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Lexa took two steps toward the door and stopped…for about the third time within the last ten minutes. Clarke tried to glare at her, but just started laughing instead. “Are you sure you’ll be okay today?” Lexa asked, hesitation clear in her voice and in her eyes.
“Yes, love. If something happens, I’ll give you a call,” Clarke assured her. Truthfully, Clarke was unsure whether she was actually going to be okay. She was scared as hell, but she trusted that Lexa would come back home in the blink of an eye if Clarke needed her to. She was protective like that and she loved her for it.
The brunette sighed and went back over to where Clarke was sitting on the living room couch. “I feel like two weeks wasn’t enough time. I’m not ready to leave either of you,” she mused, turning her attention to the little bundle in Clarke’s arms. Their two week old son was sleeping soundly in the crook of the blonde’s arms. Lexa brushed a finger across her son’s cheek and smiled as his eyes fluttered open for just a few short seconds.
Clarke used her free hand to cup Lexa’s cheek. “I promise to call you if I need anything. I’ll probably call you to give you updates every few minutes, too. Also, don’t be shocked if I call you to remind you how much I love you,” she joked. She reached over to kiss Lexa once more before telling her to hurry and get on her way to work before she was too late. Lexa groaned, but stood back up, kissed Clarke and then her baby boy’s forehead, and then gathered her bags for work.
Lexa hurried to her car after taking her sweet time actually leaving the house. She knew the firm needed her to come back to work, but she would have given anything just to spend even one more day with her family. It wasn’t until she was in her car that she realized she was smiling like an idiot. Before driving off, she took a few moments to reminisce. So much had changed over the last year…
**********
The two women were married within three years of officially dating. They had known each other a lot longer than that through mutual friends, but it took Clarke forever to formally ask Lexa on a date. Their circle of friends were ecstatic when they found out that the girls were dating, then that they were engaged, and then finally married. Though everyone had seen it coming for quite some time, the girls took a bit to catch on and finally do something about the feelings they clearly had for each other.
On their wedding day, neither girl thought they could ever be happier. Lexa never thought she would meet someone who she could spend her life with and then Clarke came along. Clarke was convinced that she would never find someone who was always up for an adventure but also enjoyed a night in. They were everything neither girl ever knew they needed.
A year into their marriage, they decided that they wanted to try for a baby. It was something that they had both been thinking about in private but were hesitant to bring up with each other. One night Lexa decided to bring it up one night over dinner – both girls burst into tears when they realized they were both thinking about starting a family. Of course, it wasn’t exactly easy for two women to have a child, so they had several doctor consultations before deciding to give in vitro fertilization a try. Although both girls were nervous, the excitement outweighed their nerves. After several lengthy conversations and multiple pro and con lists, they decided Clarke would carry their first child.
The pregnancy actually went pretty smoothly. Clarke was a tad ill in the beginning, but that subsided after some time went by. The middle of her pregnancy went completely as they expected to. The end was a bit rough, though Clarke somewhat expected that to happen – her mom had faced that exact pattern when she was pregnant. Overall, the cravings and occasional bouts of morning sickness were the worst parts of the nine months.
In hindsight, Lexa realized that Clarke had no idea what she was doing when it came to giving birth. Yes, she was a doctor; however, she had only seen births happen from observing during her residency. She did read a few chapters from a book and watched a scene or two from a birthing video, but that was not nearly enough preparation for being the one actually giving birth.
The two girls were out to dinner – Clarke had been craving Italian food and started crying when she couldn’t find any pasta in their cupboards, so Lexa consoled her wife by taking her out to dinner – when Clarke first went into labor. Although she was a doctor and knew that she wasn’t anywhere near close to actually giving birth, she insisted that Lexa rush her to the emergency room and call her doctor. It turned out to be a false alarm. The three times after that were false alarms, too.
The fourth time was the real deal. Lexa rushed home from work, grabbed the suitcases they’d packed weeks in advance, and then hauled a very irritable and pregnant Clarke to the emergency room. Her doctor met them there twenty minutes later, ready to rush Clarke to the operating room. Lexa knew that all births took place in an operating room as a precaution, but she still was panicked when they made her gown up before following them into the room. Clarke was screaming before they even had her on the table, which freaked Lexa out anymore.
Both women were thankful for the little wall the nurses put up so they didn’t have to see what the lower half of Clarke’s body – or warzone, as Lexa would describe it later – would look like once she started to push. Lexa stayed close and let her wife grip both of her hands as if her life depended on it, which it might actually have. The doctor and nurses were still preparing Clarke for birth when Lexa suddenly burst into tears. Clarke looked at her as though she had been slapped. “What’s wrong?” she asked, seconds before another contraction ripped through her body.
“I’m just so happy,” she sobbed. Later, she felt ridiculous for crying like that. Clarke was the one with a baby trying to pry its way through her vagina and Lexa was the one who was losing control of her emotions.
After what seemed like hours, the doctor was ready for the baby to make its appearance. “Clarke, can you try to give me a few pushes?” the she called from somewhere between Clarke’s legs.
Clarke muttered something that was probably rude, but Lexa was too anxious to catch it. There were nurses trying to show Clarke the right breathing techniques to coax the baby out. Meanwhile, Lexa was losing feeling in the hand that Clarke was gripping with all of her strength. Lexa eventually knelt down so she was eye level with Clarke, who was screaming in tune with her pushing. “You can do it, Clarke. Just keep pushing,” Lexa assured her.
“Get this fucking baby out of me!” she screamed in response. Lexa was overwhelmed, but she still had to laugh at Clarke. She would have to remember that for story-telling later on. Eventually Clarke would be able to see the humor in the situation, too. For now, though, Clarke glared at her wife for laughing. Lexa held her even tighter, hoping that doing so would make up for her wrongdoing.
Clarke pushed for what literally seemed like days, or so it felt for Lexa – she could only imagine how long it must have seemed like for Clarke. At one point, Clarke started crying through the pain and Lexa started crying along with her because she couldn’t stand seeing her wife in pain. Lexa was practically holding Clarke as she fought through push after push. Eventually the doctor announced that she could see the top of the baby’s head and Lexa started crying all over again. At that point, though, Lexa made the mistake of looking over the little wall that separated Clarke’s top half of her body from the birthing scene. Lexa had always been squeamish and honestly should have known better. The room instantly started spinning.
“Don’t you fucking dare pass out on me,” Clarke hissed between pushes. “Now get back over here.”
Lexa resumed her position at Clarke’s side and entangled her arms back around her wife. Clarke was sweating and still crying, which she didn’t seem to have much control over. Lexa did her best to calm her and get her to push harder and harder. The doctor and nurses continued to urge her, along with the doctor giving her little updates to give her encouragement. It seemed like it took forever, but eventually the doctor announced that she could almost reach the baby. “Clarke, I just need a few more good pushes and we’ll be able to bring your baby into the world,” she said promisingly.
“I’m never giving birth again!” Clarke screamed, announcing it to everyone within a mile radius of the operating room. Everyone but Clarke had to bite back a laugh. “I want it out of me!”
Noticing that Clarke was looking panicked, Lexa knew she had to do something to bring her attention back to the task at hand. Though she had no idea if it would work, she had to give something a try to get Clarke’s attention. “Clarke, love, can you look at me?” Lexa asked, urging her wife to look at her. Blue eyes met green. “We can do this, okay? We can do this. In a few more pushes, we’re officially going to be parents, just like we’ve been wanting for three years. Our biggest dream will become true if you can push just a few more times. Can you do that for me?”
She got a slight nod in response and that was all she needed. Lexa smiled and kissed Clarke, and then she felt Clarke adjust her grip on her hands – she had to brace herself for what was to come. A loud, painful shriek came from Clarke as she pushed even harder than before. The death grip she had on Lexa’s hands was painful, but she put on a brave face and urged Clarke on. With each additional push, everyone in the room cheered her on. At long last, the doctor excitedly shouted that she could finally reach the baby. She had Clarke push once more and announced that she had the baby. A few short seconds later, they heard crying.
It wasn’t long before both Clarke and Lexa burst into tears again. There was a lot of rushing around on the other side of the wall and this time Lexa decided not to take a look, not wanting to faint and miss the first seconds of their child’s life. She would never live that down if she did. Instead, she kissed Clarke and they cried tears of happiness together. After a few minutes, a nurse asked, “Are you ready to meet your baby?”
Both women thought it was a silly question. First, though, they had to settle their nine month long debate. Lexa couldn’t stop herself. “I bet it’s a boy,” she boasted.
They had gone back and forth throughout the entire pregnancy, debating the gender of their baby. They both agreed that gender as a whole was a moot point, but both wanted to guess correctly just to say they were right. Lexa was convinced that it was a boy; Clarke argued that her motherly instincts said she was carrying a girl. They chose not to learn the sex of their baby during the pregnancy, so the debating lasted from the moment the pregnancy test came back positive until, apparently, their baby entered the world. They had decided, though, that whoever was right would get to name the baby.
Clarke only rolled her eyes in response to Lexa. Instead, she turned her hopeful eyes to the nurse who held their crying baby. “Would you do the honors of finally settling the world’s longest debate?” she asked.
The nurse had one of the widest smiles Lexa had ever seen. “You two have the most beautiful baby boy,” she cooed.
She handed the tiny baby, who was wrapped in a warm blanket, over to Clarke’s open and waiting arms. They were too distracted by the small bundle to tease each other over their argument. He had Clarke’s blue eyes and thick, blond hair. Both girls showered him in kisses with tears streaming down their faces. Lexa couldn’t resist kissing her wife and then looking back down to their baby. “I love you so much, Aden,” Lexa cried.
“Aden?” Clarke asked, her eyes gleaming. Lexa nodded, nearly blind from her tears. “That’s perfect, Lexa.”
They basked in their happiness as the doctor and nurses went about their business. To the happy couple with their baby, nobody else existed. Even a year ago, they would have to admit that they wouldn’t expect to be here, holding their child. They hoped they would be, but they were just taking it one day at a time and taking what life decided to throw at them. When they decided they would have a baby, they just hoped for the best. Neither of them expected for it to work out on the first try.
Sometimes things just fall into place. They couldn’t be any more grateful.
**********
Lexa drove to work with the dorkiest smile on her face. She was so in love with her wife and the small family they had created together. As a teenager, struggling with coming to terms with her sexuality, she never would have guessed that she would end up with the most beautiful woman she’d ever seen and with a small bundle of joy. She wouldn’t have ever imagined not wanting to go to work because she had something even more beautiful waiting for her at home. She loved the feeling, no matter how much she hated having to leave Clarke and Aden at home in favor of going to work. She was counting down the hours until she would clock out before she even stepped foot in her office.
The first few hours were uneventful. Lexa texted Clarke a few times, but tried not to disturb her too much because she figured they would be catching up on sleep. It was nearing her lunch break when Lexa’s phone began ringing. Clarke’s name and picture appeared on the screen. She picked up instantly. “Hey, Clarke, is everything okay?”
“No!” she exclaimed. Lexa could hear crying, coming from both Aden and Clarke. Lexa stood up from her desk, immediately ready to flee if her wife needed something. Her bosses understood that she would drop her work at the drop of a hat if Clarke needed her. “He won’t stop crying! I’ve fed him, I burped him, and I – Aden, please, I don’t know what you need!”
Lexa started wracking her brain while trying to figure out what else could be wrong. Her mind went straight to health problems, but she tried to reign herself in. “Does he need his diaper changed?”
“Already tried that. He just – Oh, Lexa, I don’t know what to do.”
She sounded desperate and Lexa felt for her. She knew Clarke felt helpless and probably sleep deprived. Her mind already made up, Lexa gathered her things and informed her boss that she was leaving for the day. She stayed on the phone with Clarke the whole way home, trying to soothe her as much as she could without being by her side. Lexa drove over the speed limit and hoped that she wouldn’t cross any cops on her way. Thankfully, she made it back home without anything going wrong.
The scene that she walked into was more or less a disaster. There were baby clothes strewn across the living room, several clean diapers on the couch, and a crying baby and Clarke on the loveseat. Lexa rushed over and looked them over top to bottom. “Okay, I’m here. Do you want me to take him?”
Crying and nodding at the same time, Clarke stood to carefully hand over Aden. She looked a million times more disheveled than she did when Lexa left for work just a few hours earlier. Lexa told her that she should go bathe and then lie down for a while; it took some persuasion but she finally agreed. Lexa gave her a quick kiss before she disappeared off to the bathroom. Gently bouncing up and down, she looked over Aden’s body to see if she could figure out why he was so hysterical. Finally she noticed his eyes fluttering and him trying to force them to stay open. Lexa realized that he was just fighting his sleep and was in desperate need for a nap. Knowing it had worked for her nephews, Lexa walked slowly around the house while continuing to softly bounce Aden. Fifteen minutes later, he was snoring in her arms.
After wandering around for a few minutes longer to assure that he was asleep, Lexa went to her and Clarke’s bedroom and gently laid Aden in his crib. Clarke was sitting on their bed, putting on some fresh clothes after her shower. The blonde’s jaw dropped when she saw a peaceful Aden, sleeping away in the crib. “How in the hell did you do that?” she asked.
Lexa laughed softly. “He was fighting his sleep,” she explained. “You look like you could use a nap yourself, though you do look more relaxed now.”
She really did look like a completely different person. Just twenty minutes ago she looked like she hadn’t showered in two weeks and now she looked what Clarke would call “somewhat presentable.” Clarke tried to say that she didn’t need to sleep, but the brunette knew better than that – neither of them had averaged more than about three hours of sleep a night. To coax her to take a nap, Lexa went over to her side of the bed and slipped under the covers. Clarke watched and followed suit. They both laid on their sides facing each other.
“You’re not going back to work?” Clarke whispered.
She shook her head. “No. I think I’m needed more here, anyway.”
“I’m sorry for freaking out and making you leave work,” she said with a frown.
Lexa reached up and brushed a damp hair away from Clarke’s face, tucking it behind her ear. “No need to apologize, Clarke. My bosses are understanding.”
Clarke reached over and kissed Lexa in appreciation. The kiss was light and sweet, and Lexa couldn’t help but to get lost in the scent of Clarke’s shampoo and body wash. Eventually she had to stop herself and pull away. She couldn’t stop the blush from appearing on her neck and spreading up to her face. Clarke’s soft laugh was just as intoxicating as her lips. “We’ve been together for so long and I still make you blush. I must say, you’re quite adorable, Lexa Woods,” Clarke teased.
Lexa had plenty that she could have said, opted to pull Clarke closer instead and nuzzle her face in her wife’s neck. It turned out to be a bad idea because her scent was even stronger there. Her head started to spin. “I love you, Mrs. Griffin,” Lexa whispered just mere centimeters from Clarke’s ear.
“I love you more, Mrs. Woods.”
The two stayed cuddled there for quite some time. Clarke ended up turning over so Lexa could hold her and they cuddled together under a blanket, Aden still fast asleep in the crib at the end of their bed. Clarke started snoring within a few minutes of settling into her wife’s arms. Lexa caught herself smiling widely for the second time that day, realizing that she had never felt happier than she did in that moment. Half of her world was asleep in her arms and the other half was asleep in his crib. She was always one to second guess every decision she made on a daily basis, but that stopped the day she decided she would marry Clarke and spend the rest of her life by her side. Their small family was all Lexa needed to wake up every morning, completely content with her life.
Her eyes began to flutter shut. Before drifting off to sleep, Lexa whispered into the stillness of the room. It was something her parents had told her on a daily basis as a child, before they passed away. She had always dreamed of saying it to her own child one day…
I love you to the moon and back.