Gen 1.14 Welcome, Ash!

Lewis and Lupe had accounted for the small town gossip mill, but hadn't accounted for how it would effect her friends and family. Her daughters were cautiously excited and her friends were concerned knowing Lewis' reputation and inability to settle down. She hadn't considered what to say to Shane or how to say it when one day at custody exchange he said, “I hear congratulations are in order?”

Lupe blushed noting the tightness in his jaw, “I guess so.”

“I can't tell you how to live your life, Lupe, but Lewis strung Marnie along for years. Why didn't you tell me? I had to find out from the cashier at the corner store!” Shane was tense.

“I'm sorry, Shane, I was planning on telling you... I just didn't know how.”

“I didn't even know you were seeing anyone!”

“Oh come on! What do you think I do when Hazel is with you and Juniper is out with her friends? Knit!? Play solitaire? It's not like you ever asked and don't think I don't know about your exploits...” Lupe said crossing her arms over her chest.

Shane felt the anger and shame well up inside him and bit back a response after catching sight of Hazel watching them. Hazel was literally standing between them, glancing from one to the other with an aprehensive look on her face. She had never seen them fight. Shane couldn't even remember ever having a fight with Lupe. They'd been in love when he went to jail and then... Things just kind of faded. Maybe they'd have gotten married if he hadn't been so stupid and gotten caught. They'd never gotten any closure, they just kept going. Shane never got closure, he was just doomed to live with what-ifs and if-onlys.

Lupe instantly regretted casting Shane's dating back at him, even if gossip had linked him to Nina briefly. She directed her attention back to Hazel, “Did you have fun with Daddy, mija?”

“Yeah! We had Damaris over on Saturday and then I had scouts on Sunday! I found a crayfish! Daddy got a snake and he let me feed it! Did you know that boa constrictors unhinge their jaws to swallow mice!? It's so cool! After scouts, we went to Aunt Marnie's and I played with Jed and Jo! Jo's been calling me 'auntie' which is so weird! Did you know that Jo is Damaris's stepsister?! It's so weird! Jo says that Jas asked her if she wanted to be a big sister and Jo said no so they're not going to make her a big sister. Damaris said that no one ever asked her opinion on that. Then she got sent to time out for sassing. Damaris gets sent to time out more than anyone else, that's not fair! Why didn't you ask me if I wanted to be a big sister? I like being the little sister! Why can't I have a puppy instead of a brother?”

Shane laughed and ruffled her hair, “I may be biased, kiddo, but I think brothers are more fun than puppies.”

“That's cause you like snakes best, Daddy!”

“And what do snakes do?”

Hazel started laughing and yelling “No!” as Shane picked her up and hugged her tightly, “Constrict!”

Lupe had to laugh, he really was an excellent father.

So far, the pregnancy had been going smoothly and all the ultrasounds had been coming up normal. Only she, Lewis, Leah, Elliot, Maru, and Dr Nelson knew the true nature of this baby. Dr Pang, her obstetrician, knew the baby had been conceived via invitro fertilization which he considered odd given that he hadn't discussed any difficulties with conceiving with her and hadn't even known she had been trying. After her care had been transferred to him from Meadow Glen Fertlity Clinic, he had spent considerable time going over her chart and the paperwork that had been given to him from the fertility clinic. The whole thing was very irregular, there was no labs or notes prior to those pertaining to the embryos and placement. He kept meaning to check in with them and request the additional documentation, but there were more pressing matters demanding his concern.

Lewis had found that it was quite easy to behave lovingly towards a woman who was carrying your child. Meadow Glen was charmed by their bachelor mayor playing family man and escorting his girlfriend and her children to the park or to the diner. They ate it up when Lupe showed up to a fundraiser where Lewis was spotlighting education. The donors especially loved it when the baby began kicking during cocktails and Lupe called Lewis over to feel it and he declared that the baby must be enjoying these canapes as much as he was.

Lupe was enjoying a fairly easy pregnancy even if she wasn't enjoying all the subterfuge. She hated pretending surprise over carrying a boy. She hated the nonsense she was hearing from people about how now her family would be complete. Now that she had “her” boy. She had been enjoying a window into Lewis' softer side as he saw to her care and comfort and he reminisced about his lonely childhood.

One evening towards the end of her pregnancy, he brought over photo albums to look through. Lupe had been expecting vinyl binders full of plastic sheeting with pockets, but these were leather bound tomes filled with thick archival paper. The older photos were black and white with frilly edges of the Altermans when they'd first moved here before the town's founding. The pictures of his parents as children were the last of them in black and white. His mother's debutante portrait was in color. She stood on the staircase in a highwaisted, squarenecked white gown with elbow length gloves, her honey colored hair hanging in a ripple down her back. His father was his mother's escort at that ball, but their body language didn't suggest any affections between them. There were a few pictures of them dating, then on a yacht for their engagement party. Then wedding pictures. She was blushing and lovely carrying pink tulips down the aisle, he looked like a Dan doll with silver and gold hair sculpted back within an inch of its life and a warmth to his eyes. They'd honeymooned on a sailboat and there were a few pictures of his mother curled up wearing a mariner's sweater and shorts on deck in front of the sunset. There was a polaroid of his father standing on the yardarm, hugging the mast, silhouetted against the sky, looking tan and windswept.

Then there were babies in their long, white christening gowns and formal family portraits. His sister's debutant portrait, then pictures of Lewis acting as escort for various girls looking young and dashing in a tuxedo. There were pictures of his high school and college graduations and some neatly scrapbooked newspaper clippings as he began his political career and then his parents obituaries and a lot of empty pages.

Lupe looked up at Lewis after reading the obituaries, “What were your parents like?”

When Lewis answered it was to the question he wanted to answer and not the one he'd been asked. “Great-Grandfather Alterman owned a mine and the town sprung up around it. Grandfather expanded the operation to include smelting and Father ran the business after him. He was either working, sailing, or down at the club. He didn't have much to do with us children, or mother. They had separate spheres and really only came together for social events. Mother had her charity work and her meetings with other important women in the area. She hosted dinners and soirees... Her family owned a shipping company, the marriage was advantageous for both families. I think they must have loved each other, once. You can see it in the pictures. Mother always had help when we were small; there were nannies and tutors. We'd be cleaned and dressed up and brought down before dinner to remind our parents of our existance and then marched back upstairs to the nursery for the night. We were sent off to boarding school at age eight, other boys cried at night in the dormitory. I didn't, it wasn't that different.”

Lupe reached out and took his hand, her heart aching for the child he was. They sat, hand in hand for a while with the albums piled in front of them.

At thirty-eight weeks, Lupe went to bed convinced she would be pregnant forever. She stood in the bathroom and washed her hands after peeing for the twentieth time that day, “Look, baby, it's closing time. You don't have to go home, but you can't stay here! Lupe's body hostel is closing it's doors and you will have to find a new trampoline! I can't stand a single day more of this!” She slowly lowered herself onto her bed and started positioning pillows to support herself as she sprawled on her side. She awoke in the gray light before dawn, thinking she had a cramp in her side. As she slowly ratcheted herself up and off the bed it coalesced into a contraction. She grabbed her notebook and wrote down the time and when the pain eased she went to the bathroom. When she got back out, she had another one. She jotted down the time, and saw ten minutes. She kept track of her contractions as she began puttering around beginning the day. By the time the girls got on the bus, they'd increased to every 6 minutes and she called the doctor and Lewis. They met her at the hospital. At one the next morning, Ash Alterman was born a healthy baby boy at 8 lbs, 6 oz and 20 inches long, with both mother and baby in good health.

The next morning, Lupe woke up in a bower of flowers. As she checked the cards she discovered that it wasn't just her friends and family that had sent them, but also the local paper, local business owners, and anyone who was anyone in the town. She felt kind of empty as she realized that Ash's birth was being used to curry favor with Lewis and worse still that this would all be normal and expected to Lewis. When he came after breakfast, she asked him, “Are you ok with the fact that Ash won't grow up the same way you did? I'll do my best for him, but he won't have all the things you're used to.”

“I'm happy he won't grow up the same way I did! He'll have a mother and sisters that adore him! He won't care about silk christening gowns and Oxford educated tutors. He'll have you, his miraculous mother who made him from nothing.” He put his arm around her and gazed down at the little bundle she was holding. The baby was redfaced and scrunched up, looking even more ancient than he did. How had he ever been so small and helpless? One of Ash's hands had worked its way up and out of the swaddle, on instinct Lewis stuck his index finger into the palm of his hand and Ash gripped his finger tip tightly. They sat like that until Ash started fussing and a nurse came in to ask many questions about feces, both Ash and Lupe's. Lewis gladly excused himself.

When they were discharged the next day, Lewis helped them home and asked Lupe to take a picture holding Ash in the lab. He wanted to start filling the photo albums again.