A/N: This fulfills an anonymous request for “Please don’t cry, I hate it when you cry.” It’s been so long since I got that request, I can’t link the prompt. Sorry this took forever to finish! Life has been absolutely crazy the past few weeks, but here it is! I hope you all enjoy!
Summary: Maya’s feeling a little blue and Damien has no idea why. He comforts her, which leads to an important conversation.
“Maya, I’m home!” Damien walked through the front door only to stop when he heard sniffling. When he looked up, Maya was waiting for him, tears running down her cheeks.
“You’re crying . . .”
Her face reddened and she turned away. “No,” she insisted. “I’m fine.”
Frowning, Damien followed her to the couch where she stood, visibly shaking as she wiped her face. He turned her around to face him, giving her a hard look. “You sure about that?” The only answer he got was another sniffle. “Okay, we’re not going to dinner like this. If a waiter sees you like that, they’ll think we’re trying to score a free meal.” He chuckled good-naturedly.
“Why are you being so mean?”
His eyes widened when she began to sob, putting her face in her hands as she sat back on the couch.
“Hey . . . whoa, whoa . . . I’m sorry, I was just kidding!” Damien knelt in front of her and placed a hand on her shoulder, squeezing it comfortingly. “Here-” he handed her some tissues from a box nearby. She started wiping her tears even as more began to spill. Thoroughly concerned now, he sat on the edge of the coffee table, clasping his hands together. “Tell me what’s wrong, Maya.”
Maya went silent at that, letting her hands drop into her lap and then she looked back at him, biting her lower lip. “I need to tell you something Damien.”
He nodded, listening intently. And possibly preparing for the worst.
“I screwed up your chocolate recipe.”
If there was ever a time for a car to come to a screeching halt, causing a domino of accidents, or for a cartoon character to have their jaw literally drop to the floor for comic effect, it was now.
Damien blinked once then twice and he proceeded to gape at her for a few seconds. Is this what it feels like to have a stroke? Then he felt his throat closing up as the laughter bubbling in him threatened to burst.
A snort escaped him and her eyes filled with tears again. “Stop it,” she whined. But it was already too late. He just couldn’t help it. Damien started laughing while simultaneously trying to hold it back, though he was failing. Miserably. “Stop laughing, Damien!”
“Sorry . . . I’m sorry . . .” Damien took a few unsteady breaths, trying to rein himself in, only to lose it again – at the mere thought of how worried he’d been when he’d seen her cry and then knowing what it had turned out to be. Once he’d calmed himself down, he faced her again, shaking his head. “You’re telling me you’ve been crying all this time, just over this?”
“This isn’t just a small matter, Damien!” she insisted through her tears. “So our neighbors were asking for those homemade chocolates you’ve been making and I decided to try doing it.” Damien’s eyes widened and she quickly added, “I know, I know, you don’t think cooking is exactly my ‘forte'” She gestured with air-quotes, annoyed. “So I took precautions. I called your mom and got the recipe and I followed the instructions to the letter. The letter.”
“I get it, Maya.” Damien wiped away some tears of his own, his face scrunched up comically in an agonizing struggle to keep a straight face. “But why were you-”
“I’m telling you, Damien. It looked perfect! So I made it and shaped it into letters and everything. But when I tasted it, it was awful and I didn’t know why.” She cried even harder while Damien was looking more and more perplexed as the story progressed. “I double checked the items. Then when I looked at one of the containers I’d used, I realized that what I thought was a jar of sugar was actually salt.” She pouted. “Salt!”
Damien’s head was in his hands, muffling his laughter again. When he looked up, she was burying her face in the couch cushion and he quickly sobered. “All right, all right come here.” She shook her head, still refusing to lift her head from the pillow. He scooted over and pulled her into his lap. “Come on Maya, please don’t cry. I hate it when you cry.”
“Why, wouldn’t you rather just laugh at me?”
“Sweetheart, I don’t need a reason to laugh at you.” Her eyes narrowed into a glare and he quickly added: “And that’s one of the reasons I love you, because you’re just naturally hilarious and so damn adorable . . .” He held her more closely and kissed her temple. “I came in worried sick, and then find that this is why you’re so upset? You have to admit that is kinda funny.”
She rolled her eyes. “All right, I forgive you, you ass.”
“And you’re so sweet and beautiful . . .”
“Okay, I get it.”
“No seriously, that was really sweet of you to do that.”
“You don’t know how excited I was when you decided to come home early to see this and then I completely messed it up.”
“It’s okay, Maya. It’s the effort that counts.” He was rubbing her back comfortingly. “Hell, the way you were crying when I came in here I was worried that you were hurt or something!”
“But I am hurt!” She pouted. “We’re already engaged and I can’t even make a simple chocolate! What if . . . what if we have kids later and I still can’t get this stuff right?”
“Ookay, I’m not really sure where this is coming from but where did you get the idea that I’m marrying you for your cooking?” He cocked his head, smirking at her. “I knew what I was getting into when I proposed. And I do recall you mentioning at a certain national monument that I would be doing all the work?”
“Good point.” Her face lit up when recalling that memory. “So you’ll do the cooking, birthday cakes and more. What would I do then? With our hypothetical kids?”
“All kinds of things.” He thought on it for a moment. “Like . . . I definitely see you being the ‘fun mom’. You’d play all kinds of games with them at home, host movie marathons . . .”
“Playdates and silly dance parties . . . which you’d be part of, by the way.”
“‘Course I would,” Damien snorted. “It’d be like when I grew up with my sisters.”
“Playing of Queen of Stormholt?”
“And helping them with their homework, driving them everywhere, boy advice and more . . .”
“Well that’ll definitely be interesting.” She said with a cheeky grin. “You’re protective enough as it is.”
“Hey, so are you.” He chuckled. “I mean, can you imagine tiny little Mrs. Nazario facing down a PTA mom?”
Her face paled and she pushed back. “Whoa now, who says I’m going anywhere near that cesspool?” Damien was about to say something else, but she interrupted him. “Seriously, Damien. I’d rather let Rowan West teach me AP Literature.”
He put his hands up in a show of surrender. “Hey, it’s just an example! And what if the kid wants dance lessons? Won’t you still have to deal with it then?”
“That’s different. I can at least separate that from the place where they get their report cards.”
“Fair point.”
“So you’ll protect them from bad boys and I’ll protect them from crazy dance moms. Sound about right?”
“I think so.” He grinned. “Looks like we’ll make one hell of a team.”
Maya gestured to the kitchen, still not completely satisfied. “But Damien, I can’t even tell the difference between salt and sugar!” She lamented. “How can I possibly handle a kid?”
“Don’t worry about anything, Maya. I think you’d make a fantastic mom. You’re the most wonderful, caring person around. And I’ll be with you at every step.”
She snuggled further into his chest as the endless possibilities soared through her mind, beyond what they’d just talked about. “And you’d be a wonderful dad, Damien.” She whispered.
“Got me pegged already?”
“You’re pegged, Nazario. For real this time.”
“Guess I am. In a good way obviously.” He leaned back, smiling softly. “Feel better now?”
“Loads. Sorry about that earlier. I don’t know what came over me.”
“And you’re sure everything’s okay?”
“I . . .” She suddenly went still in his arms, seeming to contemplate something before she stood up. “It’s just that with Nadia and Steve’s kid and also when I see Sloane and Khaan with Hamza, I’ve just been thinking about it more lately.” Maya looked up at him with a soft smile. “I know it’s a little early to think about, but-”
Damien laughed at that. “Maya, we’re getting married. I’d be concerned if we hadn’t already thought about it.” He noticed a flash of relief on her face at that and watched her quizzically. “Is there something else bothering you?”
“No.” She shook her head, smiling. “Not anymore.”
———————–
One week later . . .
Maya paced back and forth, wringing her hands as she tried to forget how nervous she was.
For the past few weeks, she’d been feeling sick. She hadn’t thought much of it until she’d started having periodic dizzy spells. Then she’d missed her period, which started the nagging doubt that had prompted a trip to the drug store. The first test had been negative, so she’d just chalked it up to stress and forgotten the whole thing.
But then her obsession with chocolate had started up recently and at times, she would find herself getting upset over the silliest things, just like she had today. How did I miss this the first time?
And now, here she was again sitting in the bathroom of hers and Damien’s apartment waiting for something to appear that may change their life. When Maya had first had her suspicions, the first reaction had been nothing short of excitement. It was only minutes later as her thoughts got ahead of her that the worry had began to settle in.
Is it too soon?
It wasn’t as though she and Damien didn’t see kids in their future. No, they’d definitely talked about having a family. The original plan had been to live together, get married, then have kids once they were financially stable. They were still engaged now and things had been going smoothly until one day when she’d decided to surprise him on his lunch break on his birthday, and around that time, she’d missed her depo shot.
Therefore here she was now, waiting for the results of her second pregnancy test.
But unlike the first time, all of her earlier anxiety had now dissipated. With her conversation with Damien in mind, Maya could only laugh at herself. How could she doubt for even a second whether he’d be happy with the news? Or how soon or how late? None of that mattered anymore so long as they were together – so long as if the stick turned blue, it would be because of him.
Maya couldn’t help daydreaming just a little more as she waited impatiently.
Spending hours just looking at the baby as it slept, ‘talking’ to it, responding to its adorable babbling, arguing over whose turn it was to change the diapers and having different opinions on who was doing it right. She’d teach them Hindi and he’d teach them Spanish-
The chiming from her phone brought Maya out of her thoughts and she immediately rushed to the sink where the test was sitting there, waiting for her. Taking a deep breath, she reached out and picked it up.
Blue.