Hello readers! I decided I needed a place to put the random snippets of Newsroom (Mac/Will) stories that float around in my head so I created this. I'm not quite sure what's going to become of it or how frequently I'll post in it, but I hope you enjoy it.
This first one-shot takes place about six months after whenever Mac and Will finally (hopefully) get back together in Season 2.
They've been back together for six months when it happens.
It wasn't planned, it wasn't discussed, it wasn't even really considered.
Nevertheless, it happens.
It's thirty seconds before they're on air.
"Billy?" she whispers into her headset.
He looks up from his notes on his desk and looks into the camera.
"Mac?" he replies, a teasing smile on his lips.
"Cut the audio feed to the control room," she orders Herb. Most of the time she'll say anything to will in front of the crew, but there are still some things that are meant to be private.
"Billy, you know I love you, right?"
His smile softens and she can see his bright blue eyes sparkling on the monitors in front of her.
"Yes, Kenz, I know. And I love you too, of course."
"Always?"
He's staring directly into the cameras now, directly at her.
"Always."
"I've gotta cut back to the audio feed soon, boss," Herb tells her.
"Give me fifteen more seconds."
She turns back to the monitors where Will is reading and scribbling on his notes again.
Ten.
"Billy?"
Nine.
He looks up again, still smiling but with a look of confusion in his eyes. She usually doesn't pester him this late into the countdown.
Eight.
"Yes, dear?"
Seven.
She takes a deep breath.
Six.
"I'm pregnant."
Five.
He freezes.
Four.
She yanks off her headset.
Three.
Jim yells something at her.
Two.
Will gapes into the camera with his mouth hanging open.
One.
She flings open the control room door and strides quickly to her office.
She ignores the looks everyone in the pen gives her and she slams her office door shut when she finally reaches it. She doesn't bother to turn on the lights. She sinks into her desk chair and lays her head in her hands. She presses her palms into her eyes hoping that will hold back her tears and erase the image currently burned into her mind.
The expression on Will's face and in his eyes when she'd foolishly blurted her news to him five seconds before they went live was not one of shock or confusion or joy.
It was one of pure, unadulterated fear.
He rips his earpiece out before Jim can even say 'That's a wrap.' Or whatever-the-fuck end-of-show phrase he was planning on uttering. He throws back the pair of doors between the set and the hallways, briefly wondering who the fuck thought so many doors were necessary in such a small space. He stalks quickly to the control room and flings that door open too. He scans the faces staring back at him.
"Where is she?" he growls at them all.
No one answers.
He is about to ask the question again when he is startled by a voice from behind him. He spins around and is met with the wary eyes of Sloan Sabbith.
"What did you say?" he demands.
Sloan sighs.
"I said, I have absolutely no idea what is going on here, and I hope this doesn't get me into huge trouble with either of you, but since Mac is my best friend and the two of you are dating and you're both finally happy again, I should probably tell you that right as you went on air I saw Mac sprint across the pen and into her office where she's been locked up since the beginning of the show."
He brushes by Sloan and starts down the hallway before turning around and running back.
Sloan is still standing in the control room doorway clearly confounded by his behavior.
"Thank you," he pants. And then he's off running down the hallway again.
He pushes open another fucking set of doors (really though, why are there so many damn doors in this building?) and strides purposefully across the pen.
"Mac!" he shouts, not caring who of the few staffers left in the office can hear him.
"MacKenzie!"
He's nearly outside her door now and it hasn't opened and no light has come on. He sincerely hopes Sloan wasn't lying to him otherwise he is going to look like a fool and have to chase after his disappearing girlfriend.
He gets to the door and tries the knob.
Locked. As Sloan said it would be. Perhaps the economist is to be trusted.
He is about to pound on the door but stops when he realizes he has already caused enough of a scene. Plus if Mac is upset it's better if he approaches this cautiously.
He takes a deep breath and knocks lightly on the door.
"Mac? You in there?"
No response.
He leans closer to the door.
"It's me, Will."
Still nothing.
"Please, Mac, let me in."
He waits a few moments and finally hears what he hopes is the sound of Mac shuffling around in her office and coming to open the door. He waits a few seconds more and hears the click of the lock releasing. Mac doesn't open the door and he hears her patter back to her chair.
He sighs and runs his fingers through his hair before slowly easing open the door and entering the darkened room. The door slides shut quietly behind him and he makes sure to lock it.
When he turns to Mac's desk he only sees the back of her large leather office chair. He also sees a bottle of wine on her desk and a half full glass. He starts to panic internally.
"Mac?" he prompts tentatively.
She slowly rotates her chair around to face him and he feels like he's in some weird movie.
She doesn't speak to him, she just sips from a bottle of water and looks at him.
"You…you weren't drinking wine were you?" he asks timidly.
She cocks her head at him and gives him a small smile.
"No, Will, I wasn't. I just poured it for the…idea of the thing I guess."
She chuckles, which he takes as a good sign, and he lets out a breath of relief.
A heavy silence falls over them again as he stands in the darkness of her office and they stare at each other. He can tell that she's been crying and he feels a pang in his chest. But he also feels something else bubbling up inside of him, some mix of strong emotions that he can't quite identify. Because there's something life-changingly important that they need to talk about, something that's simultaneously wonderful yet terrifying. So he musters up as much courage as he can and does his best to push aside his anxieties.
"Kenz…what you said, right before I went on air, is it…is it true?" he asks softly.
He hopes she can't hear the waver in his voice. He hopes she can't tell just exactly how nervous he is in this moment.
There is a beat of silence.
Then she answers.
Yes, Will. It was – it is – true."
He swallows and wipes his hands on his dress pants. He doesn't know why he's so nervous about this. Mac continues to stare at him with her head slightly tilted to one side.
He manages to find his voice once more.
"Can you say it again?" he requests, stepping toward her.
She blinks confusedly up at him.
"Will, I just told you–"
"Not that. I don't mean that. Can you tell me again? What you told me during the countdown. I need to hear it again."
He sees tears spring to Mac's eyes and he thinks he might feel some starting to fill his own. She gives him a soft, watery smile (a real MacKenzie smile, he thinks), and she speaks.
"I'm pregnant, Billy."
He lets the phrase rattle around in his head for a few seconds. He lets it settle in his heart and ignite a whole bevy of new emotions he didn't know were possible. Then a big, stupid, goofy grin spreads across his face. Mac is smiling at him widely now too even though there are also tears leaking from her eyes. He imagines they are wearing matching expressions right now.
In a moment he has closed the gap between them and has reached across the desk to pull her to him in a deep kiss.
Mac is the one who breaks the kiss.
She steps back from him and her desk and tucks a strand of hair behind her ear, a nervous habit she's always had.
He's confused because everything about that moment and that kiss was perfect yet Mac is looking at him like she's going to start crying again – and they aren't going to be tears of joy.
"Mac, darling, what's wrong?"
He quickly circles around her desk and takes her hand in his when she doesn't respond right away. He notices that she's trembling slightly.
"Talk to me, Kenz," he begs.
It's killing him to see her like this.
She blinks back a few tears and whispers a question that breaks his heart.
"Y-you're really…happy about this? You're…okay with it?"
She's staring down at the floor, or perhaps at their entwined hands. He releases one of her hands and tilts her chin up so that she's looking him in the eyes.
Her eyes are still brimming with unshed tears and her beautiful brown orbs are a storm of emotions.
"MacKenzie. Of course I'm happy about this. Jesus, I'm fucking elated. And I'm way beyond 'okay' with it, Kenz. Why would you think otherwise?"
She looks down again and he gently picks her chin back up.
"I saw the look on your face when I told you the first time, Will. You didn't seem elated or 'way beyond okay with it.' You looked quite the opposite actually."
"Cut me some slack here, Mac. You told me you were pregnant five seconds before I went live on national television! And through a headset! I think I had a right to be a little caught off-guard and shocked out of my mind."
"You looked absolutely terrified, Will."
"That's because I was! And I still am! I'm fucking scared as hell, Kenz. That doesn't mean I don't want this any less. I know we were trying to take this whole finally-being-back-together-again thing slowly, well mostly slowly, but all I've ever wanted since we started dating the first time is to have a family with you, Kenz. Don't you get it? After all these years and all the shit we've been through together, I wasn't sure if it was going to happen for us. But now that it is…I've…I've never felt happier or luckier in my life."
"Oh, Billy!" Mac cries, flinging herself into his arms.
He holds onto her tightly and breathes in the scent that is uniquely MacKenzie McHale.
"There is one thing I have to ask though," he murmurs into her hair.
She remains tucked in his arms but looks up at him.
"What is it?"
"Why the hell did you decide to tell me you were pregnant at such an inopportune moment?!"
His question is meant to be teasing but Mac tenses almost imperceptibly in his arms.
"I'll admit it wasn't one of my better moments. I didn't mean to tell you then. I just couldn't keep it to myself any longer. And…"she trails off, her fingers tracing random patterns on his dress shirt.
"And what?" he prompts.
She sighs.
"And I was afraid."
"Afraid of what?"
"Your reaction. We hadn't talked about children or anything long-term like that so I was terrified this might make you change your mind about us and then you'd leave. I…I couldn't bare it if you left, Billy. After everything…it would destroy me. I know it's not really fair for me to say that considering our history, but it's the truth. And…I wasn't just afraid of that. I'm not exactly a spring chicken anymore. There are loads of risks for women my age who get pregnant. I wanted to be sure of it when I told you. There's still plenty that could go wrong over the next seven months, and that's before we even have the baby. So you're not the only one who's scared shitless right now."
Will's heart drops because he hadn't even considered the health factors and risks involved in this for Mac and for their baby. He was worried and overwhelmed enough just trying to process the basic concept of adding a new person to their lives.
"Shit, Kenz. I hadn't even thought about that," he whispers, wrapping her tighter in his arms.
He can't imagine his life without the woman nestled in his embrace; he doesn't want to. And now that he knows about the child they've created…he doesn't want to imagine a life without that either.
"I know I can't promise you that nothing bad is gonna happen because I don't know that. I'm definitely gonna screw up and forget to pick our kid up from school or accidentally teach them a curse word or something worse like let them become a Democrat (Mac swats him). And you have to carry a baby around for seven more months and that's probably gonna be highly unpleasant at times, and then you're gonna have to take care of our kid and me because we both know I behave like a child half of the time–"
"Most of the time," Mac interrupts, gazing up at him.
He rolls his eyes and sticks his tongue out at her before continuing.
"What I'm trying to say is that while I don't know what kind of trials we're going to face in the future, what I do know is that we're going to face them together. Nothing's going to change that, Kenz. Even if we're both scared and worried and have no clue what the hell we're doing, at least we'll have each other, right?"
Mac nods in agreement.
"Right," she whispers.
"Then that's all we need," he shrugs as he smiles and places a soft kiss on her forehead.
They stand there like that in the darkness of Mac's office for a while, Mac's head tucked under his chin and their arms wrapped around each other.
"Have I told you lately that I love you," Mac asks quietly.
"About two hours ago, I believe."
She goes up on her tiptoes and places a soft, feathery kiss on his cheek.
"I love you, Billy," she whispers.
"I love you, Kenz," he whispers back.
"Always and forever?"
"Always and forever," he replies without hesitation.
She smiles and sighs contentedly, laying her head back on his chest.
"Let's go home," he murmurs.
Abigail Elizabeth McAvoy (Abby for short) is born six months and twenty-seven days later. Will only forgets to pick her up from school once, her Uncle Charlie is actually the one who 'accidentally' teaches her a bad word, and MacKenzie treasures every minute she spends keeping her daughter and child-at-heart husband in line.
Well I hope you liked that giant fluff-fest. It was a fun idea to play with. Leave a review if you are so inclined or PM me if you wanna talk about any and all things Newsroom related. Thanks for stopping by!