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Percy rolled over in his comfortable bed, knowing that once he got up, he wouldn’t see it for at least twenty five hours. Nor would he see his beautiful, and very pregnant wife, Annabeth. He pulled her towards his chest and kissed her exposed shoulder and base of her neck.
Ever since she became pregnant she’s cherished the sleep she can manage. Mostly because she’s at the point in her pregnancy where everything’s just unpleasant, all the time. So, Percy disrupting that usually causes chaos to ensue, with some you fucker, you know I need my sleep, or why would you do that, kind of stuff. Not this time though. She needs any scrap of time she can get with him. While the thought of dating a fireman is appealing, there’s never much mention about how scary it is to let him walk out the door in the morning not knowing if he’ll come back in one piece.
So, to the best of her abilities she rolled over and snuggled into him more.
“You know, if you weren’t about to leave me for so long I’d be pissed.” She grumbled, her voice coated with sleep.
“I know.” He kissed the top of her head, and then her forehead, and then her nose, and finally landed on her lips. Her morning sickness usually comes around nine o’three, so they had a good three hours before she took her place at the toilet. “I’ll miss you.” She rested her hand on his jaw. It was rough from not shaving the previous day, but she loved it all the same. She found it hard to be mad at him when he might die.
When they were younger, say, fifteen, she would get so pissed at him for not spending his potentially last moments with her, but she’s past that now. Now he’s all hers, and he’s stupid enough to keep risking his life for other people. She knows she can’t tell him to stop being a fireman, or stop risking your life, because she’d sound selfish, and it would almost most definitely backfire on her. “You okay?”
“Just thinking.” She sniffled. Fuck, her hormones were fucking with her. He craned back to take a look at her, and wipe a tear off her cheek.
“About what?”
“How you’re going to be a great dad.” She nuzzled her face in his chest, gods, it’s so unfair that he smells like the beach no matter what he does.
“I will be a pretty stellar dad.”
“If you do say so yourself.” She teased.
“You said it first!” He laughed.
“That wasn’t an invitation to add on.” His hold on her tightened while he stretched.
“I need to get to the station.” She whined at his attempt to get up.
“I need my husband to stay with me.” He smiled with a hint of sadness
“We need money.” He slid out from the warm bed with unwavering confidence that he’d be back. (Which she didn’t understand how he could be so certain about an uncertain thing) “I’ll see you tomorrow, okay?” He kissed her forehead and tucked her in as she fell back asleep.
“Wake me up before you leave.” She mumbled as she settled into his pillows.
With his FDNY cotton shirt, and sweat pants, he went to kiss Annabeth goodbye, but she looked so peaceful, he just couldn’t bring himself to do it.
As he tried to back out of the room in his boots she sat up.
“I know you didn’t just try to leave without kissing me goodbye.” She said, amusement with a hint of anger laced in her voice.
“You just looked so peaceful, I couldn’t bring myself to do it.” She stuck her arms out like a little kid would. He walked back over and gave her a hug. She gripped his shirt like it would keep him hers forever. (He was already hers but it doesn’t hurt) “I’ll be back before you know it. Call Grover, he’ll keep you company.” Percy gave her one last kiss before he trudged down to the station.
Ever since the COVID lockdown lifted he’d been wary of being around Annabeth and his unborn child. (Yes, he knows how it looks, pregnant in lockdown blah blah blah... There wasn’t anything else open, what was he and his wife supposed to do? Not have sex?)
For good reason too! Firefighters, essential workers, were still working. He could have been exposed but Annabeth had been very vocal about how she can’t be home alone incase something were to happen to her, she would need help and that Grover doesn’t count as company even if he does eat all their food. So he’s home now, but won’t go six feet near her until he’s showered. She has complaints but at least she gets to sleep in the same bed at night. (Not including his twenty-four-hour shift nights)
On his way in, passing the engines, he bumped into a new EMT. It was honestly the EMT’s fault but since Percy’s who he is, he apologized, and stuck up a conversation.
“Sorry, let me help you with all of that.” He helped him with his stuff before continuing. “How was your shift?”
“Pretty quiet—” Knob, Frank, and Red all went to shush him the second he started to say the Q-Word.
“Don’t—!” They all shouted.
“What?”
”Don’t say the Q-Word. You jinxed us, dude.” Knob explained, exasperated.
“How?”
“Never say the Q-Word. On Percy’s first day, oh gods, we had what? Forty calls?”
“It was only thirty six and the gods took it out of context.”
He’d said the Q-Word in context to the dishwasher being quiet and not the day, but they still had an abnormal amount of calls.
“Oof. Well, maybe if you don’t believe in it, it won’t happ—” the EMT was cut off by the alarm going off…
Grover showed up at Percy and Annabeth’s apartment around eight fifty, just in time to be there to hold her hair back as she puked. Grover had an apple in his mouth as he held her hair and watched her breakfast come up.
“How can you eat while I do this?”
“Eh, I’m used to it by now. Besides, what are friends for if not to hold back their pregnant friend’s hair as she pukes?”
“Percy said something similar sometime ago.” She smirked as she remembered the last party they were at before they got together. (All the while keeping her breakfast down.)
It was her graduation party for college with a masters in architecture, and she was ready, after five years of non-stop studying, and reading and then rereading, she was ready to let loose and have a big blow out before she started her non-paying internship.
She’d done shot, after shot, after shot, after shot… (with an empty belly, mind you) and when the alcohol was ready to rip her a new one, she fell onto Percy, her best friend of twelve years at the time, and dragged him to the bathroom.
“Why am I—?” She puked and he understood what he needed to do. “I mean what are friends for if not to hold back their drunk friend’s hair as she pukes?” She smiled and when they eventually became a thing that line became a thing as well.
It was only two o’clock when they hit their tenth call. Previously, they retrieved kittens from trees, catching reckless fathers who climbed to get them, one call was at a Party City with a helium leak, they were hungry and tired from the day so far, so when Knob heard Percy’s voice as a higher pitched squeak he nearly lost it.
When the team got a chance to have a lunch, cooked by the gracious Red, Percy took his chance to call and check in with Annabeth.
“Hey, Wise Girl, how are you?” Annabeth could hear the exhaustion in his voice and her heart broke at the sound of it like that.
“I’ll be better once you get some sleep.”
“I’m fine. It’s just this stupid EMT he jinxed us so we just finished up our twelfth call.”
“It’s only two!”
“I know, that’s the jinx.”
“Please tell me you don’t actually believe in jinxes.”
“You’d believe it too if you were on your thousandth call five hours into a twenty-four-hour shift.”
“I’m sorry baby.”
“Speaking of which, how is the little runt?”
“Did you just call our unborn baby a runt?”
“Yes, now let’s move on and remember how tired I am.”
“After the puking session, Grover made me drink orange juice so the baby would move around.”
“Did they?”
“Still are.” He groaned.
“I wish I could be there to feel it.”
“I promise that when you get back to me I’ll drink some orange juice so he’ll dance.”
“He? We’re having a boy?”
“Well, biologically speaking, yes, they will be born with male parts.”
“Awesome!” She could hear his goofy grin through the phone. “I- I mean—”
“Jackson, come on your food’s getting cold!” Knob called for him.
“I should eat while I can.” He sounded so sad but she wanted him to eat.
“Go eat, please.”
“Love you.”
“Love you more.”
“I don’t have time for this game, Wise Girl!” He playfully chided.
“So let’s just say I love you more and call me later?”
“Next time I get to win.”
“We’ll see.” She hung up. When finally he got his butt in a chair for one second the alarm went off again.
This one was… more serious than the last couple off calls. A fast food place called saying they had a gas leak. The building went up in flames just as they got on sight.
Annabeth had taken a nap with Grover, who wasn’t supposed to be napping, but it was nice to have somebody next to her at least. She had snuggled into Grover’s chest.
“Eww, Annabeth, you drooled on me.”
“I swear it’s because I’m pregnant with Percy’s baby.”
“He still drools?” Annabeth sat up, with some help from Grover, and glared at him. Yes he still drools and on me.
“What do you think?” Grover winced and then her stomach rumbled.
“Lunch?”
“Yes, please!” Grover really wasn’t much of a chef, at least nothing compared to Percy who, on the nights he’s home, can whip up a gourmet meal like it’s nothing. Gods does she miss Percy.
It was their twentieth call and Percy was already losing his mind before they found the basement full of pregnant women.
“Who— how—?” One of the girls, she seemed to be only eighteen, managed to stand up and have her thoughts together.
“Her name is Claire. She told us that we—” One of them cried out, and the crew all looked to Percy. (He’s the resident baby man, considering he’s the only married one and has a kid on the way)
Percy ran to the— the sixteen year old’s side. Oh gods, she’s only sixteen…
“What hurts?”
“Everything.” She strained out, her forehead beaded with sweat and already looking purple.
“I need you to breathe, okay?” He showed her how to do the breathing exercise that he learned from Annabeth. She had gone to a class (without him) and she taught him the breathing she’d learned. (Because apparently he’s the one giving birth?)
The building was crumbling around Percy and this sixteen year old. “What’s your name?”
“Stephanie—” She strained out.
“I’m Percy.” The room was filling with dust from the crumbling building around them. He was holding her hand, which she was breaking his, and breathing with her. He wasn’t a doctor, but he did take an EMT course, thinking he could go that route and wouldn’t be dealing with as many fires… (he was wrong)
“I don’t think I can do this, Percy.”
“You can, and you will get through this…” He felt awkward about this part but he needed to see if she was dilated enough to start pushing. “I need to see how far along you are.” She nodded and he looked under.
“It’s his tenth time doing a twenty-four-hour shift, and I hate it as much as the first time.”
“I’m sure being pregnant doesn’t help.”
“It really doesn’t. Like, what if I went into labor? Would they let him come to the hospital?”
“Why don’t we just turn on the tv, okay, Beth?”
Captain Knob has reported that all but two have made it out of what he said looks like a brothel at first sight, but is actually a factory of pregnant women. The woman running this underground operation has been found dead on sight. Possibly died in the fire that is rapidly spreading towards Jackson and the girl that’s left. More on this later, back to you Tom…
“Why would you let me see that!?” Annabeth yelled as she whacked Grover with a pillow.
“I didn’t know that it was Percy in there!”
“Percy’s in there?!”
“Who do you think Jackson is?“
”I— Grover!” She grumbled and gripped what she believed to be the last thing she has of Percy. (It’s not true, but pregnancy hormones are wacky)
“chill out, Beth, you know Percy. Nothing can kill that bastard.”
“You just called my dead husband a bastard!” Though she was smiling a little as she whacked him with the pillow.
Percy helped the girl, the baby, and himself out of the building just in time before the 118 removed the support beams they put in place to give them more time. All the while putting out the fire that caused the damage.
“Jackson, what have I said about pulling stunts like that, Man?”
“I know, Knob, but she’s sixteen, too young to die.”
“No shit. Still doesn’t mean you tempt fate. Do you know how much it would have sucked to tell your pregnant girl at home that her guy is dead, huh?”
“No, but you’re right. If I had died, Annabeth would have killed me.”
“She still might.” Percy checked his watch.
“Lucky us, we’ve still got seven hours on this shift.”
“Whoopee!”
Back at the station Percy made brownies, extra fudge, so he could take them home as an I’m sorry I almost died kind of thing for Annabeth. She always gets so mad at him for doing that.
The last time he made I’m Sorry brownies was to propose to her. He’d stuffed the ring in the center piece, her favorite, and she nearly choked on it. She felt something hard scratch her mouth right before she spit it into a napkin and that’s when she found it. Glistening under the chocolate mound. She glared at him because he’d had the balls to propose though brownies. Though he didn’t see what he did wrong, she said yes… (Except she almost died)
He smiled, looking at the brownies, remembering how cute Annabeth’s puffy grump face was as she tried to hold back her smile. Could he have gone anymore cheesy in how he proposed, no, but that’s part of his charm. Or so she says. She’s having his baby so he’s doing something right…
Percy was feeling okay until his phone rang… from Annabeth. Crap! He didn’t call her… she probably was watching the news oh he is so screwed.
“Hey— hey there, hon-buns…”
“You idiot!”
“I know, but Annabeth, she- she looked so much like you at sixteen, just pregnant and I couldn’t just leave her.” He heard her sigh, of course she looked like her. Of course!
“Just— you can’t pull shit like that, you— you Seaweed Brain! You’re going to be a father, and maybe we’re not on the same page here but I for one would like for our kid to get to know his father.”
“I know.” He wanted nothing more than to just wrap his arms around her and let her know that he’s not going anywhere, but despite them being a mere thirty blocks away it felt like an entire world.
“How long until you can come home?” She sounded so sad, and lonely that Percy will be talking to Grover when he gets home. Because while he technically a friend, he’s really there to make sure Annabeth has everything she needs.
“Six and a half more hours.”
Once Annabeth had hung up the phone she looked over at Grover, who was asleep on their couch before locking herself in her and Percy’s bedroom to work on some blueprints. (Because, Jesus Christ, she did not think maternity leave would have such little work— like she knows she’s supposed to be getting ready to have her child but that’s no fun when there’s blueprints to be adjusted and Annabeth-ified)
She didn’t pick her head up until she heard shuffling outside, but also, ow, she hasn’t moved her neck in however long. She just assumed it was Grover since Percy still had like two hours left on his shift.
She laid back into her side of the bed and pulled Percy’s pillow to her chest, protecting her baby bump and herself. Something about Percy’s sea breeze scent just knocks her out. (Or it was the exhaustion from worrying, which is bad for the baby but whatever…)
Then the the bedroom door opened.
The other side of the bed dipped but she didn’t have it in her to care. His sea breeze scent washed over her even more, which was just unfair up until his lips were on hers. He threaded his fingers in her hair and had the other hand on her bump.
“Don’t crush my papers.”
“Love you too.”
“Hi.” She tried to keep her excitement down, because he’s just her husband and she shouldn’t be this excited to see him. But oh gods was she happy he was home. In one piece nonetheless. “You’re in one piece.”
“That I am.”
“I’m mad at you.” But it came out much happier than she’d meant to lead on.
“For what?”
“Being a heroic idiot.”
“I’m sorry.” Suddenly she was feeling angry because, he can’t keep doing this. He’s going to be a father, she needs him around, and it’s not fair for him to keep pulling stupid heroic stunts that will get him killed. It’s like he doesn’t care about the life they built together. Like she means nothing to him.
“I’m actually serious, Percy.” Her tone, body language, and the mood in the room switched so fast, it was hard to believe that a happy aura was ever around. “It’s like you don’t care about— about our family.” She kept her voice steady, not wanting to yell.
“I do care.” He said through a yawn.
“Every time, Percy. Every time, you walk out that door— how am I supposed to know that you’ll come back? How do I know you won’t pull a stunt like you did today and it doesn’t go as well at is it did? How can I be sure that you want this life? If you really want to be a hero just go back to camp. Because I’m done with this stressing, the worrying. If you’re not going to be careful than I won’t care.”
“Annabeth—”
“No, Percy. Do you even hear me right now?”
“Honestly, no, I’ve been up for twenty five hours and I really want to sleep.” He chuckled but she was too angry and upset at him that she just threw his pillow at him and did her best to stand up until he came around to help her.
“Thank you.” She said before walking out of the bedroom and going to sit next to the sleeping Grover on the couch.
She hoped he’d follow her, show her that, yes, in fact he does care. Or— she doesn’t even know but she wants him to prove that he cares and wants what they’d planned for over a decade ago. She worked too hard on this relationship, the pining, the hurt, the jealousy, the near death experiences that they had no choice about, all of it, was for this to be their life. She put the work in. She opened her heart, which is fucking hard for her after everyone left her for something better, except Percy. Who was the only one who stayed around. Now he’s being a little fucker and risking his life all over again. And for what? What reason does he have that he needs to risk his life for everyone? What the actual fuck is that? It’s attractive for like five minutes until he does something stupid like running into a literal burning building, delivers a baby, and tries to play it off like it was nothing. Like that’s what every firefighter does on a daily basis.
Percy was confused. All he’d wanted was to come home to the love of his life and cuddle in bed with her. Somehow between opening the front door and kissing her he messed shit up. She probably doesn’t want him to bother her so he’ll hide out in here until she misses him too much or something.
Besides, he’s pretty sure none of what’s happening is real and it’s just a surreal nightmare. He is no stranger to nightmares of course, especially ones that feel like they’re real and/or happening right now with him in the room.
The second his head hits the pillow he’s out like a light.
When he wakes up he sees Annabeth sitting on the bed, back turned to him, blueprints in hand. He wraps his arm around her waist, careful of the baby as to not squish the child.
Sometimes when he looks at Annabeth he can’t help but laugh about all those bullies he dealt with as a kid saying awful things to him like he’d never find anyone who’d love him or fuck him. But look at him now! He has Annabeth and proof that he’s fucked. (Made love really but the point is that this mans fucks)
“I missed you.” He said it, muffled by her back that he was sttamoting to kiss from his laying down position. She didn’t say anything, just switched between some papers.
He sat up, hoping that the shift of his weight in the bed would catch her attention. “Annabeth.” He saw a familiar crinkle in her face that he didn’t like becoming it meant she was thinking too much. (Usually more than what’s good for her) “Annabeth, hello?” She exhaled through her nose, annoyed by his almost sudden presence.
“What.”
“What did I do?”
“You were stupid… again.” He sat up with his legs around her and his chest against her back.
“That’s not new. We know I’m an idiot.” He kissed the base of her neck which made her head dip back against his shoulder almost involuntarily.
“I am going to ask you something. I want your complete and honest answer, no strings attached.”
“I’m nervous but go ahead I guess…”
“Do you want to be with me?”
“Is this because I had a required twenty four hour shift?”
“Answer the question.”
“Yes. Of course I want to be with you.”
“Do you mean that?”
“Annabeth,” He laid her back onto the pillows and laced their fingers together. “You’re right. I don’t just want to be with you.” Annabeth’s heart rate quickened. “I need to be with you.” Her breathing evened out. (Until she felt his lips on hers)
Gods does she love him. His hands on her, everywhere, feels amazing. He’s gentle, and sweet, all the while ravishing her lips.