Not Your Average Baby Story
A/N- I wrote this about a year ago when I saw FPS for the first time. I just found it and thought I would post it. I've always wondered how Alex told Goren she was pregers. And this flows along with my sick perversion of the show. In my CI imagination, Alex and Bobby have kind of a casual sex relationship with lots of love and adoration as an undercurrent. I don't really like to write them all happily ever after and in a normal relationship. Guess I draw from my own experiences, huh? What does that tell you about my love life? Sad;)
A/N2- D&C stands for dilation and curettage. It's a procedure used to speed a miscarriage up so the risk of bleeding too much or other complications is lessened. Also, when a woman has repeated miscarriages, tissue can be collected during a D&C to study for a pathology purposes.
It wasn't until five a.m. on Thursday that Alex finally found her way to sleep. Apparently, her body's version of morning sickness was not discriminatory to after midnight hours. Yep, Alex had the good fortune of being nauseas and dizzy at any hour of the day. This week had been the worst so far. The last three nights had been filled with vomit and sleeplessness.
So at seven a.m. on Thursday, she was pretty sure her body may just come unhinged. As she scrubbed the semi-digested chunks of banana and rice out of her hair, she imagined her knees becoming detached from her thighs and her elbows disuniting from her forearms. The vomiting brought on this weakness that she had never before experienced. The constant battle with dehydration made her lethargic in an almost frightening manner. This exhaustion was becoming evident in everything she did. Lifting her heavy arms over her head to blow dry and brush some volume into her spaghetti thin hair left her breathless. How she would ever survive the day…she was not sure.
There was only one thing Alex could imagine that could possibly bring some relief. As she dressed and applied her sparse makeup, her brain fantasized about the scent of the forbidden. She imagined her mouth full of happiness; her brain being awakened by bliss. How good would just an ounce of coffee taste right now? Not only was she sure she could be brought to orgasm with just a sip of her favorite Starbucks brew but she might just be able to function through the day. Her mind drifted forward to the seven eyewitness interviews she and Bobby had scheduled for that morning. With just an ounce of coffee she might be able to maintain her professionalism. Just maybe.
She took a moment to imagine how quickly the caffeine would awaken her, cure her headache and give her much needed energy. She pictured herself strolling to work, down the streets of TriBeCa, with happiness poring out of every cell. Her mind would be clear, her extremities would feel light and maybe her stomach would calm. Just an ounce.
But with all the heavenly effects she might enjoy, her mind contemplated that damn medical journal article she read in the doctor's office last week. The article that described the way a pregnant women's body metabolized caffeine more slowly than normal. The way the caffeine stayed in the blood stream and circulated for hours longer. The way the fetus's liver wasn't able to digest that particular toxin.
No ounces of Starbucks for her.
Because even though Alex was puking up anything she ate and her body seemed to be revolting against her, there was nothing she wanted more than to create the most flawless baby she could. No outrageous birth defects for this kid. Oh no, she was going to deliver perfection. Because this wasn't about Alex. This was about Alex's sister and the baby she desperately wanted.
Her little baby sister, Jennifer, had been trying to get pregnant for five years now. Jennifer was the beauty of the two Eames girls. Alex had always been interested in other things; any greasy, messy thing her older brothers were interested in. But not Jennifer. Jennifer had liked dolls and bunnies and tea parties. She was sweet and soft spoken and wore pink cardigans and she never made inappropriate sarcastic comments. It was Jennifer who had calmed Alex's nerves on her wedding day, Jennifer who had wordlessly sat with her at Joe's hospital bedside for a week and Jennifer who had held Alex in bed the night Joe had finally been removed from life support.
And Alex had seen how much each miscarriage cost her little baby sister. How each D&C made Jennifer a little quieter, a little less perfectly pinkly sweet. So after the fifth miscarriage in as many years, Alex made a decision as she arrived at St. Luke's to send her brother-in-law home for a quick night of sleep. She had watched the unit of blood drip down the tubing into her little baby sister's arm and she wondered what pregnancy was going to be like. Alex had never had the joy of the experience. She and Joe's five year marriage was ruled by their careers and birth control pills.
When sweet Jennifer's sweet brown eyes fluttered open at two a.m. that morning, Alex had leaned down and brushed her fingers through her little baby sister's dark hair and whispered, "Don't worry, Jen."
Jennifer had seemed to understand what her big sister was promising and three months later, a fertility specialist pronounced Alex pregnant.
So six months after Jennifer's last miscarriage, here Alex found herself; sticking strictly to the BRAT diet (bananas, rice, applesauce and toast), refusing herself coffee and fielding annoying calls of concern from her parents. They were concerned about her living alone in the city in her "condition" and had insisted, on several occasions, that she come home to live for the duration of the pregnancy. Her brothers had taken to stopping by unannounced, just to check on her. It was as if they were alternating weeks, taking turns being on 'Alex duty'.
But best of all, Jennifer was basking in pre-baby happiness. She called four times a day to get Alex's opinion on everything from paint colors to which nursery school to pre-register for. She was back to her normal level of sweet perfection and that was what Alex had wanted all along.
But now that she had her little baby sister back to normal, Alex could focus on other wants. All Alex wanted now was a good nights sleep and a hearty meal that would stay in her gastrointestinal tract long enough to digest. She wanted a cup of caffeine drenched coffee and the good, long, hard run that she lacked the energy for. But instead, that sleepy Thursday morning, Alex leaned against her counter and ate bland applesauce before gathering her things and heading to TriBeCa, coffee absentia.
'Be brave, Alex girl,' she successfully self- talked as the elevator chimed onto floor #11 an hour later. Her footsteps were wobbly and her mouth was watering with pre-vomit bile. She stepped around the corner and saw Bobby sitting at his desk, his head tucked down, squinting at the paper beneath him. And on her desk sat a glorious vente cup of Starbucks coffee. She could smell it from thirty feet away.
A secretary greeted her and Alex exchanged pleasantries. Goren looked up at the sound of her voice and waved to the cup.
"I was standing in line anyway so I grabbed you one, too."
She smiled through closed teeth, careful not to move any facial muscles too quickly.
"Thanks, Goren." She quickly crafted a plan. She decided she would pretend she was drinking it but when he got up to use the restroom, as he always did at 8:35 a.m., she would dump out the beautiful contents and leave the empty cup on her desk. That would work, she was sure.
Four hours and three saltines later, she excused herself in between interview #4 and interview #5 and walked shakily towards the restroom. The acid was churning and the vomit was coming. She barely made it into the toilet stall. As her back slid down the cool tiled wall, she curses those damn saltines. She was stupid to ever expect a soda cracker to appease the monster that was her stomach.
Alex gave herself two minutes before pushing her body back up and out of the stall. She glared at herself in the mirror and then rinsed her mouth with metallic tasting water before heading back to the conference room she and Goren had declared war on.
Goren was sitting there, in his perfectly pressed suit, sipping coffee and reading the lab report they had just received.
She glared at the back of his head for a moment. Damn Goren would never know months of endless morning sickness. He'd never experience the weakness and lack of caffeine. Her glare intensified for a moment until Goren suddenly turned around and motioned for her to read over his shoulder. Something about her appearance must have caught his attention because his eyes stayed trained on her.
As he inspected her, Alex could feel his eyes burning through her. For a moment, she though he had figured it out. Maybe he was adding everything together, as he appraised her, and coming up with the solution. Bags under her eyes plus a ten pound weight loss plus the sudden trips to the restrooms at none of her usual times equaled pregnancy.
But Alex's fears were vanquished when his skeptical glance disappeared under her softy honey irises. Goren would always believe her unspoken assurances because she had always delivered. And she will this time, too, but not for Goren. She'll deliver for her little baby sister and Alex still hadn't decided what that will do Goren's trust in her ability to catch him.
The rest of the day was spent productively. They got all of the interviews done and transcribed and even got the M.E.'s report back. Alex thanked the Lord for the blessedly uneventful day. As the partners walked out of 1PP, Goren tried to talk her into dinner out but her stomach put up a big protest and she begged off. He let her go with a suspicious eye and a wave.
Alex headed home to her little house. She forced some dry toast down before she changed into her oversized NYPD t-shirt and headed to her bedroom. Her head was clouded with a headache but exhaustion won and she faded out at nine thirty.
Sleep covered her heavily and she didn't dream, she didn't even stir until bright light slipped in between her eyelids. She heard running water in the back of her brain and then the light was turned off and Goren slid beside her.
Only after throwing an arm and a leg over him did Alex discover that he was shirtless. His thumb stroked the back of her thigh in a soft figure eight pattern and his breathing slowed to set pace with hers.
She murmured into his neck, "Time is it?"
"Midnight," he whispered into her ear.
Even with both eyes closed, Alex knew his eyes were on her. He had been concerned for some time and she had been walking around next to him with this secret. Part of her wanted to scream it at him, just to finally get rid of it, but she knew all along that this secret would require a little more discretion. She needed the perfect opening…the perfect moment.
But Goren's thumb has risen from the back of her thigh to her lace clad behind. She desperately wanted to resist, to just sit up and open her blurry eyes and explain to him about little baby sister's and their dreams. But his thumb had traveled again and the hitch in her breath gave her need away. She felt herself moisten and she knew Bobby felt it too because she could make out a smile on his lips as he kissed her. And his hands were so damn skilled. He knew…he just knew what to do and she knew just how to react to keep him going.
And after, as she was slipping into darkness and sleep was overcoming her again, she drank Bobby's scent in and allowed her senses to just surrender to him. She was lying on her side, facing him, curled up into his stomach. His fingers were trailing down her exposed side and she knew he was still watching. Just as she was about to cross into blackness Bobby spoke in a low rumble. His mouth was right above her ear and she wished she hadn't heard his words quite so clearly.
"What's going on with you?"
Her breath escaped her for just a moment and she found herself wishing these clandestine nights she and Bobby sometimes shared weren't quite so intimate. Maybe if she hadn't allowed him to emotionally expose her so fully and completely, she'd have a hope of hiding this right now. Maybe she should have shielded herself from his eyes all of those times he had stripped her of her walls. But that was never an option, not really, not with him. She accepted this but still found herself wishing she had a little more armor against him and his carefully timed and worded question.
Because she had a whole monologue planned and it didn't involve her still being sticky from their late night pursuits. She had pictured herself in a dark, professional suit mirroring his normal ensemble and instead of them lying curled together in her mussed bed, maybe the conversation would take place at their desks or in the SUV.
But here they were and here he was, asking her the question and seeing right through her. So Alex clenched her eyes and then opened them wide. Bobby's face was close to hers and she drank in his eyes for a quick moment before she opened her mouth and stated, "Jennifer had another miscarriage about six months ago."
Bobby's expression conveyed his confusion as she rushed on, "I decided I wanted to help."
He maintained eye contact, like he always did, as she finished, "I offered to be her surrogate."
"Carry her baby?" he questioned as understanding started to seep. And then Alex watched as he solved the math equation he had begun earlier that day in the conference room. Bags under her eyes plus a ten pound weight loss plus the sudden trips to the restroom at none of her usual times equals pregnancy.
"You're pregnant," Bobby stated slowly.
Alex's breath hitched for the second time that evening as Bobby's fingertips stumbled to a stop across her skin. His eyes darkened for a moment as he contemplated.
"I know it's out of no where and I should have warned you but I just wanted to wait until I was sure."
"How far…along are you?" Bobby asked, struggling with the terminology and racking the narrow corners of his brain for any knowledge he might posses on pregnancy.
He watched as Alex gulped and then admitted, "Three months."
And then, Alex saw a look flash across Bobby's eyes. It was a look she had seen often but it had never been directed toward her. He had flashed it at endless suspects, witnesses, fellow police officers and a certain assistant district attorney but his eyes had never conveyed it to her. It was a look of qualm. Mistrust. Suspicion. Doubt.
Alex steeled herself for the inevitable pull away. She waited with baited breath. Any moment now, Bobby's body would roll away from her and he would stand and dress and walk out of her little house. But instead, his fingers picked up their earlier trail and his eyes softened and caught her own. Neither spoke as Alex's confusion grew. Moments passed until finally, mercifully, Bobby said, "I think that's great, Eames. That you would do that for your sister. I think that's great."
His fingers were curiously exploring her stomach now, as if he had never touched or tasted the skin there. She watched as his mind rolled over the new information. She could see his dark eyes wondering and suppressed the laughter that wanted to rise. And suddenly, Alex realized exactly how Bobby would handle this unforeseen pregnancy that he had no part in. He would go to the library and check out books and log onto the medical sites online. He would study and ask her questions and treat the whole thing like a research project.
Alex smiled lazily to herself as she allowed her mind to go back to the darkness she had been approaching earlier. As sleep rolled over her, once again, she realized something else. Bobby would ask questions and do research and she would play along because that would be his way of connecting to this pregnancy. That would be his way of throwing all of his support under her. And she would take every ounce of it.