The hospital loomed over her, like a scary fortress in one of AJ's books. She had already been inside the fortress, she had already seen the monster inside, but AJ hadn't. AJ hadn't been exposed to the quiet, lifeless form of Sterling Archer. The last time she had see her father, Archer had been bubbly and goofy, he had been blowing raspberries on her tummy, booping her nose and had been an overall goofball, ignoring Lana who had still been mad at him at the time.
Lana glanced in the rear view mirror, and saw AJ playing with the teddy bear Archer had given her for her birthday. He had bought her an exuberant amount of gifts, but this was the only one that he had actually put effort into instead of just buying the most expensive gifts off the shelf, and AJ could to tell. She pressed the front paw of the bear, and Archer's voice saying, "Danger Zone," with his usual theatrics, rang through the car, causing AJ to burst into a fit of giggles.
Lana and Archer had been at a low point of their relationship when he had bought the bear, and he had said that he wanted AJ to have a piece of him no matter what state his relationship with Lana was. Lana had thought it was sweet of him at the time, and had fallen back into his bed that night, she was eternally grateful now that if anything happened to him, AJ would still have the bear. The giggling had died down in the back, and Lana turned around to see AJ clutching the bear to her chest, "I miss daddy," AJ said sadly.
"Me too baby," Lana told her, placing a comforting hand on her knee, "Do you know what we are doing?" Lana asked her, she had tried to go over what had happened with AJ, but she had not seemed to grasp the idea.
"Like in general or here?" AJ asked, Archer's dumb face written all over hers.
Lana shook her head, and tried to force herself through the next part, "Here. Daddy got very injured and his body is having a hard time fixing itself. He is still okay, but he is going to be asleep until his body can fix itself."
"How long?" AJ asked, looking up at her mother with big hazel eyes.
"I don't know, baby," Lana said truthfully, her heart hurt as AJ's eyes filled with tears. She pulled the bear away from her chest and pressed the little paw again.
"I love you AbbieJean, I hope you are having a badass day," Archer's voice said. Lana had originally been furious that he had cussed in her teddy bear, to which he had argued that ass was not in fact a cuss word. She couldn't find it in her to be mad at now, especially as her baby was now full on crying.
Lana got out of the car, swinging AJ's backpack onto her shoulder before freeing AJ from her car seat and pulling her into her arms. All of AJs limbs wrapped around Lana, the toddler crying into the crook of her neck, "It's going to be okay baby, we just have to be brave until daddy wakes up," she told her, stroking the toddler's hair, trying to push away her own tears. AJ nodded into her neck, but kept crying,
"We'll be okay baby."
The room was like any other hospital room: quiet, bland and sterile. Malory was sitting in the chair beside the bed, not getting up to greet them, she barely nodded to acknowledge their presence. Lana sat down in the chair beside her, AJ in her lap. AJ paid little attention to Malory, her focus entirely on Archer. Lana tried to make small talk with Malory: "Any improvements? Have you gotten any sleep? Do you need food?" the usual. AJ had been antsy the whole time, squirming in Lana's arms. She would glance between the two of them occasionally, but her attention always snapped back to Archer. After some struggling, AJ finally broke free of Lana and crawled on to the hospital bed. Lana went to stop her, but Malory put a hand up to stop her, "I don't think she can do anymore harm to him."
"Daddy..." AJ said quietly, barely a whisper as she looked for a sign of poked him, lifted his hand just for it to fall back into place,
"Daddy...daddy," she repeated , louder each time, trying to get him to react. Lana swore she could hear her heart breaking, Malory was outright sobbing beside her. AJ was getting upset now, she took a deep breath, scrunched up her face, and yelled, "DADDY!" at the top of her lungs. Lana felt a small smile break through the pain, she was definitely Archer's daughter, but her baby girl was starting to sob, and that had to be her first priority.
Lana motioned towards her and AJ crawled back into her lap, crying into her neck. Lana tried to console her, but nothing seemed to be working, even Malory was rubbing her back, trying to help. "Hey baby, do you want to show grandma what you brought daddy?" Lana asked her. She nodded slightly and Lana handed her off to Malory. She was still hiccuping, but seemed to be doing better.
"What did you bring?" Malory asked her as Lana dug through the backpack. She pulled out a framed picture and handed it to AJ.
"Me and daddy," AJ said showing Malory the picture. The picture had been Archer's favorite, AJ's as well. Lana always claimed that it was an okay picture, but she loved the picture as well. The picture was of Archer holding an eighteen-month-old AJ, he was in the middle of booping her nose, and she had broken out into a fit of giggles. Lana didn't know what deity had allowed for the picture to be taken, but between the giggling AJ and Archer's broad smile, she was sure she had never seen Archer happier.
"That's nice dear," Malory said, and Lana could hear the tears in her voice, as she looked at the picture of the pair. "What else did you bring?" AJ looked at Lana and opened and closed her hand towards Lana, asking for the next thing. Lana smiled at her and handed her the picture she had drawn for Archer. It was mostly just two sticks, one considerably shorter than the other and a bunch of colorful scribbles, but Lana was sure the message still came through.
"Drew daddy and me," AJ informed Malory, pointing at the tall stick as she said daddy, and the short stick when she said herself, Malory was definitely crying now. "You okay grandma?" AJ asked, reaching up to touch Malory's face.
"I am fine, princess," Malory told her, forcing a smile. Lana had known her for long enough to know she was not okay. "Did you bring anything else?"
"Yeah I brought a book," AJ said, again motioning towards Lana. She handed her the book, and she hugged it to her. "Read it to daddy," she told Malory, showing her the book.
"Do you want to go ahead and read it to him?" Lana asked AJ.
"Yes!" AJ said excitedly, nodding her head dramatically. Lana picked her up and sat her down next to Archer. AJ quickly made herself comfortable, and started dramatically telling Archer her story. She was mostly rattling off nonsense, saying a few words that she remembered from the story, but it was cute nonetheless.
"So how are you really doing?" Lana asked Malory once AJ was absorbed in the book. Malory didn't answer the question, but instead went to pour herself a glass of bourbon from the bottle on the side table. She took a few sips before downing the rest of the drink.
"Not great," she finally answered, staring at her son and granddaughter.
"It's been a rough time. I hate that AJ has to see him like this," Lana said, watching her daughters arms wave and flail as she told Archer the most animated version of her story possible.
"Well, at least he didn't completely suck at everything," Malory said pouring another drink and taking a huge swig of it and staring at the picture of Archer and AJ.
"He has done alright with that one thing. He may be a giant shithead, but he was patient, kind and just an overall good father when it came to AJ. I swear she gets a different Archer than anybody else in the entire world did," Lana said, willing the tears in her eyes to go away.
"I told you it was a good idea," Malory told her, a small smile on her face.
"And to think, I thought you were crazy. This is the one and only time I will ever tell you, you were right," Lana told her.
"You know, I don't think there is a single picture of Sterling and I, plenty of him and Woodhouse, he was there for every aspect of Sterling's life, but I wasn't," Maloy said tracing a finger down the picture.
"Well, you are here now, and at least AJ won't be able to say the same," Lana said putting a comforting hand on Malory's shoulder, surprised when she didn't shake it off. She just continued staring at the picture, probably reliving all of the moments that she had let Archer down, though that would be literally every moment. Lana looked back at her little girl and the man that she hated to admit was the love of her life. AJ was excitedly talking about princesses and astronauts, the book discarded. Lana had known that using Archers sperm without his permission had been a bitch move, but she wouldn't change that decision for anything in the world.