"I died here."

Tate's voice breaks Violet out of her reverie of rubbing coco butter on her stomach. Supposedly, it's supposed to decrease the chances of stretch marks, or so Leah says. Come to find out the kooky psychic's right: she is having a girl. No. They're—her and Tate—having a girl. For days, it seems like; she can't do anything to wipe the smug look off of his face. We can still have an alien, she justifies defiantly in her head, but he repeats what he said—I died here—and any thought about the gender is lost. "What?"

"I died here. This," he gestures to her room, "used to be mine."

He's sitting on the floor, indian-style, shuffling card after card. Violet sinks from the bed to sit beside him, to he begins to deal. "I figured you didn't know." Violet confesses, awkwardly. It isn't exactly everyday your baby-daddy has been dead longer than you've been alive. "Do you remember it?" She urges, gently. He shakes his head and gives a tiny shrug. "Why didn't you tell me?"

"Oh, yeah, that'll be a solid move," he comments with a bitter laugh. "Hi, I'm Tate. I'm dead. Wanna hook up? Yeah, I don't think so." He stops shuffling to put his hand on her stomach. Violet usually wants to punch people when they do it to her, especially random strangers, but when it's Tate it's…special. She wonders if her parents did this when her mom was pregnant with her. The little girl decides to kick and Tate's smile can light up her normally dimly lit room. "Whoa. That's never going to get old to me." Violet wants to tell him that oh, she knows, because ever since the baby found out she can use her mother's womb to practice her Gymnastics, he's been saying that phrase over, and over, and over again.

"What are we going to do now?" She asks after a moment, carelessly leaving her cards to be seen by the notorious cheater beside her.

"Well, you take a card, and then discard…"

"No." She says, giving a soft laugh. "I mean what are we going to do? What will we tell her when she brings home a boyfriend and she introduces a dad that looks the same age as she is."

Tate gives her a hard, stern look. "She's never dating, or some stereotypical shit I'm supposed to say, and we'll take it day by day. It's you and me, for always."

"You know Billie, that crazy psychic your mom talks to?" He nods, shuffling still. "She said our kids is gonna be, like, the second coming or whatever."

"More like the second coming of Kurt Cobain." He teases, and they forget about death and stupid prophecies and start to play Goldfish. She can forget she's fifteen and a soon-to-be-mother, that her own is in a Psych. ward, or that this house is fucked up beyond belief: right now, she's just a stupid girl with a stupid boy, playing cards.

It was only after Vivian Harmon was committed by her simple minded husband, and knowledge that Violet was at school, does Constance sneak into the house she used to own and silently descends the basement stairs, whispering: "Tate? Tate? Its mama." Stylish heels meet the cold ground and as soon as she turns around, she walks straight into his black shirt and his sullen expression. "Oh, there you are—"

"What do you want?" He interrupts her pleasantries before they can begin.

Old, weathered hands reach to touch his face—his beautiful, beautiful face that he always takes for granted—before he pulls away, she grips his arms. She's desperate, pleading, and for once in her life her little boy has the upper hand. "I-I heard stories about you. Stories about your bad behavior…" He's unflinching, unmoving, but she still has to ask: "It isn't true, is it? You-You didn't do it. Tell me you didn't crawl on the good doctor's wife, Tate!" She's desperate, angry, bitter tears spill from her eyes as his grow wide with fear. He's like a little child knowing he's been caught doing something he ought not to, and her temper breaks when he pleads with her to not tell Violet.

She slaps him.

Slaps him over and over until he's cowering in the corner, tear stained, saying 'mama' over and over again. That damn Billie is talented, that's for sure. "Why?" She hisses, feeling as she did the day the SWAT team shot him in his room. Constance wonders what did she do, truly, to be given such a beautiful gift as Tate, yet have it perverted with something uglier on the inside. The devil was once beautiful.

He says nothing. He merely cries. Just like it was when he was younger and she, out of a drunken rage, went to hard when he acted up. She hates herself for it. She's as capricious, self-serving, and narcissistic as she comes: that did not mean she doesn't love each of her children any differently, even when the only living one can't be bothered to answer her phone whenever she calls. She bends down, wrapping him up in her arms and he isn't fighting her. He's allowing her comfort. She remembers holding him when the SWAT team were through with him, too, crying into his bullet covered chest brokenly. She's so glad Addy was at the Zoo; Constance would've never been able to tell her about her beloved brother being dead, just like she can't bear the thought of Tate knowing about Addy's death. "My broken little boy," she coos, soothingly, rocking Tate back and forth as he wailed against her chest. "What am I going to do with you?"

"Have you thought of any names, yet?" Ben asks his daughter driving home from another doctor's appointment. He has yet to tell her the school called and suggested she finish the semester online. Somehow, he doubts Violet would have a huge problem with it, even if it took his entire being to censor himself and not threaten the conservative piece-of-shit Principal. "I like Benjamima, myself." He offers, playing the card, once more, of the dorky-slash-goofy dad that tries too hard. It works; Violet laughs, she honest-to-god laughs, and as soon as he knows it Ben is joining with her. He's been bonding with her more and more ever since Vivian was put under Psychiatric Evaluation.

Ever since he found out that one of those babies aren't his.

They stop by a park and after a short walk—she waddles and he remembers teasing her mother about it sixteen years earlier, saying she looks like a penguin—they end up sitting on a bench. She leans against him, just like she used to as a little girl, too proud to admit she was afraid of the pretend boogie man under her bed.

"When can I see mom?" She asks. He shrugs, because he honestly doesn't know.

He honestly doesn't think he wants his daughter near the woman that has been lying to him for god-knows-how-long.

"Adelaide." She says, giving him that tiny smile. The same smile she gave him when she was seconds old but the nurses claimed it was just gas (he knew better). "I know she gave you and mom aneurisms when she was alive, but she was my friend. She was nice."

"Adelaide Harmon," he tests it out on his tongue, taking in the feel, before shrugging his shoulders passively. "God, I can't believe you made me a grandfather. I'm way too awesome to be a grandfather."

"You're old."

"You're grounded."

She leaves to use the public restroom and he's stuck in his thoughts. He doesn't remember crying at the fact that he's bitter that the families around him have so much to live for, or the fact his daughter returned not too long after she waddled off, until she speaks: "You okay, dad?"

She worries about him when it should be the other way around.

"I will be." He lies, but it's better than the truth. "I will be."