Title: The Gift

Author: lyricalpeach

Summary: Follow-up to Bless the Broken Road, future speculation. No ER action.

Rating: T

Disclaimer: Without Prejudice. All the ER characters are property of NBC. No infringements of these copyrights are intended, and are used here without permission. Please don't sue me. The other words are my own. Please don't steal.

Notation: Ray's thoughts 'Neela's thoughts' Abby's thoughts

Chapter 5

It was late afternoon the Tuesday after Thanksgiving. They'd worked Thanksgiving, in order to save the time off for after the baby arrived, but after such a typically long, rough Thanksgiving weekend at the hospital, they'd taken off this first day of December off.

The door had been propped open, letting the cold air seep up the stairs onto their floor lobby. Thump, thump, thump, thump. Thunk! Loud clunking and a few expletives came drifting up periodically. Finally, Ray's head appeared from the middle of the stairwell. The stairwell is soooooo cold! His teeth were chattering slightly.

"Ray?" Neela called sweetly from their door. "How are you doing?" Ray'd instructed her to rest and stay warm and comfortable inside.

Ray finally exited the stairwell and closed the door. Instantly he felt warmer. "Fine, babe," Ray called back, "I'm almost there." Huffing and puffing as little as possible, he dragged the tree up the last steps and around the stairwell to the door. Why did I refuse Brett's offer for help? Macho dumbass that I am..

"I pushed the couch over so that you could get it into the corner by the window." Neela held the door open just with her fingertips, turning and stepping as far out of the way as possible.

Ray looked concerned and annoyed. "You're not supposed to be moving heavy things."

Neela reassured him, "I used those plastic slider thingies that go under each leg, it's fine.." Seeing the look coming over Ray's face, she started feeling timid right away.

"You lifted the couch UP??!" Ray roared at her. "Why would you do something so risky!" Stop yelling at her!

"Sorry," Neela, squeaked out.

"I'm sorry, babe," Ray dropped the tree and stepped over to hug her, "I didn't mean to yell like that."

"I know, it's ok."

"Don't be scared, baby," Ray bent down and kissed Neela's tummy. "Daddy was just scared that Mommy would get hurt." Neela smiled. 'He's so sweet, ever the overprotective husband and father-to-be.' "I'll just put it up over there."

"Ray, could you move it a little to the left?" "Oh wait, now a little to the right…" "Can you squeeze it a little closer to the wall?"

Ray made faces at Neela as she directed him, tweaking his movements. "You don't celebrate Christmas yet you are the most anal person about tree selection and placement."

"It's just blocking the light coming in a little too much…" Neela started, and then stopped. "We are celebrating because it's fun and because we want to make our own family traditions." Neela smiled widely.

Ray grinned and headed to the closet to pull out the twinkle lights and the few ornaments they'd shopped for in the last month. There weren't many, but Ray had told her he had some; old and new together and they would be enough to cover sparingly the side of the tree facing into the room.

"Here, babe, sit here and hand them to me one at a time and I'll put them up," Ray told Neela, as he pulled a chair over and peered upwards. The tree was tall enough that he'd need to stand on a chair to trim the highest branches. Why'd I get such a big tree? He pulled over another chair to the other side of the tree, so he couldn't fall on Neela.

Neela opened the box of the new ones and handed them to Ray, and as they finished the last box of new ones, she picked up the box of Ray's childhood ornaments labeled 'Fragile'. Opening it, she found several handmade ones on top, including a felt Santa and reindeer, a toothpick gingerbread house and a styrofoam snowman – 'Ray must have made these in primary school.' She absently handed those to Ray, and noticed a box labeled in script, 'For Ray'. Gently pulling it out, she opened it to find a hand-blown glass star, beautifully crafted, and cut in a snowflake pattern in the center. Neela gasped at how lovely it was, and felt a hand on her shoulder.

Ray had stepped down from trimming the tree and had been watching Neela unwrap his star. "That was a gift from my grandparents when I was little," Ray said slowly, "and I haven't opened it again since they gave it to me." He rubbed Neela's shoulders, massaging gently. "I was waiting until I had a real reason to celebrate Christmas, and a family." Neela knew he'd craved the kind of Christmas his parents had never given him. Those handmade ornaments and the star had been waiting a long, long time. Last year they were too busy and the old apartment was in disarray because they had expected they'd be moved by then. Rather than unpack, they'd had a simple gift exchange and dinner with friends in the ER.

Neela turned around as Ray kneeled down by the side of her chair. He took the star from her and put it down painstakingly on the rug in front of her, then put his arms around her belly and his ear down to listen to their baby moving inside. "And now this star will have its place on our tree," Ray said softly, as he picked up the star and climbed the other chair carefully to place the star atop their first family Christmas tree.

"It's beautiful," Neela breathed, "I can't believe how lovely it looks up there." She stood up and moved over to sit down on their new couch for a better view. Ray sat down next to her, and she rested her head on his shoulder. Ray hugged her to him tightly, his arm wrapped around her shoulders, and they watched the light catch in the snowflake pattern.

"That's because of us, we're a family." Ray's eyes glistened as he looked at the star atop the tree, and then down to his wife. "It's because of you."

Neela turned to him slowly, unable to reposition herself very well. Ray laughed and said, "Don't worry, baby, I'll do the maneuvering here…" as he deftly twisted his body and wrapped his other arm around her to kiss her deeply. Pulling back just for a moment, he whispered, "I love you, Neela." She saw that intensity in his eyes and wished for the baby to come and the healing time to pass so they could share that special closeness again.

"I love you, Ray." She kissed him, tongue tickling his lips, and reached for him. Surprised, he pulled away.

"Neela? You know we can't," he began. Neela was only a week from her due date, and he didn't want to risk anything. Over the last couple of months they'd slowed down and finally stopped, to prevent any early labor. It had been hard to resist, even pregnant she was the sexiest, most beautiful woman on earth to him, and on top of that, she was literally glowing with happiness.

Neela put a finger to his lips. "No, we can't do that," she said, "but there are other things I can do for you." Ray's face smiled and became an almost giddy grin, pleased she was thinking about him.

"Mmmm…." Ray relaxed, as Neela began tending to him. "Oh, Neela…" Ray's head started spinning. "Oh, baby..."

Neela pulled back suddenly, and Ray was startled, and immediately looked concerned. "What, what is it?" Neela looked up at Ray. "I think she thought you were calling HER!"

"What?!"

"Time to go!" Neela sang out.

000