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Ash watched Luca skate out onto the ice with their friends, bright white Centaurs pride jersey, the 18 on his back in the colours of the trans flag. He didn't have his stick, of course, but if he had, Ash knew his name would've been written on the end. Luca's wedding ring glinted in the light and a sliver of his chain collar was visible over the back neck of the jersey.
He watched Mac's boyfriend say something to Scott before he fell into place.
"Aw, he's crying," Ash said.
"Of course he's crying," Rose sighed, her head on Ash's shoulder. "I can't believe Scott Hunter is actually retiring."
"Like 'you can't believe you finished the nursery' can't believe it or 'can't believe Shane Hollander's dating Ilya Rozanov' can't believe it?" Juniper asked.
"First one," Rose said. "Ash, hun, love the theme, but if you could be a tiny bit less of a perfectionist-"
Ash rolled his eyes and put on his best TMZ anchor voice, "Rose Landry Bullies Pregnant Trans Man; Was Her Allyship a Fraud?"
Rose threw a pillow at his head.
"Adding assault to that? Really Rose, how could you-" Ash cut himself off, laughing as Rose grabbed the pillow and hit him repeatedly with it.
"Juni! Help!"
"Nope, I'm staying outta this," Juniper declared.
"We're getting too old for this," Rose sighed, sitting back on the couch.
"Irina's got several years worth of pillow fights left in her and my little fry better have Auntie Rosie pillow fights, too." Ash gently drummed his fingers on his stomach.
"When does Luca's mom come back?" Juniper asked, handing Ash a large warm mug of herbal tea.
"Next week, his sisters and dad are flying in for a week in July so hopefully they'll be out by then. And obviously Alex and Willow are gonna have a month full of celebrations." He sighed, shifting to make room for Juniper on the couch. "Two more weeks till we're at 35, any extra is even better," he spoke more to his babies than to Rose or Juniper.
"Want more pickles?" Jackie called from the kitchen, still in her coveralls covered in mint green paint.
"Always," Juniper answered.
"The big tub?" Ash asked.
Luca, Ilya, Shane, and Troy landed back in Ottawa late, their flight had been delayed three hours and it had already been a late afternoon flight. Ilya had spent the entire flight pestering Luca for details about Aris and Mac, details Luca was not giving, and Troy and Shane had slept the whole 45 minute flight.
They, in their infinite wisdom, had car-pooled to the airport. Which meant driving Troy to his place outside the city limits, then driving Shane and Ilya home via the Pike's to pick up Irina, and finally to his own home.
Ash was asleep on the couch, a cozy, thick baby-yarn blanket Yuna had given them at the exceedingly private baby shower draped over him, and Vincent curled up in the crook of his knees. Luca left him to sleep for a few more minutes, hanging up his coat and putting his shoes away, before heading to the kitchen to quietly unload the dishwasher and steep some more of the Swiss strawberry herbal tea Ash loved so much. He bent to feed Vincent, the giant brown fluff ball happily winding through Luca's legs and purring loudly at his return.
He returned wlth Ash's favourite giant mug full of tea, set it on the coffee table, and crouched in front of him on the couch.
"Träumst du süß, Härzli?" Luca asked, voice soft as he gently stroked his fingers through Ash's short hair. He'd cut it for Ash a few months ago, when he'd started showing. It had been a balancing act of physical changes that caused or assuaged Ash's dysphoria and the soft grateful smiles Luca earned from helping were infinitely precious.
"Hm?" Ash hummed before yawning, stretching out.
"Are you having sweet dreams?" Luca repeated in English.
"Ja," Ash answered, reaching his outstretched hands towards Luca and pulling his hands to Ash's stomach. "Your kids have been using my bladder as an ice rink since last night's game."
Luca leaned down and kissed Ash's stomach, feeling their babies move and shift. "Stop kicking your Dad, please," he murmured softly.
"How's Mac and his boy?" Ash asked, gently teasing.
"Scott is about thirty seconds away from adopting Aris at all times," Luca answered, sitting behind Ash and pressing a kiss to the crook of his neck. "They, in a roundabout way, told the Admirals and the rest of the Fuck Roger Crowell party that they're together."
"Aaaah, yes," Ash groaned, leaning back into Luca's chest as his hands cupped beneath Ash's stomach and lifted, pulling the weight off of his back. "Good for them."
"Kern and Aris have been drafted into the Game Changers camp this year, so if you decide you want me to stay home this year I can."
"One day at a time, right?" Ash hummed, raising one hand to curl his fingers in Luca's hair and holding his mug of tea in the other.
"One day at a time," Luca parroted, kissing Ash's temple.
Yuna Hollander scared Alex, he objectively knew this. She was a hockey mom who knew how to protect her family. He loved being a part of that protected family.
Agnes Haas, however, was a whole other beast. She had positioned Alex at one side of Ash's bed the second he'd arrived and told him in heavily accented English "do not move" the same way someone said "I will kill you." Alex wasn't going to move, his brother was literally in labour and his best friend was about 5 seconds away from shutdown sitting behind Ash.
"Hey Ashy," Alex greeted, taking one hand from Luca's so his hand could have a break from the vice-grip Ash had.
"Modern medicine is wonderful and I hate it," Ash spoke through gritted teeth.
"I know, bud, but you're almost done, right?" Alex looked at the doctor who was sitting on a short stool between Ash's legs.
"Almost," the doctor agreed.
"You're fucking late, Waters," Luca said.
"Willow's still trying to find parking," Alex explained. "This city's parking has gotten as bad as New York's, I mean what the fuck? Did you see that story of the guy who put spray foam in the coin slot of a payment machine last year? That was fucking wild." Alex kept rambling about insignificant things, letting Ash squeeze his hand to a pulp while the other attempted to rub soothingly up and down the length of his tattooed forearm.
Alex and his wife had already decided, given how complicated it would be, not to pursue kids. They tabled it for a maybe, when Alex eventually retired, when they weren't trying to soak up the time they had in between road trips like they were still horny college kids. After two hours of watching the person he probably cared the most about in the world, besides said wife, be in excruciating pain and his best friend reduced to being mostly helpless beyond support and sweet words... Well, he was pretty sure that the maybe was edging closer to a nope.
They could be the coolest aunt and uncle ever.
The doctor put the two screaming, pink, kinda goopy and very wrinkly babies on Ash's chest and Alex's hand was released. He shook it, trying to get feeling back into it. And he took a picture.
Quick, easy, reflexive.
Luca and Ash looking at the twins they'd created, with awe and wonder and love.
Alex waited, holding it in, until the babies were taken to be cleaned and then brought back. And Ash insisted on Alex holding them both too.
He cried, because of course he did, and Ash could tease him for it forever. He had niblings, wrapped up in hospital blankets with little knitted green caps on their heads.
For the millionth time, looking into the faces of the most innocent perfect babies that had ever existed, Alex couldn't understand how the Holmbergs had so monumentally fucked up.
"Holy shit," he muttered. "Ash, you're like a printer."
Ash laughed, the sort of hysterical exhausted laugh Alex hadn't heard from his brother since the last tech week of high school.
"I'm a 4D printer!" Ash exclaimed. "'Cause they have souls and shit!"
"The handsomest 4D printer," Agnes Haas insisted, holding out a giant cup of juice one of the nurses had arrived with. "Now drink up, Augesternli."
Besides the plush rocking chair, Ash's favourite part of the nursery was the tree. Their friends' and family's hand prints made up the leaves, and the trunk had been the Pike-lings contribution to the nursery. The rest of the walls were painted in two tones of green: one a bluer mint green and one a warmer lime green, both in soft pastel shades. At the join of the two colours across the room was a little patterned strip of wallpaper, a dark orange background with simple dandelion yellow seahorses and little rubber ducks alternating.
Seahorses had become a theme, accidentally. There were a dozen different seahorse plushies while baby mobiles featuring seahorses and sea turtles hung above both cribs that had carved seahorse designs in the thick pieces of wood. Though Luca's fellow Ducklings had made sure they were included too. There were twelve duck plushies: two giant crocheted rubber duckies, two male mallard plushies with their green heads that made duck noises when their foot was squeezed, two fluffy ducklings, two large Jellycat yellow ducks and two slightly smaller Jellycat white ducks, and two yellow soft ducks with little Centaurs jerseys on them, Haas' 18 exceedingly clear on the back.
Luca was putting Cedar in their crib while Ash finished burping Linden.
"Don't do camp this year," Ash said softly.
Luca smiled and turned on the mobile. "I already told Ilya I wasn't going."
"Illusion of choice," Ash sighed, standing up to carry Linden to their crib. "We made these people," he whispered, stroking Linden's freckle-ridden cheeks. "Like actually, fully, properly made them."
"Making them was the easy part," Luca hummed, sliding his arms around Ash's waist. "Raising them is a whole other adventure."
"I can't wait to see who they turn out to be." Ash smiled and turned in Luca's arms, draping his own around Luca's neck. "We're not letting them make any stupid rules."
"Agreed. Learning from their elders and such." Luca smiled.
"Exactly, sweetheart," Ash hummed and kissed his husband.