I'm listening as the doctor explains what's happening with June.  She needs to have a C-section so she and the baby can both survive.  The baby will come up to me and she will be tended to by Obstetrics. 

It frustrates me that I have to hand this tiny life over to a colleague but hospital rules won't allow me to tend to family members and they belong to us.

They take June away while Beam, Pha, and I head to the waiting room to tell everyone what's going on.  As soon as I walk in Forth grabs my arm and pulls me away.  Uncle Kovit is there.  They place a piece of paper in front of me and give me a pen.

"Sign it Kit." I sign it and pass it back. Uncle takes it and leaves.

"Is this for June?"

"No, we just adopted a baby." Forth says out of arms reach.

"We did what?" I say walking closer to him.

"Come with me." He turns and walks back to the waiting room.

"I'd like you to meet..."

"Manaying, yes her daughter is one of my patients."

"Dr. Jamornkun.  How do you know Forth?"

"This is my husband.  How do you know him?"

"Husband? So you will take care of my baby too? Oh thank goodness.  I'm so relieved now."

I turn and look at Forth for answers.

"Yes, Kit and I will be the baby's parents from now on.  He just signed the paperwork." Forth explains.

Dammit! Why do they keep doing this to me? I give him a look that says he is going to pay for this. 

Uncle comes back and joins us.

"OK we do have some court matters to deal with but I have been able to officially have Forth and Kit listed as the baby's parents.  Which means ladies and gentleman, we have a new granddaughter."

I watch as Manaying quietly slips away from the situation.  I watched her after the baby was born.  She never touched her, not once.  She didn't even name her.  It must have been too much for her. 

This sweet baby has a heart problem and will deal with a lot before it's controllable.  Thankfully she won't need a transplant but she will need a few surgeries as she grows.  I'm pretty sure Forth doesn't know. 

"Come on Forth, let's go see our daughter."

I lead him up to the neonatal unit where our baby is.  I call ahead and explain what's happening to the staff.  When we arrive we are greeted by the head of our department.  He will be taking over her case.

We walk over to her and look into the incubator.  She's so small.  The tubes look massive against her tiny body and my heart squeezes a little.  Now that she's mine, my heart immediately accepts her and aches for her pain.

While we are talking June's baby is wheeled in.  I go and look at his chart and check him over.  No he's not my patient but I dare them to say anything to me.

I look him over and make sure I agree with the assessment.  You know what the worst thing for a doctor is? Having another doctor as a patient's guardian.  I'm worse because I know more than most doctors in this section.  And that's not just me being cocky.

"KIT! Come here." My head snaps up and I run over to Forth.

"What's wrong? Did something happen."

He has a blank look on his face.  He is staring at the incubator and is pointing at something.  His eyes are tearing.

"Forth, what's wrong?" My gaze fallows where he is pointing.

I look and it's the crib card on the incubator.  I guess they changed it like I asked them to.

"I named her Boonsri, after your mother.  I thought we could call her Love." I say.

I should get to choose something after all. I didn't get to choose anything to do with our marriage OR the fact that we now have a child.  I don't think taking this liberty is asking too much.

I'm studying his face for his reaction.  Forth grabs me and pulls me into a crushing hold making me drop my cane.  I smile and hug him back.  He looks down at me and starts kissing my face.  My forehead, my eyes, nose, lips, cheeks.  Everything he can get to receives a kiss.

"I love you Kit.  I love you so much.  Thank you. Thank you for doing this for me."

"Anything for you.  I love you too."

I back away and we look at our baby together.

"She's got long road ahead of her." I tell him.

"Good thing she has us then huh?"

"There's probably going to be a day she wishes she didn't have all of us though."

"Yep, like her first day of school."

"First recital."

"First date." We both say. 

I wrap my arms around him and look at our daughter.  Not exactly what I wanted right now but I'm ok.  We'll take her, we'll love her, and raise her well.

We paid Manaying's hospital bills.  It was the least we could do.  We also set up an account for her with a monthly stipend, not because we had to but because we wanted to.  She was very grateful, I'm sure she didn't expect it.

She was discharged a few days after we took custody of Love and we assume she went back to her family.

So here we sit basically taking over the wing.  We have two babies here.  Luckily we're such a large group, we have been able to alternate people giving both babies round the clock attention.

June's baby is lucky, he's just early and so far no complications.  He just needs to grow.  June named her baby Itthipat but calls him Bas.  She says it's after her two favorite boy love actors, whatever that means.

It's been two months since the babies have been born.  Both kids have new nurseries just waiting to be lived in thanks to our engineers.  Alice's baby has one too even though they still have two months to go.  Whenever I go home I go and stand in her room.  I wonder what she'll think of it.  Will she like the color? Is her bed comfortable? Will she love the stuffed animals we picked out for her, the clothes?  I know it's stupid, she's only two months old but still I want her to love everything.

Love is officially ours now and the birth certificate lists our names as the parents.  It would normally take longer, at least six months but Beam's dad pulled some strings and got a judge to look at it sooner.  Once it was determined that everything was done above board and that we in no way coaxed, coerced, or forced the adoption our petition was granted.

Truly we could have waited the grace period but I think the elders were getting nervous and wanted closure with this.

Just three more months and Love gets to come home.  Bas goes home next month.  Love will have her first surgery at four months old and it's best if she stays here before and after the surgery. 

The closer the surgery date gets the more nervous I become.  I'll be like every other parent, I'll have to wait in the waiting room.  I won't be able to be in there.  I won't be able to control the situation. I won't be able to jump in if a complication arises.  I am going to have to trust someone else's judgement.  I'm not sure that I will be able to do that. 

Not with my daughter.