Chapter Text
Alhaitham was not a violent person by nature — he always preferred resolving conflict through words, his sharp eyes carefully observing the person before him as he looked for any signs of weakness or hesitation — but at that moment, it would definitely be an understatement for him to say that he’d beat up anyone and everyone who dared keep him from his wife.
His jaw had been set, his grip tight on the steering wheel as the images on his windshield swam before his eyes that he almost ran over three people in his haste to drive over to the hospital — totally uncharacteristic of him, as he was never one to lose his cool and be driven to a state of panic. But there’s always an exception to every rule, and today was definitely that exception.
Alhaitham had been at his office in the Akademiya ever since 8 o’clock that morning, going through the pile of paperwork that had accumulated on his desk the past week and ignoring everything and everyone in a bid to finish everything so that he could go home early, which was nothing new, considering his reputation as the most overtime-averse employee. But that day, the people in the Akademiya all knew that the haste was more than warranted — after all, his very pregnant wife was waiting for him at home, ready to give birth to their first child at any minute, with only a certain blonde architect for company.
Lumine’s due date was supposed to be last week, for which Alhaitham had taken the week off so that he could stay by her side when the moment comes, but the baby seemed to be testing the limits of her father’s patience — as children are wont to do, he recognizes, but which he certainly does not appreciate. Alhaitham had watched his wife eat anything and everything and do all sorts of exercises that the doctor recommended that may help induce labor, to no avail, which Kaveh had found amusing enough that he commented that the baby definitely took after her father in that she seemed to like taking her time to do things without regard for other people. That remark had made Lumine laugh, causing ketchup to dribble down her chin and onto her pregnant belly, and while Alhaitham didn’t appreciate the indirect jibe, seeing Lumine smile had been well worth it, and so he directed his attention instead towards wiping the condiment off his wife’s face and stomach, eliciting an eye roll from the blonde architect as he picked up another roll from the basket on the table.
Alhaitham has had mixed feelings about the pregnancy ever since Lumine first came into his study in tears with the positive test, but seeing how happy it made her was enough reason for him to hold his tongue and silently support her through it, and he in fact had been practically glued to her side as her due date approached. He only came in to work that morning to turn in the paperwork to extend his leave and clear out a few urgent requests for archive access that had piled up, but he had been so focused on getting everything done that he hadn’t paid attention to the ticking of the table clock on his desk, and once all documents had been carefully examined, read, and placed in his outgoing paper tray, horror awaited at the bottom of the pile.
12 missed calls. All from Kaveh, from four hours ago.
Not even a second had passed but Alhaitham had already grabbed his keys and was running at top speed to the faculty parking lot, and after three road near-accidents and one terrified nurse at the nurses’ station, he sprinted up three flights of steps and burst into her hospital room.
He could swear his heart stopped as soon as he opened the door.
“Oh, you’re finally here.”
Alhaitham’s gaze quickly zeroed in on the source of the voice: the blonde woman sitting up on the metal hospital bed in the center of the tiny room, her head and back propped up with pillows while she held a small bundle in her arms. Alhaitham quickly scanned her body to see if anything was wrong, but aside from her pale complexion and tired smile, not a hair was out of place.
Alhaitham exhaled. She was okay, and that was all that mattered to him.
He closed the door behind him as he watched her shift on the bed to face him, racking his brain for the words.
“How are you feeling?” They came out raspy, and Lumine smiled.
“Never been better. Just tired.” She reached her right hand out to him, which he took without question, as if it was the most natural thing in the world. It was soft and warm, and Alhaitham felt a smile worm its way sneakily onto his face as he sat on the stool beside the bed.
He could feel his heart rate beginning to slow down as he squeezed her hand, nodding. His eyes turned to the bundle in her arms. “And her?”
“She’s fine too. Just sleeping.”
He watched Lumine turn her attention back to the baby, a hopelessly smitten and adoring expression on her face as she gazed at her — it was similar to how she looked at him on their wedding day when he slipped the gold band on her finger, yet it was also completely different: it was a gaze so full of love, so full of light, that he found himself wishing she was looking at him instead.
“Would you like to hold her?”
Alhaitham’s eyes snapped up to meet her golden ones, his eyebrows rising ever slightly at her question. Lumine chuckled as she shifted closer to the edge of the bed and carefully transferred the bundle into his arms. He looked at Lumine, and then down at the squishy thing wrapped in a pink blanket sleeping peacefully in his arms.
She was so small, probably around the size of Alhaitham’s upper arm, her round head feeling feather-light as it rested on his arm and smelling faintly of powder and milk. A small tuft of blonde hair peeked out from beneath the pink bonnet snugly covering her head as she held her tiny arms against her body, sleeping, dreaming, without a care in the world.
He watched her for a few seconds as he marveled at the unusual sight before him, but then she opened her eyes, and it was as if he got the wind knocked out of him.
It should have been a familiar sight by now — after all, he saw them everyday in the bathroom mirror while he brushed his teeth — but seeing them on the face of another person was an experience that was so otherworldly, so mesmerizing , as if he were watching galaxies unfold before his eyes.
“She has your eyes.”
He could feel Lumine smiling gently as she watched him from where she sat on the bed, but he couldn’t find it in himself to look away from the tiny, defenseless human in his arms who would definitely die without his protection, and who was now looking up at him, and it was at that moment that he finally understood .
All his life he could never fathom why Kaveh was the way he is — he mostly thought of it as a difference in ideology — and didn’t understand his tendency to go out of his way to do things for other people, and to give, even though there might be nothing left for himself. He noticed it too in Lumine even before they got married, especially when it came to her brother, her friend Paimon, and with him — it was at a slightly more subdued level compared to Kaveh, but nevertheless, it was there. It puzzled him to no end, and although he had known Kaveh for many years, and had been together with his wife for several, he was nowhere close to understanding it that he eventually chalked it up as one of the things about human nature he probably would never be able to understand in his lifetime.
But humans change their minds all the time, and he was no exception, because the moment she opened her eyes, like a flash of lightning, Alhaitham immediately understood: he knew that he would give up his life for the tiny being in his arms — no strings attached, even if he received nothing in return.
He would give her the world if she asked him for it.
“Alhaitham?”
The baby closed its eyes and resumed its slumber, and Alhaitham finally looked up at his wife.
“Yes?”
A look of relief crossed her face at his reply before she leaned back onto the pillows with a smile. “We haven’t decided on her name yet.”
“Oh. Right.” Alhaitham turned his attention back to the sleeping baby in his arms as the gears in his began to turn.
A name…?
“Would you like to go over the list again? I think Kaveh put it in the front pocket of the bag before we left.” She tilted her head in the direction of the small bench in the room where her brown hospital bag sat as she waited for her husband to hand it to her.
Alhaitham shook his head. “There’s no need.”
“Oh! Have you thought of something?” He saw her sit back up on the bed excitedly at his words in his peripheral vision.
Alhaitham took one last look at her before looking up into his wife’s sparkling honey golden eyes.
“Aletheia.”
Lumine tilted her head slightly as she let it roll off her tongue.
“It means ‘to reveal’.”
Lumine thought it over for a moment, before nodding. “I like it.” She laid back down on the bed with a contented sigh. “I’m sure she’ll be happy to know that her name was given to her by her daddy once she’s older. She already looks like she’ll be daddy’s little girl.”
Alhaitham gave her a smug look. “Jealous?”
“Of course not.” Lumine released his hand and crossed her arms over her chest in mock offense. “I’m sure you have enough room in your life for one more blonde, in addition to the two already here.”
Cheeky.
Alhaitham gave his wife a teasing smile. “There’s room for one more, if you’d like.”
Lumine burst out laughing, and as the sound reached his ears, all his questions and worries were put to rest. He had felt that something had been missing ever since his grandmother’s passing, and although he hadn’t been lonely, it always gnawed at the back of his mind, an itch that he never managed to scratch. He thought, wondered, and searched all over, but before he knew what was happening, people began trickling into his life: there was the unspoken reconciliation with Kaveh, and then was Cyno, Dehya, Candace, and later on Tighnari, and then Lumine, with whom he fell in love and married. And now a new addition has arrived in the form of little Aletheia, who was oh-so-beautiful and who has his eyes, and he thought that maybe more people isn’t necessarily a bad thing.
His thoughts turn to the book with the emerald cover sitting in his study, and he makes a mental note to take Aletheia to visit her great-grandmother — he knows she will love her great granddaughter’s eyes.