2 weeks later
That morning had been strange for him, in fact the whole night before had been strange. Well, SHE had been strange.
They had worked it out, or were working on working it out. Since that night that he had come back and made love to her he had stayed. He had stayed and talked and discussed. They had argued and they had debated but they hadn't blamed each other and they hadn't accused anyone or anything.
They had rediscovered what it was to be a couple.
He had missed falling asleep with her in his arms, and waking up each morning with her right beside him.
And that's why he was a little confused at what was going on. He woke up that morning at 7 to get ready to go into the studio and work on the album some, and she wasn't there.
She didn't have to be at work until 8:30 or 9 and she wasn't one to wake up until she absolutely had to.
So when he found the note on his nightstand that said "I've gone to run errands" he was a little thrown off. He didn't have a clue where she would be that early in the morning, but he had learned in the past two weeks not to question her actions. She had changed a little, and her routine wasn't exactly the same routine that he had grown to live with before.
So he turned up the radio in his car and drowned out the thoughts in his head with the early morning talk show on one of the radio stations. His curiosity was killing him at the moment. He just wanted to know where she was, or what she was doing. Usually she would tell him that sort of thing, but now he was clueless. He battled with himself, saying he was being too uptight, but the other part of himself said he needed to be that uptight with all that was going on.
They weren't perfect yet. He had realized over the course of the past year that they probably never would be, but that wasn't the point in being married. Perfect wasn't the point. Understanding, teamwork, support...he knew if he wanted to he could probably be one of those self-motivation speakers or something after all he had been through.
The image of Chris Farley on Saturday Night Live saying "I live in a van, down by the river" made him laugh, and it felt so good.
Laughing. He had laughed a lot with her recently.
He had also cried a lot with her recently. But he wouldn't change any of that for the world.
They had talked about the baby issue, and she had an appointment later on that week to go in, with him, to the doctor and talk about possible solutions. They figured, this wasn't a fight they were willing to give up on.
They almost had before, and they knew that no matter what happened, they were gonna raise a child, some way or another.
Justin pulled into the studio, and saw that JC's car was already there, parked, probably had been for the past couple of hours.
JC had had a minor panic attack the week before about the album. It wasn't getting done as fast as they hoped, and Justin knew he was partially to blame. So they had booked up the next few months and were gonna work as hard as they could to push out some tracks.
He was slumped over some controls when he walked in, headphones on, bobbing his head to the beat slightly. Justin didn't want to scare him so he walked over and put a hand on JC's shoulder. He jumped anyway.
"Shit dude..."
"Sorry." Justin shrugged and watched his friend take off the headphones and turn off a switch.
"Hey, I know everyone doesn't want to be here today, but I figure if we work really hard this morning we can be out of here by 2 or 3."
Justin gave him a strange little look. He thought they would be working all day. But if JC wanted to get them out quick, he wasn't gonna complain. "That's cool. Ya know we don't need to rush, just get some good tunes out."
"Yeah...so I hope the other guys show up soon. I hope they didn't forget."
Justin shrugged it off and walked towards the soundbooth. "Nah, they wouldn't. I'm gonna go warm up."
"All right."
He warmed up his voice in the quiet room, concentrating only on the sounds he was making and nothing else. He smiled through the glass at Joey who strolled in casually and sat down at the boards with JC and started talking,
An hour or so later, Justin was finishing up some vocals for a song. Chris and Lance had just appeared. Chris looked a little out of it, and Lance was happily on his cell phone with his fianc�.
A little later, Justin was controlling the boards with Chris, while Joey read a magazine, and Lance was still on the phone. JC was singing his heart out in the booth on a new love song he had wrote called "Lovable ways." It was a slow song, but had a "adorable" sense to it. The whole song was basically a list of all the cute little characteristic that made him love the person he was singing about.
Even though Justin had an idea that the song was written for Christina, it made him start to think about all the little cute things Meredith did that made him love her even more.
He zoned out. Completely.
He started to smile into space at the thought of how whenever she met someone she would run her hands through her hair, almost 3 times in a row. Or how she would sing Disney songs in the shower; or get in a random mood to pull out some watercolor paints that were about 10 years old and half dried up and paint a picture.
In fact he was so zoned out he hadn't noticed JC stop singing, or Chris turn off the microphone.
"Justin!"
He turned a little, still out of it. "Huh?"
Chris patted his back, hard and he snapped out of his daze and shrugged his friend off. "Welcome back to earth, kid."
"Thanks, gramps." He rolled his eyes.
A knock on the door was heard, and then Marie the lady that worked up at the front desk of the building scooted in carrying a bouquet of red roses. "Excuse me? I don't mean to interrupt but these are for Lance."
"Flowers?" Lance asked, taking the flowers from her.
"Yup. Someone must think you are special." Marie smiled and quietly left the room.
"Who would send me flowers?"
Chris scoffed and pushed his chair away from the controls and plopped down on the couch. "Who would send a guy flowers, anyway? That's gay."
"You're just jealous!" Justin laughed.
JC stretched from being cramped in the small booth. "Who are they from?"
Lance read the card and a big smile erupted on to his face. "My girl." With that he took the flowers and walked out of the room, pulling his cell from his pocket.
"Well, there's one down." JC sighed.
"That IS kinda weird." Justin looked at his other bandmates with curious eyes.
"What?" Joey asked mid-yawn.
That made Justin yawn and he did so while he spoke. "Lance getting flowers. I mean, I know they are engaged and obsessed with each other, but what's the big occasion, ya know?"
"Dude.." Joey looked at him, almost expecting him to crack a smile and pretend he was joking.
But Justin wasn't joking. He was lost. "What?"
Chris's laughter seemed to echo around the room. "Ohhh, someone is in TROBLE tonight."
"Justin, man, you...shit..." Joey stuttered.
He looked frantically in between his companions, wondering what they knew that he didn't. He searched his mind and tried to think of what it was he didn't know about, but he couldn't think of a thing. "What, what's going on."
JC took a seat in the swivel chair beside him and clasped a hand on his shoulder, looking him in the eyes. "It's Valentine's Day man. February 14th. Remember."
Justin's jaw dropped slowly and he sunk back in his chair, hoping it was swallow him up and hide him for the next 24 hours. "Ohhh shit."
It hadn't hit him at all. He had totally forgotten. He had been so wrapped up in Meredith and getting their relationship back on track, he had forgotten one of the most important holidays there was if you were in love with someone.
And the last thing he needed was to give her an excuse to through a tantrum and propel them into hell again.
He had done a good job with keeping his head level. A few times in the past few weeks she had picked a fight, once she even pushed him, as to tick him off. But he reminded himself of what would happen if he reacted to her. And everytime instead of pushing her away, blaming her for something, or just causing a problem, he pulled her into his arms and kissed her and repeated over and over how much he loved her.
He reminded her of times in their past. Trips they had been on, crazy things they had done...Valentine's gifts he had given her.
He was in trouble.
Joey smiled at him and said in a babyish voice, "rut row."
"Don't worry man, its a holiday made by hallmark. It doesn't count." Chris shrugged.
"I cant believe I forgot. J..just so much stuff has been going on, I just haven't thought about anything like this."
"It's ok man, just buy some flowers on your way home, light some candles, you know what to do." JC smiled at him and pointed to Joey then the booth, summoning him to record next.
"Bu..but I forgot. She'll know. She's good at figuring that stuff out. Oh god, this is bad." He rubbed his temples and tried to calm his breathing but the more he concentration his breathing the louder his heartbeat seemed to get, and he could hear it in his ears, pounding.
"Don't worry about it man." Joey said, walking into the booth.
He looked frantically around at everyone else in the room. Did they not understand how big of a deal this was? Maybe if he was them he could pull it off, but Meredith took everything to heart now, and he wasn't sure if forgetting this holiday would be able to be resolved. "No..no you don't understand. W What if she gets mad at me? Like...really mad."
He looked up at JC, and pleaded with his eyes to help him. He seemed to realize Justin's urgency. Joey, who was halfway into the recording booth, halted and turned and took a seat beside Chris on the couch.
"We'll help you man."
And with that the 4 of them started to try and plan a last minute Valentine's Day surprise for Meredith. Lance had been lost for a while, and finally showed up an half-hour later with a wide grin on his face.
He was informed of the situation and soon JC had a list of ideas, half of which had been crossed out.
But in the midst of the commotion of trying to plan this, Justin's cell phone rang out in the room.
All 5 of the men stared at it in his hand.
"What do I do?" Justin whispered, shocked.
"Answer it." Chris said, not mocking, but in the same exact tone.
They all just stared in silence.
"He..hello?" He choked into the phone.
His worst nightmare came true when he heard her voice, quiet, meek-like, whisper, "Um, hi."
"Hey, um, mere."
He heard her clear her throat, and then what sounded like a sniffle. "Y You're at the studio r right?"
"Yeah, why?"
She started talking faster than he could comprehend. She sounded frantic, scared, and that terrified him. "I'm driving there. Well I cant drive but Kris is and um, I'll be there soon. yeah."
He figured she had realized he had fucked up, so he blurted out the only thing he could think of. "I'm sorry."
"F- for what?"
"You sound upset. H- Have you been crying?"
"No..." He heard her take in a shaky breath and let it out by sobbing a little bit "..yes."
"M- Meredith..." Everyone in the room was staring at him, and he thought he might explode or something.
He was lost again.
"We're almost there. Bye."
"Wait..Mere..." But the phone clicked off before he had the chance to say anymore. "fuck."
"What happened?" Joey asked.
He shot out of his chair and started pacing the 4 feet of space he had in the room filled with 4 other grown men. His hands waved around as he talked and he searched the floor for answers with his eyes. "I don't know! She was upset about something and on her way here and Kristina was driving her which is weird."
"My Chr..."
He looked at JC and glared. "Other one."
He didn't think about his next move, and stormed out of the door and down the hallway. He reached the lobby of the building and stood in front of the glass door, waiting...watching.
The weather was kinda cloudy, it had rained that morning and so there were puddles everywhere.
He just knew in his mind that was a bad omen. Something was gonna happen when she arrived. Something bad was going on. She was upset, crying on the phone and if she was having someone else drive her then she was really torn up.
He prayed for strength.
His breath caught in his throat when he saw Meredith's car pull into the parking lot and park in front. Kris stepped out of the drivers seat and he could barely see his wife, sitting there in the passenger seat, slumped...not good.
He pushed the door open and took giant steps towards Kris. "What..whats going on?"
"I don't know. I just got a phone call this morning and she asked me to go run errands with her and I ended up in the waiting room for- listen Justin, j just ask her what's up. I don't know what happened or anything but, but I just...talk to her." She let out a big sigh and looked back at Meredith's car.
"I gotta go back to work. Tell her to call me later and know what's up. i..I'm worried about her Justin. She hasn't said anything intelligible since we got in the car, and..sh she's just been crying."
"O- oh k."
"I'm gonna take her car but it will be at WEG if you guys need it."
"K."
He watched as Kris walked over to the passenger side, and opened the door. It took some coaxing but soon he saw Meredith get out of the car. Her face was red from all her crying and she looked like she had just rolled out of bed.
She clobbered her friend in a hug and then let her go and turned towards him. He didn't know what to say and couldn't think of anything to do so he just stood there.
"Hey..." She said in a hoarse whisper.
"Wh-" She had wrapped her arms around him and squeezed him so tight it started to hurt. She whispered into his neck. "IS there a vacant studio where we can go and talk?"
He nodded slowly and pulled her off him. He turned and started to go back into the building but she caught his hand and looked up at him, scared and child-like.
His stomach started to ache and he held on to her hand tightly afraid she might fall or slip away. They found an empty studio and he had long sense forgotten to tell the guys what he was doing or where he was.
He figured they'd let him have his space.
She immediately started to pace and he just stood there staring at her.
Finally he cleared his throat and said, "So just...tell me. I..I can handle it. What is it? What's wrong?"
Her eyes met his and he saw behind the redness and the glassiness... there was hope and happiness. Her eyes were...shining.
"N- nothing's wrong."
He stared at her some more, his stomach flipped even more now. He was confused and his head hurt. And she was just looking at him.
Finally she came over to him and pushed him back a little towards the couch. "Sit down."
"What is it Mere!? Y- you're killin me here." He said panicky.
She looked down at the floor, and mumbled. "I..I went to the doctor this morning."
"O..ok."
"I um, god, I don't even know how to say this." He watched her shaky hands run through her hair and he couldn't take it anymore. She was torturing him.
"Just say it!"
"I just, I mean I..Ive been waiting for this for forever and now now I don't even know h how to tell you."
He closed his eyes and there was only one thing that came to his mind. This was baby stuff. He felt for the couch, sat down on it slowly and looked up at her. "Wait, Meredith what are you talking about."
She sighed and bit her lip, her eyes still not looking at him. "I..I was supposed to get my period last week."
His mouth went dry and he licked his lips nervously. His hands were clenched in fist. He wasn't to scream and yell and stomp around just DO something, but he couldn't. And all he said was, "o..ok." He let her tell him at her own pace, no matter how excrustiating it was to him.
"And it never came."
His lungs seemed to stop working. "Ok."
"So I called Dr. Conner. And she asked me to come in this morning."
"ok."
"Justin...I ..." When her voice broke and cracked her couldn't take it anymore. She was starting to get choked up. Tears started to fall, and she tucked her chin into her chest and sobbed quietly.
And that's when he really panicked. "I..Is something r really wrong? Did something bad happen?"
"N- No Justin I.."
He tried to make a move off the couch to hold her or something, but his body felt like a dead weight, and he found it hard to even shift in his seat. "I..I can handle it."
She was quiet for a while. At first she stared at the ground and then she stared at him. He had had his eyes glued on her face the whole time since they got in the room, and his eyes were starting to hurt. He wanted to cry but was trying to be strong for her. He kept repeating in his head that he had to be strong, and he couldn't show his emotions to her. But it was so hard. He felt like his life was ending.
And he didn't even know what was going on.
And that's when she stepped forward, right in front of him. She took a deep breath and put her hands out, palm up. "Give me your hands."
"W- Why."
She closed her eyes almost in frustration. "Just give me your hands."
So he placed his hands on hers. They were warm and soft. He moved his eyes from her face to her hands and watched her bring them up under her shirt. At first he was curious as to why she was making him partially feel her up and wondered what the hell she was thinking.
But then she placed his hands on her belly, and put her hands on top of his keeping them there. "Feel this."
He couldn't speak, so he whispered out a meek, "Y- Yeah.."
"Y- you better start appreciating the size it is now, b-- because in 2 months its not gonna be this small."
His eyes jumped from the part of her stomach that was slightly exposed to her face.
He wanted to ask, he wanted to jump up and scream and he wanted to see some proof. He knew what she meant. But he was afraid his mind was tricking him.
"W- what.."
"Dr. Conner said that after the blood test she was pretty certain that, well yeah...and that maybe she overlooked something before, and sense I haven't seen her in ..well 4 months or so that something might have changed or something and well yeah...so yeah.."
He closed his eyes and when he opened them again the room was spinning. He couldn't catch his breath and he thought he might be having some kind of emotional attack. "I...I cant breathe."
She moved beside him and sat down on the couch, close to him, holding on to him. "Oh god, are you ok?"
His hands reached for her face and he cupped her cheeks and looked her in the eyes. "You mean..."
"We'll have to be really cautious and everything but um...yeah." She nodded and but he needed more.
His eyes closed. "Say it. I- I need you to say it."
"I um, I'm pregnant Justin." She said quietly.
He opened his eyes and tears fell, but there was a bright smile on his face. He looked at her and said, "Say it again."
She smiled back at him, her eyes welling up with tears also. "I'm pregnant."
"Again." He demanded.
"I'm pregnant?" She said questionably.
"One more time."
She started to laugh and he thought he might die of happiness. "Justin!"
"Fine I'll say it. You're pregnant." And a big smile broke on his face again.
"Y- yeah.."
His head shook. "No no no, we're pregnant."
"We are?" She looked at him a little funny.
"Y- Yes..w- we're gonna have a baby..I- I'm gonna..oh god, I'm gonna be..." His voice cracked and the next thing he knew he was sobbing tears of joy. He felt her pull him into her arms and rock him back and forth as he cried.
Never in his life had he burst into tears like that before. He was slow to let his emotions get to him, and tried to keep them undercover. But he couldn't help it. It was too much.
He had spent the past few months in hell, and to hear her say those two words made him willing to go through it all over again.
"You're gonna be a daddy, Justin."
He sniffed and gripped the back of her shirt tighter, not wanting to let her go. "Really? You promise me."
"I promise." He felt her lips by his ear and shuddered when she kissed him there.
"Oh god, I..I cant believe it."
"I cant either."
He pulled away and looked in her eyes. Her cheeks were wet with tears also. "W- we're gonna have a baby, angel. A- a little baby."
"I..I know."
"How..when..."
A blush covered her face and she bit her lip shyly. "Your birthday."
Another sob came over him and he spoke to her in-between breaths and tears. "I love you. I love you so much Meredith. I...I cant even put it all into words. I'm so sorry for.."
And once again she comforted him, pulled him against her, and rocked him into calmness. "Shhh, It doesn't matter. Nothing matters except this..."
And he realized then, how strong she was being. How alive her eyes looked, and how much love shone in them for him. His angel was back. And for once the world was right.
"We're gonna have a family." She whispered.
"We always have; this is just a much appreciated and loved addition."
He kissed her neck and her cheek, not being able to get enough of her. "A much needed addition."
He pulled away a little and put his hands up her shirt again, feeling her stomach all over. "Let me touch your belly again. I cant wait for you to be fat."
She laughed and giggled, he figured her was probably tickling her a little. "That was the wrong thing to say."
"Well its the truth. I cant wait for a big round belly and I cant wait for e- everything...I think I'm gonna faint." The room started spinning again, but he didn't care.
She looked down at her hands in her lap and said ashamed, "I'm sorry I didn't tell you be-"
But he reached up and turned her face to his with his hands. "Like you said, It doesn't matter."
"Ok."
He smiled at her and she smiled back. It was then that he decided to kiss her. Her lips molded against his, and he couldn't get enough of her taste and smell and feel. Everything about her was perfect to him. Perfect for him.
He pulled away, breathless and searched her eyes for understanding. "Nothing else matters Angel. Nothing."
Her eyes started to smile and he felt his like his body was melting.
"Just this." With that he pulled her more firmly against him and kissed her and kissed her and kissed her.
And then he cried with her and laughed with her, until they both fell asleep on the couch , curled up in each others arms, encircled in their love, and finally, after a torturous, long road...they were a family.