Chapter Text
“I love you… but I can’t do it.”
As soon as those words left Maya’s lips, all Carina could feel was pain.
Not only her own at having to give up on the idea of having a child someday, but also her wife’s who was just as heartbroken as she was.
Seeing the swarm of emotions through Maya’s crystal blue eyes felt like a stab through the heart but, even as every muscle in her body ached to comfort the blonde, there was nothing Carina could do, not while she was just as broken as Maya at the moment.
The Italian felt suffocated, she couldn’t breathe under the weight of all those emotions.
She needed to go.
She needed to get out of that room, out of that apartment.
She needed to think.
And she needed to accept the fact that she would never become a mother.
Because, when it’s all said and done, she'd rather grieve an abstract dream that will never be than mingle with the idea of not having Maya instead.
So she stood up under her wife’s scrutinizing gaze and left the room without saying a word.
Carina’s vision was clouded with tears but she managed to get to her car quickly, wiping the tears away before driving away. She needed to breathe.
The Italian drove without a destination for a while until she remembered a spot in the city she liked. It was one of the first places she visited after arriving to Seattle and it had the effect of calming her down.
The doctor arrived to the ferry pier not long after. She exited her car and walked to a spot where you could see all the ferries and the water, next to some very cute view finders.
Carina rested her forearms on the railing and leaned in slightly, closing her eyes. Growing up so close to the ocean, listening to the sea felt familiar… it almost felt like Italy, even if the smell was quite different. But the sea breeze hitting her skin and the sound of the ferry boats in the water, transported her to a time when she had no worries.
Suddenly, she felt her cheeks a little bit cold. She opened her eyes and realized that she had started crying.
Carina wiped the tears with the back of her pointer finger before pulling out her phone and look at the time. It was almost 9 am and, after doing the quick math, she decided it wasn’t so late in Italy for the call she was about to make, it was almost 6 pm back in the place she hadn’t called home for a long time.
The Italian extended her arm enough so her face was visible for the camera as she waited for the other person to answer the video call.
“Ciao, tesoro! È da tanto che non ci si vede!” Gabriella’s voice came through the speaker as her smiling face appeared on the screen. She was exaggerating with her greeting, they had video chatted less than two weeks ago –when Gabriella had arrived to her parent’s house for a month long family visit– but the other Italian liked to be dramatic.
“Ciao, Gabri.” Carina simply said, trying to return the smile but failing miserably.
The blue eyed Italian immediately dropped the playfulness and her features turned serious. “Carina, cosa c'è che non va? Tutto bene?” She asked her friend if she was okay, concern clear on her voice.
Carina didn’t answer right away, instead she brushed a strand of hair from her face and looked at the bay. “No lo so…” She bit the corner of her bottom lip and then she shook her head. “No, non sto bene.”
The quality of the video call wasn’t the greatest but even like that, Gabriella could tell that Carina had been crying. “Carina, tell me what’s going on.”
Carina turned around to lean against the railing with her back facing the water, still avoiding the screen with her eyes. “Maya… she…” She choked, unable to make the words come out of her mouth.
“Oh mio Dio, did she get hurt?” Gabriella jumped to the wrong conclusion. “I told her I would kill her if she got hurt, what happened to her?” She risked trying to be funny because, while her friend looked rough, Carina didn’t give Gabriella the ‘my wife just died’ vibes.
Carina almost chuckled at that. It was good to see her wife and her best friend finally getting along after their rocky start but the thought of something bad happening to her wife –even more after she told her what had occurred during her last shift– didn’t let her enjoy her friend’s attempt at making her laugh.
She shook her head, folding her free arm over her chest and adjusting the other so her friend could see her. “No, she’s not hurt. Maya’s home but… we were talking about something and I’m just…” She shrugged, her lips twisting in discontent. “I’ve been trying to bring up the subject for months but she kept brushing me off and now I know why…”
Gabriella nodded as she took in the information. “Is this about you wanting children?” She knew her friend well and they have talked about it before. Carina had talked to Gabriella about wanting to be a mom in the past and had also told her about Maya’s reluctance to talk about the subject.
“She doesn’t want kids, Gabri.” Carina’s expression dulled.
There were a few seconds of silence.
“Mi dispiace tanto, tesoro…” Gabriela started. “I know how much you want to be a mom and that you’d be great but… you knew that it was a possibility.” She said, trying really hard not to sound harsh. “You told me she wasn’t sure about having bambini when you came to Italy during the pandemic.”
Carina scoffed and rolled her eyes. “Lo so, Gabri, lo so! I’m not saying she didn’t tell me before, I’m saying she just said no, for good!” She blurted out with a shaky voice.
Even from the other side of the screen, Gabriella saw Carina’s eyes flooding with tears as her voice started to break. She decided to remain quiet, giving her friend a few moments to recover.
Carina pinched the bridge of her nose and closed her eyes tight which made some tears fall. “When she said that last year I thought…” She looked up again, turning her face to watch the sea over her shoulder. “I fooled myself into thinking she was just scared by what was happening to the world, I thought that, once covid was over, we could revisit that conversation and we would start planning how to make our family grow but…” She shrugged again, her eyebrows knitting as she thought of the conversation she just had with Maya. “The pandemic is over and she still doesn’t want children. She says she can’t.”
A line appeared between Gabriella’s brows when she heard her friend’s phrasing. “Aspetta, did she say she can’t or that she doesn’t want to?”
Carina scoffed again, raising her free hand and letting it drop, hitting her thigh. “What difference does that make?”
“Repeat Maya’s words to me, per favore.” Gabriella asked.
Carina threw her head back as she grunted in frustration. She changed her phone to her other hand –her arm was getting tired of holding the device– and looked at the image of her friend, waiting for her answer. “She said that having a kid is like ripping ones heart out and watching it walk around the world and that terrifies her but, ugh, that’s stupid, Gabri! She’s not afraid of anything!”
“Okay, let me stop you right there, Carina.” Gabriella said with a firm tone. “I love you and I’m saying this as your best friend but you’re no one to say she can’t be afraid of something. I get that because of her job she may appear fearless but that’s just a different type of courage and I know you know.” The blue eyed Italian stated, waiting for her friend to acknowledge her words with a reluctant nod. “I remember you told me something about her father being abusive, right?”
Carina tensed her jaw and looked away. She wasn’t proud about telling other people about Maya’s family situation but, back when the cheating happened, she had needed to vent to someone and her oldest friend was the best option. “Sì, he was emotionally abusive.” She confirmed, chewing on her bottom lip.
“So, maybe her fear comes from there.” Gabriella reasoned. “Wouldn’t you be afraid of being like your papà?”
“But my father has a mental illness, it’s not the same.” Carina rebuked.
“Esattamente, tesoro. Your father has a justification for being the way he is a but Maya’s father doesn’t. He gave Maya the worst example at parenting, no wonder she’s afraid.”
“But Maya is not like him, she’s caring and loving and –”
“And she has worked to be all those things, Carina.” Gabriella interrupted. “You told me how much she has changed since the first time you two met, but change doesn’t happen in the blink of an eye… it takes time. If her fears are rooted into her own childhood, those fears can fade away with time but you can’t force her.”
Carina’s lower lip trembled, wishing that Maya being afraid was her only problem. “But that’s not all she said.”
“What else, then?” Gabriella asked, reaching for her glass of wine that had been momentarily forgotten because of Carina.
“She said that having children would basically end her career in the fire department.” The tears flooding her eyes finally fell. “She wants to keep moving up the ladder, become captain again and maybe chief someday but becoming a mother would not be good for her plans.”
“Oh…” Gabriella didn’t know what else to say to that.
Carina chuckled humorlessly. “See? No matter how much I wait, that will never change.” She lamented, tucking a lock of hair behind her ear to prevent the breeze from blowing it on her face.
The other Italian sighed. “Ascolta, tesoro, I don’t want to give you false hope but that still does not sound like she doesn’t want kids, at least to me. The way I see it, her concerns come from outside sources, her father and the fire department, not from the lack of desire of being a mom.”
Carina snorted. “Sure, let’s just change the entire Seattle Fire Department to get rid of the sexism within so my wife decides to give me children.” The sarcasm dripped from her voice. “Do you hear how impossible that sounds?”
“I remember a time when you, getting married, sounded impossible and look at you now.” Gabriella had a shit eating grin, clear as day through the screen.
Carina’s chin dropped to her chest as she grunted again. “Non è lo stesso, Gabri.”
“Carina, give it time, you’ve been married for less than a year. Things change.” Gabriella insisted.
Carina rolled her shoulders, they were getting a bit stiff, and turned around again, forearms on the railing like before, holding her phone with both hands so it didn’t fall. “But we’re running out of time.” She sighed. “Even if Maya agrees to have a baby, she does not want to carry it and I’m almost 40, you know how risky pregnancies at my age are.” Her tone was defeated.
“I know you want to experience pregnancy, either yourself or watch Maya go through it, but that’s not the only way for you to have a bambino.” Gabriella smiled softly at her friend. “I really believe you two will figure it out.”
Carina looked into her friend’s eyes through the device in her hands, her words having an effect on her as if she was right next to her even when they were an ocean away. “But what if I give it time and nothing changes? What if she never wants a baby?” She asked, already knowing the answer. She had told Maya she would learn to accept that fact but that didn’t mean it would be easy.
Gabriella exhaled a little loudly, biting the corner of her lower lip. “I believe your love for Maya is strong enough. You will live a full life with her, wether you have bambini or not.”
Carina closed her eyes as she listened to those words, feeling the sea breeze ruffling her hair and the sun warming her skin. She directed her gaze to the camera not long after. “Grazie, Gabri. I really needed to hear that.”
The other woman shrugged, downplaying the whole thing. “I didn’t tell you anything you didn’t already know. A volte, hai solo bisogno di sentirlo da qualcun altro.”
And Gabriella was right. Sometimes, the things you know seem better when they come from another person.