Chapter 44: Chapter 44
The next day
"Hey baby." Axel's raspy voice greets me as I open my eyes, beyond tired.
Something seems different, but I can't exactly put my finger to it.
"Axel?" I ask, but I'm answered by a baby's cry. "Shit." Axel silently curses and I'm completely awake all of a sudden.
My eyesight clears and focuses on the most beautiful thing I have ever seen and will probably ever see. Axel is sitting on a chair right next to me, his eyes looking tired beyond help but still with a smile on his face, looking down on his lap.
And there there's a white bundle of blankets, about the size of an average loaf of bread, with a tiny, tiny hand sticking out of it, stretching towards Axel.
"Axel." my voice breaks in the middle and he finally looks at me, looking as happy as I've ever seen him.
"Sophie. Baby, I love you but I have to tell you that I've fallen in love with another girl." he says, mocking sadness.
"What?" I ask, and then it becomes clear. "She's a girl?"
Axel nods, focusing back on our baby and I move to get a good view of her, ignoring the pain. I can't help my laughter when a head with very short dark brown hair and beautiful beg forest green eyes fills my vision. "She kinda looks like you."
"I know." Axel grins. "I know I said that I was gonna be the bad cop and you the good cop in our parenting, but - you can't possibly expect me to deny her anything, ever." he says, still not paying attention to anything other than her and I can't decide what to be overwhelmed by more, my new gorgeous baby or Axel's sudden change into a soft ball of happiness.
"Why are you looking at me like that?" he asks me, unaware of anything, and I simply shake my head, reaching towards my daughter to touch her hand. "She's tiny."
"Yeah." Axel chuckles. "I was so nervous last night, during the labour. It didn't go too well and I think we might have to pay the hospital for a few new windows and a vending machine. And change our doctors, I think these will get a restraining order against me." he says all this with a smile, focusing on our baby. "They didn't want me to hold her because of my ... behaviour. That's why I broke the vending machine." he looks at me. "You're not mad, are you?"
Surprisingly, I'm not mad at all. "No. What kind of an idiot do you have to be to try to hold you back from holding your baby? Assholes."
"I know, right. Also, I think your family is quite mad at me too." he says and I sigh. "Well, what did you do to them?"
"Refused them to either see or hold the baby. I wanted you to see or hold it first, so they've been out there for almost 15 hours, waiting for your anesthesia to end and for you to wake up." he explains and I smile. "Thanks."
He coughs, clearing his voice. "So, just so we're clear... You did agree to marry me, didn't you?"
I start laughing so hard that I'm forced to stop due to pain. "Of course I did, you idiot. Who'd be able to say no to the show you put up yesterday?"
He grins. "I knew it."
I lay back on the bed, waving to Axel. "Come, give me her. I want to hold her."
Axel smiles, standing up, and carefully placing her on my chest. "She's just..."
"Perfect." he finishes and kisses me on the cheek. "Fun fact, you gave birth to her at exactly three minutes past midnight." he laughs. "She's the first girl born in the UK this year. Now scoot to the side so I can lay next to you." I happily oblige and we don't get even half an hour until everyone else barges in, trying and failing to get Axel out of the bed.
"Come on, you said I could hold her after Sophie." Amber groans, crossing her arms on her chest and Axel frowns at her. "Shut the fuck up, she's just fallen asleep. You can hold her when I trust your ass enough."
"That's never going to happen." she throws her arms in the air.
"Precisely. Now if everyone could get the hell out-" he starts to try to clean the room, but nobody listens. They know him well enough that despite the hard image he fights to keep up, deep down he's happy everyone's here.
Even his mother.