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While Emil loved extreme sports and was all for the idea of surfing in high wind, the accompanying thunderstorm was enough to put him off. Even if he didn’t have the common sense to realize that lightning plus saltwater equalled him becoming the wrong kind of Crispino, his worrywart boyfriend would never forgive him. That said worrywart boyfriend was still out on the beach was huge.
“Thank you,” Michele whispered to him as soon as he got close enough to hear. “We can try again tomorrow?”
“I’ll check the weather, but this kind of storm often comes in waves. We might be better off trying again some other week.” Emil kissed Michele’s cheek. “Don’t worry about it, Mickey. It’s not your fault, it’s mother Nature’s.”
“Thanks, but… WHOA!” Michele jumped back, tackling Emil, as lightning struck not too far down the beach. Fortunately, they were far enough away that all they felt was a slight tingle, as most of the electricity seemed to be heading out to sea. “What the hell just happened?”
“Well, we are expecting a thunderstorm,” Emil deadpanned. “Lightning usually comes with it, I wasn’t expecting it this close, I’ll admit… hey, wait, what the hell are you doing?”
Michele had started forward, heading for the spot on the sand that had been struck. He didn’t turn back at Emil’s voice, starting to jog. Oh, Emil was so holding this against him next time Michele tried to say that something Emil wanted to do was risky. He took off running fast enough to catch his boyfriend and try to turn him back.
Then he heard something – a soft cry, like a baby. Everything else was forgotten. If that was, somehow, a baby crying in the middle of a thunderstrike, he and Michele had to get to it and make sure it was okay. The sand turned black, and then glassy, under his feet, but he kept going until he reached the shallow hole.
The baby looked absolutely fine. No sign of distress other than crying which had stopped as soon as it saw Emil and Michele staring at it, it was wrapped in a soft blanket that showed no damage from the lightning strike, when Michele reached out to gently check for injuries he couldn’t find anything and the baby even started cooing. Michele looked at Emil, eyebrows raised. Emil just shrugged back.
Michele scooped up the baby and cuddled it close to his chest. “Obviously, we’ll have to go shopping for emergency supplies, but then what? Unless there’s a convenient note tucked in the blanket, how on Earth do we find its parents?”
“Bridge to cross when we get there,” Emil said. “Take it back to the hotel and I’ll head out for emergency supplies. Formulas, bottles, diapers, see if the hotel has a crib they can rent out? I’ll call Sara or Mila and ask what else we need…”
“We should probably take it to a hospital,” Michele said. “Just because I’m not finding anything wrong doesn’t mean we didn’t find it lying in the crater of a lightning bolt! They can probably advise us on what we need and how to search for the parents. Emil – what happens if we can’t find the parents?”
Emil turned around and put his arms around Michele and the baby. “The government will probably be just as happy to let us have the baby on a foster basis until they determine that the parents won’t be found and we can formalize the adoption.”
“And you’re… okay with that? When we talked last month, you said you’d prefer to wait another year or two before adopting a kid or asking Mila or Sara to carry one for us,” Michele said. “As eager as I am, not while you’re not fully on board.”
Emil reached down, gently running a hand over the baby’s head. “If the universe is going to drop hints this big that it’s time for us to have a baby, I am not going to ignore them or the next lightning bolt may land on my head.”
The hospital confirmed that the baby was physically fine. When they tried to take a blood sample, though, the needle kept breaking before it could penetrate the skin. “That’s weird. We’ll have to figure out something, but… at least we should be able to do a cheek swab for DNA.”
“How old would you guess she is?” Emil asked. “Based on development.”
“About three weeks, assuming a full-term pregnancy,” the doctor said. “You said you found her abandoned on the beach?”
“With no identification, nothing other than the blanket she was wrapped in and the clothes she was wearing,” Michele said. “We’d like to find the parents, but she really did look abandoned.”
“All right. We’ll hold her here in the hospital overnight for observation, just to make sure that nothing crops up, but we’ll make sure you two are on the list to visit or stay with her. We have an on-staff social worker you should meet with to go over foster care regulations, if you’re serious about keeping her until her parents are found or she’s deemed abandoned.”
Michele picked up the blanket and shook it out to put over the little girl. A note fell to the ground.
To whom it might concern:
It is with heavy hearts that we find ourselves forced to abandon our child. There is little we can do for him or give to the people who take him in, We are sorry and hope for the best for our beloved. By the time you find this note with our baby, we, along with all of our family, will likely be dead. Please give our child a loving home.
Tarn and Jari
He handed it to the doctor. “I know it’s not proof, but…”
“Show the social worker. There will still be a search, obviously, but this is a good argument in favor of letting the two of you foster and keep the baby.” The doctor handed it back. “Good luck.”