Their living arrangements for the past two weeks have been, well, strange. He's on an air mattress in her living room floor. She's getting less and less active every day. She looks like she's ready to pop at any second.
After what has been an absolutely terrible 9 months, they're both hoping that when their daughter arrives, things will get better. Since their moment two weeks ago, things have been better. They can't quite ignore the fact that things haven't been well between them. But waking up with him in her house is a start. It tries to put things back into the normal, the way it should be. When she wakes up and smells fruit smoothies and pancakes. When he finds she's left a towel out for him. Little things that have made these two weeks work.
Her due date is in three days. She's starting to believe that though this baby might be born into a broken home, it might still be born into a healthy one. That's more than she could say before.
It's a Tuesday, and he's back from work. He's walked Monty. She doesn't feel well, and she doesn't know what it is. He can sense that there's something going on, but she doesn't say a lot. He offers to get dinner, but she's not hungry. He offers her a tub of ice cream. She eats half of it and smiles at him. She even shares a few spoonfuls. Just a few. He asks her if she's okay, and she swears she is, that she's just tired. They end up really close together on the couch, snuggling almost.
And it really is snuggling. His arms are around her and she's smiling as she leans into his chest. It's all so perfect and sweet and she doesn't want it to end.
And that night, the air mattress only had one occupant: Monty.
She slept wrapped in his arms, and it felt good, so good.
Until sometime around 3 AM and she wakes up and feels… wet. She thinks she's just still asleep and she ignores it. But only moments later, he stirs too, and then sucks in a breath. He's wrapped around her and she reaches out and touch his leg and realizes he's soaked. They're both soaking wet, and she realizes- her water broke.
"Ew," she cringes, thinking about how gross this is. And its all over him!
He sits up in a daze. He looks at her. He knows something is going on here, but he can't place it. He doesn't know what's going on.
"So, um, I think my water broke."
"Ew," he declares, fully waking up.
"Yeah, sorry. To be fair, I'm also covered in it."
"Wait, shouldn't we be like, going to the hospital right now?"
She shrugs. "Well, I'm not in pain. I feel like you have time to put on some dry pants."
He pulls the damp covers off of him. "Yes, I'll do that."
She waddles out of bed, feeling uneasy. She changes pants too, but it's not really worth it. She grabs a towel and her bag and heads to the car. She lays her towel on the seat and tries to squeeze in.
He's behind her. "The stories we'll have to tell at her wedding."
Kensi laughs. "You're telling me."
They're halfway to the hospital before she begins to feel any sort of pain, and it starts to become real. And Deeks, no matter what, is right there beside her. As things become harder and harder in the hours after they get to the hospital, he's still there. He's holding her hand, and whispering sweet encouragements into her ears. When she feels like she can't take it anymore, he accidentally lets an 'I love you' slip through, and it gives her the strength to make it through the final push.
And they welcome their daughter.
He kisses Kensi's warm cheek and tells her how proud of her he is, but she tells him to go. Go see Marie. Go cut the cord. Go be the prod father. And she's exhausted, but she finds a short smile as she watches him go.
Finally, the moment comes later, in the calm. Once the buzz is over, the pain, the anxiety, the hustle. They find themselves all together in Kensi's hospital bed. Marie was asleep on her mother's chest, and both Kensi and Deeks were staring down at her.
"She's perfect," Deeks said.
"She kind of is, isn't she?" Kensi asked.
Her head found the crook of her neck, and she relaxed into it. "Did you mean what you said before?"
"Probably. What are we talking about?" he asked. He could feel her eye roll.
"You said 'I love you,' but I mean, just a few weeks ago it was 'I loved you,' so I'm not really sure where we stand I gue…"
"Kensi," he said, twisting around to where he could press a kiss into her. "Of course I meant it."
"No more air mattress," she said. "If we're both in love with each other, it's time to start acting like it."
"So that means…"
"Yes. I love you too."
"And we both love you," he added, wrapping his finger around the baby brown curl on the top of Marie's head.
A little knock on the window caused them both to look up. It was Kensi's mom, who'd already held the baby.
"There's a bunch of people out here who getting very impatient. Marie's popular. Kensi smiled, and nodded.
"Yeah, send them back. I don't want Sam or Callen to hurt any of the nurses."
Julia turned to walk away, and Kensi's lips found Deeks'. They were going to make it.