– Mum, congratulate us, we’re going to have a baby!” Frank beamed with happiness like a new light bulb. “A baby, Mum! My son or daughter!
Sarah’s face reflected a whole range of emotions, which ended with an expression of universal grief.
– Frank, what a baby, you’re just children yourselves! Where to give birth to Charlotte, she can not follow herself.
– Mom, you are not very happy, I see? What about your endless moaning that we have no children, and without children it is not a family? Now we’ll have a family! Be happy for a while! You’ll have a grandson or granddaughter!
– No granddaughters! Just a boy!
– Why?” Charlotte said in surprise.
– Because I have sons, two grandsons. What to do with a girl? Definitely a boy!
Charlotte and Frank looked at each other and both smiled. They did not know who they were waiting for.
– Well, we have to go, it’s late. We’ll call you tomorrow,” Frank kissed his mother on the cheek.
On the way home, the husband and wife were laughing and making bets.
– If a girl is born, I will make your every wish come true!
– Do you want a daughter so much?
– No, I want to see the expression on my mother’s face.
– Frank, you’re wrong. Well, think about it! She really doesn’t know what to do with a girl. She’s more used to boys.
– Sometimes, dear, you can keep your thoughts to yourself. Especially on a day like this. She is told that she will have a grandson, and she dictates the terms.
– Don’t overreact. We just stunned her.
– How? We’ve been married for five years, and, you know, children can be born from that. And every holiday she says her only dream is grandchildren.
– Okay, we’ll wait. In the meantime, let’s think about how to make repairs in a small room and arrange a nursery there. I have seen such interesting projects. But let’s do without pink and blue, okay?
Charlotte knew her husband well and closed the unpleasant topic.
Frank and his mother had a complicated relationship. He was a late child and his mother raised him with a fervor that sometimes turned into obsession and a commanding tone that any general would envy. No objections were accepted. By the time he was in his thirties, Frank had figured things out, learned to separate his love for his mother from the side of his life that he defined as personal, and slowly things got better. The first marriage, on which his mother once insisted, with a “girl from a good family”, broke up in two years, because the young surgeon, ready to live in the operating room and the model, who is quite successful in her career, had really little in common. They parted quite amicably, without mutual claims and reproaches. Six months later Frank met Charlotte and realized that this was the real thing.
Mom accepted her new daughter-in-law without joy. She was polite and correct with Charlotte, and periodically expressed dissatisfaction with one or the other to her son. Frank let everything pass by his ears, for him his wife was the best thing that happened to him in this life.
On the day they found out the sex of the child, Frank took Charlotte home and went to work. After cooking dinner, Charlotte decided to lie down because her legs were aching, but then the doorbell rang.
– Sarah, hi! What a surprise!
– Hi, Charlotte. Is Frank at work?
– Yes, of course, he should be here in an hour.
– Good. He said you finished the nursery. Can I see it?
– Sure, come on in.
Charlotte opened the door to the nursery and Sarah froze.
– Interesting color scheme. Why not pink or blue?
– We decided to depart from the standards. A beautiful shade, right? They say that green is good for the eyes and soothes. And it will suit both a boy and a girl.
– Do you know yet who it will be?
– We already know. They told us today. We’re having a girl!
– That’s sad. Frank wanted a boy.
Charlotte frowned.
– Did he tell you that?
– He was always very decent and tried to protect other people’s feelings. Well, it’s something that can’t be fixed. Would you like some tea?
– Yes, of course, let’s go to the kitchen.
The protocol fifteen minutes allotted to Sarah for tea passed almost silently. Charlotte either remained silent and listened, or answered without really listening.
– Delicious cake! Thank you, Charlotte, I have to go.
The mother-in-law left and Charlotte sank down on a chair in the hallway and cried. That’s how Frank found her when he returned from work.
– What is it? Time to buy a humidifier?
– Why? – Charlotte sobbed.
– Well, you’re creating dampness, apparently, there is not enough humidity in the house.
– Tell me, did you really tell your mother that you only want a boy?
– What nonsense! Who told you such nonsense? Wait, let me guess! Well, I…
– Wait a minute! You didn’t?
– No, of course not! I’ll call and find out what’s going on!
– Don’t do that! It will not lead to anything good, only quarreling. Frank, we don’t seem to have any family holidays before the birth?
– I don’t think so.
– Then let’s say that I went to my parents for a couple of months. In this case, I will not have to meet your mother, and then we will see who will love whom and how.
Four months later Charlotte gave birth to a healthy, strong girl. At first, the grandmother avoided her granddaughter. Charlotte coped well with the baby on her own, but once a week, or even more often, Sarah’s phone rang:
– We really need you!
Charlotte was a little cunning and called her mother-in-law for help. She nodded to the advice, thanked, did it her way and continued to slowly observe what would happen. And closer to a year, the little laughing Tina was already howling ropes from the strict Sarah, and she was unrecognizable. Even Frank did not remember his mother smiling so much.
– Mom, we have news! You’re going to be a grandmother again!
– Oh! Why so soon? It’s a stupid question, of course. But what about Tina, she’s just a baby.
– What about Tina? Charlotte smiled. She’s worth going on a reconnaissance mission with. Right, Tina?
– Yes! – Tina slammed her spoon on the plate and laughed out loud.
