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letterstonorahTitle: Wire Hanger, Epilogue (II/II)
Author: letterstonorah
Pairings: Kara/Lee
Word Count: 6500
Rating: NC17
Warnings: the c-word, smutty smut, the p-word (not the one that rhymes with wussy, the other one)
Author's Note: You guys. Getting this chapter to you has been an epic battle of the wills. The Universe vs. Me. I won, obvi. Let's see. So I wrote this chapter quite a while ago and hated it so didn't feel comfortable posting it. I finally decided to work on it some more...added about 3000 words....then oh, my computer randomly shut down, and after I booted it back up the fic was GONE. FUCKING GONE. Like, nowhere. I was so bereft that I threw my laptop against the wall. Yes, really. So then I irrevocably damaged my computer screen, and all I could see were swirly colors of death and sadness. The warranty didn't cover hardware malfunctions. Blah blah blah. Shit was looking bad. Then I went to this hole-in-the-wall-pretty-sure-I-saw-a-rat-scurrying-across-the floor, and they were like, "Well. We've actually got the screen you need right here. It'll take us fifteen minutes to replace yours. And uh, it's also ridiculously cheap." So I was like, "Hell yeah!" It did set me back $150 -- $150 I soooooooo did not have, but it was my fault for being a drama queen. Note to self: when you throw things hard against the wall, they break. Kay. Got it. Well, after much searching and prodding and poking, I finally *did* find the fic. Yay for recovery! It was buried in a hidden app data file. Where unsaved documents go to die. I still had a lot of work to do on it...But at least I didn't have to start from scratch.
I have to say sorry for this chapter. For so many reasons. I would especially like to extend an apology to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
wicked_sassy. Because this is meh. Just, I've done it, and now I can't take it back -- but you guys don't deserve to be left hanging, so here it is. I hope it's somewhat satisfying despite itself.
I love reading your comments. If you read, please take a moment to let me know :o)
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Before
Karl comes by at around nineteen-hundred hours to pick up Kacey—finally, frakking finally. He chatters on for much too long about the cooling weather and the Memorial that the settlers are building in Demeter City, completely oblivious to Kara’s tapping foot, to the way she hasn’t offered him a drink or a seat.
Lee cuts to the chase. “You should probably get going. It’s late, and the Commander needs to get to bed,” he says, planting a kiss on the top of Kacey’s head. She has dozed off in his arms, her head bobbing up and down on his shoulder.
She’s been very clingy these last few months, and she has yet to spend a night away from home since Kara and she have moved back into the cabin. Kara smiles at the sight of her so close to Lee, her legs wrapped around his middle, her curls obscuring half his face, her hands around his neck.
The little girl doesn’t want to let go, and it’s a sentiment with which Kara is intimately familiar. Kacey already understands that any moment her entire world can disappear just like that. At only five years of age, she’s experienced enough major loss to learn how not to get too attached to things.
“Yeah, she’s zonked,” Kara says, agreeing with Lee. “Should get her back to your place.” She stands and starts to hurry Karl toward the door.
“Ohhh, is that how it’s going to be?” Karl asks, smiling despite the chiding tone in his voice. “I get it.”
“Took you long enough there, Karl,” Kara says, and she’s too old and too experienced and has been through way too much to be blushing at Kara’s insinuation, but she is. This will be the first time in a few months that she’s gotten to be alone with Lee, and gods, all she wants Karl to do is get the frak out and take Kacey with her.
Her daughter wakes up while Lee is transferring her to Karl’s arms. She yawns and blinks as she wiggles around to make herself comfortable, lets her legs rest around her uncle’s hips.
Kara walks up to her and kisses her no less than ten times on each of her cheeks before saying good bye. “Promise to go easy on them okay?” she says.
Kacey doesn’t say anything, just hides her face in her Uncle’s Karl shoulders and nods back off to sleep.
“That so does not bode well for you,” says Lee.
Karl shrugs, “I’m used to difficult women.”
“Good night,” says Kara, opening the door, practically shoving her friend outside.
“Have fun, you two,” he says, slinging Kacey’s overnight bag over his shoulder as he balances her in the other.
The door slams shut, and Kara leans back against it, closing her eyes. “Thank gods,” she says.
“I seriously thought he was never going to leave. When he started talking about designs for the memorial park? Gods, I had to cut that short.”
“Cut it short, you did,” Kara says. “I admired your forwardness.” She mocks his voice as she continues on, “You should get going. I thought for a minute there you were going to punch him.”
“Oh, I was,” says Lee. “I really, really was.”
“So, what now?” asks Kara, smiling. Though Lee’s hair is cropped as short as it was in his military days, a dark layer of stubble covers his face and neck, making him look uncharacteristically rugged. He’s wearing a t-shirt and a pair of jeans.
“I don’t know,” Lee says, his eyes on her. He walks toward her slowly, close enough that she can feel the heat radiating off him, smell him, see the flecks of gray in his blue eyes. “Maybe play some cards? How’s that sound?”
“Like the worst idea I’ve ever heard,” she says.
“Oh?”
“Yeah, pretty much,” says Kara, folding the left side of her bottom lip into her mouth, sucking on the tender flesh as she assesses Lee. “Anything else you think we should do?”
He shrugs. “I don’t know what we should do, but I know what I intend to do.”
“Oh, and what’s that?”
“I think you know what I’ve got in mind,” he says, his voice dropping to little more than a growl as he closes the distance between them even more. His smell, salty and woody and clean, warms her up, makes her feel nostalgic for his touch.
“I want you say it,” she says.
Lee places each of his hands on the wall behind Kara, surrounding her, leaning over her. It’s a good thing that she’s already leaning against the door for support. The smell and the feel and the sight of him is frakking with her, making it so that she can’t stand or think or do anything properly.
“What’s that, Kara?” he asks. “You want me to say it? Say how I want to frak you right now against this wall hard enough so that we break down this piece of shit cabin? Make you scream so loud Karl and Sharon can hear from frakking two miles away? Is that what you want to hear? Or about how before tonight is over I’m going to have you sit on the table, legs spread, thighs wet, so I can tongue your cunt, lick your clit? That what you want to hear, Kara?”
He draws a hand along her cheek, down to her neck, collarbone. The very tip of his fingers slip beneath her shirt, grazing her skin so softly Kara’s not even sure he’s actually touching her.
Kara thinks he’s about to keep going, but she’s got her fingers tangled in the fabric of his shirt, yanking him closer, forcing their lips together. He parts his mouth and slips his tongue into hers, and everything is suddenly hot and wet and pulsing and needy.
She’s got one leg hooked around him all-frakking-ready, and gods, he’s so hard against her, his cock pressing into her thigh and pushing up at the apex of her legs.
She grabs his chest, shoulders, back, ass--whatever part of him she can touch and claim and mark. Her hands slip under the t-shirt so that she can feel his hot skin, curve her fingers around the long lines of muscles.
She sags a little against the wall then grabs the fabric of his shirt to pull him closer, forcing their lips to meet. Lee’s tongue slips between her lips, and they’re kissing frantically. The feel of his lips against hers, of his mouth wet and hot, makes the need in her body grow. Kara grabs his chest, shoulders, back, ass—whatever part of him she can touch and claim and mark. Everything is buzzing and tingling like a million nerve endings coming to life all at once.
Kara’s an animal – the way she’s scratching at him, the way she’s moving herself against him all-frakking-ready. She rides her hips along his thigh, adjusts herself just so. She’s breathy and mad and gasping.
Lee is unbuttoning her trousers, pulling them down along with her panties. “Table?” he asks, pulling her off the wall.
Kara’s too busy feeling the skin underneath his shirt, the building sensation between her legs, the heat rushing to her cheeks.
They slam back against the—something. Table? Counter? Couch? All she knows for sure that she’s surrounded by the bends and edges of Lee’s body. Sculpted arms holding her tight, abs that tighten as he lowers himself. He’s suddenly on top of her, unbuckling his trousers, moving his lips away from her hers and down to her neck.
His tongue on Kara’s skin feels hot and wet, and the world around her disappears, blurring out. He reaches under her and grabs her bare ass, pulling her up, and uses his free hand to caress her inner thigh. She’s wriggling toward his hand, desperate for contact, but he refuses to stop teasing. His fingers graze just centimeters away from her cunt.
Kara does not do well with being teased. She grabs Lee hard and pulls him down, quickly enough so that he won’t expect it. “Touch me,” she says, but she isn’t begging. She’s telling him, and there’s a threat in her voice. “Now, Lee.” She presses her hips up into his hand, and he finally stops denying her.
Kara moans as she feels his fingers sliding up her cunt before settling there—right there—not quite inside her, not quite outside her, his knuckles widening her. His thumb rolls circles around her clit as his fingers work gently at her entrance.
“Need to feel all of you, Kara,” he says. They’ve been together enough times that she knows he wants her to remove her shirt, her bra—shuck her trousers and panties off her ankles and onto the floor.
She whips off her clothing quickly, and he does the same, both of them desperate to be touching again.
Lee’s naked body is the most beautiful thing she’s ever seen. He is perfectly put together. His body flushes hot and warm against her, and she revels in the hardness of his cock against her leg, sliding along the wetness between her thighs, seeking friction. He returns his fingers to her cunt (thank gods) and she’s raking herself against him.
“Come on,” she says, and her voice is all raspy and broken as the throbbing between her legs causes her to lose most coherent thought.
“You look so beautiful, Kara,” he says, and she is pretty sure Lee’s gone crazy. She feels her body sweating, her hair disheveling. She’s clinging to him, grinding against him. This isn’t cute. This isn’t beautiful. “I almost tackled Karl to get him to leave. I wake up in the morning and all I want to do frak you. At breakfast. At lunch. All frakking day at work.”
“Just don’t stop rubbing,” is all Kara says.
“I’m not,” he says, “You look too frakking good. Even when you’ve had enough, when you’re satisfied, I’m going to keep going. You’ll beg me to let you take a break, but I’ll make you come again and gain ‘til your body can’t take it anymore.”
Lee reaches one finger slowly insider her, then another. “More,” she says, aching to feel increased pressure. She starts frakking his fingers as she’s biting and licking his neck, rubbing her hands along his back, his ass.
It’s not enough. It’s too much. It’s perfect. She’s torn between wanting it to last forever and wanting to feel him inside of her now.
She is starving for his touch, wants to feel him all over, everywhere. Kara pulls Lee’s head down, pressing her lips against his before opening her mouth and letting her tongue find his.
As he kisses her, Lee finally begins to lose it. Kara knows that he’s barely maintaining control. His breaths become heavier, more staggered. He moves his hips so that his cock rubs against her leg.
“Kara,” he says, his voice thick and low. Lee moves himself up higher against her, then he’s rubbing his cock back and forth over her center, the head of his cock touching her clit with each stroke, his dick as close to her as can be without being inside of her. She can barely breathe now, certainly can’t think. “Lee,” she says, but she doesn’t know why. She just needed to say something, to let him know how perfect and intense this is. Kara begins to move her hips in rhythm with Lee’s strokes – and surely there can’t be anything in the world better than this?
She moves up against him, biting his shoulder, enjoying the sound of his heavy breathing and low moans.
“Gods you feel so frakking good,” Lee says. “Can’t wait to be inside of you.”
Kara grinds against him faster, and Lee takes the hint, reaching down to grab his cock and angle himself to slide into her.
“Now,” Kara begs, but he’s moving achingly so, staring at her reverently.
Then just like that he’s inside of her, hard and brutal, frakking her just how she likes it.
Kara’s already so close that he’s only inside of her for a few seconds before she’s letting go, her cunt clenching over his cock.
“Yes, yes, come for me, Kara,” Lee says, his voice a moaning drawl.
He’s right there with her, his body jerking into her spastically as he comes.
“Love you,” Lee says.
“Love you,” says Kara.
Now
Kara dreams of her first memory: two years old, her feet submerged in sand the color of ashes. A castle disintegrating under the force of a rising tide. Seagulls munching on hotdog buns just meters away.
Her mother cradles her towel-cocooned body, whispering a story about pirates and seafarers. The salt-tang of the ocean lingers on Kara’s tongue, burning, but it’s all right because just a few paces away her father is cutting up pineapple for her to suck on. The sweet fruit will chase away the bitterness of the sea.
On the periphery of Kara’s memory are men with bellies like moons, fat and pale, playing a game of—volleyball? Pick-up pyramid? The image lies at the fraying edges of her recollection, fading in and out.
Above her, stars dazzle Caprica with splendid light. Even at this age, she knows she wants to be among them, flying and freefalling and catching herself at the last possible moment.
#
Kara wakes up alone—alone and frakking tired, forced out of the pleasant world of her dreamscape. She’ll worry about that memory later—painted so vividly in her sleep—and tuck the vision of her toddler self into the pocket of some forgotten pair of trousers.
Right now Kara’s only concern is the way that her stomach is churning and rolling, threatening upheaval. Nausea sits dully like a weight in her belly, but there’s nothing in her stomach to vomit up.
The cabin is empty save for Kara, and everything is eerily quiet. She finds herself missing the sound of her miniature family: Kacey arguing about what clothes she’s allowed to wear (no – Lee would say – you can’t wear a cape to school.), the kettle whistling as it comes to a boil, Lee bitching about a stain in his tie.
Gods, what’s happening to her? Kara’s turned into one of those women.
“Lee,” she calls, her voice raspy with sleep and disuse. She wonders if he’s taken Kacey to the outhouse, but judging by the light bursting brightly through the windows, it’s already late morning, at least ten-hundred hours. He must’ve taken Kacey to school hours ago, without waking Kara.
Thank the Lords of Kobol. Kara can barely sit up, let alone get a hyperactive Kacey fed and dressed.
Kara stretches, yawns, and pushes herself up, finding a note tucked under the mattress at the side of the bed.
Baby*,
Wanted to let you sleep in. You seemed so tired last night, and you barely stirred this morning when I tried to wake you up. I’ve let your CO know that you won’t be reporting for duty today—made up some excuse about you having shingles, which should give you a couple days off. Lying to authority, thought that’d make you proud of me. I’m taking Kacey to school and running into the office to work on a couple of expansion plans, but I’ll be back before noon. I was thinking, maybe we should go to the doctor about how you’ve been feeling the last few weeks, just to rule out anything serious? Dad and Laura offered to look after Kacey. I’m sure you’re fine, but you know how I get. If you call me a Nervous Nelly, I’m not making dinner tonight. No, not even if you do you-know-what.
L
Footnotes:
*Just something I’m trying out. How do you feel about it?
Kara smiles and lays the note next to the bed. If Lee has any interest in keeping his scrotum intact, he will never call her ‘baby’ again.
Once inside the cottage’s main room, she brushes her teeth over the water basin and stokes the fire. Then, pulling on several layers of sweaters, two pairs of long johns, wool socks, and her boots, Kara heads to the outhouse.
#
Lee fumbles through the folders on his desk—reports on local resources, construction projects, land allocation, food storage preparation, farming quotas. Several committees of people are in charge of overseeing the varying projects, but Lee takes it upon himself to scrutinize everything himself.
If humanity plans to survive on this new planet, they cannot cut corners. Thank gods for Demeter’s long summers with plentiful fruits and vegetables, many of which they were able to can for winter use. But sickness and malnutrition has already taken far too many lives, and winter food production levels remain ridiculously low.
But right now Lee can’t focus on the survival of the human race. He’s too concerned with the survival of his young family—if he can even call it that. He runs a hand through his hair, the waves slightly greasy. Getting Kacey ready for school had been a nightmare of epic proportions, and he hadn’t had time to wash himself properly.
The phone on his desk rings, and he sighs before picking up. “Lee Adama here,” he says, rubbing his forehead with his fingertips before letting his eyes fall shut.
“Yeah, Lee, it’s me.”
Kara.
“Is everything all right?” asks Lee.
Her voice wakes him up, puts him on edge. She never calls him here, never. He’s already standing, packing his brief case.
“Don’t worry or anything, but I think maybe you should come pick me up.”
“What is it, Kara?”
Lee gets his coat, his scarf, gloves.
“Nothing. Just what you said about me going to the doctor. Maybe we should do that sooner rather than later.”
His secretary enters his office, but Lee is already pushing past her, on his way to his transport.
The drive to their cabin is mostly off-road, but they’ve made the trip so many times that they’ve carved a path into the dirt and snow. Lee’s driving way too fast, sliding over patches of ice, but the trip is only a few miles, anyway. He’s pulling up to the cottage only twelve minutes after the initial call from Kara.
He turns off the engine and hops out, his coat unbuttoned, his hands bare. He’s in too anxious a state to notice the cutting cold, the way his face is numbing and his nose and ears are tingling.
“Kara!” he calls, slamming the door.
She’s sitting on the porch wrapped up in a blanket, a floppy hat pulled down over her ears.
“That…was fast,” she says, standing. He makes his way onto the porch.
“What’s wrong? Are you feeling all right? Are you hurt?”
Kara rolls her eyes. “Calm down. I’m all right. Just—”
“Just what, Kara?”
“I woke up feeling like shit, as usual these past few weeks. Anyway, I’m bleeding, so that’s why I called you,” she gets out, her words all blending together so that Lee can hardly understand. She digs her hands into the pocket of her coat, bows her head into the warmth of her scarf.
“Bleeding?” It’s a question, but he already knows the answer. “A lot?”
“More than a little,” says Kara. “I called Cottle’s. They said he could see me within the hour.”
“Let’s go then,” he says, feeling suddenly calm. He can do this. Lee is good in a crisis. He wraps his arm around Kara’s waist and walks with her down the steps of the porch. “You okay to walk?”
“Always,” says Kara.
Despite his worry, Lee smiles. He snuggles Kara closer to his body as they walk down the foot path to the transport.
“You scared?” Lee asks, shutting the door, jabbing the key into the ignition. He pumps up the heat and presses the gas, driving more carefully now that Kara is with him in the car.
She shrugs next to him, her eyes closed. “Mostly just tired.”
“Everything’s gonna be fine,” he says, trying to assure her.
“Yeah,” she says, but Lee can tell that she probably doesn’t believe him. “Some days I just wish I could catch a break.”
“I know,” he says, turning on the radio. There’s only one station, a broadcast of colonial government news. Updates. Progress reports. Occasional notes about the weather and traffic. Messages from officials. Vaccine alerts.
The voice on the radio drones on about disease casualties, reminding people that they’ve developed a vaccine for pox fever, a sickness to which humans have developed no immunity.
Kara, Lee, and Kacey had been among the first to receive the vaccine after the initial outbreak.
“Can you cut that off, please?” says Kara, but she’s jabbing the radio button harshly with her finger.
“Where are you in your cycle?” asks Lee because he know the practical question will calm Kara down.
“Um. The middle?”
Lee can’t bite back his smile, so he just goes with it. “Kara…”
“I don’t know. But everything’s been regular. I haven’t been late if that’s what you mean, a little spotty, but that’s not unusual. And oh my gods, Lee, what are we—a knitting circle? I feel like we’re both about to start chatting like those women in commercials they used to show back on Caprica. We’ll be drinking coffee and eating scones and suddenly talking about how great our respective contraceptive methods are. Topic change. Now.”
“You know Cottle is going to ask you all of this anyway.”
“Yeah, well, you’re not Cottle, and the last thing I want to talk about with you is where I am in my cycle, okay? We’re not in middle school, and you’re not my best friend Trina showing me how big her tits have grown in the last month.”
Lee lets it die, just glad for the light mood of their conversation. They’re both compensating—he knows that, but it still feels damn good.
“Hey, Lee?” Kara asks.
“What is it, Kara?”
“You think—you think whatever’s going on has to do with this summer? With what I did and everything that happened?”
Lee hesitates, focuses on navigating his way to the military hospital—a ship called the Chrysanthe that had been converted over the summer, updated with meds, equipment, generators.
“Honestly, Kara, I don’t know,” Lee says, “but it doesn’t matter. I’m here for you no matter what, and we’ll get through this together.”
“I guess,” says Kara.
They spend the rest of the ride in silence, enjoying the landscape of white snow, lavender sky, leafless trees.
“We’re here,” says Lee, noticing that Kara has nodded off, her head bumping up and down against the window.
He rests his hand on her thigh and squeeze in order to wake her. She stirs as the cars comes to a complete stop. “Thanks for letting me sleep.”
Due to the fact that Cottle still only sees military personnel, they don’t have to wait long to be seen. Lee flips through pages of reports as Kara rests her head against his shoulder.
“Kara? Kara Thrace?”
Lee and Kara stand as the nurse calls.
“Right here,” Kara says, raising a hand.
She walks forward, and Lee follows, feeling more ill at ease at the hospital and content to let Kara take the lead.
Lee holds Kara’s hand as they wait for Cottle. She’s already changed into a paper gown and is banging her heals rhythmically against the patient table.
“Very sexy,” Lee says, forcing a smile.
“I know, right?” says Kara.
It’s a joke, but Lee thinks the barely-there gown isn’t a bad look on Kara at all. Flimsy and short and open in the back.
Cottle walks in after the nurse has left, brows furrowed.
“So Doc, what’s wrong with me?” Kara says.
“Not sure you’re gonna want to hear this, Starbuck,” he says.
Immediately, Lee’s worried. Cottle’s usually brash and blunt, giving diagnoses straight.
“What is it?” Lee asks, his body stiffening and straightening.
“Kara you’re pregnant.”
“No, she’s not,” says Lee, because she can’t be—can’t be.
“I thought so,” says Kara, turning from the doctor to Lee. She’s trying to read his face. She bites the side of her lower lip, inhales a deep breath.
“You thought you might be? You thought you might be and you didn’t tell me?”
“Yeah—I mean no. I didn’t think I actually was. It was, just a feeling, or not even that. An inkling. Been having these really weird dreams lately.” Kara turns from Lee back to the doctor. “Cottle, how is this even possible? I’m not—it’s not like I’ve been late or anything.”
“It’s normal for there to be a little bleeding—probably just got mixed up.”
“How far along? I’ve been having what I guess is morning sickness for quite a while now. Over a month.”
“Gods, your fertile,” says Lee. He hasn’t been listening to the conversation between the two of them, too full of thanks (that Kara isn’t ill), too in shock. In one moment—just a few little words, his world has been irrevocably changed.
Or not irrevocably. What if Kara doesn’t want to go through with it?
Doctor Cottle smirks but continues on with the appointment. “I’m going to do an ultrasound, Kara, and only after that will I be able to answer your questions. Might be too early to pick up the heartbeat or to really see anything, but I want to get a good look before I do the vaginal exam. The amount of bleeding today worries me, and the trauma to your uterus this past summer means this is a bit high risk. You understand?”
“I understand,” says Kara.
“Is she—is the baby, is everything going to be all right?” asks Lee.
“That’s what we’re going to find out,” says Cottle.
The ultrasound technician comes almost an hour later. The hospital, serving all that remains of the twelve colonies, is painfully short on supplies and equipment.
“You okay, Kara?” Lee asks.
She turns to him, not meeting his eyes, nodding her head. “I just hope nothing’s frakked up.”
“What do you want to do?” he asks, the words out of his mouth before he can stop himself.
“Can’t we wait to make sure the damn thing’s even okay before you start interrogating me?” she says. Her hands fist the bottom hem of her gown, her knuckles white.
“Look, I’m sorry,” she goes on. “This is just…unexpected.”
“Oh, is it? I thought you ‘had a feeling,’” says Lee, air quotes and all.
“Don’t be a dick, Lee,” she says, rolling her eyes.
“How did this even happen? You’re up to date on everything, right? On your shots, I mean?”
“I am now, but think back to Autumn. Remember?”
Yes, Lee remembers—the first time they frakked after what had been the longest few month of his life, the night Karl and Sharon had taken Kacey and they had the cabin to themselves for once.
“That would make you…” and Lee does the math quickly in his head, “nearly three months long. Er, Caprican months. Not Demeter months. You’re not showing at all.”
The door opens, and a woman with dark hair and skin enters. “Sorry about the wait,” she says, smiling warmly.
Lee’s hand is placed firmly around Kara’s as the doctor rubs thick, cold jelly on her flat belly. She has gained weight—Lee can tell now under the harsh light of the room. But there’s no bump, definitely no bump. Just a little more softness where usually there’s hardness.
“There we go,” says the technician, pointing out a—blob.
“What?” he asks.
“Your baby. I’m going to call in the doctor, all right? And would you like to know the sex?”
“The sex?” says Kara, staring intently at the screen. Lee can’t quite get a handle on her expression. Hasn’t seen her make this face before. “You already know?”
The technician nods. “If I had to guess I’d say you’re twelve standard weeks along. Maybe more.”
“Why isn’t she showing at all then?” Lee asks, worried. “Is there something wrong with her? With it?”
“Everything looks good here, but let me get Cottle, okay?”
“Hey,” says Kara, as the technician is leaving the room.
“Yes?”
“What is it?” she asks. “The baby, I mean. Boy or girl?”
The woman smiles. “A boy.”
#
“So I think we should keep it,” says Kara randomly at dinner. They’ve been avoiding the pregnancy altogether, sticking to safe topics—work and books. Kacey is staying with Bill and Laura, and Lee and Kara are eating chicken and dumplings by the fire. “I mean I want to keep it. I think.”
“Yeah?”
“That—that okay with you?”
“Fine with me, yeah,” says Lee, even though fine seems like the least appropriate word to describe how he’s feeling—frightened and excited and ecstatic and nauseous and guilty and nervous and skeptical.
“Just don’t expect me to glow, all right?” Kara says. “Or sparkle. Or whatever it is pregnant ladies do.”
“Sparkle, Kara? It’s not like you’re a pregnant vampire.”
#
They tell no one except for Bill, Laura, and Kacey, but people catch on around the six month mark. Kara’s barely showing, but she has stopped working, her doctor having ordered it because of the high risk associated with the pregnancy.
When people confront her, she’s honest with them—tells them she’s having a boy, that no, she and Lee are not getting married, that Kacey is handling it fine, that they’re adding a room onto the cabin but it’s slow going in the cold.
Kara’s tired all of the time. The frequent trips for ultrasounds don’t help, but the obgyn insists with the high risk of the pregnancy. “Now more than ever do healthy babies matter,” the woman says. Kara just rolls her eyes, as if, A) babies haven’t always been important, and B) babies are some sort of key to human survival. Not when hypothermia has already killed off 5% of the population this winter alone. The only things that will guarantee humanity’s perpetuation are shelter, food, water, and soap.
Kara prefers Cottle, but he had insisted she switch to a specialist.
Today is one of the rare days that she has nothing to do. She’s caught up on the paperwork that she insists on doing despite being on leave. No trips in the city. No errands to run.
She sits in a rocking chair, sketching out some ideas she has for paintings while Lee works on the added room to the cabin. He’s padding the walls with old sweaters and blankets they got from the market to use as insulation.
“Sure I can’t help?” Kara asks.
“You’re supposed to be on bed rest, Kara. You already do way too much.”
“It’s not like stuffing some wool into a wall is going to make me explode,” she says, pouting. “Although I almost wish it would. Might spice things up. Being pregnant is boring, and everything hurts. Can’t we just skip ahead to the part where I pop this thing out?”
“No premature popping, Kara,” Lee says.
“Have you given any more thought to names?” asks Kara, folding her sketchbook shut.
Lee shrugs and continues working. “I don’t know. Like I said, you choose, but I get veto power.”
“What do you think of the name ‘Gaius’?” she asks, triad face intact.
“I hate you,” says Lee, throwing a stray blanket in her direction until it lands flopping over her head.
“So that’s a veto then?” she asks. Instead of removing the blanket completely, she takes it and wraps it around herself.
“I’d say so.”
“Thoughts on ‘William’?” she asks more seriously.
“Meh. You know how I feel about the whole legacy thing.”
“Right. Hmm, Jules?”
“Nah.”
“Leander?”
“Can’t take the risk that it’ll get shortened to ‘Ander,’” he says.
“Cole?” she continues.
“I could live with that.”
“Zephyrus?”
“A bit much.”
“Even if we called him Zeph?”
“I don’t totally hate it,” says Lee. “But Cole is better.”
“Eli?”
Lee sighs and walks over to Kara. “What names do you like? Really, I’ll be fine as long as we don’t name him something like ‘Donut’ or ‘Mr. Silly Pants’.”
“Mr. Silly Pants, Lee? Is there…is there a story behind that?”
“Kara, I’m just saying—”
“Yeah, yeah, I know. I’ve just never had to name anything before. I don’t want him to be stuck with something foul. Or what if I pick something and it doesn’t suit him? We can’t name him Gideon if it turns out he’s a pacifist or something—gods forbid—and how can you tell whether or not an infant is a pacifist? I don’t know—I’m tempted to just name him the first thing that pops into my head when I see him.”
“Then do that, Kara,” he says. “And wait—why would it be such a bad thing if he were a pacifist? Whatever. Doesn’t matter. The point is that no matter what, he’ll be a beautiful, wild, terror of a child. He’ll be ours. Name him anything you want.”
“So then Gaius is okay?” asks Kara, this time sticking her tongue out.
“Frak you, Kara,” he says, smiling.
“Ooo, ‘frak’! We could name him ‘Frak.’” She reaches up and pulls Lee toward her, bends her head forward so that her head is nuzzled into his stomach. He braces his hands on her shoulders. “Mmmm, ‘frak.’ Yeah, that’s the best idea I’ve had all day. What do you say, Lee?”
“With Kacey only a few meters away in the other room?”
“She’s napping. We’ll be quiet.”
“You are not good at being quiet.”
“Well, then how about we focus on you?” she asks, toying with the buttons of his trousers. She lifts his shirt and runs her tongue down the flesh of his belly, from navel to waistline, and revels in the sound of Lee’s answering sigh.
#
Lee knows this is not a great time to be doing—whatever the frak it is they’re about to do. There are a million and one things he has to finish before the baby is born—gods, the baby—his baby—their baby—what the frak? How is this even happening? Ultrasounds, construction, baby names, just—oh gods, but now Kara is unbuttoning his trousers, and who gives a frak about the rest of the universe?
“Step back a little, Lee,” Kara says. She slides from the chair down to the floor, dropping to her knees.
Her eyes look up to meet his, drawing him in. She licks her lips, and Lee knows she’s doing it intentionally just to excite him. It’s working. His cock hardens, straining against his fly.
She’s moving painfully slow. One button. Pause. Another button. Pause. When his trousers are finally lose, she stops. She’s kneeling before him, staring at his brief-confined cock.
Then her mouth is on him through the fabric, and it’s the perfect amount of pressure. The heat of her tongue feels so good. “Kara, please,” he says, he moves to pull down his underwear.
He expects her to bat his hands away but she doesn’t. She wants this as much as he does, and he can feel her breath hot against him as he lets his cock spring free.
She slides her tongue from the base down to the tip, flicking her tongue near the head in just the right spot before swallowing him. Her eyes are on his as she’s sucking him off, her head moving up and down.
He tangles his hands into her long hair, forcing her closer, to take him a little deeper. She doesn’t struggle against him, takes every inch of him willingly.
The urge to thrust himself into her, to frak her face, takes over, and he finds himself moving back and forth. Her tongue and mouth are hot and wet, perfect. Everything feels so good, his body under compulsion to just frak and frak, to get there. He closes his eyes, and he’s already so frakking close. He calls up a million different images, reliving one night several months ago—Kara pressed up against the wall, against the floor, the bed, whatever. Her touching herself as he strokes his cock, watching her get off. Coming on her face.
And because part of Lee is a sadist, he’d wiped the come off her cheeks and lips with his boxers and rubbed Kara off with the newly wet fabric, rolling circles around her clit until she tugged him close, begged him for more, finally giving herself over to orgasm.
And then licking her off while everything was still so painfully sensitive.
“Stay with me, Lee,” Kara says, her voice almost hoarse it’s so deep and raspy. Then her mouth is already on his cock again, bobbing up and down.
“Don’t stop, Kara, I’m so frakking close.”
Frak, frak, frak.
Everything disappears as the sensation floods him. He’s letting himself go in her mouth, shooting his come into her mouth.
“Gods, Kara,” he says.
She smiles at him as she wipes the corners of her mouth with the back of her hands. Lee is still trying to catch his breath.
#
It isn’t a surprise when the baby comes early by nearly four weeks. Kara had refused to take the hormones the doctor recommended to help her carry the child to term. Lee had begged her to reconsider, but Kara had insisted that that kind of intervention would be too much of an invasion, and she didn’t want it.
Lee gets the call while he’s in a meeting, that Kara’s contractions had started almost an hour ago.
“Why am I only just finding out?” he asks his secretary, putting on a jacket, rushing outside to his transport. Thank gods she’d been at the Agathons when this happened.
“Apparently they weren’t sure this was the real deal until her water broke.”
Lee doesn’t really catch what she’s saying, though. He’s already out the door, headed to the hospital.
By the time he arrives, they’re preparing Kara for a caesarean.
Kara names him Leland.
“We’ll just call him LJ,” she says, “for Leland Jr.”
“Can I use my veto power?” Lee asks.
“Nope,” says Kara. “And his middle name is William. Get over it.”
Obviously, the boy is the most beautiful thing in the universe. A head full of white blonde hair. Dark red lips. The loudest, fiercest, most obnoxious cries that Lee has ever heard.
#
Kara dozes in and out as people pass around LJ—her son, her godsdamn son. Everyone coos over him like he’s the gods’ gift to man. Maybe he is. Sure feels like he is, except when he’s biting and tearing at her nipple because he hasn’t quite gotten the hang of it yet.
Kacey is napping in Bill’s arms. Lee watches Karl as he holds Leland.
This is her family. This is the best part.
End. For real this time.
Also, your thoughtful feedback is so very cherished.
Author: letterstonorah
Pairings: Kara/Lee
Word Count: 6500
Rating: NC17
Warnings: the c-word, smutty smut, the p-word (not the one that rhymes with wussy, the other one)
Author's Note: You guys. Getting this chapter to you has been an epic battle of the wills. The Universe vs. Me. I won, obvi. Let's see. So I wrote this chapter quite a while ago and hated it so didn't feel comfortable posting it. I finally decided to work on it some more...added about 3000 words....then oh, my computer randomly shut down, and after I booted it back up the fic was GONE. FUCKING GONE. Like, nowhere. I was so bereft that I threw my laptop against the wall. Yes, really. So then I irrevocably damaged my computer screen, and all I could see were swirly colors of death and sadness. The warranty didn't cover hardware malfunctions. Blah blah blah. Shit was looking bad. Then I went to this hole-in-the-wall-pretty-sure-I-saw-a-rat-scurrying-across-the floor, and they were like, "Well. We've actually got the screen you need right here. It'll take us fifteen minutes to replace yours. And uh, it's also ridiculously cheap." So I was like, "Hell yeah!" It did set me back $150 -- $150 I soooooooo did not have, but it was my fault for being a drama queen. Note to self: when you throw things hard against the wall, they break. Kay. Got it. Well, after much searching and prodding and poking, I finally *did* find the fic. Yay for recovery! It was buried in a hidden app data file. Where unsaved documents go to die. I still had a lot of work to do on it...But at least I didn't have to start from scratch.
I have to say sorry for this chapter. For so many reasons. I would especially like to extend an apology to
wicked_sassy. Because this is meh. Just, I've done it, and now I can't take it back -- but you guys don't deserve to be left hanging, so here it is. I hope it's somewhat satisfying despite itself. I love reading your comments. If you read, please take a moment to let me know :o)
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Before
Karl comes by at around nineteen-hundred hours to pick up Kacey—finally, frakking finally. He chatters on for much too long about the cooling weather and the Memorial that the settlers are building in Demeter City, completely oblivious to Kara’s tapping foot, to the way she hasn’t offered him a drink or a seat.
Lee cuts to the chase. “You should probably get going. It’s late, and the Commander needs to get to bed,” he says, planting a kiss on the top of Kacey’s head. She has dozed off in his arms, her head bobbing up and down on his shoulder.
She’s been very clingy these last few months, and she has yet to spend a night away from home since Kara and she have moved back into the cabin. Kara smiles at the sight of her so close to Lee, her legs wrapped around his middle, her curls obscuring half his face, her hands around his neck.
The little girl doesn’t want to let go, and it’s a sentiment with which Kara is intimately familiar. Kacey already understands that any moment her entire world can disappear just like that. At only five years of age, she’s experienced enough major loss to learn how not to get too attached to things.
“Yeah, she’s zonked,” Kara says, agreeing with Lee. “Should get her back to your place.” She stands and starts to hurry Karl toward the door.
“Ohhh, is that how it’s going to be?” Karl asks, smiling despite the chiding tone in his voice. “I get it.”
“Took you long enough there, Karl,” Kara says, and she’s too old and too experienced and has been through way too much to be blushing at Kara’s insinuation, but she is. This will be the first time in a few months that she’s gotten to be alone with Lee, and gods, all she wants Karl to do is get the frak out and take Kacey with her.
Her daughter wakes up while Lee is transferring her to Karl’s arms. She yawns and blinks as she wiggles around to make herself comfortable, lets her legs rest around her uncle’s hips.
Kara walks up to her and kisses her no less than ten times on each of her cheeks before saying good bye. “Promise to go easy on them okay?” she says.
Kacey doesn’t say anything, just hides her face in her Uncle’s Karl shoulders and nods back off to sleep.
“That so does not bode well for you,” says Lee.
Karl shrugs, “I’m used to difficult women.”
“Good night,” says Kara, opening the door, practically shoving her friend outside.
“Have fun, you two,” he says, slinging Kacey’s overnight bag over his shoulder as he balances her in the other.
The door slams shut, and Kara leans back against it, closing her eyes. “Thank gods,” she says.
“I seriously thought he was never going to leave. When he started talking about designs for the memorial park? Gods, I had to cut that short.”
“Cut it short, you did,” Kara says. “I admired your forwardness.” She mocks his voice as she continues on, “You should get going. I thought for a minute there you were going to punch him.”
“Oh, I was,” says Lee. “I really, really was.”
“So, what now?” asks Kara, smiling. Though Lee’s hair is cropped as short as it was in his military days, a dark layer of stubble covers his face and neck, making him look uncharacteristically rugged. He’s wearing a t-shirt and a pair of jeans.
“I don’t know,” Lee says, his eyes on her. He walks toward her slowly, close enough that she can feel the heat radiating off him, smell him, see the flecks of gray in his blue eyes. “Maybe play some cards? How’s that sound?”
“Like the worst idea I’ve ever heard,” she says.
“Oh?”
“Yeah, pretty much,” says Kara, folding the left side of her bottom lip into her mouth, sucking on the tender flesh as she assesses Lee. “Anything else you think we should do?”
He shrugs. “I don’t know what we should do, but I know what I intend to do.”
“Oh, and what’s that?”
“I think you know what I’ve got in mind,” he says, his voice dropping to little more than a growl as he closes the distance between them even more. His smell, salty and woody and clean, warms her up, makes her feel nostalgic for his touch.
“I want you say it,” she says.
Lee places each of his hands on the wall behind Kara, surrounding her, leaning over her. It’s a good thing that she’s already leaning against the door for support. The smell and the feel and the sight of him is frakking with her, making it so that she can’t stand or think or do anything properly.
“What’s that, Kara?” he asks. “You want me to say it? Say how I want to frak you right now against this wall hard enough so that we break down this piece of shit cabin? Make you scream so loud Karl and Sharon can hear from frakking two miles away? Is that what you want to hear? Or about how before tonight is over I’m going to have you sit on the table, legs spread, thighs wet, so I can tongue your cunt, lick your clit? That what you want to hear, Kara?”
He draws a hand along her cheek, down to her neck, collarbone. The very tip of his fingers slip beneath her shirt, grazing her skin so softly Kara’s not even sure he’s actually touching her.
Kara thinks he’s about to keep going, but she’s got her fingers tangled in the fabric of his shirt, yanking him closer, forcing their lips together. He parts his mouth and slips his tongue into hers, and everything is suddenly hot and wet and pulsing and needy.
She’s got one leg hooked around him all-frakking-ready, and gods, he’s so hard against her, his cock pressing into her thigh and pushing up at the apex of her legs.
She grabs his chest, shoulders, back, ass--whatever part of him she can touch and claim and mark. Her hands slip under the t-shirt so that she can feel his hot skin, curve her fingers around the long lines of muscles.
She sags a little against the wall then grabs the fabric of his shirt to pull him closer, forcing their lips to meet. Lee’s tongue slips between her lips, and they’re kissing frantically. The feel of his lips against hers, of his mouth wet and hot, makes the need in her body grow. Kara grabs his chest, shoulders, back, ass—whatever part of him she can touch and claim and mark. Everything is buzzing and tingling like a million nerve endings coming to life all at once.
Kara’s an animal – the way she’s scratching at him, the way she’s moving herself against him all-frakking-ready. She rides her hips along his thigh, adjusts herself just so. She’s breathy and mad and gasping.
Lee is unbuttoning her trousers, pulling them down along with her panties. “Table?” he asks, pulling her off the wall.
Kara’s too busy feeling the skin underneath his shirt, the building sensation between her legs, the heat rushing to her cheeks.
They slam back against the—something. Table? Counter? Couch? All she knows for sure that she’s surrounded by the bends and edges of Lee’s body. Sculpted arms holding her tight, abs that tighten as he lowers himself. He’s suddenly on top of her, unbuckling his trousers, moving his lips away from her hers and down to her neck.
His tongue on Kara’s skin feels hot and wet, and the world around her disappears, blurring out. He reaches under her and grabs her bare ass, pulling her up, and uses his free hand to caress her inner thigh. She’s wriggling toward his hand, desperate for contact, but he refuses to stop teasing. His fingers graze just centimeters away from her cunt.
Kara does not do well with being teased. She grabs Lee hard and pulls him down, quickly enough so that he won’t expect it. “Touch me,” she says, but she isn’t begging. She’s telling him, and there’s a threat in her voice. “Now, Lee.” She presses her hips up into his hand, and he finally stops denying her.
Kara moans as she feels his fingers sliding up her cunt before settling there—right there—not quite inside her, not quite outside her, his knuckles widening her. His thumb rolls circles around her clit as his fingers work gently at her entrance.
“Need to feel all of you, Kara,” he says. They’ve been together enough times that she knows he wants her to remove her shirt, her bra—shuck her trousers and panties off her ankles and onto the floor.
She whips off her clothing quickly, and he does the same, both of them desperate to be touching again.
Lee’s naked body is the most beautiful thing she’s ever seen. He is perfectly put together. His body flushes hot and warm against her, and she revels in the hardness of his cock against her leg, sliding along the wetness between her thighs, seeking friction. He returns his fingers to her cunt (thank gods) and she’s raking herself against him.
“Come on,” she says, and her voice is all raspy and broken as the throbbing between her legs causes her to lose most coherent thought.
“You look so beautiful, Kara,” he says, and she is pretty sure Lee’s gone crazy. She feels her body sweating, her hair disheveling. She’s clinging to him, grinding against him. This isn’t cute. This isn’t beautiful. “I almost tackled Karl to get him to leave. I wake up in the morning and all I want to do frak you. At breakfast. At lunch. All frakking day at work.”
“Just don’t stop rubbing,” is all Kara says.
“I’m not,” he says, “You look too frakking good. Even when you’ve had enough, when you’re satisfied, I’m going to keep going. You’ll beg me to let you take a break, but I’ll make you come again and gain ‘til your body can’t take it anymore.”
Lee reaches one finger slowly insider her, then another. “More,” she says, aching to feel increased pressure. She starts frakking his fingers as she’s biting and licking his neck, rubbing her hands along his back, his ass.
It’s not enough. It’s too much. It’s perfect. She’s torn between wanting it to last forever and wanting to feel him inside of her now.
She is starving for his touch, wants to feel him all over, everywhere. Kara pulls Lee’s head down, pressing her lips against his before opening her mouth and letting her tongue find his.
As he kisses her, Lee finally begins to lose it. Kara knows that he’s barely maintaining control. His breaths become heavier, more staggered. He moves his hips so that his cock rubs against her leg.
“Kara,” he says, his voice thick and low. Lee moves himself up higher against her, then he’s rubbing his cock back and forth over her center, the head of his cock touching her clit with each stroke, his dick as close to her as can be without being inside of her. She can barely breathe now, certainly can’t think. “Lee,” she says, but she doesn’t know why. She just needed to say something, to let him know how perfect and intense this is. Kara begins to move her hips in rhythm with Lee’s strokes – and surely there can’t be anything in the world better than this?
She moves up against him, biting his shoulder, enjoying the sound of his heavy breathing and low moans.
“Gods you feel so frakking good,” Lee says. “Can’t wait to be inside of you.”
Kara grinds against him faster, and Lee takes the hint, reaching down to grab his cock and angle himself to slide into her.
“Now,” Kara begs, but he’s moving achingly so, staring at her reverently.
Then just like that he’s inside of her, hard and brutal, frakking her just how she likes it.
Kara’s already so close that he’s only inside of her for a few seconds before she’s letting go, her cunt clenching over his cock.
“Yes, yes, come for me, Kara,” Lee says, his voice a moaning drawl.
He’s right there with her, his body jerking into her spastically as he comes.
“Love you,” Lee says.
“Love you,” says Kara.
Now
Kara dreams of her first memory: two years old, her feet submerged in sand the color of ashes. A castle disintegrating under the force of a rising tide. Seagulls munching on hotdog buns just meters away.
Her mother cradles her towel-cocooned body, whispering a story about pirates and seafarers. The salt-tang of the ocean lingers on Kara’s tongue, burning, but it’s all right because just a few paces away her father is cutting up pineapple for her to suck on. The sweet fruit will chase away the bitterness of the sea.
On the periphery of Kara’s memory are men with bellies like moons, fat and pale, playing a game of—volleyball? Pick-up pyramid? The image lies at the fraying edges of her recollection, fading in and out.
Above her, stars dazzle Caprica with splendid light. Even at this age, she knows she wants to be among them, flying and freefalling and catching herself at the last possible moment.
#
Kara wakes up alone—alone and frakking tired, forced out of the pleasant world of her dreamscape. She’ll worry about that memory later—painted so vividly in her sleep—and tuck the vision of her toddler self into the pocket of some forgotten pair of trousers.
Right now Kara’s only concern is the way that her stomach is churning and rolling, threatening upheaval. Nausea sits dully like a weight in her belly, but there’s nothing in her stomach to vomit up.
The cabin is empty save for Kara, and everything is eerily quiet. She finds herself missing the sound of her miniature family: Kacey arguing about what clothes she’s allowed to wear (no – Lee would say – you can’t wear a cape to school.), the kettle whistling as it comes to a boil, Lee bitching about a stain in his tie.
Gods, what’s happening to her? Kara’s turned into one of those women.
“Lee,” she calls, her voice raspy with sleep and disuse. She wonders if he’s taken Kacey to the outhouse, but judging by the light bursting brightly through the windows, it’s already late morning, at least ten-hundred hours. He must’ve taken Kacey to school hours ago, without waking Kara.
Thank the Lords of Kobol. Kara can barely sit up, let alone get a hyperactive Kacey fed and dressed.
Kara stretches, yawns, and pushes herself up, finding a note tucked under the mattress at the side of the bed.
Baby*,
Wanted to let you sleep in. You seemed so tired last night, and you barely stirred this morning when I tried to wake you up. I’ve let your CO know that you won’t be reporting for duty today—made up some excuse about you having shingles, which should give you a couple days off. Lying to authority, thought that’d make you proud of me. I’m taking Kacey to school and running into the office to work on a couple of expansion plans, but I’ll be back before noon. I was thinking, maybe we should go to the doctor about how you’ve been feeling the last few weeks, just to rule out anything serious? Dad and Laura offered to look after Kacey. I’m sure you’re fine, but you know how I get. If you call me a Nervous Nelly, I’m not making dinner tonight. No, not even if you do you-know-what.
L
Footnotes:
*Just something I’m trying out. How do you feel about it?
Kara smiles and lays the note next to the bed. If Lee has any interest in keeping his scrotum intact, he will never call her ‘baby’ again.
Once inside the cottage’s main room, she brushes her teeth over the water basin and stokes the fire. Then, pulling on several layers of sweaters, two pairs of long johns, wool socks, and her boots, Kara heads to the outhouse.
#
Lee fumbles through the folders on his desk—reports on local resources, construction projects, land allocation, food storage preparation, farming quotas. Several committees of people are in charge of overseeing the varying projects, but Lee takes it upon himself to scrutinize everything himself.
If humanity plans to survive on this new planet, they cannot cut corners. Thank gods for Demeter’s long summers with plentiful fruits and vegetables, many of which they were able to can for winter use. But sickness and malnutrition has already taken far too many lives, and winter food production levels remain ridiculously low.
But right now Lee can’t focus on the survival of the human race. He’s too concerned with the survival of his young family—if he can even call it that. He runs a hand through his hair, the waves slightly greasy. Getting Kacey ready for school had been a nightmare of epic proportions, and he hadn’t had time to wash himself properly.
The phone on his desk rings, and he sighs before picking up. “Lee Adama here,” he says, rubbing his forehead with his fingertips before letting his eyes fall shut.
“Yeah, Lee, it’s me.”
Kara.
“Is everything all right?” asks Lee.
Her voice wakes him up, puts him on edge. She never calls him here, never. He’s already standing, packing his brief case.
“Don’t worry or anything, but I think maybe you should come pick me up.”
“What is it, Kara?”
Lee gets his coat, his scarf, gloves.
“Nothing. Just what you said about me going to the doctor. Maybe we should do that sooner rather than later.”
His secretary enters his office, but Lee is already pushing past her, on his way to his transport.
The drive to their cabin is mostly off-road, but they’ve made the trip so many times that they’ve carved a path into the dirt and snow. Lee’s driving way too fast, sliding over patches of ice, but the trip is only a few miles, anyway. He’s pulling up to the cottage only twelve minutes after the initial call from Kara.
He turns off the engine and hops out, his coat unbuttoned, his hands bare. He’s in too anxious a state to notice the cutting cold, the way his face is numbing and his nose and ears are tingling.
“Kara!” he calls, slamming the door.
She’s sitting on the porch wrapped up in a blanket, a floppy hat pulled down over her ears.
“That…was fast,” she says, standing. He makes his way onto the porch.
“What’s wrong? Are you feeling all right? Are you hurt?”
Kara rolls her eyes. “Calm down. I’m all right. Just—”
“Just what, Kara?”
“I woke up feeling like shit, as usual these past few weeks. Anyway, I’m bleeding, so that’s why I called you,” she gets out, her words all blending together so that Lee can hardly understand. She digs her hands into the pocket of her coat, bows her head into the warmth of her scarf.
“Bleeding?” It’s a question, but he already knows the answer. “A lot?”
“More than a little,” says Kara. “I called Cottle’s. They said he could see me within the hour.”
“Let’s go then,” he says, feeling suddenly calm. He can do this. Lee is good in a crisis. He wraps his arm around Kara’s waist and walks with her down the steps of the porch. “You okay to walk?”
“Always,” says Kara.
Despite his worry, Lee smiles. He snuggles Kara closer to his body as they walk down the foot path to the transport.
“You scared?” Lee asks, shutting the door, jabbing the key into the ignition. He pumps up the heat and presses the gas, driving more carefully now that Kara is with him in the car.
She shrugs next to him, her eyes closed. “Mostly just tired.”
“Everything’s gonna be fine,” he says, trying to assure her.
“Yeah,” she says, but Lee can tell that she probably doesn’t believe him. “Some days I just wish I could catch a break.”
“I know,” he says, turning on the radio. There’s only one station, a broadcast of colonial government news. Updates. Progress reports. Occasional notes about the weather and traffic. Messages from officials. Vaccine alerts.
The voice on the radio drones on about disease casualties, reminding people that they’ve developed a vaccine for pox fever, a sickness to which humans have developed no immunity.
Kara, Lee, and Kacey had been among the first to receive the vaccine after the initial outbreak.
“Can you cut that off, please?” says Kara, but she’s jabbing the radio button harshly with her finger.
“Where are you in your cycle?” asks Lee because he know the practical question will calm Kara down.
“Um. The middle?”
Lee can’t bite back his smile, so he just goes with it. “Kara…”
“I don’t know. But everything’s been regular. I haven’t been late if that’s what you mean, a little spotty, but that’s not unusual. And oh my gods, Lee, what are we—a knitting circle? I feel like we’re both about to start chatting like those women in commercials they used to show back on Caprica. We’ll be drinking coffee and eating scones and suddenly talking about how great our respective contraceptive methods are. Topic change. Now.”
“You know Cottle is going to ask you all of this anyway.”
“Yeah, well, you’re not Cottle, and the last thing I want to talk about with you is where I am in my cycle, okay? We’re not in middle school, and you’re not my best friend Trina showing me how big her tits have grown in the last month.”
Lee lets it die, just glad for the light mood of their conversation. They’re both compensating—he knows that, but it still feels damn good.
“Hey, Lee?” Kara asks.
“What is it, Kara?”
“You think—you think whatever’s going on has to do with this summer? With what I did and everything that happened?”
Lee hesitates, focuses on navigating his way to the military hospital—a ship called the Chrysanthe that had been converted over the summer, updated with meds, equipment, generators.
“Honestly, Kara, I don’t know,” Lee says, “but it doesn’t matter. I’m here for you no matter what, and we’ll get through this together.”
“I guess,” says Kara.
They spend the rest of the ride in silence, enjoying the landscape of white snow, lavender sky, leafless trees.
“We’re here,” says Lee, noticing that Kara has nodded off, her head bumping up and down against the window.
He rests his hand on her thigh and squeeze in order to wake her. She stirs as the cars comes to a complete stop. “Thanks for letting me sleep.”
Due to the fact that Cottle still only sees military personnel, they don’t have to wait long to be seen. Lee flips through pages of reports as Kara rests her head against his shoulder.
“Kara? Kara Thrace?”
Lee and Kara stand as the nurse calls.
“Right here,” Kara says, raising a hand.
She walks forward, and Lee follows, feeling more ill at ease at the hospital and content to let Kara take the lead.
Lee holds Kara’s hand as they wait for Cottle. She’s already changed into a paper gown and is banging her heals rhythmically against the patient table.
“Very sexy,” Lee says, forcing a smile.
“I know, right?” says Kara.
It’s a joke, but Lee thinks the barely-there gown isn’t a bad look on Kara at all. Flimsy and short and open in the back.
Cottle walks in after the nurse has left, brows furrowed.
“So Doc, what’s wrong with me?” Kara says.
“Not sure you’re gonna want to hear this, Starbuck,” he says.
Immediately, Lee’s worried. Cottle’s usually brash and blunt, giving diagnoses straight.
“What is it?” Lee asks, his body stiffening and straightening.
“Kara you’re pregnant.”
“No, she’s not,” says Lee, because she can’t be—can’t be.
“I thought so,” says Kara, turning from the doctor to Lee. She’s trying to read his face. She bites the side of her lower lip, inhales a deep breath.
“You thought you might be? You thought you might be and you didn’t tell me?”
“Yeah—I mean no. I didn’t think I actually was. It was, just a feeling, or not even that. An inkling. Been having these really weird dreams lately.” Kara turns from Lee back to the doctor. “Cottle, how is this even possible? I’m not—it’s not like I’ve been late or anything.”
“It’s normal for there to be a little bleeding—probably just got mixed up.”
“How far along? I’ve been having what I guess is morning sickness for quite a while now. Over a month.”
“Gods, your fertile,” says Lee. He hasn’t been listening to the conversation between the two of them, too full of thanks (that Kara isn’t ill), too in shock. In one moment—just a few little words, his world has been irrevocably changed.
Or not irrevocably. What if Kara doesn’t want to go through with it?
Doctor Cottle smirks but continues on with the appointment. “I’m going to do an ultrasound, Kara, and only after that will I be able to answer your questions. Might be too early to pick up the heartbeat or to really see anything, but I want to get a good look before I do the vaginal exam. The amount of bleeding today worries me, and the trauma to your uterus this past summer means this is a bit high risk. You understand?”
“I understand,” says Kara.
“Is she—is the baby, is everything going to be all right?” asks Lee.
“That’s what we’re going to find out,” says Cottle.
The ultrasound technician comes almost an hour later. The hospital, serving all that remains of the twelve colonies, is painfully short on supplies and equipment.
“You okay, Kara?” Lee asks.
She turns to him, not meeting his eyes, nodding her head. “I just hope nothing’s frakked up.”
“What do you want to do?” he asks, the words out of his mouth before he can stop himself.
“Can’t we wait to make sure the damn thing’s even okay before you start interrogating me?” she says. Her hands fist the bottom hem of her gown, her knuckles white.
“Look, I’m sorry,” she goes on. “This is just…unexpected.”
“Oh, is it? I thought you ‘had a feeling,’” says Lee, air quotes and all.
“Don’t be a dick, Lee,” she says, rolling her eyes.
“How did this even happen? You’re up to date on everything, right? On your shots, I mean?”
“I am now, but think back to Autumn. Remember?”
Yes, Lee remembers—the first time they frakked after what had been the longest few month of his life, the night Karl and Sharon had taken Kacey and they had the cabin to themselves for once.
“That would make you…” and Lee does the math quickly in his head, “nearly three months long. Er, Caprican months. Not Demeter months. You’re not showing at all.”
The door opens, and a woman with dark hair and skin enters. “Sorry about the wait,” she says, smiling warmly.
Lee’s hand is placed firmly around Kara’s as the doctor rubs thick, cold jelly on her flat belly. She has gained weight—Lee can tell now under the harsh light of the room. But there’s no bump, definitely no bump. Just a little more softness where usually there’s hardness.
“There we go,” says the technician, pointing out a—blob.
“What?” he asks.
“Your baby. I’m going to call in the doctor, all right? And would you like to know the sex?”
“The sex?” says Kara, staring intently at the screen. Lee can’t quite get a handle on her expression. Hasn’t seen her make this face before. “You already know?”
The technician nods. “If I had to guess I’d say you’re twelve standard weeks along. Maybe more.”
“Why isn’t she showing at all then?” Lee asks, worried. “Is there something wrong with her? With it?”
“Everything looks good here, but let me get Cottle, okay?”
“Hey,” says Kara, as the technician is leaving the room.
“Yes?”
“What is it?” she asks. “The baby, I mean. Boy or girl?”
The woman smiles. “A boy.”
#
“So I think we should keep it,” says Kara randomly at dinner. They’ve been avoiding the pregnancy altogether, sticking to safe topics—work and books. Kacey is staying with Bill and Laura, and Lee and Kara are eating chicken and dumplings by the fire. “I mean I want to keep it. I think.”
“Yeah?”
“That—that okay with you?”
“Fine with me, yeah,” says Lee, even though fine seems like the least appropriate word to describe how he’s feeling—frightened and excited and ecstatic and nauseous and guilty and nervous and skeptical.
“Just don’t expect me to glow, all right?” Kara says. “Or sparkle. Or whatever it is pregnant ladies do.”
“Sparkle, Kara? It’s not like you’re a pregnant vampire.”
#
They tell no one except for Bill, Laura, and Kacey, but people catch on around the six month mark. Kara’s barely showing, but she has stopped working, her doctor having ordered it because of the high risk associated with the pregnancy.
When people confront her, she’s honest with them—tells them she’s having a boy, that no, she and Lee are not getting married, that Kacey is handling it fine, that they’re adding a room onto the cabin but it’s slow going in the cold.
Kara’s tired all of the time. The frequent trips for ultrasounds don’t help, but the obgyn insists with the high risk of the pregnancy. “Now more than ever do healthy babies matter,” the woman says. Kara just rolls her eyes, as if, A) babies haven’t always been important, and B) babies are some sort of key to human survival. Not when hypothermia has already killed off 5% of the population this winter alone. The only things that will guarantee humanity’s perpetuation are shelter, food, water, and soap.
Kara prefers Cottle, but he had insisted she switch to a specialist.
Today is one of the rare days that she has nothing to do. She’s caught up on the paperwork that she insists on doing despite being on leave. No trips in the city. No errands to run.
She sits in a rocking chair, sketching out some ideas she has for paintings while Lee works on the added room to the cabin. He’s padding the walls with old sweaters and blankets they got from the market to use as insulation.
“Sure I can’t help?” Kara asks.
“You’re supposed to be on bed rest, Kara. You already do way too much.”
“It’s not like stuffing some wool into a wall is going to make me explode,” she says, pouting. “Although I almost wish it would. Might spice things up. Being pregnant is boring, and everything hurts. Can’t we just skip ahead to the part where I pop this thing out?”
“No premature popping, Kara,” Lee says.
“Have you given any more thought to names?” asks Kara, folding her sketchbook shut.
Lee shrugs and continues working. “I don’t know. Like I said, you choose, but I get veto power.”
“What do you think of the name ‘Gaius’?” she asks, triad face intact.
“I hate you,” says Lee, throwing a stray blanket in her direction until it lands flopping over her head.
“So that’s a veto then?” she asks. Instead of removing the blanket completely, she takes it and wraps it around herself.
“I’d say so.”
“Thoughts on ‘William’?” she asks more seriously.
“Meh. You know how I feel about the whole legacy thing.”
“Right. Hmm, Jules?”
“Nah.”
“Leander?”
“Can’t take the risk that it’ll get shortened to ‘Ander,’” he says.
“Cole?” she continues.
“I could live with that.”
“Zephyrus?”
“A bit much.”
“Even if we called him Zeph?”
“I don’t totally hate it,” says Lee. “But Cole is better.”
“Eli?”
Lee sighs and walks over to Kara. “What names do you like? Really, I’ll be fine as long as we don’t name him something like ‘Donut’ or ‘Mr. Silly Pants’.”
“Mr. Silly Pants, Lee? Is there…is there a story behind that?”
“Kara, I’m just saying—”
“Yeah, yeah, I know. I’ve just never had to name anything before. I don’t want him to be stuck with something foul. Or what if I pick something and it doesn’t suit him? We can’t name him Gideon if it turns out he’s a pacifist or something—gods forbid—and how can you tell whether or not an infant is a pacifist? I don’t know—I’m tempted to just name him the first thing that pops into my head when I see him.”
“Then do that, Kara,” he says. “And wait—why would it be such a bad thing if he were a pacifist? Whatever. Doesn’t matter. The point is that no matter what, he’ll be a beautiful, wild, terror of a child. He’ll be ours. Name him anything you want.”
“So then Gaius is okay?” asks Kara, this time sticking her tongue out.
“Frak you, Kara,” he says, smiling.
“Ooo, ‘frak’! We could name him ‘Frak.’” She reaches up and pulls Lee toward her, bends her head forward so that her head is nuzzled into his stomach. He braces his hands on her shoulders. “Mmmm, ‘frak.’ Yeah, that’s the best idea I’ve had all day. What do you say, Lee?”
“With Kacey only a few meters away in the other room?”
“She’s napping. We’ll be quiet.”
“You are not good at being quiet.”
“Well, then how about we focus on you?” she asks, toying with the buttons of his trousers. She lifts his shirt and runs her tongue down the flesh of his belly, from navel to waistline, and revels in the sound of Lee’s answering sigh.
#
Lee knows this is not a great time to be doing—whatever the frak it is they’re about to do. There are a million and one things he has to finish before the baby is born—gods, the baby—his baby—their baby—what the frak? How is this even happening? Ultrasounds, construction, baby names, just—oh gods, but now Kara is unbuttoning his trousers, and who gives a frak about the rest of the universe?
“Step back a little, Lee,” Kara says. She slides from the chair down to the floor, dropping to her knees.
Her eyes look up to meet his, drawing him in. She licks her lips, and Lee knows she’s doing it intentionally just to excite him. It’s working. His cock hardens, straining against his fly.
She’s moving painfully slow. One button. Pause. Another button. Pause. When his trousers are finally lose, she stops. She’s kneeling before him, staring at his brief-confined cock.
Then her mouth is on him through the fabric, and it’s the perfect amount of pressure. The heat of her tongue feels so good. “Kara, please,” he says, he moves to pull down his underwear.
He expects her to bat his hands away but she doesn’t. She wants this as much as he does, and he can feel her breath hot against him as he lets his cock spring free.
She slides her tongue from the base down to the tip, flicking her tongue near the head in just the right spot before swallowing him. Her eyes are on his as she’s sucking him off, her head moving up and down.
He tangles his hands into her long hair, forcing her closer, to take him a little deeper. She doesn’t struggle against him, takes every inch of him willingly.
The urge to thrust himself into her, to frak her face, takes over, and he finds himself moving back and forth. Her tongue and mouth are hot and wet, perfect. Everything feels so good, his body under compulsion to just frak and frak, to get there. He closes his eyes, and he’s already so frakking close. He calls up a million different images, reliving one night several months ago—Kara pressed up against the wall, against the floor, the bed, whatever. Her touching herself as he strokes his cock, watching her get off. Coming on her face.
And because part of Lee is a sadist, he’d wiped the come off her cheeks and lips with his boxers and rubbed Kara off with the newly wet fabric, rolling circles around her clit until she tugged him close, begged him for more, finally giving herself over to orgasm.
And then licking her off while everything was still so painfully sensitive.
“Stay with me, Lee,” Kara says, her voice almost hoarse it’s so deep and raspy. Then her mouth is already on his cock again, bobbing up and down.
“Don’t stop, Kara, I’m so frakking close.”
Frak, frak, frak.
Everything disappears as the sensation floods him. He’s letting himself go in her mouth, shooting his come into her mouth.
“Gods, Kara,” he says.
She smiles at him as she wipes the corners of her mouth with the back of her hands. Lee is still trying to catch his breath.
#
It isn’t a surprise when the baby comes early by nearly four weeks. Kara had refused to take the hormones the doctor recommended to help her carry the child to term. Lee had begged her to reconsider, but Kara had insisted that that kind of intervention would be too much of an invasion, and she didn’t want it.
Lee gets the call while he’s in a meeting, that Kara’s contractions had started almost an hour ago.
“Why am I only just finding out?” he asks his secretary, putting on a jacket, rushing outside to his transport. Thank gods she’d been at the Agathons when this happened.
“Apparently they weren’t sure this was the real deal until her water broke.”
Lee doesn’t really catch what she’s saying, though. He’s already out the door, headed to the hospital.
By the time he arrives, they’re preparing Kara for a caesarean.
Kara names him Leland.
“We’ll just call him LJ,” she says, “for Leland Jr.”
“Can I use my veto power?” Lee asks.
“Nope,” says Kara. “And his middle name is William. Get over it.”
Obviously, the boy is the most beautiful thing in the universe. A head full of white blonde hair. Dark red lips. The loudest, fiercest, most obnoxious cries that Lee has ever heard.
#
Kara dozes in and out as people pass around LJ—her son, her godsdamn son. Everyone coos over him like he’s the gods’ gift to man. Maybe he is. Sure feels like he is, except when he’s biting and tearing at her nipple because he hasn’t quite gotten the hang of it yet.
Kacey is napping in Bill’s arms. Lee watches Karl as he holds Leland.
This is her family. This is the best part.
End. For real this time.
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