Work Text:
Mia noisily announces it’s her one month birthday at five in the morning, her wailing cries piercing enough to cause Oliver to jolt awake from a particularly pleasant dream about what he and his wife had got up to last night after the baby had been put down to sleep. He’s used to being woken up by their daughter crying at random, god-awful times in the middle of the night by now; it only takes Oliver a few seconds to wipe the dust from his bleary eyes and focus up, pushing the comforter off him and vaulting his legs over the side of the bed.
“I’ll get her,” Felicity mutters, her voice slurred.
Oliver glances over at his beautiful wife to find her lying on her back, an arm bracing her forehead as she stares up at the ceiling with exhausted eyes. She’s been particularly sleep-deprived this last week due to Mia wanting midnight feedings; Oliver reckons she’s barely been getting three hours a night.
“No, I will.” He leans down to kiss her, brushing tangles of strawberry blonde hair out of Felicity’s face. “You pumped enough yesterday for her morning bottle. You get a couple more hours of sleep, baby.”
“Are you sure?” Felicity gets out through a huge yawn, but she’s already asleep again by the time Oliver has the time to respond.
Oliver adjusts the comforter around her, making sure she’s warm and safe in the center of their bed before standing up. He stretches his muscles with quiet groans before grabbing some casual clothes, yanking on a hoodie when he notes that there’s a cold draft in the cabin. Now early November, winter is starting to set in; they’ve woken several times to find their backyard blanketed in frost, and there’s a bite to the wind and air when they go for their evening family strolls around the Bloomfield woods.
Mia is lying in her bassinet, which is situated in the corner of their bedroom in a small alcove at the moment. Her cries continue until she sees her father looming above her, at which point they trail off to little hiccuping sobs, before she goes silent, staring up at Oliver. Her arms and legs are waving about like crazy. Oliver likes to think that she’s reaching out for him whenever she does this.
“Okay, baby girl, Daddy understands, you’re hungry,” he murmurs, picking Mia up carefully. He’s got pretty good over the last week cradling her with one arm, making sure he supports the baby’s head. “Let’s get that dirty diaper changed and then get your bottle. Will that make you happy? Yeah, I bet it will. Mommy’s tired so Daddy’s gonna feed you this morning.”
He goes through the motions of fitting a fresh cloth diaper and changing Mia into their favorite mint green bear onesie in her nursery, which is next to his and Felicity’s bedroom. Mia pays rapt attention to Oliver as he talks to her, explaining what he’s doing to her softly. She’s got to that point in her development where she recognizes her father’s face and voice and associates certain things with him. The most amusing and wonderful thing is how she smiles when Oliver brushes his fingertips lightly over her brow, as if it tickles her.
“You’re one month old today, sweetheart,” Oliver tells her, as he carries Mia into the kitchen and begins preparing a bottle for her. “Did you know that? I mean, you’re a baby, you probably don’t, but if you’ve inherited your mother’s smarts, I bet you’re a lot cleverer than most one-month-old babies.” He dots a kiss to the side of Mia’s head, sighing contently at that incredible new baby smell that his daughter still possesses. “Yep, Mommy’s a genius.”
Mia fusses, releasing a whimper. She gazes fixatedly on the bottle currently warming in a bowl of hot water.
“But you only seem to care about Mommy being your milk machine at the moment,” Oliver laughs. “Calm down, starlight. You’ll get your breakfast.”
He settles down on the couch with the baby propped up on a pillow on his lap after checking the bottle temperature is alright. Mia latches onto the bottle nipple and suckles urgently, as if this is her first bottle this week instead of just this morning. Immediately, she starts emitting soft, content hums as she eats. A fond smile spreading across his face, Oliver watches as his daughter’s eyes slowly flutter closed from the utter bliss of drinking her mother’s milk.
“Oh yes, you are very hungry, aren’t you,” he croons. “Almost finished half your bottle already, yes you have. Such a fast eater.”
Oliver wiggles his finger between Mia’s lips, forcing her to release the nipple. An indignant cry escapes her throat. He grimaces. He doesn’t want to upset the baby, but she’s drinking a little too fast for his liking. She’s on track to drink three ounces of milk in ten minutes if he lets her continue.
“I’m sorry, honey, I just don’t want you getting sick and spitting all of it back up.”
“You gotta change her position.”
Oliver looks up when Felicity’s voice echoes across the room. She’s approaching him from the bedroom dressed in his sweater - and only his sweater. Her hair is messy and her glasses are slightly lopsided, but his wife is as stunning as ever. He forces himself to keep his eyes angled up to her face rather than towards her bare thighs as Felicity sits down beside him, lifting Mia up so she can shift the pillow’ beneath her. Now, the baby is sitting more upright, the couch’s armrest propping her up. She feeds from the bottle much more slowly now as she has to properly work the milk into her mouth through the nipple, without the aid of gravity.
“There you go,” Felicity says, smothering a yawn. “You got her? I’m gonna brew some coffee. Decaf,” she adds, before Oliver can comment. “Want some?”
“Please.”
Splitting his attention between the feeding baby on his lap and his wife, Oliver watches out of the corner of his eye as Felicity pads over to the kitchen, setting up a large french press and waiting impatiently, shifting her weight back and forth on her as she measures out spoonfuls of sugar into her own mug. Because he’s not focusing completely on Mia, however, the baby stops feeding, staring up at him incredulously. Wailing loudly to try and get him to notice her, Mia lashes out with her arms around grasps her hands - closing her tiny fingers around the nipple of the bottle and as result, squirting milk all over herself.
Oliver jumps to his feet, raising Mia up so she dangles in mid-air. He lets the bottle drop to the ground with a thud as he exclaims, “Oh fuck,” quietly upon seeing how her clothes are now soaked, and she’s close to bursting into tears. There’s milk everywhere - on her face, in her hair, dipping down the neck of her onesie. She’s definitely going to need a bath.
“That’s the second time she’s done that this week,” Felicity groans. They make an exchange - Mia for his cup of coffee, and the blonde swings the baby up onto her shoulder. She doesn’t seem to care about getting milk on his sweater. “You drink your coffee, I’ll start the bath. You’ll have finished that cup by the time the water’s ready and then you can clean her up while I drink mine.”
“Partnership at it’s finest,” Oliver quips, winking.
Felicity places Mia back in her bassinet while she runs and fills up the bath, leaving the archer to watch over their daughter. He slowly drains his coffee mug, reveling in the bitterness of the hot liquid as it leaves a scorching trail down his throat that he’s grown used to. The baby makes unhappy noises and cries until she’s back in her mother’s arms, but when she realizes she’s being undressed in preparation for being lowered into the water, she goes quiet. Latching onto Felicity, she whines and begins to weep again as soon as her feet are dipped beneath the surface.
Sighing, Felicity shoots Oliver a resigned look. He nods, immediately stripping down to his boxers. They know from experience that Mia will scream her lungs out if she’s alone in the water - it scares her, which is completely understandable considering she’s a tiny baby in a big tub, even if she is being supported and held - but she’ll remain calm if she has somebody in the water with her.
Clambering in and settling himself down, Oliver raises his arms to take his daughter, resting her gently between his legs and rubbing her back soothingly. The one-month-old smacks her hands against the water as she wiggles around, sounding her extreme displeasure to the masses, but eventually, Mia stops crying and squirming and just sits limply. She’s not exactly happy, but at least she isn’t mad or upset anymore. The baby allows her father to hold and comfort her as her mother stoops down and washes her quickly with some infant soap, being careful not to get any into Mia’s eyes.
Felicity babbles to try and distract their daughter and it’s adorable. “Yes, that’s right, Mia is having a bath. She’s playing in the water while Mommy cleans her up because she did a big oopsie earlier. And you’re not crying, are you? Aren’t you an amazing little star today for Mommy and Daddy in the bath? Aren’t you - and you just shat yourself.”
“What?!”
Sweeping Mia from Oliver’s arms, Felicity hastily backs up so the archer can leap out of the now very dirty bath water. He shudders as soon as he sees the mess the baby has left behind. Luckily, Mia was instantly removed the moment it happened, so she’s still somewhat clean. Oliver, however, is going to need a shower. A shower where he’s going to use at least half a bottle of body wash.
“That’s nasty,” Felicity says, wrinkling her nose in disgust. She wraps Mia up in her baby towel, tapping her nose. “So, so nasty.”
Mia smiles.
She’s one month old, and already creating trouble for her parents.
“Take her,” Oliver sighs. “Get her changed… I’ll clean this up and -”
“Take a shower?” Felicity quirks an eyebrow. “Yeah. Good idea.”
She carries the baby out, although Mia tries to keep Oliver in her sightline for as long as possible, tracking him until the doorframe gets in the way. The archer has, fortunately, smelt and dealt with much worse in his life than shit-laced water, so it doesn’t take him long to wash out the bath, adding some diluted disinfectant for good measure. His shower is swift, as the cabin’s hot water runs out near the end; that’s the only disadvantage to living off the grid, that their utilities are a little limited. He doesn’t mind washing his hair, which he’s been growing out to Felicity’s insistence, with lukewarm water though.
Oliver re-emerges into the living room freshly dressed and chuckles when he sees his daughter lying down in her activity play mat - with Felicity collapsed down on the floor alongside her, one hand rubbing Mia’s tummy and the other holding a sippy cup which, by the looks of it, is filled with coffee.
“She started screaming the moment I left her,” Felicity sighs, leaning up on her elbow and taking a swig from the sippy cup. “But I really needed my coffee. And these sippy cups needed to be tested to see if they’re leak-proof.”
“I one hundred percent approve of your experimental testing methods.” Joining his family on the floor, Oliver stretches out on his front on the other side of the playpen, resting on his arms with his head tilted so he can observe both of her girls. “Mia’s certainly making her one month birthday an eventful one.”
“And it’s not even seven in the morning.”
“Would expect nothing less from a child with Smoak and Queen blood,” Oliver smirks. “Although I’d argue that it’s the Smoak genes that have given Mia her mischievous side…”
“If you’re saying that because William never did anything like this - one, William was fourteen years old and had enough control of his body functions to not squirt milk all over himself and shit himself in the bath, and two, William hacked into his school records to hide his miscomings from us, Oliver, multiple times. He was well-behaved, when he wanted to be.”
“You were proud of him for his hacking achievements though, admit it.”
Felicity rolls her eyes. “Well yes, but I couldn’t let him know that, could I?”
Mia squeals to get both of their attention. While Felicity has been talking to Oliver, she stopped rubbing the baby’s belly. Snorting in amusement, the blonde reassumes her movements, making their daughter sigh happily. She kicks her little legs, looking extra cute in her white leggings and blue butterfly t-shirt, and Oliver reaches out so her feet collide with his hand.
He doesn’t think that he’ll ever get used to this: this perfect, happy life with his wife and baby girl. To think that barely half a year ago, he was fighting for his life against the Ninth Circle, struggling to protect his friends and family, and secure a future for them all… and this is where he’s ended up now? If all of his prior grief and pain and suffering has led him to this life, Oliver wouldn’t change a single thing.
“Yes, we’re focusing on you, starlight, don’t worry, we haven’t forgotten you’re here,” he tells her, grinning. “Just talking about your big brother… who I hope you’ll get to meet soon. We just have to wait for his grandparents to get back to us.”
“She knows it’s her birthday,” Felicity says. “She thinks everything should be about her.”
“Everything has been about her since the moment she was born,” Oliver laughs. “Not that I’m ever going to complain about that. Today isn’t going to be any different.” He scoots over to press a kiss to Mia’s forehead. “Happy birthday, sweetheart.” He then leans over her to kiss his wife on the lips. “Congratulations on being the mom to a one-month-old.”
“And congrats to you, on being the dad.”
Taking Felicity’s now empty coffee sippy cup, Oliver asks, “Want a top-up?”
“God, please. It might be decaf, but I’m still going to drink as much of it as I possibly can.”