This is another addition to the my Faith series. It's a large follow up to Have a little Faith. As you will notice I have changed the timeline massively on this. I'm writing another addition to this, it deals directly with 9-11. So, look forward to that. Read and review. Let me know what you guys think. :)
It was a quarter to four in the morning and Will McAvoy couldn't fall back asleep. His wife was sound asleep next to him in the bed but he laid awake, counting the times the fan spun. He was up to fifteen and the number was rapidly increasing. Not to mention it was hotter than hell in the room. Mackenzie kept the double french doors open and had the fan running. If their daughter wasn't twenty-five and they were both older than when they had her, Will would be convinced that his wife was having hot flashes because she was pregnant.
But she wasn't. It was impossible now. He assured himself of that as he made his way downstairs into the long hallway of his family's cabin. He flipped on the lights to the kitchen, casting it in a warm glow and he hit the button for the coffee pot to start. He braced his arms against the island in front of him, looking at the groove in the rock. Faith had done that. When she was younger, she took a heavy object, he couldn't remember what it was now and just smashed it in.
His attention was caught at the light shuffle of feet. It could have been Mackenzie, but he figured he would have heard the light footfalls above him. Mackenzie wasn't a light walker, but she didn't have a heavy foot either. But when it came to the three of them, Faith had the lightest foot. He figured the shuffler was Faith.
And it was. She came around the same corner he had with a coffee cup at her lips. He cleared his throat and she snapped her head up, her eyes wide in shock. The surprise melted off into a grin, small and teasing like her mother when she was trying to hide something.
"Hey Dad," she smiled, setting the cup down. Faith pressed a kiss to Will's cheek and kneaded her fingers into his shoulder.
"What're you doing up?" he asked. He didn't need the answer. Her insomnia was like his. Random nights, important nights, nights when he just couldn't sleep. It was an important night, but she couldn't sleep. Neither could he.
"Do you think Mexico is going to be nice this time of year?" She asked, looking over her shoulder at her father's back. "Dad?"
He hummed and straightened his back, turning around to face his daughter, his back against the counter. She handed him the warm coffee in one of the many cups she created when she was in elementary school.
"Mexico," she repeated. "How's the weather?"
He shrugged. "Don't know. Never been."
Faith rolled her eyes at him and saddled up next to him, crossing her legs at her ankle. She clasped her hands in front of her, bowing her head.
She was worried for the past week about work. She wasn't able to work, photography was her life. She had grown up around cameras, with Will being the lead anchor of ACN for the first handful of years of her life. She could run a newsroom and do her own newscast if she had to. She was a defender like her father and a lover of truth like Mackenzie. Faith had given Mackenzie a run for her money when Faith was a teenager. Attitude and everything. But they were the best of friends. Sure Faith was a Daddy's girl because when she couldn't sleep and spent her nights doing homework with him in the living room, but Mackenzie and Faith? Inseparable.
"Geena wanted to say thank you after dinner," Faith informed him. Geena, her soon to be mother in law wanted to have a hand in everything, but Mackenzie – Mackenzie wasn't letting the other woman have a hand in anything. "For letting them stay here tomorrow. Today, really."
Will shrugged his shoulders. It wasn't a big deal. Not really. There were five rooms in the place. He easily converted his old office into a bedroom for the groom's parents.
"Mom asleep?" Will nodded and they lapsed back into silence.
Will took a sip of coffee and looked to his daughter. He could remember when she was born, the little pink hat that someone, probably Sloan who had become baby crazy at the time, had bought for her. When she was born, Faith had bright blue eyes that were just gorgeous. Her hair was a light brown, dark blonde when she was born too. When her hair started to grow out. And god was she mischievous. Hiding in places, giving him a heart attack and then erupting into a giggle fit when she brought herself came out of hiding. After a while he gave up. Wouldn't look and his laughter came from her tantrums when she'd throw a fit that he wouldn't look for her.
Something happened, something Will missed because in the middle of the silence, Faith began to laugh next to him. Her laughter got harder and when he gave her a raised eyebrow she laughed out loud, her shoulders shaking as she did.
She waved her hand in front of her face, excusing herself, and tried to take a deep breath. It only forced her to laugh harder and tears started forming. Either she was on the brink of exhaustion or whatever passed through her mind was just really funny.
"You want to share with the class?"
"I'm getting married," she laughed. "Do you remember how much I hated weddings? I hated Aunt Sloan's, I hated that one girl, she was at ACN for two minutes."
"Rebbecca?"
"Yes," she practically shouted. "I hated them all. I hated the work that went into them, standing there, posing for the pictures, having the idiot tell his assistant he's going to have to airbrush my face in post. I wanted to punch him and tell him 'I'm a model, asshole.'"
Will chuckled himself and took a drink of his coffee. He was getting to the bottom of his cup. "It's different with your own, isn't it?"
She nodded emphatically. "Definitely. But – last week when we had to finalize last night? I was ready to give it all up. Fly to France and take the modeling gig I was offered to shoot. But then I saw Mom look at you and the way you looked at her and it clicked. I fell in love with him because he reminds me of you."
"Narcissistic and a jackass?"
"Not always," Faith snapped out, her tone completely teasing. "He's quiet and fights for what he wants. His mom hates me. It's not a secret. And the fact that he loves her unconditionally and still is marrying me? That says something."
"You've got the rest of your life to find out," Will said before finishing off his coffee. Mackenzie would kill him if he fell asleep during the day. He was going to have to get to bed soon. Despite the coffee. "I'm going to go back to bed. I suggest you do the same."
She nodded and smiled as his hand came to her head, his palm against her cheek. He pressed a kiss to the top of her head, just like when she was a child. When she graduated from high school. When she told him she was getting married. It meant he was proud of her.
"Hey Dad?" Faith asked when he rounded the corner. She waited for him to reappear. When he did she looked at him, a small, tired smile on her lips. "When did you realize you wanted to marry Mom?"
"Not long after I realized I was in love with her."
"Which was the day you met her," she teased. "Mom doesn't let that one go."
"No , she doesn't," He agreed, suppressing a yawn. "You don't mess around with this shit, Faith. When you wake up one morning and you don't feel any different? That's when you know you've got something. You'll have fights over the stupidest shit. One day you'll hate the color of the walls and tell him to repaint. You'll get into an argument about it and then you'll laugh at how stupid it is."
Faith laughed.
"Tomorrow is another day of the week. You're just getting really dressed up for it and spending all my money."
Faith laughed again.
"You're going to be fine, Faith," Will said again. "Get some sleep."
"Thanks, Daddy," she grinned.
"Oh," he said, raising his hand, singling out a finger. "Tell that fiance of yours, I'm not giving you up. He gets to borrow you. You're still a McAvoy."
Faith grinned, her eyes bright. "Good night, Dad."
Yeah, he thought to himself. She wasn't a little girl anymore. She was someone's wife.
