Heaven’s Gate
84 Watching Over Us
Tuesday the twelfth of December, Junior was five weeks old, but Matthew was nine years. He joined me at the bakery at three-thirty in the morning and I led him step by step through the entire process of making the bread. I didn’t touch anything, but talked him through the steps. Having the big Iris mixer helped because it was hard to knead that much bread at once. It was part of how I had kept my upper body strength when I was baking in the big house almost every day. I helped a little getting the loaves onto the peel, but he got them into the ovens. The other kids got there at five-thirty like usual, including Melanie and Stephanie this morning. All the kids over two and several of the Moms arrived in our little shop. If you don’t have a scorecard, that’s twenty kids two years or older since Teri, Lorelei, and Evelyn all turned two in November. There were a dozen moms present and it must have looked like a strange birthday party at six in the morning. Matthew proudly removed the loaves from the ovens and I put the next batch that I’d made up in. There was soft butter on all the café tables and as soon as they could be handled, we put a loaf of bread on each table. The moms helped tear pieces of the bread off the loaves and butter them as the kids all sang Happy Birthday and chowed down on Matthew’s first batch of artisan bread. It was perfect.
Doreen hugged me and we beamed at our son.
Through our tears. Doug wasn’t there to see his son’s achievement. At least, that’s what I thought. When we were wrapping things up and Matthew had sold fifteen of his bread loaves that weren’t consumed by his siblings and cousins, he hugged Doreen.
“Thank you, Mommy.” He hugged me. “Thank you, Papa.” Then he just glanced toward the door and said, “Thank you, Daddy. And Aunt Lexi.”
Both Doreen and I turned to look toward the door, but, of course, no one was there.
We celebrated our eleventh Christmas at the ranch. Sunday night, Christmas Eve, we all gathered in the town square. I noticed that our Christmas Eve gathering was bigger than the clan now. Bigger even than the tribe. People parked in the studio lot and walked into town. I estimated that there were more than two hundred standing in the cold. The temperature hadn’t risen above freezing since the middle of the month and while we never had more than a little snow each day, it hadn’t melted. Our village looked magical.
Rose and I led the rituals, which no one seemed to associate with any religion. The kids all came up to sing their wassailing song and do a mummers’ dance—even the two-year-olds. I think that’s what most people came for. It was Christmas and that was a time for families. We didn’t praise any gods or pray. The only thing that remained for those who had that slightly religious bent was singing ‘Silent Night’ at the end as the tree was lit.
There was plenty of hot cocoa being served in front of the café. We didn’t try to feed everyone or provide champagne. As soon as the tree was lit, at about ten, people moved to their cars and a few of us hung around the fire until it burned down. I had my baby son tucked inside my winter parka with me, content that he was staying warm.
“This is the last year,” Jessica said as she came up to kiss me goodnight. “By this time next year, I won’t be going back to Paris except for vacations. Headquarters will be in New York. It will really just be commuting back and forth like I said it would be.”
“We miss you whenever you travel, Jessica.”
“I miss you, too. I miss all of you. I even miss the children. And Xan. She is very good with languages.”
“It’s because she is very good at listening,” I whispered.
“Stop by tomorrow?”
“Of course.”
She left and John took the opportunity to step up next to me.
“Exactly what do you know about my daughter getting pregnant?” he demanded softly. It took me by surprise.
“Surely it’s too soon to tell, isn’t it?”
“Aha! I knew it was true. I’m guessing that Mary will be next. They do everything together,” he laughed. He’d trapped me. “I was thinking when I looked at the crowd tonight that we need a meeting hall for the township.” He glanced at the one empty corner of the town square. “I’d suggest a church, but I’m pretty sure it would go bankrupt in this town. And it couldn’t support a building the size that we’d need. But I was thinking that a good-sized town hall could keep the people who show up for this a lot warmer. And if it was big enough, we could probably rent out to a cable network as a sound stage. Maybe we could even have concerts or theatrical performances in it. I’d guess even a dance or two.”
“A dance, John? You are suggesting a dance?”
“No, of course not. Someone else would have to suggest that. The question is whether or not this should be a village town hall or if it should be for the whole township. Of course, we’d probably need to incorporate the town now. I’d bet our neighbors in the southwest would like to be part of that now. The new road isn’t used very much, but it connects the neighborhoods so fire and ambulance response are only five minutes away now. Think about it. Merry Christmas.”
“Merry Christmas, John,” I said. “Grandpa.” He turned to look at me with a very faked startled expression. Then he grinned and left.
We marked the beginning of a New Year and a new century with Xan’s seventh birthday and great hopes for the future. It had been a difficult year with the loss of Doug, but we also had the births of five more children in the clan. It was pretty miraculous.
A town hall. Hmm. Maybe a new studio.
By Cassie’s twenty-ninth birthday at the end of January, both she and Mary confirmed they were pregnant. It seemed Mary was about a month behind Cassie, though. It made no difference. They were both ecstatic. So were Josh and I.
On Valentine’s Day, I was at Casa del Agua to celebrate the first birthday of Douglas Darnell Swift Jr. I took my Junior with me to celebrate even though he was only three months old. As we gathered around the table I realized someone was missing. There were no big Valentine’s Day parties because it was the middle of the week.
“Where’s James?” I asked. Rhiannon rolled her eyes.
“Aunt Nicolette invited him to join her and Céleste for a shopping trip to town and dinner,” Rhiannon said. “She says she is teaching them manners.”
“Oh lord! No telling what else she’s teaching them.”
“If they come back in army boots and berets, I’m going to adjust her meds for her,” Rhiannon growled. She looked around at the other children. Brian, who we called BD, and Claudia were wide-eyed. C-Rae and Matthew were acting innocent. Raven, Douglas, and Junior had no idea what was going on. “If any of you children breathe a word of what was just said, I’ll adjust your meds, too. Understood?”
“Yes, Mama,” they chorused. Doreen and Sandy lost it and started laughing. There had been too little laughter in this house over the past year and before long we were all laughing.
“Can we have army boots and berets, too, Papa?” Matthew asked sweetly.
“Now that’s all we’d need. ‘Brian Frost, is it true you are training your children as a militia? We have photographs of children as young as two years old marching in their pseudo-military uniforms.’ It would be on the front page of every tabloid we nearly ruined,” I said.
“Stick with the house gis,” Sandy said. “We’ve already fought that battle.”
“I’d rather go naked,” C-Rae said. That was something the kids could all agree on.
I needed to get Junior back to his mommy for dinner and bedtime, so after kissing Doreen and Rhiannon soundly, I headed out. Sandy snagged my arm and said she’d walk with me. We headed the big house.
“May I stay with you tonight?” Sandy asked.
“The master suite is occupied.” I said. “We’d have to go up to the big bedroom. Are you okay with that?”
“Oh, yeah. I don’t actually want sex. Although if in the midst of kissing and cuddling down to sleep, your penis wiggled into my vagina of its own accord, it would probably find my vagina very wet and welcoming,” she said. “If it happened.”
She waited in the family room while I took my son to his mamas in the master suite. That took a little longer than expected because Samantha was in the shower. Hannah took Junior and he immediately latched onto her nipple. She gasped a little and sighed. I watched.
“It’s like a pacifier,” Hannah said. “It keeps him quiet while he’s waiting for Sam as long as he’s not too hungry. And… I… don’t mind.”
I kissed a tear away from her cheek as the baby continued getting oral gratification without milk.
“It’s like when I… well, sometimes… I still suck on Rose. We don’t have sex, though I think she might have orgasms sometimes. But it’s comforting. For both of us.”
“Hannah, honey, I’m so glad you love our son so much,” I said.
“He is our son, Brian. The three of us. I couldn’t get pregnant, but I can still help raise our son.”
“Do you think he’d like one with milky in it?” Samantha said from the bathroom door. All she wore was a towel wrapped around her head.
“Look, sweetie. Mommy’s got fresh clean titties full of nice warm milk for our boy.” Samantha got comfortable and Hannah gave her our son. I kissed Sam and turned to go. “Brian,” Hannah whispered. I turned and caught her in my arms giving her a big kiss. “Junior only sucked on one side and the other feels lonely. Could you…?”
We lay down next to Sam and the baby and I latched onto Hannah’s other nipple with the same vigor that I knew babies had. She gasped again and moaned. My fingers found her pussy and dipped into the flood of moisture. I rubbed her clit and she pulled me toward her. I managed to get my cock out of my pants with a minimum of effort and in a second I’d slid into my pixie lover. She moaned deeply.
“It’s been three months,” Sam said as she watched us. “I’d like some of that pretty soon, too.” Hannah wasn’t waiting for her. Or me. She ramped up and climaxed faster than I’d ever seen her. Then she rolled toward Sam and they kissed. I pulled out and kissed them both and my son again, then pulled my pants up and went to get Sandy. I probably smelled of sex and I was hard as could be.
Sandy had already undressed and was talking to Rose. They met me on the stairs and I followed their butts up to brush our teeth and head to bed.
Lo and behold! My penis wiggled its way into her vagina as we lay amidst my cónyuge before sleep.
Comments
Please feel free to send comments to the author at devon@devonlayne.com.
