March 9th 2021

Chapter 68
Our Night of Family

If the stories did one thing, in the next half hour or so, it was to actually make Maya fall asleep. Lucas didn't realize it at first. He was still in the middle of his latest story, one he'd heard from a visitor the other day, and he was looking at Marianne as he spoke. Then, he looked to the side and saw that his wife slept. She still had her head to his shoulder, one arm close to herself, the other on his chest, near to the baby. Her eyes were closed though, and he could hear her breathing evenly. It left Lucas relieved, truly. He'd wanted this for her, and hopefully it would help her for… not so much tomorrow but rather later on today, as it looked unlikely that he would manage to put a separation between Sunday and Monday anywhere.

Marianne was still awake though, despite all his best efforts. After a minute, he started in on a new story. If he'd gotten one down, surely, he could get the other.

"It's not working, is it?" he sighed, two stories later. Marianne's response was to start crying again, and before he could do a thing to stop it, Maya startled awake.

"Wha… Did I fall asleep? Why didn't you wake me?" she frowned as she sat up.

"Why do you think?" he told her. He could have lied and said he hadn't noticed, but that was not his way. Besides, she wouldn't be upset at him, more herself if anyone. "You want to have a go?"

"Yeah, let me just…" she moved to rise, rubbing sleep from her face before going around the bed to take the crying baby from him. "No, I know, pumpkin, I know. I got you, okay? It's alright…" she breathed, working on the side of calm as she started pacing the length of the room with her. It was back to lullaby town for them.

Two minutes later, Cara appeared in the doorway. By the looks of her, they'd guess she hadn't been unaware of the activity in the room down the hall from hers, and finally she'd been unable to simply stay back.

"Is she okay?" she asked, voice still sleepy.

"Yes, it's just a bad night, go back to bed, okay?" Maya kindly told her younger sister. Lucas didn't intervene. She didn't want everything to get overwhelmed, and he was right with her. They might have convinced her to go, too, except Cara had the means to see through those words. She spotted the thermometer on the nightstand, the little sponge they'd used to try and cool Marianne down… All of this, and probably the very tired and worry-tinged faces suggested everything she needed to conclude…

"It's not just that, is it?" she fixed her big sister with a look that said, 'you're not fooling me, so what's wrong with my niece?' Maya sighed.

"She's got a fever," she finally admitted. Cara walked over, felt at Marianne's head. "We called the doctor, she told us we didn't have to take her anywhere, that it would pass, it's just…" she shrugged. What could she say? If she kept going, she'd start spiraling somewhere she couldn't afford to go.

"I'll get Gran," Cara moved off into the hallway again before Maya could stop her.

"No, please don't do that, she… And she's gone," Maya sighed, focusing back on the baby, who went on crying. "That was the last thing I wanted. There's no point in all of us being up right now…" she shook her head. Lucas was standing now, pulling a t-shirt on before turning on the lamp at his bedside.

"Somehow, I don't think she was sleeping down there anyway," he pointed out, and if she stopped to think about it for a moment, Maya knew he'd be right. In the quiet of night, even two floors down, Elizabeth Hart would have heard her great granddaughter crying, and if she was awake at any point to hear it…

Proving the point, when she arrived in the room, following Cara, she had the look of someone who had been quietly awake downstairs for a long while. But she'd also stayed back, hadn't intervened without being called upon, and for that her granddaughter's face shifted into so much gratitude, and just a sliver of surrender. She was here now, and she just might know something that would help Marianne.

"What's been going on?" Elizabeth asked, essentially asking for a rundown of the events up to now, from the moment the fever had been detected.

Maya and Lucas both explained it all, from Maya feeling that warmth, and waking Lucas. He told about the temperature readings he'd taken, and she relayed what the doctor had said when she'd called. They told her and Cara both about how they'd gotten Marianne to sleep for a while, until she woke again and was fed, and then how she hadn't gone back to sleep since, and now the ongoing crying.

"I know you don't want to right now, I really do, but I think you two need to try and get some sleep. I will stay with her, I will sit right here in this room, she won't be far, yes? But you should sleep. You're no good to her like this and you know it."

"I can't…" Maya shook her head, her voice showing the truth of it. She wasn't looking at him, but Lucas knew she was as good as pleading with him not to mention the part where she'd dozed off for a couple minutes. He wouldn't say a word. "I need to stay with her." She did look at him now, and Lucas' face said it all. He had to do the same, couldn't help it. Elizabeth and Cara, maybe they recognized it, too, because neither of them suggested otherwise anymore.

"Let me hold her a moment, take a breath," Elizabeth now suggested, and her granddaughter was on board with this at least. She passed Marianne into her great grandmother's arms, where she was received with a spirit of calm that Maya currently struggled to muster.

Cara came along and hugged her sister like she had sensed this was the thing to do, the thing Maya needed, and she was completely right. She didn't suddenly burst into tears, that wasn't the thing she required. But she held to her little sister and felt like she could breathe easier. She could almost hold her and feel that she was holding her sister as she wished she could hold her daughter in that moment. She couldn't, of course, as much for how she didn't want to add too much extra warmth and as much because she was still so small, and the embrace might have been too strong.

"Thank you," she whispered at her ear, and Cara nodded without a word.

"I remember the first time we went through something like this with your father," Elizabeth told her granddaughters, and they both turned to look at her. "You wouldn't know it from the way you know him now, but your grandfather was really something back then. He stayed with Kermit, day and night." She was quiet for a moment, her mind seeming to leap decades into the past, to a time where her son had been alive, had been no more than a baby himself, and to a time where her husband was still the man she'd fallen in love with. There was a man she'd never imagine would turn his back on the boy he'd treasured so. The way she finally blinked, and looked to Marianne again, the next thought had likely been 'but he did.'

Once Marianne stopped crying, the room felt just a bit brighter, less tense. Elizabeth sat with the baby. She started to sing to her, that still clear voice she'd honed across decades with her church choir. They'd heard her sing this one song to Marianne so many times already, it had always been her preferred one, though it was in no way a lullaby. They suspected she had once sung it to Kermit as a baby, and to Luna as well. She might have sung it to her grandchildren if she'd been in their lives at the time of infancy. But she was here now, and she sang it to Marianne, and she seemed to appreciate it greatly. Tonight, it started the baby girl on her way back to sleep. It was backed up with Cara's own offering of a song, then another that brought the three Hart women's voices together, a soft harmony which finally lulled the feverish Marianne back to sleep.

"I'm good right here," Elizabeth promised Maya, like she must have recognized the thought passing through her eyes, of not wanting to move her and wake her again.

"Okay," Maya breathed, looking from her grandmother, to her sister, to Lucas. He came and joined her, as they looked to the sleeping babe. What could they really do now?

The rest of them ended up sitting on the floor, in front of the desk chair where Elizabeth sat with the baby. The whole thing looked like they'd gathered for story time, and maybe for that, Lucas chose to entertain their little vigil with more of his ranch stories. They were very well received by both of the new additions to the group. The older ones seemed to call up memories of Elizabeth's childhood. Her family had had a dairy farm, up in New York, something which her granddaughters had been aware of, though not so much that these new stories didn't bring great added layers to what they knew of her and of their family, a few branches up on the tree.

The stories took them through another bit of the night, and after a while, they led to Cara falling asleep again, leaning against her big sister. When Maya noticed this, she smiled. She was so beyond thankful for her sister's presence in this moment, and she had genuinely felt relief expand within her to have her there. Her worries had stopped spiraling. But now Cara was sleeping, and she should be.

"Help me get her back to bed?" Maya turned her head back to Lucas, who moved to rise at once.

"Yeah," he nodded. Very carefully, he scooped her up into his arms, with Maya's assistance, and he carried her out of the room, down the hall, and into her orange room. He set her back on the mattress after Maya had the covers pulled back some more. She saw to settling her properly and then covered her again before leaning to press a kiss to the side of her head.

"Night, Mom," Cara mumbled, and Maya bit back a laugh, stealing a look to Lucas, who had a similar expression.

"Love you, Carebear," she whispered near her sister's ear, and Cara smiled in her sleep.

"Love you, too," she echoed. Maya and Lucas retreated into the hall, and after a beat Maya reached to the knob and quietly pulled the door to close.

"Extra precaution," she whispered to Lucas. He nodded in agreement.

"Are you going to tell her about…" he gestured back to the room, and Maya chuckled.

"I might… Maybe in front of Mateo," she smirked.

"I don't see it being embarrassing, it's actually kind of sweet," Lucas pointed out.

"Oh, I know, I wasn't looking to embarrass her, what kind of big sister do you think I am?" she asked, 'affronted,' then seeing him open his mouth to reply, "Don't answer that." He held up his hands in surrender. She stretched up and kissed him, and he received and reciprocated at once. It was a small beat of levity, on this strange and endless night, but in the long run they could both agree that it had been so desperately needed. Maybe now they could carry on with renewed vigor.

TO BE CONTINUED

See you tomorrow! - mooners