It was early in the evening and my team, and I were still busy at work. With the many things that we had left to do for the day, it seemed like today would be another late night at the gallery again. Thankfully, my team was full of passionate members who were truly dedicated to their jobs. It was going to be rough, but I had the confidence that we would make it through. “What about we hang this one here? Malissa, can you come over to have a look?” one of my staffs called out to me.“Sure. Be right there!” I called back before I quickly got up from my seat.The moment that I stood up, I suddenly felt extremely dizzy. My head throbbed and it felt like I wouldn’t be able to keep my balance. I closed my eyes and took in deep breaths before slowly lowering myself back down onto the chair that I had been sitting on. “Malissa, are you ok?” I heard someone ask from close to me.“I’m…” I began saying but then my head just hurt too much. My body felt strangely hot as well and my chest starte
Even if I skipped on my periods, that didn’t mean that I was pregnant, right?It has happened to me before especially when I was extremely stressed out and because of that, I wasn’t convinced that I was pregnant. “You can pee on a pregnancy stick. I’ll get someone to buy a few. Then we can get you checked up properly at the hospital,” Hayden replied very calmly. “You’ll do the check up for me?” I asked, curiously. “No…we’ll get a proper gynecologist to do it. Your husband isn’t a gynecologist, you know…” Hayden quickly corrected me. “Oh, right…” I mumbled. “Don’t worry. You’re not sick, I’m sure that you’re just pregnant,” Hayden stated with confidence. I had no idea why Hayden seemed so sure that I was pregnant. Plus, what does he mean that I’m ‘just pregnant’? Isn’t it supposed to be a super big deal if I’m pregnant? Why doesn’t Hayden seem surprised or excited at all? Although he seems so certain that I’m pregnant. Later that evening, the pregnancy sticks arrived, and Hayde
“No…I…” I began saying but I had to stop. Tears welled up in my eyes and my chest suddenly felt tight. All the emotions that I was holding in all started pouring out at once and it was too much for me to handle. I covered my mouth and sobbed. Tears streamed down my cheeks as I cried from a mixture of relief, happiness, confusion, excitement, anxiousness, stress, and so many other emotions that I couldn’t quite name or identify. “Congratulations, Malissa. You’re going to be a mother soon,” Hayden whispered tenderly to me as he pulled me into his embrace.I hugged him back tightly as more tears streamed down my cheeks. There were so many things that I wanted to say to him, but I just couldn’t find the words. I was also crying so much now that I doubt that I would be able to form the words even if I could find them. All I could do was nod my head at his words. Hayden smiled at me lovingly before he kissed both my cheeks softly in turn. “Hay…den…” I sobbed his name. “You don’t need to
There is no doubt about that now. Somewhere inside of this belly, our baby is now growing and within around 7 months, we would be holding our first baby in our arms. That was the reality that I was faced with, and it made me so happy that I wanted to jump up and down with joy. “What should I do?” I asked Hayden.Excitement and an energy that I have never experienced before surged through my body. Suddenly, I felt so energized and so strong. “What do you even mean by that?” Hayden asked as he gave me a very confused look. “Like…I’m pregnant now so what am I supposed to do? What do I eat? Do I have to exercise? Listen to classical music…or something?” I fired my questions at him in rapid succession. “You’re not making any sense. Just live your life normally, you’re only 8 weeks pregnant. Be careful and don’t do anything risky. Don’t stress and don’t overwork yourself would be a great start,” Hayden suggested as he smiled a little at me. “Aha…ok…”Hayden seemed so undisturbed by thi
“You’re not going to eat? Are you and the baby not hungry?” Hayden asked from across the table. I doubt anyone could get hungry when faced with this kind of food. However, I couldn’t bring myself to tell Hayden that after all the effort that he put in to ensure the best food for me and the baby. “I’m not that hungry but I’ll eat…” I replied before forcing a smile. “Do you want me to feed you?” Hayden asked. “Umm…no. There’s no need for you to do that,” I refused while trying to maintain my smile. “The food looks and tastes bad, doesn’t it?” Hayden asked but it didn’t really feel like a question. I guess he did realize it after all. There’s no point in lying about it now so I just nodded at my head in response. “You should have told me. I can fire the chef or get the nutritionist to change something to make it more palatable,” Hayden said as he stared at me from across the table. “I just didn’t want to burden you with something like this. Plus, I guess it isn’t that bad when I
**6 years later**“Wow…you came back pretty early today…” I said while cocking my head slightly to the side in wonder.With his busy schedule for the week, I hadn’t expected him to turn up at my gallery early in the afternoon. “Things wrapped up pretty well at the hospital today so I thought that we could go pick up the kids together for a change,” Hayden replied with a smile. “Perfect timing. Now that you mention it, we should head out now or we’re going to be late…” I said as I started grabbing my things.I turned to flash him a bright smile. Honestly, I was thrilled that he could spare some time to pick up the kids together today. Hayden was still busy with his work at the hospitals as ever and the fact that the numbers of hospitals in his network has grown over the years did not help make him any less busy. That being said, my career as an artist and gallery owner had also flourished handsomely which meant that he wasn’t the only one who had gotten busier. Layering taking care o
“Hi…” the boys said with clear disinterest. Harris and Andrew looked up at me with cold eyes while I plastered a smile on my face. These two kids were clearly told about the specifics of their family business from such a young age without leaving out any details about what was expected of them when they grew older. Harvey was heartless when it came to training up his boys into the ideal next bosses of the gang. Although the boys were still young, they already had a cold and calculating attitude.“Are you heading back now?” Amelia asked. Unlike me who was busy with my career as an artist and running my art gallery business, Amelia was a full-time mum. I didn’t envy her at all, she had her hands full just dealing with her two boys and not to mention dealing with Harvey as well. Amelia was always surrounded by a large team of bodyguards, and I bet she spent more time with them than with Harvey. Despite her burdensome life of being the new boss’s wife, she seemed quite used to everythin
Although we had not been actively telling our children about their relationship with the mafia, it wasn’t like we thought that we could hide it. As a result, we never bothered to hide it. We let them learn through their relationship with the boss, Harris, Luka and even other members of the senior management of the gang.Although our family was no where close to being a standard and normal one, we were extremely happy to be together. Harvey, Amelia, the boss, and everyone else were always supportive of our family and what we wanted to do. Hayden and Harvey remained close even though Hayden no longer helped out with the gang’s business anymore.…If I had to choose, I would say that the family that I managed to build with Hayden is my greatest life achievement thus far. However, that didn’t mean that I didn’t have other achievements to be proud of in my life especially when it came to my career as an artist.“We would like to award our amazing artist friend, Malissa, for her outstanding