Okay, Here It Is. Chapter 25. The Final Chapter In Not Just You.
Flashbacks in Italics.
There was a scene I wanted to end this with but I couldn't figure it out so this chapter is a little shorter than I intended.
DISCLAIMER: I DO NOT OWN GREY'S ANATOMY, STATION 19 OR ANY OF THEIR CHARACTERS.
Maggie is sitting at the kitchen island sipping on a cup of tea thinking about her life. It had been 3 months since she became Margaret Avery. Although, around the hospital she went by Dr. Pierce-Avery. While she was extremely proud to take Jackson's name completely in her personal life, she'd work too hard to make Pierce a well-known and respected name in the medical world to simply drop it because she got married. She was grateful Jackson was understanding of that and supported her decision. Besides, how annoying would it be to have to go by Female Avery or Male Avery like the Deluca's. No way. She chuckles slightly before taking another sip of her tea as Jackson walks into the kitchen.
"Tea? That's new" He says.
"Ughh. I don't know what's wrong with me today. I made two batches of coffee and they were both horrible. I just gave up. Do you think the beans are bad?"
Jackson comes around the island and places a kiss on Maggie's forehead, "they shouldn't be. Viola just bought them last week if I'm not mistaken." With Harriet with them full-time and the house being as big as it is, Maggie and Jackson had decide to hire someone to help them. Viola Smith had been a literal God-send, and she felt like family which was important to Maggie. She made the transition seamless and a lot less daunting. She was only there part time, but that was all they really needed. Now that Harriet was in school in their neighborhood, which was 40 minutes away from the hospital, it made things easier.
"Well then, I don't know. Maybe you could try."
Jackson raises a brow from behind Maggie, "I think I'll just drink some orange juice. How'd you sleep? You were knocked out by the time I got in… at 9pm."
Maggie rolls her eyes thinking about how she was too tired to even wait for Harriet to go to bed, "Yeah, I was exhausted last night. I ate dinner with Harriet and Vi, then I went up to bed. Thankfully Vi was able to stay with Hattie until you got home. I was asleep before Harriet. That's embarrassing" she shakes her head and chuckles.
Jackson silently watches Maggie as he thinks over the last few weeks. She'd been moody, more tired than usual, he'd even thought he noticed her breasts were fuller, and now she couldn't stand the taste of coffee, her drug of choice. She never messed up her coffee, in fact, everyone else always did, well excluding him, which is why she always preferred to make it herself. He didn't want to get his hopes up, or possibly scare Maggie but he was almost positive she was pregnant.
"Uhh, bab-" he's cut off when Harriet comes running into the kitchen.
"Morning mama. Morning daddy" she shouts as she hops into Maggie's lap nearly knocking her backward off the stool.
"Morning baby, be gentle." Jackson says at the same time Maggie says "good morning princess" and places a kiss on Harriet's forehead.
Maggie looks over at Jackson curiously. Gentle? Harriet did this every morning, they were used to it now. Maggie always made sure to brace herself, and Jackson always made sure to stand close behind. They'd never bothered saying anything about being gentle since the first time cause Maggie loved it.
"Mama, what's for breakfast?" Harriet asked.
Maggie smiled down at her. She'd never get tired of hearing that. She thinks back to the very first time Harriet called her mama, and she can't help but smile.
It had been 3 months since Maggie had agreed to become Jackson's wife and adopt Harriet, and 2 months since Maggie had signed the paperwork to make it official. She was now legally Harriet's mom, but she made sure Harriet knew she could never replace April and she didn't want to. As horrible as what April did had been, Maggie didn't want Harriet to feel like she had to hate her mom in order to love Maggie, or choose between the two of them. It wasn't fair to her. She was mad at her mom now but Maggie was sure that as time went on she'd want to talk to April, possibly even forge a new relationship with her, and she needed to know that was okay.
Harriet and Maggie were in the home theatre watching The Princess and the Frog when Maggie looked over and noticed Harriet was fidgeting and not focusing on the movie. If she didn't know her so well, Maggie may have thought she was bored. However, she was very in tune with Harriet and her moods. A quiet, and fidgety Harriet meant something was on her mind that scared her or made her nervous.
Maggie paused the movie, and it was about 2 minutes before Harriet noticed.
"Hey!" she said, but it lacked that child-like exuberance.
"Hey you," Maggie mocked, while placing her arm around Harriet's shoulder and pulling her onto her lap, "you know you can talk to me about anything, right?"
"Yes."
"Soooo…." Maggie drew out expectantly.
"It's just-" Harriet began but then stopped to fidget with her fingers again.
Maggie gently placed her hand over Harriet's hands to stop the fidgeting, "Hattie, if you're not ready to tell me that's okay. I just want you to know you can."
"I know. I was just wondering. You're my mom now, right?"
"Well, yeah. I mean your mom will still be your mom, but now you have two."
"So, what-what do I call you if my mom is my mom?"
"You can call me whatever you'd like. What do you want to call me?"
Harriet peeks up at her shyly through her lashes, "Mom," she whispers "but I don't want my first mom to be mad at you again."
"She won't be Hattie, but maybe we let her be mom and you call me another variation of mom."
"What does that mean?"
"That means you can call me something else that also means mom."
"Like mama?" she asks as she scrunches up her nose.
"Like mama. If that's what you like."
"Mama. Mama. MAMA," she tests, "I like it. Do you like it?"
"I love it," Maggie says with tears in her eyes as she squeezes Harriet tightly.
"Ow Mama!" she chuckles, "you're squeezing me."
"Sorry baby. I'm just so happy."
She doesn't realize she's smiling and crying until Jackson's voice breaks through her thoughts, "that's it." he says as he places his cup in the sink, "I'll be right back"
Maggie hops off the stool with Harriet on her hip as she follows him to the door, "Wow, you're getting heavy Hattie. Hey! Where you going? I wanna come."
"Yeah daddy. We wanna come." Harriet chirps.
"Quick store run. Put her down please babe. She's 6. She's practically your height. She can walk."
She rolls her eyes, "your point?" she says ignoring him, "what store?"
"I'll be back in half an hour," he says as he grabs his keys off the counter.
"So what you're saying is we can't come?" Harriet pouts.
Jackson turns to face them and sees them both poking out their bottom lip and giving him puppy dog eyes.
"Oh relax. I'll be back," he sighs, "thirty minutes. I promise."
Before they can say anything else he kisses them both on the forehead and walks out the house.
When Jackson comes back half an hour later he finds Maggie laid out on the couch, with the tv watching her. He places a plush throw blanket over her, before turning to go find Harriet.
Before he can move, Maggie grips his wrist and starts to sit up.
"Hey, lay back down," he says as he pushes her hair out of her face.
"What'd you get?" she questions, sitting up and ignoring him.
Jackson takes a deep breath and takes a seat next to her on the couch, "where's Harriet?"
"She's in the theatre watching The Little Mermaid. What's going on Jackson?"
She squeals when he stands and scoops her up in his arms, "what are you doing?" she says through a fit of laughter as he takes her up to their bedroom and drops her haphazardly onto the bed. "Avery. What are you doing? Where'd you disappear to?"
He lays on his side, head propped up by his hand and smiles over at her.
"Jackson, you're being creepy. What's going on?" she glances down at the bag between them, "you went to the pharmacy? What'd you get?"
He takes a deep breath as he digs into the bag, "I don't want to scare you or anything, but I think you need these," he says before placing 4 boxes of pregnancy tests on the bed between them.
Maggie's jaw drops and then she laughs, "you think I'm pregnant? That's why you were being so weird? And why so many? Two would have sufficed. There's no way I can pee that much right now Jackson" she says, all while still laughing at him.
Laughter. That was good. Jackson had been afraid she'd be upset or scared considering last time. But making fun of him? That he could deal with. When Maggie is finally done laughing, she sits up and crosses her legs Indian style, and Jackson follows suit.
"You think?" she questions when she's sobered.
"I do," he says gently, "I mean all the signs are there. You're tired a lot. Coffee tastes off to you, even though you've NEVER messed your coffee up. You're moody-"
"Moody? Who?" she interrupts.
"Maybe moody is the wrong word," he chuckles, "you're just a bit more sensitive these days. I mean, you were just crying in the kitchen for no reason."
"It wasn't no reason. I was thinking about the first time Harriet called me Mama. But I see your point," she sighs. "Well," she places her hand out, "give 'em here."
He goes to hand her all four boxes and she knocks them out of his hand. "Don't nobody need all those tests Jackson. Gimme two."
"How about 3? Best of 3?"
She rolls her eyes but holds her hand out for the additional test, and then goes into their in suite bathroom to take the tests. A few minutes later she walks back out and takes a seat next to Jackson on the edge of their California King. "three minutes," she says as she waves her phone a little to show him the timer.
He places an arm around her shoulder, and places a gentle kiss on her forehead, "whatever they say, we're gonna be okay."
"I know. So!"
He raises a brow, "So?"
"What do you want it to say?" she asks tentatively.
"What do you mean?"
"I mean, we weren't exactly trying."
"Maybe you weren't" he mumbles.
"Huh?"
'We weren't not trying," he says more clearly this time.
"True. You didn't answer my question."
"Of course I want it to be positive, but even if it's not, that's okay too. We have plenty of time and it's not exactly a burden trying," he says as he waggles his eyebrows at her.
She laughs and slaps his chest with the back of her hand, "oh stop."
"What about you? What do you want it to say?"
"I'm a little scared to hope but I want it to be positive too." Just as she finishes and Jackson smiles down at her, her alarm goes off and they both jump a little.
"Moment of truth," she says as she stands.
Jackson grabs her hand and tugs on it so she's facing him. He pulls her between his legs, places a kiss on her stomach, and then looks up at her "if those tests are negative, I want us to start actively trying."
She smiles down at him and runs her fingers through his curls, "okay. Now let's go look," she says as she pulls him up off the bed.
They get to the counter in the bathroom, and as they look at each test their smiles gets wider each time. When they finally look at each other, their smiles are so wide it practically hurts.
Jackson lets out whoop, and then picks Maggie up as he spins her around.
"We're having a baby!" he shouts.
She laughs, "We're having a baby! But shh Ha-"
"We're having a baby?" Harriet asks excitedly from the doorway.
Maggie narrows her eyes at Jackson, who just mutters oops, with a Cheshire cat smile on his face, before turning around to smile at Harriet."
"We think so," she says gently, "we've gotta go to the hospital to know for sure but we're 98% sure we're having a baby. Is that okay?"
"Okay? That's awesome!" Harriet shouts as she runs over and wraps her arms around them both.
"Awesome is right." Jackson says as he looks down at his family wrapped safely in his arms. All three of them. This is what life is made of. These moments. His family happy, healthy, and excited for what that future has in store for them.
When his eyes connect with Maggie's they both mouth I love you at the same time and laugh.
"Thank you Maggie. Thank you for all of it." he says as he sighs in contentment.
Hold Up Wait A Minute! Y'all Thought I Was Finished?
Haha, Read On For A Special Thank You For Your Patience, In the Form Of An Epilogue.