Post by GGJ5 on Jun 30, 2010 21:41:58 GMT -5
[[Yes, there is lameness here. And implied married-people-fluff. 
]]
The lights appeared out of the darkness, glinting and reflecting on the river as the sun sunk low. It felt like the evening was creeping by, drawing itself as long as possible even though they'd only been away from home (and Rae) less than an hour. It was sort of a double edged sword-- the lengthening feeling made their time alone together seem to go on and on, but at the same time, it felt like it was too long for Erin to be away from the baby that needed her. It was easy for her thoughts to drift back to the house, wondering if Rae was crying or not dealing well with the bottle or if she missed her or… Sure, Kagayaki was happy to step in to watch Rae (after much coaxing on Erin's part and promising that Cassie would be there, too), and there were plenty of tiny bottles of milk for Rae while Erin was gone…
"But no one's ever fed her but me," she'd protested earlier before they'd even really gotten ready, casting an anxious glance at the sleeping infant in her crib. "What if she won't eat because it's not me? It's totally different…"
"We can cancel…" Yukito muttered, adjusting Rae's blanket on her, brushing the sleeping child's tiny arm with his finger. He knew by now that despite what she said, Erin really didn't want to cancel. He was a little wary of leaving her, too, but their cell phones would both be on, and from the beginning their baby had been around so many people, maybe she wouldn't miss them as much as Erin worried. It was definitely more the other way around. "We could just stay here and do something…"
Erin had dropped her hands from where they were above the crib, winding Rae's musical mobile, and she shot Yukito a look. "No, Yukito, we have people coming, and I can't just say, 'nevermind!' Plus I do wanna go. We're going," she'd told him finally, determinedly.
They ended up leaving the house thirty minutes later than planned, the whole time gently being nudged towards the door by their sitters. Yukito kept finding reasons to go back into the little nursery, and of course he did it so many times that Rae woke up, and then it was no lesser task to separate them. Eventually, Erin announced she was reclaiming her husband and took Rae from him, the tiny girl whimpering in her still-waking state. Once she seemed content in their friends' arms, Erin could finally-- and quite literally-- lead Yukito by the hand to the car.
And after all her efforts to get them both out of the house, Erin's thought now drifted to their baby. Which meant that Yukito's mind was definitely drifting. "Yukito?" She tilted her head to rest on his shoulder as the two of them looked out across the river, sitting at the top of the levee steps. "What are you thinking?"
"I want to bring Rae here," he answered pensively, staring at the glimmering lights along the waterfront.
Erin's face fell into a frown. "Yukito…" She scooted closer to him, pulling her arm around him possessively. "I keep thinking about her too, but the whole point of this is for us. I don't want to get so wrapped up in her that I forget us, because she needs us…"
His response was to kiss the top of her head, wrapping his own arm around her in turn. "I know." A smile graced his face as he leaned his head over so theirs were together. Both his arms encircled her as he added quietly, "That's why I'm glad I have you…" He moved down to give her a kiss. "Haven't I already told you you're not forgettable?"
"Maybe you should remind me," Erin retorted easily, sending him a pixyish smile before brushing her lips against his in a playful gesture.
"I think I can handle that," Yukito told her softly, punctuating his words with a kiss, and then another, and another…
Eventually, Erin pulled away, smiling as she muttered through giggles, "Someone's gonna walk by and tell us to get a room."
"Your point?" He leaned over to kiss her again, finding her ear and the little space behind it.
"Yukito," she giggled, perfectly happy to be the center of his attention for now. Still, she gently pushed him away a little bit, unable to stop her smile. "The food's gonna be all cold…" Erin leaned over to where the dish of pasta, wrapped in towels, waited for them. She'd wrapped up the utensils in the towels around the dish, keeping them secure and the food warm as they had driven out to the river. "Good, it's still warm," she muttered almost as a whisper, sitting up and pulling the dish with her.
Yukito eyed the dish with little interest, put off by her breaking away for something so trivial. "You left me for that?" Erin looked up at him, not catching his joke, but didn't have time to ask-- he bobbed down for another kiss, capturing her just briefly until she started laughing. "Yukito!" she laughed, drawing herself away enough to talk, but not too far. "I made it for us… I don't want it to be ruined…" She was pouting, and she knew it now, but it was important to her.
Keeping his arm around her waist, Yukito kissed her forehead. "I know you did. Can I help it if you're distracting?"
It wasn't the first time he'd told her that, but honestly, so soon after the baby, she didn't feel very "distracting." Erin glanced away, suddenly showing a demure and somewhat forced smile. "That's me and my post-baby body, totally distracting…" She wondered if Yukito noticed the extra baby weight she was still carrying, and none of her old clothes fit right any more. She'd put on a dress for tonight, which was the closest Erin could come to "fitting right" without spending the money they'd saved for the baby on something as silly as new clothes. She missed being able to still shop in the junior's section even after getting married, and now she doubted she'd be able to go back to that. At all. And the black shirtdress she was wearing now didn't have sleeves, which she was suddenly very conscious of. It occurred to Erin again that she never used to be that self-conscious about how she looked…
"I happen to like you and your post-baby body," Yukito replied quietly, leaning forward to nudge his face close to hers. His hand rested on the small of her back, then trailed up to squeeze her shoulder affectionately.
"You have to say that," Erin muttered, tilting her head to rest on him again and begrudgingly pushing away the dish. "You're legally bound."Even though the fact that he did want to keep kissing her and holding her made her doubt her own severe thoughts somewhat. But he could still just be saying it, to keep her from crying and ruining their date… "I'm never gonna go back to how I was before, you know that, right?"
"Yeah, I know that." His arm slipped from her shoulder to wrap snug around her waist, his hand resting on her stomach. "But I also know that I don't want to go back. I didn't know it was possible to love any child the way I love Rae… and you and your post-baby body made that happen. I wouldn't trade this for anything." Erin still looked down, putting her hand on top of his. He wasn't the one having to deal with the ever-morphing body… "Erin, look at me." Instead of waiting for her, Yukito gently pulled her face up to his with his fingers under her chin. "I mean that. I love how you are, because it's given us something I never expected. I wouldn't go back for anything." As if to prove his words, Yukito pulled her tightly to him, giving her a long and drawn-out kiss that seemed to have become so rare in the recent weeks. "You just keep amazing me," he muttered before kissing her again, and maybe it was still her emotions still out of whack from their nine-month stint, or maybe she had just grown into a natural weeping willow or something, but his words had made tears well up and spill out of her eyes as she kissed him back. And unlike rain-kisses, crying and kissing somehow seemed so much better. It seemed so much more meaningful, memorable, and put thoughts of pasta and post-baby-bodies out of her mind.
Eventually, they did get around to the pasta, and the towels worked well-- it hadn't grown cold. The only problem was what to do with it afterwards, when Erin wanted to walk around. They ended up deciding to take it down together to where the car was parked, and make that part of their walk, even if parking garages weren't particularly ideal date-night locations. They'd had to park relatively high up, and all the while up the rickety elevator and into the garage, Yukito and Erin remained linked by their arms, Erin's free hand carrying the towels and utensils, and Yukito carting the dish. As they approached, the car, though, Erin stopped short, catching Yukito off guard and making him stumble for a moment before Erin gave him a stern nudge. Finally his eyes followed hers to see what had caused the sudden stop-- at the other end of the lane was the dark figure of a human near the driver's side window. "Breaking in," she whispered in his ear, gripping Yukito's arm tightly.
A tiny nod from Yukito confirmed what she'd thought, and she felt him move forward. Immediately Erin's grip tightened and she yanked him back, glaring at him in the darkness and shaking her head. Not without me, you're not, she thought at him adamantly. "Erin," he hissed quietly, objecting to her objection but not having the time or safety to tell her why in a way where she would listen. Instead before he could stop her, Erin broke free and stormed in the direction of their car. "Hey!" she shouted-- more screamed, really-- at the dark figure, gesturing all the meanwhile. "Hey! Hey, back off!" Yukito chased after her and caught up with her soon enough, but by that time they were close enough for the dark figure to turn into a young human face, looking flustered and caught red-handed. He must have been maybe four or five years their junior, and had backed away from the car with his hands up.
"I swear I wasn't doing anything bad to your car," the stranger insisted, stuttering and stumbling over his words. He didn't hesitate to defend himself, pointing a nervous finger at the windshield wipers. "Seriously, look!"
Without saying a word, Yukito strode over and plucked the little papers that were folded under the protection of the wiper. "It's money," he muttered, turning to shoot another look of suspicion at the stranger.
"It-- it was a church thing," he explained, looking a lot more scared now than Erin had initially thought. "We each-- each got a random bill, and it was crumpled so we couldn't tell what bill it was, and we were asked to give it, even--even if we could, you know, keep it. I was just giving it, but I thought…"
"You thought you wouldn't be caught?" Erin finished, the dubious expression on her face having melted away. That was really sweet of him, if he was just giving away money… It was something she would like to do, too, being a little Secret Santa or an earthly angel or something and giving away little surprises like that… But Yukito still seemed wary. He stood there and uncrumpled the bill. "How do we know it's not fake?"
"Yukito!" she chided, peering over to see the bill. "Why would he do that?"
"Here, look." The guy was holding out his phone, a number selected. "You can call my youth pastor if you want. He's the one who gave it to me. I-- I didn't mean to cause any trouble, you know..."
"It's fine," Erin said before Yukito had the chance to respond. Somehow she felt so much more relieved now, she hadn't realized how worked up she'd been. "You know what? It's fine. Put your phone away, it's fine." She looked at Yukito when she repeated it the last time, pointedly. "He was being nice," she whispered, putting her arm around him. With her free hand, Erin waved to the stranger. "Nice to meet you! Bye!"
With an awkward wave, the guy skittered off, and Erin turned to see Yukito staring at her, an expression on his face that she couldn't identify. "What?"
For a moment he didn't say anything. He just watched her, holding the wrinkly bill between two of his fingers. "You," he said, as if that answered anything.
"What, 'me?'" Now he was just being frustrating. Of course, now he just shook his head. And she thought he was even smiling. "Yukito!"
"I love you," Yukito decided, pocketing the bill -- which Erin later learned was a fifty-- and sliding the dish onto the floor of the car, right behind his seat. Erin followed with the towels, too, but when she pulled her head back out, Yukito had placed himself in the front seat.
"What? We're leaving already?" She stuck her head in the open driver's side door, eyeing him with a disappointed expression.
As an answer, Yukito reached up and captured her by her waist, pulling her down towards him until she had fallen into his lap. "You're not the only one who can change plans on a whim, you know." He kissed her before she could react, but when he pulled back, she couldn't react with anything but a smile.
"Aw, I'm finally rubbing off on you," Erin teased, returning his kiss as she wrapped her arms around his neck.
"Yeah," Yukito muttered between kisses. "That must be it." Their kisses continued, a multitude of simple actions that couldn't seem to ever lose their meaning. Eventually he whispered to her, "Want to try for number two?"
"Yukito," Erin giggled, as she pulled away just enough to speak (which meant her lips were still brushing against him as she spoke). "No more babies yet…" she murmured, taking him literally. He just chuckled and continued his trail of kisses. "Fine, no babies… Just me and you. There's a whole car here, you know…"
When they arrived back home, Yukito had made a promise to himself to surprise her with a trip to some kind of feel-good-mom day-- a spa or boutique or something, just something to make her feel spoiled like she deserved, and beautiful like she was. He'd had no idea until she had mentioned it that the post-pregnancy additions to her body bothered her that much. And he didn't trust himself to buy clothes for her. But he wasn't going to mention any of these ideas to her-- just surprise her. She had the best reactions to surprises…
Erin's arm was wrapped around him as she walked beside him up to the door. She took advantage of the moment where he stopped and searched his pocket for his keys to lay her head against him, sighing contentedly. "Let's go say good night to our daughter," he whispered to her, making her beam as they walked into the house, trying to be soft about it in case Rae was (hopefully) asleep.
She wasn't. She was, in fact, in Cassie's arms, as she fed the tiny baby from a bottle, on the couch right next to the door. That stopped both the new parents short. Automatically, Erin held out her hands to receive Rae. "Oh, here, let me--"
"Shhh… she's just getting back to sleep," Cassie explained quietly, nodding to the sleepy-eyed child. Erin bit her lip, watching Rae drifting off into sleep. She was so precious… "She's been up since just after you left, but only got fussy pretty recently."
"Aww…" For a moment, Erin felt horribly guilty for leaving her baby. Then she remembered what she told Yukito, and mentally tried to make the goofy emotions take a hike. "Well, once she's asleep, you can give her to me and we can put her to bed. She won't wake up too much."
Cassie nodded, smiling. "Did you enjoy your night out?"
Erin cast a glance at Yukito and giggled, making Cassie blush. "Why do I ask? Here," she said quietly, nodding to Rae. "She's done, and sounds pretty asleep to me."
Gratefully, Erin took her sleeping child in her arms and she and Yukito disappeared into the baby's room, gently placing her in her crib. Turning on the music as Yukito covered Rae in her blanket, Erin drifted back to stand at his side, the both of them watching her sleeping form as if they might miss another chance to absorb the image. "How did we make something so beautiful?" she murmured, leaning against him.
Yukito cocked his eyebrow in the dark, giving her a look. "Well, Erin, when two people love each other very much--" He wasn't going to continue much more anyway, but was cut off short by a playful jab to his side. "That's not what I meant and you know it!" she whispered, turning to leave the room with a smile.
"You know deep inside, that is so what you meant!" Yukito whispered back, teasing her as he gently pulled the door behind him, leaving a crack. The house was quiet-- Cassie and Kagayaki must have bowed out, especially if Cassie was still blushing.
"Was not!" Erin hissed back, shooting him a grin over her shoulder before suddenly stopping on a dime and spinning back around toward him. She leapt forward, capturing him in a surprise hug, and giving him a long kiss. Then, sending him a smile, Erin announced, "Daisuki, otto. Very, very much."
]]The lights appeared out of the darkness, glinting and reflecting on the river as the sun sunk low. It felt like the evening was creeping by, drawing itself as long as possible even though they'd only been away from home (and Rae) less than an hour. It was sort of a double edged sword-- the lengthening feeling made their time alone together seem to go on and on, but at the same time, it felt like it was too long for Erin to be away from the baby that needed her. It was easy for her thoughts to drift back to the house, wondering if Rae was crying or not dealing well with the bottle or if she missed her or… Sure, Kagayaki was happy to step in to watch Rae (after much coaxing on Erin's part and promising that Cassie would be there, too), and there were plenty of tiny bottles of milk for Rae while Erin was gone…
"But no one's ever fed her but me," she'd protested earlier before they'd even really gotten ready, casting an anxious glance at the sleeping infant in her crib. "What if she won't eat because it's not me? It's totally different…"
"We can cancel…" Yukito muttered, adjusting Rae's blanket on her, brushing the sleeping child's tiny arm with his finger. He knew by now that despite what she said, Erin really didn't want to cancel. He was a little wary of leaving her, too, but their cell phones would both be on, and from the beginning their baby had been around so many people, maybe she wouldn't miss them as much as Erin worried. It was definitely more the other way around. "We could just stay here and do something…"
Erin had dropped her hands from where they were above the crib, winding Rae's musical mobile, and she shot Yukito a look. "No, Yukito, we have people coming, and I can't just say, 'nevermind!' Plus I do wanna go. We're going," she'd told him finally, determinedly.
They ended up leaving the house thirty minutes later than planned, the whole time gently being nudged towards the door by their sitters. Yukito kept finding reasons to go back into the little nursery, and of course he did it so many times that Rae woke up, and then it was no lesser task to separate them. Eventually, Erin announced she was reclaiming her husband and took Rae from him, the tiny girl whimpering in her still-waking state. Once she seemed content in their friends' arms, Erin could finally-- and quite literally-- lead Yukito by the hand to the car.
And after all her efforts to get them both out of the house, Erin's thought now drifted to their baby. Which meant that Yukito's mind was definitely drifting. "Yukito?" She tilted her head to rest on his shoulder as the two of them looked out across the river, sitting at the top of the levee steps. "What are you thinking?"
"I want to bring Rae here," he answered pensively, staring at the glimmering lights along the waterfront.
Erin's face fell into a frown. "Yukito…" She scooted closer to him, pulling her arm around him possessively. "I keep thinking about her too, but the whole point of this is for us. I don't want to get so wrapped up in her that I forget us, because she needs us…"
His response was to kiss the top of her head, wrapping his own arm around her in turn. "I know." A smile graced his face as he leaned his head over so theirs were together. Both his arms encircled her as he added quietly, "That's why I'm glad I have you…" He moved down to give her a kiss. "Haven't I already told you you're not forgettable?"
"Maybe you should remind me," Erin retorted easily, sending him a pixyish smile before brushing her lips against his in a playful gesture.
"I think I can handle that," Yukito told her softly, punctuating his words with a kiss, and then another, and another…
Eventually, Erin pulled away, smiling as she muttered through giggles, "Someone's gonna walk by and tell us to get a room."
"Your point?" He leaned over to kiss her again, finding her ear and the little space behind it.
"Yukito," she giggled, perfectly happy to be the center of his attention for now. Still, she gently pushed him away a little bit, unable to stop her smile. "The food's gonna be all cold…" Erin leaned over to where the dish of pasta, wrapped in towels, waited for them. She'd wrapped up the utensils in the towels around the dish, keeping them secure and the food warm as they had driven out to the river. "Good, it's still warm," she muttered almost as a whisper, sitting up and pulling the dish with her.
Yukito eyed the dish with little interest, put off by her breaking away for something so trivial. "You left me for that?" Erin looked up at him, not catching his joke, but didn't have time to ask-- he bobbed down for another kiss, capturing her just briefly until she started laughing. "Yukito!" she laughed, drawing herself away enough to talk, but not too far. "I made it for us… I don't want it to be ruined…" She was pouting, and she knew it now, but it was important to her.
Keeping his arm around her waist, Yukito kissed her forehead. "I know you did. Can I help it if you're distracting?"
It wasn't the first time he'd told her that, but honestly, so soon after the baby, she didn't feel very "distracting." Erin glanced away, suddenly showing a demure and somewhat forced smile. "That's me and my post-baby body, totally distracting…" She wondered if Yukito noticed the extra baby weight she was still carrying, and none of her old clothes fit right any more. She'd put on a dress for tonight, which was the closest Erin could come to "fitting right" without spending the money they'd saved for the baby on something as silly as new clothes. She missed being able to still shop in the junior's section even after getting married, and now she doubted she'd be able to go back to that. At all. And the black shirtdress she was wearing now didn't have sleeves, which she was suddenly very conscious of. It occurred to Erin again that she never used to be that self-conscious about how she looked…
"I happen to like you and your post-baby body," Yukito replied quietly, leaning forward to nudge his face close to hers. His hand rested on the small of her back, then trailed up to squeeze her shoulder affectionately.
"You have to say that," Erin muttered, tilting her head to rest on him again and begrudgingly pushing away the dish. "You're legally bound."Even though the fact that he did want to keep kissing her and holding her made her doubt her own severe thoughts somewhat. But he could still just be saying it, to keep her from crying and ruining their date… "I'm never gonna go back to how I was before, you know that, right?"
"Yeah, I know that." His arm slipped from her shoulder to wrap snug around her waist, his hand resting on her stomach. "But I also know that I don't want to go back. I didn't know it was possible to love any child the way I love Rae… and you and your post-baby body made that happen. I wouldn't trade this for anything." Erin still looked down, putting her hand on top of his. He wasn't the one having to deal with the ever-morphing body… "Erin, look at me." Instead of waiting for her, Yukito gently pulled her face up to his with his fingers under her chin. "I mean that. I love how you are, because it's given us something I never expected. I wouldn't go back for anything." As if to prove his words, Yukito pulled her tightly to him, giving her a long and drawn-out kiss that seemed to have become so rare in the recent weeks. "You just keep amazing me," he muttered before kissing her again, and maybe it was still her emotions still out of whack from their nine-month stint, or maybe she had just grown into a natural weeping willow or something, but his words had made tears well up and spill out of her eyes as she kissed him back. And unlike rain-kisses, crying and kissing somehow seemed so much better. It seemed so much more meaningful, memorable, and put thoughts of pasta and post-baby-bodies out of her mind.
Eventually, they did get around to the pasta, and the towels worked well-- it hadn't grown cold. The only problem was what to do with it afterwards, when Erin wanted to walk around. They ended up deciding to take it down together to where the car was parked, and make that part of their walk, even if parking garages weren't particularly ideal date-night locations. They'd had to park relatively high up, and all the while up the rickety elevator and into the garage, Yukito and Erin remained linked by their arms, Erin's free hand carrying the towels and utensils, and Yukito carting the dish. As they approached, the car, though, Erin stopped short, catching Yukito off guard and making him stumble for a moment before Erin gave him a stern nudge. Finally his eyes followed hers to see what had caused the sudden stop-- at the other end of the lane was the dark figure of a human near the driver's side window. "Breaking in," she whispered in his ear, gripping Yukito's arm tightly.
A tiny nod from Yukito confirmed what she'd thought, and she felt him move forward. Immediately Erin's grip tightened and she yanked him back, glaring at him in the darkness and shaking her head. Not without me, you're not, she thought at him adamantly. "Erin," he hissed quietly, objecting to her objection but not having the time or safety to tell her why in a way where she would listen. Instead before he could stop her, Erin broke free and stormed in the direction of their car. "Hey!" she shouted-- more screamed, really-- at the dark figure, gesturing all the meanwhile. "Hey! Hey, back off!" Yukito chased after her and caught up with her soon enough, but by that time they were close enough for the dark figure to turn into a young human face, looking flustered and caught red-handed. He must have been maybe four or five years their junior, and had backed away from the car with his hands up.
"I swear I wasn't doing anything bad to your car," the stranger insisted, stuttering and stumbling over his words. He didn't hesitate to defend himself, pointing a nervous finger at the windshield wipers. "Seriously, look!"
Without saying a word, Yukito strode over and plucked the little papers that were folded under the protection of the wiper. "It's money," he muttered, turning to shoot another look of suspicion at the stranger.
"It-- it was a church thing," he explained, looking a lot more scared now than Erin had initially thought. "We each-- each got a random bill, and it was crumpled so we couldn't tell what bill it was, and we were asked to give it, even--even if we could, you know, keep it. I was just giving it, but I thought…"
"You thought you wouldn't be caught?" Erin finished, the dubious expression on her face having melted away. That was really sweet of him, if he was just giving away money… It was something she would like to do, too, being a little Secret Santa or an earthly angel or something and giving away little surprises like that… But Yukito still seemed wary. He stood there and uncrumpled the bill. "How do we know it's not fake?"
"Yukito!" she chided, peering over to see the bill. "Why would he do that?"
"Here, look." The guy was holding out his phone, a number selected. "You can call my youth pastor if you want. He's the one who gave it to me. I-- I didn't mean to cause any trouble, you know..."
"It's fine," Erin said before Yukito had the chance to respond. Somehow she felt so much more relieved now, she hadn't realized how worked up she'd been. "You know what? It's fine. Put your phone away, it's fine." She looked at Yukito when she repeated it the last time, pointedly. "He was being nice," she whispered, putting her arm around him. With her free hand, Erin waved to the stranger. "Nice to meet you! Bye!"
With an awkward wave, the guy skittered off, and Erin turned to see Yukito staring at her, an expression on his face that she couldn't identify. "What?"
For a moment he didn't say anything. He just watched her, holding the wrinkly bill between two of his fingers. "You," he said, as if that answered anything.
"What, 'me?'" Now he was just being frustrating. Of course, now he just shook his head. And she thought he was even smiling. "Yukito!"
"I love you," Yukito decided, pocketing the bill -- which Erin later learned was a fifty-- and sliding the dish onto the floor of the car, right behind his seat. Erin followed with the towels, too, but when she pulled her head back out, Yukito had placed himself in the front seat.
"What? We're leaving already?" She stuck her head in the open driver's side door, eyeing him with a disappointed expression.
As an answer, Yukito reached up and captured her by her waist, pulling her down towards him until she had fallen into his lap. "You're not the only one who can change plans on a whim, you know." He kissed her before she could react, but when he pulled back, she couldn't react with anything but a smile.
"Aw, I'm finally rubbing off on you," Erin teased, returning his kiss as she wrapped her arms around his neck.
"Yeah," Yukito muttered between kisses. "That must be it." Their kisses continued, a multitude of simple actions that couldn't seem to ever lose their meaning. Eventually he whispered to her, "Want to try for number two?"
"Yukito," Erin giggled, as she pulled away just enough to speak (which meant her lips were still brushing against him as she spoke). "No more babies yet…" she murmured, taking him literally. He just chuckled and continued his trail of kisses. "Fine, no babies… Just me and you. There's a whole car here, you know…"
When they arrived back home, Yukito had made a promise to himself to surprise her with a trip to some kind of feel-good-mom day-- a spa or boutique or something, just something to make her feel spoiled like she deserved, and beautiful like she was. He'd had no idea until she had mentioned it that the post-pregnancy additions to her body bothered her that much. And he didn't trust himself to buy clothes for her. But he wasn't going to mention any of these ideas to her-- just surprise her. She had the best reactions to surprises…
Erin's arm was wrapped around him as she walked beside him up to the door. She took advantage of the moment where he stopped and searched his pocket for his keys to lay her head against him, sighing contentedly. "Let's go say good night to our daughter," he whispered to her, making her beam as they walked into the house, trying to be soft about it in case Rae was (hopefully) asleep.
She wasn't. She was, in fact, in Cassie's arms, as she fed the tiny baby from a bottle, on the couch right next to the door. That stopped both the new parents short. Automatically, Erin held out her hands to receive Rae. "Oh, here, let me--"
"Shhh… she's just getting back to sleep," Cassie explained quietly, nodding to the sleepy-eyed child. Erin bit her lip, watching Rae drifting off into sleep. She was so precious… "She's been up since just after you left, but only got fussy pretty recently."
"Aww…" For a moment, Erin felt horribly guilty for leaving her baby. Then she remembered what she told Yukito, and mentally tried to make the goofy emotions take a hike. "Well, once she's asleep, you can give her to me and we can put her to bed. She won't wake up too much."
Cassie nodded, smiling. "Did you enjoy your night out?"
Erin cast a glance at Yukito and giggled, making Cassie blush. "Why do I ask? Here," she said quietly, nodding to Rae. "She's done, and sounds pretty asleep to me."
Gratefully, Erin took her sleeping child in her arms and she and Yukito disappeared into the baby's room, gently placing her in her crib. Turning on the music as Yukito covered Rae in her blanket, Erin drifted back to stand at his side, the both of them watching her sleeping form as if they might miss another chance to absorb the image. "How did we make something so beautiful?" she murmured, leaning against him.
Yukito cocked his eyebrow in the dark, giving her a look. "Well, Erin, when two people love each other very much--" He wasn't going to continue much more anyway, but was cut off short by a playful jab to his side. "That's not what I meant and you know it!" she whispered, turning to leave the room with a smile.
"You know deep inside, that is so what you meant!" Yukito whispered back, teasing her as he gently pulled the door behind him, leaving a crack. The house was quiet-- Cassie and Kagayaki must have bowed out, especially if Cassie was still blushing.
"Was not!" Erin hissed back, shooting him a grin over her shoulder before suddenly stopping on a dime and spinning back around toward him. She leapt forward, capturing him in a surprise hug, and giving him a long kiss. Then, sending him a smile, Erin announced, "Daisuki, otto. Very, very much."
-Mascii(:
