Chapter 495 The Home Front
Gail’s POV
The estate was quieter without Julian and Katia, but it was far from empty. Grandma Celeste had taken over the kitchen the way she took over everything else—completely and without asking anyone’s permission. Aiden had appointed himself Clara’s official supervisor, which mostly meant following her around the house with his dinosaur book tucked under one arm and narrating every single thing she did.
“She blinked,” he announced from the doorway of the nursery. “Did you see that? She blinked at me.”
“Babies blink, sweetheart,” Celeste replied without looking up from the stove. “It is one of their favorite things to do.”
“But she blinked at me specifically,” Aiden insisted.
“She is four months old. She blinks at everything.”
“Not at everything,” he argued. “At me.”
I leaned against the doorframe and watched him. He was six now and tall for his age, with Julian’s serious eyes and Katia’s stubborn chin. He had been carrying that dinosaur book everywhere since the wedding, and he had apparently decided that Clara’s arrival was the most important event in the history of our family, possibly even the world.
“Your turn,” he announced, holding Clara out toward me as though he were making a delivery.
“I just held her,” I reminded him.
“Your turn again.”
“Aiden, my arms are tired.”
“Grandma’s arms are tired too. Everyone’s arms are tired,” he explained seriously. “Clara does not care.”
He was right. Clara absolutely did not care. Within the first week of her life, she had apparently decided that being held was a non-negotiable requirement, and she communicated this by screaming whenever anyone attempted to put her down. Not crying. Screaming. The kind of screaming that made members of the staff flinch and sent the dogs looking for somewhere to hide.
Celeste had tried everything. Swaddling, rocking, a pacifier, a mobile, and even a white-noise machine that probably cost more than most people’s cars. Nothing worked. The only thing that worked was another human being. That person had to be holding Clara, preferably while moving, and they had to be prepared to continue doing it for hours at a time.
“She is going to be a handful,” Celeste said while stirring something on the stove that smelled like cinnamon and apples. “I can already tell.”
“She is already a handful,” I corrected her.
“You should pray they do not come back from that island with another one.”
I laughed. “Do not even joke about that.”
“I am not joking. I am being serious,” Celeste replied. “One baby who screams every time you put her down is already a full-time job. Two of them would be a full-time war.”
“Grandma.”
“I am just saying. Katia is young. Julian is young. They have the energy for it,” she continued. “But somehow, we are the ones who end up holding the baby.”
Aiden immediately looked up at me with wide eyes.
“Are they going to have another baby?” he asked.
“No,” I answered quickly. “No more babies. Just Clara.”
“Good,” he decided. “Clara is enough.”
“Clara is more than enough.”
Celeste smiled into her pot. She had that particular look on her face—the one that told me she was enjoying all of this much more than she was willing to admit. She had been running this family for longer than I had been alive, and she had survived every possible version of chaos this house could produce. A screaming baby was nothing to her. She had probably held Julian when he was Clara’s age while he screamed just as loudly.
“You should get married,” she said suddenly, turning her attention to me.
“Grandma.”
“You are old enough. You have a good job and a good head on your shoulders. You should find yourself a man and have children of your own.”
“I am not old.”
“You are not young either.”
“Grandma.”
“I am just saying. Life is short,” she continued as though I had not protested. “You spend all your time taking care of other people’s children. When are you going to take care of your own?”
Aiden looked between the two of us like he was watching a tennis match and did not want to miss the next serve.
“Are you going to have a baby, Aunt Gail?” he asked.
“No, sweetheart. I am not going to have a baby.”
“Why not?”
“Because I do not want one.”
“But Clara is fun.”
“Clara is fun when someone else is holding her.”
He considered my answer carefully. Then he nodded slowly, as though I had just given him the final piece of a complicated math problem.
“That makes sense,” he decided.
Celeste laughed. It was a real laugh, the kind that came all the way from her belly. She had been laughing more since the wedding. More since Katia had returned to the family. More since this house had finally stopped feeling like a battlefield and started feeling like a home again.
“You are a smart boy,” she told Aiden.
“I know.”
“Too smart for your own good.”
“I know that too.”
We spent the afternoon in the garden. Aiden pushed Clara around in her stroller until she decided she hated it and started screaming. He immediately picked her up again. Celeste sat beneath the old oak tree and watched us from her chair with the expression of a woman who had already seen everything life could possibly show her and somehow still managed to be surprised by some of it.
“She likes the garden,” Aiden announced. “She stopped screaming when we came outside.”
“She likes the fresh air,” Celeste explained. “Babies are simple creatures. They want food, sleep, and someone to hold them. Everything else is extra.”
“She wants to be held all the time.”
“That is not extra,” Celeste corrected him. “That is the main thing.”
I sat down beside Celeste and took Clara from Aiden. She settled against my chest almost immediately, her small head tucked beneath my chin. She was warm and smelled like baby lotion and milk. One tiny hand curled tightly around my finger.