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Post by malia on Mar 28, 2022 22:32:05 GMT -5
She doens’t want to admit it now, but she HAD thought he was serious. Maybe the human part of her brain should have been dominant enough now to know that he wasn’t. Or maybe she should’ve just known him well enough by now to know that Stiles Stilinski never just made spur of the moment decisions like that. He wans’t going to just walk into the police station, walk away from the carreer he’d built, and his father, and leave them hanging. But she’d so desperately wanted to believe maybe it could be true. Especially now that they have Ava. And they both need him so much. And they needed him to come home again.
She has to pull her gaze away from his, feeling slightly ashamed of her gulibility and also her desperate desire for it to have been true. But she doesn’t want him to know that all of the sudden. She knows how hard this morning has been for him and knowing the truth about this would only make it that much harder. She shakes her head, meeting his gaze again and hoping that he believes her. “It’s okay,” she says, lifting her hand to his cheek. This new worry that she has for the abject danger of his job making her stomach feel tight.
She loved him. She had always loved him. But it was just so much more now. So much more now that they shared this little life that they’d created. Malia couldn’t even exaclty put her finger on how and when it had become so much more. She just knew that it was. She leans in to press a kiss to his cheek, finally pulling away to step out of the shower and wrap herself in a towel. There was also a part of her brain that understood what he was saying. Ava was all of the sudden the most important thing in the world and if either of them could do something to ensure that the world was a safer place for her, then wasn’t it their job to do it?
Maybe this is what Stiles felt like he had to do.
But that doesn’t mean she has to like it.
She towels herself dry, wrapping her long hair up in another towel so it can dry as she heads back into the bedroom to look for a clean pair of shorts to put on. As soon as she finds some, she straps on one of her nursing bras, forgoing a shirt as she walks over to the baby. Ava is still sleeping soundly, her legs curled up against her tiny body as she breathes softly and rhythmically. Malia reaches for her forehead, brushing her soft skin with her fingers, almost as though she feels the need to check her temperature, make sure that everything is completely okay.
The sooner Stiles left at this point, the sooner he would be back.
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Post by stiles on Mar 29, 2022 17:57:30 GMT -5
He knows it’s not okay. Even as she tells him it is as she kisses his cheek, everything about her demeanor tells him it’s not okay. She's quiet as she grabs a towel, stepping out of the shower before he can say anything more. He thinks about catching her waist and pulling her back in to finish the conversation, but he's not sure what to say, other than that he's sorry he led her astray. So he watches her as she quietly dries off, then wraps her hair in a second towel before slipping out of the bathroom altogether. And he's left alone with his guilt.
He sighs as he turns the water off, standing in the shower for a minute as the water on his skin begins to cool. If he hated his job before, Ava's arrival made him loath it now. It literally felt impossible to think about packing up for the day and heading out, leaving her for an entire day. But right now, he's more concerned about Malia. He'd have to be an idiot to not notice how disappointed she had looked for that split second before she pulled herself together and promised him it was fine. It only makes it seem that much harder to leave now. Plus, he's left to wonder what's upset her the most: Is it just that he's returning to work after these two weeks spent together as a family? Or does it overwhelm her to be alone with the baby all day?
As he grabs a towel and dries off, he finds himself wondering if he even should be going back to work now. Ava still seemed so small, and her routine still seemed fragile. Some days, she stuck to it like she knew it as well as they did, but other days, she refused to nap or fed every twenty minutes instead of every two hours. But each time he starts to lose his resolve, he finds it again just as quickly, reminding himself that it's for Ava's benefit he has to go back. It becomes his mantra as he goes through the motions of the rest of his morning routine, that it’s the best thing for his family for him to return to work. Still, when he steps back into the bedroom to find Malia beside the bassinet, simply watching the baby sleep, he can feel his resolve threatening to break again.
She looks over at him briefly as he hops his way into his socks, refusing to sit down. “You sure you’re gonna be okay?” He asks again, feeling less certain by the second that he’s making the right decision. “I could call Braeden and Derek. See if they could come over for a little while.”
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Post by malia on Mar 30, 2022 22:48:28 GMT -5
She turns to watch him as he stumbles his way into his socks, fumbling around stubbornly instead of just sitting down to pull them on like he might normally. It makes her feel sad all over again. She hated the thought of not getting to see him, just like this, for an entire day. How had she gotten so attached to having him around all the time in just two short weeks? She’d gone years without him, and sure, she’d missed him. She’d missed him a lot. Some day she had missed him so much it physically ached. But this was different. This was a different kind of separation anxiety. She felt like she needed him. But she also knew he had to go. She looks back down at Ava, still sleeping soundly and sucking at nothing in her sleep every few seconds. She doesn’t look up again until she hears him speak, and by the time he does, he’s pulled on his pants and uniform shirt and is working on buttoning it up as he looks at her expectantly.
“No,” she tells him. She doesn’t want to see anyone. And she definitely doesn’t want him to think that she feels she can’t handle being alone with their baby. She knows she can. That’s not it at all. It’s him she’s not sure she can handle being without. “We’ll be fine. I promise.” She turns away from the baby finally, moving to his side and resting her hands on his chest before she finishes buttoning his last several buttons. “Besides, if we need anything I’ll just call you.”
That seems to satisfy him, and he leans in to press a kiss to her lips before pulling away so he can grab his belt and holster, strapping them on. About this time on a normal morning, She would begin to smell the faint scent of coffee stirring her from her sleep as he brewed a cup for both of them. Ava would sleep for another hour or so, usually, and they would enjoy a few minutes of morning peace before their day became consumed by the baby again. The mornings were nice. In fact, she thinks she might miss them the most.
She follows him to the door, struggling against her exhaustion and her hormones to keep the tears that she knows are threatening to spill from her eyes at any moment at bay. She won’t cry. She can’t cry. She can’t do that to him, and she doesn’t want to feel that weak. He leans in to kiss her one more time, his hazel eyes filled with a concern that she’s familiair with by now. “We’ll be fine,” she assures him again. He nods, making his way to his squad car and watching her as he pulls from the driveway. She sighs as she closes the door, knowing that this is going to be the longest day she’s experienced since the baby had been born.
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Post by stiles on Mar 31, 2022 19:52:45 GMT -5
"Well, seriously, call me if you need anything," he tells her before leaning in to kiss her one last time. It's this last moment in the doorway with her that's the hardest. Like it feels physically impossible to move his body from this spot. It doesn't help that he can see the way her smile wavers, and after this much time spent navigating her hormones, he knows she's on the verge of tears. And that becomes his driving force to finally leave. Already, he knows that if those tears have a chance to spill over, there's no way he'll be able to leave. So he waits just long enough for her to nod, and then he forces himself away from the door. He doesn’t look back at her until he’s already backing down the driveway. Even then, he catches her force her smile back on her face, and it’s almost enough to make him stop. But somehow, he makes it down the driveway with a wave, and then he’s pulling away before he can convince himself otherwise.
He feels sick to his stomach for the entire ride to the station, certain that he’s made the wrong decision. Twice, he pulls his phone out to check that she hasn’t already tried to text her call (She hasn’t.). Three times, he almost texts her to check in (He doesn’t.). And once, he almost flips it around and heads back home, certain he’ll pull into the driveway again before Ava even wakes up for the day. It’s not the farthest he’s been from them, and, at this point in the morning, it’s not the longest either, but it’s the looming nine hours that leave him nauseous. Suddenly, Ava seems so tiny, and Malia seems so new at this, and he feels like he’s letting them both down by returning to work. It’s all he can think about for the ten minutes it takes him to drive to the station, and the extra five minutes he sits in his car, wondering if he should just go back home before anyone even realizes he’s here. But leave it to his dad to be loitering by his car, probably making sure he doesn’t do just that. And then he has no choice left but to go in.
Noah Stilinski claps him on the back as they head inside together, squeezing his shoulder a little harder than normal, and that’s how Stiles knows he’s definitely wearing his heart on his sleeve today. ”It’s like riding a bike, kid,” his dad says. ”Give it an hour, and it’ll be like you never left.”
But Stiles waits all day for it to feel normal. He waits for that moment when he realizes he’s just back into the swing of things, back to his normal routine. For that moment when he stops watching the clock constantly, waiting for it to say he can finally come. And that moment never comes. It never feels normal. His morning is spent being bombarded with people who want to hear about the baby, and as much as he swells with pride every time he pulls out his phone to show off the latest pictures of Ava, it makes him miss them both more. And it means it’s an hour before he can get to his desk and send that first text to check in with her. After that, it’s an hour with HR getting Ava added to his insurance. Another check in with Malia. A mountain of paperwork awaiting him on his desk. A whole new policy already firmly in place after only two weeks that he has to learn. Before he knows it, half of the day is gone, and there’s no way he can swing past the house any time soon.
He feels nauseous again when he texts Malia to let her know that he won’t be there for lunch, and he’s not sure if she’s trying to make him feel better or being a little passive aggressive when she sends back a picture of Ava, sprawled on her belly on a blanket in the nursery, her tiny face turned to the side and facing the camera. He hopes she knows it’s a joke when he sends back, Tummy time without me? Are you kidding me? If she doesn’t, there’s no way for him to know. The rest of his day is a whirlwind, right up until he intentionally starts wrapping up his day 15 minutes early, doing everything in his power to be right out the door at five.
When he does leave, he doesn’t say goodbye to a soul. Instead, he slips out as quickly as possible. He swings by the drugstore for the few things Malia had texted him they need, and stops for a pizza so that he doesn’t have to spend any of the time he has with them tonight cooking. His foot bounces the rest of the way home as he hits every red light on the way. But it all feels worth it when he finally pulls into the driveway again, the front door swinging open before he’s even put the car in park.
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Post by malia on Apr 1, 2022 22:06:56 GMT -5
It’s an impossibly long day.
Not because anything particularly bad happens. In fact, it goes really good all things considered. Ava seems to understand that something is different, and that Malia is a little out of sorts because she sticks to her schedule like a pro. Well, the bit of a schedule they’d managed to come up with during these first two weeks of her life that is.
After Stiles was out of view, Malia had wandered back into the house and immediately gone back to the bedroom to lay down with the baby. She’d had the intention of trying to fall back asleep, but instead, she just laid there and cried. She would never tell him that. She wouldn’t tell anyone. She feels silly, and angry, and she doesn’t understand what her problem is. It’s not like he’s leaving them for a long period of time. It’s just one day. They’d been apart for way longer than this before. But not since Ava had come, and not since she’d gotten so used to spending almost every single moment of every single day with him and the baby. She just hates that he’s gone. Before she even realizes it and before she knows how long it’s actually been, she hears Ava begin to stir in the small basinette. She whimpers slightly, her little hands fisted angrily as she begins to cry. And there’s something comforting about the familiarity of it. Malia dries her own tears and that seems to be all it takes to get them through the day, just that one little wake up call.
From that point on, things are pretty normal. She feeds Ava again, they go outside for a little while. She lays down on the nursery floor with her while they do tummy time. She fields text messages from Stiles and sends him pictures any time the baby does something that makes her smile. She even gets a bit of a nap in when Ava falls asleep in the afternoon. And that’s huge because when she is startled awake by the baby an hour and a half later, it’s only twenty minutes until Stiles will be getting off work. She feels excited butterflies in her stomach as she thinks about it. They have one more feeding, and a change of clothes for both of them, and then she finds herself standing at the door and looking out at the road. She pats Ava’s back smiling when she finally sees his car pull onto the street and into the drive way. “Daddy’s home,” she mumbles excitedly to the baby who is currently balled up against her chest, her tiny head occasionally pulling away from Malia’s shoulder until she feels like she can’t hold it up anymore. She opens the door and walks out onto the porch as Stiles climbs out of the car, the smile on his face surely matching the one she’s wearing as she waits for him.
It feels like Christmas morning.
She kisses him immediately as soon as he joines them on the porch and he immediately focuses completely on the baby. He sets the pizza and small bag he’s carrying down, and she doesn’t waist anytime before transfering Ava from her arms into her daddy’s waiting embrace. Things finally feel right again now that he’s here, holding the baby, standing beside her. “We missed you,” she tells him honestly, knowing she speaks for Ava as well as herself. She can feel it.
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Post by stiles on Apr 2, 2022 11:11:40 GMT -5
Coming home to Malia and Ava waiting just inside the door makes Stiles feel the most like he’s truly coming home that he’s ever felt. And it makes sense, considering the fact that Malia moving in is what made this first feel like home. It had been his house before then. He had been proud of it, sometimes to the point of smugness when Mason and Liam complained about the woes of still not being on their own, but it had been a house. Really, it had been lonely. For the most part, his door had been a revolving door, with his dad coming once a week for dinner, Scott there most weekends, and Lydia dropping by pretty regularly given the case she was working on at the time. But unless Scott was too tired after a hospital shift or Lydia had one glass of wine too many and they crashed in the guest room, eventually everyone left, and then it was just him alone in a house that felt too big for only him. Having Malia there had made it feel different immediately, but it also felt so normal to have her there at at all times, it had taken him a little while to even realize it. She had just made it feel like home, and he adjusted to that so quickly, Stiles forgot it had ever not felt like a home.
But coming home to Malia and Ava is something else entirely. His heart swells the moment Malia steps onto the porch with Ava in her arms. Her smile is wide, and the baby is just a tiny ball of polka dots and dark hair against her chest, and he forgets all about the rest of his day. Nothing else that’s happened since he left is as important as this moment right now.
His own face hurts from the force of his smile by the time he reaches the porch. Before he can say a word, Malia greets him with a kiss, and he kisses her back a little more intensely than he normally would have as a greeting. Their morning is still fresh on his mind, his body still very much remembering how good it had felt to be touched by her, no matter how fleeting it was.
When he pulls away, he sets the pizza and the bag down on the bench before crouching down, trying to find the baby’s tiny face. “Hey, Ava,” he says softly, placing a gentle hand on her back. The baby seems to startle at the sound of his voice, lifting her head from Malia’s shoulder. She succeeds in staring straight up, her head bobbing on her developing neck muscles in a way that Stiles has told Malia countless times makes her look like a turtle. And then, ten seconds later, her muscles are too tired, and her tiny head comes crashing back down to Malia’s shoulder, face first. “Oh that poor face,” he murmurs, even though the baby seems unbothered by the ordeal. She squirms against Malia, rubbing her face against her shirt before Ava finally figures it out and turns her head to face him.
Malia pulls the baby away from her chest then to hand him to her, and Stiles gladly accepts the baby, settling her there in the crook of his arm. It won’t last long; the baby will get mad that she’s not completely pressed against him, but for now, he wants to be able to see her tiny little face. “I missed you, too,” he tells Malia, not sure he’s ever meant it as much as he means it then. He bends down to press a kiss to Ava’s cheek before pulling back, offering her his finger to wrap her tiny hand around. “Everyone wanted to know all about you, Ava,” he tells her before he looks back over to Malia where she’s gathering the things he set down so they can head back inside. “How’d she do today?”
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Post by malia on Apr 3, 2022 22:10:12 GMT -5
Her heart swells with an intense love that she’s still trying to get used to as she watches them together. The way Stiles beams as he coos at Ava, the way she seems to not be able to pull her eyes from her daddy’s face, the way she fits just so perfectly there in the crook of his arm as he leans down to kiss her cheek. She loves them so much, it’s almost like a physical ache. She wonders how they’d made it through an entire 9 hours not being together. She missed him that much. And she loved him even more. She could stare at them together for hours, just watching the way they are together, the way he holds her and cares for her. And the way she seems to gaze at him as though she already knows how special and important he is even though she’s not really old enough to understand much of anything that isn’t related to eating or sleeping (and sometimes she doesn’t seem to understand those either honestly).
She reaches for the things he’d set down so he could take Ava into his arms, the pizza still hot in the box. Her mouth begins to water as she follows them inside. She hadn’t realized it until this moment when she’s faced with the smell and reality of food filling her belly that she hadn’t really taken the time to eat at all since breakfast. Ava’s scheduled had been a little off, and she’d been thinking she would wait until Stiles came home to eat with him, and then he wasn’t able to come home. And the thought just slipped her mind. She looks up at him again when she hears his question. “Fine,” she assures him in her general fashion. It really had been a pretty uneventful day by newborn standards. “She ate well, and took a couple of good naps. I even got to sleep for a little while with her.” She follows him into the kitchen so she can set teh pizza down on the counter and focuses on Stiles with the baby again. He loved her, she knew he did. But the look that he shares with Ava is beyond even the way he looks at her. She smiles softly, reaching out to stroke the baby’s soft hair again.
“Do you want me to take her so you can go get out of your uniform?” She asks him curiously. She knew how unhappy he was with his job right now, and the uniform was part of the job that was easy to shake off and put away. But he shakes his head, too enamored with the baby to want to hand her back over just yet. Malia turns away just long enough to move to the refridgerator so she can open it and get him a beer, untwisting the top and handing the cold bottle to him while he bounces Ava gently in his arms.
“How was your first day back?” She asks him, genuinely curious. He’d been smiling since he’d gotten home. Maybe that meant it had gone a lot better than he’d thought that it would.
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Post by stiles on Apr 6, 2022 15:55:51 GMT -5
Stiles hears every word she says, but his eyes never leave the baby in his arms. He studies Ava’s tiny face as she stares up at him, trying to find anything that’s changed. Some part of him knows that’s crazy, but he’s never been away from her for as long as he has been today. And it feels impossible now to think that there's no noticeable difference, especially when he had spent so much of the day feeling like he was missing some vital part of himself. Sometimes at night, Stiles will startle himself awake now, flailing to catch a baby that was safely in her bassinet and no longer sleeping on his chest. It felt like that today, too. Every so often, he was just completely overwhelmed by the feeling that something was off. Now, having her back in his arms, it's hard to believe that Ava is exactly the same as she was that morning. But she only stares up at him with the same gray eyes, opening her mouth in the same round O as she flings an arm over her head to stretch before settling back the way she was a minute ago.
But if she's still exactly the same, then why does it it feel like he's missed out on so much?
Ava starts to squirm again, scrunching her face up in the way she always does just before she lets them know just how made she is, so he brings her to his chest as he follows Malia inside. "Good," he says, finally processing what Malia had said about their day. "That's good." He pulls the baby away from his chest far enough to see her tiny face again, her eyelids already heavier than they were a minute ago. "Good job, Baby Girl," he says before pressing another kiss to the top of her tiny head. "Letting your mama sleep." She stirs again like she might throw a fit, so he's quick to bring her back to rest against his shoulder. Which also frees up his hand so he can take the beer Malia offers him.
"Oh. Thanks," he says, managing to take a sip just before Malia asks her question. Immediately, he makes a face, shaking his head for the few seconds it takes him to swallow before he can talk. "Terrible," he admits. It had never felt quite normal being back for that entire first day, but he had still felt that overwhelming sense of dread as soon as he pulled into the parking lot. The job had gained a little luster the previous winter, after his shift had been the only reason he stumbled across Malia back in Beacon Hills. But by now, that had faded. She's a permanent fixture in his life, not a perk of his job, and he hates how responsible he feels to stay in a job he loathes.
Malia looks concerned, so he's quick to wave his hand that's not holding the baby. "Just busy," he tries to clarify. "Tons of paperwork. And tons of stuff I left half finished the day you went into labor. And tons of meetings." She's still watching him in that same way, unfamiliar to him, and he smirks. "What? It was just boring."
That same grin is still on his face as he leans against the counter. Before his hip makes contact, there's the distinctive clink of his holster hitting the surface. He startles at the sound, causing the baby to jump in his arms. Stiles looks down to see his holster still there and immediately shoots away from the counter, pulling Ava away from his body. "Oh shit," he says, holding the baby out towards Malia. "Can you take her? I still have my gun on me."
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Post by malia on Apr 7, 2022 21:35:04 GMT -5
She wasn’t sure what she’d been expecting when she’d asked him how his day was, but as he answers with terrible, she realizes that it really wasn’t that. She had hoped that he’d go back today and things would be okay, that he’d be a little less miserable after a few weeks away than he had been before Ava had come. Or that he would have been so miserable that he’d just quit and stay home with them until he figured out what he really wanted to do. Those were the outcomes she’d been expecting (or maybe just wishing for she realizes on the other side). Terrible hadn’t been part of the plan. But he quickly corrects himself, assuring her that it was just the tediousness of the first day back. Paperwork, talking to people, meetings. That all in all, it was just boring. She narrows her eyes at him, trying to read behind the words, but she really can’t get a feel on what he’s really trying to say so she goes with the fact that he must be telling her the truth. She worried about him. She always had. She’d always been fiercely protective of him and that hadn’t changed. Well, it had changed actually, it had gotten more intense. It was what she’d felt before times a thousand. She felt like it was her responsibility to keep him safe and his job wasn’t safe. And she wasn’t with him.
As much as he hated his job, she thinks she might hate it even more.
She watches as he leans back against the counter, the baby snug against his shoulder as he takes another sip of beer. She’s not prepared for the way he starts as soon as he makes contact. She almost jumps in response as he holds Ava out to her at arms length. The baby begins to fuss and she watches as he quickly upholsters his belt and gun. She bounces Ava in the crook of her arm gently as she senses the disdain he feels for that item in his hands. He hates the gun almost as much as he hates the job. She’d never given much thought about his gun and the baby. He always kept it locked up when he was home, and he was so careful with it when it was on him, it just hadn’t crossed her mind. But seeing his extreme reaction to having it on him while he’s holding the baby makes her feel a little less comfortable with it even being in the same room as Ava. She doesn’t say anything though, just watches him as he disappears from the room and returns again a few minutes later without the belt and without the firearm.
Ava is working herself up by the time he’s back in the kitchen. She’s hungry and she’s already eaten so much today that Malia isn’t sure her nipples can handle another feeding so close to the last. Stiles is immediately back at her side, soothingly cooing at the baby as Malia continues to bounce her gently. She can barely get the words out, but she manages even though she doesn’t want to ask him. “She’s hungry,” she says as if he’s not just as familiar with what her cries mean as she is. “Do you want to give her a bottle?” Her nipples just had to have some kind of break.
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Post by stiles on Apr 8, 2022 11:10:59 GMT -5
He hadn’t minded the gun at first. In fact, it had held a little bit of novelty at first. He was young and dumb, and that power had gone straight to his head. But it had been six years since he had joined the sheriff’s department now, and that luster seemed to fade a little with each passing year. And then Ava had arrived.
Stiles distinctly remembered the night he had come home from work and had that sudden realization. Malia was barely pregnant, still so tired he woke her up when he opened the front door as he arrived home. It had started with a conversation about setting up a nursery, which had turned into talking about where the baby would sleep, which had led him to the realization that she’d sleep in their room - just as he was tucking his gun safely away in its safe. Just the thought had made him pale enough for Malia to ask him what was wrong. She didn’t seem to have the same visceral reaction when he asked her how she felt about the baby sleeping in that room, but the thought had stuck with him. It didn’t seem to matter that both he and Malia had grown up in homes where there was a gun, or that he’d never even shot said gun, aside from his training. It only mattered that their baby would be so close to a gun.
Even once the baby is in Malia’s arms now, he needs the gun away from his body. As soon as his hands are free, he works quickly to take off his belt and holster, like it’s some kind of bomb he has to disarm immediately. “I’m gonna go change,” he tells her as she settles the baby against her chest, an amused look on her face. He barely catches her nod as he turns on his heel, heading for their bedroom. He’s more meticulous than he’s ever been as he unloads the gun and tucks it safely away in the safe beneath his side of the bed. Even once it’s locked away, though, that tightness still lingers in his chest. It’s another mark against his job today, the strongest he’s encountered thus far. If he got rid of the job, he’d get rid of the gun, plain and simple. But that tiny baby is the same reason it feels more impossible than ever to leave the force. Because if he’s not there, who will look out for her?
He changes quickly, pulling on a pair of sweats and a t-shirt. The baby begins to fuss while he’s still back in their bedroom, and it’s only then, hearing her cry that he realizes how drained he feels. It’s been harder than he thought it would be to resume his daily schedule running on so little sleep. But he pushes that exhaustion away as he puts his uniform in the hamper and heads back towards the kitchen. Malia is bouncing her gently as Ava alternates between rooting around for a source of food and crying. “Oh, Aves,” he coos as he walks back into the kitchen. “What’s the deal? I just got home.”
Malia lets him know she’s hungry, and he’s about to let her know that a day away hasn’t made him lose all knowledge of Ava’s habits, but she asks her question before he has the chance. He freezes, looking back up at her. “Are you serious?” he asks. The thought makes him excited to finally be the one to feed her, but something about the moment doesn’t feel quite right. He had honestly thought it would be at the last minute they’d give her a bottle, when there was simply no other choice. And he had expected tears, but the way she’s worrying her bottom lip doesn’t feel far from it. “What’s wrong?” he asks, brow furrowed together in worry. “Did something happen?”
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Post by malia on Apr 10, 2022 22:52:17 GMT -5
She hadn’t thought about what her offer might seem like to him when she made it.
She hadn’t made it a secret. She loved nursing Ava. It was one of her favorite things about being a mother. Those special times when it’s was just the two of them together, connected, bonded. It wasn’t like anything she’d ever felt before. The way that the baby looked up at her with those big eyes, or fell asleep there against her breast, her hand splayed out against Malia’s skin. They were moments that she cherished and that she would miss when they were finally gone forever. Stiles knew how she felt about it. So it makes sense that he looks at her with concern in his eyes when she asks him if he wants to take this feeding on with a bottle himself. “I’m serious,” she assures him, biting her bottom lip again. She could feel herself getting emotional even as she said the words. She may have been a few weeks out from giving birth, but that didn’t mean all of her emotions and hormones had gone back to normal.
She hands the quickly angering baby back to his waiting arms as she pulls her gaze from his, moving to the refrigerator to pull out one of the bottles of breast milk that they’d had prepared and waiting all the time just in case there was an emergency or she couldn’t feed Ava for some reason. “She’s just been eating a lot today,” she finally manages as she sticks the bottle in the waiting warmer. She doesn’t turn back to him even though she can hear Ava beginning to cry harder. When the bottle warmer beeps and announces that it’s finished, she removes it and tests the milk to make sure it’s warm enough before walking back to his side with the bottle. “I think my body just needs a break.” She didn’t want to tell him how badly the last couple of feedings had hurt, leaving her nipples raw and bleeding after Ava had finished. She didn’t want him to worry and she knew him well enough to know that he would.
She hands him the bottle just as Ava’s little face begins to get red with her anger. If they waited much longer, she would be too upset to eat and then they’d both have a restless night. But his concern is still there written clearly across his face and she tries to wipe away any of that sadness and regret she feels over the decision. She smiles as convincingly as she can. “It’s fine, I promise,” she assures him. But he still just stands there and stares at her, holding the bottle awkwardly as he cradles Ava.
“Go,” she tells him with that same smile. “You’re making her mad. If you don’t feed her soon she won’t eat at all.”
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Post by stiles on Apr 11, 2022 21:48:18 GMT -5
Malia places the baby in Stiles's arms, and it's a miracle he doesn't drop her when he's so focused on Malia. Or at least so focused on his worry. Ava is angry, and getting angrier by the second each time she presses her mouth against his chest and her tongue only finds his t-shirt. But Malia has Stiles's attention. The first time he had brought up a bottle, wanting to help her more in the middle of the night, she had burst into tears, thinking he didn't think she was doing a good enough job nursing. The second time, it had been anger instead of tears, and then he had stopped mentioning it. It still came up every so often, mostly off-handedly, like Y'know, if we leave her with my dad, she should really take a bottle first or Scott said she's less likely to have nipple confusion if we give her a bottle while she's still tiny. But Malia would always pat his chest and tell him that they'd give her a bottle eventually. That they were fine for now.
So now, he doesn't know what to do with her suggestion. He can feel his chest start to feel tight when he realizes that she's acting weird, too. She grabs a bottle from the fridge and takes it over to the warmer they've yet to use without making eye contact. In his arms, Ava ratchets up her crying again, and he instinctively starts to pat her tiny diapered bottom. But the baby continues to wail as Malia sighs and tells him her body needs a break. Instead of making him feel better, his worry only rises.
Somehow, he takes the bottle from her, but he doesn’t offer it to the baby. He’s still distracted by her, studying her to try to determine how truthful she’s being. In all of Ava’s two weeks of life so far, her body hadn’t needed a break. Her smile is forced as she insists that she’s fine, and then it feels like she’s trying to distract him when she urges him to just feed the baby. Granted, Ava is getting angry. She alternates between crying and trying to suck anything that comes close enough to her mouth, but Stiles barely even notices.
“Okay, well, now I”m worried about you,” he admits, still holding the bottle in one hand and the fussing baby in the other. “I thought you said today was fine.” Malia sighs again as she insists one more time that he feed the baby. This time, he finally looks down to find Ava’s face bright red, her hands up by her mouth as her tiny body grows rigid. He sighs to himself as he tries to offer her the nipple, easing it into her wide open mouth as he looks back up at Malia. “Do you think something’s infected?” he asks her, mind working overtime as he tries to remember all of the ailments he had read at some point nursing could bring with it. For a split second, the kitchen is quiet. Just long enough for him to follow up his initial question by asking, “Can I see them?”
And in the next, Ava shoves the nipple out of her mouth with her tongue and starts to scream again. “What the…” he says as he looks back down at her, finding her face bright red again. He gets the bottle into her mouth again, but it lasts only a second again before she shoves it away again. “C’mon, Ava,” he sighs. “You’re so hungry, Baby Girl. This is what you need.” He tries a third time, only to have her shove it away a third time. With a groan, he pulls the bottle away, pressing his finger over the nipple and shaking until a drop of milk lands on his finger. “Let’s try this,” he says as he moves his finger to her mouth, waiting until she latches around his finger and sucks it clean before trying to ease his finger out and the bottle nipple into her tiny mouth.
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Post by malia on Apr 12, 2022 22:04:35 GMT -5
She knows him well. Possibly better than she knows herself now. Definitely better than she’s ever known another person or animal before in her life. And she knows how he worries. She knows what triggers his anxiety. And she knows that once he starts to spiral, sometimes it’s a little hard for him to stop. And this was exactly why she’d tiptoed around the issue for a few minutes before just telling him exactly how she was feeling.
He looks at her with worry in his hazel eyes, their daughter growing increasingly more angry and agitated as she feels his tension rise. She can smell it, and if Ava takes after her at all, she’s sure the baby can as well. Her senses may have just been starting to develop, but Malia’s sure that she can feel and smell more than a normal baby her age would be able to.
“It’s fine,” she reassures him as he continues to stare at her. She’s just about to go ahead and take the baby from his arms because he’s clearly malfunctioned when he teases her little lips with the nipple. The baby immediately takes it in, and at first it seems like everything is going to be completely fine. She’s just about to lift up her shirt and show him how raw and cracked her nipples are when Ava begins to protest the unfamiliar bottle. It doesn’t seem to matter how hard he tries, he can’t get the baby to latch on for more than a second before she angrily pushes the rubber nipple of the bottle from her tiny mouth again. Ava is getting, well…pissed. Stiles is getting flustered.
And for the first time in a few days, Malia is sure that she might cry and she really doesn’t want to cry. Just when she thinks she might, she watches as he pops his knuckle into the baby’s mouth and she latches on to it quickly. Like he’s preforming some kind of magic trick, he smoothly pulls his finger from the baby’s mouth and replaces it with the nipple. And almost as if she doesn’t really know she’s been duped, she latches on and begins to suck greedily as her eyes roll back in her little head and she falls into that utopia that she always seemed to find when she finally felt the warm milk filling her little belly.
It’s almost like Stiles forgets completely about everything that they’d been talking before as he smiles, looking down at the baby and back at her. She reaches out and smooths down Ava’s dark hair. His anxiety seems to fall away as he lets himself relax. She follows him as he moves to one of the chairs in the room so he can sit down, Ava relaxing in his arms as she continues to eat.
And Malia feels relieved. Relieved that the baby’s eating. Relieved that her nipples are getting a break. And more than anything, relieved that he seems to have forgotten about the anxiety that she thought was going to send them all into a tailspin.
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Post by stiles on Apr 13, 2022 12:47:07 GMT -5
It's not until he's in the midst of trying to force feed Ava her first bottle that he realizes this might be a struggle. In his mind, it had been a seamless transition. In fact, he had been looking forward to this moment from the time they brought Ava home. He had bonded with the baby just fine, quickly falling in love with the way she would cling to him even if she didn't know his smell or touch or voice quite like she knew Malia's. But he struggled with feeling like an equal partner in this parenting business sometimes. Especially when he sometimes slept through Ava's cries, and Malia changed her or rocked her back to sleep after a feeding without waking him. With Malia nursing, there seemed to be no way around it. But now, if he could help with feedings, maybe it would start to feel like they're on a more equal playing field.
That is, if Ava ever takes a bottle.
"C'mon, Aves," he murmurs as he tries this last ditch effort. The baby is quickly becoming angrier, reaching a point where they'll have to find another way to soothe her before she'll eat anything. And he can feel his own anxiety increase in response, feeling like he's failing her in some vital way because he can't get her to eat. He's not feeling confident, even when she latches around his knuckle. And then it's a race against the clock to ease out his finger and in the nipple. And yet somehow, it works. He holds his breath as she latches around the bottle, waiting for the moment when he realizes that it's not Malia. Instead, she sucks hard enough this time to pull milk from the bottle. And that's all she really wanted in the first place.
Stiles sighs to himself as his face breaks into a smile. "Good girl, Ava," he coos as the baby sucks greedily at the bottle. He's held the belief that she's the most perfect baby to ever have existed since the moment she was born, and it's only encouraged by moments like this one. She's the sweetest, the prettiest, the smartest baby to ever exist. "You're so smart," he tells her now before looking over at Malia with that same wide smile. It's a relief to see it mirrored on her face, instead of sadness or disappointment. And then his eyes are immediately drawn back to the baby, staring down at her with that same sense of admiration as she drinks greedily from the bottle.
"You're so smart," he tells her a second time as he moves to sit at one of the hightop chairs at the counter. Ava is entirely unbothered by the change, continuing to drink. And it's as he settles in with her that he remembers his concern. It's not as intense, not now when Malia wears that same relieved smile he can feel on his own face. But he still can't help that worry from beginning to creep back in.
It feels almost impossible, but he manages to pull his eyes away from the baby to look back at her. "So what's going on?" he asks her, that same worry as before evident on his face, though less intense. "How uncomfortable are you? Do you think we should call Nat?"
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Post by malia on Apr 14, 2022 21:56:04 GMT -5
She could have sat there watching them forever. The way that Stiles dotes on the baby, and the way she gazes up at him as she finally begins to suck contentedly on the bottle. But there’s also a little heaviness in the back of her mind. She tries to push it away, but she doesn’t love the fact that the baby’s having to take a bottle at all. Not when nursing had become such a special time for them, something that she looked forward to.
When it wasn’t excruciating at a least.
She’s so lost in watching them that it almost startles her a bit when she hears his voice again. When she looks up, his gaze is focused solely on her, Ava left to her own devices with the bottle, her little body going a little limp in his arms as her eyes begin to drift closed and she continues to suck with all her might. She has to pull her gaze away from his, unable to shake the feeling that she’s somehow failed them a bit. Failed at being a mother because she’s failing at this one most basic and instinctive part of motherhood. But he pulls her gaze back again when she hears him mention Nat’s name.
“No,” she responds firmly. “No way.”
She sighs, lifting up her shirt so she can reveal her swollen breasts. She needs to pump at least. She’s uncomfortable, and that’s just from her milk, not the fact that her nipples are red and raw, cracked and even bleeding a little in a couple of spots. “I think my skin is just dry,” she tells him. “Maybe there’s some kind of better cream that I could use. I’m going to have to at least pump soon.” She pulls her shirt down again, covering her chest. Stiles winces as she does, as if he’s feeling some of the pain she is just by looking at her.
“Besides, I don’t want her to get too used to the bottle,” she mumbles, even though he really had enjoyed getting to watch him feed the baby, bonding with her in a way that only Malia had up to that point. “What if she stops wanting to nurse?”
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