Mallory Winchester
Jun 3 2012, 01:54 AM
Her eyes snapped open at the feel of the kick, her hands already instinctively at the spot her little peanut hit. She grinned, even through her annoyance of being woken up. Without much more thought she rubbed the spot before letting her hand drop, her sleepy eyes closing. This happened usually once or twice a week and once or twice a week Mallory rubbed the spot (or spots) and rolled onto her side and fell back to sleep. Now that she was pregnant she slept on her back a lot, it ached and it made her feel better, but when she woke she tended to roll onto her side and tug her husband towards her to spoon. Didn’t help her back, but she liked sleeping this way much better.
Which is what she did tonight, he never seemed to mind, or really even remember she did it in the morning. She suspected he didn’t even wake after sleeping with her all these years. Normally, she fell right back to sleep and nothing came out of it. But that’s when her stomach growled.
She whined lightly, her protruding belly blocking her stomach when she tried to put a hand on it to silence it. She was having issues imagining herself getting any bigger, even if she was only six months along. She was already fat. She couldn’t possibly get fatter.
Mallory’s stomach growled again and she curled up into a tighter ball, pulling Orson closer, as if he could protect her from her own stomach.
It wasn’t working. She was hungry. She needed food now.
She pouted, all the sudden wide awake, her mind going through all the food downstairs. All the food that absolutely disgusted her right now. They had the grossest crap down there. Ice cream, sandwiches, meat. Ugh. Meat was the worst. She didn’t want any of it. What she really wanted was chocolate. Oh oh oh and vegetables. Vegetables sounded good. With a nice chocolate bar.
Her mind stretched further, but they didn’t have those things in the house right now. Chocolate ice cream, yes, but ew. She was not eating that disgusting piece of grossness. No. There was a store not too far from their house though that was open 24 hours. It wasn’t walking distance though this late at night. You never know what you could find at 3 am. Normally she’d just apparate but… well. Orson and Mallory talked in a bit of length about Mallory apparating for the 9 month span she was housing someone else in her body. She could apparate, she had her license, and had never actually splinched herself or anything… yet. But she had a hard time getting the hang of it and transfiguration wasn’t her best suit. Orson wouldn’t outright admit it, but Mallory did, they were scared she’d apparate and leave the little peanut behind. That wouldn’t be so good. So she hadn’t apparated in 6 months. She was nervous for 3 months from now when she could again. What if she forgot how to do it and left her legs behind?!
So apparting was out. Walking was out. She squirmed slightly in her bed in slight frustration. But she was so hungry. Being pregnant was annoying at 3 am. She huffed slightly, her mind reeling. She would just go back to sleep. It wouldn’t be a big deal. She’d ask Orson in the morning to apparate there really quick and get her some before he had to go to work. No big deal. No big deal. Not a big deal at all.
Okay it was slightly a big deal right now.
“Orson?”
Mallory rolled back onto her back, speaking slightly softly. He was pretty alert to the sound of her voice though, his eyes popping open to look at her.
“I want a yorkie. And one of those fancy yellow peppers. Not the green ones, those are gross. The yellow one… pretty pretty please? I’m really hungry. My stomach keeps growling and I really was a yorkie and a green pepper. And we don’t have them and I can’t apparate. Please?”
She wondered if puppy dog eyes had any effect on him what so ever.
Orson Winchester
Jun 6 2012, 04:30 AM
Something was squirming.
Orson murmured something unintelligible into the nape of Mallory's neck, and nuzzled in closer. He never did remember her fidgeting in the morning, though she claimed she did, and tonight wouldn't have been any different, his mind fogged with sleep and unwilling to commit anything to memory. He was warm, and Mallory's smooth skin scraped his as she untangled her legs from his, and his hand rest lightly on her swollen stomach; the tangible, present proof that she was his Mallory, and she was pregnant, and everything was well in his world.
Until she spoke. Orson blinked his eyes open, forcing them to focus on hers, blue and doe-like and already beseeching. Her mouth was moving, and he could hear the sounds, but she had woken him so quietly that it took his brain a moment to wake enough to pay attention.
“--please? I’m really hungry. My stomach keeps growling and I really want a Yorkie and a green pepper--”
His gaze ticked past her, to the alarm clock on their bedside table. The red LED lights glowed 3am. Despite the time, and the stars still out, one corner of Orson's mouth curled upwards slightly in the dark. He shifted, twisting over her like was now habit, pinpoint perfected positioning to keep his weight off of her. The mattress creaked slightly beneath his weight, as he lowered himself close enough to kiss her.
“Okay, baby,” he murmured against her mouth, before giving her another quick kiss and then throwing his side of the covers back.
It was winter, and he was immediately cold. His skin prickled and tightened, and he hurried to grab a sweater from the laundry pile. He yanked it on over his head, tugged on a pair of old jeans, zipped up commando, and stuffed his feet into his work boots, moving slower-than-quick as he shook the last traces of sleep from his brain. He cracked a yawn and raked a hand through his hair, as he crawled back onto the bed to give her a final, affectionate kiss before apparating from the house.
He liked taking care of her. He liked that she needed him in the middle of the night because she was pregnant with his baby and he needed to go and hunter-gatherer a chocolate bar. It was warming in the same way as the blankets had been warming, hot with their body heat and sleep, but this was under his skin, and somewhere beneath his rib cage, and it felt a lot like love, and contentment, and the deepest kind of self-satisfaction.
When he apparated into a rainy drizzle, and pavements slick with ice, just around the corner from the 24/7 store, it didn't change that. This was his job, the one thing in this pregnancy that didn't make him feel helpless by simple virtue of not having a uterus. Should Mallory but ask, he would bring her all of the damn Yorkie bars in the country.
He snagged three of them from the confectionary aisle, just in case, before heading over to the chilled section, with its sad-looking carrots and squashed boxes of cream cakes. There was one green pepper in a sea of yellow and red, quickly bagged, and paid for. Orson walked only far enough out to get off of CCTV footage before apparating back into the hall outside of their bedroom—in case she'd managed to fall asleep in the five or ten minutes that he'd been gone, and the crack woke her from much-needed sleep.
“S'just me,” he said softly, cracking the door open and slipping inside. The carrier bag rustled as he kicked his boots off, shucked his sweater, and then crawled up the bed from the foot of it. He handed his prizes over, and sat propped up by the headboard and a couple of pillows, his legs crossed at the ankle, and pressed close to her from shoulder to elbow to knee.
Mallory Winchester
Jun 17 2012, 11:11 PM
A smile burst onto Mallory’s face as he twisted over her to plant a kiss on her lips. “Thank you,” she said, though now she didn’t want him to go. She was tempted to snag him and tug him back closer. Though that was getting harder with her growing uterus. And right on cue, her stomach growled, reminding her what was growing inside her, and that she needed to feed it.
She curled up as she watched him get dressed, wide awake. While she always loved him, it sometimes struck her how much she loved him at random moments. This was one of them. She didn’t think she could love him more, really. She had loved the boy since she was 14 years old, fell in love almost instantly. She had always loved him. But it had happened when she became pregnant. He was so amazing. If she wanted anything, he was on it before she could even say it. If she did say it, he was standing up and on it before she could consider getting up. He was so attentive, making sure she was always comfortable. He was great at the doctor’s appointments too. Always asking the correct questions, making sure they were as ready for the next stage of pregnancy as possible. It made her grin just thinking about it. She couldn’t have dreamed of a better father to be. He was wonderful and the child wasn’t even here.
“Bye,” she whispered as he disappeared after a final kiss, placing a hand on her stomach. It was like she was whispering so she didn’t wake the little nugget up. She absentmindedly looked out the window, the stars twinkling slightly, as she waited. She didn’t have to wait long, he was back almost instantly.
A bright smile appeared on her face as he returned, handing over the bag and sitting beside her. She snuggled into his body heat and tore into the bag, starving.
That’s when she realized. She was wrong… this was so not what she wanted.
Mallory hesitated as she help up the green pepper. She thought she wanted yellow… she didn’t even remember anymore. She had changed her mind last minute. But now she wished she had a yellow one. The green one smelled all wrong.
“Baby,” said Mallory hesitantly, her stomach growling. The smell of the green pepper was making her want to vomit though. She was pretty sure that phase was done. “This one smells funny. Did they have yellow peppers there? Oh oh oh and roast chicken crisps?”
Orson Winchester
Jun 18 2012, 04:43 AM
The winter chill in the air—and in the rain—outside had cleared the sleep from him like a broom sweeping through cobwebs, but the bedroom was darkened, and warm, and it was easy for Orson to turn his thoughts back to sleeping. He was mulling over whether or not Mallory would make him get out of his jeans, idly stroking his thumb over the swell of her stomach, when she piped up.
He knew that tone of voice. It was her 'I know you're not going to like it' tone of voice, reluctant and just a little bit preemptively pouty. Orson lifted his head from where he had rest it gently against hers, and he knew that expression, too—oh, man, did he know that expression.
She was going to throw up.
A mixture of alarm and wariness jolted through him, ending any hope he might have had of getting back to sleep quickly. His hand stilled on her stomach, knowing that it didn't take much some days. There was also little he could do about it, and he hated that.
“You alright?” Part of him was already filing away the new grocery list—different coloured pepper, and some of those crisps she hadn't been able to go near until she'd gotten pregnant. It seemed like she must have been if she was thinking with her stomach. “Sure thing.” Orson twisted, reaching up to smooth down her hair and place a consoling, apologetic kiss to her temple, before snagging the green pepper from her and getting up again. He shoved his feet back into his boots, yanked the sweater back on over his head, and apparated into the kitchen to toss the offending vegetable in the bin before moving on to the store.
A yellow pepper, check.
A multipack of Walkers roast chicken flavour crisps, check.
Back track to grab a red pepper too, just in case, check.
It was the same guy behind the counter, raising a finely arched eyebrow. The instant Orson asked for the red pepper to be in a separate bag to everything else altogether, however, seemed to solve the mystery, and the look on the cashier's face became both knowing and sympathetic. The brotherhood of expectant fathers. Who knew.
Orson worried his fingers through his hair as he strode back out into the drizzling rain, finding the gesture somehow reassuring even though it was self-applied. He yawned, tiredness beginning to set in behind his eyes, like a physical, live thing. Once more, he apparated home, into the corridor outside their bedroom. He kicked the door open a lot less carefully than he had the first time, and sat on the edge of the bed instead of up by her. Keeping the red pepper for himself for the moment, he handed over the other bag, and waited for her ruling.
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