ILLEGITIMATE
Chapter 3 Baby Teeth and Barley The guys do know. Didn't say a word. A big storm cloud full of rumors rolls over his head. He asks Sarge why such vital information wasn't conveyed and his boss replies that it wasn't his information to give. When he approaches Ed with the same question, Ed answers that a pregnancy isn't exactly something Jules could hide forever. The bet the rest of the team had going for when he would figure out was more entertaining than sitting him down and explaining the biology of the situation. Wordy wins the pool. Buys him a beer. The all appeasing effects of hops and barley. They don't communicate much, not after what happened in her locker room. Not after he had an average reaction caused by his heart collapsing along with the jumpstarting pain in his face. Not after she took offense to his natural response and left him to sulk until the environmentally friendly lighting left him in the dark, sitting on one of her benches and imagining what her future is going to be like carting around a baby, then a toddler, then a kid by herself. Imagining how much better her future would be if Steve didn't catch a bullet with his chest. Thinking about how much worse his life would be if Steve didn't. He deals with her in abstractions instead. Through chain events or multimedia. Drives in a rig with Ed and overhears through the comm. link how her and Wordy have stopped off at a fast food place because she needs a milkshake. Listens to Ed and Wordy debate whether she should find out the baby's gender or not. Ed is for, Wordy is against. " There's no greater surprise in life." "Except because you wanted a surprise, you didn't prepare for anything. Find out what it is." "I think Ed just wants to know what it is." "I just think we've had a lull in boys being born at the SRU, that's all." Halfway through the conversation she's usually gone. Hand in a bag full of something to snack on and walking away to somewhere less forcefully helpful. Less judgmental in opinion. Never to him. The small speed bump on her stomach grows, becomes more pronounced until there's no mistaking her condition. It's still comfortably cloaked in her uniform, not straining on the fabric for freedom yet. But on her personal clothing choices it's noticeable. Her stomach distends over her waistband, body creates a curvacious 's' to accommodate the weight. He wonders just how long it would have taken him to notice if she didn't flat out tell him. He appreciates her honesty. Lesser people would have run. He ran. Doesn't exactly know how far along she is, but two days ago he overheard her talking with Sarge about feeling the baby move. The excitement in her voice, the mannerisms of her hands. It was the first time she genuinely smiled since the locker room. Smiled despite the situation because she was so thrilled, so proud. The first time she's been this way since before Steve died. He struggles to satiate the burrowing hole in his being with the company of other women. Enters into trysts which he hopes flourish but always wilt with a quick diminishing optimism. Girls from bars, from coffee shops, from grocery stores, from the gym. Blonde, brunette, or red-head. He doesn't have a type. For five weeks dates just as many girls, thin lips, fat lips, thin hips, wide hips, as tall as him, shorter than him, athletic, lethargic, naïve in youth, scorned in experience. None of them work for him, all delightful in their own way but lack a vital mechanic. He knows he has a type and it's tragic because it's her. It's a ruminating afternoon when they get a hot call for a bomb scare in an office building. On hot calls they all treat her the same way. Vault her up in the back of the truck. Would padlock it if they could because she's not so much a liability as a constant concern. They all feel it. Sarge has a talk with them at about how they should start treating her differently without outwardly treating her differently. About how if anything happens to her now, it happens to two people. Ed asks when she's going to take maternity leave. Sarge just laughs because legally they can't force Jules to leave and physically they can't force Jules to leave. She'll go when she wants to and not before. The hot call is refreshingly aided by security guard named Craig from the building. He knows the place inside and out. Offers them secure locations where past suspicious packages have been left, gives them suggestions for other areas. It's so refreshing none of them challenges him. Until his helpfulness borders on intent. They sew together the bits of Craig conversations while Wordy searches the security desk and recovers schematics for a small handheld bomb which could detonate a building if appropriately fueled. The team's voices claw over each other for dominance in the discussion which ensues. Sarge tries to get the major information points, Ed demands to know what direction Craig took off in, Spike declares the perimeter around the building be doubled. Finally he asks the logical, "Who was the last one to speak to the guard?" "He was helping Jules scan through security footage in the truck a few minutes ago." His eyes snap up. Check the passive black eyesore through bay windows across the atrium. It's still idle. Still in place. Timeless. But the rest of them infuse with the panic, the team's secondary responsibility going unattained. "Jules, get out of the van," Ed demands, voice grating like gravel under tires with sternness. They all adopt the same swift-legged gait towards the front door. "Boss, you have to pull back the crowd." "What?" Jules languid voice sparks to life on the other end of the comm. link. She's tired today. Dragging a bit. Ed joked earlier about this being the time to have her do the physical portion of her requalifying exams. She replied that in roughly five months she'll be doing a physical drill none of them will be required to do. He smiled inwardly. "What's going on Eddy?" Ed covers up the speaker piece of his link and over the shoulder mutters, "Spike how far do we need it expanded?" "Another twenty feet." "Pull them back another twenty feet Boss." They're halfway to the door. The sound of four pairs of boots over the floors, echoing off three storey high atrium walls. Clomping. Timed clomps in a march. The army still leeches. Truck hasn't emptied. She hasn't gotten out yet. Why hasn't she gotten out? She needs to get out. "Jules, out of the truck now." "Look, it's nice that you guys want to see my face but—" "Jules, get out of the goddamn truck." It pours out, like drinking hot coffee too fast, touches the tip of his tongue and drips back out onto the ground. Or when he's already too drunk and can't hold his liquor anymore and it rolls down his chin. His veins tighten and pop. He won't be an inactive spectator watching her get charbroiled inside the impenetrable skeleton of the truck. But then it happens. Happens in slow motion. Starts in the middle of the truck, red combustion shoots it up in the air. A fireball in the middle of downtown Toronto, igniting upwards in the gray May sky and slamming down so hard on the ground two wheels shoot off. One of them propels through the high atrium windows and skims by them. It lodges in the empty space between the modern stairs. The event causes the team to flinch back as a whole. Causes mystical orange shadows to dance across the spotless white tiles and their faces. Smoke ballets, twists and en pointes into the sky. A charcoal smudge. "No." He wants to scream it like his last comment, but it comes out strangled in his throat. He tries to run towards the wreckage, the empty husk of a vehicle the fire gnaws away at, a hungry dog with a bone, but Ed hooks an arm around his. Wordy, expressionless except for two crashed eyebrows, grabs his other arm and hold they him in place. "No, no, no, no." "I repeat, Sarge, Jules come in." Ed's voice is disrupted by his entangled arm attempting to break free. Spike doesn't move, twitch, blink or speak. He's having Lew flashbacks. "I'm here Eddy," Sarge replies after a few seconds, voice winded. "Just a little shocked." "Is Jules with you?" "Jules is in the truck." He wants to throw up. Can literally feel every organ, every vein, every fiber and cell in his body. His stomach boulders and his knees knock underneath the weigh because outside the window the truck still smolders like a morbid campfire. Through the broken pane the smell of gas, exhaust, and smoke suffocates him. "Greg." Ed chokes; all of them glassy eyed watching the vehicle like moths to flames. The innate sense of team protection, of male responsibilities literally aflame before them. They wanted to padlock her in. "The truck is what exploded." There's the long hiss of static. "No—" But a few curt coughs and a groan interrupt premature lamentations. "I'm here." "Jules?" Sarge's voice raises its registry a few octaves. The arms restraining him drop and suddenly become forceful jovial slaps on his shoulder and back. "Yeah I was going to say that I was doing crowd control. You guys were arguing about it but no one was doing it." "I told you to stay in the truck." "And look how well that would have turned out." "Are you hurt?" "I might have scraped my knee. I think I'll live." In all honesty he doesn't hear the remainder of the comm. link argument between Sarge and Jules who are likely only a block apart. The relief manifests in a wave of complete relaxation. Stomach boulder pebbles away, disintegrates, and his body uncoils. For the minute the team remains motionless, the minute he understands Jules and unborn baby Callaghan are in perfect health, the puncture in his being is filled. Wordy and Spike end up catching unbalanced Craig who just likes to see fires. Different types of fires. All kinds of fires. Never saw a vehicle explode which is why he planted the bomb there. While they're tracking the security guard down to the alleyway only six blocks away and listening to his somewhat erotic explanation of arson, Sarge convinces Jules to go to the hospital. Her only physical injury is a scraped knee. It's the back draft of masculine duty, ensuring she's okay. They imagined her exploded, so now overcompensation is in order. At the end of the shift he lags in the locker room. Sits on a bench with his shirt ringing between his hands, wondering what the fuck he's actually been doing for the past five weeks. For the past year. Since he moved to Toronto. Mentally charts what he wants out of life and in a perfect world, how quickly he would want it. House, wife, kids, how many, dog. Does it have to be in Toronto? He feels like he lost all his baby teeth here, and new ones just aren't growing in. Then the door opens, he doesn't bother getting up because he figures it one of the nameless faces from the next shift, from another team. But it's not the tall guy with muscles. Or the tall skinny lean guy. Or the tall guy with more muscles than the first guy. She's wearing jeans and a gray zip-up sweater. Stomach poking out like she overstuffed the front pockets with tissue, a habit she adopts when she's sick. She's not sick. The bump sort of has an apex, a point to it. He wonders if it's because she's early on in her pregnancy, or if it will never round. Wonders if he'll get to see her when she's further along. When she waddles. "Oh sorry." She stops abruptly and her sneakers squeak against the linoleum floor. It's still a little wet with condensation from the long mulling shower he took in which he made zero life altering choices. "No, it's fine." He stands, and realizes as the air hits his stomach that he's shirtless. The top unfurls and she's momentarily blocked from his view as he pulls it on over his head. "Did Sarge leave yet?" There's a coy smile playing at the corner of her lips and he recognizes it as excitement. Maybe she's feeling the adrenaline rush from not blowing up. "Yeah, maybe half an hour ago." "Oh really," Mirth drains from her voice, her expression. She examines him with a tilted head. "Half an hour? Jesus Braddock, you're getting slow." He only manages a half smile at her quip and busies his hands with packing up his gym bag. "Everything go okay at the hospital?" "Oh yeah." She laughs and reclines against the dip in the wall. The pot lights accent her curves. Halos her hair, the top of her stomach, side of her right thigh. With a deep inhalation she rests her left hand on her bump. "They wanted to kick me out because of the scraped knee, but I told them what happened and they gave me an ultrasound." "Really?" Doesn't know why this interests him. Doesn't really know what she would have seen or expected. Just blobs on blobs like in an abstract art museum. Under appreciated unless viewed by the right person. "Is everything—?" "Everything's fine." Thumb scoops down the dip, the peak at her navel and she wears the calmest of smiles. "It's just really surreal seeing what's going on in there. Little fingers. Little toes." She senses the awkwardness that her words instill. The awkwardness her hand flaunting her stomach exudes. The awkwardness conceptualized in vast silence. "Anyways, I'll leave you to your dawdling. Hopefully you'll get home in time to sleep before the next shift." "Yeah, hopefully." He laughs into the gutted interior of his locker, reverberates like a cavern. Watches her ponytail sway like a pendulum while she walks away. Might be wishful thinking but her athletic steps seem to evolve into a pre-waddle. Just observing her, interacting with her since he inadvertently snubbed her relives him. Revives him in the way that hearing her voice did while watching a burning truck acting as a coffin's proxy. "Jules?" "Yeah?" "It was a long two minutes before we knew you weren't in the truck." "I'm okay." "Yeah." Nodding, he catches her eyes from across the room and remembers. Really remembers. How her lips are just the right plumpness and never leave stains of makeup on his face. How his body looms over hers and it gives him a false sense of security in protecting her. How her hips fit perfectly in his cupped and kneading hands. How she's always been the right mixture of everything. "I'm glad." "Me too. Goodnight Sam." The door snaps closed behind her with a whoosh of quick air. He hates Steve. The hatred boils and simmers eventually waning because Jules, she was never really his, or Steve's. Never really anybody's but her own. But he hates Steve because of the majority of his meditations bring up the same question. Why me? Or better yet. Why him? Why Steve? He dated Jules longer, took better care of her and loved her through her bulleted body. Why did Steve get first prize? Why did Steve get to create this mess and leave? Why is Jules so happy to be part of something so unplanned? Something so completely misplaced that the whole team acts differently now. Why despite everything, does he want to be a part of this mess? Next Chapter - Unbeknownst changes happen. Imperative decisions are made. And dandelions.
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