Qbonbon and anyone else that was wondering, how did Gail recognize Dorothy?: at some point I mentioned that Gail felt that she recognized Dorothy, that she felt she knew her from somewhere, sure its vague, but I was going with siblings look alike and have similar mannerisms and Dorothy looks like her brother, who Gail spent several months undercover with, I don't know, it's a stretch sure, and it really only makes sense after the fact I guess. Or do you mean how Dorothy (in general)? I gave Dorothy multiple background stories, she kept showing up at inopportune times and rooting through their stuff and asking probing questions, and Gail thought she was suspicious. Anyways, hope that helps.
Joyce and Charlie spent a couple more days with the newly returned women, but they had to get back to Montreal. Both still work and have to get back to their lives; however, they said they would come visit on March Break, since Joyce works at a grade school she gets the full week off and Charlie will take a couple of days off to come see his new grandchild.
Holly and Gail spend the rest of Gail's time off shopping for the nursery, Holly decides to keep the spare room a spare room and move her desk and bookcase out of the office into her room, since there was enough space. Gail helps put together a change table and carry various other items up to the office, well now the baby's room. They acquire a rocking chair and a little book shelf to start placing books and stuffed animals on it.
Gail does go back to work at the end of her week off. Holly decides to go to work as well; she heads to the labs to let her boss know what is going on. Holly's boss was overjoyed to see Holly again, giving her a hug, and laughing with joy at how pregnant Holly is. Holly agreed to finish her paperwork from her previous cases, to go over the ones that she had started and a coworker finished to make sure she would have come to the same conclusion, and help out on consult where needed until she was officially on maternity leave.
Gail's helping her brother with some case; she's quote 'easing' back into police work, thanks to Oliver, so naturally she got paired with her brother for the day. She's sitting in his office area with her feet on his desk. Her phone is next to her feet. It vibrates and the message she just received flashes on her screen. Steve quickly grabs it and reads aloud, '"I'm starving.'" He laughs, "how did you text yourself?" He laughs at his own joke.
Gail sits up and grabs her phone, "funny." She unlocks her phone, "it's from Holly. She went to work today." She looks at her watch, sees that's it's just after 11, "it's close enough to lunch time, I'm going for lunch." She stands up typing something into her phone; a smile appears on her face as it beeps back, "call me if you find anything." She raises her hand to wave goodbye.
"Say 'hi' to Holly for me," says Steve.
"Maybe," says Gail.
Gail takes the couple block walk to the labs, hitting up a sandwich place along the way. Spending all those weeks on that mail route, Gail actually doesn't mind the frigid cold walk through the city. She enters the labs, flashing her badge, saying she's there to see Dr. Stewart. Some lab tech points down a hallway, saying the offices are down there. Gail not familiar with this part of the building reads every name she passes on the doors until she finally finds 'Stewart.' Gail knocks softly, she hears a quiet, 'come in.' She opens the door and finds Holly in her desk chair with her arms over her head. "What are you doing?" asks Gail.
"I have this weird cramp and raising my arms helps."
Gail nods her head, she drops the bag of sandwiches on the desk and takes the two steps over to Holly's guest chair and sits down. "I brought lunch," she says.
Holly has her eyes closed, "thanks, but I'm not hungry anymore."
"Oh," says Gail, who feels weirdly deflated, she took her lunch early to spend it with Holly, and Holly's in some sort of pain that Gail can't help with. She sighs, not sure what to do, she feels like this keeps happening to her, she feels like she is in a constant state of not knowing what to do. She gets to a place then she's just not sure what to do, does she continue on with what she's been doing, find something else, she doesn't know. It's exhausting her though. "Well," Gail stands ready to make her trek back to the precinct.
"You're not going are you?" Holly looks at her with a soft worried expression, "you just got here…"
Gail, who was just about to leave, says, "no…I was going to the bathroom, to uh…wash my hands, be back in a minute."
"Okay," says Holly, as she watches the blonde leave her office.
Gail takes her time going to the washroom, poking her head in various other rooms that she's never been in before. When Gail returns she opens Holly's door and finds the doctor eating the sandwich she brought for her, "good?" asks Gail.
"Mhmmm," nods Holly.
"Good," comments Gail as she sits back down in the guest chair and reaches for her own sandwich.
A few weeks go by, Gail goes to the station and out on patrol, but always takes her lunch break with Holly. Sometimes her partner of the day will join her in Holly's office eating fruits, vegetables and other healthy stuff. Today it's Andy, as they're about to leave Andy asks, "you two coming to the Penny with us after work for some drinks?"
Gail shakes her head, "Holly will be too tired."
"Awww, come on Gail, since you've been home you haven't gone out with us once," Andy whines.
Andy whining doesn't work on Gail, but Holly hears it differently, Holly fears that Gail is turning down her friends cause she doesn't think Holly would be up for after work activities and should not be alone for too long, they had talked about it previously, how they were always together and Gail had been noticing how tired Holly gets now and how much other help Holly needs, it's a lot easier for Gail to direct a sleepy Holly to a couch or bed, and to help Holly with preparing food and what not, Holly seems to be fine with going to work, pretty much always staying in her office chair and her coworkers coming to her if they need anything, nothing too strenuous, but generally speaking Holly's pregnancy has been pretty good, no real problems, just typical tiredness or soreness. "You should go," Holly tells Gail. Holly likes the idea of Gail putting her first, but she also doesn't want the blonde to lose her connections to her friends.
"What?" questions the blonde officer.
"I'll be fine by myself for a little bit, if you're nervous about leaving me home alone I can call one of my friends to spend the evening with me, I don't need a babysitter…"
"Yet," says Andy, who's totally been watching this whole interaction, "and I totally want to be a babysitter again, add me to your list of willing participants." Andy looks between Holly and Gail; she directs her question to Holly, "so Gail can come out with us tonight?"
Holly laughs at the question like she holds the power of what Gail does or doesn't do, "yes, and she could have slash should have gone out with you guys previously. I don't know why she didn't."
"You know why I didn't, we put together the nursery and stuff," Gail trying to defend her choices.
"And I'm very grateful for your help," Holly walks over to give Gail a kiss on the cheek. "You can pick me up and drive me home, then you can go out with your friends."
"You sure?" asks a reluctant and worried Gail.
"Yes," Holly kisses her again, this time on the lips. Holly presses her body into Gail's.
Gail happy for this closeness to Holly, she slowly runs her hand from Holly's shoulder down to her hip, there is no denying how attractive Gail finds Holly, "okay," she lets their lips touch again, letting their lips stay in contact for just a little longer, "okay," Gail repeats about to let their lips come in contact once more, but Andy coughs. "I should go," Gail reluctantly leaves Holly's office, but with one more quick kiss.
Gail and the rookies are at the Penny. They're happy Gail's home, happy to be catching up with her. Gail wants to be in the moment with them, because after all she missed them too (not like she's going to tell anyone), but she also wants to be home with Holly, who truly hasn't been feeling well this week. She goes back in her head, 'home with Holly, who would have thought?' She grins to herself and checks her cell phone for the umpteenth time that night to see if Holly sent her anything, to make sure that Holly is okay.
"Gail," Dov says, "you're not even paying attention."
"What do you expect," asks Traci. Gail sticks her tongue out at her.
"Tell her about the case with twins," suggests Chris.
"Yes. That was a great case," hypes Dov. "It was a case with identical twins. Gail you would not believe it but," he holds for suspense, "these identical twins looked exactly alike."
"Generally speaking that is how identical twins work," Gail rolls her eyes.
Traci huffs out a laugh. Gail looks at her phone again. She realizes that it has been over two hours; she decides enough is enough and leaves.
Gail gets back to Holly's after the Penny. She's tired, long day at work on patrol with Andy then spending time with her friends, more like exhausted. She hangs up her coat, takes off her boots, hangs her keys in the kitchen, and heads upstairs. She finds Holly lying in bed, staring up at the ceiling. "Hey," says Gail.
"Hey."
Gail moves into the bathroom, taking off her makeup, washing her face, changing into her pjs. She enters the bedroom again to find Holly still in the same position. Gail pulls back the sheets and crawls into bed, "how are you feeling?"
"…good." A pause.
"Are you okay?" asks a concerned Gail.
"…just thinking."
"Oh," says Gail curled on her side facing Holly, "about what?"
"You."
Gail's heart drops, her mind quickly goes to her insecurities of not being good enough, this is what she's been fearing, Holly's ready to say goodbye to Gail, Holly wants her life back, she wants Gail out of it.
Holly speaks cutting through Gail's unfortunate thoughts, "I've been thinking about how great you are, and how grateful I am to have you in my life. It's so easy to talk to you and to share with you, and I love having you around. How we met as strangers in a weird circumstance, but you quickly became my best friend." She turns to look at the blonde, "you are my best friend Gail, and I love you."
"Oh." A pause, Gail's surprised, she wasn't expecting that. "I love you too," whispers Gail, she snakes her hand down Holly's arm to grab her hand.
Holly squeezes Gail's hand, "I know you do." Neither taking their eyes off the other, even though Holly just said those beautiful words to her, Gail can't help to think how much longer will she be able to look at Holly like this, to lie so close to her, to share this moment.
Once again Gail's walking to the labs for lunch with Holly; she enjoys these walks, outside in the fresh air. She seems to find these walk back and forth from the precinct is her quiet thinking time, sometimes thinking can get her into trouble but she can't help herself. She thinks back to what Holly said the night before, I love you. Even though she's heard Holly say it before, numerous times, Gail still gets a warmth that washes over her, she gets this giddy feeling that she's truly never really felt before. Sure she's had people tell her they love her before, whether it be from Chris or Nick, but it never felt like this. And it's not like it wasn't reciprocated, she loved them too… to a degree, and they loved her…to a degree, maybe that's it, maybe that's why she feels different, she loves Holly, not to a degree, she loves her. Period. Gail comes to her early conclusion, she likes these walks.
And yet, she tells herself don't get too comfortable, who knows how long Holly will want her around. Especially with the baby coming, what will happen then? Gail sighs. Too much over thinking is not good for anyone. Thinking is over rated.
Holly is starting to feel sluggish about going to work, but she wants to work for as long as she possibly can, wanting to work until the baby is born. She knows she gets a year off, but she wants her year off to start when the baby is actually born, so that she gets a full year off.
Gail is in parade, she had to rush to make it on time to work today, she had to get herself ready, help Holly get ready, drop Holly at the labs, then book it to the station. She quickly changed, grabbed a mug of coffee from the coffee machine, and sat down just as Oliver entered the room, as he passed her to the front he patted her on the shoulder. He was talking about open cases, things she already knew from Steve, so she was half listening. "Volunteers," he repeats, "the kids are off on Monday and a lot of you have requested for that time off too, so I'm looking at those in blue who don't have kids…" Oli scans the room. Gail raises her hand, knowing that this schedule of going to work is working for both women, keeping them busy rather than sitting and waiting in Holly's townhouse helps the time go by faster. "Thanks Peck." She raises her mug of coffee to cheers Oliver. He smiles at her, "don't think that I don't notice you using my 'DAD' mug," Gail takes a sip of her coffee not breaking eye contact with him. He smiles at her, "fine, keep the mug, it's yours. Glad your back Peck, I haven't been properly menaced in a while, neither has the station." The other officers' laughter in the parade room is slightly nervous.
Gail's at work and she gets a text from Holly who also had to work on the Monday, "come here."
Gail texts back, "I'm on patrol, can it wait until noon?"
Holly never having felt pain like this before holds her breath to silence the scream that was sure to come. The pain passes. She looks at her watch, it's 11:13. She thinks to herself, just over three quarters of an hour, she can do this. She types back, "ok."
A beautiful February day, clear blue skies, still a sharp crispness in the air, Gail takes a step out of the station and takes a breath of air. As has been her routine, she walks from the precinct to the lab, stopping along the way for sandwiches, healthy sandwiches, sandwiches full of vitamin rich vegetables, and whatever else the doctor had said was good for Holly. She waves to the person at the reception desk, still doesn't know their name, never been introduced, and truthfully doesn't really care. She walks along the hallway and hears a faint scream. Gail picks up her pace and busts into Holly's office, where she sees Holly panting and red, all hunched over in her chair. Gail drops the sandwich bag and rushes over to Holly; she kneels down next to her, "babe, what's wrong?"
Holly grabs Gail's hand, the one that is not rubbing circles on her back, and squeezes hard, "my water broke, I think I'm having contractions."
"Oh my God, Holly! The baby is coming!"
"I know Gail," Holly drawls through clenched teeth.
"I don't have my car here; can you wait while I run back to the precinct to get it?"
Another contraction, Holly getting more and more vocal, also not releasing Gail's hand. "I'll take that as a 'no'," says Gail. She stops rubbing Holly's back and fishes her phone out to call Steve, luckily he answers, "Steve!" says Gail without letting him say anything, "my car keys are in my locker, get them and bring my car to the lab fast!" She hangs up, not wanting her brother to make her talk more. Gail shoves her phone away. She has Holly straighten up in her chair, she places one hand on Holly's face, "look at me," Holly does, "hey beautiful, you're going to have a baby today," Gail can't help but smile, Holly continues to pant, but nods her head, "in a minute you are going to stand up and we are going to walk to the exit, and Steve is going to drive us to the hospital, okay?" Gail asks rhetorically, but Holly nods her head. "Okay," says Gail, "on the count of three you are going to stand up. One. Two. Three." Up Holly stands. "Great, you're doing great. Now let's take our time walking to the door, no need to rush. Let's be careful."
Gail and Holly step out into the February cold just as Steve parks the car, he sees the distress Holly is in and jumps out to aid his little sister getting her pregnant girlfriend into the car. After all three are settled in the car Steve once again jumps into the driver's seat and races to the hospital.
They get to the hospital; Holly gets escorted to a room, and moved into a hospital bed. Gail notices that Steve stayed in the hallway. Gail thinks that maybe that's where she should be too. Gail makes an excuse, "I'm just going to make a quick phone call-"
Holly from the bed, "where do you think you're going Blondie?" she spits out in a bout of anger.
"Nowhere," Gail shakes her head, quite stunned at Holly's tone of voice.
"Good," growls Holly. "Please come hold my hand again," sweet Holly is back.
Gail's too afraid to laugh, but finding those two sides of Holly hilarious.
After several hours of labour, Holly is finally resting against the pillows at the top of the bed holding her new baby boy; Gail is sitting facing the two mid-way down the bed. Holly passes the baby to Gail. Gail smiles. The baby opens his eyes. Gail takes a sharp breath of air, as two startlingly blue eyes stare back at her. She gives a breathy laugh as she says, "you sure I'm not the dad?" She still hasn't taken her eyes off of the beautiful baby boy in her arms, all wrapped up in a blue blanket, she can't stop smiling.
A nurse comes into the room to take the baby for medical reasons, "mind if I take him for a sec? To get some weight numbers and such." Holly nods her head and has Gail pass the baby to the nurse. Before the nurse leaves the room she turns around and says, "Happy Family Day."
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