Free Hand On Heart: Sequel to Head Over Heels by Sara Downing Page B

Tom had calmed down.  ‘The motorway splits up here.’  Tom executed a manoeuver not dissimilar to the Citroen driver, incurring the wrath of the car behind with a loud ‘Beep’.  Oh well, what goes around comes around on these French roads, she thought. 
    ‘How did you know that?’ he asked.
    ‘Sat-Nav said so just now,’ she replied.  ‘When you were busy swearing.’
    The phone rang.  ‘We’re at the ‘Aire de Mandé Bois’ for lunch,’ came Evie’s voice.  ‘Want to come and find us if you’re not too far behind?’
    ‘Um, okay, just working out where we are,’ Grace replied.  She knew perfectly well where they were, but looked to Tom for a sign that he was happy to meet up, or otherwise.  He nodded.  ‘Yeah, fine, looks like we’re only five k’s or so behind you, so see you there in a bit.  Make ours two large cappo’s if there’s a big queue please, my lovely!’
     

June 2010
     
    ‘Hi honey, had a good day?’ Tom asked as he walked through the front door.  Grace was kneeling on the living room floor in front of the twins’ bouncy chairs, a bottle in each hand, and a baby attached, with limpet-like suction, to the end of each bottle.  He kissed her on the cheek and bent down to kiss his babies’ downy heads.  At the sight of another doting adult, two pairs of tiny arms and legs began to waggle furiously, which in turn set their baby chairs bouncing, but only momentarily dislodged lips from teats, before they decided that quite clearly food was their first priority, and Daddy came second.  Despite their one-track minds when it came to feeding time, their bright little eyes followed Daddy’s every movement around the room.
    ‘And how are my little darlings today?  Have you been good children for Mummy?’  Then to Grace: ‘Here love, let me take one and give your arms a rest.’  He unclipped little Jack and scooped him from the seat and into his arms, expertly keeping bottle engaged with mouth as Jack’s deep blue eyes bore into him, a veiled threat as to the volume of yell that he could produce at a moment’s notice, should his supply of food cease even for one second.
    ‘Oh, that’s good, thank you,’ Grace replied, shaking out her left arm.  ‘Gives me cramp, it does, sitting like this, but there isn’t any other way I’ve found of doing it!’  She unclipped Lily and scooped her up into her lap, as she took a seat on the sofa with a sigh.
    ‘Ahhh, just how do people with triplets manage?  Feed one with their feet?  I suppose we’d have had to get some help, so thank you up there, whoever you are, for providing us with only one child per parent.’
    ‘How have they been?  Have you managed to get out at all?  Have you eaten even?’  Tom knew just how hard Grace was working to look after the twins.  It really was a case of taking it one day at a time, and sometimes the long days felt like an exercise in basic survival techniques.  He quite often felt like he had the easier option, out at work all day and only around in the evening, for some lovely cuddles, a nappy change or two and tucking up in bed.  And at least now he wasn’t falling asleep at his desk anymore – at eleven weeks, the twins were just about sleeping through from very late evening to around five thirty or six, which he and Grace considered a ‘whole night’s sleep’.  They knew they were lucky to be getting that; they’d heard some real horror stories from friends about sleepless nights that went on for years.  How did they cope?  He looked down fondly at his little man.  Sleep or no sleep, I wouldn’t swap parenthood for the world, he thought.  He was looking forward to being around more when term ended in a few weeks.  Grace needed the help, but not only that, he missed them desperately when he was at work all day.
    Grace knew she was coping pretty well with the twins, but she had no benchmark to compare to, and having two babies at once was definitely a baptism of