Shameless Shules family fluff. I am not ashamed, I'm just not.
/|\
It had been a long day for Juliet. In the fallout of a close encounter with Shawn while on a high profile case, she'd had to go through a mountain of paperwork and listen to Carlton complain about his, unloading every possible form on her nonetheless.
Her home is silent. While usually, being Mrs. Shawn Spencer, she'd be grateful for some peace and quiet, she really wants to curl up on the couch with her husband and her baby girl and watch a stupid movie from the eighties that no one but Shawn and Gus remembers.
But the silence in the house is so thick, it echoed. Considering that naptime might have run late (and she'll kill Shawn if Taylor's nap had run so long that she's up all night), she slipps into her bedroom and changes out of her pencil skirt and blouse into a pair of flannel pants and a Miami-Dade Police Academy sweatshirt.
She makes her way into her daughter's room, not finding the girl in her crib and her father sprawled out on the padded carpeting he'd insisted upon.
Then there is the first sounds she'd heard all night- a small child's laughter and a series of splashing, followed shortly by Shawn's light chuckle.
She finds them in the bathroom across the hall. Shawn sits cross-legged in the half-full bathtub wearing a pair of swimming trunks with his daughter in his lap, both of their heads foamed up with generous amounts of Johnson's Baby Shampoo.
He looks up at her and smiled, smiles big. She thinks briefly of all the people who'd said he wasn't capable of settling down and committing, thinking they should see him now, taking a bath with his baby girl and his wedding ring sitting safely on the counter, thinking how good it would feel to shovel out all those I told you so's.
Pulling her own ring off and setting it besides Shawn's, she pushes the sleeves of her sweatshirt up to her elbows and sits cross-legged on the tile by the tub.
Shawn laughs, a sure sign of premeditation. He pulls a blob of suds off Taylor's little head of baby-short blonde hair and spreads them oven Juliet's nose. The little girl laughs, splashing her hands in the water.
Yes, they should see him now. She'll admit, she had her moments when she believed them. Nights she, for one reason or another, spent alone thinking maybe they were right. Late hours when she'd lain with her silent tears, submitting to the notion that maybe, just maybe, the man she loved was still too much a child to ever be somewhere like this.
She smears her hand through his bubbly hair and swipes it across his face, causing the child on his lap to squeal in her laughter. She laughs as well, cleaning the excess bubbles off of her hand with his shoulder.
He gives her a playfully smoldering look when her hand lingers for half a second.
Juliet shakes her head, smiling dismissively. Waving her hand thought water, she scoops up handfuls of it and washes the shampoo off her daughter's back. "So, how were you planning on rinsing the both of you without either of you drowning?"
"You doubt my mad skills, Jules?"
"Just a little, yeah," she grins back at him when he feigns hurt.
"Whaddya say, Tater Tot? Should we show Mommy our trick?" He asks the little girl, looking at her seriously and bouncing her on his knee.
Taylor just stares back at him with wide blue eyes.
He slides to the end of the tub, folding his legs up and setting his baby on his stomach and laying down. He submerses his head under the water and runs his hands harshly over his scalp. The girl laughs and claps as the suds disperse and Shawn sits up and water drips from his face.
Sliding back towards the other end of the tub and sits her in the shallow water, leaning her back just until her own scalp is in the water. He then proceeds to scoop handfuls of water over it, careful to avoid her eyes.
Satisfied, he reaches for her towel and wraps her up in it, offering the bundle to Juliet and grabbing his own towel when she takes her.
"If you get her dressed, I can dress myself and get a movie set up for us," he smiles, skimming the towel over her face and neck.
She's almost come to expect the way he can read her like that, but still she's taken aback a bit, nodding all the same.
When she brings Taylor to the living room, the credits to the movie he's chosen a movie and popped a bag of popcorn. He gently takes Taylor into his arm and pulls Juliet into his lap, where he settles down to watch a movie on a Tuesday evening with his beautiful family that he wouldn't trade in for the world.
She doesn't know what her deal is tonight, but something about domestic Shawn has stricken her dumb, and all she can think about is all the people who told her it'd never happen and how wrong they are. But then the forces herself to think about being cradled to his chest alongside their little girl.
"Love you, Jules. Love 'ya, Tater Tot." No, she'd never shed another tear for his lack of commitment again, he'd proved that too her time and time agian