Note From the Author- I continue to be positively overwhelmed by your reaction to this story, and I appreciate it so much! This chapter is more Mindy and Danny goodness, and the rest of the gang from the office will start making appearances in the next. Enjoy
Disclaimer- I do not own the characters of The Mindy Project
"Remind me again why we went to someone else's office to get the blood test done."
Mindy looked up from the envelope in her hands, making an exasperated noise. "Because, Danny. We agreed we weren't going to tell anyone else about this until after the first trimester, and if we did the test in the office everyone would know. When we tell everyone we're already going to have to deal with sweet Betsy's wondering if we're going to get married and Morgan telling us he has a prison buddy who makes cribs. I'd like to put that off as long as possible."
Danny frowned slightly. "Okay, good point. So you asked them to print out the results and seal them for what, dramatic emphasis?"
"It's a big moment!" she protested, smacking his arm. "Plus, you were delivering a baby, and I wanted you to be here."
"Okay, you win, I'm happy I'm here too," he told her softly. He clapped his hands then rubbed them together, psyching himself up. "Let's do this then."
She took a deep breath, then ripped into the envelope. When she pulled the lab results out her breath whooshed out of her in a rush; wordlessly, she passed it to Danny. Once he registered the results she nodded and swallowed hard. "It's official then, we are having a baby…. Oh my God we're having a baby!" Mindy squeaked.
He took in her wide eyes, shaking form and rapid breathing and reached out to take her hand. "Hey, we knew this, this is just official confirmation."
"It just got real. This just got real Danny!"
Clearly calming down wasn't happening, and in fact she seemed to be getting even more panicked. At a loss for what else to do, he reached out and shoved her head between her legs as gently as he could. "Breathe," he commanded, but his stern tone was offset by his hand running softly up and down her back.
After a minute or two it finally seemed as if she was finally pulling air into her lungs, and she was no longer trembling. With a deep breath she finally raised her head to look at him. "Okay, I'm okay." She waved her hands in front of her body, her eyes closing as she tried to officially work herself out of the last vestiges of her brief panic attack. "So what's our next step?"
Danny thought for a moment before answering. "Well, we need to do an ultrasound, so you need to decide if you want to stay with your gynecologist or…"
"Or what?" she questioned when she cut him off. "Or have someone in the office do it? Last time I checked I can't examine myself, so that leaves you and Jeremy. I don't know about you, but I don't think I'm comfortable with someone who used to be intimately familiar with my lady business in very un-clinical ways being intimately involved in my pregnancy as well."
His frown was swift. "Yeah I am so not comfortable with that either. I could always take over."
"Okay, let's remember the epic disaster that was the time when you tried to be my gynecologist and freaked out before we could get to the main event, shall we? Plus," she reached out to take his hands in hers, "could you really do this and maintain any kind of objectivity? If, God forbid, something should go wrong, would you be able to keep your cool when it's me and your child on the line?"
"No," he admitted with a sigh. "I don't like thinking of complications, but we have to be realistic, and I can't guarantee that I can be calm if I need to. So you stay with your OBGYN and we keep this out of the office until we're comfortable with telling everyone what's going on."
Mindy gave him a radiant smile. "This is all so surreal. Here we are having these serious conversations and we haven't even had a real date."
"So let's remedy that; get your coat."
"Really? You're being all romantic and spontaneous?"
The mingled pleasure and surprise in her voice made him grin and he nodded. The grin turned into a laugh when she stood and gave a happy little hip shake. "Well I'm trying to be anyway, but honestly, go get your coat."
Before she did as he asked she bent to give him a lingering kiss, which he returned happily. When she rose again he gave her butt a playful swat just to see the sexy little smile she shot over her shoulder at him as she sauntered off.
"Are you going to tell me where we're going?" she asked, when she returned.
Danny simply held out his arm to her. "Spontaneous remember? I have no idea. But we'll figure it out."
And they did. As first dates went it was a lot of fun, and without the drama and craziness of the failed double date they had shared over a year before. They found a tiny little Greek place with excellent Gyros and crappy service where they laughed over Morgan's latest hijinks and discussed Jeremy's growing crush on Betsy. They talked a little bit about the baby and decided that boy or girl there would be no naming their child something crazy like Apple or Zappa, or something equally ridiculous. On the walk back to her place they ate the best churros in the city and took it slow, strolling leisurely arm in arm.
When they did finally make it back to the apartment Mindy leaned against her door with a lazy smile. "So you do know how to show a girl a good time outside the bedroom," she ribbed.
"Hey, to be fair some of those good times were out of the bedroom," he told her. He leaned in to plant his hands on either side of her shoulders and punctuated his following words with kisses. "I distinctly remember there being good times in the kitchen, and the living room, and in one particularly memorable case, your office."
She chuckled. "Okay, point goes to Danny on that one. But honestly, I had a really good time tonight." Grabbing him by the lapels of his jacket she pulled him down for a longer, more heated kiss. "I had a good time. Our first date was indeed spontaneous and romantic, even if we have done things backwards."
"Backwards works for us," Danny observed with a shrug.
She flashed him a wicked smile. "Want to be really backwards and put out on the first date Castellano?"
"I thought you'd never ask."