How A Fluff Cares For Sleepy Girls

[A/N: After doing one new story to this series, I immediately got the urge to do one more. With a bit of a time skip. Maybe I’ll even do another one, we’ll see. Hopefully you don’t mind getting the stories in little bursts like this, rather than regular intervals.

I just wanted a bit of domestic slice of life with some good girls.]

Chris was done studying for the day. She hadn’t quite started the final year yet, but she still had to prepare herself. Good grades didn’t happen on her own, and she had her thesis to worry about in the coming year. Not that she was super worried or anything, but she wanted to do well.

She opened the window in her room to let some of the stuffiness out. It was definitely getting warmer as Spring progressed, but not quite warm enough to sit with the window open all day. She took the time to stretch her arms and back, before heading into the living room.

Miku was still at work, but Hibiki should be home. There was someone they couldn’t leave all alone, after all. Chris ended up finding both of them on the couch.

Hibiki was sound asleep, and so was the little body lying on top of her. Their daughter Ena, who was approaching her first birthday in about a month.

Chris didn’t want to wake them, but she couldn’t help shaking her head a little.

She could at least put that thing away before falling asleep.

Hibiki had clearly been breastfeeding Ena. Both her and Chris had gotten injections that let them produce milk, so they didn’t push all that burden onto Miku. One of the upsides of several mothers. There were plenty of other challenges anyway, so anything they could do make it easier was a relief. It had still meant a lot of sleepless nights over the past year, but at least they could take turns comforting her. Ena was a fussy baby, though she had started to calm down a little.

Chris crouched down a little to get a look at Ena’s face.

She’s so cute when she sleeps. Both of them are.

It was already clear that Ena resembled Hibiki a fair bit. It would probably be a while longer before they could see what traits she had gotten from Miku. She had Miku’s eyes. Everything else looked to be mostly Hibiki so far.

And currently they were both drooling in their sleep.

Like mother, like daughter. Well, I can’t just leave them like this, I should get Ena to bed.

First off she took a cloth and gently wiped the drool off Hibiki’s face. That girl could sleep through a storm, but Chris was still careful. And she couldn’t resist running a hand through Hibiki’s hair. Hibiki had grown up into a fine-looking adult. Her handsome face and muscular physique would make any girl’s heart skip a beat. She still had the same messy hair that Chris had known from the start though. That was one thing that had not changed.

Very carefully Chris lifted Ena up, wiped her face, and got a good one-armed hold on her. Then with her free hand she could cover up Hibiki’s breast, and draw a blanket over her.

Can’t let the dummy catch a cold. Contrary to the old saying, she can absolutely get them.

Getting Ena to bed was a similar measure. Letting the baby sleep in the open with just a regular onesie wasn’t good enough. Better to have her sleep in a proper place.

Instead of either of them going on full maternity leave, Hibiki and Miku managed to get an arrangement that let them alternate their days off. Miku felt it was important that Ena got to see all of them as much as possible, and the other two weren’t inclined to disagree. Chris couldn’t really take days off from studying, but several of her classes offered online lectures, and she was always on call, so to speak. If anything was up, she could leave the university at any time to come help, and then catch up on her studying later. She had a friend who was willing to share notes, and accept any handouts for her whenever Chris had to leave.

The three of them had different parenting styles. Hibiki tended to spoil her daughter rotten. Miku was far more sensible in her approach, but still leaned on the soft side. Chris tried to be like Miku, and was handling that fairly well so far, but she was a bit of a pushover. That would come more into play later as Ena became more interactive, and could ask for (demand) things, but for now Chris lived under the illusion that she was a completely responsible parent.

They had grandparents willing to help out as well. Genjuurou had been even more eager than expected to take on the role of grandfather, and Miku’s parents liked coming to visit as well. They were even talking about moving closer so they could stop by more often, something Miku had conflicted feelings about. She wanted to be an independent adult, after all. Hibiki’s side was still a complicated issue.

As she entered Ena’s room, she could feel the bundle in her arms stirring, and she looked down to see a pair of green eyes looking up at her.

“Oh, did I wake you?” Chris said quietly. “I’m sorry, sweetie.”

Ena yawned. “Ma…ma.”

Chris felt a jolt in her heart. She’s so cute! ‘Mama’ had been Ena’s first word, even if one could argue it was barely a word. It was just two syllables that were easy for a baby to say. She had since also starting saying ‘no’.

Ena called all three of them ‘mama’, and they all loved hearing it. Chris was just as thrilled as the other two, even if she wasn’t a biological parent. She certainly didn’t love Ena any less because of that. Miku had come with an interesting proposal, though. There was new technology that allowed an egg to be fertilised by more than one person. So they could have children with all three of them involved. None of them were against having more children at this point. Chris was still not comfortable actually bearing a child though, but Hibiki was willing to do it this time. In fact, she seemed kinda eager to do so.

It was probably a good time to get that process started as well. There was some waiting time involved, so by the time they got Hibiki implanted it would probably result in roughly a two year gap between the children when born. And Chris should be done with her master’s degree around that point. It wouldn’t be too bad taking a year (or two) off to focus on the children afterwards before she found a job. At heart she was looking forward to it. A little.

Ena was squirming in her arms.

“Since you’re awake anyway, I guess I should check your diaper,” Chris said in a calm voice. Ena liked being talked to, and sung to. Chris hoped that meant she had a soothing voice.

Thankfully Chris didn’t have much aversion to gross things to begin with, so diaper-changing wasn’t a big deal to her. Afterwards she could try to figure out whether Ena wanted to get more sleep, or more food. While they still relied on breast milk, they had started her on a bit of solid food as well a couple of months back. At this point baby food, and mushed fruits were a regular part of the diet. Miku had chided the other two for feeding Ena too much, but she was a growing baby, so surely there wasn’t a problem.

As she laid Ena down on the changing table, she noticed yet again how the child’s eyes followed Chris’s swaying hair tails. She was the only person in the household with long hair, and Ena seemed absolutely fascinated by it. She tried to grab it, and pull on it, frequently. It wasn’t just Chris though, she reacted the same way whenever Tsubasa, Shirabe, or Maria were over. It was apparently the length of the hair, and not the person possessing it, that was the important thing.

With the diaper changed, Chris picked her child back up. Even though it was a lot of work caring for a child, she felt rather fulfilled by it, and she was sure the other two felt the same. Sharing the work between the three of them was probably a big part of it. Chris was not certain she could have handled it on her own. She was actually pretty certain she couldn’t have.

It didn’t take long for Ena to go still in Chris’s arms as she carried her back out. Apparently she had been quite tired after all. Her and Hibiki were probably playing while Chris was studying, and they had both worn themselves out.

Speaking of which, she found Hibiki in the living room, sitting upright, and rubbing her eyes.

“Chris-chan?” she said groggily.

Chris raised a finger to her lips in a shush motion. Thankfully Hibiki got it right away, and didn’t say anything more while Chris put Ena to bed. She left the door slightly ajar so they’d hear if Ena started crying, then sat down next to Hibiki.

“Did you have fun today?” she asked.

“Yeah.” Hibiki yawned. “Didn’t mean to fall asleep though.”

“I guess that’s another way you and Ena are alike,” Chris teased.

“You think so?” Hibiki took it as a genuine compliment.

Chris didn’t have the heart to correct her. “Yup.”

Hibiki smiled, and kissed Chris on the cheek. “Thanks, Chris-chan.”

Chris blushed. It’s not fair that she’s this attractive, is it? Well, two can play that game. She turned her head, and kissed Hibiki on the lips. She had gotten a little bolder, and more confident as an adult. Even if she still couldn’t do it without blushing.

It led to Hibiki kissing her back. Which led to Chris pressing in closer. Which led to them making out. In the end they forgot to get dinner ready for when Miku got home, and had to make it up to her later.

~Wulf