Drabble 44: Emotions Run High
A/N: Here's your drabble, AwesomeGirl! It was really fun to write, and I think you'll like it. Leave me a review, guys, and please give me more prompts!
Strictly speaking, agents weren't allowed to have relationships with each other. Especially if they worked on the same team.
One benefit of having the director of S.H.I.E.L.D. as you team leader? He allowed his team to have inter-relationships, as long as it didn't hurt their work and they kept it secret from everyone else.
So when Fitz and Simmons started dating, Coulson first told them how happy he was for them. Then he pretended he knew nothing about it.
When they got married, about a year later, he gave them his blessing. He even walked Simmons down the aisle in the little ceremony they had on the Bus. He was extremely supportive of their marriage.
Even so, when Simmons found out she was pregnant she couldn't bring herself to tell him. Coulson had sent her home that day because she wasn't feeling well. That happened every so often, so it wouldn't be too suspicious. All she had to do was make sure Fitz kept her pregnancy secret as well.
After she told Fitz, he looked happier than she'd ever seen him. But even he knew they couldn't tell Coulson or the others about it. Not until it was a lot closer.
As soon as a woman was known to be pregnant in S.H.I.E.L.D., she was forced to do desk work until after she gave birth. Fitz and Simmons rarely entered the field as it was, but she didn't want to stop their working together in the lab. So they decided to keep it a secret.
At first it was easy. Simmons was a fairly small person, but she very frequently wore a loose lab coat, which hid any sign of a baby bump.
What they hadn't counted on was the hormones.
Fitz knew Simmons as a mild, gentle, and loving woman, who rarely got angry and was never cruel. He had no idea how hormonal his quiet wife would become once she was pregnant.
He came back from lunch one day in her second trimester and found her sobbing over a notebook, the page blotted with tears. He had had to leave while he ate, because the scent of his sandwich made her feel sick.
"What's wrong?" he asked immediately, rushing to her side. "Why are you crying?"
She looked up and he saw that her face wasn't too flushed; she hadn't been crying for too long.
"I don't know!" she sobbed. "I don't know why I'm-crying, but I can't-stop!" she managed through hiccupping sobs.
Fitz held her close to him from her seated position and rubbed soothing circles on her back. It seemed to work. After a few minutes she had calmed down, and when he hesitantly separated from her she smiled at him gratefully.
"I needed that." She said. "I'm good now."
He nodded and walked over to his desk, getting ready to go back to work. Things went normally for about two hours. Coulson paid them his typical afternoon visit and checked in with them.
Then came the explosion.
Fitz was reading through a report he had just written when he heard sniffling from across the room. He looked up and saw Jemma starting to cry again, looking at something on her laptop. He waited a second to see how upset she was, and then decided to go and comfort her anyway.
She looked up when he placed his hand on her shoulder, her eyes full of warmth and love. She even leaned her head against him until she stopped sniffling.
Fitz was thankful when she did. He hated seeing her cry.
He found out a minute later he also hated seeing her angry. Just as suddenly as she had stopped sniffling he felt her tense under his hands. She stood up and moved away from him, her eyebrows drawn together in anger. "Why did you do that?" she asked him.
He was genuinely confused now. "Comfort you?"
"Is that what you call it?" she asked him, louder.
"What? I tried to help you stop crying!" he said.
"Exactly!" she yelled. "You didn't care about my feelings! You only wanted me to stop making noise!"
He raked a hand through his hair and took a deep breath, his eyes widening. "Jemma, you're just feeling a little emotional right now." He said calmly. "It's just your hormones talking."
"There you go!" she shouted. "What's wrong with my wife, you ask? Oh, it's got to be those damn HORMONES! It couldn't be that she's actually upset!" Her voice was like a whip.
She had stalked forward in her shouting with her fists clenched, and Fitz felt himself shrink backwards, away from her. He'd never seen her like this before.
She seemed to register that he'd actually moved back in fear, and a look of horror crept onto her pink face as she fumbled backwards. "Fitz!" she said. She stepped towards him again, this time hesitantly, her hands raised up to show she meant to harm. "I'm so sorry, I didn't mean it…"
She moved his arms around her and buried her face in his chest, holding him tightly. Fitz allowed her to keep his arms that way, and held her like she wanted to be held. His mind was racing. Where had that anger come from? He hadn't even known Jemma could be that angry.
So he patted her awkwardly and timidly, wondering whether she was going to explode again or start sobbing.
Oh, God, he thought. Those were only two emotions. What else could an extremely hormonal Jemma do?
He didn't want to think about it. He had to hope that this was the worst it would be, and that it would only happen rarely. He would always be there to help her when she wanted it, but in her current state he had no idea when that was. Should he embrace her, or get as far away as possible?
This is the drawback of pregnancy, he thought. You have the promise of bringing life into the world, but first it has to make an emotional wreck of its parents. And yes, parents. Jemma was the one who was mostly affected, but he definitely was too.
Then he felt badly about his thought. Jemma couldn't control what was happening to her. She had no way of stopping it from happening, however much she wanted to. And he knew that Jemma hated not feeling in control of herself.
So he decided to let her show him exactly what she wanted. He would hold her as long as she needed, and then he would give her space. She could lead.
He was careful after that first very emotional day. He was a bit scared, and he could tell Jemma was too. She hadn't known what had come over her.
They coped with outbursts when they happened, and never let it become a problem between them. They were too happy about the baby's progress to be upset over mood swings. By her third trimester they were over the worst of them, and were preparing a room in their little house for the baby.
But Simmons realized something. She was getting quite large by her third trimester, and knew her team wouldn't believe she had put on that much weight. She had used that excuse early on in her pregnancy; she had said it was because of stress. Most of the time after that she had stayed in the lab until everyone was gone, to stop them from seeing her. And when they did see her, she was bundled into a big sweater, with little definition. It was easier to stay hidden in the lab than to hide the obvious change in her body in person.
She also knew that you weren't supposed to fly in your third trimester. Which was a problem as long as they stayed on the Bus.
So she and Fitz walked to Coulson's office one day and knocked on his door, set on telling him. He still visited them every day, but Simmons was often behind her desk. She had no idea if he'd figured out her secret or not.
He opened the door and smiled when he saw them, gesturing for them to come inside. "How can I help you?" he asked.
They all sat down around Coulson's desk. "Sir, there's something we have to tell you." Simmons said.
Coulson looked between them and then nodded. "I'm guessing you're pregnant?"
Wonder how he figured that out, Simmons thought as she looked at the large sweater she was wearing to conceal her swollen belly. She had always worn sweaters, but this was definitely different.
"How long have you known?" she asked him.
"A few weeks." He smiled at them. "I knew you'd tell me eventually. You two always play it safe."
Fitz leaned forward. "We just didn't want to be separated. We both wanted to continue working in the lab as long as possible."
"The main reason we're telling you now is that I'm not supposed to fly anymore."
"Right." Coulson said slowly, leaning back. "I'd forgotten about that."
Simmons's eyes never left his face as he looked at a calendar on his desk. "I don't know if it'll be every day, but we can try to stay on the Playground from now on. We'll just leave the two of you behind when we have missions. Does that sound good?"
Simmons broke into a smile. "That sounds wonderful, sir. Thank you."
She noticed Fitz watching her carefully and turned her head to look at him. "Something wrong?" she asked.
He shook his head. "Nope. Just wanted to see if you'd start being all emotional."
She punched him in the arm.
"I'm counting that as emotional."