Status: 1/1
I Have Died Every Day Waiting for You
☼ ☼ ☼
Alex is twenty-three years old when he decides he’s ready to have a child.
Jack is twenty-two years old when his boyfriend drops that bombshell on his life.
There’s an argument.
“Why are you freaking out about this?! You know I love kids, you knew I wanted to have children some day, and you know I want to have them with you!” Alex yells.
“I didn’t think ‘some day’ meant when we’re in our early twenties and we’ve barely even lived first! I mean, jeez, Alex, you can’t just come out with that kinda thing over breakfast one day! ‘I think we should try for a baby’ -- please! We can barely take care of ourselves! We live in a tiny apartment, we were struggling to make rent last month! You think a baby is gonna make all that easier?” Jack tries to reason, but he’s shouting too, and all it really achieves is upsetting Alex further.
“We’ve been together since we were sixteen, Jack! I’m ready, don’t you see it? We're ready! Money won’t matter, we’re ready,” Alex argues desperately, his tone softening and an almost a smile coming to his face as he steps forward and clutches at Jack’s shirt.
“Alex…” Jack says very quietly, feeling his heartbeat speed up as Alex presses sweet kisses along his jaw.
“Baby, please, we’re so ready,” Alex whispers, fingers tightening their hold in Jack’s shirt.
Jack almost caves, almost lets this end in a make-out session that would almost certainly lead to sex, and in the heat of the moment, Jack probably wouldn’t care if it was unprotected or not. The consequences of that wouldn’t hit ‘til later. It’s only the thought of that that makes him stop.
“Alex, no,” he frowns, much more firm as he pushes away Alex’s hands and walks away from him to the other side of the room. “You can’t just decide you’re ready one day and expect me to be right there with you when we’ve never even talked about this seriously before! That’s not fair, and it wouldn’t be fair on a baby.”
Alex wilts, tears welling in his eyes. He knows he’s maybe being ridiculous, and that it really isn’t fair to push this on Jack so suddenly. But if Alex lived in a perfect world, he would’ve started having kids when he was eighteen and he wouldn’t have stopped until he had five of them. He wanted a family. It already felt like he’d been waiting an eternity, hoping and praying that now was finally a good age for them to do it, for him to bring it up. Apparently not.
“But you always said you’d love to be a dad--,” Alex tries one more time, fighting not to let himself cry.
“I would love to be a dad! I can’t wait to be a dad! But I’m not ready; I’m not you. I haven’t been dying to have babies since I was fucking fifteen or whatever. I haven’t had my kids’ names picked out for years, I haven’t been researching preschools and baby food brands and whatever else it is you do at midnight on your laptop! I’m not that eager, Alex, I’m twenty-two! I haven’t lived for myself! I still feel like a kid, I can’t bring a baby into the world feeling unprepared. That’s not fair on anyone! And money will matter, babies are expensive. We’ve talked about marriage and kids and growing old together but you can’t just skip all the steps to get to those parts! I know you want children, and I’m sorry. I’m more than willing to give them to you, but at an appropriate time. Our life isn’t one of your weird space movies, you can’t just fast-forward to the scenes you like best. Why is it not enough to just be with me and enjoy being young and having life all to yourself for now? We have so much time to do all that, Alex. I’m not going to father a baby for you. Not yet.”
Jack finds himself panting when he stops talking, and it’s only then that he notices the tears that have spilled down Alex’s cheeks. They stare at each other for a few long seconds before Alex runs past Jack right out of the apartment, slamming the door behind him.
Jack sighs and starts to clear away their breakfast things.
“Some day,” he says quietly to himself. “Not yet.”
+++
Alex comes home hours later; not crying any more, but with evidence that he had been. The first thing Jack asks is where he’s been as he wraps his arms around his boyfriend and holds him, and the first thing Alex tells him as he collapses into Jack’s embrace and sobs is that he went to their friend Zack’s place and cried to him and his fiance, Matt. They were both terribly nice about it and made him hot chocolate and watched Friends with him until he’d calmed down.
Jack just shushes his boyfriend’s cries and strokes his hair.
They stand hugging in silence for a few more minutes before Jack decides he has to ask.
“Did you-- did you tell Zack and Matt why you were… you know?”
Alex lets out a shaky little the sigh, the kind that only comes after long and pained sobbing, and he pulls back slightly to answer Jack’s question.
“Yes. I did. Only because they were so worried and I didn’t-- I couldn’t keep it bottled up,” he whispers it, worried in case it might make Jack mad, that he’d shared such personal business of theirs with their friends who need not know about it, at least not right now.
But Jack’s not angry. “And what did they say?”
Alex takes a deep breath. “They said some things that made me realise I was being stupid. I’m sorry I sprung that on you.”
“No, babe, no, I’m sorry I was so harsh and… and defensive about the whole thing. I know you want to have babies, but it just… it seems so soon. We’re still young. We have so much time to start the whole big adventure of raising a family together,” Jack reassures, cupping Alex’s face to give him the most loving kiss he can muster. “I love you. I want to have kids with you. Just not yet, okay?”
Alex sighs, feels more downcast by it that he cares to think about, but he knows Jack’s right. “Okay. We can wait until we’re both ready. And… financially stable, I guess.”
Jack chuckles at how depressing Alex makes it sound, kissing his nose. “Babe, please don’t be so sad. I’m sorry. But this is a good thing! It means we have time to get more life experience and have fun and make a better life for our future kid. You don’t wanna raise a baby in this dingy little apartment, do you? I wanna raise my kids in a house, with a garden where we can play, and a family-friendly street with lots of other kids for them to play with, a park nearby, quiet roads where they can ride bikes and scooters and skateboards… the whole nine yards.”
Jack’s smile was bright as he described their future and Alex beams at him, holding Jack’s hips tightly and using the grip to wiggle his body for him.
“You’ve thought about this as much as that?” he asks, a bit surprised.
“Of course I have,” Jack softens even more, looking at Alex with nothing but adoration. His boyfriend was such a gentle soul, and it brought out a different side of Jack. “I really do want a family with you, Alex. Just not yet. We’re going to make more wonderful memories together first, stories that we can tell our children to help them drift off to sleep at night about what adventures their daddies had, and we’re going to find a good, permanent place to live first. I just want to be stable and emotionally prepared. We can do that, can’t we?”
Alex’s eyes water again, but with only happy tears this time. “Yes. Yes, we can. I love you. We can… we can wait. You’re all I need right now.”
He does mean it. He stills aches for children… but Jack is here now, and Jack is more important because of that.
+++
They turn their lives around in two short years. A change of jobs for them both, a new apartment. Saving up. New cars for them both (maybe that was a help from their parents, whatever). More saving up. Alex gets taken under his father’s wing at the company. Saving up? More like swimming in money, but they keep that quiet. They still save it; they’re not stupid with it. Travelling around Europe. Travelling around America. A trip to Australia for a bit. And when they come back, a new house. It’s beautiful, still in their hometown of Baltimore, but it’s huge and perfect to raise a family -- just what they’d both had in mind.
But even when they’re settled into their gorgeous new house, skin browned from the sun in all the beautiful places they visit, Alex doesn’t mention babies. Jack doesn’t mention babies.
Alex wants to mention babies, but he’s kept so busy with work. Not as busy as Jack, though. Jack adores his job, and is working towards opening up his own clothing store with his original designs and the designs of other young people in the industry. It’s a wonderful thing. He loves it, but he comes home exhausted every day. Alex doesn’t want to have a baby like that, with his boyfriend tired all the time and barely having time for a child.
So he keeps it quiet. Jack will be ready soon.
+++
Zack and Matt’s wedding is the most beautiful thing Alex has ever witnessed. He tells Jack this as they sit at their table clapping away as Matt makes a speech to his new husband.
That night, slow-dancing with a scattering of other couples, Jack holds Alex close and whispers to him.
“So… a wedding, huh?”
Alex squints at Jack, with a bemused smile. “Yeah? What are you getting at?”
Jack leans closer to his boyfriend with a smile, nose nudging his ear. “Nothin’. Just, you said this wedding was the most beautiful thing you’ve ever seen earlier.”
“It was,” Alex blinks, confused as he hooks his chin over Jack’s shoulder, almost hugging him as they dance. “Did you not think so? Matt and Zack are so happy.”
“Of course I thought so, they’re our best friends… it was amazing,” Jack agrees, but then shrugs a bit. “S’just, I think there’s a much more beautiful wedding you could see, maybe in the near future.”
Alex pulls back, stopping dancing altogether. “What are you saying?”
“I’m just saying that I think our wedding will be the most beautiful thing you see,” Jack says, in such a casual manner that Alex misses a few beats before he catches up.
“Are you proposing to me right now?” Alex gapes.
Jack laughs and pulls Alex closer by his waist again, forcing him to move so they’re not just standing like idiots on the dancefloor. “Of course I’m not, you think I would propose like this at someone else’s wedding? I just wanted to let you know our wedding’s gonna beat this wedding.”
Alex chuckles, shaking his head. “It’s not a contest! Zack and Matt are our friends.”
“Just you wait and see.”
They keep dancing, and Alex laughs it off, but Jack knows. Jack knows their wedding will be the most magnificent thing Alex has ever laid eyes on.
Well, at least until they finally have that baby. Some day, anyway.
+++
They awake in their hotel that they stayed in just for the wedding, and have breakfast on the balcony.
Alex should have expected it, but he didn’t.
+++
Alex is twenty-five years old when his boyfriend drops to one knee, not even a day after the wedding of their best friends, and proposes to him there in their dressing gowns.
Jack is twenty-four years old when he knows he can commit himself to the love of his life forever. He already knew, but it was time to make it official to all their friends and family.
Alex cries and Jack hugs him, slipping a slim band on his finger, with a shimmering tanzanite stone embedded amongst the silver. It’s Alex’s birthstone.
+++
The days come and go, and Alex thinks only in passing of babies. He’s swept up in wedding planning with Jack -- he wants to be married within a year of the engagement. Hasty, and ambitious, he knows… but he’s finally marrying his high school sweetheart, and he doesn’t want to draw that out longer than need be.
Meanwhile, Jack wonders.
They’re earning good money. They have the perfect house. They’ve travelled to so many lovely places together.
Jack thinks that maybe, just maybe, it’s time to spend that money on a baby. Raise a child in their perfect house. Travel with a tiny life in tow, letting it see the wonders of the world with its parents.
He doesn’t mention it to Alex, though.
Jack wants to be married before they take that next step, and that isn’t far away. He’ll tell Alex he’s ready on their wedding night.
He can’t think of a more precious start to their married life, than trying for a baby for the first time with rings on their fingers.
+++
Merely seven months after their engagement, the wedding day takes place.
It’s a simple outdoor ceremony in the warm breeze of a Baltimore summer, surrounded by their friends and family under a gorgeous white canopy.
Zack cries as his best friends say their vows, his own husband holding his hand the entire time.
Alex is surprised to find he doesn’t cry -- he’s too ecstatic for tears as he slips the ring on Jack’s finger, and Jack does the same. What does surprise him, is that Jack cries. He practically sobs as they kiss, their guests clapping and cheering as they did so.
As they make their way back down the aisle and away from the guests to prepare for dinner, Alex squeezes Jack’s hand.
“Are you okay? I can’t believe you cried and I didn’t,” he grins, quite possibly the happiest boy in the world. “We’re married, Jack! We did it.”
“I’m okay,” Jack nods, leaning over to kiss his new husband on the cheek. “I’ve never been better. I love you.”
He wasn’t going to tell Alex yet, but he was crying at the joyful thought that he was about to give his life-long love everything he’d ever wanted.
Just a few more hours.
+++
They were in the hotel that night when it happened.
Jack was on the bed, wearing just his shirt and underwear as he readied himself to tell Alex he wanted to try.
Alex was in the bathroom. He’d been in there for quite some time, however. Jack didn’t really notice; he was too busy stressing about how to tell Alex he was ready. It had to be perfect. It had to be as perfect and beautiful as their wedding had been. Jack wanted this to be a moment Alex would remember forever.
He jumped in fright when Alex came running from the bathroom, shouting and waving his hand about wildly.
“Jesus Christ, Alex! What’s the matter?!” Jack exclaims, stumbling off the bed and facing his husband.
Alex has tears streaming down his face, but he’s smiling, and Jack doesn’t really understand until a small white stick is shoved into his hands.
He looks down at the item, knowing immediately what it is, but he can’t even process it for a few seconds.
“I know we didn’t plan this,” Alex is breathless. “But it’s right. It’s so right. It’s such perfect timing. The universe decided for us, love. We’re ready.”
For a moment, Alex thinks Jack is appalled. He drops the pregnancy test on the floor and for another moment, Alex thinks he actually might be something akin to disgusted.
Until he throws his arms around Alex and laughs long and loud, never happier.
+++
Alex is twenty-six years old when he’s finally pregnant with the baby he’s always longed for.
Jack is twenty-five years old when he’s finally prepared to take this journey with Alex.
As soon as the honeymoon passes (which came a mere two days after the wedding), the newlyweds tell their parents. They tell their siblings. They tell all their closest friends. Zack and Matt practically squeeze the life out of the pair with a bone-crushing hug when they hear the news, and the four of them stay up talking excitedly long into the night just like when they were teenagers. They pop champagne, and Alex has lemonade.
He’s only eight weeks along.
+++
Jack is overseeing the opening of his third store, lingering over the brand new section he added for baby and child clothing. He decided on the idea before the wedding, before he knew Alex was pregnant. Such a funny coincidence, but he couldn’t stop running his hands over the tiny suits for newborns.
He couldn’t quite believe something so small was going to need his care in just a handful of months’ time.
Jack was clutching a miniscule pair of socks when his assistant appeared at his side, looking white.
+++
Alex had simply lay down in the doctor’s office and wept, hardly able to breathe, and nobody could make him move. He was terrifying all of the other patients waiting to be seen.
It took Jack an hour of coaxing before he finally got his husband to come to the car. Alex didn’t speak for three days, but Jack spoke a lot.
“It just-- it just happens sometimes, babe.”
“You were really early, we should’ve known.”
“It’s not your fault, don’t blame yourself.”
“I didn’t even know you booked an appointment, I wish you’d told me. I wish I could’ve been there when they told you.”
“This doesn’t mean we can’t try again.”
“Lots of couples go through this.”
“We’ll just take a little break for a while, try not to think about it.”
When Alex finally replies to Jack’s many, many statements regarding the matter, he’s cold and emotionless. It chills Jack to his very core; not even after their worst fights has Alex ever been so dispassionate in every possible aspect.
“I deserve a baby. We’re not waiting any longer.”
+++
For a few weeks, it’s tense. The doctor recommended a three-month wait before trying again, and Alex follows that because he wants to be safe. Jack wonders if it’s healthy for Alex to be so focused on getting pregnant again -- replacing one pregnancy with another just for the sake of it won’t heal the wound of a miscarriage, and Jack knows it. He just hopes Alex knows it.
But slowly, his husband gets back to normal. He laughs more, he cooks with Jack, he kisses his neck in bed and asks to be held.
It relieves Jack, but like a clock ticking down to something terrible but unknown, he knows Alex has the calendar marked for the three months being up. It approaches all too fast, and Jack naively hopes Alex might forget all about it for just a little longer. He needs more time.
He thinks they’ll get away with it too, but night falls, and as they’re lying in bed talking about their days at work, there’s a silence. Alex takes his chance.
“Baby? You know today’s the day, don’t you?” he whispers into the dark, shifting closer to his husband and pressing their lips together softly. “We haven’t slept together since it happened. It’s time. We waited.”
Jack wilts as he kisses Alex, only letting it keep going until he feels a hand try to slip into his underwear.
“No, no, love, don’t,” Jack stops him, pushing his hand away. “I’m sorry. I-- I can’t. I don’t want to.”
Alex prickles immediately, sitting up and turning on the lamp so he can look at Jack properly. He doesn’t want to fight in the dark. Jack sits up with him, trying not to sigh, because he knows Alex won’t back down easy.
“Why not? Is this because three months isn’t long enough, according to you? The doctor told us, it’s safe after three months. I’m back to normal, my body is fine, I’m ready,” Alex defends himself before Jack can even speak.
“No, Alex, I know that three months is long enough for you physically, but mentally, it’s not the same for everyone--,” Jack starts, rubbing his eyes tiredly, but he’s interrupted.
“Jack, I’m fine mentally too! There’s nothing wrong with me! I want this baby! I’m ready! The miscarriage hurt, but I’m fine, this is going to happen sooner or later, so why not sooner? We were stupid to tell everyone so soon, we should’ve waited until I was past twelve weeks, I know that, but we won’t make the same mistake again. We were too excited, but this time we’re gonna be fine! I’ve waited years, I’m not going to wait any more! I know you want this too, why are you so determined to wait longer?! Why are you so determined to keep this from me?!”
Jack had kept his cool. He had worked very hard to do that, because he knew Alex was in a bad place, whether he admitted it or not. But he couldn’t hold it back any more.
“Because you’re not the only one who is fucking hurting! I lost a baby too, Alex!”
That stopped Alex short.
Jack stared him down for a long moment, but his beautiful brown eyes, flecked with black, the eyes that Alex loved so much, grew shimmery with tears and he turned to leave the bed; leave the room. Alex didn’t know what to say to stop him, so he didn’t say anything.
The older of the pair had barely considered that Jack was taking this as hard as he was. Alex had been concealing his pain, but it was still obvious he’d been hurting -- the long days where he wouldn’t speak, the nights Jack could only get him to eat something like soup or yoghurt for dinner. It was more than clear Alex was in pieces. But Jack? Jack hid his pain differently.
He was so good at pretending and putting on a strong facade for Alex like always.
In the empty bed, straining for sounds of his husband crying elsewhere in the house, Alex Gaskarth had never felt more selfish.
This wasn’t the start to married life either of them had been hoping for, but to not even be offering a dual support system to the man who had always been his rock was the worst thing to realise.
It took ten minutes of deciding what to say before Alex gets up, and goes in search of Jack.
He finds him sitting in the kitchen nursing a cup of coffee, but he’s got one hand over his face, and Alex knows right away he’s in tears. Silent, veiled tears; the same way he’d been keeping all of his emotions lately.
“Jack,” Alex whispers as he sits down on the kitchen island right across from him, reaching to pull his hand from his face. “I’m so sorry. I’ve been so needy and selfish. I didn’t know… I didn’t know it meant as much to you.”
“How can you say that?” Jack responds, no longer angry, but just exhausted. “I wanted this baby just as much as you did. I know you’ve been desperate for kids for years, but that doesn’t mean I wasn’t just as eager once you fell pregnant. I’ve never felt so heartbroken in my life. And it hurt even more because I had to see you lose something that you’ve wanted for so long; that you’ve deserved for so long. Of course it meant as much to me. We’re gonna be parents together, it’s not just you in this. I was so excited to take that step with you. Now we don’t get to. I was beside myself, Alex.”
Alex’s eyes water, and he bites down on his quivering lip as he takes Jack’s hand in his across the counter top. “I’m sorry. If I’d realised you were hurting sooner, I would’ve… God, it doesn’t matter, I should’ve been there for you like you were for me right from the start.”
Jack softened more hearing that, squeezing his husband’s hand. “No, it’s not your fault. I should’ve talked to you about it sooner as well… I was covering it up because I didn’t want to stress you more than necessary. But I’m sorry. Guess communication kinda broke down, huh?”
Alex smiles through his tear, chuckling a little. “Well, you were right about everyone handling this differently. The point is we’re talking now, right? We’re gonna be okay.”
“We are gonna be okay. But can we just take this a little bit slower? I want a baby as much as you do, but we don’t have to rush to do it. I’m still hurting over the loss, and I know you wanna power on through it, but you’re hurting too. Aren’t you?” Jack looks Alex in the eye, and he ducks his head when he knows Jack is right. “You’re the bravest man I know, but please, let’s just let ourselves hurt the way we should right now. Hurting leads to healing, Alex. When we’re really ready to try again, we’ll know.”
Alex is sobbing by the time Jack finishes speaking, and he rushes around to Jack’s side of the counter to hold him close.
It meant more waiting, but Alex knows that once again, it’s the right thing to do.
+++
They know they’re ready in the most ridiculous way.
Or rather, the baby decides they’re ready for them.
It’s been another three months, and they’re out for Chinese food. They haven’t once mentioned the b-word, or the p-word, or even the m-word.
They’re just taking it slow, enjoying being married, and it’s kinda nice. Alex feels like there’s something missing, and Jack senses it often, but they still don’t mention it. Their time will come.
It’s such a mundane day and it catches them so off-guard.
Jack opens his fortune cookie at the end of the meal, and it’s a pretty basic one, simply reading, Your good deeds do not go unnoticed.
Alex laughs at it and says it’s true, giving Jack a kiss before he opens his own.
Something very small is going to bring you the greatest happiness.
When he shows Jack, they both smile at the message and puzzle over it for a second. Something about it clicks in Alex’s mind, and his hand immediately goes to his stomach as he looks at Jack with wide eyes. Jack’s own face falls, and they practically run from the restaurant to the nearest convenience store for a pregnancy test. The cashier gives them both a look which Alex doesn’t even notice in his rush, but it makes Jack’s cheeks burn. They must look like a couple of kids caught short.
Back at the house, Jack waits anxiously outside the bathroom door. They haven’t spoken since they came home -- Alex had run straight to the bathroom and Jack hadn’t stopped him.
Every logical thought Jack had told him it was preposterous, that Alex would not be pregnant, that the fortune cookie was too vague, and besides, those things never actually have truth to them. If it fits someone’s current situation, it’s always just coincidence.
It didn’t stop him sweating through his shirt as he heard the toilet flush, waiting for Alex to open the door.
When he did, his expression was unreadable. Jack had a twinge of deja vu when Alex pushed the stick into his hands.
“Something very small,” he hears Alex whisper, heart thudding in his ears as he takes in the tiny pink plus sign.
Something very small indeed.
And the greatest happiness? It was greater than words could describe.
Alex had immediately yelled in excitement, and Jack the same, both of them leaping into each other’s arms and kissing like it was the last thing they’d ever do.
The celebrating had almost taken place right there on the hallway floor, but Jack had stopped them while they still had (half) their clothes on, picking Alex up and carrying him to bed.
“Gotta be more gentle with you now,” he’d whispered. “You’ve got something very small to look after.”
Alex just squealed with glee and hugged Jack tightly.
They were ready.
+++
As with most things though, fate didn’t line up with being ready.
Alex is at Zack and Matt’s new house -- they moved in three weeks prior and it’s in the process of being decorated, but it’s looking beautiful. With Matt at work, Zack had gotten bored and invited Alex over to talk baby shower plans.
He was fourteen weeks along.
“I know you just want something simple but it would still be nice to have some decorations, maybe just balloons and a few banners? They can be gender-neutral colours, assuming you and Jack don’t wanna know the sex of the baby,” Zack points to some yellow and green balloons in a magazine that read, CONGRATULATIONS! over them. “I know green can be kind of a boyish colour sometimes but no matter.”
“Green and yellow? I don’t want this party to look like a garden salad,” Alex laughs, leaning over the magazine and flicking aimlessly through the pages. “It’s just gonna be low-key! A little family-and-friends get-together, we don’t need balloons or anything.”
“Oh, Alex! Every party needs balloons at the very least, I don’t care how freakin’ low-key it is,” Zack argues.
He keeps talking about stuff this party will need -- absolute essentials like extravagant finger-food (how finger-food can be extravagant, Alex will never know) and some very nice white wines. But Alex stops listening after a moment, because he feels weird and he’s not sure why. He hasn’t been getting any kind of morning sickness, but he wonders if the twinges he’s been getting all day are the beginnings of it.
A searing pain in his lower abdomen makes him drop his tea, and Zack jumps.
+++
“Jack, you have to come home from work. Something’s wrong with Alex, and I don’t know what to do.”
Jack stops typing on his MacBook, taking the phone away from being held between his ear and shoulder to hold it properly. “What do you mean? What happened?”
“I asked him over today to talk about the baby shower, we were just talking and then he dropped his tea all over the floor. I think it must’ve burned him but he didn’t even seem to notice, he just apologised a lot and said he had to go to the bathroom. He’s been in there for nearly forty minutes and I can’t get him to come out. Every time I tell him to come out, he just says he’ll be two minutes more and then it’s quiet again. I’m seriously gonna break down this fucking door, I don’t know what he’s doing but he doesn’t sound right.”
Jack stumbles to his feet, grabbing his jacket and locking up his office in thirty seconds flat. “I’ll be there as soon as I can.”
+++
When Jack gets to Zack and Matt’s place, Zack is crouched outside the bathroom door, pleading with Alex to let him in. It makes Jack go cold, and Zack stands up when he sees him, going over to speak quietly with Alex’s husband.
“He’s-- is he talking to you? I mean he’s conscious, isn’t he?” Jack asks in a panic.
“Yes, yes, he said something just a couple of minutes before you got here so he’s fine in that respect but-- I don’t know, Jack, it’s been an hour, something’s not right.”
Jack squares up and goes to the door, knocking on it three times. “Alex, it’s Jack. Will you let us in, please? You’ve stressed Zack out and I’m worried. Tell us what’s wrong.”
There’s no answer, but Jack thinks he can hear him crying. He glances over at Zack who’s standing in the background looking as if the past hour has completely fried his nerves. It probably has.
“Alex, seriously, Zack said it’s been an hour? You’re scaring him. You’re scaring me. Please reply to me, let me know you’re okay. Or at least awake.”
There’s still no answer but Jack really thinks he can hear crying, and the panic is starting to make him shake.
“Alexander, I’m gonna give you one minute to open this fucking door, okay? You’re really freaking me out.”
Jack walks back over to where Zack is standing, and Zack gives his friend a quick hug.
“Listen, man, if he’s not out in the next sixty seconds, we’re gonna break down the door. I’ve already tried threatening that and he didn’t even budge, so I think we should just do it,” Zack explains in a hushed tone. “I don’t know what the hell he’s doing in there but if he’s not willing to communicate, we’re gonna have to just find out what’s wrong by force.”
“I’m okay with that. I didn’t run three red lights to get here just to stand outside your bathroom and lose my mind,” Jack wipes his brow, waiting beside Zack for a little longer before they decide it’s time.
“Alex, get back from the door, we’re coming in whether you want us to or not,” Zack warns.
They get no response and the worry is now very real that Alex might be unconscious, so the two men position themselves against the wood and start to push.
The pressure of their combined weight pressing on the door causes the lock to burst very quickly, and Jack almost falls onto the bathroom floor., stumbling to his knees. Zack manages to retain his balance in the doorway, and he sees the mess first before Jack rights himself. At the sound of Zack’s muffled sob, Jack looks up.
His stomach turns and it’s hard to keep composure.
Alex is leaning his head and one arm on the rim of the closed toilet, body streaked with sweat. He’s shirtless, and Jack can see his previously white t-shirt on the floor, obviously used as a cloth in a vain attempt to mop up the distressingly large pool of blood.
The source of which, Jack can see, is at the crotch of Alex’s pants.
Alex looks at them with sufferance and acceptance, his face wet with sweat and tears. The past hour looks to have aged him, and when he speaks, Jack can’t hold himself back from crying.
“I couldn’t make it stop.”
+++
Their first miscarriage had broken Jack’s heart, but the second?
He wasn’t sure there was a word for what he feeling.
There was certainly no word for what Alex was feeling.
He spent nearly a week in hospital to recover from the blood loss, and he had a high fever. There was no explanation for it. Their doctor said that Alex was perfectly healthy in all other aspects, and the fever was just a symptom of the bad miscarriage.
Jack was slowly beginning to learn that the most frustrating thing about miscarriages was the lack of answers -- there was rarely one solid cause for a miscarriage. It just happened. Sometimes the body would just be correcting a pregnancy that got off to a bad start. Jack supposed he could live with it, he just wished it didn’t hurt so much.
And God, if only it didn’t ruin Alex.
He would take all the pain if it meant Alex didn’t feel the way he did.
+++
Alex is twenty-seven years old when they’re finally allowed to try again.
Jack is twenty-six years old when he signs them up to go to a fertility clinic to check everything is in working order, terrified that a third pregnancy will end the way the first two did.
The results come back clear, however, and tentatively, Alex convinces him that it’s alright to try again. Jack finds it somewhat inspiring how well Alex recovered; he was inconsolable after the incident on Zack and Matt’s bathroom floor. He had made his peace with it though. Every time Jack would check on him, Alex would just say it hadn’t been their time.
They’re about to try when Jack stops them, his nerves obvious. It’s already a bit strange because they’re having sex with the lights off and that’s something they don’t really do by choice. But they’re both a little apprehensive.
“Alex, are you sure you wanna do this? We can-- we can wait, it’s okay.”
“Jack. I want to. And I know you want to, right? It’s gonna be fine. There’s no panic, we’re just trying. It’s safe to try.”
Jack can’t believe how calm his husband is, but he’s thankful for that. Lately, Alex has had to be his rock this time around. Matt keeps reminding him it’s okay to be weak now and again. Jack’s trying really hard to keep that in mind as he peppers Alex’s neck with kisses, feeling his husband’s legs around his waist.
They move gently and in sync; almost afraid to hurt each other. It’s sweet, and Alex’s mouth eventually finds Jack’s, moaning softly against his lips. If this is the encounter that makes a baby, it’ll be a lovely one to look back on, Alex thinks.
It’s been so long for both of them, though, that the sex itself is ephemeral, and afterwards, they lie together breathing heavily, holding hands, and saying nothing.
But they’re both hoping that they just miraculously made a baby, so, so much.
+++
Of course, they didn’t make a baby that time. But the next few times might have done it.
Alex fell pregnant again, and his ebullience when telling their friends and family stunned Jack. He was just so blissfully happy, whereas Jack was a nervous wreck. He couldn’t bring himself to think too much about the pregnancy, or doctor’s appointments, or planning for the baby actually arriving. It all brought him out in a panic. He was able to hide it at first, especially when people kept congratulating him, but after a while, Alex began to pick up on it.
He brought it up one day while they were putting away groceries and listening to the radio.
“Jack? You wanna tell me what’s up with you lately? I feel like you don’t really wanna talk about… about the baby.”
Jack stiffens as he puts things into the fridge, taking a deep breath through his nose. “Well. It’s not that I don’t wanna talk about it, I just… I don’t know, I just…”
“I know you’re worried,” Alex saves him from having to come up with an excuse. “It’s okay. To tell me you’re scared, I mean. And it’s okay to actually be scared. I was, when I first looked at the pregnancy test, and even more so when the doctor confirmed it. But that all went away really fast because… well, I’m pregnant. I wanna remember my pregnancy as a happy time, not being stressed that I might… stop being pregnant. You know?”
Jack sighs and turns towards Alex, nodding. “Yeah. I know what you mean. And I want to be like that too, I just can’t seem to help it. I’m sorry. I’ll try to take a few deep breaths and remind myself not to worry next time we talk about the future of the baby, it’s just… hard.”
Alex smiles lightly, kissing Jack’s cheek. “Is all this worrying why you didn’t want me to buy stuff for the baby’s nursery?”
“Kind of,” Jack admits guiltily. “I just felt like it was really soon to worry about the nursery.”
“Jack! We’re gonna be fine. Decorating a nursery isn’t going to jinx anything.”
Jack nods, and kisses Alex’s forehead, and they go back to putting the groceries away and then sit down to a cup of tea.
The radio continues to play in the background and Alex picks up on a song playing.
“What’s that one on right now?”
“Hm? Oh, I think it’s that Thousand Years song by Christina Perri. She did Jar Of Hearts, remember? You used to wanna play it in the car all the time,” Jack replies, sipping from his mug and glancing back down at the newspaper in his hand.
“It’s nice,” Alex nods, noting one of the lines in particular. “‘One step closer’? Sounds like these pregnancies. Always one step closer than the last one.”
Jack looks up and gives Alex a stern glare. “Don’t do that.”
Alex shrugs, only being honest. “Sorry. Still, it fits. Feels like we’ve been waiting for this baby for a thousand years, doesn’t it? But third time’s a charm, little one. We’re waiting for you.”
Alex smiles down at his stomach and rubs it. Jack just looks at him and says nothing.
+++
Alex is twenty-eight years old when he miscarries a third time, at fourteen weeks, just two weeks after telling Jack they had nothing to worry about. He didn’t even get a chance to start the nursery.
Jack is twenty-seven years old when he goes to therapy for the first time to cope with the loss.
His husband refuses to go with him, and Jack worries day and night until he thinks he’s going to get grey hairs over it, because he’s more than sure Alex is just pretending to be okay. They both take time off of work, and visit Alex’s parents’ holiday home in California, because the therapist thinks a break from their “real world” will help them both. For a while, it does. They’re gone for three weeks and they feel refreshed and tanned when they return. Jack surprises Alex by adopting a Papillon puppy named Sebastian. Alex immediately falls in love and spends time with the puppy day and night -- training him, teaching him tricks, playing with him outside, comforting him at night when he cries.
Jack’s glad he’s got something to focus on, but it just makes him ache when he watches them together because the dog feels like a replacement for the baby-shaped hole in Alex’s life. It’s something he tries not to wallow in too much.
They’re starting to feel truly normal again when Zack and Matt invite them over to dinner with news.
“We’re… we’re having a baby,” Matt announces over dessert, and Alex and Jack’s creme brulee suddenly tastes sour in their mouths. “We already told our other friends and family and stuff, but we thought… well, we didn’t want to spring it on you. We wanted you here with us.”
Alex stiffly swallows his food and stares down at his plate for a moment, and Jack feels the awkward silence descending. His friends look like they’re wilting -- Jack knows they’re not doing this to hurt them.
“That’s great news, guys!” he forces a smile, but only partially, because he really is happy for them. “Who’s pregnant?”
“I am,” Zack beams, hands on his stomach beneath the table cloth, a tiny swell already there. “We’re gonna wait to find out the sex but I feel like it’s going to be a boy. Matt’s bet is on a girl, but even if it’s not, maybe the next one will be!”
He and Matt chuckle, and Jack joins in, congratulating them again. That’s when Alex looks up, a watery smile on his face as he reaches across the table and touches Zack and Matt’s hands.
“I’m so happy for you guys, you really deserve it,” he praises, but his voice wavers, and they can all see the glassiness in his eyes as he gets up from the table, smile quickly slipping. “I’m sorry, excuse me for just a moment.”
He runs out of the room and they hear him go up the stairs and close the bathroom door. Jack looks at Zack and Matt and bites his lip.
“I’m… I’m sorry,” he offers. “Please don’t feel like this should take away from your happy news, I think he would’ve been like this no matter how you told us…”
“No, Jack, jeez, don’t be sorry,” Matt shakes his head. “We wanted to be as sensitive as possible. Alex is allowed to react like that.”
“I know he wants to be happy for you guys, it just… might be hard to be there for some of it,” Jack sighs.
Zack nods understandingly across the table, though it stings to think Alex might not be around for the big moments like the baby kicking and the scan photos and even the birth.
For the next few months, Alex makes the biggest effort he can to be around. He actually really throws himself into it. Between his puppy and becoming an honourary uncle, he’s got a lot to do. He buys clothes and toys galore for his niece- or nephew-to-be, and Zack actually has a quiet word with Jack because he’s worried Alex is spending too much money on them. But Alex still insists even after Jack suggests reining it in a bit. He can’t help himself.
Jack’s therapist thinks Alex is trying to project his fatherly desires onto someone else’s baby, and Jack agrees. He’s on the verge of actually forcing Alex to go talk to the damn therapist himself when something happens.
Alex gets sick three mornings in a row, and on the third day, exactly one week before Zack’s due date, he realises it was naive to brush it off as a stomach bug.
He takes a pregnancy test at work and almost faints in the bathroom stall.
Pregnant.
+++
Zack has a baby boy in the end, James Mark Flyzik, born weighing exactly seven pounds. Alex cries when he holds him, and Jack cries because his best friends have a baby and his husband is pregnant and it’s all a bit overwhelmingly happy.
For just a moment, it’s so overwhelmingly happy.
Alex is a crushing thirteen weeks when he miscarries.
+++
Alex is twenty-nine years old and has since added another two miscarriages to his list, both before the ten-week mark.
Jack is twenty-eight years old when he gives up.
He stops going to therapy, believing they’re not destined to be parents. Alex has always believed, ever since they were teenagers, but Jack just can’t any more. It hurt too much. They’d been hurting on and off for so many years and Jack couldn’t do it any more. Believing they could keep getting pregnant just opened him up to too much hurt, and he wasn’t strong enough for it.
What gave him the most unbearable pain, though, was that Alex still believed.
He still believed they could have their long-awaited baby.
Alex, despite the miscarriages, had went ahead and decorated the nursery anyway. He’d painted the walls a dusty blue-grey, and put up big wooden shelves. They were littered with books and beautiful animal ornaments, and a dog piggy bank that looked like Sebastian. There was a gorgeous crib in the corner, and Alex spent hours upon hours making a mobile to hang over it with plush stars and a moon and a sun and planets. Jack cringed every time he caught Alex working on the room, chest feeling empty at the idea of it never being used.
Alex just believed.
It was a conversation that came up at least three times a week right before they went to sleep, and Jack wasn’t sure how much longer he could listen to the hope in Alex’s voice.
It must have been the millionth time Alex had mentioned it when Jack really, really couldn’t even fake a smile for him any more.
“Jack, you know it’s gonna happen for us, don’t you? We’re not giving up. I thought I would be a dad long before now but that doesn’t mean it won’t happen. And lots of people start having children in their thirties anyway, we’ve got plenty of time.”
Jack is lying on his side, his back to Alex. It’s the first time he’s ever decided to openly put Alex down on the matter. “It’s not about the time we have left any more, Alex,” he mumbles. “I just don’t think I can handle it again.”
Jack turns out his lamp and listens to Alex swallowing sobs for an hour before he falls asleep.
+++
Alex is thirty years old when his best friends Zack and Matt announce their second pregnancy -- and this time it’s twins.
Jack is twenty-nine years old when his best friends Zack and Matt announce their second pregnancy, twins and all.
The day after, that night, he trashes the study in their house, and Alex comes in from work and has to physically wrestle Jack to the floor to make him stop.
“Jack! What the fuck are you doing?! What’s the matter with you?!”
“It’s not fair! It’s not fucking fair! They have a kid, they have their kid and now twins!” Jack yells, and though Alex keeps him pinned on the floor, he loosens his grip slightly. “Fucking twins! When is it our turn?! How come they get fucking twins, fucking three kids, and I can’t even give you one baby?! We’ve paid our dues, I can’t-- I can’t even give you-- I can’t.”
Jack dissolves into a sobbing mess on the carpet, and Alex slumps beside him and rubs his back, tears streaming down his face. He knew Jack didn’t mean this. Jack adored his friends with all his heart; but he was bottling his stresses about not having a baby, and nothing hurt Alex more than when it all came out at once like this.
“My poor boy,” he whispers, kissing Jack’s hair. “It’s gonna be okay. You know Zack and Matt deserve their babies, they’re amazing parents. They didn’t choose twins. They didn’t choose any of this, they’re not having a family to hurt us. And I know you love them, and you love your nephew, and you’re gonna love these twins just as much. I know it’s not fair but we aren’t being punished. I know it’s awful to watch. I cried for a week straight when Zack got pregnant the first time. But this is a happy time for them, we can’t be angry at them for being happy. We-- I think you should go back to your therapy, babe. I’ll come with you, just-- please. We can’t bottle this up.”
Jack sits up and wraps his arms around his husband, and they cry together on the study floor surrounded by bits of paper and the keyboard from their computer for a long time.
+++
The twins are born two weeks early, but they’re perfect in every way. Two little girls -- Alice Samantha Flyzik and Eadie Carla Flyzik born within three minutes of each other.
When Alex and Jack visit, Jack is the first to hold them both, and he doesn’t let them go for two hours.
Alex just smiles and kisses the three of them on the forehead. Their couples counseling is definitely helping.
+++
Years pass, and while they’re happy, things still feel off sometimes.
They adopt another dog, a pitbull named Peyton, and they take vacations, and they spend time with their friends and families… and they’re pretty much like any normal couple without kids, except the fact that neither of them can stand not having kids.
Alex stops bringing it up because he decided it was a bad idea to keep pushing it on Jack when his husband was so obviously not prepared to go through the pain of losing another baby -- at this stage, it was always going to be a possibility.
Truth be told, Alex wasn’t sure he could handle losing another baby either. But in the back of his mind, he always wanted to try again, always telling himself just one more time and they’d manage.
They decide to take time off work and go travelling again; they planned a trip that would last them nearly a year. All around America, then a few of their favourite iconic places in Europe, then Australia for a while.
The trip was wonderful and enlightening and everything they’d really hoped for; memories that would last them the rest of their lives. The only thing missing was the fact that it wasn’t a family trip. Just a couple and their dogs.
They were almost at their door, home from the trip with bags galore, when Alex says it.
“Have we given up?”
Jack just stays quiet for a bit, feeling a familiar pain in his chest.
“Does it feel like we’ve given up?”
Alex pauses and then nods, face slightly crumpled as the tears well, and he unlocks the door.
Jack sighs softly and follows in a similar fashion. He didn’t like to think of it that way. He really, really didn’t. The therapy had helped them both greatly, and they were, by all rights, a happy couple. It was just that the feeling of something missing was never going to be ignored, and they were both learning that slowly and painfully as the time passed.
Maybe they had given up.
+++
Alex is thirty-four years old when he finds himself in a hospital, aching and in pain, horribly exhausted… and the happiest he had ever been as he cradled a seven pound, four ounce bundle with a dusting of dark hair and the brightest eyes.
Jack is thirty-three years old when he finds himself in a hospital, in awe of the tiniest miracle he’d ever seen, held safe in his husband’s arms.
The world could be so cold, Jack had come to realise, but people like Alex were what made it a warm place.
He had always believed.
And like an answer to a thousand prayers, here she was.
Indiana Joyce Isobel Barakat. Tiny, exquisite, and terrifying in every way. They were in charge of this new life. As scary as that was, Jack knew she would grow up loved more than any child ever had been.
Jack had lost count of the amount of times he had kissed his husband and called him amazing in the last twenty-four hours. Every moment that went past with her tiny heart beating beneath their fingertips was like sweet relief; she was here, and nothing would take her away now.
Despite the overwhelming desire to stay awake and stare lovingly at his husband and newborn, Jack begins to succumb to sleep. He’d need it in preparation for all the visitors tomorrow. He doesn’t know how Alex is still conscious, but that doesn’t even matter because he has his baby.
He has his baby. The thought makes Jack feel more at peace than he has for years.
Though barely awake now in the chair beside him, Jack listens closely as Alex clutches their daughter to his chest, and sings to her through falling tears.
“Time stands still; beauty in all she is.
I will be brave, I will not let anything take away what’s standing in front of me.
Every breath, every hour has come to this.
One step closer…
I have died every day waiting for you.
Darling, don’t be afraid, I have loved you,
for a thousand years.
I’ll love you for a thousand more…
And all along, I believed I would find you.
Time has brought your heart to me,
I have loved you for a thousand years.
I’ll love you for a thousand more.”
Jack is twenty-two years old when his boyfriend drops that bombshell on his life.
There’s an argument.
“Why are you freaking out about this?! You know I love kids, you knew I wanted to have children some day, and you know I want to have them with you!” Alex yells.
“I didn’t think ‘some day’ meant when we’re in our early twenties and we’ve barely even lived first! I mean, jeez, Alex, you can’t just come out with that kinda thing over breakfast one day! ‘I think we should try for a baby’ -- please! We can barely take care of ourselves! We live in a tiny apartment, we were struggling to make rent last month! You think a baby is gonna make all that easier?” Jack tries to reason, but he’s shouting too, and all it really achieves is upsetting Alex further.
“We’ve been together since we were sixteen, Jack! I’m ready, don’t you see it? We're ready! Money won’t matter, we’re ready,” Alex argues desperately, his tone softening and an almost a smile coming to his face as he steps forward and clutches at Jack’s shirt.
“Alex…” Jack says very quietly, feeling his heartbeat speed up as Alex presses sweet kisses along his jaw.
“Baby, please, we’re so ready,” Alex whispers, fingers tightening their hold in Jack’s shirt.
Jack almost caves, almost lets this end in a make-out session that would almost certainly lead to sex, and in the heat of the moment, Jack probably wouldn’t care if it was unprotected or not. The consequences of that wouldn’t hit ‘til later. It’s only the thought of that that makes him stop.
“Alex, no,” he frowns, much more firm as he pushes away Alex’s hands and walks away from him to the other side of the room. “You can’t just decide you’re ready one day and expect me to be right there with you when we’ve never even talked about this seriously before! That’s not fair, and it wouldn’t be fair on a baby.”
Alex wilts, tears welling in his eyes. He knows he’s maybe being ridiculous, and that it really isn’t fair to push this on Jack so suddenly. But if Alex lived in a perfect world, he would’ve started having kids when he was eighteen and he wouldn’t have stopped until he had five of them. He wanted a family. It already felt like he’d been waiting an eternity, hoping and praying that now was finally a good age for them to do it, for him to bring it up. Apparently not.
“But you always said you’d love to be a dad--,” Alex tries one more time, fighting not to let himself cry.
“I would love to be a dad! I can’t wait to be a dad! But I’m not ready; I’m not you. I haven’t been dying to have babies since I was fucking fifteen or whatever. I haven’t had my kids’ names picked out for years, I haven’t been researching preschools and baby food brands and whatever else it is you do at midnight on your laptop! I’m not that eager, Alex, I’m twenty-two! I haven’t lived for myself! I still feel like a kid, I can’t bring a baby into the world feeling unprepared. That’s not fair on anyone! And money will matter, babies are expensive. We’ve talked about marriage and kids and growing old together but you can’t just skip all the steps to get to those parts! I know you want children, and I’m sorry. I’m more than willing to give them to you, but at an appropriate time. Our life isn’t one of your weird space movies, you can’t just fast-forward to the scenes you like best. Why is it not enough to just be with me and enjoy being young and having life all to yourself for now? We have so much time to do all that, Alex. I’m not going to father a baby for you. Not yet.”
Jack finds himself panting when he stops talking, and it’s only then that he notices the tears that have spilled down Alex’s cheeks. They stare at each other for a few long seconds before Alex runs past Jack right out of the apartment, slamming the door behind him.
Jack sighs and starts to clear away their breakfast things.
“Some day,” he says quietly to himself. “Not yet.”
+++
Alex comes home hours later; not crying any more, but with evidence that he had been. The first thing Jack asks is where he’s been as he wraps his arms around his boyfriend and holds him, and the first thing Alex tells him as he collapses into Jack’s embrace and sobs is that he went to their friend Zack’s place and cried to him and his fiance, Matt. They were both terribly nice about it and made him hot chocolate and watched Friends with him until he’d calmed down.
Jack just shushes his boyfriend’s cries and strokes his hair.
They stand hugging in silence for a few more minutes before Jack decides he has to ask.
“Did you-- did you tell Zack and Matt why you were… you know?”
Alex lets out a shaky little the sigh, the kind that only comes after long and pained sobbing, and he pulls back slightly to answer Jack’s question.
“Yes. I did. Only because they were so worried and I didn’t-- I couldn’t keep it bottled up,” he whispers it, worried in case it might make Jack mad, that he’d shared such personal business of theirs with their friends who need not know about it, at least not right now.
But Jack’s not angry. “And what did they say?”
Alex takes a deep breath. “They said some things that made me realise I was being stupid. I’m sorry I sprung that on you.”
“No, babe, no, I’m sorry I was so harsh and… and defensive about the whole thing. I know you want to have babies, but it just… it seems so soon. We’re still young. We have so much time to start the whole big adventure of raising a family together,” Jack reassures, cupping Alex’s face to give him the most loving kiss he can muster. “I love you. I want to have kids with you. Just not yet, okay?”
Alex sighs, feels more downcast by it that he cares to think about, but he knows Jack’s right. “Okay. We can wait until we’re both ready. And… financially stable, I guess.”
Jack chuckles at how depressing Alex makes it sound, kissing his nose. “Babe, please don’t be so sad. I’m sorry. But this is a good thing! It means we have time to get more life experience and have fun and make a better life for our future kid. You don’t wanna raise a baby in this dingy little apartment, do you? I wanna raise my kids in a house, with a garden where we can play, and a family-friendly street with lots of other kids for them to play with, a park nearby, quiet roads where they can ride bikes and scooters and skateboards… the whole nine yards.”
Jack’s smile was bright as he described their future and Alex beams at him, holding Jack’s hips tightly and using the grip to wiggle his body for him.
“You’ve thought about this as much as that?” he asks, a bit surprised.
“Of course I have,” Jack softens even more, looking at Alex with nothing but adoration. His boyfriend was such a gentle soul, and it brought out a different side of Jack. “I really do want a family with you, Alex. Just not yet. We’re going to make more wonderful memories together first, stories that we can tell our children to help them drift off to sleep at night about what adventures their daddies had, and we’re going to find a good, permanent place to live first. I just want to be stable and emotionally prepared. We can do that, can’t we?”
Alex’s eyes water again, but with only happy tears this time. “Yes. Yes, we can. I love you. We can… we can wait. You’re all I need right now.”
He does mean it. He stills aches for children… but Jack is here now, and Jack is more important because of that.
+++
They turn their lives around in two short years. A change of jobs for them both, a new apartment. Saving up. New cars for them both (maybe that was a help from their parents, whatever). More saving up. Alex gets taken under his father’s wing at the company. Saving up? More like swimming in money, but they keep that quiet. They still save it; they’re not stupid with it. Travelling around Europe. Travelling around America. A trip to Australia for a bit. And when they come back, a new house. It’s beautiful, still in their hometown of Baltimore, but it’s huge and perfect to raise a family -- just what they’d both had in mind.
But even when they’re settled into their gorgeous new house, skin browned from the sun in all the beautiful places they visit, Alex doesn’t mention babies. Jack doesn’t mention babies.
Alex wants to mention babies, but he’s kept so busy with work. Not as busy as Jack, though. Jack adores his job, and is working towards opening up his own clothing store with his original designs and the designs of other young people in the industry. It’s a wonderful thing. He loves it, but he comes home exhausted every day. Alex doesn’t want to have a baby like that, with his boyfriend tired all the time and barely having time for a child.
So he keeps it quiet. Jack will be ready soon.
+++
Zack and Matt’s wedding is the most beautiful thing Alex has ever witnessed. He tells Jack this as they sit at their table clapping away as Matt makes a speech to his new husband.
That night, slow-dancing with a scattering of other couples, Jack holds Alex close and whispers to him.
“So… a wedding, huh?”
Alex squints at Jack, with a bemused smile. “Yeah? What are you getting at?”
Jack leans closer to his boyfriend with a smile, nose nudging his ear. “Nothin’. Just, you said this wedding was the most beautiful thing you’ve ever seen earlier.”
“It was,” Alex blinks, confused as he hooks his chin over Jack’s shoulder, almost hugging him as they dance. “Did you not think so? Matt and Zack are so happy.”
“Of course I thought so, they’re our best friends… it was amazing,” Jack agrees, but then shrugs a bit. “S’just, I think there’s a much more beautiful wedding you could see, maybe in the near future.”
Alex pulls back, stopping dancing altogether. “What are you saying?”
“I’m just saying that I think our wedding will be the most beautiful thing you see,” Jack says, in such a casual manner that Alex misses a few beats before he catches up.
“Are you proposing to me right now?” Alex gapes.
Jack laughs and pulls Alex closer by his waist again, forcing him to move so they’re not just standing like idiots on the dancefloor. “Of course I’m not, you think I would propose like this at someone else’s wedding? I just wanted to let you know our wedding’s gonna beat this wedding.”
Alex chuckles, shaking his head. “It’s not a contest! Zack and Matt are our friends.”
“Just you wait and see.”
They keep dancing, and Alex laughs it off, but Jack knows. Jack knows their wedding will be the most magnificent thing Alex has ever laid eyes on.
Well, at least until they finally have that baby. Some day, anyway.
+++
They awake in their hotel that they stayed in just for the wedding, and have breakfast on the balcony.
Alex should have expected it, but he didn’t.
+++
Alex is twenty-five years old when his boyfriend drops to one knee, not even a day after the wedding of their best friends, and proposes to him there in their dressing gowns.
Jack is twenty-four years old when he knows he can commit himself to the love of his life forever. He already knew, but it was time to make it official to all their friends and family.
Alex cries and Jack hugs him, slipping a slim band on his finger, with a shimmering tanzanite stone embedded amongst the silver. It’s Alex’s birthstone.
+++
The days come and go, and Alex thinks only in passing of babies. He’s swept up in wedding planning with Jack -- he wants to be married within a year of the engagement. Hasty, and ambitious, he knows… but he’s finally marrying his high school sweetheart, and he doesn’t want to draw that out longer than need be.
Meanwhile, Jack wonders.
They’re earning good money. They have the perfect house. They’ve travelled to so many lovely places together.
Jack thinks that maybe, just maybe, it’s time to spend that money on a baby. Raise a child in their perfect house. Travel with a tiny life in tow, letting it see the wonders of the world with its parents.
He doesn’t mention it to Alex, though.
Jack wants to be married before they take that next step, and that isn’t far away. He’ll tell Alex he’s ready on their wedding night.
He can’t think of a more precious start to their married life, than trying for a baby for the first time with rings on their fingers.
+++
Merely seven months after their engagement, the wedding day takes place.
It’s a simple outdoor ceremony in the warm breeze of a Baltimore summer, surrounded by their friends and family under a gorgeous white canopy.
Zack cries as his best friends say their vows, his own husband holding his hand the entire time.
Alex is surprised to find he doesn’t cry -- he’s too ecstatic for tears as he slips the ring on Jack’s finger, and Jack does the same. What does surprise him, is that Jack cries. He practically sobs as they kiss, their guests clapping and cheering as they did so.
As they make their way back down the aisle and away from the guests to prepare for dinner, Alex squeezes Jack’s hand.
“Are you okay? I can’t believe you cried and I didn’t,” he grins, quite possibly the happiest boy in the world. “We’re married, Jack! We did it.”
“I’m okay,” Jack nods, leaning over to kiss his new husband on the cheek. “I’ve never been better. I love you.”
He wasn’t going to tell Alex yet, but he was crying at the joyful thought that he was about to give his life-long love everything he’d ever wanted.
Just a few more hours.
+++
They were in the hotel that night when it happened.
Jack was on the bed, wearing just his shirt and underwear as he readied himself to tell Alex he wanted to try.
Alex was in the bathroom. He’d been in there for quite some time, however. Jack didn’t really notice; he was too busy stressing about how to tell Alex he was ready. It had to be perfect. It had to be as perfect and beautiful as their wedding had been. Jack wanted this to be a moment Alex would remember forever.
He jumped in fright when Alex came running from the bathroom, shouting and waving his hand about wildly.
“Jesus Christ, Alex! What’s the matter?!” Jack exclaims, stumbling off the bed and facing his husband.
Alex has tears streaming down his face, but he’s smiling, and Jack doesn’t really understand until a small white stick is shoved into his hands.
He looks down at the item, knowing immediately what it is, but he can’t even process it for a few seconds.
“I know we didn’t plan this,” Alex is breathless. “But it’s right. It’s so right. It’s such perfect timing. The universe decided for us, love. We’re ready.”
For a moment, Alex thinks Jack is appalled. He drops the pregnancy test on the floor and for another moment, Alex thinks he actually might be something akin to disgusted.
Until he throws his arms around Alex and laughs long and loud, never happier.
+++
Alex is twenty-six years old when he’s finally pregnant with the baby he’s always longed for.
Jack is twenty-five years old when he’s finally prepared to take this journey with Alex.
As soon as the honeymoon passes (which came a mere two days after the wedding), the newlyweds tell their parents. They tell their siblings. They tell all their closest friends. Zack and Matt practically squeeze the life out of the pair with a bone-crushing hug when they hear the news, and the four of them stay up talking excitedly long into the night just like when they were teenagers. They pop champagne, and Alex has lemonade.
He’s only eight weeks along.
+++
Jack is overseeing the opening of his third store, lingering over the brand new section he added for baby and child clothing. He decided on the idea before the wedding, before he knew Alex was pregnant. Such a funny coincidence, but he couldn’t stop running his hands over the tiny suits for newborns.
He couldn’t quite believe something so small was going to need his care in just a handful of months’ time.
Jack was clutching a miniscule pair of socks when his assistant appeared at his side, looking white.
+++
Alex had simply lay down in the doctor’s office and wept, hardly able to breathe, and nobody could make him move. He was terrifying all of the other patients waiting to be seen.
It took Jack an hour of coaxing before he finally got his husband to come to the car. Alex didn’t speak for three days, but Jack spoke a lot.
“It just-- it just happens sometimes, babe.”
“You were really early, we should’ve known.”
“It’s not your fault, don’t blame yourself.”
“I didn’t even know you booked an appointment, I wish you’d told me. I wish I could’ve been there when they told you.”
“This doesn’t mean we can’t try again.”
“Lots of couples go through this.”
“We’ll just take a little break for a while, try not to think about it.”
When Alex finally replies to Jack’s many, many statements regarding the matter, he’s cold and emotionless. It chills Jack to his very core; not even after their worst fights has Alex ever been so dispassionate in every possible aspect.
“I deserve a baby. We’re not waiting any longer.”
+++
For a few weeks, it’s tense. The doctor recommended a three-month wait before trying again, and Alex follows that because he wants to be safe. Jack wonders if it’s healthy for Alex to be so focused on getting pregnant again -- replacing one pregnancy with another just for the sake of it won’t heal the wound of a miscarriage, and Jack knows it. He just hopes Alex knows it.
But slowly, his husband gets back to normal. He laughs more, he cooks with Jack, he kisses his neck in bed and asks to be held.
It relieves Jack, but like a clock ticking down to something terrible but unknown, he knows Alex has the calendar marked for the three months being up. It approaches all too fast, and Jack naively hopes Alex might forget all about it for just a little longer. He needs more time.
He thinks they’ll get away with it too, but night falls, and as they’re lying in bed talking about their days at work, there’s a silence. Alex takes his chance.
“Baby? You know today’s the day, don’t you?” he whispers into the dark, shifting closer to his husband and pressing their lips together softly. “We haven’t slept together since it happened. It’s time. We waited.”
Jack wilts as he kisses Alex, only letting it keep going until he feels a hand try to slip into his underwear.
“No, no, love, don’t,” Jack stops him, pushing his hand away. “I’m sorry. I-- I can’t. I don’t want to.”
Alex prickles immediately, sitting up and turning on the lamp so he can look at Jack properly. He doesn’t want to fight in the dark. Jack sits up with him, trying not to sigh, because he knows Alex won’t back down easy.
“Why not? Is this because three months isn’t long enough, according to you? The doctor told us, it’s safe after three months. I’m back to normal, my body is fine, I’m ready,” Alex defends himself before Jack can even speak.
“No, Alex, I know that three months is long enough for you physically, but mentally, it’s not the same for everyone--,” Jack starts, rubbing his eyes tiredly, but he’s interrupted.
“Jack, I’m fine mentally too! There’s nothing wrong with me! I want this baby! I’m ready! The miscarriage hurt, but I’m fine, this is going to happen sooner or later, so why not sooner? We were stupid to tell everyone so soon, we should’ve waited until I was past twelve weeks, I know that, but we won’t make the same mistake again. We were too excited, but this time we’re gonna be fine! I’ve waited years, I’m not going to wait any more! I know you want this too, why are you so determined to wait longer?! Why are you so determined to keep this from me?!”
Jack had kept his cool. He had worked very hard to do that, because he knew Alex was in a bad place, whether he admitted it or not. But he couldn’t hold it back any more.
“Because you’re not the only one who is fucking hurting! I lost a baby too, Alex!”
That stopped Alex short.
Jack stared him down for a long moment, but his beautiful brown eyes, flecked with black, the eyes that Alex loved so much, grew shimmery with tears and he turned to leave the bed; leave the room. Alex didn’t know what to say to stop him, so he didn’t say anything.
The older of the pair had barely considered that Jack was taking this as hard as he was. Alex had been concealing his pain, but it was still obvious he’d been hurting -- the long days where he wouldn’t speak, the nights Jack could only get him to eat something like soup or yoghurt for dinner. It was more than clear Alex was in pieces. But Jack? Jack hid his pain differently.
He was so good at pretending and putting on a strong facade for Alex like always.
In the empty bed, straining for sounds of his husband crying elsewhere in the house, Alex Gaskarth had never felt more selfish.
This wasn’t the start to married life either of them had been hoping for, but to not even be offering a dual support system to the man who had always been his rock was the worst thing to realise.
It took ten minutes of deciding what to say before Alex gets up, and goes in search of Jack.
He finds him sitting in the kitchen nursing a cup of coffee, but he’s got one hand over his face, and Alex knows right away he’s in tears. Silent, veiled tears; the same way he’d been keeping all of his emotions lately.
“Jack,” Alex whispers as he sits down on the kitchen island right across from him, reaching to pull his hand from his face. “I’m so sorry. I’ve been so needy and selfish. I didn’t know… I didn’t know it meant as much to you.”
“How can you say that?” Jack responds, no longer angry, but just exhausted. “I wanted this baby just as much as you did. I know you’ve been desperate for kids for years, but that doesn’t mean I wasn’t just as eager once you fell pregnant. I’ve never felt so heartbroken in my life. And it hurt even more because I had to see you lose something that you’ve wanted for so long; that you’ve deserved for so long. Of course it meant as much to me. We’re gonna be parents together, it’s not just you in this. I was so excited to take that step with you. Now we don’t get to. I was beside myself, Alex.”
Alex’s eyes water, and he bites down on his quivering lip as he takes Jack’s hand in his across the counter top. “I’m sorry. If I’d realised you were hurting sooner, I would’ve… God, it doesn’t matter, I should’ve been there for you like you were for me right from the start.”
Jack softened more hearing that, squeezing his husband’s hand. “No, it’s not your fault. I should’ve talked to you about it sooner as well… I was covering it up because I didn’t want to stress you more than necessary. But I’m sorry. Guess communication kinda broke down, huh?”
Alex smiles through his tear, chuckling a little. “Well, you were right about everyone handling this differently. The point is we’re talking now, right? We’re gonna be okay.”
“We are gonna be okay. But can we just take this a little bit slower? I want a baby as much as you do, but we don’t have to rush to do it. I’m still hurting over the loss, and I know you wanna power on through it, but you’re hurting too. Aren’t you?” Jack looks Alex in the eye, and he ducks his head when he knows Jack is right. “You’re the bravest man I know, but please, let’s just let ourselves hurt the way we should right now. Hurting leads to healing, Alex. When we’re really ready to try again, we’ll know.”
Alex is sobbing by the time Jack finishes speaking, and he rushes around to Jack’s side of the counter to hold him close.
It meant more waiting, but Alex knows that once again, it’s the right thing to do.
+++
They know they’re ready in the most ridiculous way.
Or rather, the baby decides they’re ready for them.
It’s been another three months, and they’re out for Chinese food. They haven’t once mentioned the b-word, or the p-word, or even the m-word.
They’re just taking it slow, enjoying being married, and it’s kinda nice. Alex feels like there’s something missing, and Jack senses it often, but they still don’t mention it. Their time will come.
It’s such a mundane day and it catches them so off-guard.
Jack opens his fortune cookie at the end of the meal, and it’s a pretty basic one, simply reading, Your good deeds do not go unnoticed.
Alex laughs at it and says it’s true, giving Jack a kiss before he opens his own.
Something very small is going to bring you the greatest happiness.
When he shows Jack, they both smile at the message and puzzle over it for a second. Something about it clicks in Alex’s mind, and his hand immediately goes to his stomach as he looks at Jack with wide eyes. Jack’s own face falls, and they practically run from the restaurant to the nearest convenience store for a pregnancy test. The cashier gives them both a look which Alex doesn’t even notice in his rush, but it makes Jack’s cheeks burn. They must look like a couple of kids caught short.
Back at the house, Jack waits anxiously outside the bathroom door. They haven’t spoken since they came home -- Alex had run straight to the bathroom and Jack hadn’t stopped him.
Every logical thought Jack had told him it was preposterous, that Alex would not be pregnant, that the fortune cookie was too vague, and besides, those things never actually have truth to them. If it fits someone’s current situation, it’s always just coincidence.
It didn’t stop him sweating through his shirt as he heard the toilet flush, waiting for Alex to open the door.
When he did, his expression was unreadable. Jack had a twinge of deja vu when Alex pushed the stick into his hands.
“Something very small,” he hears Alex whisper, heart thudding in his ears as he takes in the tiny pink plus sign.
Something very small indeed.
And the greatest happiness? It was greater than words could describe.
Alex had immediately yelled in excitement, and Jack the same, both of them leaping into each other’s arms and kissing like it was the last thing they’d ever do.
The celebrating had almost taken place right there on the hallway floor, but Jack had stopped them while they still had (half) their clothes on, picking Alex up and carrying him to bed.
“Gotta be more gentle with you now,” he’d whispered. “You’ve got something very small to look after.”
Alex just squealed with glee and hugged Jack tightly.
They were ready.
+++
As with most things though, fate didn’t line up with being ready.
Alex is at Zack and Matt’s new house -- they moved in three weeks prior and it’s in the process of being decorated, but it’s looking beautiful. With Matt at work, Zack had gotten bored and invited Alex over to talk baby shower plans.
He was fourteen weeks along.
“I know you just want something simple but it would still be nice to have some decorations, maybe just balloons and a few banners? They can be gender-neutral colours, assuming you and Jack don’t wanna know the sex of the baby,” Zack points to some yellow and green balloons in a magazine that read, CONGRATULATIONS! over them. “I know green can be kind of a boyish colour sometimes but no matter.”
“Green and yellow? I don’t want this party to look like a garden salad,” Alex laughs, leaning over the magazine and flicking aimlessly through the pages. “It’s just gonna be low-key! A little family-and-friends get-together, we don’t need balloons or anything.”
“Oh, Alex! Every party needs balloons at the very least, I don’t care how freakin’ low-key it is,” Zack argues.
He keeps talking about stuff this party will need -- absolute essentials like extravagant finger-food (how finger-food can be extravagant, Alex will never know) and some very nice white wines. But Alex stops listening after a moment, because he feels weird and he’s not sure why. He hasn’t been getting any kind of morning sickness, but he wonders if the twinges he’s been getting all day are the beginnings of it.
A searing pain in his lower abdomen makes him drop his tea, and Zack jumps.
+++
“Jack, you have to come home from work. Something’s wrong with Alex, and I don’t know what to do.”
Jack stops typing on his MacBook, taking the phone away from being held between his ear and shoulder to hold it properly. “What do you mean? What happened?”
“I asked him over today to talk about the baby shower, we were just talking and then he dropped his tea all over the floor. I think it must’ve burned him but he didn’t even seem to notice, he just apologised a lot and said he had to go to the bathroom. He’s been in there for nearly forty minutes and I can’t get him to come out. Every time I tell him to come out, he just says he’ll be two minutes more and then it’s quiet again. I’m seriously gonna break down this fucking door, I don’t know what he’s doing but he doesn’t sound right.”
Jack stumbles to his feet, grabbing his jacket and locking up his office in thirty seconds flat. “I’ll be there as soon as I can.”
+++
When Jack gets to Zack and Matt’s place, Zack is crouched outside the bathroom door, pleading with Alex to let him in. It makes Jack go cold, and Zack stands up when he sees him, going over to speak quietly with Alex’s husband.
“He’s-- is he talking to you? I mean he’s conscious, isn’t he?” Jack asks in a panic.
“Yes, yes, he said something just a couple of minutes before you got here so he’s fine in that respect but-- I don’t know, Jack, it’s been an hour, something’s not right.”
Jack squares up and goes to the door, knocking on it three times. “Alex, it’s Jack. Will you let us in, please? You’ve stressed Zack out and I’m worried. Tell us what’s wrong.”
There’s no answer, but Jack thinks he can hear him crying. He glances over at Zack who’s standing in the background looking as if the past hour has completely fried his nerves. It probably has.
“Alex, seriously, Zack said it’s been an hour? You’re scaring him. You’re scaring me. Please reply to me, let me know you’re okay. Or at least awake.”
There’s still no answer but Jack really thinks he can hear crying, and the panic is starting to make him shake.
“Alexander, I’m gonna give you one minute to open this fucking door, okay? You’re really freaking me out.”
Jack walks back over to where Zack is standing, and Zack gives his friend a quick hug.
“Listen, man, if he’s not out in the next sixty seconds, we’re gonna break down the door. I’ve already tried threatening that and he didn’t even budge, so I think we should just do it,” Zack explains in a hushed tone. “I don’t know what the hell he’s doing in there but if he’s not willing to communicate, we’re gonna have to just find out what’s wrong by force.”
“I’m okay with that. I didn’t run three red lights to get here just to stand outside your bathroom and lose my mind,” Jack wipes his brow, waiting beside Zack for a little longer before they decide it’s time.
“Alex, get back from the door, we’re coming in whether you want us to or not,” Zack warns.
They get no response and the worry is now very real that Alex might be unconscious, so the two men position themselves against the wood and start to push.
The pressure of their combined weight pressing on the door causes the lock to burst very quickly, and Jack almost falls onto the bathroom floor., stumbling to his knees. Zack manages to retain his balance in the doorway, and he sees the mess first before Jack rights himself. At the sound of Zack’s muffled sob, Jack looks up.
His stomach turns and it’s hard to keep composure.
Alex is leaning his head and one arm on the rim of the closed toilet, body streaked with sweat. He’s shirtless, and Jack can see his previously white t-shirt on the floor, obviously used as a cloth in a vain attempt to mop up the distressingly large pool of blood.
The source of which, Jack can see, is at the crotch of Alex’s pants.
Alex looks at them with sufferance and acceptance, his face wet with sweat and tears. The past hour looks to have aged him, and when he speaks, Jack can’t hold himself back from crying.
“I couldn’t make it stop.”
+++
Their first miscarriage had broken Jack’s heart, but the second?
He wasn’t sure there was a word for what he feeling.
There was certainly no word for what Alex was feeling.
He spent nearly a week in hospital to recover from the blood loss, and he had a high fever. There was no explanation for it. Their doctor said that Alex was perfectly healthy in all other aspects, and the fever was just a symptom of the bad miscarriage.
Jack was slowly beginning to learn that the most frustrating thing about miscarriages was the lack of answers -- there was rarely one solid cause for a miscarriage. It just happened. Sometimes the body would just be correcting a pregnancy that got off to a bad start. Jack supposed he could live with it, he just wished it didn’t hurt so much.
And God, if only it didn’t ruin Alex.
He would take all the pain if it meant Alex didn’t feel the way he did.
+++
Alex is twenty-seven years old when they’re finally allowed to try again.
Jack is twenty-six years old when he signs them up to go to a fertility clinic to check everything is in working order, terrified that a third pregnancy will end the way the first two did.
The results come back clear, however, and tentatively, Alex convinces him that it’s alright to try again. Jack finds it somewhat inspiring how well Alex recovered; he was inconsolable after the incident on Zack and Matt’s bathroom floor. He had made his peace with it though. Every time Jack would check on him, Alex would just say it hadn’t been their time.
They’re about to try when Jack stops them, his nerves obvious. It’s already a bit strange because they’re having sex with the lights off and that’s something they don’t really do by choice. But they’re both a little apprehensive.
“Alex, are you sure you wanna do this? We can-- we can wait, it’s okay.”
“Jack. I want to. And I know you want to, right? It’s gonna be fine. There’s no panic, we’re just trying. It’s safe to try.”
Jack can’t believe how calm his husband is, but he’s thankful for that. Lately, Alex has had to be his rock this time around. Matt keeps reminding him it’s okay to be weak now and again. Jack’s trying really hard to keep that in mind as he peppers Alex’s neck with kisses, feeling his husband’s legs around his waist.
They move gently and in sync; almost afraid to hurt each other. It’s sweet, and Alex’s mouth eventually finds Jack’s, moaning softly against his lips. If this is the encounter that makes a baby, it’ll be a lovely one to look back on, Alex thinks.
It’s been so long for both of them, though, that the sex itself is ephemeral, and afterwards, they lie together breathing heavily, holding hands, and saying nothing.
But they’re both hoping that they just miraculously made a baby, so, so much.
+++
Of course, they didn’t make a baby that time. But the next few times might have done it.
Alex fell pregnant again, and his ebullience when telling their friends and family stunned Jack. He was just so blissfully happy, whereas Jack was a nervous wreck. He couldn’t bring himself to think too much about the pregnancy, or doctor’s appointments, or planning for the baby actually arriving. It all brought him out in a panic. He was able to hide it at first, especially when people kept congratulating him, but after a while, Alex began to pick up on it.
He brought it up one day while they were putting away groceries and listening to the radio.
“Jack? You wanna tell me what’s up with you lately? I feel like you don’t really wanna talk about… about the baby.”
Jack stiffens as he puts things into the fridge, taking a deep breath through his nose. “Well. It’s not that I don’t wanna talk about it, I just… I don’t know, I just…”
“I know you’re worried,” Alex saves him from having to come up with an excuse. “It’s okay. To tell me you’re scared, I mean. And it’s okay to actually be scared. I was, when I first looked at the pregnancy test, and even more so when the doctor confirmed it. But that all went away really fast because… well, I’m pregnant. I wanna remember my pregnancy as a happy time, not being stressed that I might… stop being pregnant. You know?”
Jack sighs and turns towards Alex, nodding. “Yeah. I know what you mean. And I want to be like that too, I just can’t seem to help it. I’m sorry. I’ll try to take a few deep breaths and remind myself not to worry next time we talk about the future of the baby, it’s just… hard.”
Alex smiles lightly, kissing Jack’s cheek. “Is all this worrying why you didn’t want me to buy stuff for the baby’s nursery?”
“Kind of,” Jack admits guiltily. “I just felt like it was really soon to worry about the nursery.”
“Jack! We’re gonna be fine. Decorating a nursery isn’t going to jinx anything.”
Jack nods, and kisses Alex’s forehead, and they go back to putting the groceries away and then sit down to a cup of tea.
The radio continues to play in the background and Alex picks up on a song playing.
“What’s that one on right now?”
“Hm? Oh, I think it’s that Thousand Years song by Christina Perri. She did Jar Of Hearts, remember? You used to wanna play it in the car all the time,” Jack replies, sipping from his mug and glancing back down at the newspaper in his hand.
“It’s nice,” Alex nods, noting one of the lines in particular. “‘One step closer’? Sounds like these pregnancies. Always one step closer than the last one.”
Jack looks up and gives Alex a stern glare. “Don’t do that.”
Alex shrugs, only being honest. “Sorry. Still, it fits. Feels like we’ve been waiting for this baby for a thousand years, doesn’t it? But third time’s a charm, little one. We’re waiting for you.”
Alex smiles down at his stomach and rubs it. Jack just looks at him and says nothing.
+++
Alex is twenty-eight years old when he miscarries a third time, at fourteen weeks, just two weeks after telling Jack they had nothing to worry about. He didn’t even get a chance to start the nursery.
Jack is twenty-seven years old when he goes to therapy for the first time to cope with the loss.
His husband refuses to go with him, and Jack worries day and night until he thinks he’s going to get grey hairs over it, because he’s more than sure Alex is just pretending to be okay. They both take time off of work, and visit Alex’s parents’ holiday home in California, because the therapist thinks a break from their “real world” will help them both. For a while, it does. They’re gone for three weeks and they feel refreshed and tanned when they return. Jack surprises Alex by adopting a Papillon puppy named Sebastian. Alex immediately falls in love and spends time with the puppy day and night -- training him, teaching him tricks, playing with him outside, comforting him at night when he cries.
Jack’s glad he’s got something to focus on, but it just makes him ache when he watches them together because the dog feels like a replacement for the baby-shaped hole in Alex’s life. It’s something he tries not to wallow in too much.
They’re starting to feel truly normal again when Zack and Matt invite them over to dinner with news.
“We’re… we’re having a baby,” Matt announces over dessert, and Alex and Jack’s creme brulee suddenly tastes sour in their mouths. “We already told our other friends and family and stuff, but we thought… well, we didn’t want to spring it on you. We wanted you here with us.”
Alex stiffly swallows his food and stares down at his plate for a moment, and Jack feels the awkward silence descending. His friends look like they’re wilting -- Jack knows they’re not doing this to hurt them.
“That’s great news, guys!” he forces a smile, but only partially, because he really is happy for them. “Who’s pregnant?”
“I am,” Zack beams, hands on his stomach beneath the table cloth, a tiny swell already there. “We’re gonna wait to find out the sex but I feel like it’s going to be a boy. Matt’s bet is on a girl, but even if it’s not, maybe the next one will be!”
He and Matt chuckle, and Jack joins in, congratulating them again. That’s when Alex looks up, a watery smile on his face as he reaches across the table and touches Zack and Matt’s hands.
“I’m so happy for you guys, you really deserve it,” he praises, but his voice wavers, and they can all see the glassiness in his eyes as he gets up from the table, smile quickly slipping. “I’m sorry, excuse me for just a moment.”
He runs out of the room and they hear him go up the stairs and close the bathroom door. Jack looks at Zack and Matt and bites his lip.
“I’m… I’m sorry,” he offers. “Please don’t feel like this should take away from your happy news, I think he would’ve been like this no matter how you told us…”
“No, Jack, jeez, don’t be sorry,” Matt shakes his head. “We wanted to be as sensitive as possible. Alex is allowed to react like that.”
“I know he wants to be happy for you guys, it just… might be hard to be there for some of it,” Jack sighs.
Zack nods understandingly across the table, though it stings to think Alex might not be around for the big moments like the baby kicking and the scan photos and even the birth.
For the next few months, Alex makes the biggest effort he can to be around. He actually really throws himself into it. Between his puppy and becoming an honourary uncle, he’s got a lot to do. He buys clothes and toys galore for his niece- or nephew-to-be, and Zack actually has a quiet word with Jack because he’s worried Alex is spending too much money on them. But Alex still insists even after Jack suggests reining it in a bit. He can’t help himself.
Jack’s therapist thinks Alex is trying to project his fatherly desires onto someone else’s baby, and Jack agrees. He’s on the verge of actually forcing Alex to go talk to the damn therapist himself when something happens.
Alex gets sick three mornings in a row, and on the third day, exactly one week before Zack’s due date, he realises it was naive to brush it off as a stomach bug.
He takes a pregnancy test at work and almost faints in the bathroom stall.
Pregnant.
+++
Zack has a baby boy in the end, James Mark Flyzik, born weighing exactly seven pounds. Alex cries when he holds him, and Jack cries because his best friends have a baby and his husband is pregnant and it’s all a bit overwhelmingly happy.
For just a moment, it’s so overwhelmingly happy.
Alex is a crushing thirteen weeks when he miscarries.
+++
Alex is twenty-nine years old and has since added another two miscarriages to his list, both before the ten-week mark.
Jack is twenty-eight years old when he gives up.
He stops going to therapy, believing they’re not destined to be parents. Alex has always believed, ever since they were teenagers, but Jack just can’t any more. It hurt too much. They’d been hurting on and off for so many years and Jack couldn’t do it any more. Believing they could keep getting pregnant just opened him up to too much hurt, and he wasn’t strong enough for it.
What gave him the most unbearable pain, though, was that Alex still believed.
He still believed they could have their long-awaited baby.
Alex, despite the miscarriages, had went ahead and decorated the nursery anyway. He’d painted the walls a dusty blue-grey, and put up big wooden shelves. They were littered with books and beautiful animal ornaments, and a dog piggy bank that looked like Sebastian. There was a gorgeous crib in the corner, and Alex spent hours upon hours making a mobile to hang over it with plush stars and a moon and a sun and planets. Jack cringed every time he caught Alex working on the room, chest feeling empty at the idea of it never being used.
Alex just believed.
It was a conversation that came up at least three times a week right before they went to sleep, and Jack wasn’t sure how much longer he could listen to the hope in Alex’s voice.
It must have been the millionth time Alex had mentioned it when Jack really, really couldn’t even fake a smile for him any more.
“Jack, you know it’s gonna happen for us, don’t you? We’re not giving up. I thought I would be a dad long before now but that doesn’t mean it won’t happen. And lots of people start having children in their thirties anyway, we’ve got plenty of time.”
Jack is lying on his side, his back to Alex. It’s the first time he’s ever decided to openly put Alex down on the matter. “It’s not about the time we have left any more, Alex,” he mumbles. “I just don’t think I can handle it again.”
Jack turns out his lamp and listens to Alex swallowing sobs for an hour before he falls asleep.
+++
Alex is thirty years old when his best friends Zack and Matt announce their second pregnancy -- and this time it’s twins.
Jack is twenty-nine years old when his best friends Zack and Matt announce their second pregnancy, twins and all.
The day after, that night, he trashes the study in their house, and Alex comes in from work and has to physically wrestle Jack to the floor to make him stop.
“Jack! What the fuck are you doing?! What’s the matter with you?!”
“It’s not fair! It’s not fucking fair! They have a kid, they have their kid and now twins!” Jack yells, and though Alex keeps him pinned on the floor, he loosens his grip slightly. “Fucking twins! When is it our turn?! How come they get fucking twins, fucking three kids, and I can’t even give you one baby?! We’ve paid our dues, I can’t-- I can’t even give you-- I can’t.”
Jack dissolves into a sobbing mess on the carpet, and Alex slumps beside him and rubs his back, tears streaming down his face. He knew Jack didn’t mean this. Jack adored his friends with all his heart; but he was bottling his stresses about not having a baby, and nothing hurt Alex more than when it all came out at once like this.
“My poor boy,” he whispers, kissing Jack’s hair. “It’s gonna be okay. You know Zack and Matt deserve their babies, they’re amazing parents. They didn’t choose twins. They didn’t choose any of this, they’re not having a family to hurt us. And I know you love them, and you love your nephew, and you’re gonna love these twins just as much. I know it’s not fair but we aren’t being punished. I know it’s awful to watch. I cried for a week straight when Zack got pregnant the first time. But this is a happy time for them, we can’t be angry at them for being happy. We-- I think you should go back to your therapy, babe. I’ll come with you, just-- please. We can’t bottle this up.”
Jack sits up and wraps his arms around his husband, and they cry together on the study floor surrounded by bits of paper and the keyboard from their computer for a long time.
+++
The twins are born two weeks early, but they’re perfect in every way. Two little girls -- Alice Samantha Flyzik and Eadie Carla Flyzik born within three minutes of each other.
When Alex and Jack visit, Jack is the first to hold them both, and he doesn’t let them go for two hours.
Alex just smiles and kisses the three of them on the forehead. Their couples counseling is definitely helping.
+++
Years pass, and while they’re happy, things still feel off sometimes.
They adopt another dog, a pitbull named Peyton, and they take vacations, and they spend time with their friends and families… and they’re pretty much like any normal couple without kids, except the fact that neither of them can stand not having kids.
Alex stops bringing it up because he decided it was a bad idea to keep pushing it on Jack when his husband was so obviously not prepared to go through the pain of losing another baby -- at this stage, it was always going to be a possibility.
Truth be told, Alex wasn’t sure he could handle losing another baby either. But in the back of his mind, he always wanted to try again, always telling himself just one more time and they’d manage.
They decide to take time off work and go travelling again; they planned a trip that would last them nearly a year. All around America, then a few of their favourite iconic places in Europe, then Australia for a while.
The trip was wonderful and enlightening and everything they’d really hoped for; memories that would last them the rest of their lives. The only thing missing was the fact that it wasn’t a family trip. Just a couple and their dogs.
They were almost at their door, home from the trip with bags galore, when Alex says it.
“Have we given up?”
Jack just stays quiet for a bit, feeling a familiar pain in his chest.
“Does it feel like we’ve given up?”
Alex pauses and then nods, face slightly crumpled as the tears well, and he unlocks the door.
Jack sighs softly and follows in a similar fashion. He didn’t like to think of it that way. He really, really didn’t. The therapy had helped them both greatly, and they were, by all rights, a happy couple. It was just that the feeling of something missing was never going to be ignored, and they were both learning that slowly and painfully as the time passed.
Maybe they had given up.
+++
Alex is thirty-four years old when he finds himself in a hospital, aching and in pain, horribly exhausted… and the happiest he had ever been as he cradled a seven pound, four ounce bundle with a dusting of dark hair and the brightest eyes.
Jack is thirty-three years old when he finds himself in a hospital, in awe of the tiniest miracle he’d ever seen, held safe in his husband’s arms.
The world could be so cold, Jack had come to realise, but people like Alex were what made it a warm place.
He had always believed.
And like an answer to a thousand prayers, here she was.
Indiana Joyce Isobel Barakat. Tiny, exquisite, and terrifying in every way. They were in charge of this new life. As scary as that was, Jack knew she would grow up loved more than any child ever had been.
Jack had lost count of the amount of times he had kissed his husband and called him amazing in the last twenty-four hours. Every moment that went past with her tiny heart beating beneath their fingertips was like sweet relief; she was here, and nothing would take her away now.
Despite the overwhelming desire to stay awake and stare lovingly at his husband and newborn, Jack begins to succumb to sleep. He’d need it in preparation for all the visitors tomorrow. He doesn’t know how Alex is still conscious, but that doesn’t even matter because he has his baby.
He has his baby. The thought makes Jack feel more at peace than he has for years.
Though barely awake now in the chair beside him, Jack listens closely as Alex clutches their daughter to his chest, and sings to her through falling tears.
“Time stands still; beauty in all she is.
I will be brave, I will not let anything take away what’s standing in front of me.
Every breath, every hour has come to this.
One step closer…
I have died every day waiting for you.
Darling, don’t be afraid, I have loved you,
for a thousand years.
I’ll love you for a thousand more…
And all along, I believed I would find you.
Time has brought your heart to me,
I have loved you for a thousand years.
I’ll love you for a thousand more.”
♠ ♠ ♠
I love this song, I think it's very romantic, but I realised it could be applied to a newborn baby... and this idea just blossomed. It gave me much pain and suffering because it was so sad, but I had to write it. I procrastinated it for months, maybe even a year, but I managed it bit by bit. And then my aunt had a baby and that helped, even if it made it hurt EVEN MORE. I hope you love this story, because I'm immensely proud of it, I have absolutely poured my soul into this story. It's also my first mpreg!I'm sorry for any mistakes, it's 3AM and my vision is blurry. I hate editing.
Please COMMENT if you read it, it would mean the world.