Mike gets Thursday off before the Mexico tour. Which is good because, if they had booked him for something on Smackdown, he might have skipped the event for the first time in his career. They weren't booking him in televised matches anyway, what could they really do to him? Keep him off media events and house shows? How terrible.
Either way, he's at home for the next ultrasound, which is good on multiple fronts because he's woke up early Thursday morning, groggy and disoriented, by AJ tossing and turning. He squints at the clock, frowning upon finding it's 5 AM. The appointment isn't until 2 PM so he rolls over and wraps an arm around her, causing her to squeak. "What's going on?" he murmurs sleepily into her throat. "Why can't you sleep?"
She sighs and runs her fingers through his hair, her heels digging into his calves. "Well, your daughter keeps kicking and I'm not used to the sensation enough to sleep through it yet. If I didn't know better, I'd think she was nervous about today too."
This gives Mike pause while also waking him up a bit more and he sits up, peering into his wife's eyes. "Why are you nervous, sweetheart? Everything's going to be perfect... just like our little girl already is, kicks at obnoxious hours of the morning non-withstanding..."
AJ sighs as Mike lightly strokes her stomach, feeling for their child. "It's just... what if we're wrong? What if this entire time, she wasn't a she at all, and it's a boy and... we already don't know our child well enough to guess its gender and it hates us because of it?" Her eyes start welling with tears, which used to freak Mike out, but now has just become one of those unfortunate side affects of pregnancy and hormones all over the place.
He hovers over her and strokes her cheeks, her nose, her mouth. "Oh come on, how could she or he ever hate you? No matter what gender it ends up being, we'll love it just the same and it'll feel that. At the worst it's in there, rolling its eyes at us, thinking Oh, mom and dad," he says in his best impersonation of a bratty teenager. "You'll see, sweetheart. Everything will be fine." Her tears slowly dry and she blinks up at him sleepily. "Better?"
"I think the baby fell asleep," she muses. "It's not really kicking anymore. Just fluttering a little bit."
"I always do have that affect on people," he jokes before wrapping his arm snugly around her once more. "Close your eyes, sweetheart. In a few hours, we'll be seeing her again and the doctor will prove once and for all just how well we know our daughter."
"You're sure it's a girl?" she asks softly, tracing circles in his arm.
"Yes, I do. Call it father's intuition." She giggles against him softly and he kisses her until she falls slack against him, fast asleep. Relieved, he kisses her nose before closing his eyes and dozing back off as well.
Once they're awake and have had a quick breakfast of pancakes and sausages, he leads her out of the house to enjoy the mid-October sunshine. Mostly to distract them from the hours they still have to wait until their appointment. Hands clasped loosely together, he guides her down the street and avoids some of the neighbors who are out and about, neither of them feeling like having a conversation. She rests her head on his shoulder and stares around at the trees, the blue sky, the rows of houses, imagining how it'll all look to their baby in a few months.
She changes their course a couple of blocks down and leads him to a park, walking over to a bench to sit down and rest for awhile while still enjoying the nature around them. He follows her and they watch squirrels skittering around, chattering at each other. She laughs and kisses his throat, humming. "Alex would hate this, wouldn't he?"
"Yes, he would," Mike breathes, listening to the soft pattering of a water fountain nearby. They stay there for another half an hour or so, enjoying the peace around them, before Mike glances at his watch. "Ready to go home, sweetheart?"
She sighs. "I guess. What'll we do there, though?"
He presses his forehead against hers and smiles. "I'm sure we can find something..."
She smirks and shakes her head. "You're incorrigible, Mike."
"And you love that about me," he tells her softly, her eyes fluttering as he cups her face and kisses her warmly.
"Well, yes," she says. "And may I say, you're very good for my self-esteem right now... because I have needs too..." His blue eyes fixed on her, she rasps her fingers against the buttons of his shirt teasingly. "More and more each day..." She laughs and squeals when he picks her up bridal style and carries her out of the park.
That afternoon, she's standing before the full length mirror, dressing for the appointment, when he walks up behind her and watches her pull a baggy shirt over her head. It's long, going down to her thighs, and his hands navigate there, brushing against her warm flesh and pulling her against him. She sighs softly and looks up at him as he stares at their reflection in the mirror. "What are you thinking?" she wonders softly, lifting his hand and kissing his palm.
"How you've always been beautiful, but now... you're just transcendent," he murmurs, tilting her face up and kissing down the column of her throat slowly.
She groans and closes her eyes, entangling her fingers with Mike's and guiding his touch, her breath stuttering. "If we don't finish getting ready, we'll miss our appointment-"
"We have time," he mumbles with a vague smirk. "Remember, I always leave plenty of time for traffic. We'll be fine..." She loses the ability to argue as his lips meet hers in a slow, sensual kiss that leaves her leaning against him for any sort of balance.
"Well, you look cheerful and relaxed," Dr. Chi notes as they follow her back to the room where the equipment is waiting. AJ and Mike exchange knowing glances before AJ hops up on the exam table and Mike sits in a nearby chair, his fingers turning white against the arms of the chair until his wife reaches over and snags his nearest hand, pressing it against her. "Today should be simple enough, just a quick ultrasound to look things over, we'll check the baby's size and make sure everything's progressing well. Listen to its heartbeat again, and ..." She pauses with a small smile, tapping her pen against the file in her hands. "Well, this is usually where I ask the parents if they want to know the sex of the baby, because we should be able to determine it as long as the little one's cooperating... I'll give you some time to decide while I set things up."
AJ and Mike share another, secretive smile before she preps AJ with the gel once more, bringing the wand over and running it over her abdomen, looking for the baby. Since it's grown significantly since the first ultrasound, it's easier to find this time and the doctor looks at it for a moment before angling the monitor so the parents can see as well. "How are things looking, Dr. Chi?" AJ asks after a moment, voice choked with emotions and awe as she once more looks at her child, so much bigger than the wispy shadows she'd seen the last time. There is definition now, the baby's skull, body and hands easily discernible and AJ gasps as she feels the shifting on the screen in her own stomach.
Dr. Chi smiles. "Everything is progressing beautifully. Your baby is healthy and right on track for a healthy delivery in February." She turns back to them, the question clearly once more on her lips, but Mike beats her to the punch once he finds his voice after staring at the little life on the monitor.
"So, Dr. Chi, my beautiful wife and I have made some assumptions and it's up to you to prove that we're right." He engulfs AJ's hands in his own, gazing at the doctor with a wavery smirk. "See, we think when this baby graces our lives in a few months that Sara Louisa will be a perfect name and you need to confirm so before we change our minds and make it Samuel Lee or something."
AJ giggles at the startled look on the doctor's face before the woman clears her throat and peers back at the ultrasound, giving herself a moment to recollect herself, formulate a response. In the interim she prints out the two sonograms for them and turns back towards them. "Sara Louisa sounds like a beautiful name," she says simply, handing them the pictures of their daughter.
Mike's entire face lights up while AJ releases a shaky breath, grinning through her tears when Mike hugs her. "I told you," he whispers to her as she nods. "You need to listen to me more."
"I know," she laughs, squeezing him tightly. "I know I do." They pull away and stare at the picture for a few moments while the doctor leaves to give them some privacy. "We're going to have the perfect little family..."
"We already do," he tells her softly, kissing her warmly.
-x
Mike clearly feels like he's walking on air as he arrives at the Mexico tour. The sonogram in his pocket, paint options for the nursery saved in his phone, and a spring in his step is what he greets Paige with as she crosses her arms and tries to not completely lose it in the face of everything that reminds her of Ricardo. She's clearly on the brink of completely self-destructing- he'd seen Smackdown, had come to his own conclusions about what happened to Natalya, and it's done nothing but worry him. AJ had looked a bit pale upon seeing the footage as well.
So now that they're actually face to face and he can do something, he gets Ricardo on Skype. Their short, muffled conversation seems not to attract her attention as she stares out of their hotel room window and, before long, he walks over to her and hands her the phone. She goes through a wave of expressions before settling on a hungry, desperate one that only seems marginally sated by Ricardo's words, his face. Once she hands Mike back his phone and goes out to tour the sights with her own phone, he sits on his bed and pulls the sonogram out of his pocket, examining the images that are already imprinted in his brain.
He's tired from the traveling, the touring, the separation from his girls, so he settles in to sleep. But before he does, he rests the ultrasound on her pillow with a short note. Try not to be sad, Aunt Paige! I'll be here for you to hug before you know it. -Sara Louisa
He conks out quickly and doesn't hear her return, nor her muted gasp as she spots the display on her pillow. Her trembling smile and tearful recitation of the note also goes unnoticed as she sits heavily on the bed and stares at it in amazement. Her dark eyes drifting up to rest on his peacefully sleeping face, she smiles. "AJ is a very lucky woman." Standing up, she gently tucks the sonogram back in his bag and turns the lamp off so he can sleep on undisturbed. "You are a bloody fantastic friend, Mike. Thank you."
The note she keeps with her and rereads it in the dark until she falls asleep too, a small smile still on her lips.