Disclaimer:Days own the characters, I just take them out the toy box to play with from time to time!
The Man
Gabi's confession was a heart-breaking as it was unexpected. It shift the very sands Will had begun to base his life upon, his future upon.
He had been prepared for the orange jump suit, for the confinement, for the loneliness that was ahead of him. Yet he would only make a liar of himself if he did not say he was relieved none of that would come to pass.
As soon as they are out the room, he can breathe, he can think, he can remember…
And he can allow the love he feels for his husband and his daughter to fill him up again. The only way he would have got through was to forget, to push the love he felt for them to some secret corner of his heart that only a reunion could unlock.
But it has come so much sooner than he had thought it would.
Sonny hovers about him, the physical contact the both crave never more than a gesture away. Sonny holds his hands, massages his shoulders, put his chin on his shoulder. The only way they know to reassure one another is physically – it's the unspoken language of their love, it makes it real. They both needed something to hold on to, and had done long before they had met.
Now they had it.
But their love… it hasn't been about just the two of them for a long time now.
As soon as he is told Ari is with a social worker, Will is desperate to go and get her. The idea of a stranger watching his child has and will always be repugnant to him. Ari had, after all, just lost her mother, most likely, for a long time…
More than anyone, she needed him and Sonny.
Once they are told they can pick her up, they walk down the station corridor, hand in hand to the room where Ari is being watched.
The little girl is clearly getting cranky when they arrive. A short, blonde haired lady is wondering around, bouncing her a little to comfort her but Ari's lip is doing that little pout that says she needs a cuddle. A proper cuddle from one of her three parents.
It doesn't normally matter which one.
As soon as she clocks Will though, her arms are out stretching and she's moaning, and struggling to get to him.
Here she is. His little baby girl…. In the first dress he ever got her… He had so nearly missed her first day of kindergarten, her first tooth coming out, her first school play. He wouldn't have been there to see her off to high school, or to hold her when she gets her heart broken for the first time, or to tell her how proud he was at her graduation. By the time she had got married, had a child of her own… she'd never have trusted him. He'd simply be the man who left her.
But that's not him. He is the man who has her in his arms right at that moment. She nuzzles into him as she hold her blocks and he cuddles her tight, blinking away the heat in his eyes. As Sonny cuddles him from behind him, it hits him – he nearly lost everything. The price he had nearly paid was too high.
"We've got you, baby girl," he murmurs as he tries to let himself believe he will be able to tuck his daughter into bed that night. As he tries to believe he will sleep in Sonny's arms that night. "I'm sorry, sweetheart. I'm sorry."
"Its ok," Sonny soothes him. Nothing is unfixable between the three of them. "Let's go home, baby. Let's take our girl home, ok?"
Will nods. Home sounds… lovely.
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