The day his daughter is born, small and perfect, is the first day that he looks down at the scars on his wrists and thinks maybe all the pain was worth it.
Skye goes into labor while he is on a mission. Of course, the mission was only supposed to last four hours, and in that small time frame his daughter wanted to be known to the world.
He's not late, though, by any means. He runs as fast as he can, and when he gets there, she is sitting in bed, still pregnant, talking with Jemma. She smiles when she sees him, reaching out her hand for him to sit next to her on the bed. He sits on the end though, taking her aching feet in his hands and rubbing them and she sighs with content.
She lays low on the bed, smiling up at him until another contraction rips through her. Then she groans, clutching her stomach and glaring at him through the pain.
Another contraction hits her after that, and Jemma runs off to find the doctor.
Two hours later, his daughter is born.
They name her Avery, after the woman who saved Skye's life, and her middle name is Soleil, because, like her mother, she is a light in his life. He watches Skye hold her daughter for the first time, and he feels an overwhelming sense of peace. He sits behind her on the bed, arms wrapped around her and Avery, and stares into Avery's familiar dark eyes. Avery peers up at him with curiosity. Skye carefully lifts his arm to her and kisses his scars softly before turning to him, tears of happiness sparkling in her eyes. He thinks maybe it was all worth it, because, in her mother's and father's arms, his daughter smiles too.
…
His daughter is almost two years old when she notices her father's scars. She's just beginning to walk on her own. One day, not unlike any other, she trips over her own tiny feet, and he is there to catch her.
She rights herself in his arms, patting his arms in a message to let her go. Her hand brushes over the scar on his wrist, long and thin, and she pats it several times, trying to understand the change in texture on his skin.
She looks up at him with big round eyes, like she's knows the cause of this uneven skin was pain. She pats it softly then and places her mouth on it and gives it something between a kiss and a nibble. It tickles, and he laughs. She grabs at his other arm, and discovers the other, smaller scar there, patting that too, and kissing it also. Then she swings her chubby arms upwards, a sign she wants to be picked up.
He tells Skye that night, that their daughter saw his scars. She curls into his chest, breathing deeply. They have left that life behind, though they don't hide it. They are separated from the bus and the bases. But, as his daughter found out, the scars remain. He apologizes, tears running down both of their faces. She says it a story they will have to share eventually, but they can save it for another day. He kisses her, soft and gentle and they tangle their legs together as they fall asleep.
…
He used to hate when people looked at or brushed against his scars. It caused a burning sensation and he always flinched. But Avery is four now, and she always likes to brush her fingers on them. He knows she doesn't understand the concept of scars, only that somehow his skin goes from smooth to rough and back to smooth because of these jagged lines.
Whenever he reads to her, sitting up on her bed while she's curled under the covers, she always takes one hand and rubs her thumb back and forth along his wrist, from one side of the scar to the other. He's gotten really good at reading storybooks with only one hand to turn the pages.
…
Avery is seven the first time she asks "Where did you get those scars?"
He stops his chopping vegetables at the counter, and behind him, Skye stops stirring the pot on the stove.
He swallows, asking where she heard that.
"My teacher has one on her forehead. She said she got it in a bike accident. Did you get in an accident?" Her eyes wide with innocence and curiosity, and he smiles.
"Remember when we told you that mommy and daddy used to be spies? Well, we got in a lot of accidents," Skye says, turning from the stove and resting her arms on the counter, looking at her daughter. Avery takes this answer, turning back to her coloring at the kitchen table. His back is still rigid though, so Skye rubs a hand down it and kisses his cheek before turning back to the stove.
Later that night, she curls around him so that his head is curled into her chest. He breathes deeply her scent, anchoring him to this world.
"When she's older," Skye voice is a soothing whisper in the dark. "We'll tell her when she's older." She kisses the top of his head, and he wraps his arms tighter around her side.\
When he wakes up at two in the morning covered in sweat, Skye rubs her hands down his neck and back until he falls back asleep.
…
Avery comes home from school when she is eleven with tears in her eyes.
"There was a boy," she says, curled in mothers lap, "And no one knew what was wrong with him, but he-"she chokes on her tears, and he goes to sit beside them, "He tried to hurt himself."
She looks up at her father then, tears on her face, and he hopes she doesn't out the pieces together. She doesn't then, only buries her head in her mother's chest.
However, later, when he returns from his run he hears them in the living room. He sees their backs, Skye sitting up and their daughter lying with her head in Skye's lap.
"Did daddy try to hurt himself?" he hears his daughter ask and his heart breaks.
"It's a long story," Skye replies, dropping a kiss on Avery's forehead.
He sees his daughter sit up and bury her head in her mother's shoulder, breathing deeply, try to control her tears.
"He's not going anywhere, baby," she says, and Avery breathing evens out. By the time Skye has carried her to bed, he is getting out of the shower. Pulling on his flannel pajama bottoms, he climbs into bed. She curls into his side, the way her daughter had, so he wraps his arms around her tiny frame and pulls her to his chest.
"I'm not going anywhere," he whispers into her hair, and she places a kiss to his jaw before curling back into his chest and falling asleep.
…
Avery Soleil is fourteen years and three days old, and she knows what she wants for her birthday.
He knew this day would come. They both did, but even though they knew, neither Skye nor he was quite prepared for what their daughter asks of them.
She wants to know the story. Their story, the one that started so many years ago and held so much hurt and pain. And she wanted to hear it all. They didn't want to have their daughter carefully preserved innocence destroyed by their own story. But, as their daughter said, a story like theirs is meant to be shared, and so they did.
They sat down on the couch, with him in the chair next to it, lest their daughter want to storm out of the room and not have to cross by him. He sits, watching Skye play with her ring, a nervous motion she had developed rather than biting her fingernails.
"Where do we start?" Skye asks, curling her legs underneath her.
"At the beginning," Is their daughter's simple answer, and he can tell she is almost as nervous as they are.
"I was an orphan…" is where Skye starts the story.
An hour later and they've finally gotten to the day when it all went to hell. He and Skye have traded off talking, but he knows that Avery should hear this part from Skye before she hears it from him. It's sad, he thinks, that out of all the anniversaries and birthdays, this day will still be remembered. April 29, 2014.
By the time Skye has finished talking about the end of the fight at Cybertek, Avery is crying. She doesn't seem angry though, or scared.
"Avery sweetheart," he begins quietly, "I'm so sorry…"
But she doesn't answer, only climbs off the couch to curl into his lap. She cries into his shirt, clutching him and gasping with sobs. Skye comes to sit on the arm of the chair, placing her hand on their daughter's back.
"Do you hate me?" he asks.
She shakes her head into his chest.
"Daddy," she says, still crying, "I don't care. It doesn't matter because it's in the past." She pauses, wiping the tears off her face. "No matter what, you're my dad. That means you're always going to be my hero. I love you" She starts crying again, holding him tighter than before.
"Is that why," his daughter looks up at him with tears streaming down her face before sobbing and burying her face into his shoulder.
They stay like that for a long time, curled together on the chair. When hours have passed, and the sun has gone down and Avery has stopped crying, she whispers the question he knew would be asked.
"Is that why you tried to hurt yourself?" Her voice is tiny, the voice of the seven years old who didn't really know what it meant to have a scar. He places a kiss on her head, whispering
"Yes."
"What stopped you?"
He sighs, holding her close.
"I love your mother so much. And I was selfish. I was selfish at the beginning when I shouldn't have loved her. I was selfish then because all I wanted to do is see her again. I know she gets annoyed when I always try to protect her, but it's because I'm so selfish I don't want to live in a world where she isn't there."
"I don't think that's selfish daddy. I think that's just love."
"That's what I've been trying to tell him," says Skye from the doorway. "Now come on little lady, its way past your bedtime."
Avery sighs, placing a kiss on his cheek before untangling her limbs and going up the stairs. Skye takes her place, throwing her legs over his and curling up to his chest.
"That wasn't as bad as I thought it would be," he says.
"With more people carrying the story, the easier it is to carry," she responds.
"I love you, Skye"
She looks up at him, giving him the smile that was his reason for living.
"I love you, Grant."
He places a kiss on her head.
For this, he thinks, it was all worth it.