July 2022

"This ones nice." Seth was holding a picture of Emily as a toddler with her parents. He was over helping her put together nursery furniture, but she'd gotten distracted going through boxes of her mom's stuff looking for family photos she could put up.

"Nothing with my dad." Her voice was snipper than necessary; Seth was doing her a favor and it's not like he could read her mind about which photos she liked.

"Right, sorry." He put the picture down with the other rejects but she picked it back up. It was the first photo with her dad that they had come across. Granted that was probably because there was no rhyme or reason to her mother's 'filing system' so the box they were looking through now was a mix of old tax returns, Emily's report cards, random receipts, and a bunch of photos from her mom's life in Florida, but apparently some pictures from her childhood were scattered in there as well.

It really was a nice picture, she thought. They were out on some kind of picnic, probably something at the church, her face was smeared with what looked like chocolate ice cream and both her parents were laughing. Looking closer at her father's face she tried to see if she could work out some look of discontentment, or some distance. Anything that hinted that about four years after this picture was taken he would walk out on her. But if he had already been looking for a way out, it didn't show in this picture. She sighed. She'd been thinking more and more about her father in recent weeks. Everyone told her that pregnancy and hormones and starting a family would bring up all kinds of feelings from the past, but she knew it was more than just that. It was the way Aaron was acting lately.

Ever since that night he'd gotten back from Arizona and broken down something had shifted between them. Any hope she'd had that he'd be more open after that night, or that he would at least feel better having let some of his feelings out was quickly dashed. He'd been curt the next morning when she tried to get him to talk about what he meant when he said he 'couldn't do this.' He'd assured her that it was nothing to do with them, and he'd just been feeling down, but she was sure he wasn't telling her the whole story. And as the days went by, he only seemed to become more withdrawn. On the surface he was still the same Aaron, he'd still have long conversations with her over some arcane policy point, still tease her over almost everything, and still worry endlessly about the baby.

But there was no sense of intimacy between them anymore. He never shared what he was feeling with her, never talked about anything deep. He never initiated any physical contact, and while he would return a hug or a kiss from her there was something missing. She tried to tell herself it was just the long hours, or all the time on the road, or the heat and humidity of DC in July, but she knew that was glossing over some real problems. And even if it was those things none of them were going away anytime soon, so as her due date got closer she was questioning more and more if it was a good idea having Aaron play such a big role in her daughter's life. As much as she wanted to believe Aaron would never walk out on them, she worried how sustainable their relationship really would be in the long term if he wouldn't, or couldn't, open up to her.

Looking over at Seth she saw he was flipping through a stack of photos from what looked like an apple picking trip. She was a little older in these ones, maybe six or seven. She wondered if this had been their last family outing, maybe even the last photos of her and her father. She looked so happy in them, and she'd never thought of herself as a daddy's girl, but she was practically hanging off him in every picture. Seeing her eyeing them Seth passed the photos over to her and grabbed another bunch. She studied each photo intently, looking for even a hint that her dad didn't care about her. "He looks like a good dad doesn't he?"

"It takes more than a trip apple picking to be a good dad."

"I know. But if you look at these pictures, you wouldn't think that he was just going to leave and never look back."

Seth sighed, "Em, I don't think you're going to find the answers you're looking for there. But if you're worried about Aaron, I can't promise you he's never going to break your heart or do something stupid, but he'd gonna be there for your kid as long as you let him."

"You think?" She forgot how well Seth knew her. It was scary sometimes, like he could read her mind.

"He paid the college tuition of some kid he unknowingly smuggled across the border. He has his issues but lacking a sense of responsibility isn't one of them."

"Yeah, you're right." It was true, Aaron really wasn't the kind of person to turn his back on something he saw as his responsibility. It wasn't the most romantic thought, but it was something. And it really got to the crux of what she thought his issue was right now, he was too busy trying to be there for her and everyone else to take care of himself.

"Everything okay with you guys?"

"Yeah, we're fine. Just pre baby jitters, getting nervous about delivery." Emily smiled internally seeing the color practically drain out of Seth's face. Bringing up labor was a surefire way to put an end to any conversation with him she didn't want to have. Which these days included her and Aaron. She wasn't sure how she felt about things herself, so she didn't really want to hear Seth's thoughts. "You hear from Allison at all?"

"Trying to change the subject on me?" Apparently Seth wasn't quite as easily deterred as she'd thought he would be.

"Oh, you wanted to talk about the ring of fire?"

"No." He said quickly. "I don't even want to know what that is."

"That's what I thought. So you and Allison?"

"I think it's over, over"

"Really?"

"Yeah, we were still talking a bit at first after she said she wanted some space, but I haven't heard from her in close to two weeks, so..." He shrugged.

"That sucks."

"I should call her. Leaving things hanging like this isn't good. Either that or I can steal from the Emily Rhodes playbook and buy her a six month anniversary gift."

Emily blushed. It was always weird thinking about when she and Seth dated. "Well it was that or the classic 'accidental' wrong number text talking about the date I definitely just went on."

"I'm assuming that's the move that finally got you and Aaron together."

"No, I think once you get pregnant you need to stop playing those kinds of games."

"I think the same is true for guys in their forties."

"Well for what it's worth, I think straightforward is generally the way to go anyway."

"Yeah I think you're right." And then looking down at some paper in his hand he laughed.

"What's so funny?"

"Just that the nun's in Akron had you figured out a long time ago. 'Emily is a bright girl, but she struggles with letting her peers contribute in class and is bossy during free play. She will often refuse to take part in games if she is not in charge. This term Emily should work on sharing, taking turns, and letting her classmates be the leader.'"

"That can't really be what that says." But when Seth passed her it and she read it, it was there, word for word. "I was ahead of my time, you get in trouble if you call a girl bossy these days."

"Thank god for the 90's when we got the unvarnished truth about a young Emily Rhodes. Give it back to me, I want to send a picture to Aaron."

Rolling her eyes she gave him back the report card. Maybe it would cheer Aaron up. Or at least getting him talking to Seth, she honestly didn't think he socialized with anyone but her these days.

0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000

Tom slid a package across the table to Emily. "Since you guys aren't doing a shower or anything, I figured I would give this to you now."

"You know the point of not doing a shower, is that we don't expect people to get us gifts." Emily just felt weird having a shower, she and Aaron were both established adults with well paying jobs so having a big party focused around gift giving felt weird. And it was another milestone that she probably would have enjoyed with her mother, that was easier to skip rather then pretending it was the same without her.

"I think the customary response to presents is 'thank you,' and it's just something small."

Emily blushed. The stress of getting closer and closer to her due date, while Aaron seemed to be retreating further and further into himself was really getting to her. She found herself getting snippy with everyone these days. "Thank you." She said softly. She ran her finger over the package, it was clearly a book. It was wrapped somewhat clumsily in newspaper, there was a half cut off article about pipes leaching lead into the water of some DC housing projects. Probably not the article she would have picked to wrap a gift in. "I take it you wrapped it yourself."

"Guilty. I thought since it's a personal gift I wouldn't have someone on staff take care of it, but maybe I should have outsourced it to Penny."

"Might have been a good idea." She said, trying to summon a smile.

"You know it's also customary to open presents." Tom was giving her a searching look.

"Right, sorry. Mommy brain." That was her excuse for everything lately, and it was half true. She was finding it difficult to keep track of things the way she used to, but it was also a nice excuse to throw out when she was letting herself get lost in her thoughts. She ripped the paper off the book and saw a copy of The Complete Tales of Winnie-The-Pooh. "Thank you. We needed a copy of this. It was one of my mom's and my favorites when I was a kid."

"I'm glad. You should read the inscription."

Emily opened the book to the first page and read in what looked just like Alex's handwriting, 'Here's to a lifetime of exciting adventures for your new family. Some to be found in the pages of this book, and some out in the wide world. All our love, The Kirkman's' Emily ran her fingers over the letters. "Did Alex write this?"

"She did. I'm not sure who it was originally intended for, but I found it not long after you told me you were pregnant and it felt like it was meant for you. It was Alex's go to gift for new parents."

"Are you sure? You don't think Penny or Leo would want this someday?" She knew she was incredibly protective of anything of her mother's.

"They have a lot of Alex's things. This one is all yours."

Emily wiped a few tears from her eyes. With everything else she didn't often spend time thinking about how much she missed Alex, but Alex had been like her surrogate mother in DC. She was the kind of person Emily could have seen talking through everything going on with Aaron with. "Thank you. We'll treasure this."

"I can address it to you kids, but I wasn't sure if you were the Rhodes family, or the Shore's or Rhodes-Shore or something."

Emily had no idea how to respond. She knew Aaron was dreading telling Tom he was planning on changing his name, and he had even asked her somewhat sheepishly if she would do it. She supposed she could now, but she felt at the time and still did now that that news should come from Aaron. After all, if he couldn't tell Tom, who was really one of their closest friends, she wasn't sure how he was going to address it with the media and the public. Because fair or not the Vice President couldn't just change his name and not expect to be asked about it a million times in a million interviews.

Emily must have taken too long to respond because Tom said, "Sorry didn't mean to throw you for a loop. Everything okay with you and Aaron?"

She must be wearing her heart on her sleeve too much to have both Tom and Seth asking her the same question in less then a week. "We're fine." But her point was entirely undercut by her breaking down sobbing.

Tom pushed his chair next to her and put his arm around her. It was pathetic to consider, but this was the most physical contact she'd had with someone in close to a month, and it was nice. Trying hard to reign her tears in before she made a complete fool of herself she wiped her eyes and gave him her best attempt at a smile, "Sorry, hormones."

"Emily, not everything needs to be hormones or mommy brain. You're allowed to just be upset." She just shrugged. He pressed on, his voice sounding somewhat unsure, "I noticed you're not wearing your engagement ring."

"My fingers are swollen. I am eight months pregnant, you know." Which was actually the truth this time. The only problem being she might have already blamed too many things on her pregnancy tonight for Tom to buy that as well.

"Okay. Well I'm here for you if you even want to talk. I know Aaron's my VP, but I consider you an honorary Kirkman Emily."

She took a deep breath to try and stave off a fresh crying jag at that comment. And then before she could stop herself her feelings came tumbling out, "I'm just worried about him Tom. He's bottling so much up. It's nothing to do with us as a couple, I still plan on being there for him no matter what, but I'm just scared for him. He takes so much on, and he won't talk to anyone, or let anyone help him. And I don't know what to do."

"It'll be okay Emily. I'll have a talk with him."

She wanted to tell him not to. She'd already felt like she was violating Aaron's privacy by telling Tom this to begin with, but honestly she was out of ideas and really starting to feel anxious about everything. So she just whispered, "Thanks."

"You just worry about taking care of yourself and your baby girl. You've got enough on your plate without taking care of Mr. Grumpy as well."

And honestly it felt like a huge weight had been lifted from her chest. She wasn't sure Tom would have much luck getting Aaron to open up, or get some help, but just knowing she wasn't alone worrying about him helped.