It was already midnight when Arash was wearily waiting for Hana"s message by the sofa in the living room. This was the third day he took leave from his company. His boss was sounding more and more constipated; work has been piling up and he was the one who needed to cover his subordinate"s a.s.s.What made things worse was Arash didn"t explain what was happening. Not entirely anyway.
n.o.body would"ve believed him if he said his wife was gone and got stuck somewhere unreachable. If he tried to explain, they will either think that his wife ran away, or she was kidnapped. Then, all sorts of problems will reach their front door.
His boss suspected that their whole family went on a spontaneous vacation without consideration while he cooked up a weak half a.s.sed excuse for a cover up. Arash would not bother anymore as his boss mindset has already been fixed. He can only accept his boss" anger later.
[Truly hope I won"t get sacked for this...sigh...]
Arash "s mind was actually occupied with something more complicated.
All this while, his wife took care of his and the children"s daily necessities and he never interfered. She also took care of their children without external help. So, when an emergency like this came, he didn"t know who to send them to as he never employed a babysitter.
The third leave was meant for him to sort and reshuffled his daily routine to be in line with the kids.
He woke up very early this morning to arrange many things. He went to meet up with the kindergarten owner and opted for a full day schooling plus daycare. The owner recommended another establishment to care for the baby since the baby was too small. Arash was skeptical with it, but he tried to meet the owner of that establishment too.
There were a lot of cases of childcare abuse in their area (1). Hana and Arash were terrified to send their children over as most of those abuse resulted in deaths was due to negligence. The newspapers reported them almost daily.
That was why they decided to segregate their job thoroughly; Arash at work, Hana at home.
All this while, many had raised an eyebrow from their arrangements. Some were shocked and sighed pitifully at Hana. While others blamed Arash for preventing Hana to go to work. Most of the people a.s.sumed the worst and linked them with chauvinistic male dominance and oppression.
Arash stayed strong and prevented all the negativities from reaching his beloved wife. He knew she sacrificed a lot from their arrangements.
Hence, this time he needed to step up to cover his wife"s part and become the ultimate engineer daddy.
"Wahhh!! Wahhh!! Wahhhh!! Mom! Mom! Mommy!"
Arash snapped out of his reverie when he heard his little one cried for her mommy again. The baby kept on crying nonstop until she got tired and fell asleep every day before the cycle continued again when a new day arrived. This had happened since Hana"s disappearance.
He felt sad. He never knew his little daughter was this colic (2) before. She was a very mild tempered baby, rarely cried and most of the time giggled so much while saying "papa..papa..I lup you". Hana taught her that just to make Arash happy.
He carried the baby and tried to coax her patiently while getting a bottle of formula he haphazardly prepared for her. Thank goodness, their first child wasn"t woken up by the loud sound.
Since their baby drank milk on demand (3), they had never freeze any extra milk before. Now, he had no choice but to provide her with formula milk. Fortunately, the little one was not picky.
After that, he continued finding several contacts to get a suitable trustworthy babysitter for his little one. He truthfully explained his child"s condition to prevent any unwanted problems from arising. A lot of babysitters declined as they didn"t want troublesome kids.
Arash nearly lost his temper from the ongoing headache due to those people"s rude disposition.
[My daughter is a nice girl! What do you expect from an un-weened baby who suddenly lost her mom?!]
Fortunately, after searching high and low, he managed to meet up with a prospective babysitter; a Madam Lisa. He felt that this lady had the impression that the mother of his baby daughter had pa.s.sed away. She had high empathy and seemed very caring. He didn"t try to correct her though.
Her establishment had many professionally trained staff. He was satisfied with the environment and the staff to children ratio when he went over for a look this afternoon.
Two babies per staff. It was considered very high quality with extra attention. There was even a play school session for the babies every day. Hence, the fees were significantly higher; three times more than the average fee for sending a child.
Fortunately, what he didn"t lack was money. Although he didn"t own any kind of extra business, his has a high paying job. The catch was the long hours. They were very thrifty; mostly splurged on child education and high quality food ingredients. No branded items, no extra cars or a.s.sets; everything at the bare minimum. Hence, his savings were quite substantial. Now was the time to use it.
[Anything for her...as long as she"ll be properly cared for.] Lament Arash while sighing. He truly hoped their baby would be able to adjust to a new environment soon. He didn"t know when his wife will be coming home.
Arash looked around the house.
The house was a mess and the kitchen was unwashed since the day his wife disappeared. The pots from Hana"s last cooking session were still there on the stove. The sink was nearly full while the wet leftovers had started emitting unpleasant smell. Ants were crawling on the kitchen floor since n.o.body mopped it after the children spilled their food during each meal.
His hands were already full just by handling the girls while helping Hana with the tutorials. He had never once complained since he doesn"t want Hana to worry. He knew, in Hana"s eyes, he was like a st.u.r.dy rock, supporting her fragile heart. Arash needed to play the part or else, his wife might lose hope.
He knew how weak-willed she was; he had courted her for eight years before getting married. This year should be their tenth year anniversary.
Sigh... tomorrow I will get a cleaner to clean up the mess. Too tired to bother already.
Thank goodness tomorrow was the start of a two-day weekend. He had two additional days to arrange everything well.
He gently tapped his smartphone and checked the LINE application.
Still no response.
He tapped on the smartphone"s gallery and browsed through the family pictures. Surprisingly, he had very little of his wife"s photo. Most of them were dominated by their children"s cheeky smiles. It must be his wife"s work; she loved to swipe his phone for taking the children"s picture since his smartphone"s camera has higher resolution than hers.
His eyes turned red and misted thinking about his wife.
[Hope she is doing alright today.]
In between his worries, Arash fell asleep on the sofa.
Author"s notes:
(1) cases of childcare abuse = true cases which causes deaths. There"s too many to count. The latest was the case where a 5m old baby stashed into the freezer of the babysitter after she caused the death of the baby and made a false police report saying he was kidnapped. Mr and Mrs Mooncat were horrified by the news. Due to that, the government enacted a new policy regarding on "in-house company childcare services" very recently. Will it be properly implemented? Only time will tell.
(2) colic = the case when a baby will keep on crying usually due to "wind" in the tummy, but not necessarily. There are some babies who will keep on crying nonstop without reason. That is also known as colicky babies. The parents could only persevere. Usually when they grow a bit older, the crying will naturally stop.
(3) drank milk on demand = the baby gets whenever she wanted it, either day or night. A quick question to the young readers, do you guys know, a mom can actually feed their babies while she lie down in a side sleeping postures? (laugh) This posture can alleviate back pain and let the mommy rest well even when feeding during night time. It"s great for co-sleeping.