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13: Stomach Kiss
She hadn’t thought he’d take the news so well.
She knew he had insecurities about his upbringing from here to the Seine and back. She’d expected meltdowns and midnight nightmares. She’d worried that he would withdraw, pull into himself, fret and panic and push her away. The most she’d hoped for was for him to take it calmly, with grace — to stay open with her and to the possibilities.
She hadn’t expected this.
She hadn’t expected the excited chatter or the honest enthusiasm. She hadn’t expected the stacks of pregnancy books to start piling up by their bedside or the little onesies to make their way into their shopping cart. She hadn’t expected to wake up to fevered kisses, little prayers and thank yous and I love yous pressed into her nape, across the breadth of her shoulders.
She hadn’t expected this, but the more she thinks about it, the more she thinks that maybe she should have.
He loves kids, loves playing with them and listening to them and working with them in his shoots. Mamon had adored him back in their teenage years, had eagerly asked when Marinette would babysit with him next, had begged to spend time with the three of them together.
(Maybe the look on his face whenever she’d caved to Mamon’s pleas should have been hint enough.)
A tug on the book in her hands broke Marinette out of her reverie (she had been looking over the same paragraph for ages now without really reading it), and she glanced up to see her husband gently drawing it loose.
“Hey,” she protested, quiet and sleepy and not all that bothered.
He gave her a wry grin. “What chapter were you on?” he asked, freeing the book and waving it with a finger trapped between the pages she’d stopped on.
She leaned forward to see if she could spy the page, but he twitched it away from her, scolding, “Ah ah ah ah ah!”
She fell, a dramatic collapse on her mountain of pillows braced against the headboard, then pouted and made a guess. “Eight?”
He checked. “Ten.”
“Darn,” she giggled, giving up the book and going for Adrien instead.
“Ah, your page-” he warned, bracing himself on the pillow mountain and holding her book out of firing range as she twined her arms around his neck and pulled.
“Leave it,” she murmured, nuzzling his neck with a happy little sigh. She’d have to reread it anyway; it wasn’t like she’d registered any of those last few pages.
“You say that now,” he grumbled, returning the nuzzle.
“Mmhmm…” she purred, warm inside and out and seduced by the embrace of this muffled, exclusive little bubble of them.
He pressed a kiss to her temple, soft and sweet, then pulled away and pressed a kiss to the slight swell of her abdomen.
“I love you,” he whispered — to it or to her or to them both, Marinette didn’t know.
It didn’t matter. He loved them, and they loved him. The rest was all semantics.
“‘Love you too.”