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As soon as Hawk laid his eyes on Jackson, he knew he would love him like nothing ever before.
There was a sense he felt throughout the pregnancy that he would not feel the paternal instincts kick in. Hawk never thought to have children, never knew a relationship with a father that was not fraught with tension. Even summers spent with the Smith family had an underbelly of deception, mistresses and late night wandering hands between boys discovering themselves.
Thus, the pounding of his heart as soon as he saw his baby took him by surprise.
“He’s perfect,” Hawk whispered over Lucy’s shoulder as she held the baby in her arms. “Absolutely perfect.”
She hummed in agreement. “Jackson Fuller… sounds presidential, doesn’t it?”
Hawk chuckled. He reached out to smooth his hand over the peach fuzz adorning the baby’s head, watching in fascination as he seemed to almost lean into Hawk’s hand.
“I told you,” Lucy whispered. “A boy, just as predicted.”
“It was a lucky guess,” Hawk teased.
“No luck about it, call it intuition.”
“Fifty-fifty odds are a bit generous, don’t you think?”
“Hush,” Lucy replied with a small smile. “I just had our baby, I’m allowed to win.”
The comment stopped him. It was easy to look at a baby and recognize that on some level, you have always known they were yours without saying anything at all. Hawk recognized that the child in Lucy’s arms was his, in the way his ears curved and the ways his fingers clenched in his sleep.
What he did not think about was how the baby had Lucy’s hair color. That the baby was just as much Lucy as it was him.
Hawkins Fuller grew up without siblings, his concept of sharing forever being warped from a generous childhood and adolescence. Once he gave something up he ceased to be in control; it was out of his hands and yet still remained tied to him. There was a reason he didn’t let wayward boys keep his lighter.
Lucy had always wanted her hand in the steering wheel, always prying up the seams that stitched together Hawk’s life. The daughter of a politician, compromise kept her family tree healthy with strong roots.
Our baby, she had said. He carried his last name, and Hawk felt those same roots constrict around his neck.
“I need some air,” he said. He walked outside into the sun, a beautiful day, and found a bench to smoke cigarette after cigarette on until a nurse found him to tell him that Lucy had been asking for him.
That night, with Lucy at home taking a shower and the phone ringing off the hook with congratulations, Hawk realized he left his wallet at the hospital.
It was absolutely not necessary in terms of the greater scheme of things -especially since he and Lucy were planning on returning to the hospital in the morning with clean clothes- but Hawk found himself yearning to see the baby’s face once more, without Lucy’s prying eyes. She had given him a funny look once he returned from his extended smoke break, and Hawk was not looking forward to the inevitable conversation.
With a hastily written note left on the counter, Hawk drove to the hospital. It was night time, closing soon but Hawk only needed a minute. He would only give himself a minute. He parked in the “new parent” parking space and entered the building.
Hawk approached the nurse on duty, signing the clipboard as he spoke. “Hawkins Fuller, I was here earlier with my wife in the maternity ward and I’ve come back to retrieve something I forgot.“
“Mr. Fuller,” the nurse said. “Yes, I remember you and your wife earlier. How is life as a parent treating you?”
He knew she meant it as a joke, but the words felt bitter. “Beyond description.”
She smiled, and suddenly her eyebrows lifted. “Oh, while you were gone, there was a young man in here earlier looking for you and your family. He seemed slightly frazzled, like he was in a hurry.”
Hawk stopped. “A young man, you said?”
“Yes, brown hair and glasses. He didn’t sign in and just rushed past me-“
“Did he give a name?” Hawk asked even though he already knew the answer. Maybe he just needed someone to acknowledge Tim’s existence to make him feel more tangible.
“I didn’t quite catch the name, however he left the premises without incident.” The nurse smiled as though this news would be a relief to Hawk. “He won’t be coming back anytime soon, not like that at least.”
Hawk felt himself nod absentmindedly. “Timothy Laughlin. That was his name, he was a coworker of mine,” he said in a soft voice. “Tim.”
The nurse returned his shallow nod and directed him down the hallway to see Jackson, reminding him of the impending end of visiting hours before being called away. Hawk floated down the hallway alone but for ghosts.
He did not allow his mind to think about how he was retracing Tim’s steps. Steps that were apparently hasty and nervous, unsure about if he were welcome.
There was a moment in time where he could have run into Tim in this hospital with his newborn baby. He could have seen the devastation in his eyes as the betrayal became real, no more an abstract concept born in the early hours of the morning. Hawk had just missed watching Tim lay eyes on his son for the first time. He itched for a cigarette.
As Hawk finally stepped in front of the window containing his baby, wallet long forgotten, he visualized gentle hands on the sill, nervously tapping an erratic rhythm. He could picture tears running down Tim’s cheeks as he saw this baby that was half Hawk, what Hawk traded him for, and he could imagine acceptance blooming on his face. Because Tim was a good person and he would never blame this child. In the face of everything Hawk did to him, he knew Tim would look past the layers and accept this was what was for the best. For a second, his hand stung with the residue of a slap to the face.
Tim was hard to pin down and oftentimes made things difficult. He was Hawk’s favorite burden, a well loved stone you leave on the journey home because no matter how pretty it is, at the end of the day, it still weighs you down.
The baby shifted in the blankets and Hawk felt his heart clench. He was a father now. He imagined driving home and crawling under the covers of his bed, one that was doomed to always be a tad cold compared to the dingy one in an abandoned building downtown.
Hawk’s love for Jackson was new to him, but his love for Tim felt eons old.
The baby yawned, and Hawk placed his forehead on the glass with his eyes closed, a palm reaching up to press onto the barrier separating him from his boy.
“Tim,” he whispered to himself, the closest thing to an amen he would ever get. Hawk then opened his eyes, and walked off to find his wallet so he could return home to his wife.