(no subject)
Kellin’s call in the middle of the night one night had terrified Matty. He hadn’t known why Kellin would be calling at 3 am unless something horrible had happened, and he’d answered as soon as he’d gotten his phone to slide to fucking answer. He’d listened as Kellin told him that he was pregnant, and cried about his father not wanting to help, he’d listened as Kellin told him he didn’t know what to do. And he’d planned. He’d planned in an instant and had spoken very softly to Kellin, telling him that they’d take care of the baby together. Matty would get a job. Matty would get a job, and he would take Kellin to his baby doctor’s appointments, and he would make sure that Kellin got the right vitamins and that he ate somewhat healthy food, even if he was craving ice cream all the time. And he had. Matty had been there through the whole pregnancy, taking care of Kellin and holding him through his mood swings. It was really a wonder that Kellin hadn’t realized sooner quite how in love with him Matty was.
And when Melody was born, Matty was there in the room with Kellin and the first time he held her he knew that that little girl was forever going to be the love of his life. She became his world in that very first instant, even more than she already had been with all the work he’d put into making sure she arrived healthy. Her light, downy hair, her big eyes that were so like Kellin’s and the way she cooed and keened when the doctor handed her to him, he was gone. From that moment on he knew he would do anything for her.
So he’d gotten a job. He’d gotten a full time job on top of still going to high school full time. He worked every night from 4-10 pm, under the table, at Tony’s pizza. He took orders, and he made pizzas, and sometimes he got amazing tips and sometimes he got none, but he always got paid. He always worked hard because he knew that they had to support their baby girl on their own, no one was going to help them. Matty’s mother did, of course, as much as she could. She loved baby Melody just like she was her own granddaughter and she was so proud of Matty for stepping in to take care of a child that wasn’t his, born of a situation that had been terrible on Kellin. She supported Matty taking care of what he had decided was his little family 100% and she would buy diapers if they couldn’t afford them, or formula, or new onesies as Melody grew ever bigger. Matty would take her home with him on the nights he wasn’t staying at Kellin’s, he’d bring her and Kellin home and Melody would sleep in the crib his mother had bought that was set up in his room.
Kellin worked so hard all the time as well, and they were both tired a majority of the time but Matty couldn’t bring himself to let Kellin have to get up every single time in the middle of the night that Melody cried. It wasn’t just that he wanted to let Kellin rest, but that he wanted to be sure for himself that Melody was safe. He needed to know. So he’d be the first to wake to the sound of her cries from her crib, and he’d be the first to shush Kellin and tell him to go back to sleep before he’d get up and go take his tiny precious baby from her crib. He’d look down at her and ask her softly what was wrong, and hold her close to his chest and pat and rub gently at her back. He’d make sure her diaper was clean, he’d make sure she wasn’t having gas pains. As a second to last resort he’d heat her up a bottle and feed her just a bit of it, a few ounces just to soothe her, and then he’d burp her again and swaddle her back in her blanket and rock her back to sleep. He’d sing to her the whole time, all the little lullabies he knew. He’d sing her every lullaby he could think of, though her favorite honestly seemed to be Hammers and Strings by Jack’s Mannequin, or Lullabye by Fall Out Boy. She’d always calm down, and he found that to be the most amazing thing. He’d sing her the traditional ones too, of course, and of those her favorite was You Are My Sunshine.
Matty would get up early in the morning with her and Kellin, and he’d feed her the 6 ounce bottle she took every morning, and he was dreading introducing baby cereal to her diet, afraid she’d have allergies and that she was going to be in pain from the foods that she couldn’t handle. He was afraid of these things, and he worried for his tiny daughter as she got bigger by the day, and smiled more, and laughed when he tickled her. He would take her to the park and put her in the swings as soon as she could solidly hold her own head up, and she would scream and laugh and Matty loved this little girl more than anything in the world, much the same as he loved her mother. Matty very much settled right into the family life, and nothing would change that. This little girl, this tiny baby who was so dependent on him and Kellin for everything in her life, who would smile when Matty would come in the room, and coo when Matty would sing and grab at his hair and his face and give big drooly baby kisses… This little girl was his daughter, and just because he was young didn’t mean that he didn’t understand the implications of that. It meant that he would always have a child who needed him, always have another life who looked up to him, and needed his support and guidance and loved him. He’d signed the birth certificate that day, knowing he wasn’t biologically her father because he’d made the decision the moment Kellin had told him that he was going to raise this baby. He hadn’t regretted it a single day since.