Hellooooo everyone! here's another fanfic I wrote as I watched season 7 and tried to guess the finale. As always, I'm leaving you the original note I wrote when I posted it, right after 7x06.
Well. I couldn't help myself.
When I watched 7x06, I couldn't help but think about bbg fs (baby girl fitzsimmons), since I'm still clinging to that theory that somehow between season 6 and 7, Fitz and Jemma had a child. When Jemma said that Fitz was exposed, I immediately thought that he couldn't be with their potential kid, right? so of course the first thought me and a few friends had was that bbg might have been left with someone else, and when my mind immediately went to Bobbi and Hunter (wouldn't that be amazing), I wanted to write Fitz and Jemma leaving their little girl with Fitz's mother.
Yeah, I just wanted to write about Fitz's mother, too. And the title is from one of the Hamilton songs I really like, because HAMILTON IS STREAMING ON DISNEY+ TODAYYYY!
All mistakes are mine and English isn't my first language, so i'm sorry about that. I hope you'll like it nonetheless! xx
Linda Fitz had always lived a quiet, quite tedious life. When she'd met Alistair Fitz, she wasn't ashamed to say that she'd fallen in love almost at first sight. Alistair was handsome, charming, and most importantly the nicest man she'd ever met. When he asked her out, she didn't even think twice before saying yes, and a couple of months later they'd moved in together. The first few months of their life together had been wonderful: Alistair was kind, affectionate, and they'd lived passionate moments she could not erase from her memory, no matter what came after.
But it had all changed the moment he'd learned that she had gotten pregnant. The charming men she'd known had completely morphed into a quiet, cruel man. She'd never once thought about ending her pregnancy like he'd so heavily suggested, and the months she'd spent growing a life inside of her were both the best and worst of her life. Linda gave birth to a healthy -if not tiny- baby boy on August 19, 1987, and her entire world shifted on its axis. For the first time in what felt like forever, Linda felt happy again.
Leopold grew up to be a brilliant, kind and surprising young boy. Linda realized quite early as she watched her quiet son grow curious about things he wasn't supposed to take interest in at his age that her Leo would be special, and she was right. By the age of 7, Leopold was more intelligent than an average teenager, and her heart bursted with pride every time she looked at him. Alistair never took interest in his son, no matter how hard he tried to make him proud, and Linda soon realized how much it affected him. And by the time Leo was 10, Alistair walked out of their front door never to come back.
Linda sometimes felt her heart clench when she realized how much it had affected her son. When she'd thought that Leo would be best without his father, he'd grown even more quiet after his departure. Somehow, as if it was possible, he'd learned even more things and grown even more intelligent and in the blink of an eye, he was off to college. When he got his PhD, Linda cried for hours. She was so proud of the man he was growing to be, Alistair Fitz be damned.
Then, when he was 16, Fitz introduced her to Jemma Simmons.
Linda had known for the first time she'd laid eyes on the quiet and polite girl standing in front of her porch that she'd play an important part in her Leo's life. When they joined SciOps and then SHIELD a little while later, she was glad to know that Jemma was by his side. Back then, she still received some phone calls from the both of them, and her attachment to Jemma grew even more. Linda didn't need to be a genius to realize how much his son cared for her, and the few times they visited after joining SHIELD only confirmed how much her son was in love with the English girl.
The months following the reveal of HYDRA hiding beneath SHIELD were hard for Linda. It was months before she got any news of her son, and only then did she allow herself to cry. Her Leo hadn't died, but there was something he wasn't telling her either. The way he'd stuttered painfully into the phone had not gone unnoticed, but she hadn't meant to pry. She so rarely had news, she didn't want to hurt him by asking. That night, she still cried herself to sleep thinking about what could have happened to her boy. After a little while, his voice gradually came back to normal and she got a few months of regular phone calls before it all went to hell again.
"Jemma's gone" he'd whispered one night, voice hollow. Linda didn't miss the fact that it was past two in the morning in America, and only clenched her phone harder. "But I'm gonna bring her back, mum. I promise."
Linda realized that this promise wasn't even meant for her in the first place.
Then, six months later, Jemma was back. Linda had no idea what happened exactly and how her son had brought her back, but soon they were both at her door, smiling as they announced they'd gotten a two weeks vacations in Scotland. She'd tried to arrange the guest room for Jemma as soon as they'd stepped inside, but the red cheeks and shy smiles on both their faces had told her everything she needed to know. That night as she went to bed, she threw a last lingering look towards the two people laughing at something they were watching on TV, pressed as close as humanly possible against each other on the couch, Linda fell asleep with a smile on her face.
But a few months after, everything went to hell again. She had gotten quite regular calls from Leo (and Jemma, telling her they were looking for a place and then complaining about Leo's awful habits sometimes too) before it all stopped. Linda only had to turn on the news to realize that SHIELD was now branded as a criminal organization, and both her kids -because Jemma was, after all, part of the family- were most wanted. In the midst of all this chaos, Linda was grateful that they had each other, still.
For months, Linda busied herself with her life, her friends and her part time job at the florist shop around the corner of her street to stop thinking about her son. Then, one morning, she found small package on the steps of her house as she walked back from work. Inside, she found a pressed daisy and a polaroid picture, and Linda couldn't help but burst into tears as she peaked at it. It only showed two hands, fingers entwined, matching wedding rings in display. She could recognized Jemma's lean fingers and her son's gifted one, and she framed the picture to put it on her bedside table. They were still most wanted, and the world was not ready for SHIELD to come back, but somehow her children had found a way to make them know they were okay.
Years passed, until her life was completely shifted once again.
The moment Linda heard a soft knock on the door, her heart suddenly dropped at the bottom of her stomach. It had been years (seven, to be exact) since she'd last seen her son, but somehow, she knew Leopold stood behind the thin barrier that was her front door. Straightening her skirt with shaky hands, Linda walked to the door and yanked it open in an exhale.
"Hey, mom" Leo whispered, and Linda felt her knees grow weak.
Her son had changed so much since the last time she'd seen him. He had a small beard covering the lower half of his face, making him look more mature, and definitely even more handsome. His hair was longer, still as curly as ever, and his entire frame looked more muscular than she'd ever seen him. His piercing blue eyes hadn't changed, but they matched the little girl's he was balancing on his hips. For a beat, Linda couldn't take her eyes off the toddler in her son's arms. She looked exactly like him, save for the brown hair and rounder nose, a nose she'd recognize everywhere. Looking up from the little girl, Linda's eyes fell on Jemma, standing a couple of inches behind Leo.
"Hello Linda."
And although Linda felt like screaming, her head buzzing with thousands of questions and her heart racing like never before, she managed to nod at the three of them.
"I'm gonna make some tea" she said as she mentioned for them to come inside. "Come in."
She kept her gaze on the kettle in front of her as the little family moved inside and towards the living room, but couldn't help but throw a glance from behind her open cabinet and through the kitchen door when she heard Leo's voice, softer than before as he addressed his daughter.
"Do you want to sit on my lap?" he asked, voice laced with amusement when the toddler went from the soft cursion of the couch to his knees as he sat, and Linda's heart clenched when she saw her son wrap his arms gently around her small figure.
Next to him, Jemma was looking at them with a smile that was somehow strained with worry. Neither of them had lowered their guard, Linda realized after a while, and the protective way Leo was holding his daughter didn't go unnoticed either.
"I made some Earl Grey" Linda said when she came back with the cups, before bringing the teapot. "I feel like this situation calls for it, wouldn't you say?"
Leo had the presence of mind to look sheepish, burying his reddening face in his daughter's hair. Jemma's hand tightened on his, and she threw Linda an apologetic smile.
"We're so sorry we never called" she said, and Linda was surprised to see her eyes grow wet. "The last few years… have been difficult."
Leo's free hand was now playing with his daughters, and Linda felt captivated for a moment by the movement of her small fingers as they wrapped around her father's thumb.
"We couldn't risk coming here, or even contacting you" Leo said with a sigh. "I wanted to, especially when Rosie was born but…"
"We couldn't" Jemma finished for him. "It would have put you at risk, and we couldn't."
Linda could see her fingers tightening against Leo's, and they shared a glance. The air was strangely heavy, not because of the way they acted around each other -they were in synch as ever, and Linda had never doubted that marriage wouldn't change a thing for their relationship- but because there was something they weren't telling her. She knew her son, and she knew he was extremely worried.
"What brings you here?" Linda said. "I guess it's not only to introduce me to little Rosie here?" she asked with a smile, her stomach filling with glee when the little girl replied with one of her own, unaware of the tension between the adults in the room.
"Ah, no" Fitz said, frowning. He pushed a kiss against the back of Rosie's head. "Not only, at least." He stopped, hesitating for a while. Jemma nodded at him to continue, and he sighed. "We need your help, mum. And it's okay if you don't want, because it's a big responsibility, but.."
Linda looked between the three of them. She couldn't deny that she was a little angry, mostly because she'd worried about her son and Jemma for years. But they had a kid, and she was a grandma now, and a rational part of her mind knew that they'd never have left her in the dark if it wasn't for their dangerous lifestyles. She hadn't missed the gun on both their hips as they walked inside the house, neither did she miss the newfound confidence with which they carried themself. Linda had no idea what they'd been through all those years, but she knew it had been rough and had shaped the people they were now.
"What do you want me to do?" she finally asked.
Leo's eyes looked a little wet as he looked up at her, and Linda ignored her urge to wrap him in a crushing hug. There would be time for that later.
"We need you to keep Rosie with you for a while."
Next to him, Jemma exhaled a shaky breath, her free hand cradling her daughter's head as she pushed a few strands of her hair behind her ear. Linda's gaze fell on Rosie, finding the little girl staring right at her with a calm, if not curious expression.
"Why?" Linda heard herself ask, never taking her eyes off the toddler.
"Jemma and I… we need to go, for a little while. Somewhere that is definitely not safe for her, and we can't… We don't trust anyone with our daughter as much as we trust you."
"You're leaving her?"
As soon as the world passed her lips, she saw her son tense up, and mentally kicked herself over it. Jemma's hand froze against his, and Linda immediately shook her head.
"I'm sorry, Leo" she said, "I didn't mean it like that."
"I would never abandon my child" Leo replied, voice hard and unforgiving. "Not after…" He trailed off, and Jemma's body inched a little closer to his instinctively. Leo closed his eyes, taking a deep breath. "We don't have a choice, mum. We really don't."
Linda shook her head, her stomach suddenly in knots. "I didn't mean it like that, Leo. I'm so sorry."
The air around them was filled with tension, and only Rosie seemed to be unaware of it as she started playing with her dad's fingers again. For a moment, Linda realized that she didn't recognize the man sitting in front of him. It had been seven years since she'd last seen her son, and it was clear that the change within him was not only physical.
"Now, why don't you tell me a little bit about this adorable young woman?" she asked again, booping the tip of Rosie's nose playfully. The little girl giggled automatically, and for a moment Linda was struck by how much she looked like Leo when he was just a kid. Her baby blue eyes were the exact same as her father's, and it hit her hard and all of a sudden that she was a grandmother.
"Well" Jemma spoke, her voice soft as ever, but Linda could decipher a softness in her tone that she'd never heard before. "This is Rose Mackenzie FitzSimmons, she's three years old-"
"Three and a half" Rosie interrupted with a pout, staring at her mother with a glare that made Leo snicker.
"Three and half, very important, Jemma" he insisted, eyes sparkling with amusement. "Right, monkey?"
"Yes!" Rose perked up, bouncing on his lap. "Because six months is 182 days, and 182 days is a long time to do a lot of things mum."
Jemma rolled her eyes in response, and as Linda looked down at the little girl, she realized that there might have been more similarities between her Leo and Rose than just physical. She was the child of two geniuses, and she'd clearly picked up on the good side of the genes.
"You're absolutely right, monkey." Leo pressed. "She's three and a half years old, and she loves astronomy. She was born on May 15, and she likes to sleep in if we don't wake her up, which she inherited from me I'm afraid." He turned his attention back to his giggling daughter. "And remember what we talked about before coming to see Nana?" he insisted, directing Rose's attention on Linda again. "Remember what we've talked about for months?"
Rose scrunched up her nose adorably. "You said you and mummy will left"
"Will leave" Jemma corrected automatically.
"Will leave" Rose repeated obediently. "You said mummy and you will leave."
Fitz smiled, caressing her hair. "Yeah, that's right."
"But I don't want you to leave" Rose whispered.
The same look of pain flashed on both Jemma and Leo's faces, and Linda felt herself swallow around the knot in her throat. She knew but too well how it felt to be separated from her child, and she would have gladly taken their pain away if she ever could.
"Oh baby" Jemma replied, cradling her daughter's cheek. "We don't want to leave either. But it's gonna be so fast you won't even have the time to miss us, yeah?"
The redness in her eyes told Linda everything she needed to know. Wherever Leo and Jemma were heading next, they had no idea when, of if, they'd be back.
"Plus" Leo interrupted, probably sensing his wife's distress "what did I tell you about Nana's shortbread?"
Rosie's interest immediately shifted back to Linda, and with a smile she could barely conceal, the grandmother saw Rosie's baby blue eyes lit up instantly.
"You said she makes the best shortbread in the world!" the little girl exclaimed immediately with a beaming smile. Her hands excitingly shot up in the air, and the soft smile on her face made Linda's heart melt. She looked so much like her father, and from what she'd gathered, she also shared her stomach.
"That's right, she does" Leo said with a wet chuckle. "Now monkey, why don't you stay here and play for a minute, mummy and I have to talk to Nana. Alright?"
Rose nodded immediately. "Alright."
Only then did Linda notice the small backpack that Jemma had brought with her, and Rose immediately got a few toys and a book out of it carefully. Linda recognized a plush monkey as well a children's astronomy book, and her heart seemed to swell even more in her chest. All of these similarities with her boy took her back to happy times, times when she had no idea how much Leo would accomplish in life and what a kind person he would become. When Jemma and Leo got up at once, squeezing each other's hands for comfort before walking towards the kitchen, Linda followed them without a word.
"Mum" Leo began, enveloping her in a crushing hug as soon as they were out of sight. Linda immediately felt herself shag in the embrace with an exhale, and couldn't help but let a few tears escape her eyes as she did so. He definitely felt a lot stronger than the last time she'd seen him, and it was a little weird at first to feel his muscles as she squeezed her usually lean son. "I'm so sorry we never called" he said again as he pulled back, wiping a few treacherous tears of his own.
As soon as he took a step back, Linda's arms were filled with Jemma this time as she hugged her tight. "I've missed you so much" Jemma whispered, her smile a little shaky as she pulled back and sniffed.
"You have a child" was the first thing Linda blurted out after wiping away the few tears sliding down her cheeks with the back of her hand. "You actually had a baby."
Both Leo and Jemma smiled a little sheepishly at this.
"Well, she was quite a surprise for us too" Leo confessed. "We went to space, and Jemma's IUD started acting up. It wasn't long until we realized she was pregnant, and here came Rosie a few months later."
Linda's brain somehow froze on the first part of the sentence. "You went to space ?!"
"Uh. Well, we have quite a lot to tell you, mum." he apologized with a shake of his head. "But we don't really have time for that. We'll tell you when we come back, uh?"
"Assuming you come back at all" Linda pressed. She saw the way both Jemma and Leo froze at that, Jemma turning her head away from her husband as she pursed her lips in a thin line.
"We really don't have a choice, mum" Leo insisted, his voice breaking on the last word. "We would never… we would never have come here if we could have helped it. But it's beyond us, now. We have to leave."
For a moment, Linda studied the once so familiar face of her son. His eyes were hard but pleading, and his entire demeanor told her how much this decision had cost him. Jemma wasn't fairing much better, her eyes planted on her daughter playing innocently in the living room as she trembled from head to toes.
Linda shook her head. "I've spent years wondering if you two were dead. You're my children, the both of you. I worry for you, and I love you. I know you know how that feels now, to make sacrifices for your child" she mentioned at Rosie with a shake of her head. "And of course my door will always be opened for the two of you, or should I say the three of you now." She stopped, sighing. "All I want is for you to be happy, because that's all I've ever wanted. And of course I will take care of my granddaughter."
She stopped, not missing the way Leo's hand caught Jemma's as they leaned against each other.
"Even if it means not knowing when you'll be back, and involves lying to a child for her protection." she finished with a sad shake of her head. "But I wish… I wish you didn't have to."
"I wish we didn't have to either" Jemma spoke up, her voice raspy and tainted with emotions. "But we simply cannot let this situation go on any longer. Rosie's life is at stake, and so is everyone else's." She shared a glanced with her husband, and he nodded. "We have to protect her, at all costs, even if it means being away from her for a little while."
And who was Linda to judge? She would do anything for her child, and she knew how much it implied. She'd raised a son alone with barely even enough money to get him a proper education, and she'd often cried alone at the dinner table in the middle of the night. She knew the sacrifices of parenthood, and she also knew the heart of the two people standing in front of her in the kitchen at this very moment. Leo and Jemma were two of the most intelligent people in the world, and if they were here today, it also meant that they'd tried everything but this last solution.
"Tell me about her." she demanded then, throat tight and stomach in knots. "Tell me everything I need to know to keep this little girl safe."
Because there wasn't a single thing in the world that would prevent Linda Fitz from protecting her granddaughter through everything. And so Leo and Jemma started talking, their eyes shining with every little details they could think of, laughing and smiling as they told her about their little miracle. By the time they'd told her everything they could think of, their cups of tea in the living room were cold and Rosie was pacing anxiously in front of the couch.
"I'm done reading it two times over" she said when her parents walked into the living room again. "I'm hungry, mum."
"It's gonna be time for dinner soon" Leo replied gently, bending over to scoop her up in his arms.
Linda dreaded the question before it even slipped past her lips. "Are you staying for dinner?"
"We can't" Jemma apologized, her eyes falling on Rosie. "We've already spent too much time here."
Her hands found Rosie's back, rubbing it delicately as the little girl pushed her face against Leo's neck. For a little moment, the family embrace felt almost too intimate for Linda to watch as they hugged, squeezing Rose in between their bodies.
"Remember what we said?" Jemma whispered to her daughter, eyes wet with unshed tears. "Be good to Nana, alright? We'll be back very soon."
Rosie nodded against Leo's shoulder. "Yes, mummy."
"We love you to the moon and back again, you remember that monkey?"
"Yes, daddy. I love you to the moon and back, too."
When they finally found the strength to let go of her, their eyes were red and filled with tears. Rose only fussed for a moment before she realized it only made the situation worse, and she very quietly slipped away, sitting on the floor of the living room with her plush monkey. Jemma's hand immediately found Leo's as they looked at her one last time, and they squeezed each other tight for a few seconds.
"Linda, we'll never thank you enough." Jemma said, sniffing.
"Don't thank me" Linda immediately replied. "Just come back for her, alright?"
That night, as she rocked a teary little girl who was still basically a stranger to her to sleep, Linda Fitz allowed herself to let go of any restraints and mourned her son and his wife, and the moments they'd miss in their daughter's life.
(It felt so WEIRD to call Fitz "Leo" during the entire thing, but I really wanted to write as Linda, and we all know she's the only person in the world allowed to call her son Leo. Except for Jemma when she's mad, but that's another story entirely).
You can find me (and clown with me) on twitter /keptinonzebridg or on my fanfiction dedicated account /phlebotinum! xx