Souls Companion (The Child) Chapter 2
Abby chewed nervously on the end of one of her pigtails as she waited for Tim to come over to her apartment for lunch. She had decided that during the day while Dante was asleep was the best time to try and have this conversation with Tim. With one of them she had a slim chance of convincing him of the sanity of her plan but facing the two of them together? The idea terrified her.
She had practised what she wanted to say a thousand times but still every speech she had concocted seemed completely inadequate for the immensity of what she was going to ask.
How on earth do you say to your best friend that you wanted to have a child with him? Not could he go to the movies with you or help you move or even pick you up from the airport but create a connection between you forever in the shape of a baby?
Abby had spent many sleepless nights considering her options to no avail. She could adopt but she wanted to at least try for her own child. She could go with artificial insemination but she wanted someone she knew and trusted to be the father of the child even if they couldn’t....didn’t want to...weren’t able to....
And there was the big unknown part of the problem.
Dante.
Abby had no idea how the vampire would take to the idea. Would Tim have to hide part of his angel identity and his vampire lover from the child in the hopes of portraying a normal life? Would Dante even allow Tim to be the biological father? Would Dante see it as Abby trying to take a part of Tim away from him? By giving him something that Dante never could? What would the child of a dream walker and angel be like anyway? Could Tim even have a child with her now that his DNA wasn’t completely human?
And so with dark circles under her eyes and a knot of anxiety in her belly Abby waited. She had tried to let the idea go but now that the hidden part of her mind had latched onto it she couldn’t seem to let it go. She kept flashing to the image of McGee with his arm curled protectively around little Brian Abbott as they lay asleep on her lab floor. She walked down the street and found herself studying babies in their prams and wondering what her own child would look like? Would it have dark hair like hers or lighter, softer, blonder hair like McGee? Would she have a raucous boy or a gentle girl or given the potential parents a sweet tempered boy or a noisy troublesome girl?
The knock at the door made her jump and plastering on a nervous, bright smile she went to answer it.
“Hey McGee. It really has been too long since we caught up with just the two of us”
Tim smiled and nodded as he held up a large paper bag of pastries he held in his hand.
“Yeah it has. I brought pastries as I wasn’t sure what we were doing for lunch and I know how much you like them.”
“Would you have a child with me?”
Abby blurted out what had been burning into her brain these many weeks and she slapped her hands hard over her mouth as she stood frozen in her door way, her eyes wide with horror.
Tim blinked and then cocked his head slightly, looking at her curiously as he slowly lowered the bag back down to his side.
“Did you just say what I thought you said?”
Abby pleaded with her eyes and nodded, her hand still firmly clamped over her traitorous mouth.
Tim blinked again, his eyes confused.
“You, as in Abby Scutio would like to have a child with me?”
Abby took a deep breath as she felt the moment begin to slip away through her grasp and all her thoughts started to tumble out in no specific order.
“Well you’re my best friend and i love you and your smart and sweet and disease free and I want a child and it’s not likely with what you have going on with Dante that you are going to be able to have a child so it would mean that you would get to be a father too.
Although I understand that it might be awkward with all the other stuff going on so if you didn’t want to be involved and you just got me knocked up that would be cool too.
I have money put aside and while it would be great if we could do it together I’m ok being a single Mom too. And don’t worry if you think this is just some spur of the moment thing, it’s not. I been thinking about this for some time and this is something I really, really want. I would move to a bigger apartment and I would even change my car so it’s more suitable. I know I would be giving up my late night parties but I’m not going to them now. Lately they just don’t make me excited like they used to. It just seems to be the same people doing the same thing over and over like a sort of Groundhog Day. I want more than that.
I don’t want just anyone to be the Father either. I would really like it to be you. I know everything about you and that you’re allergic to cats and you get seasick but you’re smart and cute and strong and I think you would make a great Daddy and I’m kind of getting older and I kept thinking that there would be more chances down the road but now that I look the road is kind of running out and you’re the best one I can think of to share something like that with me.
I know it will be hard and I’m obviously not going to be able to work the hours that I used to and it will affect the team and I would have to tell Gibbs at some stage but I just can’t get it out of my mind and I really want to be a Mother and I think I would be a great Mommy and you would make a fantastic Daddy no matter what Tony might say.”
Abby looked at Tim with bright shining eyes and a face full of hope as she finished her speech and panted as she caught her breath.
“So what do you say McGee will you be my Baby Daddy?”
Tim shifted his weight from foot to foot as he contemplated one of his life’s biggest decisions in the hallway of Abby’s apartment building.
“Ahhhhh can I come in first?”
“Oh I’m so sorry! Yes of course you can come in!” Abby grabbed the bag of pastries out of his hand and practically towed him through the door, before shoving him down onto the couch.
“Well? What do you think?”
Tim looked up at her looking like he had just been blindsided by a large truck, which he basically had.
“Umm you want an answer NOW? Abby I really wasn’t expecting this. The biggest decision I expected to make today was the chocolate or the glazed pastries. Besides I’m going to have to think about all this and the implications and work and .....Wow to be a father? Me? Really? I will have to speak to Dante about this. It wouldn’t be fair otherwise. I mean I never considered that you would..... I kind of gave up on the idea of children when I accepted Dante and that was fine with me. I have not regretted the decision but.......”
Abby watched as Tim’s analytical mind whirred through the long list of overwhelming complications and then she watched as he lifted his face up to meet hers and tremulous hope bloomed across it.
Abby grinned as she saw the desire stamped across his features and she knew that whatever happened she was at least in with a chance. She had known he would make a great father but what she hadn’t known was that it was something he had wanted and put aside as impossible.
Hope of her own unfurled painfully in her chest and she tried unsuccessfully to stamp it down. Dante adored McGee and if anyone could convince the vampire that this was a great idea then it was his own sweet Companion.
Tim looked up at her again as she grinned down at him.
“You know what Ab’s do you mind if we skip lunch? You’ve given me a lot to think about and I think I need to go take a walk or something?”
“Yeah that’s a great idea Tim. Go take a walk. Look at the birds and the bees. “
Abby hauled him off the couch as something strange seemed to have happened to his knees and practically shoved him out of the door.
“Call me!”
Abby watched Tim stagger absentmindedly back down her hallway before she shut her door and sagged back against it. Closing her eyes, she crossed all of her fingers.