Ever The Same

Week 10 - Freaking Out

I been freaking out
You've been having doubts
Tell me what you want, anything at all
I just need to know now
Are you freaking out?
——Freaking Out, Spencer Sutherland

Week Ten
Your baby is the size of a prune

October 17, 2021

Grayson blinked his eyes open and saw that the other side of the bed was empty.  But then he remembered the events of the previous evening and bit back a moan. 

He'd picked Cait up from work on Friday and she'd been telling him about the research she'd started doing on twins.  On how they should share a bedroom.  And a crib.  She'd been chattering and he'd felt like his head was going to explode.

They'd gone home and had dinner, then Grayson had taken the dog for a walk, trying to wrap his head around everything.  It hadn't worked.

His walk had been interrupted by the Andersons again, who were getting a bit peeved that he and Cait hadn't accepted their dinner invitation yet.  Since the general public didn't know about Cait being pregnant, let alone with twins, he'd made excuses about the crazy preseason schedule and promised that they'd work something out soon.

But his walk hadn't been interrupted by Ethan Frazier and that bothered him too.  The Fraziers' house looked closed up and Grayson frowned at that, hoping they were just away for the weekend. 

That had distracted him from thinking about the fact that his wife was pregnant with twins.  But as he'd turned back onto his own street, that reality had smacked him in the face again. 

He hadn't wanted Cait to know how he was feeling, so he'd gone home, professed exhaustion, and gone to bed.  Not that he'd slept much, but he'd faked it.

He'd gotten up the day before and insisted that he needed to go get some extra work in.  He'd known that Cait wouldn't argue with that.  But she'd asked when he wanted to let their families know the news.

Since he wasn't sure he could say the words out loud, he'd deferred.  And gone to the gym, even though he'd seen the hurt in her eyes.

She had brought Connor to his preseason game the night before. And he'd gotten a tech. And a flagrant. The other player had actually been ejected for taking a swing at him, but that didn't matter. Twitter was at it again. After the game, Cait had taken Connor home, so Grayson left the arena alone. When they both finally got home, Cait had been angry.

He hadn't expected that. She always handled his incidents by making light of them. By teasing him or telling him it would blow over. Not this time.

She'd told him that it had to stop. That he was going to get seriously hurt. That he now had a family to consider and needed to grow up.

That had pissed him off. They'd argued and she'd gone to sleep in the guest room.

Grayson rolled to his back with a sigh. Twins. The reality was starting to sink in. And he realized that he was ruining this for both Cait and himself.

He should be happy. They should be happy. There'd been a time when they weren't sure they'd ever be able to have a biological child. And Grayson had been willing to take that risk because he wanted Cait. But he'd known all along that he also really wanted children of their own.