Unresolved Feelings, Post Kids
It had been a long shift, and as rewarding as it was, watching new life be brought into the world, Carina was ready to go home to her own wife that had given her their own children so many years before. Maya had been working a 48 hour shift, so Carina had not seen her in three days. Carina was broken out of her thoughts by the sound of her phone buzzing in the pocket of her scrubs. It was the home phone.
"Bella, is that you?"
"Mama, it's me." That couldn't be good.
"Drew, piccolo, perché non sei a scuola?" Carina asked (Drew, baby, why aren't you at school?). Drew wasn't the one to play hooky, and even if he had, he wouldn't have called Carina unless something was wrong. Especially on the home phone, which would immediately expose that he was at home.
"Sono tornato a casa durante il mio libero per prendere dei compiti," Drew paused, taking a deep breath, "È Mom. Penso che qualcosa non va. Quando scendi?" (I came home during my free to grab some homework. It's Mom. I think something is wrong. When do you get off?)
"Qualche ora. Bambino, cosa sta succedendo?" (A few hours. Baby, what's going on?)
"I've gotta go back for a quiz next period. Could you just come home early?"
"Si, caro. I will be there as soon as I can. You go ahead and go back."
"Grazie, Mama. Ti amo."
"Ti amo," Carina quickly looked around, assessing the quickest at which she could get everything she needed ready to leave, "Oh, and Drew?"
"Si?"
"Buona fortuna per il quiz." (Good luck on the quiz).
"Grazie."
Half an hour later, Carina was unlocking the front door to their house. She wasn't exactly sure what she was walking into. Drew had been very vague, but he'd sounded scared and that was not reassuring. Drew was very overprotective over his moms, but usually for good reason.
"Maya!" Carina called out, not sure whether she would be more reassured by a response or not. When there was nothing, she set her stuff down on the front dresser, and headed upstairs to their bedroom. Her heart sunk when she registered the scene before her. Maya was curled up on Carina's side of the bed, her hair clasped in her hands, dark circles under her eyes. Carina hadn't seen her like this in years, not since her accidental encounter with her father that had left Maya hellbent on proving that just because she hadn't carried Drew didn't mean that he wasn't her real child, before falling into a depressive episode. Carina slowly approached the bed. Taking a seat next to Maya, she gently disentangled Maya's hands from her hair, and interlocked them with her own.
"Bambina, talk to me. What's going on?" Maya looked up, her eyes barely even seeming to register that Carina was in front of her.
"Oh shit is it two already? Do you need me to go pick up the twins?" Carina sighed, leaning forward to press a kiss to Maya's forehead.
"It's only eleven. Drew called me, so I came home."
"Drew? Is everything okay? Did something happen?"
"Maya, he called me about you. He was worried. Did something happen?" Maya pushed away from Carina, sitting up.
"He was here?"
"Si."
"He saw me?"
"Si."
"Fuck." Carina took Maya's hands again. She tried to tell Maya with just her eyes that everything was going to be okay, because she knew that she probably wasn't going to be ready to hear that out loud quite yet.
"It's alright, bella. We're just worried about you. Can you talk to me please?" Maya didn't answer for awhile before nodding. Carina smiled encouragingly.
"There was a five alarm. Ever since the kids everytime we have a five alarm I get really anxious. I've talked about it with Dianne quite a lot, and I was meaning to tell you. There was just never a good time I guess," Carina moved her thumb back and forth across Maya's palm, assuring her that it was okay to take her time, "Anyway, so the five alarm actually went really well, but then there was just this pile of anxiety just sitting there on my chest. When I called you last night, that's why. I needed to hear your voice, and the kids' voices, just to know for sure that everyone was okay. We kept getting low stake calls all night so I didn't really sleep, but then this morning at four we got a two alarm." Maya took a shaky breathe, and Carina kissed her cheek soothingly. Maya paused, just basking in the feeling of Carina's hands in her own, her lips on her skin.
"The two alarm was at one of those apartments in that complex just down the street from here," Carina had seen the remnants of the fire on her drive home, "One of the kids had accidentally left the burner on by accident after making breakfast. She's on the swim team and had to be at school early for practice. She'd left the burner on, which set the apartment on fire. We managed to save the kid's mom and older sister, but her younger sisters were nearest to the kitchen and were dead from smoke inhalation before we even got there." Maya's voice caught in her throat, and she managed to choke out a few more unintelligible words before the sobs started. Carina could feel herself start to get emotional just at the sheer pain she could see that this was bringing her wife. Maya had always taken incidents at work so personally. Carina assumed that it came from the lack of love and care from her parents growing up. Maya was so intent on being the best mother and wife that she could be that every single freak accident that Maya ran into on the job was projected onto her fear of losing Carina and the kids.
"Shhh, bambina, it's okay. I'm right here. The kids are okay. We're all okay. You are so good at protecting us, I promise." Carina hated to play into Maya's determination to be the family's protector, but she knew that it was what Maya needed to hear right now. She'd encourage Maya to talk to Dianne about it later on.
"School's set on fire all the time. I've seen it. If anything we should hire them a home tutor. That would be much safer." Maya, unfortunately, continued her spiral.
"Maya, we can't just pull the kids out of school. First of all Gigi would emancipate if we made her leave Will and all her friends." Maya laughed weakly.
"Yeah... Did you see the way that she and Will were looking at each other the other day? Honestly I think meeting Kim in the caf at Grey Sloan was the best thing that ever happened to that girl and she wasn't even born yet." Carina smiled, and squeezed one of Maya's hands.
"This is a very different sentiment than you had when Will and Gigi came to tell us that they were dating."
"Well, I thought about it. We watched that boy grow up from the second he was one bald newborn next to another in the NICU, and Kim did an amazing job. If there was any boy that I would trust with our daughter, who is barely sixteen and not nearly old enough to be dating, it's Will Lucas."
"So it's only Will Lucas, and then any girl who's good enough for our daughter huh?"
"Not any girl. Just most," Maya smiled widely. Carina rolled her eyes playfully. Instead of answering her ridiculous wife, she kissed her, long and full of passion.
"Aspetta solo che Jodie e Nora inizino a frequentarsi," (Just wait until Jodie and Nora start dating) she whispered against Maya's lips. Maya pulled back.
"Don't you dare." They both laughed, neither of them quite ready to address the thought of their eleven year olds reaching dating age.
"I think we're good for awhile at least. The twins seem pretty content in their belief that boys have cooties, and I've seen them try to talk to girls in the past, and that's not something I think we're going to have to worry about."
"I guess they inherited my pediatric shyness."
"I wouldn't call it a shyness, per se. Maybe just a lack of, how you say, game?" Maya smiled. She couldn't quite believe how lucky she'd gotten in life. Carina had this innate ability to make her go from balling to laughing in seconds, and on top of that, they'd made these wonderful kids together who had inherited all of those quirky things that they loved so much about each other.
"Do you think with should talk about it with Nora more?"
"Talk about what?"
"What she came to us about Thursday night. About wanting to pursue solely the arts in high school?"
"What did Mason say?"
"He said he'd be happy to talk to her about the pros and cons. I just don't want to make it seem like we're not going to let her go. I want it to be clear that we want her to be absolutely sure, but that if she wants to go the answer will always be yes." Carina tucked some of Maya's hair behind her ear, and kissed her furrowed brow. She'd figured that more than the call gone wrong was causing Maya's episode.
"Il trauma è duro, piccola." (Trauma is hard, baby.) "I know you're scared of being your papá, but I think that Nora already knows that you would never prevent her from following her dreams."
"I wish I could just send her without having to worry about the possible repercussions should it not work out, or if it did work out."
"Fa schifo that that's the way it is, but Sfortunatamente that is just how the society that we live in works."
"Si. Sfortunatamente." Hearing Maya talk in Italian still made Carina's heart soar, and her legs turn to jelly. She knew it was pretty bare minimum for Maya to learn Italian so that they could speak in Carina's native language as well as Maya's, but something about hearing the love of her life speak Carina's own native language made her weak at the knees.
"Drew really called you?"
"Si, bella.
"He's just like his namesake- a need to care for others." Carina eyes glistened with tears; she knew her wife was right. Andrea Jr. was turning into a collection of the parts of Andrea that he'd prided himself off, the very thing that had gotten him killed. So as much as Carina loved being able to see her younger brother in her son, she often felt anxious about the implications of that.
"I'm so utterly grateful that the girls will get to experience what it was like to have their zio as a fratello, that we'll get to experience the love that Andrea had for Mama, even Papá. But it scares me, that Andrea Jr. could end up in a situation just like the very man that he models himself off of." Maya sighed. She'd worried that this might be hard for Carina, having a son who was like her brother, who'd gotten himself killed playing vigilante. She moved closer to Carina, who buried herself in her wife's arms.
"I know, baby, I know. I know it can be hard to imagine a reality where you weren't responsible for Andrew's death, but would be able to prevent Drew from putting himself in the same type of situation, but I promise you it is possible. If we ever found ourselves in a situation where we had to stop Drew from playing vigilante, we would succeed."
"L'eroe del vigilante." (The vigilante's hero.)
"Exactly."