Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended.
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Peter sat in the chair next to Claire's bed, exhausted and still a little nervous about the attending physicians' grumbles about having security come and escort him out.
But all that was over now. Peter had thrown a fit of gigantic proportions - threatened all sorts of lawsuits, and name-dropped every obstetrician that he'd ever worked with, every study he could think of or make sound convincing.
In the end it had worked. Claire's doctor had relented, and she'd given birth naturally.
She named him Daniel.
His middle name was Noah, after her dad.
Mrs. Petrelli rolled her eyes and made a comment about 'biblical southerners'. But no one seemed to mind. Everyone was happy, ecstatic.
A name for each of her fathers, she said with a smile on her face. Then she announced that she had given her son the last name Petrelli. It shocked Nathan to the point where he needed to sit down.
Claire merely touched the soft cheeks of the baby nestled against her, and said that she had grown so close to all of them, felt so connected to the Petrelli's during the pregnancy, that she wanted to thank them in a small way.
Heidi understood then. Claire meant to honor them, and while the reasoning and execution were a little awkward, the sentiment was…very sweet.
Besides, as Nathan said, little Daniel really looked like a Petrelli. He had Claire's mouth, for certain, but the rest, well. Full on Petrelli. He had a long torso and dark hair that curled around his ears – so much hair!
Claire made a sarcastic remark about Peter's long locks, that Daniel would probably get a haircut before Peter did. She was never too tired to tease him, thought Heidi.
Daniel also had the beautiful Petrelli eyes that Nathan and Peter and her boys had all lucked out on. Large and dark and varnished in gold, framed by long eyelashes
Bennet turned to goo, quite literally, as soon as he laid eyes on his grandson. It was odd to see such a large, stoic man nearly cowed by the tiny face that peeked out of a red blanket. And Claire's mother was over the moon, frantically ordering them to use antiseptic gel every three seconds.
Claire was glowing, a proud new mother with pink cheeks as Heidi circled her, taking dozens of photos. Claire and Bennet. Claire and Nathan. Claire and her brothers. Two with Claire and Peter, because Claire said she blinked in the first one.
It was a beautiful day, not even marred when the CNA brought the birth certificate papers. No one noticed but Peter; they were too taken with the little creature with tiny toenails.
The CNA helped her to sit up a bit, propped a pillow behind Claire's back so she could lean over the table to write. She picked up a pen and filled out her name, then Daniel's.
Peter tried not to stare at the line, at I that /I line, pretended to look away when her pen paused over the piece of paper.
And then she caught him staring. Just a quick flick of her eyes to his before he looked away.
Claire cleared her throat softly, and asked the CNA if she could fill that line out later.
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Claire and Daniel lived for nearly three months in Nathan Petrelli's home. She had a little wooden bassinette in her old room, and spent most of her time there. She emerged for meals and sometimes she'd come out in the evenings, sometimes with Daniel, sometimes alone because he was napping.
She went to the gym for an hour three days a week. Claire would let Heidi watch Daniel in that time. The only time Claire spent away from her son. Heidi had insisted that exercise after the first one was crucial in order to stay out of Mom Pants, and somehow convinced Claire to keep up the gym membership.
But really, Heidi knew it was more than that. Exercise released endorphins, and it got Claire out of the house for a little bit. Which was good for Claire.
All of the Petrelli's loved Daniel. Mrs. Petrelli was known to dawdle the hand of the child, and Nathan, wonder of wonders, fed him a bottle every once in awhile. And there was no one more baby-crazy than Heidi, who would have had ten children if she'd had her way.
Peter was still traveling with Mohinder a lot, but tried to make it a point to visit New York more often. Usually on the weekend. He would stay with his brother when he did, and was one of the few people Claire permitted into her room. He always left the door open, wide open, and Heidi had grown used to the sound of Peter bouncing the baby as he walked the floor and chatted about this and that with Claire.
It was over dinner during one of his weekend visits that Claire announced she was moving out. That she'd found a little apartment in Chelsea with great rent, and she was going to be gone in a week.
Just like that. Said it very matter-of-factly.
May as well have dropped a bomb in the middle of Heidi's chicken marsala.
Why and how were at the top of Nathan's list, and he tried not to yell when he said the words.
Claire said that it was nothing against all of them, just that she thought she needed her own space, that she and Daniel needed to have their own place. She'd loved her time here, real-
Nathan interrupted her loudly, and asked how in the hell she was going to pay for it all.
Peter watched as she took a brave little breath and said that she had found a job.
Nathan was at his nastiest, saying tersely that whatever a 21-year-old in her position could make money at wouldn't pay enough to keep her in an apartment. He added the word legally in an ominous fashion.
The words tripped out of her mouth quickly, before anyone could interrupt. She had found a job doing transcription work from home, so she could stay home with Daniel. That she was still going to school online and she was going to work and it was all going to be fine.
Nathan snorted and got up from the table abruptly, throwing his napkin onto the table as he shot a dirty look at his daughter. He marched purposefully into his office.
The rest of the family was deathly silent as they sat at the dinner table. Peter wouldn't look at Claire's face. He just gripped and re-gripped the tablecloth that spilled onto his lap.
Heidi winced when she heard her husband ask tersely if Bennet was there. She turned to Claire when the shouting began.
Claire tried to speak to her, but Heidi just shook her head and raised a hand softly, told Claire that she was not ready for this.
Claire smiled sadly at her dinner plate, and slipped away from the table.
Peter followed.
She told him to go away as she stamped up the stairs.
He stood at the bottom of the stairs for a few minutes, just getting madder and madder. And then he went up the stairs. She didn't want to talk, fine. Well he did.
He pounded at Claire's door and called her name, that if she didn't answer right then he was going to go in.
But she did answer. She said just a minute and he heard her undoing the lock on the door. She opened the door but did not invite him in, just turned and went back to fiddling with some clothes in a drawer.
Peter shook his head in frustration and tried not to yell as he spoke to her. Why was she shutting him out like this? What was wrong, what had he done? They had been close, really close, he thought. She used to trust him. What had he done wrong?
She played dumb at first, said that nothing was wrong, nothing at all. And that she trusted him a lot, of course!
She spoke the last words with a healthy dose of sarcasm mixed with an amount of anger that took him aback for a moment. Peter didn't have any clue why she was mad at him. He hadn't done anything.
Then she tersely invited him to leave her room.
He said that this was bullshit, and she angrily told him not to cuss in front of the baby, gestured at the bassinette.
This silenced him for a minute, but then he tried again.
He hoped his voice was calmer as he spoke this time. She hadn't told him about the baby. She didn't tell him about moving out. Why?
Claire turned away from him, her hands leaning on the dresser that held Daniel's baby clothes. She said that she had just told him about moving out, that she hadn't known about it till just this afternoon.
And then she faced him.
As for the baby…her baby. That was her business.
And she looked at him for a long, long time.
He cleared his throat uncomfortably. He left her then, went back down the stairs to the sounds of his big brother's voice echoing off the walls.
