“Why’s there so fucking much of it?”
“You bit through the medical tape to get the socks off, so we got the maintenance guys tape. You gnawed through that too,” she pointed down at small flecks of silver all over the floor beside the bed. “So we had to use more. We then taped it to the bed so that you couldn’t chew through it again, even though you tried, so Parker gave you a sedative.”
I was just about to lose my shit and demand that she untape me when Parker walked in with a nurse.
“Hey man, so how much do you remember from yesterday,” he pulled my leg out from under the bed and picked a syringe up.
“Ebru just filled me in,” I couldn’t stop the squeak that came out when he stuck the needle in me. Those things hurt!
I sat through another three sulking because no matter what I did, I always seemed to end up making a twat of myself in front of the one person that I wanted to look good to.
“I had to admit, I thought they were yanking my crank about the whole Viva El Unicorn thing, but seeing it first hand,” the mean asshole sniggered as he put all of the syringes in the special box that the nurse was carrying. What he said sank in at the same time as the drugs, and I vaguely registered the fact that the nurse he’d brought with him was glaring at me, although that might be because she was the one I’d done the Weiner windmill in front of last time. Ebru was looking at the wall like it held the secrets to the universe.
“Please tell me I daaadn’t,” the injections kicked in fully. I went to move my hand to touch my numb lower lip and give it the ‘wibble’ that kids did, but my hand wasn’t moving. Why was it stuck to the bed?
“Okay, before he breaks free of the restraints and starts using his magical unicorn horn as a wand to grant wishes again, let’s check him over. Then I have to go and arrange counseling for Mrs. Brant in room three-twenty-seven.”
I was proud of my magical horn; only special unicorns got to grant wishes! “Veeeeeaaaaa lllllll uniooorn!” The horn was free!
Chapter 3
Ebru
I felt like I had a beach in my eyes, every blink felt like I had the sands of Florida scratching across my eyeballs. I’d now been at work for twenty-five hours. Granted, I’d had a couple of hours of sleep in Cole’s room, but it wasn’t enough to recharge my batteries.
“Morning sunshine!” The perky asshole Lars said as he walked past. It was okay for him, he’d been in the on-call room and had probably had a couple of hours of real sleep. Me, I’d woken up every ten minutes worried in case Cole was trying to chew through the tape again. How he had any teeth left I’ll never know, but Jesus he’d been determined.
Glaring at Lars, I put my head back down on the desk. “So, how’s Harry Potter?”
Why was he talking to me? Couldn’t he see that I was dying?
“Eeeeeeebruuuuuu, ohhhhhhh Eeeeeeebbbrrrruuuuuu!”
That was it; my head snapped up, and he immediately started backing away with wide eyes and his hands out in front of him. “Oh shit! No, now Ebru let’s talk this through. Violence doesn’t solve anything!”
Like that would save him!
“You’re fucking evil,” Lars hissed as we walked back toward Cole’s room on our rounds. Thankfully, Mrs. Brant had gotten over the shock of his magical horn, so we hadn’t had to deal with her shaking again.
“You sang at me,” admittedly I felt bad, but I was exhausted, and when people were overly chirpy in the morning it inspired violence in me. I’d still had a roll of Duct Tape from last night which had been sitting right in front of me, but I didn’t think it would take a layer of skin with it when I stuck it on roughly one-third of Lars’ eyebrow. “If you hadn’t left it for so long, it wouldn’t have been so bad.”
I was saved from whatever he was going to say by Colette who was standing next to Cole’s bed. Jack, Linda, and Hurst, who was eating the biggest muffin I’d ever seen, were sitting around the room reading.
“Oh Ebru, morning! How is he today?” She bit her lip after asking. I’m pretty sure it was Hurst who snorted behind me.
“Confused about the restraints and itchy.”
“Does he remember…” she trailed off and winced, and this time there were four snorts from behind me.
“Uh, no. I told him about the restraints and chewing, but not the rest.”
I was saved from reliving it by Parker who walked in to check Cole over.
“Good morning!” My eye started ticking at those two words. As he updated them about the medications that he’d given Cole to get rid of the swelling and reactions that he was having to the bites I considered cutting the restraints off of Cole. We’d tried the normal hospital restraints last night, but somehow he’d gotten out of them, so we’d had no option but to use the industrial strength tape. After what had happened to Lars when I’d stuck a piece on his eyebrow, I was starting to worry about what would happen to poor Cole’s arms.
“I think it’s best if we don’t tell him about…well you know,” Colette whispered, looking back down at Cole repeatedly.
“Oh, you mean the magical horn?” Parker smirked and crossed his arms to another chorus of snorts.
Glaring back at the peanut gallery, Colette said, “Yes, he’s sensitive, and it took forever for him to get over it the last time.”
“Collie, that little turd ran through the hospital yelling his magical horn was a wand,” Hurst said through his laughter.
“Oh no, my favorite part was where he yelled that there would be no wishes for me because I’d stuck something in his ass that made it hurt,” Parker added. “And then labeled me the booty bandit.”
“How is the old lady?” Colette winced as she asked, and with good reason.
“Thankfully she’s gotten over the shock of him singing ‘when you wish upon a horn’, along with the moves he accompanied it with.”
Hurst was bent over roaring in his chair while Jack pinched the bridge of his nose and laughed beside him. Linda just sat on her chair glaring in Cole’s direction.
“Oh fuck me…” the magical horn wielder himself whispered from the bed. “Please, tell me I didn’t say that my nuts were crystal balls and that I could do fortune telling with them.”
By this point, noises so high-pitched that it’s a wonder there wasn’t a chorus of howls outside were coming from Hurst, Jack, Parker, and Lars. I was starting to worry about Hurst because he was holding his chest while he laughed, but so long as he managed the breaths in that the others seemed to be struggling with it was okay.
“Hey honey,” Colette leaned over him and stroked his forehead.
“Please, tell me I didn’t!” He repeated in a horrified whisper.
We were saved from having to answer him by Parker talking to Hurst.
“Where the hell did you get a muffin that big?”
Hurst was still chewing the massive bite that I’d just watched him take, so he held his finger up and waited until he’d finished before answering.
“That coffee place on the corner, Luna something. I gotta say, it’s the best muffin I’ve ever tasted,” he replied, before taking another large bite which he choked on when Linda elbowed him hard in the ribs and glared at him. “Apart from yours. Jesus was there any need to break a rib?”
Linda was still glaring at him when Parker asked, “what flavor is it?”
“Blueberry.”
Parker snorted and looked over at Cole who was glaring around the room at us all. “So, Cole flavor?”
Hurst had been about to take another bite when Parker said this, but he paused and looked up at Parker. “Huh?”
“Blueberry,” none of us were catching onto what was so funny. “Because he has blueberries.”
I’ll admit, I was one of the people who let out a blast of laughter, one of those laughs that takes even you by surprise and comes out sounding like a fog horn. Hurst looked down at the muffin in his hand, pulled a face and then got up from his chair and threw it in the garbage as he walked out the door muttering and cussing.
“Fucking assholes,” the unicorn whisperer said from his position on the bed.
“Oh good, Gypsy dick is awake,” Ren said from the doorway. Admittedly, he might have a better reason than anyone to be pissed at Cole. After all, Cole had just finished giving his ass and nuts a good scratch when he tackled Ren to the floor somehow and sat his bare ass right on his face. None of us could figure out why he’d done it, but it didn’t change that it had happened.
“Oh shit…”
Cole
After everyone had left, Parker had said that they could reduce one of the medications that he thought that I was reacting to. Now, I was see the restwaiting for Ebru to take the tape off my arms.
“I’m so sorry, Eb.” What else could I say?
Shrugging, she went back to sticking the wet cotton bud under the tape to try and work it away from my skin.
“I always make myself look like a dick in front of you,” I groaned leaning back.
“No, you always show me your dick when I’m in front of you,” she sniggered, making me groan again.
I did my best to stay quiet for the next five minutes while she worked away at the tape, but at this rate, she’d be there forever, and I’m sure she had other shit to do.
“Just tear it off.”
“Uhhh no,” she replied with a guilty look on her face. “Trust me, you don’t want that to happen.”
“Eb, tear it off!”
“No!”
“Rip it!”
“No!” She was yelling now.
“If you don’t, I’ll say ‘good morning’ a thousand times until you…” That was when she snapped, and the next thing all I could focus on was the sensation of acid pouring over my arm from where she’d ripped a big chunk of tape off. “You evil cow…oh my God why?”
“And I’ve not even gotten all of it off.” The look on her face was scary as she reached for my arm again while I tried to pull it away from the railing that it was attached to. “And then I have the other arm to do!”
I’m not ashamed to admit that I screamed as she waxed not only the hair but the skin off my arms too.
One week later…
I was holding baby Kali while Isla changed Dewi’s diaper and Maya sat beside me inhaling a bowl of popcorn.
“I can’t get over how big they’re getting.” It still amazed me that these little people had been inside tiny Isla’s stomach and that there was one growing inside Maya at this moment too. Looking at them made me hurt, but I was sticking to my plan to close myself off to it now; I was moving on. “Just think, there’s one right there,” I poked Maya’s belly just in time for the baby to kick out at me.
“Stop riling him up. He’s going to do Riverdance on my bladder now!”
“I wonder how big he’ll be?” Isla mused as she picked up Dewi and swapped her with me for Kali. “You know,” she continued as she unsnapped the popper things on the crotch of the bodysuit, “there’s an old wives tale that says that the weight of the father determines the weight of the baby. How much did Ren weigh when he was born?”
“I dunno? Wait, I’ll text Colette!”
I gently stroked Dewi’s little button nose and her soft hair, taking in her features. Dewi had Luke’s blonde hair, and the rest of her was her Mom including her beautiful hazel eyes. Little Kali had his Mom’s dark hair and the rest of him was his Dad. Taking in the differences seriously amazed me. How could they be twins, but look so different?
“I swear, everything about this baby is just beautiful and perfect. Kali too.” I really loved these little guys. They’d healed something in me somehow.
“Fuck me,” Maya whispered as she looked down at her phone.
“What?” We were all still on edge about what had happened only a matter of weeks ago and the fact that we still didn’t know who, why or if they were going to do it again. “What happened?”
She was still staring at her phone and hadn’t said anything, so I snatched it out of her hand and looked at the screen.
“Oh shit,” I burst out laughing waking Dewi out of her mini nap which she let me know was not bueno by screaming at me until she went red in the face. Normally I’d be panicking about how to fix it, but I was too busy laughing at what Mom had text back to Maya.
“Someone tell me what’s going on. And for the love of God Cole, try and stop her crying before this guy starts…” too late, Kali was joining in now, earning me an extra glare from his Mom.
“She says…” Maya whispered staring into space. “Ren was…”
“Jesus. Cole what the hell did your Mom tell her? What was he, eight pounds? Eight and a half pounds?” Still laughing, I held up the phone so she could see the screen. “What the hell?” Isla sat back and patted Kali’s back as she tried to process what my Mom had just told us. “You’re going to need a new bajingo, Maya. Nine pounds ten ounces?”
At that point, the alien burst out of the guy’s stomach on the television making Maya go even paler.
“I’m going to have a wind sock!”
“A what? What the fuck is that?” I popped Dewi’s bobo in her mouth and lifted her to my shoulder to rub her back.
“One of those things that you see on a runway at the airport,” Isla filled me in and then held her phone up to show me a picture of the huge orange tunnel things that were blowing in the wind when you looked out the window of the airplane. I stopped laughing because the thought of that being a vagina was just disgusting! “Hey, I had two babies, and I’m not inhaling furniture when I sit down,” Isla shrugged.
“I can’t do this! I’ve changed my mind. We’ll just keep him in there and…” Maya trailed off.
“Don’t be ridiculous, Maya. You don’t even know that the baby will be that big.” Isla chuckled beside me and then whispered, “she’s fucked!”
Moving Dewi off my shoulder so that my laughing wouldn’t shake her around, I went to say something smart to Maya about black holes when the most God awful sound came from the baby in my arms.
“No, not again!” I couldn’t go through being covered in baby shit again. It had taken me days to get the smell off of me last time.
“I thought you said that everything about her was beautiful and perfect?” Isla gasped through her laughter.
I was just about to pass her off to Maya when the smell hit me, and I started gagging. “Oh my God, put it back in!” I couldn’t stop the retching. “What the hell do you feed her? She’s just a baby! Oh, lord Jesus, my eyes are burning!”
Getting up, I handed her to Maya, whose face was now looking slightly green, to enjoy and ran out of the house rubbing at my eyes. I got as far as a bush and had to give into the nausea that was almost suffocating me. “Jesus shit, it’s like fuckin’ napalm!”
Walking into Jilly’s, I immediately clocked the table where everyone was sitting. We were meeting for something to eat, but I had Ebru plans too. I’d thought about it long and hard, and I was going to ask her out. I had what I was going to say planned out and had rehearsed it in front of the mirror at work; I just hope she’d say yes.
“Cole my man! How’s the balls?” Ren the fuck face asked as I sat down on the empty seat at the end of the table next to Ebru. The truth of the matter is that they were still uncomfortable, but at least the swelling had mostly gone down on them.
Shooting him the bird, I turned and looked at Ebru. “How are you doing, baby?”
“I’m good, Cole. You?” She wasn’t looking her normal cheerful self, and the smile she gave me didn’t reach her eyes. It looked strained and forced like she was in pain or something. Oh, fuck me, what if she was sick? Could a nurse look after themselves?
“Good, baby,” I kept my voice low so that the others couldn’t hear us. “Are you okay?”
Giving me another tight and forced smile, she started picking at the label on her bottle of beer. Looking up, I saw Caleb looking at her worriedly and grit my teeth. He’d been spending a lot of time with her lately and it was killing me, even though it was my own fault
. He must have felt me glaring at him because he looked over at me and discreetly nodded his head in Ebru’s direction and shook his head in a ‘not good’ way. I lifted my chin back at him and tuned back into the conversation around me while watching Ebru out of the corner of my eye.
“Yeah, you don’t have to give birth to a fucking Thanksgiving turkey big enough to feed forty people you asshole!” Maya was saying to Ren while everyone else winced at the mental visual.
“Baby, we don’t know that he’s going to be as big as that. And hey, Mom gave birth to me and she’s okay, right?” Ren replied, trying to calm her down.
“Have you seen the size of me?”
“It’s true,” Tony spoke up from the other side of Ebru. “Her ass has at least quadrupled since you knocked her up. In a couple of weeks she’ll be visible from spa…” he broke off with a flinch and then wheezed, “What the fuck, Isla?”
The little pixie sitting opposite him holding Kali just smiled sweetly in return. It was so hard to get angry at her, especially with the gorgeous little baby in her arms who was looking around the place before stopping on me and whimpering.
“Ah, he wants Uncle Cole,” Isla said, changing the subject and standing up to walk the baby around the table to me and then passing him carefully into my arms which I’d held out the second he’d started whimpering. I wasn’t going to say no.
After listening to Maya make more analogies that the state of her vagina would be in after she gave birth, Luke took over the conversation steering it far away from time portals and civilization inhaling black holes. It was just as well because Tony was now gray and was now glaring at Isla across the table. I had to say, I wasn’t feeling much better, and I hadn’t seen what he had when Isla gave birth to the twins.
“Are y’all ready to order?” Jilly asked from beside me. I hadn’t heard her arrive, so I jumped which woke up Kali who started wailing. Grabbing his bobo from Isla, I popped it in his mouth and put him on my shoulder, calming him down instantly. “Well, I never thought I’d see the day that the Cole Townsend would be the baby whisperer.”
Providence Series Books 1-4 Page 53