230. {c} [suits] (harvey/donna) a lot like love (8/?)
a lot like love ; r ; 2,675 words ;
7, the truth
AU ; Harvey and Donna both have teenage children with an agenda all on their own
Chelsea doesn’t understand what’s going wrong. Theo just isn’t interested in helping her come up with a plan to get their parents together anymore. Something must be going on with him. He’s been quiet lately and hanging around her mom a lot. She has a pretty cool mom, for a mom, but he has a cool dad too so she doesn’t understand what he’s doing. She can’t get him to talk.
She looks over at him. He fell asleep on the other side of her bed, which is whatever. They’ve been having sleepovers in the same bed since they were 7. Why should that change now that they are getting older? She gets that something is going on with him between staying in shape for baseball, band, and school. He’s so busy.
Chelsea thinks maybe Harvey has been busy or something. He hasn’t been around much and if Theo isn’t with them then he’s pretty much just home alone. She wonders if her mom knows that, if that’s why her mom keeps inviting Theo over and taking care of him. Maybe the reason she hasn’t been able to get her mom and Harvey in the same room is because Harvey has been too busy with work.
She’s only 15, she should be worrying about things like school and her own love life, not her mom’s. Maybe Theo has the right idea in just focusing on his own stuff. She has been a little annoyed at him lately though. Mostly just upset - upset because he isn’t speaking to her. She’s always been the one person that he talks to. She is practically his sister. Maybe that’s what makes her want their parents together even more.
Chelsea goes through her own things. She talks about them with her mom and figures out how to deal with things. It hasn’t occurred to her that maybe her best friend just doesn’t have the same luxury that she has. But she doesn’t even know what kind of problems he has. He used to talk to her more but now he almost doesn’t talk to anyone at all.
She’s suddenly mad at everything on his behalf, but grateful for her mom for always being there when either of them need her.
Her phone buzzes on the nightstand and she lifts her gaze from her book. Her fingers leave her place in the spine and she almost loses where she’s at as his ringtone blasts out. His ringtone has never been the default ringtone so she knows when it’s him, but that was before - before he used to kiss her and before they used to have sex whenever they could sneak away from watching eyes. She answers with a grave voice, hoarse from lack of use since she’s gone hours without speaking.
“It’s late,” she points out.
He sighs into the phone. “I finally got her out of my office.”
“Took you long enough,” she comments teasingly.
“You’re the one who penciled her in,” he challenges.
She shrugs even though he can’t see her.; she adds sarcastically, “just doing my job, baby.”
Even though he knows she’s being facetious, he still smirks. “I wish I could see you.”
“You should come over,” she replies, “your son is asleep on my couch.”
“Wow, thanks for telling me,” he counters. She can hear the teasing in his voice even though he’s a little upset that he wasn’t informed beforehand. She leans back against her pillow, the softness nearly engulfing her as she sinks into the feathers. “Why didn’t he call me to let me know?”
“I told him that I would let you know. You were calling me when you were leaving the office,” she explains, “and if he would have called you, Scottie just would have used that as a way to have a personal conversation with you. I figured the less she felt she could talk about, the faster you’d get out of there.”
“You just wanted to see me,” he replies teasingly.
“Yes,” she affirms dramatically, “now you have no reason not to come over.”
“I wouldn’t need that much convincing,” he comments. She thinks that maybe it’s a good thing it’s him she’s doing this with. On one hand they are so familiar with each other and their kids are comfortable enough around each other that it isn’t weird for their kids to be at each other’s house without them being there. She doesn’t exactly know what she’s thinking. The family sleepovers isn’t normal. “I’ll be there in ten.”
“Just come in,” she replies.
She loses track of time while waiting for him but it feels like less than ten minutes that she’s waiting for him. He eases her bedroom door open with a confused look on his face, a look that she almost misses because she’s so distracted by her magazine. She lifts her gaze to him shutting the door gently behind him, quietly like he’s trying not to disturb anyone who may be sleeping. She unconsciously smiles at him and a grin tugs at the corners of his mouth in response.
“I thought you said my son was asleep on your couch,” he says while taking off his suit jacket.
She shrugs and closes her magazine. “I told him that he could sleep on the couch but he could have just fallen asleep in Chelsea’s room.”
“Don’t you think they’re a little old for that?” Harvey asks, pulling a face of slight disgust.
“Don’t make that face at me,” she counters. He kicks off his shoes before sitting on the other side of the bed beside her. She folds her arms over her chest and looks at him pointedly. “They’ve been sleeping in the same bed for years. Don’t make it a thing.”
He’s suddenly relaxed, she notes as he presses his lips to her exposed shoulder. “But they’re teenagers now and it’s weird. We’re dating. What if something happens? What will that mean for us?”
She laughs. “Nothing is going to happen.”
He furrows his eyebrows challengingly. “How do you know?”
“Because he’s a boy and she’s a girl.” Donna smirks in return.
“Exactly,” he practically shrieks.
“Harvey, there’s something you need to know about my daughter,” Donna says carefully, reaching over and lightly touching his thigh. He takes that as an invitation of sorts and kisses her cheek. This is not the man who she was arguing with hours ago. Or maybe he’s the same man and she’s the one who is different. “My daughter doesn’t like boys. She’s never liked boys and she will never like boys. One day, she’s going to bring a girl home and that’s going to be perfectly fine with me.”
“Okay, so, nothing is going to happen with them,” Harvey echoes decidedly. He laughs a little, amazed by what she knows about her daughter, but he doesn’t understand how she could know unless Chelsea told her. For a moment, he’s envious of the way that both of their kids talk to her. “How do you know that she, you know, likes girls?”
“Oh, Honey,” she half mocks, “she used to have the biggest crush on Rachel. Every time that she came into the room, Chelsea would bat her eyelashes until she fell asleep on Rachel’s lap.”
“How old was she?”
Donna laughs like she’s replaying the memory. “That was two years ago. Let me tell you, that girl is not subtle. She gets it from her father.”
In that moment, Harvey remembers that there is going to always be another man in the picture. He’d forgotten about it a long time ago. He doesn’t know why he forgets and it always sneaks up on him like a fucking tornado. He swallows but doesn’t say anything. The silence draws him to press a kiss to her lips, something he’s been waiting to do all day.
She pulls back before she gets too distracted by him. “How did things with Scottie go?”
He sighs like he’s annoyed. “She’s playing hardball. She doesn’t want to agree on anything even when I start compromising with her just to get her the hell out of my office. I think she’s stalling in hopes that I’ll change my mind.”
“And you’re sure you’re not going to?” Donna pushes.
“Are you crazy? I finally have the woman I want. Why would I ever compromise that?” He counters sternly. He narrows his gaze at her and it makes her feel warm. She isn’t sure yet if it’s in the good way or the bad way. All she knows is that she’s afraid she’s going to mess up with a man who has never committed to anything and it isn’t the commitment that scares her, it’s the man. “Which reminds me,” he adds before she can say anything, “I want to tell the kids that we’re seeing each other.”
“No,” she says a little too fast.
“No?” He repeats slowly. She can tell that he isn’t amused. “You don’t want to tell our kids that we are seeing each other?”
“That’s correct,” she says. Her words are hard. He feels like he’s been punched in the diaphragm.
He scowls. “Why the hell not?”
“What if we change our minds?”
“That’s exactly why I want to tell them,” he clarifies. “You’re changing your mind every forty-five minutes about being with me like we’re not fucking in all the rooms that have standing walls without being glass and it’s driving me up the wall.”
“Don’t call it that. You know I hate it when you call it that,” she reminds him.
He growls at her in the bellows of his throat and, of course, she finds it sexy. “The point here is that you want me to say that we’re making love but you can’t even tell our kids that we’re doing it in the first place.”
“I’m not changing my mind. I just don’t feel like I need to tell my teenage daughter that I’m having sex at all, let alone with the guy who pays me,” she argues gently.
“First of all,” he starts, “I don’t pay you anymore; the firm pays you. Second-“
“Anymore?”
“Second,” he continues, “you’re not just having sex with me. You’re trying to see if we work as a couple, if we can be intimate with one another and not lose the essence of what we have.”
“I didn’t know you could be so sentimental,” Donna replies sarcastically.
He rolls his eyes and smiles. He can’t help smiling even though he keeps thinking about all of these things. “Do you want to be with me?”
She looks at him then and sees the worry lines on his face. She doesn’t even remember them being there a month ago, like she’s been causing him all of this extra stress with her trying to be logical while giving in. It could seem like she’s toying with him, toying with herself, and she really doesn’t want to keep doing that.
“It’s still new, Harvey.”
He shakes his head lightly, “the only thing new about us is how we’re having sex.”
“And how you’re sitting on my bed with me half naked right now,” she adds.
“I didn’t even notice,” he comments with a shrug. She doesn’t believe him but there’s a certain edge to the way that his eyes light up when his eyes travel over her. “I’ve been on your bed when you were half naked before. This is just the first time I’ve felt like I can say that it would be my pleasure to do the horizontal tango.”
“Wow,” she mouths; she adds, “the horizontal tango? That’s what you’re calling it now?”
“Let’s make a deal,” he starts.
“Oh god,” she groans.
He laughs gently and shakes his head. He reaches over and lets his fingers work their way over to her thigh like he’s mimicking what she’s doing. “Hear me out on this one.”
“Fine,” she mumbles.
He turns onto his side to face her while inching further down the bed. “We tell Theo and Chelsea and I’ll agree to call us having sex ‘making love.”
She has to think about it.
This is how Theo finds out.
He wakes up in a bed that doesn’t belong to him, in an apartment that he doesn’t call home, and a mixture of smells that he is not familiar with. He looks over to see Chelsea drooling on her pillow but is distracted from waking her up when he hears laughing in the kitchen. It carries in through the cracked door in a way that makes Theo furrow his eyebrows. He’s confused as to who can be laughing so early in the morning.
Theo practically falls out of the bed, his jeans sticking to his legs, and makes his way down the hall. He rounds the corner of the kitchen to see Donna perched at the counter and his father standing over the stove like he cooks all the time. He doesn’t even know when his dad got there, but it was obviously after he fell asleep.
Theo scratches at his eyes and collapses into the chair at the counter beside Donna’s before he can even register that either of them have acknowledged him. “Huh?” He asks hoarsely.
“I asked if you slept well,” Harvey repeats with a smirk.
Donna pours him a glass of orange juice before taking a sip of her coffee. “I was tired. What are you doing here?”
“I could ask you the same thing,” Harvey returns.
Theo grumbles for a moment before he looks directly at his dad - “I didn’t want to be alone so I came here.”
Harvey swallows hard before shifting his eyes to Donna. “I couldn’t get Scottie out of my office.”
“Ugh,” Theo groans, “she’s not coming back around, is she?”
“She’s only around now because Donna,” he exaggerates her name, “won’t quit penciling her in.”
“She has business to discuss,” Donna mutters.
Theo laughs a little at their exchange, at how natural it seems. He doesn’t always see their exchanges but sometimes he catches them in just the right moment that he’s reminded that he wonders why the hell aren’t they together? He takes a long gulp of his orange juice and momentarily forgets that he’s been spending a lot of time alone lately.
“Dad?” Theo asks before the two can go off in a different conversational direction. “Did you stay here last night?”
“Yeah,” Harvey answers slowly. There’s a bit of airiness to it, like he’s not certain he wants to tell Theo anything else.
“He, uh,” Donna tries to help but she stutters.
Theo’s dad clears his throat and shakes his head fervently. “Wait for Chelsea.”
“Why are we waiting for Chelsea?” Chelsea grumbles as she enters the kitchen.
Harvey takes the rest of the food out of the pan and turns the stove off. Chelsea digs through the refrigerator for the milk as Donna tucks her bottom lip between her teeth. Theo recognizes that there’s so much going on and he can’t figure any of it out. He raises his eyebrows at his dad.
“What’s going on?” He finally asks.
Donna firmly sets her mug of coffee down on the counter as Harvey leans against it on the other side. Their gaze locks and Theo almost feels a little uncomfortable being in the same room as them. Chelsea turns around to see everyone in silence, looking at each other, and she wonders if she missed something.
“What did I miss?” Chelsea questions, confusion written all over her face.
“Harvey and I,” Donna starts. Theo notes that she looks nervous, a characteristic that he’s only seen on her a handful of times over the years. She smiles and looks at his dad again. He smile looks uncertain. “We have entered a relationship.”
Harvey laughs at her word choice. “We’ve been seeing each other for the last month and we felt that you two should be the first to know.”
“Is that okay?” Donna adds.
Chelsea’s eyes widen as her gaze meets Theo’s. They smile at the same time. “It worked,” she says under her breath.
7, the truth
AU ; Harvey and Donna both have teenage children with an agenda all on their own
Chelsea doesn’t understand what’s going wrong. Theo just isn’t interested in helping her come up with a plan to get their parents together anymore. Something must be going on with him. He’s been quiet lately and hanging around her mom a lot. She has a pretty cool mom, for a mom, but he has a cool dad too so she doesn’t understand what he’s doing. She can’t get him to talk.
She looks over at him. He fell asleep on the other side of her bed, which is whatever. They’ve been having sleepovers in the same bed since they were 7. Why should that change now that they are getting older? She gets that something is going on with him between staying in shape for baseball, band, and school. He’s so busy.
Chelsea thinks maybe Harvey has been busy or something. He hasn’t been around much and if Theo isn’t with them then he’s pretty much just home alone. She wonders if her mom knows that, if that’s why her mom keeps inviting Theo over and taking care of him. Maybe the reason she hasn’t been able to get her mom and Harvey in the same room is because Harvey has been too busy with work.
She’s only 15, she should be worrying about things like school and her own love life, not her mom’s. Maybe Theo has the right idea in just focusing on his own stuff. She has been a little annoyed at him lately though. Mostly just upset - upset because he isn’t speaking to her. She’s always been the one person that he talks to. She is practically his sister. Maybe that’s what makes her want their parents together even more.
Chelsea goes through her own things. She talks about them with her mom and figures out how to deal with things. It hasn’t occurred to her that maybe her best friend just doesn’t have the same luxury that she has. But she doesn’t even know what kind of problems he has. He used to talk to her more but now he almost doesn’t talk to anyone at all.
She’s suddenly mad at everything on his behalf, but grateful for her mom for always being there when either of them need her.
Her phone buzzes on the nightstand and she lifts her gaze from her book. Her fingers leave her place in the spine and she almost loses where she’s at as his ringtone blasts out. His ringtone has never been the default ringtone so she knows when it’s him, but that was before - before he used to kiss her and before they used to have sex whenever they could sneak away from watching eyes. She answers with a grave voice, hoarse from lack of use since she’s gone hours without speaking.
“It’s late,” she points out.
He sighs into the phone. “I finally got her out of my office.”
“Took you long enough,” she comments teasingly.
“You’re the one who penciled her in,” he challenges.
She shrugs even though he can’t see her.; she adds sarcastically, “just doing my job, baby.”
Even though he knows she’s being facetious, he still smirks. “I wish I could see you.”
“You should come over,” she replies, “your son is asleep on my couch.”
“Wow, thanks for telling me,” he counters. She can hear the teasing in his voice even though he’s a little upset that he wasn’t informed beforehand. She leans back against her pillow, the softness nearly engulfing her as she sinks into the feathers. “Why didn’t he call me to let me know?”
“I told him that I would let you know. You were calling me when you were leaving the office,” she explains, “and if he would have called you, Scottie just would have used that as a way to have a personal conversation with you. I figured the less she felt she could talk about, the faster you’d get out of there.”
“You just wanted to see me,” he replies teasingly.
“Yes,” she affirms dramatically, “now you have no reason not to come over.”
“I wouldn’t need that much convincing,” he comments. She thinks that maybe it’s a good thing it’s him she’s doing this with. On one hand they are so familiar with each other and their kids are comfortable enough around each other that it isn’t weird for their kids to be at each other’s house without them being there. She doesn’t exactly know what she’s thinking. The family sleepovers isn’t normal. “I’ll be there in ten.”
“Just come in,” she replies.
She loses track of time while waiting for him but it feels like less than ten minutes that she’s waiting for him. He eases her bedroom door open with a confused look on his face, a look that she almost misses because she’s so distracted by her magazine. She lifts her gaze to him shutting the door gently behind him, quietly like he’s trying not to disturb anyone who may be sleeping. She unconsciously smiles at him and a grin tugs at the corners of his mouth in response.
“I thought you said my son was asleep on your couch,” he says while taking off his suit jacket.
She shrugs and closes her magazine. “I told him that he could sleep on the couch but he could have just fallen asleep in Chelsea’s room.”
“Don’t you think they’re a little old for that?” Harvey asks, pulling a face of slight disgust.
“Don’t make that face at me,” she counters. He kicks off his shoes before sitting on the other side of the bed beside her. She folds her arms over her chest and looks at him pointedly. “They’ve been sleeping in the same bed for years. Don’t make it a thing.”
He’s suddenly relaxed, she notes as he presses his lips to her exposed shoulder. “But they’re teenagers now and it’s weird. We’re dating. What if something happens? What will that mean for us?”
She laughs. “Nothing is going to happen.”
He furrows his eyebrows challengingly. “How do you know?”
“Because he’s a boy and she’s a girl.” Donna smirks in return.
“Exactly,” he practically shrieks.
“Harvey, there’s something you need to know about my daughter,” Donna says carefully, reaching over and lightly touching his thigh. He takes that as an invitation of sorts and kisses her cheek. This is not the man who she was arguing with hours ago. Or maybe he’s the same man and she’s the one who is different. “My daughter doesn’t like boys. She’s never liked boys and she will never like boys. One day, she’s going to bring a girl home and that’s going to be perfectly fine with me.”
“Okay, so, nothing is going to happen with them,” Harvey echoes decidedly. He laughs a little, amazed by what she knows about her daughter, but he doesn’t understand how she could know unless Chelsea told her. For a moment, he’s envious of the way that both of their kids talk to her. “How do you know that she, you know, likes girls?”
“Oh, Honey,” she half mocks, “she used to have the biggest crush on Rachel. Every time that she came into the room, Chelsea would bat her eyelashes until she fell asleep on Rachel’s lap.”
“How old was she?”
Donna laughs like she’s replaying the memory. “That was two years ago. Let me tell you, that girl is not subtle. She gets it from her father.”
In that moment, Harvey remembers that there is going to always be another man in the picture. He’d forgotten about it a long time ago. He doesn’t know why he forgets and it always sneaks up on him like a fucking tornado. He swallows but doesn’t say anything. The silence draws him to press a kiss to her lips, something he’s been waiting to do all day.
She pulls back before she gets too distracted by him. “How did things with Scottie go?”
He sighs like he’s annoyed. “She’s playing hardball. She doesn’t want to agree on anything even when I start compromising with her just to get her the hell out of my office. I think she’s stalling in hopes that I’ll change my mind.”
“And you’re sure you’re not going to?” Donna pushes.
“Are you crazy? I finally have the woman I want. Why would I ever compromise that?” He counters sternly. He narrows his gaze at her and it makes her feel warm. She isn’t sure yet if it’s in the good way or the bad way. All she knows is that she’s afraid she’s going to mess up with a man who has never committed to anything and it isn’t the commitment that scares her, it’s the man. “Which reminds me,” he adds before she can say anything, “I want to tell the kids that we’re seeing each other.”
“No,” she says a little too fast.
“No?” He repeats slowly. She can tell that he isn’t amused. “You don’t want to tell our kids that we are seeing each other?”
“That’s correct,” she says. Her words are hard. He feels like he’s been punched in the diaphragm.
He scowls. “Why the hell not?”
“What if we change our minds?”
“That’s exactly why I want to tell them,” he clarifies. “You’re changing your mind every forty-five minutes about being with me like we’re not fucking in all the rooms that have standing walls without being glass and it’s driving me up the wall.”
“Don’t call it that. You know I hate it when you call it that,” she reminds him.
He growls at her in the bellows of his throat and, of course, she finds it sexy. “The point here is that you want me to say that we’re making love but you can’t even tell our kids that we’re doing it in the first place.”
“I’m not changing my mind. I just don’t feel like I need to tell my teenage daughter that I’m having sex at all, let alone with the guy who pays me,” she argues gently.
“First of all,” he starts, “I don’t pay you anymore; the firm pays you. Second-“
“Anymore?”
“Second,” he continues, “you’re not just having sex with me. You’re trying to see if we work as a couple, if we can be intimate with one another and not lose the essence of what we have.”
“I didn’t know you could be so sentimental,” Donna replies sarcastically.
He rolls his eyes and smiles. He can’t help smiling even though he keeps thinking about all of these things. “Do you want to be with me?”
She looks at him then and sees the worry lines on his face. She doesn’t even remember them being there a month ago, like she’s been causing him all of this extra stress with her trying to be logical while giving in. It could seem like she’s toying with him, toying with herself, and she really doesn’t want to keep doing that.
“It’s still new, Harvey.”
He shakes his head lightly, “the only thing new about us is how we’re having sex.”
“And how you’re sitting on my bed with me half naked right now,” she adds.
“I didn’t even notice,” he comments with a shrug. She doesn’t believe him but there’s a certain edge to the way that his eyes light up when his eyes travel over her. “I’ve been on your bed when you were half naked before. This is just the first time I’ve felt like I can say that it would be my pleasure to do the horizontal tango.”
“Wow,” she mouths; she adds, “the horizontal tango? That’s what you’re calling it now?”
“Let’s make a deal,” he starts.
“Oh god,” she groans.
He laughs gently and shakes his head. He reaches over and lets his fingers work their way over to her thigh like he’s mimicking what she’s doing. “Hear me out on this one.”
“Fine,” she mumbles.
He turns onto his side to face her while inching further down the bed. “We tell Theo and Chelsea and I’ll agree to call us having sex ‘making love.”
She has to think about it.
This is how Theo finds out.
He wakes up in a bed that doesn’t belong to him, in an apartment that he doesn’t call home, and a mixture of smells that he is not familiar with. He looks over to see Chelsea drooling on her pillow but is distracted from waking her up when he hears laughing in the kitchen. It carries in through the cracked door in a way that makes Theo furrow his eyebrows. He’s confused as to who can be laughing so early in the morning.
Theo practically falls out of the bed, his jeans sticking to his legs, and makes his way down the hall. He rounds the corner of the kitchen to see Donna perched at the counter and his father standing over the stove like he cooks all the time. He doesn’t even know when his dad got there, but it was obviously after he fell asleep.
Theo scratches at his eyes and collapses into the chair at the counter beside Donna’s before he can even register that either of them have acknowledged him. “Huh?” He asks hoarsely.
“I asked if you slept well,” Harvey repeats with a smirk.
Donna pours him a glass of orange juice before taking a sip of her coffee. “I was tired. What are you doing here?”
“I could ask you the same thing,” Harvey returns.
Theo grumbles for a moment before he looks directly at his dad - “I didn’t want to be alone so I came here.”
Harvey swallows hard before shifting his eyes to Donna. “I couldn’t get Scottie out of my office.”
“Ugh,” Theo groans, “she’s not coming back around, is she?”
“She’s only around now because Donna,” he exaggerates her name, “won’t quit penciling her in.”
“She has business to discuss,” Donna mutters.
Theo laughs a little at their exchange, at how natural it seems. He doesn’t always see their exchanges but sometimes he catches them in just the right moment that he’s reminded that he wonders why the hell aren’t they together? He takes a long gulp of his orange juice and momentarily forgets that he’s been spending a lot of time alone lately.
“Dad?” Theo asks before the two can go off in a different conversational direction. “Did you stay here last night?”
“Yeah,” Harvey answers slowly. There’s a bit of airiness to it, like he’s not certain he wants to tell Theo anything else.
“He, uh,” Donna tries to help but she stutters.
Theo’s dad clears his throat and shakes his head fervently. “Wait for Chelsea.”
“Why are we waiting for Chelsea?” Chelsea grumbles as she enters the kitchen.
Harvey takes the rest of the food out of the pan and turns the stove off. Chelsea digs through the refrigerator for the milk as Donna tucks her bottom lip between her teeth. Theo recognizes that there’s so much going on and he can’t figure any of it out. He raises his eyebrows at his dad.
“What’s going on?” He finally asks.
Donna firmly sets her mug of coffee down on the counter as Harvey leans against it on the other side. Their gaze locks and Theo almost feels a little uncomfortable being in the same room as them. Chelsea turns around to see everyone in silence, looking at each other, and she wonders if she missed something.
“What did I miss?” Chelsea questions, confusion written all over her face.
“Harvey and I,” Donna starts. Theo notes that she looks nervous, a characteristic that he’s only seen on her a handful of times over the years. She smiles and looks at his dad again. He smile looks uncertain. “We have entered a relationship.”
Harvey laughs at her word choice. “We’ve been seeing each other for the last month and we felt that you two should be the first to know.”
“Is that okay?” Donna adds.
Chelsea’s eyes widen as her gaze meets Theo’s. They smile at the same time. “It worked,” she says under her breath.