Summary: Hartley's life is flipped upside down on the day his parents are killed in a car accident. Not only does he learn that they were trying to get back in touch with him to reconcile, but they recently just had a baby girl. Hartley's sister, Jerrie. It's not going to be easy grieving and raising his sister and having to deal with everything their parents left behind, but Hartley's friends are there to show him he doesn't have to deal with it all alone.
(Established Barry/Cisco, eventual Barry/Cisco/Hartley)
Jerrie (Baby)
Jerrie was a very late in life baby for Rachel and Osgood Rathaway. The birth was hard on Rachel, even with opting for a c-section, and she doesn't even get to hold her baby until the day after she's born.
She's born perfect. This gorgeous bundle in Rachel's arms.
And she can't help it. She remembers holding another baby in her arms and thinking he was perfect too.
Her baby, Hartley, who has spent the last several years thinking his own parents hated him.
It's not the first time during her pregnancy that she's had cause to regret alienating her son, but it is the moment that she resolves to reconnect with Hartley. No matter what Osgood may choose for himself, she wants to do better by Hartley.
When she rewrites her will a few weeks later, Hartley is quietly added back in alongside the sister he has yet to meet. More reluctant, Osgood does the same thing.
And then Rachel hires a private detective to track down her missing son.
The afternoon Ralph Dibny was supposed to tell the Rathaways that he's found their son - spending time with Barry Allen, of all the most vexing discoveries - he arrives at their home only to have a screaming baby shoved into his arms by a very tearful nanny.
"They're dead," she tells him and Ralph looks down at the shrieking child he is most definitely not qualified to be holding. "Rachel and Osgood, they were killed in wreck this morning. Jerrie won't stop screaming. Child Protective Services is on their way."
Ralph sighed. "I know where Hartley is," he tells the frantic woman. "Look, if you take the kid back and call me when CPS shows up, I might be able to get this kid to her remaining family by the end of the day."
The nanny takes back the screaming child and Ralph breathes a huge sigh of relief, then heads back out to his car. If he's lucky, he'll still get paid for this. If Jerrie's lucky, then her big brother will take her in and protect his claim on her with lawyers as fast as possible.
Hartley is arms deep in the speed cage, dismantling the holographic projector so they can build a mobile projector half the size, when the intercom down the hall buzzes so loudly in his ears that he bangs his head on the lip of the cage's casing when he jumps at the noise.
Swearing under his breath and scowling at Cisco, who was too busy laughing to be of any use, Hartley stalked out of the room to go answer the summons. It was probably another package delivery for the not-apartment Harry was cobbling together on the abandoned third floor.
"This is Dr. Rathaway. Be right up," Hartley told whoever was in the main lobby, and then headed for the elevators. A few minutes later, Cisco having joined him on the way up, the two scientists were walking into the bright, friendly, very dusty and ignored main lobby for STAR Labs.
"Uh, hey. Dr. Rathaway? You're the one I'm here looking for." The brunet was tall and lanky and very, very attractive. He was also holding out a folder. "I'm a private investigator," he added, which made Hartley immediately wary.
The only people who'd bother hiring a PI to track him down were his parents and god only knew why they'd bother when, just a year ago, they wouldn't even admit he existed at the lowest point of his life. If they'd just spoken to him, listened... maybe he wouldn't have made a mess of things as the Pied Piper, a screw up he was still paying penance for despite having earned everyone else's forgiveness already.
"My parents hired you, didn't they?" Hartley, reluctantly, took the folder.
"Yes. They said they wanted to reconcile with you. Because of Jerrie." This time, the PI was holding out his own phone, showing a picture of a baby. "Congratulations, you're a big brother."
Numbly, Hartley picked up the phone too and stared at the baby in the photo. She was so tiny...
"I was supposed to deliver that folder to your parents today so that they could initiate contact with you, but..." the man hesitated. "Look, I'm sorry. There's no easy way to say this. They were in a car accident this morning and didn't survive.
"You're Jerrie's closest living relative now."
Hartley's not sure how he's still standing until he realizes Cisco is letting Hartley lean on him, murmuring soft, calming promises of support.
"They un-disowned you too, or whatever the right term for that is, so if you want custody of your sister and you know a good lawyer, it's pretty unlikely anyone will be able to take her from you."
It takes him a few moments to realize he's in shock. Cisco gets the PI's information - apparently there's a business card in the folder - and Dibny assures them more than a few times that Rachel and Osgood were sincere about reconciling with Hartley.
It was all Hartley had ever wanted to hear from his parents. And they'd intended to ask him back, to apologize for hurting him... to introduce him to his baby sister.
"Oh, god, I have a sister," Hartley mutters, too stunned to take in the rest. He wants to meet her. Hold her in his arms. Cry with her over what they've lost...
The moment Ralph leaves, Cisco calls Barry. The speedster is there in moments and pecks Cisco on the cheek, before hesitantly seeking permission to give Hartley a hug.
"I want to see my sister," Hartley says and Barry nods.
"Do you want me to run you there? What's y... what's the address?" In response, Hartley tells Barry the address, and then they're there, just around the corner, and Hartley needs a few moments to lean against a wall to get his equilibrium back.
Eventually, though, Hartley is ready and the head into the house - mansion, really - and a screaming, wailing baby is placed in Hartley's arms shortly after he proves he is who he says he is. Jerrie quiets almost immediately, hiccuping and raising pudgy little fingers towards Hartley's face.
Barry's never seen anyone fall in love so fast, but Hartley was already twined around those tiny fingers.
"Hi Jerrie. I'm your big brother, Hartley. I know everything is kind of scary right now, but I promise. I'm going to take good care of you."
Backing off to the side, Barry starts texting the situation to Joe. Hartley's going to need infant formula and loads of diapers and someone experienced to teach him how to change those diapers. And a good family lawyer who'll help keep that baby girl in her big brother's arms where she belongs.
Thankfully, Joe can help with all of those problems.
The lawyer Joe puts Hartley in contact with is quick and efficient; very good both at law and with kids. She drives out immediately as a favor to Joe and hammers out a list of what Hartley needs to do to get custody of Jerrie. The CPS representative has already agreed to Hartley's temporary custody of his sister at that point.
His estrangement from his parents are points against Hartley right now, but his parents wanting to reconcile helps mitigate that to some degree. Hartley's own work with the Freespace children's programs are working in his favor as he actually has taken the majority of the parenting courses required for foster parents.
"Finish those courses ASAP and it'll look even better for you," Lisa Hallet advised, setting aside the documents Hartley'd just signed to retain her services as a lawyer. "We'll need to see the contents of your parents wills, so I'll be contacting their lawyers to find out when the readings will be. They may have had someone lined up to take her in the event of their deaths and we'll need to be prepared for the possibility of them challenging you for custody. Any other relatives who may have been considered to act in loco parentis?"
"No. Both my parents were only children and all my grandparents are dead. No cousins either. A grand aunt in Oklahoma, but she's in an assisted living facility." They've got some extended family beyond that, but too distant to be able to challenge Hartley's claim to Jerrie. Probably too distant for CPS to even consider, anyway.
Friends of the family were another story entirely. "If they've already had her baptized, she'll have godparents. I don't know who they'd be. My godmother passed away a few years ago and my godfather..." Hartley shrugged.
Moira Queen had been there for Hartley even when his parents chose not to be, which had put a schism between them even before Moira's death. And August Randal had disappeared to parts unknown when Hartley was twelve. Hartley had been kept away from the arguments August had with his parents, but there were enough clues in retrospect for Hartley to suspect August had been in some way queer himself.
"You've got a good support network," Hallet said, breaking through Hartley's thoughts. "Don't forget to let them keep helping you through all this, okay?"
The reading of the wills reveals that Hartley's parents left nearly everything to him and Jerrie. Their company stocks, the house, their money and possessions...
Barry holds Jerrie while Cisco holds Hartley as he cries.
None of it's enough. Not really. Hartley never wanted his parents things. He just wanted his parents.
The only good news is that his parents hadn't named anyone else to raise Jerrie in their absence. And with no one to challenge Hartley's guardianship, Jerrie's his now. Free and clear.
Hartley takes time off from work. Babies need a lot of minding and he can't bear to let her out of his sight. But he's never really alone, either.
Caitlin shows up in the mornings, usually sending Hartley to go sleep while she putters around his apartment's living room with Jerrie, watching old Care Bears DVDs and Disney Princess movies. He's usually too exhausted to argue about it from all the getting up all hours of the night to feed Jerrie or change her diapers or walk around with her because something made her wake up shrieking. Not that he's going to argue about getting a few precious hours of sleep.
Hartley's starting to suspect Jerrie's sensitive to sounds as often she reacts to noises that most people wouldn't even notice. Things Hartley wouldn't have noticed if not for his enhanced hearing. Buying a white noise machine has her sleeping better and makes it easier for him to fall asleep during Caitlin's umpteenth replay of the Care Bears Countdown. (He tracks down some Rainbow Brite DVDs on Amazon for Caitlin to add to the rota, just for the extra variety, and convinces her to branch out into the Netflix kids catalog eventually, though the classic cartoons are still her favorites.)
Weekends Joe shows up, either Saturday or Sunday work permitting, and babysits while Hartley runs errands. Grocery store runs usually, but sometimes he'll just go wander his favorite stores for a while in order to get out of his head. And when Joe doesn't show up, Iris will and then she and Eddie will take Hartley out for dinner. Which is incredibly touching because Hartley barely knew either of them before all of this, yet here they are treating him like one of their own.
Weekday evenings, though, are when Cisco and Barry show up. They'll often bring dinner, or take Hartley out for dinner, and then stay at the apartment talking about anything and everything or watch Netflix with him or... the point is, they're over nearly every night. They're dating each other and Hartley knows he should tell them to spend more time together, go have a date night...
But Hartley likes the quiet, late nights where he falls asleep on Cisco's shoulder and wakes up in his bed the when Jerrie starts crying. Or evenings where he makes dinner with Barry in the cramped kitchen, each shuffling past each other and taste testing the food. He wants to keep them both for himself.
But in the midst of all this, Hartley has to pour through all the papers and things his parents left behind. Get access to their credit card accounts and close those. Their cell phone contracts have to be canceled and the phones wiped and donated. Hartley takes Jerrie with him to their parents home in the afternoons as he slowly dissects his parents lives and makes difficult choices about what to keep and to get rid of, one way or another.
Rachel's jewelry, some of which are heirlooms, is hard to go through. Osgood's cuff links and pins. He finds his mother's diaries and reads her most recent entries, trying to understand what changed their minds about him.
He goes through their books in the large study, getting rid of encyclopedia sets that were likely never read, sitting on the shelves for show. Photo albums he keeps, tracing the names and faces of half remembered family members long dead. He plans to digitize as many of the photos as he can, maybe research his family tree at some point so that he can tell Jerrie who these people were and where their family came from. Most of the rest of the books are in genres he's not interested in or rare copies of books probably bought more to show off the family wealth than because Rachel or Osgood were actually interested in reading them. He sets the older, more expensive looking books aside to eventually sell to someone who would appreciate an preserve them.
Hartley also has to settle things with the household staff. The nanny is the first to go and Hartley can't say he's sad to see the last of her. He can't tell if she just doesn't like children or doesn't like Jerrie, but he can say with certainty that she doesn't like him. Mostly because Hartley rather pointedly suggests that she's in the wrong line of work. (No one else may have heard her call Jerrie an unnatural, changeling child, but Hartley heard her.)
There's a maid service that he doesn't end quite yet, but lessens the times they come by the house to once a month. He doesn't have the time to clean his own apartment anymore, never mind an entire mansion. And Hartley's got dust allergies in addition to Jerrie's sensitive baby nose. Better to keep the service up until he can sell the place.
Hartley tries to let the butler go,; Archie should have been retired already. But the old man had worked for the Rathaways since Hartley was a child and he just gives Hartley a steady look and tells him that even if Hartley stops paying him, he'll show up every day to help settle Rachel and Osgood's affairs anyway.
"You shouldn't be in this place alone. I know your memories here are harder than they should be and if you need a minute alone, Jerrie likes me well enough that I can watch her for a spell."
Hartley knows he's got a point too, so Archie stays and helps with sorting the items that can be sold or donated or trashed, sings Irish lullabies to Jerrie when she's put down for an afternoon nap in her old room, and gently answers Hartley's questions about his parents lives for the last... nearly ten years.
And then, finally, Hartley runs out of excuses and looks into his old room. He expected to find it was turned into a guest room, all his childhood things gone.
It's exactly how he remembers it. And dust free too, like he'd just packed his things and been kicked to the street just yesterday. All his old clothes. The pictures of his high school boyfriend whom he'd only dated for a few weeks before they both decided the pressure of the secrecy was too much for them both. A few boys-love mangas hidden under the bed, a long forgotten pros-cons list for telling his parents he was gay hidden amongst them. Several PS2 games, though no console as Hartley had packed it and his three favorite games when he'd moved to the dorms. So he hadn't needed to worry about leaving it behind when his parents...
There's the false bottom drawer in the dresser where he'd stored all his most important documents. He'd packed them all when he got kicked out, but his social security card had been lost in the shuffle. He'd replaced it easily enough when he finally needed it for obtaining his passport during grad school (spring break in Mexico and way too much alcohol), but its finding the original that finally breaks the dam, as it were. Archie looks in on him to find Hartley sobbing on his childhood bed, grieving for the closure he can now never truly have.
He stays away from the house for the next few days after that, instead taking the time to visit Dibny and pay him what his parents had owed him for his services and to thank him for coming straight to him after his parents died.
Ralph seems like a nice guy trying a bit too hard to play the part of a hard-boiled noir detective. Hartley hopes he gets over whatever is haunting him one day.
It was Saturday and Barry had the day off, so unless there was a Flash emergency, he and Cisco had the whole day to themselves. Except...
"Is it bad that I wish we had Hartley and Jerrie here with us?" Cisco asked, flopping onto the couch.
"No," Barry settled beside him, stroking Cisco's hair. "We've been really happy together since we started dating, but... we've both been even happier all those evenings we've been spending with them."
The two sat in silence for a long moment before, hesitantly, Cisco spoke back up. "Do you think... do you think he'd be interested? In us? In, um..."
"Dating us?" Barry filled in.
"Yeah..." Cisco bit his lower lip nervously. "Would that be something you'd like? Because I..." he trailed off as Barry cupped his cheek and delicately ran his thumb along Cisco's abused lip.
"It's definitely worth discussing." Barry brushed a kiss against Cisco's mouth. "Don't want to rush into this without thinking it through, but... yeah. I'd like it if our relationship meant not just you and me, but you and me and Hartley."
Cisco hummed, a pleased smiled lighting up his face. "You know, just a year and a half ago, I still hated him. Now I can't imagine our lives without him around."
"I know what you mean. He's changed a lot... but so have we." A wry grin stole its way across Barry's face. "I mean, I didn't take fifteen years to ask you out, right?"
Cisco laughed and kissed Barry's cheek. "Definitely an improvement there."
Hartley blinked at his alarm clock. Had he really just...
Getting up, he quietly walked over to the crib. Jerrie was still asleep. And not a peep all night which meant... Jerrie just slept through the whole night for the first time.
He's still celebrating, dancing with Jerrie - to the baby's delight - when Caitlin gets there. She lets herself in with the spare key he gave her and turns on his coffee maker, giggling at the sight he makes.
"And now she just needs to make this a habit," Caitlin agreed, plucking the giggling Jerrie out of her brother's arms. "You're gonna let your big brother get a consistent night's sleep, right sweetie?" Caitlin booped Jerrie on the nose, grinning at the scrunched up face the baby made in response. "Yes you are. 'Cause you're a good little sister, you are."
"I've been thinking. I don't need to do it yet, but sometimes in the next year or so I should probably look at getting a bigger apartment so Jerrie can have her own room. And also so I can have my own room again."
"Wanna look at apartment floor plans to get an idea of what you want down the road?" Caitlin grinned and added, "I found the first season of Ghostwriter we can watch in the background."
"No! No way, you didn't," Hartley burst out laughing. They'd been talking about their favorite PBS shows from their own childhood the other morning. Caitlin was all about Wishbone, but Hartley'd thought Ghostwriter was the superior show. "Did you know Samuel L Jackson was in Ghostwriter?"
"You may have mentioned it once or twice or a few dozen times already." She snickered when Hartley stuck his tongue out at her. "So lets watch this thing already. Because I don't remember him being there at all, but IMDB agrees with you. Three episodes and they'd better be first season episodes or I'm going to be very disappointed," she nodded her head to the purse she'd left on the counter. "DVDs are in there."
"As you command," Hartley joked, retrieving the DVD case and heading over to the TV.
Not only were all three episodes in the first season, it turned out he was in the very first episode. Barely, but enough considering the stars were the kids.
"You need to take a day off and just sleep," Cisco said. "You're more exhausted than Barry and he just finished stopping a bank robbery."
"But I also had, like, three coffees since then," Barry interjected from the kitchen where he was putting some frozen pizzas in the oven.
"Caffeine doesn't work on you, though," Hartley objected with a yawn. "Which I guess just further's 'Sco's point..." he listed to the side for a moment and then straightened up in his seat on the couch.
Sitting next to him, Cisco snickered in amusement. "You okay there, Hart?"
"Didn't sleep well last night. Neighbor's kid had a late night party 'cause today's a school holiday. Music didn't stop until two and then I had the meeting with the antique's dealer at eight... and this afternoon I finally started going through the art collection. What'd they even need all those paintings for? How often did they even look at them?" He yawned again and then leaned back, let his head flop against the top of the couch cushion so that he was staring at the ceiling. "I'm think of getting them appraised and then donating them to a charity auction or something. There was one absolutely awful piece in bright yellows and oranges that made Jerrie start crying just to look at it."
"Brighter colors tend to cause greater eye strain," Cisco observed. "Particularly yellow."
"Yeah..." another yawn and Hartley gave up. "Barry, I'm using your boyfriend as my pillow," he declared, cuddling against Cisco's side.
"You do that," Barry agreed, laughing. "He's a very comfy pillow."
"What, do I get no say in this?" Cisco teased, warm laughter bubbling out of him.
Cisco's laughter is always warm, Hartley thinks as his brain goes extra sluggish. "Nope. Comfy pillow..."
Jerrie started fussing, though, and Hartley jolted back up.
"I got it," Cisco said, getting up. "Diaper changing time, I think."
When Jerrie was changed, Cisco brought her over and let Hartley cuddle her close while she cooed happily and haphazardly clapped her hands together. But when Hartley glanced back up at Cisco, there was a look on Cisco's face that made Hartley sort of freeze up even as his face flushed. Because...
But then Cisco was looking away to check on Barry in the kitchen and Hartley could breathe again. Had he just imagined...
After the last of the pizza was finished off (by Barry) and Jerrie was settled down for the night, Hartley came back into the living room to find Barry and Cisco giving each other pointed looks and gestures. "Do I need to make some popcorn to go with this show?" Hartley asked.
"Nope," Barry squeaked, blushing.
"Um... Hartley." Cisco licked his lips nervously. He glanced at Barry, who just nodded. "There's something we've been wanting to talk to you about."
Caitlin took Jerrie for the whole day when Hartley asked.
He slept in late after the ladies were gone. Then he took a relaxing bubble bath in his slightly cramped tub after lunch, reading a book on his tablet while he lounged in the hot, vanilla scented water while sipping a glass of white wine. Once he was out and dressed in his comfiest pajamas and snuggled in his soft robe, Hartley sat down at his desk out in the living room and started a pros-cons list, a cup of lavender and honey chamomile tea sitting next to him.
Pro: He had been idly fantasizing about what'd be like to be actually dating Cisco and Barry, so this would be a literal dream come true.
Con: Joe was probably not going to approve and he was really hoping to work up the courage to ask Joe to be Jerrie's Grandpa Joe, what with not having any biological grandparents left to speak of.
Pro: Maybe Joe could be bribed to be okay with it by asking him to be Grandpa Joe to Jerrie? It'd be a few years at least until Iris and Eddie had a kid to call him Grandpa, after all.
Con: He had an awful time managing relationships with just one person at a time, how was he going to manage with two boyfriends?
Pro: He was already looking into finding a therapist and was already doing a lot better managing his more self-destructive tendencies these days, especially for Jerrie's sake.
Pro: Barry and Cisco adored Jerrie and she was quite taken with them too.
Pro: The sex would probably be fantastic.
Pro: Hartley really missed morning cuddles and surely at least one of them was a cuddler too.
Con: He was terrified of change. What if he ruined two of the best friendships he'd ever had?
Pro: He had a good feeling about this. And he really, really wanted to try.
Con: His bed was way too tiny to handle three grown men.
Pro: He wanted a new place anyway, so maybe a new bed that needed some breaking in was in order.
Setting aside his pen, Hartley smiled wryly. Now he was just being silly.
More pros than cons. That was always nice to see.
Hartley still had no idea what sex with Barry and Cisco was like, but... he did know they both liked morning cuddles. Nudging the two warm bodies sandwiched around Hartley on his far too small for three bed, Hartley muttered, "Jerrie's fussing. Let me up. Time for breakfast."
Yawning widely, Cisco sat up and shifted out of Hartley's way, looking far too cute in the pajamas he'd brought along for date night. Just preparing ahead, had been Cisco's explanation when he gleefully pulled out his Star Wars themed night clothes the evening before.
If they were ever going to do more than sleep in bed together, they were going to have to get someone to babysit over night. But...
Holding Jerrie in his arms and greeting her with a, "good morning, baby. Let's go warm up some delicious formula, huh?" Hartley glanced back at the bed to see two faces staring at him with adoring - and adorable - grins.
Hartley was okay taking it slow. Moments like this were more important anyway.
Joe - who is very happy to start calling himself Grandpa Joe to Jerrie after all - takes Jerrie from Hartley's arms so that Hartley, Barry, and Cisco can have a date night to themselves. He'll get Jerrie back in the morning (and Hartley blushes every time it occurs to him Joe knows perfectly well what Hartley and Cisco want to be getting up to with his son tonight) and Hartley's anxious about being parted from her. She had a bad cold the last few days that's finally subsided to general crankiness, but it was the first bad fever she's had and Hartley's not over how anxious that made him.
"You're a good brother," Joe observes quietly as Hartley uses a magnet to stick the emergency numbers - Jerrie's doctor and the lead nurse practitioner at the pediatricians office - on Joe's fridge in case Jerrie relapses. "And a good dad."
Hartley smiles quietly over at Joe. "Thank you. That's... thank you." It means a lot to hear that from Joe, who loves his kids so much and is loved so very much by them in return. Hartley knows he's just Jerrie's brother, but he is basically her dad now too and... it scares him sometimes still. He'd never really thought he'd have kids of his own.
But if anyone tried to take Jerrie away, they'd have a fight on their hands.
"Have fun on your date," Joe tells him and waves Hartley off to join Cisco and Barry in the living room.
The date is fun at first, but Hartley's anxious and unsettled and feeling increasingly, uncomfortably warm. It takes him far longer than it ought to realize it's not just anxiety killing his appetite, but that he's actually unwell. He'd been looking forward to their first real date, just the three of them, for a while now and Hartley hates to ruin the evening. But eventually he's got no choice.
Pushing his dinner plate a few inches forward, Hartley tells his boyfriends, "I think I caught Jerrie's cold."
Barry's hand is pressed against Hartley's forehead in moments. "You don't have a fever yet that I can tell, but you feel clammy. Let's get you home."
Meanwhile, Cisco was already flagging down the waiter for their check.
Hartley's listless the whole ride back to his apartment, hating that he's ruined the date and unhappy knowing he should ask Joe to keep Jerrie until Hartley's well again. He wants his little girl back already and he's half worked himself up into tears when he realizes... they're not at his apartment.
They're back at Joe's house.
Confused, Hartley waits quietly with Cisco on the bottom steps of the stairs while Barry goes to talk with Joe about... about keeping Hartley here while he's sick? Why would they want to...
"We don't want you to be alone," Cisco murmured softly against Hartley's hair and he realized he must've been talking out loud for some of that. "And you'll feel better the closer you are to Jerrie."
Joe is, thankfully, good with this plan. Cisco leaves to fetch more clothes from Hartley's apartment - both for Hartley and Jerrie - and Barry leads Hartley up to his room. "Jerrie'll be in Iris' old room, right on the other side of that wall," Barry told him. "I'll be sleeping in there with her so you can get some uninterrupted sleep and if she needs anything, Joe or I will see to it, alright?"
"Thanks, Bar," Hartley shucked off his clothes to change into the pajamas Barry had provided for him. "Sorry I ruined our date."
"You didn't ruin it," Barry promised, kissing Hartley's cheek. "We'll have other dates anyway. Get some rest; Cisco'll want to check on you when he gets back with the clothing and some of Jerrie's toys and books."
Despite himself, Hartley fell asleep with a smile, not even waking when Cisco slipped in for a few moments later on that evening.
Jerrie throws an absolute screaming fit when Hartley's too sick to hold her the next morning. But Hartley's feverish and absolutely should not be holding the baby. Even though he most definitely caught his cold from her, better safe than sorry when it came to keeping Jerrie from getting sick again. But with all the shrieking, Hartley couldn't sleep either.
So he sent Barry to get one of the books from Hartley's old bedroom in the mansion (which he'd finally started cataloging now that he was running out of his parents things to inventory). Barry was giving the cover curious looks when he handed it over. Then, while Joe sat with Jerrie and Hartley lay on the couch (and Barry sat on the floor, back against the couch), Hartley started to read aloud.
"The Mennyms, by Sylvia Waugh. Chapter one," Hartley said, voice nasally and weird sounding to him. But Jerrie went quiet, save for hiccuping a little as she calmed down. A little sniffling, too, as her nose cleared from the crying. "The Letter. Dear Sir Magnus," he read, skipping over the address to get to the actual story. "Seems strange, me writing a letter like this to a sir and all that..."
Hartley's voice was too scratchy to go on after the second chapter, for all that the chapters were quite short, and he handed the book down to Barry, who kept reading in his stead. Thankfully, Jerrie liked Barry's reading voice well enough and Hartley fell asleep to the story of life-sized living dolls trying to live like normal people while hiding what they really are (quite difficult with button eyes).
He woke up to Cisco reading from the second book and the smell of chicken soup wafting through the house from the kitchen. Wondering, idly, when Cisco had arrived, Hartley smiled softly, rolled on his side, and enjoyed the sound of his voice.
"Okay, Jerrie," Hartley told her, bouncing her on his lap, "I don't expect you to say brother first. It's a hard word. I'll settle for something simpler, you know... baby steps." He grinned impishly and Jerrie blew a raspberry at him, presumably for the pun. "Already a critic," he teased, tickling her belly with one hand while supporting her back with the other. "So lets start with ba-ba. I'm definitely cool with being referred to with sheep noises if its you."
"That's so adorable," Cisco piped up, softly closing the door behind him. Barry was, presumably, still asleep in the other room. "I can help her with that. Come on, Jerrie," he teased, settling beside Hartley on the couch and leaning against his shoulder. "Baaa at Hartley with me. Baaa, baaa."
Jerrie just giggled and clapped her hands.
"She'll get there," Hartley said, kissing the top of Cisco's head and cuddling Jerrie closer. "You dork."
"Love you too, Hart. And you too, Jer," he added, giving Jerrie's foot a light tug.
As Barry zombie shuffled out of the bedroom towards the kitchen, Hartley grinned contentedly. He couldn't ever remember feeling this happy before.