Flicker

14

May 18, 1991

A three-month-old baby Stevie has noticed is something else. She's laughing and clapping her hands. She's not rolling completely over but if Stevie puts her on her back and she's doing something Aubree will try to roll to where Stevie is. Aubree loves her little gym thingy and she enjoys grabbing at the dangly things. She's still sleeping in a bassinet in there room with them but she's sleeping longer into the night which is glorious for Stevie and Lindsey. 

They're laying in bed, waiting for Aubree to wake up for the morning. 

Stevie has her head on Lindsey's chest and she sighs looking up at him. "Thank You, Lindsey, for doing this with me." 

"Well, of course, it's our baby's first public-ish appearance. I wasn't going to miss it for the world." Lindsey rubs her back. 

Today was the day that Stevie was launching her baby clothes. She had worked all night to set up the section in her shop and she sent a good chunk to Kohl's also but this was the official release event. She does a press conference and the store hosts this big sales event with balloons and treats and mingling, it attracts a lot of not only famous people but townspeople as well simply because Stevie's there from open to close 10-9, and she takes pictures and signs autographs. Normally Lindsey won't go with her, but since it's a baby line she wanted to bring her baby but she wasn't going to bring her baby by herself. 

"Do you think it'll go okay?" She asks.

"I think it'll be fine." Lindsey kisses her head as the baby cries from her bassinet. 

Stevie pulls away from Lindsey and swings her legs over her side of the bed and reaches into the bassinet. 

"Oh my god," She says.

"What?" Lindsey asks.

"Lindsey her hair's coming in." Stevie gasps lifting the baby up and bringing her over to the bed. She cradles her in her arms, and brings her right hand up to finger through the tresses.

"She's got dark hair. I'm surprised. She looks like you, has your eyes I figured she'd have your hair too but I guess she's going to have mine." Lindsey chuckles.

"It's too short to tell if it's going to be curly though," Stevie explains. 

"Honestly babe, I don't care either way but we need to get ourselves ready." LIndsey grins kissing his wife's head. 

"You're right. Her little dress and bow are sitting on her dresser. It's red can you grab it for me, and a diaper and the wipes?" Stevie asks.

"Sure." Lindsey sighs crawling out of bed and making his way across the hall.

While Lindsey's gone she sits her baby up against her thighs and starts tickling her tummy and making faces pulling giggles out of the little girl. 

***

The whole thing is a skeptical and as much as Stevie hates it, she absolutely loves it. When their car pulls up the paparazzi are already sitting at the door of the shop and the reporters. And people are lined up down the block. Mostly expectant mothers, others just normal people who want to take advantage of the fact that Stevie's going to be there.

"How do we go about doing this?" Stevie asks. 

"You get out first. I've got Aubree just distract them." Lindsey states fastening the Bjorn baby carrier around himself. It's great really, she hates the Bjorn and he hates the wrap. Therefore the Bjorn is situated for his body so he can get it on quick. 

"Okay, just cover her face, the flashes you know." Stevie states.

"I know." He nods. 

When Stevie steps out of the car, the flashes arise and she smiles and waves for all of them. She was wearing a black dress with a lace overlay and she flaunted it. Lindsey waited until the "press conference" part of the day was underway before he made his way out of the car, their daughter safely tucked to him. 

"So what made you decide to do a baby line. You started out with couture red carpet wear and now you're in stores and you have a line for all ages." 

"I still do gorgeous gowns and suits for red carpets, but I can do a lot of things. I designed my wedding dress, both of my sister-in-law's wedding dresses. But to answer your question, I wasn't going to. I simply was not going to. The adult line is one thing but kids and babies I never had the want to do that until my niece was born. She just turned four and I liked making outfits for her so I just said well yeah, let's do a children's line. As for babies. I got pregnant. I was trying to think of a creative way to tell my husband and I went into a baby store. The little outfits were awful looking and they felt itchy and just unpractical. Don't get me wrong the store was amazing and I got all of our nursery stuff from there but I wanted my baby in well made, soft, comfortable clothes so I immediately got to work and I started drawing and I made four or five outfits and that's how I told my husband I was pregnant." Stevie explains. 

"Now your little one," 

"Yes, she's a great baby. She's got a wonderful personality. Not shy at all, she's the cutest thing ever and I love her so much." Stevie grins. 

She answers a few more questions and then finally opens the shop where Lindsey ultimately hands her the baby as soon as she enters. "I've gotta pee." He whispers

Stevie just chuckles and situates the sleeping baby in a different way. Instead of having her head in the crook of her elbow she pressed her head to her breast. She was holding her like that, mingling with her shoppers and her workers when Lindsey came back and wrapped the baby wrap around her.

"Much better," Stevie kisses him causing coos to filter around the shop. 

Throughout the day she helped customers pick out some clothing, baby or otherwise and by the time they got home they both passed out in the bed, still in their clothes from that day, they're baby sleeping between them.