Title: Maybe, baby
Author: Little Firestar and Artist:Casper
Total Word count: ~21550
Rating: T
Fandom: New Girl
Summary : season 2 AU. Jessica is the one with fertility issues, and needs to get pregnant. Nick, accepts to father her child through artificial insemination but as the pregnancy progress, he'll fear he'll not be able to go on without her. The birth of their daughter will eventually provide an happy ending.
Disclaimers: New Girl is a trademark, and all registered properties belong to the respective owners.
Notes: Set at the beginning of season 2, goes AU from there. Written for the 2013 het bigbang on livejournal and AO3. Many thanks to Casper for the art and Amy for betaing.
She couldn't believe that CeCe was so calm. Jess was practically jumping. She couldn't stand still, her palms were sweating. And at her side, CeCe was all... calm and quiet. And she was smiling. Actually smiling. Like... ugh. She didn't want to think about it. Her mind was filled with enough dark, evil thoughts. After all, she was 30, single, had just started a new job and, according to stats, she had already lost 90% of her eggs. Best case scenario.
And CeCe was smiling.
And... why wasn't Sadie talking? She wasn't supposed to just look at the screen of her computer with a little smile that didn't reach her eyes. Jess didn't like that kind of smile on doctors. It felt too polite, kind, and yet forced. In other words, their way of bringing bad news.
She knew it. All she had wanted to do with her life was to be a teacher and love a kid of her own, to provide the family she never had growing up to her baby. And now... now the dream was no more. All because that idiot of Spencer had to go and cheat on her after six years. Six. Freaking. Years.
(Ok, the idea of a baby with Spencer was kind of a nightmare, now that she thought about it...)
"Well...Cecilia... your results are off the chart. I don't know how you can do that, but they are astounding for someone your age! I've never seen a 30 years old woman walking with so many eggs!"
CeCe smiled, blushing a little, and biting her lips. It was clear she was uncomfortable, not because of the whole egg count thing, but because she hated, absolutely hated, that they had caught her being relieved that she had still so many years in front of her before giving up her solo life. She wasn't ready to be a mother yet, but she knew that one day she was going to do exactly that. One way or another, even if in her own way, she was going to follow into her mother's footsteps. Getting married. Having a child or two of her own. Leaving the job and becoming a stay at home wife. Only, the job she was going to give up on was modeling, and she was going to get married because of love, not because the parents had decided for her and her better half to join in the holy bonds of marriage. She didn't know who he was going to be, even if a part of her still dreamt of Schmidt being the father.
"Oh, CeCe, you are the eggs Queen!" Jess told her friend, smiling happily, her happiness increased by the blush on CeCe' s cheeks. It was a clear sign (to Jess) that she was thinking about the pregnancy scare she and Schmidt had a year before. "You are the queen, queen of the eggs!" she sing-sang, turning back to face Sadie with a happy smile.
It was impossible that there was going to be bad news, right? They were both fine, and Nick was going to be, for once, right. She was going to meet someone, she was going to fall in love and either get married and have a baby afterward or vice versa. He was right. Everything was going to end well. She was going to be fine. She was going to have her baby and her family and not live in an apartment where there were four people instead of the three allowed.
He just had to be right, for once. She wasn't exactly a religious person, but for once she found herself praying. Sadie kept still silent, so it couldn't be good news, but maybe it was just her way of passing of time while under duress or stress. Maybe it was all in her mind and in truth Sadie had just talked with CeCe.
Yep. It had to be that way. No way in hell it was any different. It just... it couldn't be.
"Jessica..." Sadie started, and just at the mere mention of her full name, she started crying. The full name was never a good sign. Like Sadie's sad expression. "Honey, do you want to talk about it in private?" the doctor asked, reaching out for her friend from her spot, a hand on Jess' forearm. The brunette just shook her head, no, sniffing, trying to say between sobs that it was all right, the she wanted-actually, she thought she had used the word needed- CeCe there. They were friends, maybe even closer to some kind of weird and crazy sisterhood, and they didn't have any secrets between them any longer. She wasn't going to put this between them, not after they had fought about secrets because her friend liked (liked!) Schmidt.
"Jess, There's no easy way to say it, so I'll be direct. The test shows that you suffer from what we call Premature Menopause... but, it's in an early stage, and we can still..."
"Stop it? Reverse it?" she asked, very hopeful, suddenly feeling a tiny spark, buried deep within her, coming back to life, shining as bright as a star. Maybe her dream could still become true. Maybe there was still hope for her. The husband and the kid, maybe even two kids, a boy who was going to take after his irresistible father and a girl just like her. A house with a white fence. A cat and a dog. Maybe she could still have it all. Everything she had been denied while growing up because of her parents' divorce, she still could have it. She could still give that perfect, movie-like family to a tiny, perfect child of her own. Maybe, after all, Nick was right.
But the tiny star died as soon as Jess allowed her gaze to linger on Sadie's sad and defeated features. It was the same look her mother had when she told her precious daughter that her beloved granny was no more, and in that moment Jessica Day finally was hit by the harsh reality. Nick was wrong. She knew he had lied to her because she knew that look. Sadie was mourning with her a child that was never going to be.
CeCe took her left, and Sadie her right, and they both hugged her while she cried, burying her head in the crook of the doctor's neck, until Sadie's lab coat was damp, and even then, Jess couldn't stop sobbing.
CeCe buried her head in Jess' dark curls, crying with her, and Sadie patted her back. Jess heard words, but she couldn't make them out, nor understand what her friends were telling her. She was still in shock. She felt devastated, like a failure as a woman.
And as much as Sadie was telling her that they could still buy themselves time, she didn't care. Because her time was up, whatever her friend was saying. She was 30 years old, single, living with three male roommates and she was currently on minimum salary on a new job.
Yep. Her time was up. She could kiss her dream of the picture perfect family goodbye.