"Did I spit-up this much when I was a baby?" Shaylyn asked, gently wiping the white chunks splattered down Kaito's face with a soft cloth and popping the bottle back in the infant's mouth.
"Nah. Doc thinks Kaito is having trouble digesting the formula. When you were little we would have switched brands, but now there's just the one kind," Mike explained.
"I think he's smiling for real now," Shaylyn continued, making silly faces at the baby as she spoke. Mike stopped his attempt to make dinner – cooking was not one of his skills – to watch the two. Christine might have declined to meet Kaito upon her arrival in St. Louis three weeks ago, but the girls did not have the same reservations. To Mike's relief, both took to Kaito immediately, demonstrating little to none of the sibling rivalry that Mike expected. Whitney treated the infant almost like a pet, clucking over him on her way past but not spending any length of time with him. Shaylyn, on the other hand, spent every minute that she could with Kaito. Holding him, feeding him, even changing his diaper, there was no task that Shaylyn was unwilling to tackle.
"Well, don't tell your sister, but I'm pretty sure that you are his favorite," Mike said, dropping his voice to a whisper.
Shaylyn giggled. "He likes Whitney a lot too. She showed Mom the picture you took of the two of them together and Mom agreed that he was smiling at her. Whitney doesn't understand why she won't even meet him."
Mike winced as he imagined Christine's reaction to seeing a picture of Kaito, no matter how innocently the topic was raised – and Mike had his suspicions on that front. Whitney wasn't known for her subtly (she was his daughter, after all) and she had made her unhappiness with the current situation – a situation which she blamed on her mother – perfectly clear to both of her parents.
Upon arriving back in St. Louis, Mike had turned his townhouse over to Christine and the girls, moving three minutes away to Tex's place. Well, Tex's place on paper. As far as Mike could tell, the man hadn't set foot in the apartment in months, instead electing to stay at Andrea's house with Kat. With anyone except Andrea, Mike would have assumed that the two were shacking up, but Mike knew his XO well enough to be very confident that when she said Tex was sleeping on the couch, she meant it. Still, wherever Tex was sleeping, it wasn't at the apartment, which meant that Mike had the run of the place. Although the girls spent most nights with Christine, both liked to spend the evenings with Mike and Kaito, giving him plenty of time to become reacquainted.
"You know that your Mom has gone through a lot, right Pumpkin?" Mike asked gently.
Shaylyn shrugged, her attention appearing to be on Kaito, but Mike wasn't fooled. Christine wasn't the only one who had been through the wringer over the past year.
Living through a pandemic.
Losing friends and neighbors.
Watching their brother die.
Being kidnapped and held hostage for months.
Not knowing if their father was dead or alive.
One of the first things Mike did once they were back in St. Louis was make appointments for both girls with the therapist Kelly Tophet recommended, a woman named Liliana Small, who had worked with Ava. Given everything that had happened since he hugged them goodbye and left for the Arctic, Mike was taken aback when Whitney's primary complaint to the therapist was about the state of her parents' marriage, but Dr. Small assured him that it was normal. For months Christine had kept the girls going with promises that Mike would find them, her reassurances taking on an almost fairy tale quality after the Nathan James and Mike actually found a cure for the Red Flu, and sustaining the girls during their lowest points. So it was little wonder that they were unhappy with the reality that they now faced, one which didn't coincide with the future they had been dreaming of for months.
"Yeah, but so have you. Mom said so. And so did Uncle Tom."
Before Mike could press on that last point a little, the door to the apartment was thrown open.
"Hello? Anyone home?" Kat didn't wait for an answer before popping her head into the kitchen. "Is Whitney here?"
"She's in the bedroom," Mike began, only to be interrupted by his older daughter, who walked into the kitchen wearing only a shirt. "What the hell are you wearing? Go put on some pants!"
Whitney rolled her eyes, exchanging a glance with Kat that had both teens giggling. "This is a dress, Dad. Tex bought it for Kat and she's letting me borrow it."
Mike scowled, making a mental note to read Tex the riot act. "And why would you need a dress anyway?"
"For her date, Dad. Duh," Shaylyn piped up.
"Date?" Mike was completely blindsided. "What date? With who? When? You are way too young to date!"
"Girls, perhaps you should go hang out in your room while I have a chat with your father," Andrea said calmly, the first time Mike noticed that she was even in the apartment. Whitney flounced out of the kitchen whispering something to Kat – probably about what a tyrant her father was. Shaylyn deposited Kaito in the bouncy chair sitting on the table and scurried after them, the infant losing out to the appeal of the older girls. Andrea reached past Mike to turn the stove off. "Pretty sure those noodles are about five minutes past done."
Mike said the first thing that came to mind. "Tex lets Kat dress like that?"
Andrea snorted. "God, no. He probably thought it was a shirt, if he even paid any attention to what she was buying at all. The man is clueless when it comes to raising a teenage girl."
"Coffee?" Mike asked, pouring himself a cup, mind still spinning over the news that Whitney had a date. When did his little girl get old enough to date?
"Sure." Andrea busied herself cooing over Kaito while Mike poured another cup, grabbing her two sugars out of habit. When Mike turned he could see that the baby was almost asleep. "It's a school dance. One of the Abbott boys asked Kat to go with him. Whitney's going with his brother. Nothing to worry about, Mike."
Despite his relief, Mike still felt like he's just been punched in the gut. "How do you know that?"
Andrea shrugged. "Kat knows the drill at this point. She tells me where she's going and who she's going with, I give her space. She lies to me or tries to sneak around, she gets to spend her evenings and weekends with me repairing engines. It works for us."
"It was all so much easier when they were little," Mike lamented, sitting down across from Andrea. "Most of the time I don't know what to do with them at all. Christine was the one who handled that stuff – coordinating school and sports and appointments, knew where they were and what they were up to. All I had to do was show up when told."
"No change on that front, then?" Andrea asked, sipping her coffee.
Mike's grip on his cup tightened and he forced himself to relax. "No. Kelly said to give her time. That she's still grieving for Lucas. And I get that. Hell, I'm still grieving for him too. And if this was about me not being there when he died, well, I get that. But her not wanting to be around Kaito, not even agreeing to meet him. That just isn't Christine, Eng. Not the Christine that I knew, anyway."
"Maybe not, Mike, but losing a child, it does a number on you." Andrea's finger ran around the rim of her cup, her eyes fixed on the cabinet behind Mike's head for a minute, her thoughts obviously not on Christine or Mike or Lucas. "And Christine didn't have time to grieve properly, Mike. She was busy staying alive, busy keeping the girls alive. She couldn't risk falling apart. Your wife is a good woman. She'll come around eventually."
Mike wished he could be that confident. He was, at the beginning, thinking that Christine just needed some time to wrap her mind around the idea of raising another child. After all, this wasn't like the time he surprised the kids with a puppy without running it past her first. But as the days stretched into weeks, his confidence waned. "I guess we'll see."
"How's it working out with Mrs. Foster watching Kaito?" Andrea asked, obviously sensing that Mike was done discussing his wife – or ex-wife as the case might be.
"Surprisingly well," Mike replied, perking up. Since Debbie was already watching both boys while Kara worked, she offered to continue doing so until he figured out a more permanent solution. "The woman seems to have an endless amount of energy."
Andrea smiled. "Tex told me that she is arranging some social events for the crew over the next couple of months. Apparently she convinced Captain Chandler that it would be good for morale."
"So long as it's not something ridiculous like painting or cooking," Mike grumbled, drawing a chuckle from Andrea.
She nodded her head towards the disaster on the stove. "I don't know. Seems to me that you could use some help in the cooking department. Burning noodles takes a special kind of talent."
The conversation was interrupted by a knock on the door, the sound just loud enough to rouse Kaito from his nap. Upset by the disturbance, he began to fuss. Andrea waved Mike towards the hallway. "You handle whoever that is and I'll deal with crabby-pants here."
Expecting a messenger – Tom had a habit of sending someone over with paperwork at least twice a week – Mike was caught off-guard by the sight of Christine standing on the other side of the door, her hands twisting the handle of the bag she was holding, a sure sign that she was nervous. As the silence stretched on, she arched an eyebrow at Mike.
"Can I come in?"
Embarrassed to realize that they had been standing in the doorway for who knows how long, Mike waved her inside. "Of course."
Ushering Christine into the kitchen, Mike motioned towards Andrea, who was bouncing Kaito. "Christine, you remember Andrea Garnett. She's my XO now."
If Andrea was surprised by this turn of events, it didn't show. She nodded politely. "Mrs. Slattery. Your timing is perfect. I was just asking Mike if the girls could come spend the night with Kat and he said he needed to run it by you."
"Oh, yes, Whitney's friend Kat lives with you, doesn't she?" Christine replied, sounding distracted. "That's fine. Assuming the girls want to go, of course."
"Let me go rouse the troops then," Andrea replied. She began to set Kaito back in his bouncer.
"Here, let me."
Mike wasn't sure who was more surprised by the offer. Andrea shot a quick glance at Mike, who simply shrugged, before surrendering the infant to Christine. No more than a minute passed before Andrea was marching three smirking girls through the kitchen. "I'll have them back in time for school tomorrow."
"Behave." Mike leveled a stern look at his daughters, one that was completely ignored as Whitney gave him two thumbs up behind Christine's head. A minute later the door closed behind the foursome, leaving Mike alone with his wife for the first time since, well, since before he left for the Arctic actually. He looked towards Christine, who was standing by the window with Kaito in her arms, her back towards him. Needing to break the silence, Mike spoke. "Coffee?"
"Sure." Christine turned, and for the first time Mike saw the tears running down her face.
Habit propelled Mike towards Christine but at the last moment he stopped, uncertain of his welcome. "Do you want me to…" He trailed off, having no idea what to say.
Christine smiled, reaching out to squeeze Mike's hand. "First coffee. Then I think it's time we talked."
