Chapter Text
“How do you feel about kids?”
The question, understandably, catches Helen off guard. Her hand stills from where she had been trailing absentminded patterns up and down Madeline’s bare arm. She cracks an eye open to look down at the woman curled against her chest, only to be met with a stare way too intense for a lazy Sunday morning. Helen lets out a measured breath.
“Conceptually or in actuality?”
Madeline thinks for a moment, seriously considering the question that Helen absolutely asked as a joke in order to put off answering herself. “Both. If you have thoughts.”
Helen purses her lips, staring up at the ceiling so that she doesn’t have to look at Madeline watching her think.
How does she feel about children? She likes spending time with them when they’re interesting, but is that fucked up to admit? Even if there’s no right answer to this question, saying that she’d need to vibe check a child feels unequivocally like the wrong one. The general appeal of babies, specifically, is not lost on her – of course she’s seen chubby little cheeks puffing out around a chubby little fist and felt some amount of affection. Doesn’t everyone, though? It hardly feels like a determining factor.
In another life, she imagines she would have done the kids thing without question. It’s what she was raised to believe she should do, and what so many girls she grew up with ended up doing themselves. If she does have a latent desire for motherhood: is it real, or something manufactured from years of being brainwashed into thinking that was the only option for her future?
Her head starts to spin from the overload of thoughts, which Madeline quickly notices. “Nevermind,” she says, trying to make herself disappear into the crook of Helen’s neck. “I was just wondering. It’s not important.”
Liar, Helen thinks, and almost says as much, but the timidness in Madeline’s usually confident demeanor has her leaning toward sincerity instead of any kind of teasing.
“No, let me answer,” she says. “I just hadn’t thought about it.” Madeline nods solemnly, seemingly taking that as enough of an answer, which causes Helen to frown. She brings the hand not currently wrapped around the woman in her arms and gently grabs her chin, forcing her to look up at Helen. “I’ve now thought about it. I have thoughts. Let me answer.” She leans in, kissing Madeline soundly on the mouth.
“I think…I always assumed I would have children, but I don’t know if it was a true desire or just part of my programming as a woman.” Helen pauses before continuing, pushing a blonde curl behind Madeline’s ear. “There were a lot of expectations placed on me, and that was certainly one of them. But once it stopped feeling like an inevitable conclusion…” she trails off, the Ernest-sized elephant in the room peeking out from a closet, “I don’t know. I didn’t really think about it. Until you asked.” She raises an eyebrow at Madeline. “What did make you ask?”
A sudden shyness comes across Madeline’s features, and Helen falls in love with her all over again. Madeline looks up at her through long lashes. “Yesterday. Watching you with your nieces.” She turns her attention to the pendant around Helen’s neck, toying with it instead of looking Helen in the eyes. “You were so…good with them. I don’t know how to describe it. You listened when they tried talking to you, you cared about every thing they wanted to show you, you were there when they needed to be held or comforted – you treated them like little people deserving of respect and I –” she stops short, looking back up into Helen’s eyes. “It was so unlike anything I experienced as a child, and it made me feel something that I’d never felt before.” After a moment, she quickly adds, “And not just because it was also kind of hot.”
Helen laughs, continuing her previous ministrations up and down the soft skin of Madeline’s shoulder. Her sister asked them to watch the girls, and though she was hesitant at first, Madeline’s clear enthusiasm at the thought of having two little partners in crime for the day eventually won her over as well. It was nice, she thinks, to read the girls books with Madeline supplying additional voices, and make lunch together while wrangling the toddlers out of the kitchen, and snuggle together on the couch watching a movie before putting them to bed.
“Did you ever want kids?” Helen asks. She moves her hand from Madeline’s shoulder to card through her sleep-mussed hair. Madeline curls even closer into Helen’s side.
“I don’t know.” A pause. “Not before you.” Helen involuntarily sucks in a breath. She understands the sentiment – there are so many things that never seemed possible to her before, but come as easily as breathing when she’s with Madeline. She feels loved, truly and wholly, and maybe that’s why it’s easy to imagine passing some of that love onto a new, tiny person.
All at once, images flash in Helen’s mind with startling clarity – her and Madeline taking their daughter to ballet classes; the two of them cheering for their son at a hockey game; birthdays and holidays with Madeline and a living, breathing piece of their hearts walking around outside of their bodies. The warmth that blooms in her chest is unexpected, but not unwelcome.
“And now?” Helen asks. Madeline gently takes the hand that had been combing through her hair and brings it back around her body and to her lips. She looks back up at Helen, her eyes big and blue and wet.
“I think we could be good moms.”
And honestly? Helen finds that she doesn’t disagree. The thought of experiencing motherhood with any of her previous partners used to fill her with a resigned dread. But with Madeline…she might actually want it. They deserve to be able to create the kind of family they never really had themselves. She realizes she’s never considered it as an option (which doesn’t feel very progressive of her), but now that she’s imagined it, the idea buzzes around her head, refusing to leave her alone. It feels like how she felt when she first realized she wanted Madeline – really wanted her – which is equal parts terrifying and exhilarating.
“Mad…” she starts, but doesn’t finish, because Madeline sees something in her face that causes her to drop Helen’s hand, scrambling to disentangle herself and sit up.
“Helen Sharp.” Another pause, drawn out to Madeline’s desired level of suspense. “Let’s have a baby.”
“When do you want to get pregnant?”
Helen chokes on the coffee she had just taken a sip of. “Come again?”
“Maybe later,” Madeline breezily replies before charging ahead. “When do you want to get pregnant?”
The grip Helen has on her mug tightens considerably. She forgot, somehow, that having a baby meant that one of them would have to have the baby. Seated across their kitchen island, Madeline returns her focus to Helen’s laptop, which sits open in front of her. (Helen’s reading glasses are also perched on the end of her nose, despite Madeline’s constant claims that her vision is still absolutely perfect, thank you very much.)
“When did we decide I would be the one to get pregnant?”
Madeline sighs, exasperated as if she’s just been asked to explain exactly how babies are made, but closes the computer and pushes the glasses up on her head to give Helen an answer regardless. “Helen. Honey. Darling. One of us,” she gestures across the kitchen to where Helen leans against a counter, “has a career which allows her to work looking…however she wants,” (Helen narrows her eyes) “and one of us,” she refers back to herself, hands framed around her face, “is required to be at peak physical performance at all times. Which obviously includes appearance.”
Helen offers an exaggerated pout. “Oh, so it’s all about vanity to you?”
Madeline blinks. “Well, not all about it.” Seeing Helen’s expression shift from playful sadness to scathing disapproval, she rushes into more of an explanation. “I just want to be able to work, baby. To be able to help support us. If I were to be the pregnant one, it would essentially shut me out of any projects for a year at the very least.” She slides off of her seat and glides over to Helen, who still looks unsure about the proposition. Madeline removes the glasses from her head and delicately places them on Helen’s face.
“Plus,” she says, taking Helen’s mug and placing it on the island behind her, “I would love to see you carrying my child.” She places a soft kiss on Helen’s collarbone.
However, the pout returns. “Not our child?”
Madeline tuts, distracted by her sudden desire to kiss a path up Helen’s chest and into her neck. “I meant more in the literal sense, since we’d be using my eggs.”
“And when did we decide that?” Helen pulls away from Madeline’s wandering lips, causing the other woman to whine.
“Hel,” she starts, adopting that tone she uses that suggests she doesn’t understand how Helen isn’t getting it. “One of us gets pregnant, and we use the other one’s eggs. That’s how the lesbians do it. Everybody knows that. It’s like you don't know anything about gay people.”
“Please stop saying eggs.”
“That’s what they are, Helen! What would you rather I call them? Seeds?”
Helen gags. “Absolutely not.”
“Spuds?”
“No.”
“Sprouts?”
“No. Any and all other variations of horticulture-related terms are also vetoed.”
Madeline rolls her eyes. “Fine. Although I think we are really missing an opportunity by not considering saplings.”
Despite herself, Helen’s eyebrows raise in amusement. “A massive blow to couples everywhere, I’m sure.” Something occurs to her, then. “And who is everybody?”
A blush creeps up Madeline’s chest, and she suddenly finds herself enraptured by a loose curl that had escaped from Helen’s clipped back hair. “Just. People.” Helen gives her a look she’s sure she’ll use on their kid one day. “I might have done some research. And some reading. And watched some vlogs.”
The admission is unexpectedly endearing to Helen, and she can’t help but pull Madeline forward by the hips. Madeline’s arms instinctively wrap around Helen’s waist, and she nuzzles into the crook of her neck. It’s not that Madeline doesn’t care about things – she does. But when she’s particularly invested in something, and dedicated to achieving something she wants, she throws herself into it a hundred percent. That she’s apparently been privately reading up on how other couples can conceive is an indication that she’s even more invested in this than she originally let on, and it makes something squeeze in Helen’s chest.
The fact is, Helen can’t argue with Madeline’s logic. It does make the most sense for her to be the one to have the baby, and it does seem fair that the way to equitably include Madeline in the process would be to use her genetic material. Plus, there’s Helen’s next novel to consider; she would lock herself away to write it anyway, so she can’t see why she shouldn’t grow a human at the same time. Surely, it wouldn’t affect her process that much. A vision of a mini Madeline pops into her head and, oh, the thought of her beloved blonde with a little blonde baby on her hip is something that pulls a yearning deep from within her.
As if she can read her mind, Madeline says, “Remember when we found my old baby pictures? You cannot tell me you wouldn’t want to have one of your own.” She pauses for a moment, pulling back to look at Helen. “Or did you not think I was unbelievably adorable?”
“You were,” Helen agrees, “and still are.” Madeline gives her a dazzling smile, one reserved only for her, and kisses her again.
“I promise I’ll take such good care of you,” she almost purrs. “I’ll help satisfy every craving.” Kiss. “I’ll massage any and every part of your body.” Another kiss. Madeline then leans closer to whisper in her ear. “And I’ll tell you how beautiful you are, even when your ankles are so huge and swollen that they start to resemble tree trunks.”
Helen slaps her ass. Madeline cackles maniacally.
“Can you believe her?”
Helen angrily charges into their apartment, tossing her purse, coat, and shoes aside with much more force than is strictly necessary. Madeline trails behind her, hesitant to do or say the wrong thing, and carefully watches as Helen plops onto the couch. She tosses her head back over the arm, putting a pillow over her face in a way that rivals Madeline’s own dramatics.
Madeline gives Helen a minute before padding over. Gingerly, she lifts Helen’s feet and sits, returning them back to her lap. It’s not funny, Helen being genuinely distressed at what just occurred at her doctor’s office, but Madeline has to fight to hold back the amusement that so desperately wants to show itself on her face. More often than not, she’s the one spiraling over something. Helen has her moments, to be sure, but her spirals aren’t usually this…theatric. Madeline clears her throat.
“All she said was–”
“I heard what she said, Mad,” Helen spits back, though there’s no real bite to her words. Instead, hurt seeps through her voice, eliciting from Madeline the most intense urge to gather up Helen in her arms. Instead she gives Helen her space to process whatever’s going on in that beautiful brain of hers, settling for stroking rhythmically up and down Helen’s shin. “She said I was old.”
Madeline’s mouth twitches as she tries not to smile. “I believe what she said–”
“Geriatric, Madeline!” Helen interrupts, again, throwing the pillow previously covering her face directly at Madeline’s head. The other woman deftly blocks the projectile with practiced reflexes. “That’s exactly what she said, and that means I’m old.”
The role reversal here would make Madeline scream with laughter if she wasn’t so focused on walking Helen back from the ledge. Aging has never really been something that bothered Helen– at least not outwardly– so her reaction is as puzzling as it is entertaining. Madeline is the one who forbids any numeric decorations or paraphernalia on her birthday; Helen is always telling her what a privilege it is to get older. Seeing her lose it a little bit is kind of a little bit satisfying, and Madeline would tease her mercilessly for it if she wasn’t so dedicated to being “loving and supportive during this difficult process.”
(A phrase Madeline used before their voyage to the doctor, which she’s now repeating in her head like a mantra.)
“Darling,” she says, “it’s just a word. It doesn’t inherently mean anything.”
Helen’s pout deepens, her eyes beginning to water. “Yes it does. It means that at my age, just existing in my shriveled up womb is enough to put the baby at risk.”
Madeline’s heart breaks. “Oh, honey.” She tries for something reassuring. “On the bright side, the egg came from me, and I’m much younger.”
“I am three months older than you, Madeline.”
“That’s what I just said.”
Helen whimpers a pitiful sound she’s not used to letting out in the light of day. She’s done her own share of research – learning that it’s becoming more and more common for women to have children later in life, that risks for certain complications might be higher but not astronomically so, that her general good health works in her favor for having a healthy baby. But one thing about Helen Sharp is this: she can spiral into the worst case scenario better than anybody she knows. Between fertility drugs and her own general anxiety, she feels the reins slipping out of control of her logical brain, and her emotions quickly taking charge.
While she agonizes over every possible outcome, Madeline moves from sitting on the couch to kneel on the floor by Helen’s head, who then turns more fully toward her. She takes one of Helen’s hands in both of hers.
“I can’t promise you that everything will be okay. And even if I did, you wouldn’t believe me.” Madeline fixes Helen with a playful glare, which gets the small smile she was aiming for. (God, she’s good.) “But I can promise you that dwelling on everything that could go wrong is not the solution.” A hand disentangles itself and cradles Helen’s face. She melts into Madeline’s touch, almost turning into putty in her hands. “We just have to take it one day at a time. And I’ll be here with you through it all.”
Helen doesn’t react for a moment, but then finally gives Madeline a tentative smile. (To reiterate: God, she’s good.) “One day at a time.”
Madeline beams at her in return. “Exactly. So,” she leans forward, resting her chin on folded arms, “are we allowed to celebrate now?”
The smile that appears on Helen’s face will be seared into Madeline’s memory for the rest of their lives.
“Hm. I suppose that’s fine.”
She nearly catapults herself into the empty space next to Helen, shimmying to get as close to her as she can. With their noses almost touching, Madeline pulls Helen closer by the waist, peppering kisses on her cheeks, her nose, her forehead.
“It took.”
“It did.”
“You’re pregnant.”
“I am.”
There’s still an edge of trepidation in Helen’s voice, but the joy in her eyes is unmistakable. Madeline starts her assault of kisses all over again.
When Madeline arrives home after a grueling day of rehearsal, the apartment is dark, save for a single overhead light coming from the kitchen. She slips out of her heels as she locks the front door, haphazardly kicking them somewhere to the side.
“Hel?” Madeline yells, and the sound echoes off the walls. When she receives silence in response, she tries again. “Hel, are you home?” Still, no answer. This is when the panic starts to creep in. Helen is a creature of habit — almost to a fault. Her schedule is meticulous and detailed, and Madeline always has the knowledge of where she will be and when. “In case something happens,” Helen had said, and Madeline wondered what ungodly horrors the woman cooked up in that head of hers to worry that something might.
So she knows Helen had a meeting with her agent at two. She knows that the meeting would have only taken an hour or so, and that the trip from the office back to their apartment is, at the most, thirty minutes. And she knows that it’s nearing seven, and Helen is seemingly missing.
Well, not missing. Her shoes are placed carefully by the door, so where the hell is she?
Madeline takes the stairs two at a time. When she reaches the second floor, she can feel her heartbeat in her throat. “Helen?” She tries one more time as she approaches their closed bedroom door. There is literally no reason for her to believe that Helen is anywhere other than somewhere in their home, but when she opens the door and peers inside, the sense of relief that washes over her would lead her to believe her nervous system thought Helen vanished from the face of the earth.
Though the room is dark, Madeline can make out a Helen-sized shape on the other woman’s side of the bed. As quietly as she can, she tiptoes over to the bed (though, if her yelling didn’t get a response, she’s not sure why walking on the hardwood floor would suddenly do it). Helen’s eyes are closed and periodically twitching; Madeline knows without a doubt that she’s fast asleep. She looks angelic with her hands folded perfectly under her cheek. Perching on the edge of the bed, Madeline brings a hand to Helen’s hip and rubs gentle circles. A fond smile blooms on her face when she realizes Helen is still wearing the slacks and dress shirt she went off in that morning.
If it were up to her, Madeline would let her sleep. Since they embarked on this baby adventure, however, she promised herself she would do whatever she could to take care of Helen – even if it meant waking her up to make sure she eats something.
“Hel, baby,” she says, her hand moving to traverse up the expanse of Helen’s back. Her nails scratch softly against the silk of her shirt of their own accord, and the sound is the only thing breaking the silence in the room. As Madeline moves up Helen’s body, she cradles the back of her head in her hand, and tenderly rubs her thumb back and forth over Helen’s cheek. Slowly, the redhead’s eyes start to open, and she gives Madeline a dopey grin that makes her feel like she’s falling. “Hi, sleeping beauty.”
Helen hums, her eyes slipping closed once again. She turns just so to kiss the pad of Madeline’s thumb. “Hi. You’re home early.”
Amused, Madeline quirks an eyebrow. “I most certainly am not.” Even in her half-asleep state, with her eyes still closed, Helen pouts, confusion etched on her face. She blindly reaches out next to her to grab her phone where she placed it on the nightstand. (After a few seconds of watching her try to find it herself, Madeline gives in and retrieves it for her.) Helen grows more and more alert the longer her eyes are open, and they get comically wide when she checks the time.
“Oh.” Madeline chuckles, carding a hand through loose red curls. Helen turns onto her back, letting out a sigh that sounds like it contains centuries of weariness. She finds Madeline’s hand again and laces their fingers. “I’m so fucking tired, Mad.”
Madeline says nothing, but squeezes Helen’s hand in acknowledgement. “I know, honey. Outside clothes on the bed? That’s serious.”
Helen huffs out a laugh, then blinks long and slow. “Is it too early to just go to bed?”
“No,” Madeline says, pulling Helen up into a sitting position. “You just have to eat something first.” The groan Madeline receives in response gives her an idea of what their kid’s adolescence will look like as Helen immediately flops back down. “I know, baby. But you know you’ll feel like shit if you don’t.”
Resigned, Helen nods, because she does know she’ll feel like shit, because “morning sickness” actually just strikes whenever it feels like it and not just in the morning, because the universe in all its infinite wisdom decided to make pregnancy as uncomfortable as possible for Helen, specifically. Silently, Madeline stands and slowly drags Helen toward her by the back of her knees. A little huff of surprise leaves Helen before she realizes what’s happening, and lets her body relax.
Madeline methodically approaches her task. She first unbuttons Helen’s pants, shimmies them gently down her hips and thighs, before sliding them off completely. They’re folded neatly and placed at the foot of the bed with the knowledge that Helen would appreciate the care taken toward her clothes. Madeline takes both of Helen’s hands and again pulls her up. Starting from the collar, one by one she undoes the buttons on Helen’s shirt. Finally, she slides that, too, off of Helen’s arms and deposits it into the growing stack of clothes. In most scenarios of Madeline undressing Helen, she would immediately be all over her breasts. But she remembers Helen telling her last week that they’d been sensitive to the point of pain, so she does her best to avoid even brushing up against them (a truly Olympic-level feat, for her). So instead, she gingerly encircles Helen in her arms and reaches behind her for the clasp to her bra. As she does, Helen takes the opportunity to lean into Madeline’s neck, kissing her so sweetly that for a second she thinks her knees might give out. They don’t, though, and she’s able to remove the bra as it slips down Helen’s arms.
Once her bare skin is exposed, Helen shivers, goosebumps appearing on her chest. Madeline quickly rifles through a drawer and pulls out a pair of thick, fleece pajama pants and a t-shirt that says I’m Not Weird, I’m Limited Edition before padding back over to Helen. They have a silent conversation as Helen’s eyes slip shut again, and she allows Madeline to maneuver her into the change of clothes. Once she pulls Helen to her feet, she presses a kiss to her temple and sends her downstairs with a gentle push.
“Go. I’ll be down in a second, and we can figure out dinner.”
No more than ten minutes pass and Madeline is clad in a matching cashmere set and headed back down to find Helen. Before she’s off the stairs she spots her, and something primal and affectionate claws through her ribcage.
Helen is on the couch. Head tilted back. Fast asleep.
Madeline tip-toes over. She catalogues the blissfully relaxed features of Helen’s face – sweetly closed eyes; smooth brow; plump, slightly parted lips – and thinks about how uncomfortable the past few weeks have been for her. Between spending the days constantly fighting to stay awake and the nights kneeling against cool porcelain emptying her guts, it’s been miserable.
And not just for Helen. It’s agonizing for Madeline, watching Helen suffer and being unable to do anything more for her than try to make her comfortable. In just thinking about it, she realizes she’s reached a level of devotion to Helen that she previously had no idea existed, and it’s equal parts exciting and terrifying.
As she lowers herself down on the other side of the couch, she pulls Helen down with a gentle tug on the back of her neck, and her head comes to sit softly on Madeline’s thigh. A content sigh escapes Helen’s lips, and she pulls herself closer to the other woman. Adorable, Madeline thinks. She can’t help herself; her hand travels down the side of Helen’s torso and slides against the soft skin of Helen’s stomach, finding its way under her shirt. There’s no discernible bump yet, but there’s a more pronounced roundness now. It sets loose a hundred butterflies in Madeline’s stomach. Suddenly, the warm body on her lap stirs.
“Mad?” a voice says, muffled by the thick fabric her face is pressed up against. Madeline hums in acknowledgement and rubs her thumb back and forth over soft, warm skin.
“I’m starving.”
On the calendar hanging up in the kitchen, the date had been circled in red and surrounded by messily scrawled pink stars.
They are so abnormally quiet when they approach the doctor’s office that for a second Madeline worries Helen has gone catatonic. Their hands are entwined from the second they walk through the revolving door, only releasing briefly to switch sides when Helen has to fill out some paperwork.
There are a lot of things that could go wrong at this appointment; Helen has imagined and played out the scenario of every single one. What started as a cursory research mission ended in Helen hunched over her laptop until the early hours of the morning – on the rare nights she’s plagued by insomnia rather than fatigue intense enough to knock out a horse. The majority of her reading supports what Madeline repeatedly tries to convince her: that everything is going to be fine. Logically, Helen knows it’s not productive to worry about problems they don’t even know exist. There will be so many more appointments and so many more opportunities to catch if something is wrong, but this will be the first time they actually lay their eyes on their baby. She’s anxious, vaguely nauseous, and terrified of what they might find.
Conversely, Madeline nearly vibrates with excitement. As they sit in the waiting room, Madeline’s leg bounces energetically. Helen says nothing, but pointedly places her free hand on Madeline’s thigh, abruptly stopping the movement. Madeline’s eyes snap to Helen’s, her jaw dropping in disbelief.
“So you hate me,” she whispers, which feels necessary to do even though there are only two other people in the room with them; if she speaks above a certain decibel, Helen might take off like a horse hearing a backfiring car. Instead she ignores Madeline, staring at the clock on the wall in front of them. A TV on an adjacent wall plays the last half of some obnoxious morning talk show and Helen fights the urge to claw at her skin. Fifteen minutes go by until a woman emerges from behind a door, calling out Helen’s name. Madeline mumbles an exasperated finally before all but yanking Helen out of her seat.
Once in the exam room, the nurse rattles off a number of questions to Helen while she situates herself on the table. Madeline only half listens; she uses the other half of her attention to imagine what their baby will look like if they get her first nose. As Helen catalogues the nightmare she’s been living for the past couple of months, Madeline scans the room. Abstract art pieces of female anatomy cover one wall, which she’s into. Another wall displays enough information to fill a dozen textbooks, which she likes less. Before she can finish reading a poster depicting the three stages of labor (she shivers at the thought), they’re alone again, and Helen reaches out for her. Like a magnet Madeline flies to her side, sandwiching the other woman’s hand between both of hers.
“You good?” she asks, kissing Helen’s knuckles. She grimaces in Madeline’s direction.
“Having the time of my life.”
Thankfully they don’t have to wait long – suddenly the doctor enters the room with a warm smile thrown in their direction.
Helen slowly lays back on the table. Her hands tremble a bit as she unbuttons her pants and pushes her sweater up just below her chest. To the untrained eye, nothing about Helen’s abdomen looks remarkable. But Madeline is an expert in all things Helen Sharp – a seasoned professional who knows Helen’s body as well as she knows her own. And she knows her own very well. The slight slope of her stomach is firm, the tautness of her skin visible under the fluorescent lights. It could easily be mistaken for the aftermath of a large meal, but the knowledge that their baby is right there makes Madeline almost giddy.
Cool gel is applied to the skin just below Helen’s navel, and she involuntarily flinches at the temperature change. There’s barely time for her to figure out if she’s excited or just ready for this to be over before the transducer is gliding purposefully over her stomach. An agonizing few minutes pass as the doctor searches, her face unreadable and the screen turned out of Helen and Madeline’s sight. Finally, a smile appears on the doctor’s face. She turns the screen toward both women.
“There we go. There’s your baby.”
A feeling she can’t name crawls up from the depths of Helen’s chest. There obviously was no doubt that she’s pregnant, but seeing the evidence so clearly makes her head spin. Inside of her, she really is growing a little human, and the little human in question is apparently thriving. Madeline gasps at the sight – ever the drama queen – but just this once, her theatrics are the most comforting thing Helen’s ever heard.
Until another sound fills the room.
“And a very strong heartbeat.”
For once in their lives, both women are speechless. The quick, steady thump-thump of the heartbeat has them in a trance watching the image on the screen. Madeline can make out the little head, a little arm, a little leg – to her annoyance, she can’t yet make a determination on the nose. She manages to tear her eyes away from the screen to look at Helen, and what she sees makes her chest ache. The redhead’s bottom lip trembles, her eyes wet, as she furrows her brow.
“Everything’s okay?” she asks. “Nothing’s wrong?”
The doctor’s expression shifts to something softer, easing some of Helen’s anxiety. “So far, everything looks absolutely perfect.”
Helen releases a breath she’d been holding since they left the apartment that morning. An errant tear (that she will adamantly blame on hormones) slips out of the corner of her eye and falls toward her hairline. Madeline catches it with her thumb, then leans close.
“Helen. I need you to be honest,” she says, deadly serious. “Did you really think that a baby with my DNA had even a chance of being anything other than perfect?” A watery laugh escapes Helen against her will, and even the doctor looks amused. She notes a few measurements.
“Baby is measuring exactly on track for twelve weeks. I’d put your due date at August 13th.”
Another trademark Madeline Ashton gasp. “A Leo, Hel,” she says, hand flying to her chest. “That really is perfect.”
After multiple pictures are acquired and the next appointment is set, Madeline takes Helen’s hand again as they leave the office. She stares at the ultrasound images in her other hand.
“Should I make this my phone lock screen? Well, maybe not my lock screen, because I love that picture of us at the Tonys. And the baby is kind of only vaguely baby-shaped at this point. I mean, I of course want to stare at this picture forever but it’s not really aesthetically pleasing, you know? So, maybe the phone background?” She turns her attention to Helen. “What do you think?”
Helen sighs, shaking her head, but squeezes Madeline’s hand nonetheless. “I think you’re ridiculous, but unfortunately I love you anyway.” A pause. “I also think I need to throw up.”