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One hundred and six
El won’t stop staring at her ring.
We are in the backseat of the car heading to the hotel for dinner when she reaches up to give me a kiss. Leaning on me, she smiles at her ring again. I think I did right by her. Her mother will be happy. We had a long, loud, argument about this. About the vow renewals too but that will be after El delivers.
“I have two rings,” El says, hand stretched out in front of her. She rolls Mother’s ring on her middle finger. “Does that make me Lord of the rings?”
“Lady of the rings, maybe.”
My phone vibrates with a text from Joshua. He wants to know if I did it. I facepalm at his request of a picture. It’s one more thing I have to get better at. Capturing the memories on camera. I nudge El with my elbow to show her the text. Her hand eventually lowers, she nods eagerly and strikes a pose, flashing her teeth in all the selfies. She knows she is pretty.
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El sneaks an arm around my waist. Her belly is bigger now. Our babies will be showing up soon. She leans on me for support while we wait for the private elevator. It was her idea to get out of my office to buy crackers. A little fun fact: We have boxes of crackers at home. If she wasn’t pregnant, her attitude would have been suspicious but with pregnancy, anything goes. Rule number 123432444: Never argue with a heavily pregnant woman. It will end in chaos. We enter the elevator with my hand on her lower back. Our reflections on the metallic wall smiles at us and El laughs. I set my suitcase on the ground and palm her face for a proper kiss. With the pregnancy due, her office has become mine. She spends more time with me than anyone else. I love it. Her lips taste like donuts. We ordered some an hour after she arrived to “pick” me. I will never let her drive in her state but she enjoys using that term even if she was brought here by a driver. She r
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Choruses of happy birthday fill the air. I am dragged away from El before I can kiss her back or utter a reply. I was so worried she would forget about today I forgot it myself. Mother nudges me with her hip and grins. Well played. Even the girls were in on it.Joshua claps my arm. “Happy birthday, brother.” This idiot. He called me during the day and didn’t wish me anything. “Many happy returns.”We cheers to my new age and Bren pulls me to the living room where the real party is happening. The place has been redecorated. There are balloons tied to the wall, a table with a bigger cake on it and the words, “Happy Birthday, my love” written on it.There’s another cake. Well, there are three more cakes. Instead of my love, one has son, the other has brother and the last one has Daddy written on it. A cake from each of the most important people in my lives. My wife. My kids. My brother and my parents
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Chaos breaks out. Everyone is all over me and El, saying so many things at once. The smile sitting on her face disappears. Tears fill her eyes, her nails dig into my shoulders so hard I’m sure it will leave a mark.She is hurting.Annika is speaking so fast, asking about the baby things. Mother is telling everyone to calm down. El is crying, she doesn’t want to go to the clinic with a wet dress. I don’t know what to do. I wasn’t present for the first pregnancy. Mother pushes me aside and helps El to her feet. I almost scream. Is she allowed to stand? What if our kids fall out?I rush to El’s side. Mother guides her through a breathing exercise as what she calls a contraction hits El. It must have really hurt. She balls my shirt and makes a pained sound that stops everyone in their tracks. More than six pairs of worried eyes pin her in a stare but she focuses on only me. My baby.“I’m okay,”
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The cries of our newborn babies snap me out of my sleep. I jerk up and check the time on the alarm clock. 7 pm. I groan into my hands.My life has changed since their arrival. My sleeping pattern has worsened and my knowledge about babies has increased.Babies poop a lot. They cry too damn much. They don’t need a reason to cry, just existing is enough reason for them to cry. It is exhausting.Brandon Langalethu Stark is the louder one. Brendan Lelethu Stark is quieter. Annika gave them their middle names with approval from their godfather, Joshua. Lelethu means ours while Langalethu, short for Langa means our sunshine. I must admit, he hasn’t been a ray of sunshine for a while. He’s a big ball of noisy energy. El rouses from her sleep at the incessant sound of her crying babies. I love my sons but they cry too goddamn much. Their cries are coordinated. Once one of them starts crying, the other twin is bound to join in.
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I am stalking my wife. I am cyberstalking her with no intention of stopping. Her figure moves across the screen of my laptop, I follow it with a sad smile making its way to my lips. It still feels so surreal, almost like yesterday when she asked for a divorce with teary eyes. I can still smell her on me, the new shampoo enriched with a mix of unidentified fruits. I never got to ask her the name. The memories wash over me, I slouch in the seat and allow myself to relive them. To feel them like I have done for five years. My eyelids flutter open, it takes a second for me to process the new view, I realise I have been transported back to the mansion, to our room. Back to that day when everything fell apart. “I killed him,” I whispered. I glanced at her pregnant frame seated on the edge of the bed, the thick cover hanging from her chest was the only item of clothing she had on. She stared at me with a lost expression, I squirmed in
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