Erin, asleep on the couch, hears the distant sounds of a baby crying. Her baby crying. Her body still reeling from pushing a baby out of it, her boobs still sore, her hormones are still balancing out, she remains in a deep sleep, only startling awake and shooting up in her seat when the cries get louder. Her head immediately scans the room in search of her baby, her heart rate picking up as fast as a hummingbird's wings and the moment her eyes land on her crying infant, resting comfortably in the bassinet near the couch, she releases a breath she didn't realize she was holding in. Emma is crying; her little face scrunched together and red as she screams her lungs out and before Erin can kick the covers off her feet to make it easier to reach for and tend to her baby, her mother comes rushing out of the guestroom, dressed in her pajamas with a spa mask hardened around her eyes, nose and mouth. It nearly startles Erin and if her baby had better vision, she knows it would have startled her too, "I got her. I got her. You go back to sleep."
"Thanks mom," her raspy voice fills the walls of her living room. She leans back, buries herself back into her cushions of the couch, tucking the blankets around herself before waiting for sleep to overcome her once again. It doesn't come though, at least not right away, she's unable to fall asleep without problem until her daughter's cries stop. It takes a diaper change from her mom, a gentle rock and a soft lullaby to lull her newborn back to sleep. Pretty soon, both she and baby are out, at least for another hour before Emma's cries fill the walls of her living room again.
She doesn't wake in a panic this time, more so because she doesn't feel as exhausted as she did when she woke up the first time. She tosses the blanket to the edge of the couch and reaches into the bassinet, knowing this wakeup call is for her feeding. Without fuss or pushback, Emma easily latches on and fills her belly with the natural milk produced by her mama. Pretty soon, Erin unintentionally falls back asleep on the couch while a few minutes later her daughter follows and dozes off next, drifting into the innocent world of slumber against her mom's chest. Another two hours later, Erin isn't woken up by the sounds of her daughter whining but instead by the aroma of breakfast filling the walls of her apartment. Her stomach growls. Her eyes flutter open, blinking the exhaustion from her orbs. And suddenly, she remembers falling asleep with her baby in her arms and now panic consumes her when she wakes up with Emma no longer being on her chest.
She jumps up, scanning the couch, making sure she didn't roll on top of her then checks the floor to ensure Emma didn't roll off of her, "I put her back in her bassinet," her mom calls out from the kitchen, "I saw the two of you sleeping on the couch when I woke up. I moved her to make sure she didn't get hurt or hurt herself, you might want to be mindful of that sweetheart."
"Thanks for moving her. I must have been more exhausted than I realized."
Erin was discharged from the hospital two days ago and she has yet to establish a routine now that she's home with her mom and her baby. She gets sleep when her baby is sleeping but other than that she's following her mother's lead since she's been there and done this already. Erin doesn't claim to know everything about motherhood, she just started the job less than a week ago so she's far from an expert. She'll take all the advice she can get and even though she didn't fall asleep with her baby in her arms on purpose, it wouldn't hurt for her to be reminded to be more self-aware. She rose from the couch, folding the blanket and laying it on the arm of the chair before deciding to take advantage of the baby being asleep and getting a shower in. She drags her feet to her bedroom, her body still exhausted and depleted from a lack of a full night's rest and as she collects her towel and washcloth, she calls out for her mom to watch the baby as she disappears behind the door of the bathroom. Shutting it, locking it and then resting her back against it to take a deep breath, "Woo-sah," she takes a deep breath and then looks into the mirror, scrunching her face in judgment as she takes in her messy hair and the dark circles surrounding her eyes.
Her eyes glass over, her gaze isn't focused and she has yet to turn on the water to the shower. It's just not enough time in the day. It feels as if most of her day is spent sleeping, eating and caring for her little one. Other than that, it's not enough time. A knock sounds on the bathroom door, snapping her out of her reverie, clearing up her gaze and focusing her on the reason she's in here in the first place, -to shower. However, before she can, she's turning the knob of the bathroom door and cracking it open just enough to stick her head outside of it, "Hey mom, everything okay?"
"Yeah, I was just wondering where are her extra bibs? She spit up all over herself."
"Um," Erin scratches the top of her head as she thinks, "dresser in the closet."
"Thanks," Camille turns to walk away then pauses, looking over her shoulder and assessing her daughter, "Are you okay kid?"
"Yeah, just wondering if it's possible to take a nap in the shower while I eat breakfast?"
Erin has felt like a zombie since she gave birth. She had yet to get a good night's rest even with her mother staying with her for the last couple of days.
Camille gets a good laugh from that. Erin does too even though a part of her was dead serious. The laugh is enough to wake Erin up a bit too and the heat from the shower running against her back, soaking her hair is enough to wake her up even more. She knows if she gets some coffee in her she'll feel better but this is definitely a good start. It's her first shower since being home, gross yeah but she's a new mom who barely finds the time to sleep so a shower was definitely nowhere on the forefront of her mind until now. And considering how good this shower is feeling, she kind of wishes she moved it up her priority list sooner. The scent of her shampoo is calming, the massage she gives her scalp is even more soothing, she nearly falls asleep with how good it feels.
It's only when her stomach starts to growl that she realizes she needs to end her shower to get some sustenance before she withers away. She gets out of the shower, chooses to allow her hair to air dry, then lotions her body up before getting into another pair of her pajamas. Showering just to go nowhere. She's running the towel repeatedly through her hair as she ventures barefoot out of her bedroom. Now that she feels like a new woman, rejuvenated and way more energized than she did prior to her shower, she walks out to the living room, curious to see what her mom and baby are doing now, only to come to an abrupt stop when she sees that Jay is here.
"I decided to stop by before work," he answers her unasked question.
"You're going to be exhausted," Camille cautions, setting a plate down for Jay.
"I'll be fine," he waves it off and then takes a seat to eat, "thanks Camille for the food."
"Oh, sweetheart don't worry," she smiles and then excuses herself to make Erin's plate. She'd been heating up one of the prepped meals in the refrigerator so it didn't take much energy.
Erin could feel the soreness settle into her chest and when she glances down, she notices that her boobs had leaked a bit. She's embarrassed; she'd be lying if she said she wasn't. Jay turns his head away, nodding towards the baby in the bassinet before reassuring her that it's no need to be ashamed, "It's okay. The baby has to eat; she's probably hungry now."
She is. Erin knows she is. She goes over to the bassinet to find her baby awake, eyes open and alert and despite knowing Emma is hungry, she isn't whining or crying. Her hands are curled into fists and they rest beside her head. Her bright, innocent eyes so wide, forcing Erin to grab her phone off the coffee table to capture an adorable picture of her. She's been obsessed with her face ever since she laid eyes on it. She sends off the picture to Julia and gets an immediate reply from her, earning a chuckle when Julia responds with a range of random emojis. Erin tosses her phone onto the couch and lifts her baby up, taking a seat on the arm of the couch as she aids Emma in latching on. Camille carries both hers and Erin's plates out and sets it on the table, "Sweetheart, your dad wants to know when's a good time to come and see the baby."
"Um, three am would be very helpful," she pulls her gaze away from her daughter for only a second to capture her mom's expression, "tell him thank you ahead of time for me."
"I'll tell him to come after work."
She shrugs, "It was worth a try." She spots her mother utilizing her fingers to tap each button one at a time on the touchscreen, "It is seriously causing me pain to watch you text that slow." And after saying that, she notices her mother still hasn't finished typing. If Emma wasn't in her arms, she'd spare her and finish the message for her, but she figures now is as good as any time for her mother to learn how to text at a reasonable speed, however, texting is not new and if she hadn't learned yet then maybe she's actually a lost cause. Camille sets her phone faced down once the message is sent and when it vibrates, hinting that her dad replied, she makes no move to check it.
Once Emma finishes up and Erin collects her bearings, she carries her baby girl on over to the table so her mama can now enjoy herself some breakfast. It's been a long morning already and there were still so many hours left in the day. Erin scarfed her food down one-handed, fork scraping against the plate with every stab on the heated-up dish. She chose to hold Emma instead of trying to put her down because the baby appeared to remain quiet longer when she was held. Though the second Jay takes his last bite, she's quick to hand the baby over to him so she can eat in peace.
With the bulge still present under her top, seemingly taking its sweet little time in going down, she surprisingly finds herself not too concerned about the postpartum weight. She's not cutting calories to lose weight faster and she's not going against doctor's orders to rush to a gym to workout. She's going to take advantage of her maternity leave and focus on her little babe, rather than spend it trying to drop the postpartum weight. It'll happen when she and her body are ready.
The baby is soon enough back in her arms when Jay disappears to use the restroom and her mom disappears to the kitchen to wash dishes. Left alone to her own devices, Erin flops down onto the couch, little Emma snugged securely in her arms as mama bear scrolls through social media. Erin snickers as she uses her one free hand to rewind a video and play it again. She holds in the loud laugh she senses wants to come out in an effort to not disturb her calm baby, but when her mother comes out, curiosity painted on her face, she realizes that maybe she's louder than she first thought, "What is so funny that has you laughing like that?" Instead of giving a long, drawn-out answer that would deflate the joke, Erin rewinds the video and raises her phone so her mom can look at the source herself, "Who is that?" Camille takes a hold of the phone to look at it closely.
"Mom, I don't know," frustration is clearly in her response, "just laugh and give me my phone back." Camille doesn't get the joke; she doesn't laugh at it at all. Erin doesn't even know why she's tried. Her mom was focused on the wrong thing. Erin doesn't know the people in the video, it's some random people that filmed a video that unexpectedly went viral. There's nothing more to that and there's nothing less than that. Erin scrunches her face up and shoos her mother away.
"Stop making that face," Camille chuckles backing away, "before it gets stuck like that."
Ah, a tale Erin has been told to her by her mother since her teenage years. Erin drops the face and jokingly masks a smile onto it as a replacement. Camille blows a kiss and Erin turns back to her phone, rewinding the video to watch it one more time.
"Alright," Jay comes back into the room, "I have about a half an hour left before I gotta go."
"…then you can have the honor of putting her down for a nap before you go. I feel like I've spent majority of the last two days just thinking about when I can lie down again," Erin happily relinquishes the baby to him, "Why doesn't she understand that naps aren't for her but for me?"
He presses a soft kiss to the baby's cheek.
Then he adjusts her in his arms and begins walking her around the living room, humming a soft tune as her eyes fluttered. She's fighting sleep. She's trying to ignore the temptation of slumber, but it's a battle that she inevitably loses when Erin places a pacifier in her mouth. Her nose crinkling up, her soft sighs and one of her hands fisted around his finger before he settles her into the bassinet, rocking it gently to ensure she didn't wake up from the change in setting. He moves his hand from her and when the pacifier falls from her mouth, he quickly reaches in to put it back before she woke up. He stands at the side of the bassinet, watching her as if it's the most exciting vision he's ever laid eyes on, just watching her as she sleeps so peacefully and innocently.
"Should we wake her?" Erin interrupts the moment he's sharing with his daughter, "Maybe check and see if she's breathing? She just looks so still; it makes me nervous sometimes."
"…maybe not necessarily wake her, it wasn't that fast in putting her down."
A compromise was made resulting in Erin putting her hand to her baby's belly to ensure it rises and falls at a steady rate while Jay lowers his hand to the baby's face, feeling for the soft breaths that escape her partially opened mouth. Once both of them are satisfied with their findings, they fall back on the couch, simultaneously lean their heads back and shut their eyes. Jay remains conscious of the time, knowing that soon enough he's going to have to leave. For a brief moment, she turns her head to stare, focusing on the side of his face, the outline of him until the silence is interrupted by his whispered words, "You're staring."
"Are you coming back over here after you get off?" She doesn't bother responding to his comment, instead shifting the conversation to what she knows will be on her mind after he leaves.
"I want to but I guess it depends on what time I get off."
She pats his thigh, knowing that the answer he's provided her wasn't one he wanted to say, "I just want to remind you that you can come over whenever. You have a key."
Erin doesn't push the silence. She settles in it. Jay does too, before he voices his next thought, "I'll just need to send Abby a text so she doesn't worry or anything if I show up too late."
"Are things going um good between you two?" She doesn't know if she wants an honest answer to that question but it doesn't stop her from asking it anyway.
"It's going," he leaves it at that, "it's just going."
"How's the dog bite?"
"It's healing."
His answers are purposefully vague and once again, Erin picks up on what's being left unsaid. He doesn't want to talk about this. He didn't come here to talk about this. She wants to play obtuse, act as if she can't pick up on the hints he's putting down, but her history has proven that she can read his hints. She spares him, but she knows at some point, he won't be able to remain vague and brush off her questioning, at some point he's going to be figuratively backed into a wall.
Jay rises to his feet, his movement suddenly reminding Erin that he has to leave for work. She watches as he gently caresses the baby's hand in an effort to say goodbye without waking her up. He doesn't want to leave, that much is obvious by the number of times he looks over his shoulder to stare longingly at Emma. Erin truly does sympathize for him. She can't imagine having to leave to go to work right now. She honestly can't even imagine going back to work in a few weeks.
"My door is always open for you. Please feel free to visit anytime."
His hand hovers above the door knob and before he twists it, he turns to face her, "Thanks again Erin," and before she can assume what he's thanking her for, he elaborates, "for not questioning me anymore when I made it obvious I didn't really want to talk about it," he runs his hand down his face and looks over her shoulder at the bassinet in the living room, "it's just a lot. She's a lot."
He leaves it at that. He gives her nothing more, nothing less. He simply leaves.
She remains standing in the door, even after she hears him step into the elevator, even after she knows he's long gone. She doesn't know exactly what he means, or how loaded his last words were, but she can clearly see that Abby is a true manipulator and she's found the perfect target in Jay. He's a flawed person, but aren't they all, and Abby tends to prey on his flaws. In Abby's eyes, every wrong that Jay has done is someone else's fault. It's something painted obvious in the way she treats him versus everyone else. It's almost as if her tactic of manipulation is guilting him for all his faults in the hopes that when hers are revealed, he's too blind to see them. Erin knows that in time Abby will spiral herself into a web that she cannot get out of, that she's locked herself in on at every angle, however she doesn't want Jay to get caught up in her mess either, because his mess will affect Emma and anything Emma related will inevitably affect her. Whether she likes it or not, Abby is in Erin's life until she's out of Jay's.
Erin knows he thinks Abby's shortcomings are his fault and even though she knows that's not the case and anyone that knows what's going on can say the same, it's up to him to see that. He takes on all the guilt from Abby and it's trickling into their relationship and him wanting to take on all the guilt with Erin too. It's hard for Jay to see just as it was hard for Erin to see when she was in a toxic relationship. She tries to remember that when she gets frustrated at the lack of progress he's made in his relationship with Abby. She reminds herself that the best thing she can do for Jay is give him time. It's what she needed in her last relationship because the truth always comes out, everything done in the dark eventually does come to the light. Erin looking in on his relationship and looking back on hers, all of the red flags were there, they were big, bright, neon and bold and at the time she couldn't see them just like he can't see them now.
"Sweetheart, someone is awake and wanting to see her mama."
The perfect distraction in the form of her daughter brings her out of her darkest reverie, anything pertaining to Abby is a blackhole that she can find herself unwillingly getting lost in. She scoops her baby girl up and snuggles her up in her arms, taking a large whiff of that fresh, newborn baby smell that she absolutely finds herself obsessed with, "You smell heavenly."
"I was thinking maybe we can watch a movie or something, just me and my girls."
Erin takes another whiff, tucking her nose in the crook of her baby girl's neck, "I think that's a great idea. Something Disney though, something fun, something that won't make me cry."
"Okay, so that eliminates a lot of Disney films. It doesn't leave us with much."
"Hey," Erin swats at her mother, "my hormones are still balancing out."
"So, what's your excuse for the last time you watched Bambi or The Lion King or-"
"Okay, okay, I get your point. Just put anything on."
Camille and Erin spend their day watching Disney films, eating leftovers and taking turns changing diapers, playing, cuddling and rocking the baby to sleep. A great day overall for them although Jay wouldn't say the same for him. He was on his way back to the precinct after meeting the team at a crime scene of a case he was alerted they've caught on his way to work. He's spent hours there, looking over the crime scene, talking to witnesses and passing out his contact information to bystanders before he finally began heading back to the precinct. He waves his partner to go inside, whispering that he'll meet him in there when he spots the back of a familiar head, "Abby," he says loud enough for her to hear, "What are you doing here?"
"I-" she opens her mouth then closes it, "I-" she does it again.
Jay waits for Abby to turn around and once she does, he poses the question that's circulating around his mind, "Are you okay? What's going on with you?"
"I don't," she pauses and casts her teary eyes down to the ground, "I don't know if I can love a child that's not mine." It took every part of her to honestly admit that. She just hopes it doesn't backfire on her, "I want to, I really do, but every time I look at the picture you sent me of her at the hospital, I feel nothing. I stare and stare and will myself to feel something but I don't."
He stands, confused, unsure as to why this conversation couldn't wait until he got home. He opens his mouth to speak, but the raising of her hand silences him, "…but I'm going to try for you, Jay, because I love you. I'm willing to try because of that. That's all." She turns on her heel and she left, she actually gets into her car and pulls off without hearing what he had to say.
Huh? He doesn't get her, every time he thinks he does, she throws a curveball at him. The pendulum swings from thinking of her as unpredictable to predictable and then back again. He can't keep up. He tucks his hands in his pants, frown lines evident on his forehead, mouth parted for the words he didn't have a chance to say. If she didn't have the capacity to love his child then he couldn't be with her. She must have known that, maybe it's why she left before he could speak, but at the same time, why even tell him in the first place? Why drive all the way to his job to say this and not even linger around to hear his response? He doesn't get an extra moment to formulate a reason why because his boss is calling his name, throwing out a sarcastic response along the lines of not paying him to stand around and sightsee. He files his train of thought to the back of his mind and heads inside, throwing himself into the case until he clocks out and heads to visit Emma.
The day drags on for Jay, and it drags on even longer for Abby. She sits outside of Erin's apartment, watching as Jay enters her building. She can only guess or imagine what's being done or said behind the walls of her apartment. Her only comfort is knowing that Erin's mother is there, Camille is decent enough. Abby doesn't like her but at the same time she doesn't dislike her. Abby groans in her seat, day obviously leaning towards bad until she receives a text from her contact, it's ready for pickup. She nearly throws her phone into the other seat, Jay an afterthought as she starts her car and heads to pick up what's next in her grand plan of getting her man back for good.
She rips through the city streets of Chicago to get there in record time, figuring if she gets a ticket then she'll get Jay to get rid of it for her. She pays, directs her contact on where to put it before she heads back to the home she shares with her boyfriend. She gets home, absolutely exhausted from lugging that thing to the apartment and she passes her time in showering, washing her hair and dressing herself comfortably in her pajamas. Checking the clock every once in a while, she doesn't want to fall asleep until Jay gets home which means she cannot go to bed yet. If she lays down, she's going to nod off. She has to move around; she needs to stay busy.
She cleans the kitchen. She vacuums the carpet in the bedroom. She wipes down the windows.
And when she gets a message from Jay, telling her he's on his way home, she prepares her surprise.
Abby stares down at the large stuffed animal, an octopus that's about half her size. Its eyes are a bit off, a bit too spaced out but with the camera lens planted inside the left eyelid she knew it would have to do. She sets the stuffed animal in the corner of the living room and moves across the room to take a look at it from a distance. No one would be the wiser. She paid heavy money for a techie to insert this camera unnoticed and undetected. She draws her cell out and logs into the recently downloaded app to check the visual. It's clear. It's in color. And she waves her hand in the air to test out for any lags in the film, she realizes that it's something she'll have to get used to when she notices a two second delay. Abby speaks next and she assumes because she's in the same room as the octopus that the echo she hears is due to that. If she can't get into Erin's apartment one way, this is plan B, this is the next best way to get a glimpse into what is going on behind those doors.
She immediately clicks out of the screen and pockets her phone in her back pocket when the front door swings open. Jay comes trailing in, dragging his feet, absolutely exhausted from what she can assume is balancing work responsibilities and daddy duties. He drops his keys in the decorative bowl near the door, something she bought to add some color to his dull living room. He walks further inside, toeing off his shoes before coming to an abrupt stop as if he wasn't expecting to see her in his living room, as if he forgot that she lived here too. He couldn't have though; he text her.
"I bought a gift for Emma," she says by way of greeting. She waves her hand in the direction of the purple octopus. His gaze follows her hand and his eyes nearly widen when he spots the size.
"Wow," he whispers, sizing the octopus up, eyeing it from top to bottom, "it's huge."
"It's for Emma," she reiterates.
"…yeah, you've said that."
"I want to apologize for earlier," she mentions, rocking on the balls of her feet, "I shouldn't have said that. I shouldn't have come to your job and did that. I'm sorry."
He's surprised, more so because of the apology; she isn't one to apologize, "Um…"
"I don't expect your forgiveness, at least not yet, I want to earn it," she rushes up to him and takes his hand, "I know if I can't love Emma then that means you can't stay with me, but I'm telling you, I'm willing to try and this gift is a peace offering," she says, separating herself from him to walk over to the large monstrosity, "I didn't get a gift for her so I figured better late than never."
"I don't know what to say. I'm still confused if I'm being honest. I also don't know if Emma's room even has the space for this," he jokes; his skin crinkles in the corner of his eyes as he fully takes in the gift, appreciating the effort, "regardless I'm sure Ems will love it. Thanks Abby. I'll take it with me the next time I go over there." It's left unsaid but it's assumed that the next day he visits Erin's place will be tomorrow considering he can't stay away.
Abby watches him disappear into the bedroom, patting herself on the back for the distraction she's served him. She knows when he's no longer exhausted and has managed to catch up on sleep then he may revisit this conversation, he may want an explanation, but Abby is always one step ahead.
She went there because he told her he would be at work. She went there to verify that. He caught her and she had to think quickly on her feet. So, she made it up. It was the first thing that came to her mind. And then in the middle of her speech, she realized that her words could backfire, he could break things off with her so she left, she ran in an effort to hope he forgets, to hope that work was so stressful that her appearance was like a fever dream. Abby knows she can love Emma; that baby is an extension of him, and she loves him, and she knows that if this peace offering doesn't work and he brings the topic up again, she can present him with a more permanent solution, a permanent gift to really help her show her love for his daughter. She's desperate for his understanding. And desperate times call for desperate measures.
There isn't anything she isn't willing to do to prove her love to him. Abby dips into the bedroom, grabbing his phone while he's in the shower to swipe through the stream of photos of his daughter. When she finds one that truly captures her eye, she airdrops it to herself. Clicking back out of the app with seconds to spare, she sets his phone back down where she finds it and then quickly crawls into bed, pulling the covers up to her shoulders and pretending to be asleep when she hears the shower cut off and the bathroom door swing open.