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Emma smiles at her. “He is.”

Biddy touches one finger to the blanket near his foot. “Can he meet Sprout tomorrow?”

“We might wait a little longer than tomorrow,” Emma tells her.

Biddy’s face falls. “Sprout will be sad.”

“He’ll survive,” I say.

Babs looks up at me. “Can we hold them?”

“When everybody’s ready.”

She nods because apparently becoming a big sister has made patience possible for at least thirty seconds.

Mom comes beside me and looks down at her newest granddaughter. “How are you doing, Benny?”

I glance around the room before answering.

Babs is asking whether babies can sleep in bunk beds. Biddy is telling Emma she can teach her brother how to color once he learns to hold crayons.

Theo is visible through the doorway with flowers tucked beneath one arm and a stuffed wolf in the other, waiting until the girls stop crowding the bed.

Mom stands beside me. Emma watches us with our son against her chest.

My daughter shifts against me, and I look down at her before meeting Emma’s eyes again.

Babs is asking Mom when the babies will be big enough to play with her, while Biddy has moved on to explaining that Sprout can meet them if somebody holds his collar.

Emma listens from the bed with our son tucked against her chest, smiling despite how exhausted she looks.

Our daughter shifts against me, and when I adjust the blanket beneath her chin, Babs comes closer to inspect what I’m doing.

“Daddy, you gotta hold her head.”

“I’ve got her.”

“She’s wiggly.”

Babs puts one hand against my arm as though she’s prepared to assist if my parenting skills deteriorate, and the gesture brings back another hospital room, another baby in my arms, with Celeste beside me telling me almost exactly the same thing.

The memory hurts, but I don’t turn away from it.

Biddy climbs onto the chair beside Emma and starts telling her brother that he’ll be allowed to use her crayons when he’s bigger, although apparently the purple ones require permission.

Emma catches my eye over Biddy’s head and reaches toward me.

I carry our daughter closer and take Emma’s hand, fitting my fingers through hers as Babs wedges herself against my side so she can see both babies.

Mom watches all of us from the end of the bed, and I know Celeste would have laughed at Babs supervising me, worried about Biddy introducing newborns to an eighty-pound dog, and cried over the two babies Emma and I are holding now.

I can miss her here.

My hand tightens around Emma’s as she leans toward me, and I kiss her forehead before Babs starts another question about when her sister can sleep in their room.

“Ask me again when she’s older,” I tell her.

“How old?”