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When she opens the door to her dimly lit bedroom to find her husband lying flat against the floorboards, Ingrid can only laugh.
“You almost made it,” she teases, crossing her arms as she approaches. The bed is only a handful of feet away from where Sylvain lays.
He doesn’t even look up at her, which is a shame because she enjoys it when he pouts at her. Instead, she watches his chest deflate as he slowly blows out all the air in his lungs.
The man is so dramatic sometimes. He’s just lucky that she doesn’t mind.
“ Ingrid ,” he groans, draping an arm over his eyes. “I. am. so. tired .”
She laughs again. “The girls run you ragged?”
He grunts something that Ingrid takes as an affirmative.
Ingrid can’t help it. Not when it’s so easy. “Now look at that, never all my years would I ever imagine, Sylvain Jose Gautier, the mighty war hero, bested by a couple of girls.”
Even in this light, Sylvain’s tired smile is bright. “You’re really enjoying this.”
She nudges him with her bare foot. Automatically, Sylvain scoots over, even when there’s already plenty of space on the floor. “Why wouldn’t I?” Ingrid continues as she finds her place next to him. “It only serves you right.”
He doesn’t fight it, he simply shrugs and says, "yeah, well..."
Poor Sylvain does sound exhausted but it’s the kind of exhausted that she knows he loves. It is nothing like the exhaustion that comes from work and war. This is something else. This is the exhaustion that you sink into. It is the kind that allows you a soft and easy slumber at night.
It comes with peace. Peace and parenthood.
It is not always so easy, this they both know, but some days are better than others.
She turns to lay on her side. The floor is not so comfortable but Ingrid doesn’t mind it when she gets to see Sylvain in profile. Even when he covers half his face, he is still strikingly handsome. He has only grown more handsome in his age. It is both entirely unfair and incredibly wonderful.
“Did you have fun?”
His smile stretches wide. “Of course we did. I know how to throw a party.”
She’d roll her eyes but Sylvain wouldn’t be able to see it so she reaches up to pull his arm away from his face. When he turns his head to grin at her, the urge to kiss him is so fierce that she doesn’t fight it. She wouldn’t be able to anyway.
When she pulls back, she simply settles into his side. It is not long before his arms wrap around her, pulling her so close that her head settles comfortably on his chest.
“The girls asleep?” he asks.
“Yeah, I just put them to bed. Took a while though since they were wired up on cake.” She pokes him in the side. “Thanks for that by the way.”
“I think there’s more downstairs if you want any.”
She shakes her head. “Too tired.”
“They got you too huh?”
She swears she can hear the smirk in his tone. She’d swat him but her husband is just so warm and so comfortable. Now that she’s here, she can’t even imagine moving. She suddenly understands the appeal of laying on the floor of a barely lit room. “I still blame you,” she murmurs into him. It is all too easy to close her eyes against the steady beats of his heart. “And the cake. Too much sugar.”
“You have to have cake at a birthday, Ingrid. Since when were you so against cake?”
“Since it left us both on the floor of our bedroom.”
“Yeah, well, I can’t exactly move right now, can I?”
“Neither can I.”
He laughs. “I guess we’ll just have to stay here then.”
“Guess so.”
She feels him press a kiss on her head. For a moment, he stays quiet, happy to hold her in his arms but then, very quietly she hears, “I think we did well.”
Ingrid shifts so that she hovers right over him, cradling his jaw with one hand while the other props her up. “We did,” she says firmly, searching his eyes for any trace of the very old insecurity that still hides within him sometimes. “Sylvain, we did.”
He simply looks back up at her, expression soft. He is searching her eyes too. Then, finally, after a long moment. He nods. “We did, didn’t we?”
Ingrid smiles, relieved and reassured. In truth, that old insecurity wells up in her too sometimes, but when she’s with Sylvain like this, it feels like it’s something they both can learn to carry.
And truly, he is just such a good father.
When she kisses him again, she feels his smile against her lips. It’s almost enough to make her want to keep going. Almost. But not quite.
She is rewarded by his pout. “That’s it?”
“I thought you said you were tired.”
He groans. “I am,” he says, “but never too tired for you.”
She laughs again and presses a kiss against his cheek. “Not on the floor.”
It is funny how that jolts him upright, taking her along with him. “Sylvain!” she shrieks.
He hushes her quickly as he lifts her. “Shh,” he teases as he drops her on the bed, “you’ll wake the girls.”
“Can’t have that, can we?”
“It wouldn’t be very good of us, no,” Sylvain says as he settles over her. Her arms circle his neck. “But I think I know how to keep you occupied.”