A/N: After months of not uploading anything I decided to re-write the first story I ever posted. The storyline had so much potential but it didn't turn out the way I wanted it to back then. This gotta be the most me-story I've ever written, it includes so many personal references and is kind of a way of me trying to work through something. Donna and Harvey will always be my comfort characters ahh.
-angelina aka. mrandmrsspecter on twitter
Chapter 1: off the table
Will I ever love the same way again?
Will I ever love somebody like the way I did you?
If I can't have you, is love completely off the table?
Do I sit this one out and wait for the next life?
November 1st, 2020 – Midtown Manhattan, New York City
It was on a Sunday in November when it happened for the first time. After entering their local Starbucks on 47th Street, Harvey Specter stood in line to order his usual morning coffee. He's coming here ever since he moved to New York ages ago and doesn't really make himself stand out in comparison to the remaining crowd of business men rushing through the coffee shop. In a city like New York nobody cares if it's a Sunday. He headed to a 7am meeting for the upcoming trial tomorrow since some last-minute evidences appeared out of nowhere. That's a perk of having Jessica Pearson back as managing partner. But he couldn't be happier that she decided to move back to the city. Everyone surrounding him is on their way to an early morning meeting, has a flight to catch, or needs to solve a client's emergency. Harvey Specter has done all of that before. But if you take a closer look at the man's appearance, you'll notice that he's different than all of the other stressed out workaholics grabbing their large black coffees from the counter. The most obvious thing would be the relaxed, satisfied smile on his face. You heard me right – Harvey Specter does smile. The second thing to catch one's eye would be the golden wedding band on his ring finger. In his hand you could witness the lawyer unlocking his phone with a picture of himself admiring a beautiful redhead. And if you gaze down a bit further you'd see a pink baby bottle on top of the files in his bag. Two actually. So behind the expensive Tom Ford suit and the handsome features Harvey Specter is a loving husband and most importantly: a dad.
"Next one." one of the baristas shouts. "Can I please get two Venti Triple Shot Vanilla Lattes, one with two sugars and the other one with low-fat milk and whipped cream, an Everything Bagel with cream cheese and an almond croissant?" Harvey says while fishing his wallet out of the pocket of his coat. "I'll need your name for the order." The barista remarks while tapping onto the screen of the cashier machine. "Harvey." He responds. "Sure, that'll be $14,21." The brunette responds with a smile before Harvey kindly hands her the amount. The lawyer walks a few steps along the counter to stand next to the other customers waiting for their orders. Some of them talk flustered to people on the phone and others read today's printing of the Wall Street Journal. Harvey smiles and pulls his phone out of his pocket as well. He types in a smug good morning text to his wife, asking if she already made it to the office. "Venti Triple Shot Latte with two sugars." A barista shouts and puts the white paper cup down onto the counter to let the respective costumer get their drink. Harvey's head shoots up from his screen as he strides forward to get his order. He takes one of the paper things where you can transport multiple drinks at once and turns the cup around in his hand to put in properly into the holder. And that's when he sees it. The black font being written on the cup. Where he expected to see his own name were bold thin letters spelling out a name he hadn't been confronted with in 12 years. After staring at it for a second longer than he should've, he put it back down and explained, more to himself rather than the barista, that it's not his drink. "You don't exactly look like that's your name, I got to admit that." The young man jokes and turns to his colleagues to ask about the remaining orders. Harvey swallows the lump in his throat together with some faded memories and waves it off. Luckily, he doesn't have time to think about it any further since two baristas put multiple drinks and snacks on the counter several seconds later. He sees two cups and a paper bag with his name on it and grabs them before heading out of the store. Turning right he makes his way up Lexington Avenue to take the short morning stroll to the office.
From the left side of the entrance there was a woman rushing into Starbucks a few seconds later. "Is there any chance that you have a Venti Triple Shot Vanilla Latte with two sugars that no one picked up? I grabbed my Croissant and got a call and in between all of that I forgot that I never picked up my coffee." She asks out of breath after heading to the pick-up counter. "Ohh, you must be Katherine then." A young barista responds handing her a cup with her name. "Oh my god, thank you so much, I'm really sorry. Have a great day." She says thanking the barista before waving and heading out of the store again. Taking a sip of her coffee she thinks to herself "I definitely wouldn't make it through that 24-hour shift if someone accidently took my coffee. That's called blessing in disguise." before turning left.
"Do I have to book an appointment at your secretary's desk or can I greet my wife for a second?" the lawyer says with a smug grin while peaking his head through the glass door of his wife's office. "Do you have coffee?" she whines, almost falling asleep as she leans her head backwards in her chair. "Starbucks. Triple shot Vanilla Latte. With Whipped Cream." Her husband replies. "Come in, silly head." She says while yawning. "I love you too." He tells her encouraging. "Thanks Harvey, I really needed this. How was the meeting?" she says while taking the coffee and kissing him back as he leans down to place a quick kiss on her lips. "Well, don't tell anyone but sometimes sitting in a room alone with Jessica Pearson and Samantha Wheeler can be really intimidating. I sometimes forget I studied law as well, they always seem to be two steps ahead of me. I probably watched too many episodes of paw patrol with the girls." He whispers with a smirk. "Ohh, I'll so tell them that you said that." She laughs. "Have you eaten this morning?" Harvey asks while fishing for her croissant in the Starbucks bag. "Am I a joke to you? I got two toddlers with my sense of fashion and your stubbornness ready for the nursery." She complains whining while shooting him a deadly look. "I am not that stubborn." He objects like the lawyer he is. "Here, I also got you an almond croissant." He tells her kindly while handing her the pastry. "Is my after baby body a joke to you as well? Do you know how many calories this has?" she complains again.
"Alright, I'll eat it myself then-" he immediately intervenes because he knows this is how to get her to eat. "Don't you dare. Give it to me." Donna demands. Harvey laughs while handing her the food. "See you later, I love you Donna Specter." he whispers with a wink.
December 12th, 2020 – 5th Avenue, New York City
The date marked a Saturday in December when it happened for the second time. Harvey Specter was strolling down 5th Avenue with his daughters to pick out some nice Christmas presents for Donna. Ms. Aurora Specter decided to get some beautiful candles for her mommy since Donna really got into decorating their apartment lately so they made a stop at Bloomingdale's and Harvey didn't hesitate to pull out his credit card. Ms. Isabella Specter wanted to get something rather Donna-like for her mommy and wanted to go Hermès where Harvey's credit card suffered again. It was no surprise that the twins are barely 5 years old but know exactly how you go on a shopping tour with their mom's genes. The girls wouldn't stop asking Harvey what he would get their mom for Christmas this year but he waved it off by saying "best comes last" with a smug grin on his face. As the last stop of their Christmas shopping tour Harvey led his daughters right into Tiffany & Co. to get Donna a wonderful and unique present since Christmas is her favourite holiday of the year – after Halloween, of course.
Right after entering the stunning decorated jewelry store a young brunette kindly asks the Specter family to fill out a sheet of paper with their respective contact details. "Due to the covid-19 pandemic we always ask each costumer to fill out this document so if there is a case occurring we can contact every person who was in our store at the same time to inform them about the high risk of infection." she kindly explains while handing Harvey a pen. "Of course, that's no problem, I'm really glad you're doing this." Harvey declares understanding while starting to write down his name, the names of his daughters, his phone number and their address. He hands it back to the employee and wants to head further into the store when the woman says "Specter, that's such a coincidence. Your wife was here a few hours ago, apparently you'll have similar presents for each other this year." she smiles while putting Harvey's document into a folder. "Excuse me?" Harvey says confused and tells the girls to start looking at some earrings but not to touch the glass panels. "Specter. I had a woman with that last name filling out one of the Covid papers todays. Oh my god, I hope I didn't ruin any surprises. I won't tell Katherine you came here, of course." She promised immediately. The lawyer furrows his brows before some realization washed over his face and turned into an open mouth and a pulsing vein on his forehead. Her coffee order in a cup that said her name was one thing but her full name on a contact list at Tiffany's. This can't be true. It just can't. That's an unspoken topic. It's off the table. She is off the table. He hadn't heard that name in 12 years and didn't see her in almost 18 years. That's not fair. Not now. "Mr. Specter, is everything alright?" the employee asks worried pulling him out of his almost panic attack. "Yeah, everything is alright. That's not my wife's name by the way. No worries, you didn't ruin anything. If a Donna Specter comes here by any chance, then you could do me a favour by not telling her that you've seen me here." He responds kindly since it's not the woman's fault and explains the mistake. "Ohh, I got it. There are living more Specters in Manhattan than I would've thought." She jokes. "Yeah, me too." Harvey responds dryly and ventures into the store to join his daughters.
They end up picking a matching set of earrings together with a necklace that Harvey decides to engrave the number 17 as their 17th Christmas together into the backside. It's really been 17 years since she started working for him. Now he can say that they made it. 17 years, many fallouts, a wedding and two kids later they are finally where they were always meant to be. "Don't you guys dare tell mommy what we got for her." Harvey tells his girls seriously and they nod insightful. "Where are we going to hide the presents?" Aurora asks. "Mommy finds everything, we can't hide it from her." Isabella complains worriedly. Harvey laughs because it's true. You really can't hide anything from Donna, just like you can't surprise her, neither can you keep something from her. The December Sagittarius in her sees those things coming from miles away. That's why he always has a plan for the important anniversaries and holidays. "Don't worry girls, I'll give them to Aunt Samantha and she will hide them at her place so mommy won't find them." he whispers and convinces the girls that he has a good plan.
January 11th, 2021 – Lexington Avenue, New York City
The holy trilogy was finally united on a Monday in January. Samantha's adopted daughter Sage Wheeler fell off the slide at the nursery and started complaining about pain in her left arm. The blonde took her daughter to Manhattan's Mount Sinai Hospital for a check-up to see if there was any broken bone or a sprain in her daughter's arm. After being sent into pediatric surgery, a nurse took Sage to get an X-Ray of her arm done. Later in the examination room, a female doctor in dark blue scrubs and a white coat walked in that immediately caught Samantha's eye. Something about her seemed familiar but she couldn't quite put her finger on it. "You must be Sage, right? I'm Kate, do you think we should take a look at your scans?" she hears the brunette say to her daughter after greeting her with a smile as well. "If I'd look like this, I wouldn't hide myself under those baggy work clothes the entire day." The lawyer thought to herself and watched how the doctor's big brown waves cascaded down her shoulder while the woman was busy explaining the X-Ray results to Sage. "You were very lucky, young lady. I've seen bad bone fractures from falling off the slide but your arm seems to be just fine." She says, pointing onto the X-Ray. "There could occur some bruises over the next few days and I'll prescribe some light painkillers for you and you can always put some ice on it." The doctor says smiling and prepares a prescription which she hands to Samantha a few seconds later. "That'll be Sage's scans and her prescription, along with the receipt for your insurance and Sage's examination results. She should be fine to go back into the nursery but if she doesn't feel like it, let her stay at home if that's possible." The doctor says while handing Samantha all the documents and starts searching for candy to give to Sage before the mother-daughter duo leaves the hospital. After the elevator started the descent Samantha looked at the very last paper with the doctor's signature and that's when she witnessed something suspicious.
Katherine Specter M.D. F.A.C.S
Attending Pediatric Surgeon
"Mommy, the doctor was so nice, wasn't she? I wasn't afraid at all even though I don't like doctors. My arm feels better by the way, I think I can go back to the nursery, I promised to have a tea party with Aurora and Isabella. And maybe Lucy Litt but we have to think that through first." Sage said pulling her mom out of the thousand things running through her head where she was trying to explain to herself why there is another person with Harvey's last name living in New York City. And not just any person. A woman. A tall pretty brunette. That looks nothing like his sister. Or his sister in-law. Don't venture there Samantha. Don't even think about it. "Sage, I told you guys to stop being mean to Lucy all the time just because Harvey and I are mean to her dad sometimes. A friend group of 4 is way funnier than a friend group of 3, I can tell you that. Ever since it's Aunt Katrina and Aunt Donna vs. Aunt Jessica and me, the Margarita parties are way more exciting." She smiles down at her daughter teaching her some important life lesson while folding the documents back together and putting them in her bag. She has to think about that later.
Jessica Pearson wanders across the hallway of Pearson Specter Wheeler to inform Harvey and Louis about the latest news regarding the huge Van de Kamp Case they're currently working on. It's still crazy to say that phrase – Pearson Specter Wheeler - even though it's been multiple months since they renamed the firm. Again. When Donna and Harvey got married and decided to move to Seattle to go and work with Mike and Rachel, everything seemed to have fallen into place. Until 3 months later when Donna and Harvey found out that they're expecting twins and agreed quickly that they don't want them to grow up in a rainy Seattle. They liked working with Mike and Rachel but their hearts live in New York City. That's where they first met. And where they fell in love. So when the Specters announced that they will be moving back to the city, Louis Litt expressed his happiness by saying "I told you that you don't want to live in that rainy cold village up there." He welcomed the couple back to the firm immediately since their reappearance was kind of convenient for him. It was about the same time that not only Louis but also Alex Williams remarked that they have quite different plans regarding the firm. Alex declared his desire to venture into a different legal field at least once before he will retire some day and told Louis that he accepted a job offer at a firm for immigration law. Meanwhile Louis told Samantha that he wanted to step down from his position as managing partner since he wishes for a less time demanding job to watch his daughter growing up and provide Sheila the opportunity to end her maternity leave and go back to work as well. That made two names off the wall within a few hours and when Katrina told Samantha that she would go on a longer trip to Italy to take some time for herself, maybe meet a nice Italian guy and find out a bit more about what she really wants from life, Samantha almost had a meltdown. The past 2 years changed every single member of the firm so much that it's almost scary. 2 years ago, all everyone seemed to care about was their last name upon some wall and now everyone suddenly seems to value time and life more than ever before. But not just everyone around her went through some life changing decisions recently. Some things in Samantha Wheelers life seemed to have fallen into place at the most unexpected time. She just went through a really effortful adoption process to give a blonde little girl the love and the home she deserves. The little girl – whom we know as Sage now – reminded Samantha of herself when she was a kid. She saw the potential, the sassiness and the curiosity in the moment she first met the girl. And they were meant to be. And in between all those disappearances, self-care trips and re-orientations not only the Specters remembered New York City to be their one true hometown. Jessica Pearson remembered it as well. After dating the rather handsome criminal lawyer Austin Hawkes for quite a long time, he asked her during a romantic dinner if she had any regrets in life and would to something differently if she could experience it all over again. Jessica responded by saying that she never regrets anything since you learn from mistakes and fallouts make you stronger. But if she could change one thing it would be not leaving New York and her firm – better to say her family. She loved working in Chicago and it told her many important life lessons. But not permanently. And the next day they talked about buying an apartment in Upstate Manhattan. "It's crazy how your life can change within the blink of an eye." Jessica thinks to herself when she notices a blonde sitting behind the glass panels in the right corner of her vision.
"Hey, I thought you're taking the afternoon off today. Your work is covered, go home to Sage." Jessica says encouraging while entering Samantha's office. She heard about the accident when Samantha had to leave a meeting a few hours ago. "No, she's fine, really, it was nothing serious. A tough girl, she even wanted to go back to the nursery, I told her to be careful." Samantha promises with a grateful smile. "That sounds great, maybe I'll visit our brave girl later today in the nursery then and spoil her a bit." The brunette laughs while turning around again to leave the blonde's office again. "She'd be glad to see Aunt Jessica. By the way I wanted to tell you about something regarding our hospital visit. Or better to say: I wanted to show you something." Samantha says more seriously in a low tone. She fishes Sage's documents out of the locked drawer of her desk before handing them to Jessica. „Sage and I went to Mount Sinai Hospital and she was taken to pediatric surgery. When I looked through the papers after we left I noticed the Doctor's name. For one second I thought what a coincidence, this is so funny. But then I had a weird feeling and thought that there will be an easy explanation for this that probably Jessica can give to me since you and Harvey are like brother and sister." She smiles embarrassed at how odd she sounds. „Am I going insane Jessica or does this woman is in some way related to Harvey?" the blond says in a hilarious way. Do you know that particular moment when you're laughing out loud in such a fake way so you don't have to cry because you're on the verge of crying. Yeah, that's how Samantha felt. „Samantha, I really think this is just a huge coincidence. Some names are just not as rare as you'd imagine." Okay Jessica, this didn't sound convincing at all, the brunette thought to herself but if she would've added any other phrase like "I would know if Harvey had a relative called Katherine" it would've felt like lying to a good friend. And Samantha doesn't deserve that. She could've gone to Harvey or even Donna and ask the immediate source but she decided not to which was very mature and decent. "Don't think about it anymore, the most important thing is that she examined Sage and that's the little girl is fine. I have to take these to Harvey now, see you later." The brunette says convincing. "Ohh, do you have a copy of that?" Jessica spins around again pointing at Sage's check-up papers. "I'll need one for the staff department because you took the morning off, for the records." Jessica explains. "Uhm, I don't have a copy, take that exemplar and just let them copy it, I'll pick it up before I go home." Samantha responds handing her the multiple pages.
„Harvey. Your office. Now." the brunette demands as she passes by the lawyer who was currently standing next to his new associate Tom in his cubicle. "That doesn't include you. She's going to roast the hell out of me for some reason. I don't even know what I did this time." Harvey explains confused with a smug grin on his face while pointing at Tom to tell him he should stay where he is. "Alright, Mr. Specter, I'll just… wait here." The young man stutters back but Harvey is already out of sight.
"Where is Donna?" Jessica asked as soon as they enter Harvey's office. "It's snack day at the nursery and our turn this week, so we made blueberry pancakes. She just brought them there-" but he gets interrupted by the brunette handing him a few pieces of paper. „What's that?"
He asks but it was only until a few seconds later that he noticed the header. „Mount Sinai Hospital? Is everything alright, Jessica?" he asks worriedly. „I'm fine. I just don't know if you'll be fine in a few seconds." she says seriously in her famous Jessica-Pearson undertone
„This is Sage Wheeler's check-up from the accident today. She went to pediatric surgery at Mount Sinai. Look who was the doctor in charge."
Katherine Specter M.D. F.A.C.S
Attending Pediatric Surgeon
„Jessica." Harvey breathes desperately, knowing what the brunette is not amused. Neither is he. He brushed the incidences of the last two months off and forgot about them a day later since they confirmed absolutely nothing. He also forgot about it because it's simply none of his business anymore. She is none of his business anymore. So he couldn't care less where she lives or works now. „Don't Jessica me." she fires back. „What is she doing here?" Jessica asks, demanding an answer from the male lawyer. "I don't know, Jessica!" he shouts. "We didn't exactly meet up for coffee, if that's what you think." He adds sarcastically and notices by the dead look in Jessica's eyes that this wasn't the right thing to say. "You're not the same man anymore as you were in 2008. Where all you cared about was either success, money or a one-night-stand. You're a grown up man now, married to the love of your life with two wonderful daughters. That's your main responsibility now. So stop acting like a child who pretends that this woman wouldn't have the power to destroy what you love the most. She could. And this time, I won't be the one covering for you." Jessica says slowly, controlled and more serious than ever before while facing away from Harvey. "Everyone has a skeleton in their closet. Yours's just walked back into your life." And with that she ends the conversation and leaves Harvey's office.
I'll wait for you even though it always feels like I'll be number two.
If you let me in, I'm ready to give you what I couldn't before.
I can you love you harder than I did before.
Was in a dark place back then, I was toxic to someone else.