1997

He was told to leave the hospital room after he passed out seeing the crowning. So he left, with Hesperia’s permission and encouraginement. The sight still made him feel sick—and that was coming from someone who had seen too much bloodshed in his dad’s organization.

He kept pacing along the floor, panicked, anxious thoughts running through his head. He was going to be a dad. He was hardly even twenty-two and he was going to be a dad. Damn. He had beat his own father’s record of having him and his brother at twenty-four.

But it was a human child. How was he supposed to take care of a human _child? _An infant that couldn’t fend for themselves, who could only cry and cry when they needed something? How was he going to raise that child into a well adjusted adult? He winced when he heard the cries coming from the delivery room. He was trying to remind himself that she was in good hands. She had told him to leave. But he should be there for her. He was supposed to be there for Hesperia. He couldn’t even begin to imagine the pain she must be in.

With a hard swallow, he kept pacing up and down the hallway, the sanitized scent stinging his nostrils. How was he going to be a dad when he was hardly even an adult himself? He wasn’t even technically with Hesperia—ugh. He hated situationships. Especially situaitonships where you had a child with the person. What was it even at that point? Was it normal?

No, it couldn’t possibly be normal.

His feet stepped along the tiled floor, the faint buzzing of the AC filling his ears. The lights against the white walls were blinding and he could barely keep his eyes open without feeling dizzy. Everything was too overwhelming. Being a dad was going to be overwhelming. But he had to step up. Or else he would be a bad person. He couldn’t let Hesperia and their child go through life alone when he could be there to help.

Gaspar kept pacing, and pacing, and pacing. As if that could erase all of his fears and worries it he knew it couldn’t.

Then it happened.

“Mr. Madrazo?”

Gaspar had a knee jerk reaction and whirled his head around to the door where a nurse wearing a mask was standing. He heard it; the crying and wailing of a little baby. His eyes widened. They were here. The nurse removed their mask and smiled proudly at him. “It’s a boy!”

A boy. He was in charge of taking care of a little boy. He hadn’t even heard the crying, so wrapped up in his worries.

Without thinking for once, he ran past the nurse, shoving her aside—rather rudely, he knew, he apologized for it late in which she just laughed and said it was fine—and in an instance, all of the worries were gone.

Hesperia was lying in bed, her strawberry blonde hair spread along the pillows and her amber eyes were exhausted and weary. But there was a smile on her face. She was holding a small swaddled up bundle with a wisp of hair on top of his hair and a crying sound.

All of the worries vanished when she whispered. “Do you want to hold him?”

He was going to be the best dad he could. Bette than any other father in the world.