One Mississippi, Two Mississippi

Callie sat cross legged on the floor of the living room, an ice pack laid on one ankle and she was rubbing the other. She was going through a stack of resumes trying to find the perfect replacement for herself at work before she was done in 2 weeks. So far no one was really standing out. She glanced up as the front door opened and Jamie came through with two boxes stacked on top of each other. She watched as he set them down on the floor across from her and Jordie came in after him with another two.

Jamie looked at the boxes, grabbing the one that had kitchen written on it in Callie's writing, he made his way into the kitchen to set it down with the rest of the boxes. Callie glanced back down at her papers and jumped up with a scream. Jamie came running into the living room, Jordie from upstairs, Callie hid behind Jamie as he laughed upon seeing the spider on the coffee table.

"Quit laughing and kill it already!" Callie said, giving him a little shove forward.

Jordie glanced around Jamie and to the coffee table and exclaimed, "holy shit that things huge."

"I swear to god if one of you don't get rid of it within the next ten seconds I'm moving back to BC." She told them, rolling her eyes as Jordie shrugged as if to say he didn't care. Jamie took his shoe off, slammed it on the table, making Callie jump. When he went to put his shoe back on Callie warned him, "like hell you're putting that shoe back on and walking around my house."

"Oh it's your house huh?" Jamie joked, making her roll her eyes.

"Until you clean the coffee table and your shoe yes it is." Callie told him, making him walk to the kitchen, clean the bottom of his shoe with a lysol wipe and then come back to clean the coffee table.

He couldn't help but ask her, "what do you do when I'm on the road and there's a spider in the house?"

"Sleep at Kara's." Callie told him with a shrug, making both Jamie and Jordie laugh. She rolled her eyes at them and picked up her pile of papers before she asked, "how many more boxes?"

Jamie shrugged, "three or four for upstairs. I'm actually kind of impressed you managed pack so well."

"Contrary to your beliefs it's you that owns too much shit." She said, making Jordie laugh. Jamie went to argue but Callie interrupted him, "don't argue. I had 2 medium suitcases and 2 boxes. You? You had like 4 suitcases and I lost count of boxes."

Jamie shrugged, brushing it off, before he told her, "so I was thinking that tomorrow we could finish unpacking, tonight we could just hang out and relax."

Callie nearly sighed, they had moved from the condo into a house a few blocks away from Kara's only three days previous. They had a bed, the coffee table and couches set up and that was it. Jamie was set to start the new season in two weeks and Callie was due 3 weeks after that. They had no time to do anything. Instead of showing her frustration she smiled and welcomed the opportunity to relax and be off her feet, "only if you promise to let me eat ice cream tonight

Jamie smiled, "straight from the tub."

- - - -

Callie rested her head on Jamie's shoulder as they leaned against the headboard of the bed. Jamie was flipping through tv channels, every so often he would place his hand on her stomach. Callie laced their fingers together and let out a small laugh as Jamie settled on a TLC show about babies.

He glanced at Callie and asked, "so… have we decided on a name yet?"

Callie shrugged, "we haven't found one that we agree on yet that's for sure."

"Do you want to do same initials?" Jamie asked curiously, it was something they hadn't really talked much about, neither had given much thought to names, but now that there was only a little over a month left it seemed to come up more and more.

"I don't know. I'm not necessarily looking specifically for J or C names. Are you?" Callie asked, looking up at him.

Jamie shook his head before he asked curiously, "what about last name?"

"What about it?"

"I just wasn't sure… I mean we aren't married yet and I wasn't sure if you wanted to do a hyphenation or just your last name or something." It was something he had thought of often and until now he had never gotten the courage to ask Callie.

"Not my last name, and it definitely won't be Jones-Benn. Hyphenations annoy the hell out of me." Callie told him, giving his hand a gentle rub as she added, "it's definitely gonna be Benn."

Jamie smiled gently, he moved his hand along her stomach. He couldn't help but think out loud, "we don't really have much longer now huh?"

"Nope. Only a few more weeks now." Callie said softly, adding, "we so aren't ready. We don't have anything done."

"We'll be okay. We can get everything done, we still have 5 weeks." Jamie told her, trying to be supportive, trying to show her that he knew they would be ready when the time came. He knew Callie was frustrated and nervous and there wasn't much he could do or say to change that.

"No we don't. We have 2 weeks before your season starts. We both know that's gonna take up almost all of your time."Callie told him, rolling her eyes as he shrugged in response. Callie stared at their hands for a few moments before she spoke softly, almost afraid of Jamie's reaction, “just promise me that I'm not gonna have to do this by myself.”

“What do you mean?”

“I know you, you get into hockey mode during the season, and that's fine, but I don't want to be one of those hockey wives that raises kids on her own.” Callie told him, watching as he sighed at her. Callie nearly rolled her eyes, but instead she simply said, “I don't want to start a fight over this.”

“What, you really think I'm gonna just party with the guys all the time and never come home?” Jamie asked, trying to keep hints of his annoyance out of his voice, but he knew he hadn't succeeded very well.

“I'm not saying that at all, it's just.. you're gone a lot, and I know that's your job, but my dad was gone all the time for work when we were kids and it was rough.”

“That's different, it was just your dad. This kids gonna have two parents.” Jamie told her, watching as Callie shrugged her shoulders. He let out a breath of air before he told her, “nothings gonna happen to you.”

“You don't know that. Everyone thought my mom would be around to raise us. Things happen Jamie, and it worries me, because I know you're gonna love this baby, but I'm scared that if something happens… I don't know." Callie stated, not able to finish her sentence. She stared at her stomach, avoiding Jamie's face.

"This something you think of a lot?" He asked curiously, watching as she nodded. He once again told her, "nothings gonna happen."

"You know my mom was 32 when she died. I was four, and I don't even remember what she looked like anymore, or what her laugh sounded like. I used to hide my parents wedding book under my bed, and I'd go through it like a bed time story. I don't have my own memories, everything I know is from what people tell me." Callie said, reaching up to wipe her cheeks with the back of her hand. Jamie let out another breath and gave her hand a squeeze.

"You can't think like that. The more you think about stuff like that, you're gonna miss out on all the memories." He told her, making her nod gently. Finally he asked, "how long has this been bothering you?"

"A couple weeks. Mike called, and he told me that Dana keeps asking when mommy's coming home." Callie heard Jamie suck in a breath of air, and he leaned back against the headboard, placing an arm around her shoulder, pulling her into him.

"I know that everything with Cora is still really fresh, I know you probably think of her, and the kids a lot, especially now, but do you remember when you made me promise I wasn't gonna die on you? Well I'm asking you to promise me the same thing. You're right to be worried, I don't even know how to change a diaper or to hold a baby properly so I need you to be around to teach me that. Not just for this baby but for all the other ones we have. I need you to be there to help me through when our daughter gets her first boyfriend. And I need you to be there so I can explain baseball to you before our sons first game. So when I say nothing is gonna happen to you, I need you to believe that." Jamie told her, reaching over to wipe her tears. Callie looked up at him, she tried very hard to not make a joke about the tears in his own eyes.

"Even I won't be able to help you through first boyfriends. Which is probably why you more than likely won't even know about it for several weeks." Callie told him, patting his cheek gently.

Jamie chuckled and said, "every day I pray this one is a boy."