Chapter 34

A couple of hours later it was time to feed the boys again. Laura had been sedated, her OB still had a few things to learn, so Mike and his mom washed up and gowned up and were allowed in together to feed the little guys with what Laura called a high powered formula designed for malnourished children. She had used it many times in her exploits around the world.

The Neonatologist ordered that the boys be fed every two hours for the first few days to help them gain the weight that they needed.

While the boys were being fed the rest of the firefighting family gathered at the window to watch, Chet and Marco had finally gotten the news and were there to see the new additions, once the little ones were fed and burped Mike managed to take both of his boys in his arms and walk to the window where his friends and brothers could see them.

"I know Mike told us they were going to be small, but I had no idea how small, small could be." Chet exclaimed when Mike turned his back to hand the babies back to the nurses. "Are they going to be alright, I mean no birth defects or anything like that?"

"Well," Roy started to answer, "The Doctor's have been giving Laura a high powered drink to give the boys the stuff they needed to grow the best they could for a while now so they think everything will be just fine. They just need to keep them fed and watch for any complications. Their biggest fear is that they'll catch something before they develop the immune system to fight it."

"So how long are they going to have to stay in the hospital," Marco wanted to know.

"That depends on how fast they grow," Johnny answered this time.

"But even when they do get them home they're going to have to restrict the number of people around them for a while yet." Roy added, so his crewmates would understand there would be no parties at the Stokers for a while nor would it be likely that the Stokers would come out to parties for several months now.

"What about the parties tonight?" Chet asked since he and Marco had been out picking up the gift for Mike when all the excitement was happening.

"There's been a change of plans," Roy informed, "Mike has agreed to represent Laura at my Wife's party so us guys are going to get together at my place like we planned only now we'll just stay in the back yard and the women will join us when the burgers are ready."

"I happen to know Mike didn't get any sleep last night and with all this excitement he's going to need a nap," Hank advised all the wrong people.

"With all this excitement I doubt he's going to be able to take a nap," Johnny figured out loud.

-0-

By mid afternoon Laura had slept off her sedation and Mike felt confident that he could safely leave the hospital. His mother took him home and helped him clean up the mess in the bathroom and then stayed while he showered and changed for the party and then she took him with her to the DeSoto's where she would do at least a little to help get ready for the party.

Roy managed to coax Mike to relax in the recliner in his den and he was asleep before Roy left the room.

It was the sound of laughter and the flash of a camera that woke Mike, before he could get his eyes open he heard the door to the room shut. Mike had no idea how long he had been asleep but the sounds coming beyond the newly closed door told him that the party he was supposed to be standing in for his wife had started.

Pushing himself upright in the recliner, he could immediately tell something was different. He was having difficulty sitting up straight thanks to something on his chest but before he could figure out what that was he needed to get the stringing mop out of his face, something that was going to take more than just pulling it off of his head. At least that was the case if he still wanted his own hair left when he was done.

Parting the dark strings that had fallen in his face Mike looked down at his chest to see a large T-shirt had been stuffed with a couple of pillows and sewn across the bottom to keep them in and then the T-shirt had been safety pinned at the shoulders to his shirt. It took a minute for him to read upside down but on the front of the shirt was printed, 'I Believe in Miracles'.

The laughter that he heard beyond the door was unmistakably Jester Chester and John Gage and then the door opened again and standing there holding the door knob was good old Cap.

Cap started holding his breath and turning red in the face and then he couldn't hold back any more, he just burst out laughing and bent over to slap his knees. Mike had no choice but to join him in laughter as he looked down at himself. Mike tried to pull his stomach padding off and noticed the back of the t-shirt. Printed there were the words 'You Sexy Thing.'

"Thank heavens they had the side showing that they did," Mike continued to laugh then he accepted Cap's helping hand to get to his feet and for the sake of the rest of the crew giggling in the door way he proceeded to waddle around the room with his hands on his back complaining of a back ache.

The next all out laughter from the doorway belonged to Mike's mother.

Hank and Roy helped Mike out of his costume then guided him to the bathroom where he was turned to the mirror to see the lipstick that needed to be washed off.

When Mike was done washing he turned to Johnny who still had his camera in his hands, "You are going to give my wife a copy of those pictures aren't you?"

John just snickered and nodded his head with emphasized affirmation.

"She'll get a kick out of that," Mike leaned against the door frame and smiled. "You know when we were out buying maternity clothing I found all these t-shirts with fun sayings on them and I picked out a few I wanted Laura to look at, anyway I showed them to her by holding them up to myself and she laughed at me saying I was in too good of shape for anyone to take me seriously if I wore them. I guess I should have stuffed a pillow up my shirt then."

John just smiled one of those my face is about to start killing me type of smiles as Mike smiled next to him.

"Please just tell me this is not a dream, I really am a father right? The twins are going to be all right now?"

"Not a dream, it's going to be quite a while now before you're going to get a good night sleep. I think you still have all those Polaroid photos in you jacket pocket if you need more proof." John smiled and placed a hand on his friends shoulder.

"Thanks again for being there; I didn't know what to do when we reached the end of the umbilical cord."

"Glad I could help out."

Mike gave another glance in the mirror to make sure his face was clean before he headed down the stairs into a room full of women.

Mike's mother stepped up to his side and took his elbow pulling him toward the scary room while John just wiggled his fingers in a good bye motion before heading out back to help Roy cook the hamburgers.

Mike was seated in a prominent chair after he started a stack of photos going around the room and the questions started coming. "How big were they?" "Was it a thrill to deliver your own babies?" "How is Laura doing, is she glad she didn't have to have a C-Section after all?"

"What are you going to name the babies?" Mike was preparing to answer that question when his mother spoke up.

"Please tell me you're not going to let them put baby boy 1 and baby boy 2 on the birth certificates!"

"No," Mike answered then started to laugh, "We're going to name the babies after their grandfathers, but we didn't want to have a Jr. or a third in this case and make one of the babies think they were more loved than the other one. So we're mixing up the names a little. We'll name one Michael Carl, My Father's first name and her father's middle name, and the other one Gregory Jaron; her father's first name and mine's middle name. We just need to decide which one to name which and how to tell them apart so we can keep it straight."

The women ahh'd and laughed as the pictures continued to be passed around and then they started handing gifts to Mike for him to open.

Package after package of matching baby clothes in all sizes, handmade quilts to compliment the nursery, shoes, booties, toys, baby carriers, a couple of savings bonds and stuff Mike had no idea what it was. Thank heavens JoAnne was at his side writing down what was received and from whom so Laura could at least direct the writing of the thank you notes later.

Then a package was handed to him by Emily Stanley and Mike had to chuckle at the two pair of hand crafted boxing gloves used to decorate the package. After admiring them for several minutes and trying to see how they were made, he then carefully opened the package to find handmade outfits from the Cat in the Hat story he had been reading his sons while they were still inside of Laura. He was now looking at the preemie sized outfits labeled 'Thing 1 and Thing 2' complete with attached hoods sporting bright red fur on top. She also included dolls to wear the outfits when the boys out grew them. If there was one gift that stood out among all the rest that one was definitely it. Leave it to Hank's wife to come up with the perfect gift.

Under the circumstances it was decided to forgo the cutesy shower games and the entire party joined the noisy firemen out back for burgers and salads. Mike found the phantom with his back turned and walked up to place him in a choke hold and rub his knuckles across his head. That's when he noticed the big box on the picnic table that had clearly not been wrapped by a woman.

"Don't tell me you guys thought of something else you could give me after everything the phantom has been leaving in my locker the last two months?"

"That was just little stuff," Chet spoke up with a smile as Mike moved over to the package.

"There are a few things that every first time father really needs," Hank started speaking, "The disposable gloves and nose plugs are on that list," Laughter rang out among both the men and the women, "But what lay ahead of you needs to be properly documented for posterity," Hank then changed the tone of his voice, "And, so when your sons are teenagers you can have something to remind you that they were once cute and lovable."

With that Hank handed Mike the package and he already had a pretty good idea what was inside. First he opened the card and found a list of at least thirty names of fellow firefighters throughout the county that had contributed to the gift then with a smile Mike tore the paper away from the box to realize it was a box for a case of oranges, pulling the top of the box off Mike found inside a lot of wadded up newspaper that quickly got tossed over his shoulder till his found the boxes for a very nice still camera and a movie camera.

Lifting the movie camera box Mike looked it over then looked to Johnny, "Wow guys this is great, I, I don't know what to say, you're going to teach me how to use it aren't you Johnny?"

"I think the instructions are inside the box," Chet called out; at least I think you can read.

"Yeah but are the instructions in English?" Marco piped up.

"Thank you guys, Wow, thank you," Mike stammered.

Roy knew just what Mike needed next, "All right everybody, let's eat."

00000

Three days after delivery Laura was diagnosed with a post delivery infection. Probably because there hadn't been time to pull on sterile gloves before she delivered. All that really accomplished was keeping Laura in the hospital until the boys had grown enough that their doctor was willing to let them go home when she did.

Mike was grateful for that, after all that Laura had been through and all that he had been warned about by other doctors and friends Mike did not want to take Laura home without her babies. Once they were home Mike was ever grateful for his mother's help and it didn't take him long to start to feel comfortable holding his tiny sons, of course he thought it was because they were growing but even then they were still tiny.

The routine was that when Mike was home and the babies cried Mike got up to get them and brought them to Laura. Laura had been shown how to nurse them both at the same time and then when they were finished Mike would take one of them to burp and then they would both go change diapers and slip the babies back in the crib they were to share for the first three months. That's when they started keeping each other awake and needed to be separated.

When Mike returned to work he beamed with news that the boys were now a whopping eight pounds, and every shift after that started with a weight report on the twins.

Eighteen doctors and several nurses got together and supplied the funds to hire a nanny for a year and Mike and Laura were pleased to find a grandmotherly type who was willing to live in their basement apartment while she worked with them. The plan was once the boys were a year old then Mike and Laura would hire JoAnne to take care of them while they were both at work.

When the boys were six months old Laura brought them to a safety fair where Mike was working along with his crew showing the fire engine.

It was Marco that noticed Laura coming in their direction with a boy in each arm and sent Mike to give her a hand.

"Hi there," Mike called to his sons as he slipped between them to give their mother a kiss.

Instead of just taking one of the boys Mike held his hands out and waited to see which one wanted to come to him.

"Oooh," Little Michael Carl sounded with wide eyes as he pointed to the big red fire engine behind his father.

Gregory Jaron didn't say anything he just moved so that he could see around his father to get a good look at the big red engine.

Hank was soon at their sides laughing, "Like Father like sons," he laughed as he gave each boy a small plastic replica of a fire helmet and when Mike took one of the boys Hank took the other one and they were both given an up close look at the engine before all the men and their families gathered in front of the engine to have their picture taken.

That was the picture that Mike took with him to his new station when he was promoted to Captain. Those men and their families had been much more to him than mere coworkers.