I sing sometimes like my life is at stake
'cause you're only as loud as the noises you make.
And I'm learning to laugh as hard as I can listen.

- Ani DiFranco, "My I.Q."

Juliet's dragging today. Her back hurts, her hips ache, she's exhausted, and her astronomy final was this morning, so of course she was up way too late last night studying for that. Next final's tomorrow and then two more on Wednesday, annnd two papers before she's done.

Sleep. Sleep would be amazing. Sleep would be the best fucking thing to ever happen to her in her entire life. But is she sleeping right now? Nope. Why not? Because there are rows of Styrofoam coffee cups to be stacked, spilled sugar to be wiped up, muffins to be boxed, and a whooping pack of middle school boys at the tables to be gamely ignored.

Most of the other employees boot them out after they sit around for too long after buying not much more than a soda, maybe a muffin, but Juliet's working alone in the front right now, and she's always felt sort of bad for them. Sure, they're doofy and annoying, but it's also not their fault that they're 12 or 13 and no one wants them around because of it. Maybe someday someone will try to boot her son out of someplace just because he's young, and that doesn't seem all that fair, either.

This is her last day on the job. She can do it. She can. Just three more hours. But no one else is around, and Juliet doesn't try to hide her yawns.

She's dumping coffee grounds into the machine when Danielle shuffles out of the back. "Juliet, I have to go - Alex is sick." The poor woman is wringing her hands anxiously. "You will be all right here?"

Juliet straightens up. "That's fine, is there anything I need to do?"

"There is a timer on the bread, just take it out. It should be ready in half an hour. I don't know if I can come back. Can you, can you call Evelyn?"

"Sure. I hope your daughter feels better."

Danielle nods, her fingers tight around her bag. Juliet watches her go. She's doesn't know Danielle very well, doesn't know what the deal is with Danielle's daughter's father. Probably just a preview of single motherhood for Juliet, anyway, unless she's actually supposed to trust Jack. (Is she actually supposed to trust Jack? Oh, forget it, she's too tired to think about this today.)

On the phone, Evelyn tells Juliet that someone - someone, she just doesn't know who (story of Juliet's life) - will be in as backup as soon as possible.

The next half-hour is slow, a few customers and mostly just for coffee. The kids are lingering, loud as usual, flipping through some sort of card collection. But when Juliet hears the timer go off, no mysterious coworker has shown up yet (of fucking course. Also see: story of Juliet's life), so she casts a wary glance at the kids before heading into the back.

The entire room smells like rosemary and olive oil and bread, and mmm, but it takes her a minute to figure out where the oven mitts are before easing the trays onto the big stainless steel table in the middle of the room. She's burned her hands one too many times on these things as it is.

The last tray's on the table when things out front go quiet.

Too quiet.

Juliet pauses, tilting her head, trying to listen out front, and all she knows is that she has a bad feeling about the entire thing. She pulls off the oven mitts as she pushes through the double doors, and one of the kids pauses, his jaw dropping as his eyes go big. Of course, because he's at the counter, holding the plastic tip jar, and he startles, jerking his head toward his friends.

"Hey!" she yells, but just like that, the kids start running, and the ones by the table are out the door in a flash, that last one with the tip jar not far behind them. She takes off after them, as best she can, anyway, considering she's 32 weeks pregnant, and this entire thing is ridiculous, but she let those jerks stick around when anyone else would have booted them out after 15 minutes, and this is her last day and she needs those tips, and... FUCK!

Outside they're already on their bikes, except for one who grabs a skateboard, throwing it down on the other side of the curb and jumping on. But either he's not exactly a proficient skateboarder - or isn't thinking about what the hell he's doing when there's a yelling pregnant girl running after them bitching about petty larceny - because the board slips straight out in front of him and he faceplants squarely onto the asphalt.

The boy - an Asian kid with spiky hair, black shirt - yelps loudly, laying there on the street, and Juliet stands there for a second watching her tips get pedaled down the street by the Criminals of Tomorrow. Can this day get any better? Finally she kneels down next to the bad skateboarder.

Her voice comes out angry. "What the hell did you and your little friends think you were doing?"

"I don't - I didn't - " he stammers, sitting up.

"You think it's OK to just steal people's stuff?" Juliet yells. "What the hell is wrong with you? You never thought that maybe people need the money they make?"

"It was my friend's - "

"Yeah, and look how well that worked out for you!" She flings a hand out toward the empty road. "They're gone, they don't care about what happens to you! You're gonna end up in jail if you keep hanging around with people like that!"

The kid's chin trembles and he bursts into tears. That's when Juliet realizes the trembling chin in question is actually bleeding, and his jeans are ripped, too, revealing a torn-up knee. Well, shit. Juliet... just made a kid cry. She's going to be an absolutely terrible mother, isn't she? "Oh, god. Um... Um... W-why don't you come inside?"

Through his tears, the kid gives her an incredulous look, embarrassed though he may be. His eyes flick back over to his skateboard. "I..." he begins, and then hiccups, a shuddering sob rolling through him that he doesn't quite manage to suppress. Juliet glances back toward the curb. No one else is showing up right now. Not any bakery employees, not any of this kid's friends.

She picks up his skateboard. "Just come on, let's go inside. I'm not gonna yell at you anymore, and I'm pretty sure we have band-aids in there. And now I've got your skateboard, and you're probably going to want it back."

The kid looks simultaneously embarrassed and terrified. It's strange to think he's really only a few years younger than her, especially considering how inadvertently old she's been feeling lately.

"I'm Juliet," she tries.

"J... Jim," he says, his mouth twitching nervously.

Sure. Sure, it is. "And what's your real name, Jim?"

He narrows his eyes, which proves to be a mistake because they're still half-full of tears, and he's forced to blink. "Miles," he mutters.

This time she believes him, because no one is going to think of a fake name like Miles. "Come on, Miles."

Miles hesitates for a second, but she's still got his skateboard, so he stands and follows her inside, down the back hall to the bathroom. She sorts through the stuff in the tall metal cabinet behind the door, finds a bunch of bandages from the last time she burned her hand. "Let me see," she instructs.

The entire time, he looks like he's going against his better judgment, but she cleans his scrapes with antiseptic, looks for errant gravel, dabs his wounds with Neosporin. Bandages him up.

He finally speaks. "Are you going to call the police?"

For some reason in her head, there he is, grown up, cleaning rifles, staring at security monitors. God, she's tired today. "Do you think you can convince your friend to bring the money back?"

He shrugs. "Probably not."

"Would you try? Except..." Shit. Why is she trying to bargain like this with a kid? And it's her last day anyway. Juliet lets out a long, frustrated sigh. "Listen, it's my last day here. Just forget it."

He eyes her stomach warily. "OK."

"That was a really lousy thing your friend did. I'm serious, you shouldn't hang around people like that."

"I know. But you're... really not gonna call the cops?"

She hesitates. "Well, maybe I should call your parents." This is weird, this is too weird, trying to discipline him, tell him what's good or bad for him, like she's an adult, like she's in charge.

Miles parts his lips to argue with her, lets out a shaky sigh when he realizes she's got him in a no-win situation. "I swear, I swear I won't hang around with them anymore."

She watches him for a long moment, the way he's breathing too fast, the way his eyes are wide, his face still tear-stained. "Don't forget your skateboard," she finally says. "I'm telling my boss what happened. Don't come back here if you don't want to get in any more trouble. And find some better friends."

"OK," he says anxiously. Juliet twists away slightly, to give him room to leave, but once Miles stands, he suddenly pauses, looks up at her. "Thanks. Thanks a lot. Good luck with... good luck with your baby and stuff."

Why does she want to laugh all of a sudden? She made a kid cry today, she'll probably be a terrible mother, but looking at that band-aid on his chin, well, at least she can deal with scrapes. "Thanks, Miles."

On Sunday morning, Jack shows up at her dorm with a U-Haul, and Juliet can't help but laugh. He looks confused, rubbing a hand over the back of his head. "I thought I was helping you move."

"You are, it's just..." She shakes her head. She's not sure why she'd forgotten how big Jack is on grand gestures, considering he flew across the country just to talk to her, and quit his rotations at Columbia just to prove a damn point. But here he is with a 10-foot rental truck idling at the curb, and up in her room, she's got eight boxes, a small TV, her stereo and three suitcases. OK, and the bassinet and the bouncy seat. And maybe it was silly to buy those before she moved, but they were at Goodwill and there was no guarantee they were going to still be there afterward, and anyway, she needed some things for the baby. As in, she needed to have things, to cement the whole thing in her mind. Not matter what a huge idiot she'd felt like, lugging that stuff into her dorm room. Relieved no one actually saw her that day.

"Jack, I don't have that much stuff." It would have been only two carloads, probably.

"So it'll go quick then." Jack shrugs, his eyes round and uncomprehending.

Juliet shakes her head, still smiling. "Thanks, I guess. Come on."

Jack chuckles once they're up in her room. Her stuff is grouped together in the middle of the tiny room, her bed already stripped down, the shelves empty. "I see your point."

She'd taken down the ultrasound pictures, but they're lying on her desk still, the edges slightly curled. "Um..." Suddenly her heart is thrumming in her chest, and she's not sure why she's so anxious to show them to him, it's not like he doesn't know, obviously, but... it's just that these pictures, that day she got them, it just felt like everything had changed for her that day, that day she'd changed her major, bumped into that stranger in the rain, went to Dr. Burke's (and Dr. Burke's) office, saw the baby for the first time. Found out he was a boy. The whole thing, it was more than she could even explain. "I, um... I thought maybe you'd like to see these."

Juliet holds the pictures out to Jack, and his eyebrows shoot up, his mouth dropping open a little as he takes them from her. "This is...?"

"Yeah."

"This is our baby," he says in wonderment, his eyes getting too bright and then, there, he's tearing up, but for once she can't blame him. Even if the our baby thing still doesn't hit her in quite the right way. Not the way it should. It still feels like he's usurping this from her, like he couldn't possibly understand, but then it's not Jack who's been lugging around this tiny being for just about eight months now, it's not Jack who's been worrying and planning for months, it's not Jack who gets kept up late at night by the baby trying to run a marathon in place.

"Yeah," Juliet says again, softer this time. Trying to sound like she understands him, like she's willing to share this with him. Which... well, she's still not sure that she is.

"Is it... is he sucking his thumb in this one?"

Juliet steps forward, almost closer to Jack than she's comfortable with at this point. Squints at the printout, even though she knows exactly which one he's talking about. "Mm-hm."

Jack rubs his hand over his forehead like he can't believe it, then looks back at Juliet, looks right into her eyes. "This is the..." He blinks a couple of times. "This is the... most amazing thing I've ever seen."

And it is for her, too, even months later. But why does she want him to stop looking at her right now? Like she's just exposed too much, shared too much, given something she wasn't ready for. She shifts where she stands, averting her gaze. Her pulse feels uneven. "I... I know, Jack. Do you think we could just get started? I don't think it's going to take that long. I just - I just thought you should see."

He looks down at the pictures again for a long moment. "Thank you," he says finally. "Thank you."