in his brown eyes.
"I knew," he told her, the sparkle now gone, only to be replaced by a look that could only have been understood by two people who shared one of the deepest loves.
She tossed her hair, trying to remove a strand from across her face without using her hands, and began to rub a hand in small circles over her belly. Raven tresses fluttered gently back over her pillow and she pouted at Aiden, her lips threatening to crack and let colour bleed back to the flesh that had practically turned white from the extraneous air that had been flowing across them during her contractions.
"Aiden," she started, halting the circles on her belly and reaching out for his hand again, "I know we agreed not to talk about it until--"
"We're still not going to talk about it, mia bella," he told her, that knowing look back in his eyes.
"Aiden," she said again, this time more urgent, her hand squeezing his.
"Anna--" he interrupted.
"Aiden!" she cried, throwing her head back again as another contraction wracked her body. She panted heavily, her hand squeezing his like a vice. He whimpered and bit his lip, trying hard not to pull his hand away. He let her squeeze his hand until the contraction had ebbed and her breathing had begun to slip back into a semi-normal rhythm. After it was over, he slipped his aching hand out of hers and brought it up to her head, running his fingers through her thick locks and then leaned over to kiss her on the forehead. She smiled up at him and then winced as another contraction punched through her. Her hands gripped the bedsheets tightly and a single bead of sweat formed over her left eyebrow, falling ever so slowly across it and then down over her temple, leaving a shining line of liquid in its tracks.
"I love you, Anna," Aiden told her gently, moving closer to her and watching as healers began to enter the room. He turned his head back to face her, squeezing her shoulder gently. "Let's make this a quick one, eh?" he asked her with a smile.
"Sir," a healer interrupted their quiet moment, "Can you step back please?" indicating that Aiden should move back behind Annaliese's head. He nodded and complied, stepping up behind the head of Anna's bed.
Things began to move quickly after that. The healers moved in and situated themselves and their equipment near Anna's lower half, with two healers--one on each side--around her and one down between her legs.
"All right, Anna," the healer told her, "We talked you through this. You know what to do." Anna simply nodded and then reached a hand up to Aiden, giving him a weak smile before focusing on the healer. There was a single squeeze to Aiden's hand before an oddly familiar odor invaded his nostrils. After that, the last thing he heard was "Someone make sure he doesn't smother her?" before everything went black.
Aiden awoke with a start, jumping from the bed and then looking around, realising where he was and what had happened. He shook his head and smacked himself, stepping around the barrier in hopes of finding someone to tell him where he'd been moved to. Instead, he found something entirely better. There on a new, clean bed, lay his wife and their newborn child. She looked up at him and smiled brightly.
"Aiden, look. Look at our new baby," she said quietly. He moved closer, holding a hand out and then stopping just inches from the infant's head, hesitating as though touching the child would confirm that he was only dreaming that it all was happening. Finally, after what seemed like forever, he ran a finger over the soft bit of down on the child's head.
Annaliese began humming and then cradled the infant carefully, a single tear falling from her eye and sliding gracefully down her cheek.
"Mio bambino bello," she whispered gently, kissing the baby boy's forehead lightly and then smiling up at Aiden.
