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Tim wasn’t quite sure how he had ended up here, holding his fifteen-day old daughter, some time after four am.
The darkness surrounded him, the moon the only being wide awake beside them in the quiet of their home. At some point in his life, he had thought of the moon as a backstabber, an unfair brightness in a world of nightmares. It stood as a token of sleeplessness, of the pain of a past that no longer felt like his.
Lucy had changed that.
She had changed a lot of things about him, but the moon was no longer his enemy. No longer a reminder of pain so deep, not even his subconscious could stop it, but rather a beacon of new beginnings. She had dragged him out to their backyard, on countless night hikes, even just to the window in their room and had told him stories of the stars. Of gods and goddess’ part of a narrative they didn’t fit, but captivated attention nonetheless. Of hope. The moon had stood through it all, even when it was new and unseen, always there even when the stars weren’t.
Lucy was his moon.
His one constant in a sky of change. His other half, through thick and thin. Now that they had her, the tiny, innocent bundle held protectively against his chest, he doesn’t think he could have done this with anyone else. In the two weeks she had been alive, motherhood had come easily to Lucy. She had taken it in stride, like the moon that beams through a stormy night. Tim had only fallen more in love with her. Everything she did, for him, for their daughter, made his heart jump.
“Hey.” Lucy’s voice carried through the room. Light against the darkness of the night. Of their job’s. Of their pasts. Even through the haze of parenthood and lost sleep, her mere presence anchored him in the storm of adapting.
“What're you doing up?” Tim met her gaze, taking in her features in the dim light. Her body, still healing, was hidden beneath his old academy shirt, worn from so many years of use that it hit her mid thigh, almost covering the loose shorts she was wearing. The smooth expanse of her thighs were on display, skin softened by the lotion he had insisted on rubbing in just hours earlier. He was hardly able to tear his gaze away. Knew that was what had led them to where they were now, his inability to leave her and her thighs alone.
“I could ask you the same thing.” Begrudgingly dragging his gaze up, past the faded Bradford across her chest and the soft curve of her jaw, he was met with a raised brow, a look of knowing written across her face. He had always been infatuated with her. It had only deepened after years of marriage. Years of knowing and loving her, even before a band and a court recorded promise.
“C’mere.” Tim gently shifted the newborn into right arm with a gentleness he didn’t believe he had possessed until Philippa had been born but Lucy had known and come to appreciate for years, freeing his right arm to urge the woman over. It was with a soft smile that she pushed herself off the door frame, crossing the room in six small strides, no more no less. The plush rug embroidered with raised, cartoon-esque flowers and butterflies in a multitude of colors they had spent weeks debating cushioned her steps, silent against the hardwood floor.
It had taken months for the nursery to become the quiet retreat it was now, countless hours spent perfecting every detail, far before they knew she was pregnant. Their want for kids was mutual and the minute they had moved into their forever home, they knew where the future nursery would be. It sat with the door closed, housing nothing but the rare compulsive buy here or there.
A onesie on a random Tuesday that was too cute to pass up. A pair of hand-knit socks from a vacation, the craftsmanship impeccable. Once, a small, stuffed elephant that Lucy had picked up during an undercover op that had gotten her in more heat than she had anticipated, both from Tim regarding her safety and from the rumors that had spread after. The items, small and innocent in nature, sat untouched, waiting for their time. Work on the room had begun not too long after they had discovered she was a girl. Slowly but surely, the nursery had come to life. A pale pink colored the walls, an oak crib pushed against the wall, a reclining chair nestled in a corner.
The rug had come last, a mere four days before Lucy had gone into labor. They had gone back and forth for months, no right decision in hundreds of rugs, until Tim had led her into the nursery after Nyla and Angela had brought her to the mall in an attempt to start labor two days before her due date. The rug itself was simple and unassuming, a white circle with scalloped edges and a playful scene lining the edges. It had been perfect though. Exactly what they had been looking for, without even knowing.
“Couldn’t sleep?” Lucy questioned as her hand dragged across his neck, fingertips brushing past the hair there as her elbow came to rest around the nape there, hand splayed against his upper arm. His own arm snaked around her waist, hand curling around her hip to drag her closer until her side pressed against his own. She used his shoulders as leverage to sit on his thigh, her eyes never leaving the newborn held against his chest, even as she groaned softly.
“Too much coffee. You?”
“It’s forty past her normal feeding time.” Lucy’s thumb probed softly at the edge of Pip’s lips, gently tracing the valleys and peaks of her face. The baby jerked softly at being bothered, her fists balling and limbs extending, face scrunching. The brunette moved to rub at her cheekbone instead, though that did little to soothe the infant. As if on cue, her mouth dropped open with a loud wail, the sharp noise slicing through the quiet in the same way the moon sliced through the dark room. “Guess she understood.”
Tim chuckled softly as he sat up straighter, allowing Lucy to shuffle until her back was pressed securely to his front. He never fully transferred the infant into her arms, instead raising her enough so her mother could slot right hand under her head, her left easily pulling her shirt up and unclasping the strap of her nursing bra. Tim had commented on it six days after she was born, having noticed the switch from Lucy’s usual pajamas of, well, nothing under her top to the bra, frowning when she had mentioned she had tried it the night earlier and had experienced nothing but pain and discomfort. Angela had reassured her it was normal, that she herself still wore a bra to bed despite Emmy being nearly a year old. He had accepted Lucy’s answer without any argument, willing to do anything to help.
It was easy enough to get the baby to latch, having done it enough times to know how she liked to be fed. Her left arm joined Tim’s in supporting the newborn, leaning her whole body weight back with a soft sigh. Despite the infant not being on an actual schedule, they had gotten her feedings to be fairly consistent throughout the night and the extra over half an hour of delay had made her breasts more tender than normal. The extra sleep had been a nice trade off, though her body had woken her up when the discomfort and muscle memory of feeding had kicked in.
The room was quiet, save for the suckling and small coos Phillipa would make, the couple content to sit in peace. Time ticked by. The moon still shone, the only light source in the room. They didn’t dare to move until she needed to switch sides and even then, their movements were small and precise, not breaking the tranquility they had created. Lucy let her head lean back with a yawn, eyes shut as she let Tim support them. Tim couldn’t take his eyes off of them. The way Lucy was the sole reason their daughter was healthy and growing, for the past nine months and now. How, even now, exhausted and in the middle of the night, she gave and gave and gave. And expected nothing back. She wanted the best for their daughter, no matter what.
As Pip finished, Tim took her back into his arms to finish burping her, allowing Lucy to fix herself without the added challenge of their child. Both tasks were simple enough and the brunette was turning on his knee before long, joy written in the soft smile that tugged at her lips as she watched them. He was so gentle with her. So caring. Before long, they were back where they started, seemingly the only ones awake in all of LA.
“She looks like you.” Tim whispered softly, eyes scanning the baby’s features. Since the day she was born, he had memorized her. The way her lips puckered and bowed, how her nose twitched before she would make any sound, whether it be cooing or crying, how her tongue pressed against the seam of her lips and her cheeks. Lucy had jokingly told him that she was convinced he’d be able to recognize her out of a line-up, but she knew she would be able to, too. That despite the physical manifestation of their love, it didn’t feel real. That the life they had spent so long building and perfecting didn’t feel real. And yet, it did. It felt so real that it was almost painful in their bliss.
Lucy shook her head with a hum of disagreement.
“She has my lips, but everything else is you.”
It struck him then that his years of self-hatred, of punishing himself for any and every thing, had culminated into something so precious, into something physical and not mental he had to protect, that he couldn’t see past the love he had for their daughter to see that she was his twin. That he could hold up baby photos of himself and wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between them. That thought had him pushing the baby into Lucy’s arms. Not out of anger or fear, for once, but out of catharsis. Relief so great it becomes release.
“Tim?” Lucy’s fingers found his hair as she took Phillipa, her body following easily as he turned her to face him and pulled, his face pushing into her neck, her chin resting on the top of his head. He breathed heavily, eyes shut against what he used to call traitorous but now knew was life, tears carving wet trails down his cheeks and pooling in her clavicle. “Talk to me, baby.”
“I thought-” Tim sucked in a breath, the sound echoing harshly in the quiet room. His arms wrapped around her back, hands splaying and grasping what had become her shirt, tugging her as close as possible with Pippa still between them in his suddenly desperate search for comfort. Some younger, more hardened version of himself had never thought this was possible. That he could trust himself to love another person enough to let them in, let alone create a family with them.
He had dreamt of it, at multiple times throughout his life. As a boy before his father had become the only version of a father he knew. During his twenties when he was convinced he would break the cycle, until Genny had knocked some sense into him and he realized he couldn’t just get with any girl that would let him while he was deployed. With Isabel, when he had thought she was the one. But now, with his girls held in his arms, he knew everything that had ever happened had been worth it. That despite an entire lifetime of knowing only suffering, that love could blossom and win.
“I thought she looks like you because I love you. Because I never thought there was a world in which I could love any version of myself. But… she looks like me and I love her. I could never hate her. She…” He cut himself off with a soft cry, reluctantly pulling his face out of the woman’s neck just enough to be able to see Phillipa, needing to see her. To prove she was still here. To prove that his fears weren’t real because she was. His hand, calloused from years of fighting, cupped the newborn’s head behind Lucy’s, both of which felt too soft against his. He steeled himself before his next words, searching for his truth in her face.
“I love myself because of her.”
“Oh, Tim.” Lucy gasped shakily, water glistening in her own eyes and clouding her vision as she moved until she could see his face. She took in how he watched their daughter, tears still silently streaming, his other hand grasping her hip as if it were his only tether to the world. As if Lucy would be the one to save him. Because she was. Because no matter how many times she would deny it or brush it off, she saved him. From danger. From his past. From himself. She had been the one to teach him he could love. Is the one who kept him living, not just alive. He knew what that meant now, because of her. Because of the kindness she had shown him, no matter how undeserving he was of it.
“You did that, Tim. You put in the work to get here, she just helped you admit it.” Her hand moved from his neck to his face, softly tugging it up so she could see him. This was why she loved him. He could have hidden, he could have run, he could have done anything so she wouldn’t see him. But he didn’t. He came willingly, lip wobbling and body shaking to her. She ran her thumb beneath his thumbs, her skin soft against the gentle prick of stubble there.
Tim pulled her to him, tilting his head as he moved to kiss her. It was small. Her top lip slotted between his. There was no heat to it. No intense need for it to go any further. Just the need to be close. To be intimate. To be them.
“I just… I love her so much, Lucy.” Tim mumbled against her lips, forcing his eyes open to look between them. He felt, rather than saw, Lucy’s smile before she pulled back just enough to see all of him, thumb moving to where her lips had just left. He kissed the appendage softly, watching as his words landed in her heart. The moon stood tall behind her, bathing her in soft white light, like she was his own personal goddess.
“I know you do. That’s what makes you a good dad.”