by Claire Adams
"What's up?"
"I hate to interrupt your game but someone needs to have a nap soon," I said, going over and sitting with them. "But first, he needs to eat."
"Do you want me to do it?"
"I'm out of bottles. I could wait to pump, but he gets cranky if he becomes too tired." I picked Damien up, placing him in my lap as I pulled my top down and pulled back the cup of my nursing bra so he could latch on.
"Does that hurt?" Jason asked, watching me.
"No. There's some pressure, but it doesn't hurt."
"How often do you have to do that?"
"As often as he needs me to."
"Does it..." He trailed off.
"Does it what?"
"Does it feel good? I mean, do you like it?"
"If I don't get the milk out, they hurt like hell, so I like it in that way, I guess."
"No, I mean... no, forget it."
"No, tell me," I urged. Pregnancy had to be one of the most common phenomena on earth, but it mystified even people who could get pregnant. People had all kinds of questions but weren't brave or brazen enough to ask a lot of the time. Sex during and after pregnancy had been... interesting.
"Do you know what it tastes like?" he asked.
"You wanna find out?" I asked. He frowned a little, looking like he didn't know what the right answer to that question was.
"How does one of those pump things work?" he asked instead, changing the subject. After feeding, I went and laid Damien in his crib, turning on the sound machine to soothe him to sleep. I closed the door carefully and went back to the living room. Jason had gotten off the floor and was sitting on one of the couches.
"Is he down?" he asked. I went up and sat next to him.
"Uh-huh, finally," I said, running my hand down his chest. I bit his ear, letting my hand travel down his body. This was the one area where I didn't have any questions about him. I loved his body; I loved when he was inside me. The past couple days we had been all about the baby. He had said he had wanted us to reconnect too, but he had respectfully been keeping his distance. Meanwhile, I had been going fucking crazy.
"Whoa, Shel, wait a second," he said. I backed up, looking at him.
"What?" I asked.
"Are you sure we should?" he asked. I looked at him. He had been doing this all weekend, making me wonder what had happened to the man he used to be, but now, if his face really did melt off and it turned out he was an android, it would have made more sense than this. I had had to push him off me enough times in the past. As much as I appreciated it, yes, I was sure. I wasn't horny all the time like when I had been pregnant, but I did miss being with him that way. We had been getting closer, and I wanted to be closer in this way too.
"What's the matter? Not up to it?" I asked, running my hand over his chest again.
"It's you I'm worried about, not me," he said. His pants were tenting at the crotch; he was more than up to it. I got up and held a hand out to him.
"Then come on," I said, flirtatiously. He got up and kissed me, hard. His hands tightened around my waist and pulled me close to him. That intensity he had been keeping tamped down took over. We were ripping at each other's clothes before we even got through the door to my bedroom. Jason lifted me onto the bed and tugged my jeans off, climbing between my legs. He kissed me while his hand traced circles over my clit, making me squirm and arch my back. He pulled my top off next, kissing a trail to my cleavage. My nursing bra latched in the front.
"Wait," I said, breathlessly, stopping him from unlatching my bra.
"What is it?"
"It can get a little messy," I warned him, as delicately as I could. I had no problem with him touching me there, but he had to be ready to get an eye or mouthful of milk if he did. He undid the latch, freeing my breasts. They were round and heavy, a cup bigger than they had been pre-pregnancy. He cupped one of them and rolled my nipple between his fingers. A trickle of milk flowed down my ribcage.
"Then put a towel down," he said bluntly, pulling my panties down my legs. His mouth on my clit, sucking and licking, shut me up before I could say anything back. I bit back a scream when he pushed two fingers into me, thrusting them in time with the rhythm of his tongue on my clit. I ran my hands through his silky golden hair as he worshipped me. My orgasm shot through me. His arm over my hips held me down as his hand and mouth pushed me over the edge.
I was limp, panting on the bed when he climbed back up my body. He kissed me, deep, letting me taste myself on his tongue. I tugged his t-shirt off impatiently. He undressed and rolled us over; he wanted me to ride him. Straddling his body, I moaned as his thick piece pushed into me. He sucked one of my nipples into his mouth as I fucked myself on his hard cock. His hands on my hips stopped me from going too fast. I was lost in the sensation of him, wishing for release but hoping at the same time that we could make the sensuous torture last. I rode him, slow and steady, drunk on what he did to me.
"I'm coming; where do you want it?" he choked out. I moved down his body and took over with my mouth, sucking the head of his cock while I jerked the root with my hand. He groaned, cursing as he came. I swallowed as he shot in my mouth, continuing to suck till he was done. He pulled me up to lie with him when we were both spent, kissing me lazily. Neither of us said anything; we didn't have to talk. Sex with him was incredible, and he already seemed to love Damien so much. I wanted us to move slowly, but at times like these, my mind wandered. I thought about maybe having a future with him, the day we got over this hump and could work together, all three of us.
I was dozing when the baby monitor sounded. Damien had woken up.
"He's up," I said, pushing myself up off the bed.
"Hm," Jason sighed, sitting up. I grabbed my t-shirt off the floor and pulled it on over my bra. I felt a little sticky but more satisfied than anything.
"Can you change him while I fix dinner?" I asked. He smiled and said he would. He got back into his clothes and walked out into the nursery. In the kitchen, I whipped up a simple carbonara and pumped while the food cooked. I filled two plates and took them to the living room where we ate on the floor with Damien instead of at the dining table while Damien had his bottle, together, like a family.
Chapter Twenty-One
Jason
Damien and Shelby didn't end up making it to the airport with me. My flight was too late. I sat in my seat, staring listlessly out the window at the lights of L.A. disappearing into the distance. I had left my hotel at check out and ended up spending the day at Shelby's. She was still on her break from work, and that had been the way we had spent our days since last Friday anyway. Together. Damien, Shel, and I, like a family. We had just put him down to sleep before I had left for the airport.
I had just learned that I had a son last week. I had only gotten to be a dad to him for the past few days. He was such a good baby; I was going to miss them. I was no expert, but I was working on getting the hang of it. Holding him right, feeding him, I hadn’t given him a bath yet, but I had watched Shel do it a couple times. I’d be able to give it a shot when I got back.
This trip wasn't going to be long, but it sucked anyway that I had to make it at all. I had quit my job already, so there wasn't anything really pulling me back, just the fact that I had had my entire life in New York: my car, my penthouse, everything I owned. I was moving to L.A., and I wouldn't have been able to do that from L.A.
I had lived in New York since graduating, more or less my entire adult life. Thinking about leaving, I had thought that maybe I'd be a little sad or something, but nope. The city had lost its place as my home when my family had stopped being there. Wherever Damien and Shelby were was where I wanted to be. The only reason I was okay with making this trip was because I was going to be back in L.A. with them soon. I didn't have an exact number of days, but I was getting started sorting my shit out as soon as I landed.
Meeting with Victoria was at the top of the list of things I had to do, then contacting a realtor, then packing my place up; it wou
ld probably take a little while, a couple days or so. I wasn't looking forward to it, but it had to be done. This was what it would take to start my new life. I ended up sleeping most of the flight, so I wasn't exhausted the next day. Vic had asked for a morning meeting. Going into the station for what was going to be the last time didn't feel the way I had thought it would. A few old colleagues stopped me to ask why I had quit and where I was going but a lot more were busy and didn’t bother. My job had been it for me for such a long time; being back in the station, it was like eating a snack you used to love as a kid as an adult and finding that it tasted like shit all along, but you just hadn't known better as a kid.
It had taken losing Shelby and becoming Damien's dad to realize that I had wanted both. I had quit my job and was moving across the country for them; I didn't just want them: I needed them. I could get another job, but I couldn't see the rest of my life without Damien and Shelby in it. I wasn't going to live the rest of my life without them in it. Giving things up was easy when that was the trade-off. Vic was waiting for me in her office. She had had time to cool off since I had quit over the phone, but I apologized again.
"Hm," she said. "Some Christmas present that was."
"I could have had better timing. That's not the kind of thing you want to hear on Christmas day especially after the call I had given you before about the leave of absence."
"It could have been worse. Actually, the ratings have been fantastic since you left." My eyebrows raised. Yeah? Had they? Huh. Okay then. I didn't have much of an opinion on that. Good, I guess, for her and for the station.
"Good way to end the year," I said.
"Great way," she said. "Why didn't you walk out of here sooner?"
The ratings that the station got were none of my business anymore; I no longer worked there. Paying attention to the ratings hadn't even been my business when I had had a job here, but I had cared whenever anyone had taken the time to mention them to me. They mattered; obviously, the aim was to have more eyes watching you than anyone else. What did it mean that more people were watching since I had left than when I had been there? Fuck if I knew; a whole load of factors went into ratings. I probably would have been pissed if they had gone up since I had left in the past but now, it just seemed like someone else's problem, and I had my own to think about.
Once Victoria was out of the way, I could think about the penthouse. I had only lived in it for the last three years, moving in a year after starting at WRTC. At the time it had been an investment, but things changed. I had seen myself living in it for a while longer, maybe buying another home, moving and making it a rental property. Keeping it when I was in L.A. wouldn't make sense, especially if Shelby and I were going to end up moving into a house. Her apartment was spacious, but we'd need more eventually. Damien wasn't going to be a baby for that much longer.
That was the next step: the three of us moving in together. I mean, we hadn’t had the most conventional trajectory, and I didn’t even know what to call us at this point. I knew what I wanted though. I had missed out on months of living with my son. The days we had spent together had been great, but I hadn't spent a night before. I wasn't getting the full fatherhood experience. Shelby and me too, we had been doing well. We made a pretty great team, and I felt good about what was happening. It would just make sense. Once Damien got a little older, and this place had sold, we'd figure out what to do from there.
The penthouse was nice; I wasn't worried about how it would sell. White oak floors, one-eighty-degree views, and close to four thousand square feet. I had gotten it furnished but added some stuff. Not much. I had switched the bed out, added some storage and shelving, converted one of the bedrooms to a library and home office. All that would go into storage, no problem. That would take care of itself tomorrow. I still had the contact with the firm that had found me the place; one easy phone call had gotten me a meeting with a broker for the next day.
I wasn't going to miss it. It had been a bachelor pad. I worked so much, I wasn't spending hours and hours in the house anyway. All that was going to change once I got back to L.A. and I was looking forward to it. Finding time finally around nine that night, I called Shelby. It was around six her time, so I hoped she was home. She picked up quickly.
"Jason?"
"Hey, I hope this isn't a bad time."
"No. I just took Damien for a walk. We’re heading home. How was your flight?"
"It was all right. Sorry, I couldn't call sooner."
"Busy day?" she asked. "What were you doing?"
"Just getting stuff back on track after being gone so long," I said vaguely. I hadn't told her that I had been planning to sell my place or anything else about the move. She had no idea, and I wanted to keep it that way. As far as she knew, I'd be back in L.A. to see them in a few days before I left again. We hadn’t made any plans about what was going to happen with the three of us; we were sort of just taking the days as they came.
That set up wouldn’t be enough after a while if we ever wanted to get anywhere, which was why it made the most sense for us to move in together. I couldn’t be a dad, not the kind that I wanted to be, from New York when Damien was in Los Angeles. I didn’t want to be long distance with Shelby either. When I told her like that, she’d totally be on board. I wanted to surprise her, but this felt like something you discussed face to face. I’d say something once I got back. As soon as I was done getting all my stuff in order, I was gone, and I wasn't looking back.
"How's that going?" she asked.
"All right. What about you?"
"I'm okay," she said lightly. "I've been thinking about sleep training Damien."
"Sleep training? What's that?" I asked. She explained it to me. Apparently, Damien couldn’t sleep the whole night through yet. They did that with babies to get them on a regular sort of routine. I'd never even thought about that. Damien napped a couple times a day; I just figured babies liked to sleep and were good at it. I had a lot to learn. I was getting a little tired of being clueless in front of Shelby, even though she was being really patient with me.
"He only gets up once or twice right now, so I think he'll pick it up fast," she said. "Could I call you right back? I have to get up the stairs."
"No problem. I wanted to ask whether I could talk to you later on Skype, so I could see Damien." She told me to give her a couple hours; she'd call me just before she was getting Damien down for bed.
It had been a while, a long time since I had called a woman and asked her how her day had been. This whole thing with Shelby was pretty new, but in a good way. I had never wanted to in the past. The year that Shelby had been gone hadn't been a long enough time for me to forget her. It was good that I hadn't because of Damien, but there had been something else too. I wanted her. I always had. When we had worked together, I had thought that I had her, but I had been wrong. I never stopped thinking about her the whole time we had been apart. I had had hook-ups, a short-lived thing with some model who split her time between New York and London, but Shelby had always been there, somewhere at the back of my mind, reminding me that none of those women was her.
Of all the women that I could have gotten pregnant by accident, and that was a long list, I was glad that it had been her. Something told me that she was the only person who I would have actually wanted to take that step with. She ended up sending me a text a little while later to get on Skype; it was getting close to Damien's bedtime, and that was the only time that I'd get to see him before he dozed off.
I smiled seeing them fill my computer screen. I had been with them the day before, but it hadn't been enough. I had never been as certain of anything in my life as I was of this. They were my future. I'd say goodbye to everything to be able to have them. In a few days, I'd tell Shelby the good news.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Shelby
The elevator doors opened, depositing me on the ground floor. I trudged out, exhausted. The New Year was always a busy time. That was when all the lifestyle and self-impr
ovement stuff got big to capitalize on everyone making resolutions. I didn't buy into it personally, not that much but the 'new year, new me' stuff got ratings. Who was I to talk shit?
I only had one resolution, which was to be the best parent to Damien that I could possibly be. I felt relieved walking to the daycare to pick him up. I felt like it had been days since I had seen him; work had felt way too long. Was it just because I was coming off a break that I felt this way? Christmas was over, I had taken our tree down already and been preparing mentally for work again, but I still felt like my body was here, but the rest of me was not. I didn't know what it was; I had never felt that way before.
I loved my job, and I always had. Why did I wish that I was at home? It didn't make sense. I thought I loved working and having a career. Usually, I did; work was fulfilling, and I wanted to do it, but, I don't know, I was in a weird funk today.
It would most likely pass. I was counting on it. It didn't matter as much what I wanted to do; it mattered what I had to do. With Damien, having a stable job was not optional. Just give it a few days, I thought to myself, you'll be back to normal in no time. Obviously, the problem was I had gotten too used to rolling out of bed and spending the whole day in my pajamas; now it felt like it wasn't fair when I had to wear makeup and come to the newsroom.
Damien wasn't suffering any of the post-break bullshit that I was. He was happy when I collected him from the daycare and drove us home. I had been looking forward to getting home, but there had also been something else. Jason. He was finally back in L.A. He hadn't been gone a long time, but it had felt that way. I had gotten used to him being around. I had had to; when he had come around, he wouldn't want to leave: not that that had been a problem. He wasn't as hard to be around as he had been in the past. Not to mention seeing him with Damien was heart-meltingly cute.
We were getting dinner that night. He hadn't asked me to, but I was bringing Damien instead of calling Paula. I was so glad that he had proven me wrong about how good he could be in Damien's life. My caution had been totally uncalled for. I should have let him show me that he could be there instead of making the judgments that I had. With that too, it was a godsend to have another pair of hands to help with the baby. It was beautiful watching Jason fall in love with his son. I guess I had kind of missed hanging out with him too. We were taking things slow, but he wasn't making me regret letting him in.