#oursims

"Don't worry," Freeman pulled her in close to him, wrapping his arms around her shoulders, hugging her from behind. "They'll be completely fine with your Grandpa and Rose."

She sighed and leaned her head back against his chest, "I guess. It just feels wrong. Hey, why didn’t my sister call me and ask if she could come get Caleb to play with Brookie? Why would she call you?”

“I texted her first.”

“Why?”

“To see if I could borrow the twins’ sleeping bags from when they went camping a few years back, but then Sophia reminded me that we just bought new ones from when we went camping up along the coast.”

“Hmm..” Faye pulled away and headed back into the house, pouting. “This all still feels wrong. I miss my babies.”

Freeman stayed outside until he could no longer see their car before following Faye inside. She sat at the kitchen table that was covered in papers and a calculator. This was the fourth time he's found her like this. He knew she was stressing over something financial since she kept going over their bank statements and their current bills. He'd even seen her looking up stuff about houses on the market on her laptop when she wasn't aware he was there. He watched her until his phone vibrated in his pocket. He knew what it was without having to pull it out and check.

"Babe," Freeman started after closing the front door. "I made reservations over at La Comeda for us to have dinner, why don't we go take a shower and afterwards you could slip into that beautiful little red dress that I like taking off of you so much and we'll go have dinner. What do you say?"

"I say, no." She stood, reaching to gather the loan statements she'd picked up from a few banks in the surrounding area.

"No?" He looked wounded. She felt instantly horrible for turning him down so hastily.

"I'm sorry," she sighed. "I just didn't know you'd made reservations and I have a lot on my mind right now. Can we just stay in and make dinner, maybe watch a movie or something?"

"If that's what you really want."

She looked up at him, she'd really hurt his feelings more than she'd realized. "Ok. We can go."

"No, you don't want to."

"Really, I do. I just jumped the gun. La Comeda you said?"

"Mm... but I can make you a better Mexican fiesta than they can. Why don't you pull up RedBox on your laptop and see what's new and we can go pick it up and get some snacks for later also."

"Or, I can just go get dressed and we leave now to go eat at La Comeda's." She dropped the stack of papers on the table and headed for their bedroom, but Freeman grabbed her around her waist and pulled her against him. She immediately went tense.

He held her firmly against him, his chest against her back. He didn't move, but she could feel his heart beating and his breathing changed. She stayed very still, his hands were so close to her belly. Too close. She closed her eyes and pressed her lips together as his hands moved slowly from her midsection to her lower abdomen where they met with her rounded belly. A single traitorous tear escaped from the corner of her eyes that were still squeezed tight. He moved his body to her side and slowly eased himself down to the floor, lifting the hem of her shirt up. Underneath was a belly band, the ones you buy at the Maternity Stores. He broke the rubber band that held her pants fastened together, unzipped her jeans and grabbing the top of the belly band he pulled it and her jeans down until it released her swollen abdomen.