Twelve Days (It takes two): Day 6

It was the start of Ryan’s paternity leave and it was 10am and he had only just decided to get up. Sarah had been subtly prodding him by telling him the time every 15 minutes in the hope that he would help her get everything ready for the baby’s arrival. She was fully immersed in her nest building and had already rearranged the lounge 4 times by the time he made it downstairs.

“Finally Ryan, at last, about time…I have been waiting for you to get up.”

“Wha..what?! I thought you were busy rearranging the lounge?”

“I was doing that to keep busy whilst I waited for you.”

“Oh, oh right. So what do you need me to do then?”

“I’m so glad you asked…here’s the list!”

Ryan stared blankly at the piece of paper he now held in his hand, the list seemed to be of a similar length to the Homer’s Iliad, and he didn’t have any idea of where to start first. He pottered about the house on the pretence of getting ready to start on the jobs and as soon as Sarah left to go to her mother’s he picked up the phone and called his friend.

“Hey Mike, how are you? Are you ready for Christmas?”

“Hi Ryan. I’m good. Glad that I have finished work for the Christmas break, gives me a chance to do some things I enjoy. What about you? What are you up to?”

“Oh, nothing much. Sarah has left me a huge list of jobs.”

“Really, you have all day to do those, why don’t you meet me at the Red Lion pub at say…noon?”

“I don’t know…”

“C’mon…first rounds on me.”

“See you at noon!”

Ryan screwed up his face and tried to focus. Had the door always swayed like that? He held tightly onto the flap of the letter box and stabbed the key at the door. Several attempts later and still with no success, he stooped over to peer through the letterbox and whisper gently to Sarah. Apparently, gently in his current state equalled the same decibel rating as a fog horn, which he only realised when the door was flung open and a very unimpressed Sarah stood glaring at him. Before he could utter a word, she spoke..

“Ryan, I am so angry right now, where the hell have you been? You didn’t leave a note or anything, you could have been lying in a ditch somewhere!”

“Shhhh…Sair…shhhhh…I don’t know any ditches anywhere….shhhh…youre so beautiful when youre quiet..”

“WHAT?! Just go to bed. I don’t even want to hear your excuse.”

“I love you Sarah” he said as he swayed forwards towards her and swung an arm around her neck.

“Oh please..don’t hang off me…you are too heavy…just go to bed Ryan.”

“I love you so much! I know you won’t believe me…*hic*… but even more than cheese and pickle sandwiches.”

Sarah raised an eyebrow.

“Whaaaat? I know I don’t like pickle but I mean, if I did like pickle and I put it in a cheese sandwich and I ate a lot of them and then I really loved them because we spent so much time together. I would still love you more!”

Sarah struggled to hold back a snigger, she secretly loved the nonsense he came out with when drunk as it was so much more ridiculous than sober, she used her hand to hide her smile and looked at the stairs.

“Ok, ok...I’m going to bed…just remember…cheese and pickle sandwiches…love you…more than…cheese…” and Ryan clambered up the stairs to bed.

When Sarah went up to bed, after leaving him for half an hour alone to pass out, she entered the room and he was lying face down outstretched across the entire bed. He had managed to remove his top and shoes and his trousers had barely made it past his hips.

She didn’t want to disturb him and would sleep in the guest room that was ready for his parents arrival once the baby was born. She lifted the blanket to cover him up and as she did so she noticed there was something on his right bum cheek. Leaning in for a closer examination it looked very much like a tattoo. Ryan was the last person she would have expected to get a tattoo what with his fear of needles.

Then Sarah couldn’t help herself, the first wave of giggles took her by surprise, and she managed to contain them but the more she looked at the tattoo the more she giggled, and the tattoo was so hideous that she couldn’t look away, and the giggles kept on coming, her shoulders bobbing up and down as she gasped for breath, if she couldn’t stop laughing she was at risk of going into labour. She wiped away a tear and kept mumbling to herself that it wasn’t that funny but there on his right bum cheek was a tattoo of a piece of cheese in the shape of a love heart and with the words ‘More than’ written over the top.