I'm exhausted beyond words by the time I all but collapse into Kairi's house, barely making it through the narrow hallway and into the sitting room before I sink to the sofa.
"You're a lifesaver," I say gratefully, trying to coax some warmth back into my legs as Larxene climbs gracelessly onto my lap, pressing her cold nose against the exposed skin on my neck (which isn't much warmer). Kairi just smiles and gives me back my baby, my fat little Roxas who fits snugly in my arms and gurgles contentedly at me. "Had a fun day at Auntie Kairi's, did you?" I ask in an entirely adult voice. Roxas pulls on my too-long hair. "Yes, yes, I know," I say; "I need a haircut. So do you." His hair, so pale and silky, just like mine when I was a baby (or so it looks from the few photographs of me that remain) and just like Larxene's before it darkened into a smudgy, dirty blonde, is beginning to curl into a crown on his head. I ruffle it affectionately, but Roxas doesn't like my cold hands and makes that signature pre-wail choke that guarantees my hasty retreat.
"I made some soup," Kairi, expert chef extraordinaire, says, which is probably the only promise capable of giving me the energy to leave the sofa and head for the kitchen, Larxene trailing in my wake. Kairi makes the most delicious soup I have ever tasted (although admittedly I'm not exactly a soup expert) and judging by the smell of the little kitchen, today is no exception. I eagerly fish a pair of bowls out of the cupboard and am ladling generous helpings into each before I even notice Olette, Kairi's girl friend and housemate, at the kettle, holding a sleeping Xion. Olette just has a way with children, moreso than Kairi and completely unlike me.
"I thought I heard you come in," She says, leaning over as I pour a generous amount of cream into Larxene's soup so she'll eat it without complaint. "Were you really just dressed in that, with all this snow? No wonder you look so cold."
"I managed," I say in a brave voice that everybody knows means I won't be if the temperature drops even further this tonight, and we troop out into the sitting room again. I end up being the one inundated with babies, because Roxas wants to sleep on my (carefully disguised) boob and Xion likes Roxas and wibbles until Olette hands her over, and Larxene says she's cold but really probably just wants to cuddle. I'm content to focus on my soup and let Kairi and Olette chat about university and anthropology and shopping, only joining in when they ask me how work was (the usual: long and brutal, but strangely satisfying in ways that only posting that final letter of a huge bundle can be) or enquire after Larxene. Mostly they just chat about girl things like shoes and make up and boys.
I finish my soup and close my eyes, leaning back on the sofa and adjusting the weight of the children on my lap. Roxas gurgles and reaches for my chest.
"Oh, would you look at that," Olette coos, "He wants to breastfeed."
"Not a chance," I say without opening my eyes. Not in public, anyway.
And then Kairi gets up to do some tidying around the room and picks up Olette's open handbag to shove it out of the way, happening to glance inside as she does so.
"Olette!" She exclaims, a grin breaking out on her face. "I didn't know you were on the Pill!"
Olette colours immediately, snatching her bag away.
"Goodness, Kairi, like you can talk, and anyway, I'm on it for cramps,"
I give her a look, one that is a whole lot more disinterested than I really am.
"Cramps?"
"Yeah, you know, period pains?" Olette says, waving her hand. Oh, I know period pains. They have the unique effect of crippling you even when they don't actually hurt that much, a property that is as infuriating as it is baffling. "You wouldn't understand, but if they're really bad then the Pill helps."
"Oh," I say. Kairi makes a joke about the fact that I didn't know that, and the conversation moves on.
And I sit there with my children on my lap and a dark cloud above me dispersing, and I wonder if these two cheerful girls realise that they have just saved my life.