'Cause baby, you're a firework
C'mon, show 'em what you're worth
Make 'em go aah, aah, aah
As you shoot across the sky

--"Firework," Katy Perry

Blake went back to the maternity hospital the next morning before his shift at the rehab was to start. He walked into Heather's room and found his parents there. Stan was reading the newspaper and Carol was knitting something. Heather was asleep in her bed.

Blake bent down to kiss his mother on the cheek.

"I meant to finish this before the baby came, but..." Carol whispered to him, indicating the baby blue knitted thing she was working on. "The nurse told us Heather was awake crying most of the night, refused to let them give her any sleep medicine. She finally fell asleep a little bit after we got here. I think she feels more comfortable with us here."

Blake looked back over at his sister, who looked so young and innocent. "Has she gone to see him?"

"Um... she said she couldn't," Carol said. "I mean, they'll allow her to see him, but she's not ready."

"Go take him to see the boy," Stan quietly said to his wife.

"Um... okay... come on," Carol said to her eldest child, setting down her knitting project before walking toward the door.

Once out in the hallway, Blake asked her, "Did the doctors or nurses say what's wrong with him?"

"Yeah... We spoke to the pediatrician when we got here. She's pretty sure he has-"

"Down syndrome," Blake said, stating it rather than asking.

Carol sighed as they walked toward the neonatal intensive care unit. "He has the physical characteristics. They have to run a genetic test to diagnose him. Luckily he doesn't seem to have any complications from it at the moment, but it's too early to know for sure."

They got to the outside of the NICU, which was lined with windows. Carol stopped at the second window and pointed at an open bassinet.

"There he is," she said, a tone of melancholy to her voice.

Blake peered through the window. He could see a tiny body lying in a bassinet, but he couldn't make out any of the baby's features.

"He's too far away, I can't really see him," Blake said.

"Did you want to go in and see him? Heather put your name on the list of approved visitors."

He looked at his mother in surprise for asking such a silly question. "Of course I want to see him, he's my nephew."

A nurse requested for the two of them to wash their hands thoroughly before going inside the unit. They were then walked over to see ‘Baby Boy Wyzecki'.

Blake looked down into the open bassinet. He could immediately see that the sleeping baby indeed had the characteristics of Down syndrome, which he had read more about on his computer after going home the previous night. The baby had a small head and ears, a flat face, almond-shaped eyes, and a flat, wide nose.

"He's beautiful," Blake said, truly meaning it.

Carol sniffled. "Yeah... he's ours."

The baby had fair skin like Heather, with thin golden-blond hair. He had pouty pink lips, which were slightly parted. His pink tongue was poking out a bit. He was wearing only a diaper and had a few electrodes attached to his little chest and belly.

Blake finally reached out and touched the little boy on his arm. His skin was warm, due to the heating lamp overhead.

"Did she ever pick out a name? I think she had it narrowed down to two."

Carol shook her head. "I asked her this morning, but she just started crying."

A nurse walked by and Blake got her attention.

"Excuse me, how long is he going to be in here?"

"Probably for the rest of the day, at least," the nurse, whose name tag said Candace, answered. "He's doing very well at the moment. He's at a healthy weight and able to drink from a bottle without choking. Right now our main concern is his heart. These little guys are about fifty percent likely to be born with a heart defect. His heart seems to be normal so far, but we want to monitor that closely. He's also on a sleep apnea monitor because there's about a sixty percent chance of him having that. He'll need to be monitored for that in the future since it can be quite serious if it's not caught."

Blake tried to remain calm but couldn't help but tear up. "But otherwise... is he healthy?"

Nurse Candace gave him a small smile. "He seems to be, yes. He's a strong little boy. He'll need regular check-ups to ensure everything is okay. It's too early now to know if he'll have any developmental delays. These first three to five years are crucial in proper development. Are you his father?"

Blake shook his head. "Uncle. His mommy's brother."

She looked down at the baby and then back up at him. "He looks a lot like you."

Blake looked at the baby again. "You think so?"

"Oh yeah," she confirmed.

"Why was his condition not caught during an ultrasound or other prenatal testing?"

"I understand that his mother is fairly young," Nurse Candace said.

"She just turned twenty-three last month," Carol answered.

"Well, a majority of Down syndrome babies are born to women under thirty-five, because young women statistically have children more often than older women. The facial features aren't always caught in ultrasounds, so it can be quite a surprise when the baby is born. Fetuses of women under thirty-five aren't routinely screened for Down syndrome, especially when the pregnancy seems normal."

"Heather didn't have any tests like that run," Carol said. "She didn't see a need to have any kind of invasive tests run, like an amniocentesis, because her doctor kept saying that everything looked normal during her visits and we don't have any family history of serious diseases."

"Down syndrome isn't usually an inherited condition," Blake said, recalling what he had read. "It happens randomly and it can happen to any mother at any age."

Blake soon had to leave to go to work, but not before calling Ted with an update.

"See? I told you he's going to be okay," Ted said.

Blake rolled his eyes. "Yes dear, you're very old and wise."

"Hey kid, watch the ‘old' shit," Ted said to his husband, who was twelve years his junior.

Blake returned to the women's hospital later that afternoon to see Heather, only to find that her room was being cleaned by the housekeeping crew.

"Excuse me," Blake said to one of the cleaning ladies. "Do you know where my sister is?"

"Do you mean the patient in this room earlier? She went home," he was told.

He recalled his mother saying that Heather wasn't due to be released until the following morning, so that was a big surprise to him. As he made his way over to the NICU, Blake took his cell phone out of his messenger bag and called his mother.

"Hey, Honey," Carol said, her voice a bit tense.

"Mom, did you take Heather home?" Blake asked.

"Yes. When she woke up from her nap around lunchtime, she said she wanted to come home. She signed herself out against doctor's orders."

Blake looked into the unit's windows and found that ‘Baby Boy Wyzecki' was still in his bassinet.

"Did she see the baby before she left?"

Carol sighed. "No... she wouldn't even sign the paperwork for his birth certificate and Social Security number. She brought that stuff home and said she'd do it later."

"What the fuck?" Blake said, furious at his sister.

"Language," his conservative mother admonished.

He rolled his eyes. "Let me talk to her, maybe I can talk some sense into her."

"She's in her room, resting."

Blake hung up and stormed out of the hospital. He happened to see Ted's car out in the lot as his husband was trying to find a parking spot. Blake flagged him down and told him what was happening.

"Well, she knew that she wouldn't be able to take the baby home with her, so-" Ted began to say.

"I'm going over there," Blake announced before stomping off to his car.

Ted followed Blake to the Wyzecki home. Luckily he knew the way because his husband left him behind after the first stop sign, which he hardly tapped his brakes through.

He didn't feel right barging in his in-laws' home, so he rang the doorbell. Stan let him in, and Ted found Blake and his mother standing at the foot of the staircase with Carol trying to block her son from going upstairs.

"She just needs some time," Carol pleaded with her oldest child.

"Time for what?" Blake demanded to know.

"Time to get used to all of this," she answered, her voice cracking. "This is a lot to take in, having a special needs child. She was already terrified to raise this baby as a single mother, now this."

"Has she even told what's-his-face, the father?"

Carol shook her head. "She told him he didn't have to be involved when she first found out she was pregnant and he was happy to take the out. She doesn't want to needlessly dump this on him."

"Heather!" Blake suddenly yelled in the direction of the second floor.

"Blake, please!" Carol said. "Your sister is exhausted and very upset. Just let her rest, okay?"

"You need to stop babying her!" Blake said to his mother. "She has a baby of her own now. One who she needs to take responsibility for!"

"Go home, son," Stan said gruffly, putting his hand on Blake's shoulder.

"Get your fucking hand off me!" Blake yelled, before grabbing his father's wrist to remove his hand.

"Blake!" Ted yelled at his husband, not wanting to see this escalate any further. "Let's go."

Blake got ahold of himself and followed Ted out the door. He broke down into tears on the front porch.

"What the fuck is wrong with them?" Blake asked. "Heather is practically abandoning her son and it's like they're letting her do it! It's not his fault he wasn't born perfect."

Ted wrapped his arms around his husband tightly and let him cry on his shoulder for a minute.

"Let's go home. We can order some Chinese," Ted said after Blake seemed to calm down a bit.

Blake wiped his eyes with the arm of his coat and nodded.