Work Text:
Reggie’s first Father’s Day came just a little over two months after his daughter was born.
He had actually completely forgotten about it.
Between the sleepless nights, never-ending diaper changes and laundry, trying to take care of Flynn as well as the baby, he hadn’t given a single thought to his first ever Father’s Day. When he woke up that Sunday morning to the distant but familiar sound of his daughter crying, the only thing that was different was that the baby wasn’t in her bassinet by the bed and Flynn wasn’t next to him. Grabbing his phone, Reggie grimaced when he saw it was already six-thirty in the morning: how had he slept in? He stifled a yawn as he wasted no time in shuffling out of bed and following the sound of his daughter’s cries to the kitchen downstairs.
The Taylor family was fully settled into living with Ray, and as the weeks stretched on post-birth, Reggie couldn’t have been more grateful for the offer to move in with him. Ray was more like a father to him than ever, full of parenting advice and watching out for him when he was so focused on caring for his wife and baby that he forgot to take care of himself. And his daughter already loved Ray like a grandfather, always looking safe and content whenever Ray happily took a turn at bouncing her in his arms.
When he reached the kitchen, Reggie expected to find his daughter already getting fed by her mother, or maybe already being held by her grandfather but he blinked in surprise when he found Trevor Wilson trying to feed her.
“Georgia, oh Georgia, Georgia, Georgia,” Trevor sang softly under his breath as he tried to console his daughter. He offered Reggie an apologetic smile when he saw the dad was awake and whispered: “Well damn, we woke Daddy anyway.”
“’s okay,” Reggie yawned, holding his hands out. “Gimme.”
Trevor let out a sigh of defeat as he passed the baby over, and almost as soon as Georgie was in his arms, she stopped crying. As soon as his daughter was in his arms a wave of relief washed over him: he’d never get over how right and incredible it felt to hold his baby. His callused fingers held her teeny tiny hand, brushing over her dark skin and his eyes shone as they met her wet brown ones. To most people, his daughter looked much more like his wife than him and that was all they saw when they looked at him and his daughter, but to him, it still stopped his heart to look in her eyes and feel a little piece of his soul gazing back at him. He could care less who she looked more like, that was all that mattered.
“Hey baby girl,” Reggie smiled at her, kissing the top of her forehead. “There you go, it’s okay. Daddy’s here.”
Nothing made him feel better than getting to tell his daughter that, getting to be there when she was upset and scared and helping her to feel safe.
He lifted the tip of the bottle to her lips and was satisfied when she finally started to take the bottle. Feeding her had been a trying time since she was born, with Georgia not taking well to breast feeding and being a little underweight. Thankfully she was catching up now, but although she was taking formula in well now her favorite people to feed her by far were mom, dad…and uncle Stevie, funny enough. Probably because he and Reggie looked so much alike, and Stevie treated his niece with every bit of softness and caring as he did. Even though feeding was a time with Georgie, they truly did have a village helping to raise her and she seemed to already love her big family. Besides mom and dad, Ray was Georgie’s favorite person to hold her, Luke was her favorite to read to her, Julie was her favorite to sing to her and if she was in a good mood she loved Alex and Willie “dancing” with her. Georgie was…warming up…to Tía, at least she burst into tears a lot less whenever she would try to take over caregiving. He couldn’t exactly blame his daughter- most people were terrified of Victoria when they met her, though she meant well.
“Sorry,” Trevor offered, “we were trying to let you sleep in. Ray’s out in the studio and Flynn ran out with a bit and asked if I could keep an eye on Lil Bit here for a bit.”
He couldn’t help but to smirk; Reggie had never seen Trevor looking after the baby without Ray right by his side.
“And you have zero experience with babies,” Reggie teased.
“Zero,” Trevor remarked dryly. But bless him, the musician really did try his best to help out whenever he stayed over. He was pretty sure Trevor secretly loved the taste of domestic life he got when sleeping over at Ray’s. “Your wife had stuff to do to get ready for her...plans...for today and handed me this baby to watch and, well, we tried."
Georgie didn't look super amused with Trevor when he tried to throw her a big smile.
Reggie blinked.
“Plans?”
“For Father’s Day,” Trevor reminded him. The dad’s jaw fell open as it finally dawned on him what today was, and the rockstar let out a quiet laugh. “You completely forgot, didn’t you?”
“Yeah…” he admitted. Suddenly he was crawling with both nerves and excitement. He loved surprises- but mostly surprises for other people. It made him uncomfortable when anyone went out of their way to plan anything big for him. “Any idea what she has planned?”
Trevor made a ‘zipping’ motion on his lips.
“My lips are sealed.”
Now he was just curious. With a smile playing at his own lips, Reggie was anxious to know what was going on. Why would Flynn need to wake up so early and leave the house to start his Father’s Day plans?
“You said Ray was in the studio?”
Once Georgie was done with her bottle and Reggie burped her, he let her rest on his shoulder as he took a walk outside to the garage studio. The door was propped open as Reggie stuck his head inside. Mostly, the studio looked exactly the same as it did when he lived here with Alex and Luke with the old couch still there and Rose’s piano sitting in front of the stained-glass window and wall of plants. But in the back, Ray had taken up some of the space to turn into an official photography studio. He and Flynn both worked from home, and it was nice for her to use more of the office space inside the house to be with the baby. Sure enough, Ray was sitting at the back table, editing on his laptop.
“Hey,” Reggie greeted.
A bright smile crossed Ray’s face as he looked up to see Reggie with his granddaughter.
“Hola mijo. We were trying to let you sleep in. Happy Father’s Day.”
His heart swelled at the compliment, and it was the first time it really hit him. It was Father’s Day. His day.
“Thanks,” Reggie replied, genuine. “I guess you’re not going to tell me where Flynn went either?”
“Nope,” Ray grinned. He closed his laptop as he stood up and held out his arms for Georgie. “But if you let me hold my granddaughter, I might give you your present early.”
“Present?!” He squeaked. Even after remembering it was Father’s Day, he hadn’t even thought about getting presents. Especially not from Ray.
He quickly transferred the baby over to her grandfather. Ray laughed at Reggie’s excitement, his own eyes shimmered with joy as he took his granddaughter and placed a kiss on her forehead.
“Hola nieta,” Ray told her softly, taking one of her tiny hands in his before looking back up to Reggie. “Your gift is in the bag.”
Ray nodded to a bag that was hidden on the shelf in the back. Reggie’s eyes lit up when he saw the sparkly “Happy Father’s Day” writing on the gift back and he raced over to it. His heart pounded like it was Christmas morning as he tore into the bag and pulled out a photo album. On the front was the photo Ray took of him, Flynn and Georgia the day they brought her home from the hospital. His eyes watered as he opened it to find photos from her first day at home.
“It’s a scrapbook!” He realized. He let out a laugh as he flipped through the goofy pictures of the guys with the baby and his heartstrings pulled when he landed on a photo of him holding his daughter and gazing out the window in her nursery. “I had no idea you took most of these.”
“You were just a bit preoccupied,” Ray teased as he stepped up next to him. He placed a hand on Reggie’s shoulder. “One of my favorite things is to look back at all those photos and videos of the kids. I know the first few months are…pure insanity. It’s been hard and taking pictures hasn’t exactly been your priority-“
Reggie cut him off by throwing his arms around him, carefully minding the baby in his arms. He sniffled back tears as he murmured:
“Thank you. This is so perfect.”
“You’re welcome, mijo. Happy Father’s Day. You’re an incredible dad, Reggie. I’m so proud of you.”
The comment meant more coming from Ray than anyone, and now he was really having to fight back tears. Over the past year, Ray had been more of a dad to him than his own father had ever been. It was through Ray that Reggie had learned what a dad should be, what being a family truly meant. As Ray helped him navigate fatherhood, his career and marriage, Reggie had become comfortable this year officially thinking of him as his own father.
“Thanks, Dad.”
His heart fluttered again as he felt a kiss being placed to the top of his head…then his eyes went wide when he realized his mistake.
“I meant to get you something!” Reggie blurted out as he pulled away.
Ray just smiled as she shook his head and nodded at the baby who bounced in his arms.
“Give me the morning to spend with my granddaughter while you look after yourself, and that will be a gift enough.”
So, for the first time in months, Reggie allowed himself to enjoy his old morning routine. It was strange, being away from the house on his own for so long, but the morning run felt amazing as he flew down the beach, gulping in the fresh sea air. He hadn’t realized how much he needed the break and time to himself until he got it, and he was surprised that he didn’t even feel guilty to enjoy it, even if he was curious about what his daughter was doing the whole time he was out. He even did some yoga on the beach for the first time in ages, his muscles grateful for the stretch. When he returned home, Ray and Trevor all but forced him back out of the house with his laptop and car keys once he was showered and changed. Flynn was still out herself, only texting him back a winking emoji when Reggie asked her if she was okay. The guys suspiciously did not answer when he asked if they knew what was going on today. Assuming all of this was further instruction to enjoy ‘his morning’, Reggie took his laptop to a nearby park and got some time to finally get back into catching up on fanfiction. He had so many ideas about baby-related stories now that the baby was born, and admittedly, it felt amazing to get to write out all of the experiences and fatherhood anxiety he had over the past couple of months.
It was lunch when he got the text to come back home again, and Reggie couldn’t help but to smile to himself as he skipped up the drive. He knew there was some kind of surprise waiting for him back home, and it wasn’t like Ray could hide everyone’s cars parked out on the street. He couldn’t wait to get inside and see what was up. Sure enough, Flynn greeted him on the front porch, waiting for him in a bright red summer’s dress.
“Hi dad,” Flynn smiled as he stepped up to her. They leaned in for a sweet kiss that made him all warm and fuzzy inside. “Did you enjoy your morning to yourself?”
“Yes,” Reggie admitted with a grin between kisses. “You wanna tell me what’s going on?”
His wife just held a finger to her lips, her eyes twinkling as she took his hand. Instead of leading him into the house, she led him around back to the backyard. The white fence was decorated with red and black streamers- still his favorite color combination after all these years. She let him push open the gate, and his heart pounded with excitement when he saw that everybody was there. All of the guys, Julie, Flynn’s parents, his brother and Carlos. Ray had the grill fired up and was beaming as Trevor held onto him, both of them wearing matching ‘kiss the cook’ aprons. There was a table full of all kinds of cookout food and a big “Happy First Father’s Day” banner was draped across the back fence. Stevie was standing by Carlos, holding his niece in his arms. Georgie looked so fascinated at what was going on, her brown eyes wide and staring around at everything.
“Surprise!” They all cried.
Bobby's daughter Carrie and his partner's daughter Hayley were jumping up and down like crazy, both girls clearly just excited to surprise them as they had been to celebrate with their own dads. They both loved having a baby in the family and jumped on any chance to get to ‘babysit’. There was even a table full of gifts, Reggie realized. He was so stunned everyone had done all of this for him he didn’t know how to react. Flynn’s fingers ghosted up and down his back as she held him upright, planting a big kiss to his cheek.
“Happy Father’s Day, baby,” she whispered. She tugged him toward her, their hands folding together as they faced each other. “I couldn’t have asked for a better father for my daughter. You deserve the absolute best first Father’s Day ever.”
She leaned up to kiss him, warming his heart even more. A huge goofy smile was plastered across his face as he turned back to his family, letting out a laugh of shock.
“We always love throwing dad a big Father’s Day cookout,” Julie explained. She and her brother, who was holding hands with Stevie, beamed at him as he they all came up to give him hugs. “We all wanted to do something special like that for your first Father’s Day.”
“I thought it sounded like the perfect tradition to carry on,” Flynn told him. She smiled around to the group. “After all, we have a lot of amazing fathers to celebrate in this family.”
“And we all know what a big deal this Father’s Day is,” Bobby finished for her. He and Reggie exchanged smiles; he hadn’t been there when Bobby had secretly had his own kid after leaving the band, but the two had bonded a lot over the past year as Reggie became a father himself. He fully appreciated now how hard and scary it had to have been for his friend, and he wished he had been able to be there to throw a party like this for Bobby back then.
“We cooked your favorite,” Ray announced.
“Cheeseburgers!” Reggie gushed when he saw all of the burgers ready on the grill.
“And we even have…” Luke went on, but Reggie jumped up and down and interrupted when he saw…
“Pizza!”
“We brought you your favorite donuts,” Alex announced, proudly presenting him with a whole bag of donuts from the little shop down the street from his and Willie’s dance studio.
“And I went out to get these,” Flynn told him. She turned him toward a small table of desserts, and he gasped when he saw the huge cake that was there, along with one of his favorite chocolate pies and a whole tray of cookies from his favorite bakery.
“You didn’t have to do all of this!” He stammered, looking around to everyone, trying to express his gratitude.
“Well, it’s not just for you,” Julie added playfully, nodding to her dad, “but your first Father’s Day is a big deal. We all wanted to party on your behalf today.”
“We wanted to celebrate,” Flynn told him. “Because you’re the best dad, and you deserve the world.”
The best dad.
“I don’t know what to say,” Reggie choked out. He reached out, cupping his wife’s face. “Except that I love you, and I couldn’t do this without you-“ he turned to the rest of his family, “without any of you. I love you guys.”
Reggie blushed as his friends raced toward him, jumping on him and hugging him. After accepting everyone’s hugs and well wishes, Reggie turned to his brother, who still held his daughter. He felt a surge of pride as he accepted his daughter back into his hands from her uncle and gently brought a thumb up to stroke her cheek, wondering how he could ever be so lucky as to have such an incredible family to love. He knew everyone here had every bit of faith in him being a dad, and though sometimes it was hard to have as much faith in himself as they did, seeing everyone gathered around today to celebrate him being a father made him feel like he must be doing something right.
“I love you most of all,” Reggie whispered to his daughter. “I couldn’t be more honored to be your dad."
He kissed his little girl one last time before leaning over to give his wife another kiss too. A brilliant smile drapeda across his face as the three of them joined their family in gathering around the grill to enjoy the first of many Father Days.