"Are you asleep?" Len asked one night as he and Sara were lying in bed just after the clock struck midnight.
"Of course not," Sara replied and so he rolled over to face her. "I'm too anxious to fall asleep." As previously stated the clock had just struck midnight, meaning that now it was officially December 19th.
Without a word Len placed a hand on Sara's belly and began rubbing it in small circles, continuing to do so even after Sara placed her hand on top of his. They were both silently wondering if this would be their last night spent like this, if in only a few hours their son or daughter would decided that they're ready to join the world and they would find themselves in the hospital.
"What do you think?" Len finally asked,
"I have no idea," Sara huffed, "Nothing feels any different than the past few weeks-"
"Well it is only two minutes after midnight," Len interrupted and Sara rolled her eyes,
"You know what I mean," she taunted, playfully swatting the back of Leonard's head with her free hand. "The baby has been moving just as much as always, I haven't even felt any of those false contractions, and I have no idea how I would even be able to tell if my cervix started dilating." She listed before eyeing him with a look that said she did actually have one idea, one that Leonard quickly dismissed.
"Sorry darling but I'm not entirely sure I would be able to tell, not as well as a doctor anyway." He told her and she sighed but said nothing else. "Get some sleep," he instructed before leaning over and giving her a light kiss on her temple, "You might end up needing it."
But of course Sara couldn't sleep, any little movement from the baby or pretty much anything else that started to feel even the slightest bit different than usual had her snapping her eyes wide in anticipation that something might happen.
She must have fallen asleep at some point, although she had no idea when, because when the sunlight from outside penetrated through the windows Sara found herself opening her eyes. With a yawn she stretched out her arms but after that she simply continued to lay where she was. Len was nowhere in sight but that wasn't a surprise anymore. Back on the Waverider it had always been either Leonard or herself who was awake first on the team. But ever since somewhere in the middle of her second trimester Len had been managing to get up before Sara every morning, although it was only by about twenty minutes if that.
Since she was alone, although honestly she really wouldn't care if Len caught sight of this, Sara smoothed a hand gently over the stretched fabric her boyfriend's t-shirt, which covered her bump.
"Hey, are you ready to come out?" She asked in a sweet and gentle voice, or as sweet and gentle of a voice as she could manage anyway. "Come on, daddy and I are really excited to actually see you and I promise you'll love it out here, at the very least it has to be more exciting than in there." She half joked and that was when she looked up to see Leonard lounging slumped against the doorframe, an amused smirk spread across his face.
"Trying to bargain with it?" He inquired and with a laugh Sara shrugged,
"You never know, could work." She defended as her boyfriend approached her and then proceeded to sit down beside her.
He just sat there for a minute, that silent smile on his face almost as bright as Sara's. His hand joined hers, rubbing gentle strokes over her rounded tummy as they both thought about how at any minute this part could end and they'd be thrown into the next portion of this insanity; actually raising a kid. It had them both nervous, but then again it would probably have anyone at least a little nervous.
"Nine months ago we still hadn't defeated Savage, and we were on a mission when you fainted." He mused and Sara couldn't help but laugh at the reminder.
"It feels like a lot longer," She replied so of course her boyfriend smirked.
"Well if you want to get technical we were in 1901, so I guess it was 115 years ago." He said and Sara laughed,
"Ok come on, help me get up." She asked and Len smirked, to be fair Sara doesn't exactly need his help getting up but it's either him or the nightstand and frankly he's a lot better at it. So he got up and held out a hand to her, pulling her to her feet.
As the rest of the day went by you could've cut the tension in the air of the Snart/Lance apartment with a knife, a very sharp knife. The two of them were practically holding their breath the whole day, at every little thing that happened. Be it a move from the baby, a lack of movement, or any little pain that Sara had in her back. Her mother was texting her every few hours to see if there was any news but alas she always got the same reply from her daughter: nothing. Lisa and Laurel had each sent a text or two but unlike Dinah they took Sara's word for it when she said she would update them on any change, that or they were more confident she would be late. Her father hadn't texted or called at all, but Sara was sure that's only because Laurel was most likely passing information along to him. Anyway the day ended and needless to say Sara was not pleased when she went to bed without even one sign of labor.
When the next morning came things were still that same as they had been yesterday and Sara and Len were eating breakfast at the counter when Len's phone buzzed. He scowled upon picking it up and looking at the text.
"Jim says he needs my help," he told Sara with a frown, referring to the friend that he works with.
"So go," Sara encouraged and Len looked at her as if to argue but she cut him off, "I will call you if something happens, but as of right now this baby isn't going anywhere." She promised and when he still looked skeptical she only rolled her eyes. "If it makes you feel any better I'll call Lisa to come keep me company," she offered,
"That does make me feel better," he admitted before getting up with a sigh and placing his plate in the sink. "Ok fine, but call Lisa." He instructed and with a roll of her eyes Sara pulled out her phone and sent a text to her boyfriend's sister.
"Still nothing?" Lisa asked when she entered her brother's apartment, he was already gone and Sara was sitting on the couch scrolling through something on her iPad.
"Nope," The blonde replied, popping the P as she did. "I'm looking up ways of naturally inducing labor." She said and in response Lisa furrowed her eyebrows.
"You're only a day late," she said but when Sara sent her a glare she immediately realized the mistake in that statement. "Ok so what's it say?" She asked, "Isn't eating spicy foods or walking supposed to work?" She asked, she may not be an expert on pregnancy but she did have her share of generally common knowledge.
"I eat spicy food all the time, so I doubt that would do anything. And Len's going to kill me if I go for a walk without him…" She trailed off as she looked over the list before sighing and putting the tablet down. "Maybe you're right, maybe I should just wait a little bit before I do anything." She said and Lisa shrugged,
"I mean at this point I doubt inducing yourself would be bad, I'm just saying that maybe you should wait until at least tomorrow." She suggested and so Sara nodded acceptingly, after all what if there was a reason that the baby hadn't come yet? Maybe it actually wasn't ready to come out. She didn't want to risk having the baby end up in intensive care after birth simply because she had been impatient and tried to speed up her labor.
By that same time the next day, Sara didn't care so much about being impatient. It was now two o'clock in the afternoon on December 21st, two days past her due date, and nothing felt like it was going to change.
"You're making me dizzy," Len groaned as he sat on the couch and watched his girlfriend pace around their coffee table in a circle with her hands on her back.
"Well sorry but I'm trying to get your kid out of me!" She snapped, to her credit she was trying to keep her temper in check but every passing second of these last few days had gone by agonizingly slowly and the aching pain in her back, which unfortunately wasn't do to contractions, was not helping.
"All you're going to do is fall over when you can't see straight," Len objected but aside from sending him a glare Sara ignored her boyfriend.
She paced around for a few more minutes before she started to get dizzy herself and decided to settle herself on the couch beside Leonard.
"I'm sorry," he said to her sympathetically but she only scoffed.
"Why? It's not you're fault, well not completely anyway." She muttered,
"I know; I just hate watching you suffer." He said and Sara scoffed again,
"You hate me biting your head of every time you open your mouth." She corrected and Len had to concede to that, no matter how much he didn't want to.
"Guilty," he admitted before getting to his feet and offering his hand to Sara. "Come on," he said to her as she stared quizzically up at him.
"Where are we going?" She asked, slipping her hand into his and allowing him to pull her up to her feet.
"To get you out of this apartment before we both go crazy," he replied.
Their little journey outside of the apartment found them at the local discount store where they decided to get a plastic Christmas tree and a few ornaments before they were all gone; they had been so busy preparing for the baby all month that they hadn't done much in celebration of the upcoming holiday. They bought mostly plastic balls and some colored lights, but after they were done Len drove to a nicer store closer to the center of town and dragged a very confused Sara inside with him.
"No," she said once they were inside the store and Leonard came to a halt by the nice Christmas ornaments. She tried to fold her arms over her chest to show her defiance at what her boyfriend was so clearly thinking, but that ability was long gone by now and so she settled for placing her hands on her hips; not matter how ridiculous it made her look.
"If you don't pick one out I will," Len told her firmly. Let the record show that normally Sara would not be opposed at all to buying a nice ornament, but the fact that he had brought her over to a rack of Baby's First Christmas ornaments when she was already two days past due and the holiday was just four days away felt like it was a cruel joke.
"What if it doesn't come by Christmas?" She asked and Len's only response at first was to eye her skeptically.
"Do you really think you're going to go more than six days overdue?" He questioned her; honestly he still believed that Mick's bet would be dead on with the 23rd.
"I don't know," Sara admitted with a shrug, "According to Lisa you were ten days late, so it's possible." She continued and Len let out a sigh,
"My mother's doctor also let a time traveling assassin and reincarnated bird make off with me five minutes after she brought me to the nursery, she wasn't all that bright." He teased and Sara smiled, "Now seriously, pick one. Worst comes to worst we'll have it for next year." He said and Sara couldn't help but smile at his words. It wasn't the idea of buying their child a Baby's First Christmas ornament that had her so giddy, well not entirely anyway. No it was Len's idea of the worst-case scenario, that they would have it for next year. That there wasn't a doubt in his mind that they would still be together as of next year.
She looked over the rack for a moment or two before selecting the one that she liked the best.
Len smiled as a sign of agreement when his girlfriend grabbed the ceramic ornament that was shaped like a snowflake with the words Baby's First Christmas written across the center in light blue cursive.
"And here we were hoping you might be in the hospital," Cisco exclaimed in disappointment when Sara and Len showed up to the S.T.A.R. Labs Christmas party on December 23rd and yup, she was still heavily pregnant.
"You and me both," Sara chuckled.
"Don't you people celebrate Christmas together? Why are you having a Christmas party?" Len asked while setting down the plate of cupcakes he and Sara had brought. They hadn't been 100% sure if they were even going to come but Sara needed a distraction from her misery and it's not like they couldn't make it to the hospital from S.T.A.R. Labs if something were to happen; which even if it did and they couldn't make it for whatever reason it would be better to be at S.T.A.R. Labs than their apartment.
"You call your doctor?" Barry asked, having heard from Lisa that Sara had decided if she didn't have at least any signs of having the baby by today she was going to go get checked out.
"Yup," She replied with a roll of her eyes, conveying the message even before she spoke it that whatever the doctor told her had not been what she wanted to hear. "They said that if I haven't had the baby by the 29th they'll induce me," She continued and most, if not all, of her friends shot her a brief look of sympathy.
With that said their little party got underway and eventually Len, who had mostly just been hanging in the back corner the whole time, found himself in the company of his little sister.
"How's she holding up?" She asked, taking a sip of her soda as she did so,
"Well she's tried every method of self induction that she can find but so far nothing's worked, so she's pretty frustrated." He replied and Lisa nodded, according to Sara her mom still hadn't given up on texting her every couple of hours and now even Laurel was sending a message asking about her status more than once a day, and she couldn't imagine any of this was helping.
"How are you holding up?" She asked and Len smirked before taking a swig of his own drink.
"I think I'm about as done with this part as she is," he mused, "Carter does have a point though, kid's just as stubborn and Sara and I." He continued and Lisa smirked at the statement.
"If that's the case, good luck."
While the two Snart siblings had their little conversation over in the corner Sara was talking with Caitlin to see if she had any ideas on how to prompt the kid into coming out already. Unfortunately everything Caitlin suggested Sara had already heard and tried at least twice and so they determined that she really had exhausted every method in the book. Caitlin offered to take a look at her, although she warned that this stuff isn't exactly her specialty, but Sara declined the offer. She had gone this morning to be checked out and she knew that Caitlin would give her the same results as her doctor did earlier; "Everything looks fine, the baby is in position which is good, it's just taking it's time."
Wally was nearby as they spoke and so when Caitlin was called away by Cisco it left Sara more or less alone with the kid who was looking at his phone and obviously only pretending to text.
Sara didn't know much about Wally; she knew who he was, that he had gotten along well with Jax at Thanksgiving, and she knew that is father still doesn't understand why he didn't become a speedster when he got hit with radiation the night Barry got his powers back. He's somewhat of a shy kid she's realized, not so much with his friends but with his family, and especially around her. She never really thought much of it, and even right now she still didn't, but she figured that sooner or later they were going to have to stop being strangers with each other.
"Wish you were anywhere but here?" She asked, snapping his attention away from his phone.
"No, it's just um… I didn't want to interrupt, I mean you and Caitlin…" He continued to stutter until Sara smiled at him in amusement, letting him know that whatever he was babbling about was perfectly ok. "Sorry, just I didn't want to be rude and look like I was eavesdropping." He said but Sara actually laughed at the notion.
"Don't worry about it kid, at this point I don't think it's a secret that I'm willing to try anything." She told him.
"Well sorry but I don't know any kind of tricks, or anything about babies at all." He admitted and that was when Sara understood his discomfort around her.
Wally had grown up with his mom and at one point his grandma, he lived as though he were an only child and because of work schedules and health issues he hadn't spent much time with friends or their families. As he got older he spent his time at the races, and those are certainly no place for a baby. He'd probably only ever been around a baby a very few number of times in his life, and clearly he'd be the first to admit that he knew nothing about pregnancy. So when it came to Sara he didn't quite know his boundaries, and so he played it safe by acting as though he weren't even there.
"Trust me, I've already tried everything." She told him, acting as though she hadn't just figured him out.
"So maybe you were right and the ornament was a bad idea," Len admitted the next night when he and Sara finally got around to decorating their fake tree. He had just finished stringing lights on it and so they moved on to the plastic Christmas balls.
"It's like you said, at least we'll have it for next year." Sara said in an attempt to stay positive, although she really wouldn't mind saying "I told you so" right about now.
They continued decorating while trying to talk about anything other than the baby, which at this point was nearly impossible, until Sara froze in her place and rolled her eyes with a scowl.
"Crap," she grumbled, setting down the ball that she had and turning to leave the room.
"What?" Len called after her,
"I peed my pants," she muttered, just barely loud enough for him to hear, before she slammed the bathroom door.
Despite his girlfriend's obvious annoyance, Len couldn't help but snicker. This wasn't the first time she had peed herself because she didn't even know she had to go, but it was the first time in about a month and honestly it still made him both laugh and feel sorry for her. But the amusement didn't last long, as less than five seconds later he heard Sara scream and so he bolted to the bathroom.
Leonard had every intention of just bursting into the room, but Sara opened the door just before he could grab the doorknob.
"It wasn't pee!" She quickly informed him,
"What?" He demanded, suddenly even more convinced that something was very wrong.
"My water broke!" She exclaimed and although Len heard her loud and clear his brain seemed to shut off at her words.
"What?" He asked again, although a little less worried.
"My water broke!" She exclaimed again, this time a wide smile slowly creeping across her face and soon Len's as they processed that this was really happening. "We're having a baby," Sara said when it finally processed.
Author's Note:Hey guys, i'm just leaving this note to let you know that the voting poll is officially closed! Thanks so much to everyone who voted on the baby's gender, you'll find out soon what the results are!