wwwillow

How many times in the middle of the night has Jack woken up to find her screaming her ears off, only to wake you up and deposit the bundle of sweetness into your lap with a kiss to your forehead and an apology in his mouth?

Gladly Jack would feed her if he were able to produce milk. But humans and other mammals alike, males are not genetically evolved to nourish their offspring. Because if he could, he would.

“Bug, there’s nothing here,” he tries telling her. Which does nothing good, except earn a chuckle Jack knew very personally. The voice and its owner — a perpetual pain in his butt since the first year of med school — make themselves known with another chuckle. To which Jack can only groan, “what’re you doin’ here?”

“Here to see my goddaughter.” Robby and his insane timing. Why must he choose this specific moment to display his affection? Of every low point Jack has quietly accumulated throughout his life, Robby has been there. It is impossible to figure out how Robby knows these embarrassing moments and decides to pop up, but he always does.

The statistical probability of this is insulting. Of all the rooms in this hospital, of all the moments in a day, Robby walks in for the exact one where Jack is being actively suckled at by his infant daughter. He could’ve walked in when Jack was skillfully changing her diaper — wait that’s not better. Thing is it’s unfair, with drool on his shirt and a six-month-old clamped to his pec, is when Robby decides to be a present and loving godfather.

“How did you know I was here?” Jack prods, all the while trying to keep your baby from latching onto his nipples through his shirt, it not being much of a barrier at all.

Robby completely ignores Jack’s question — like he usually does, like that one time when Jack asked him, directly, in plain English, whether he'd eaten the rest of his leftovers from the fridge, and Robby held eye contact with him for four full seconds and then asked if Jack had seen the new attending in neuro — and nods towards the baby, “she good?”

“Yeah, she’s — she’s just —” Jack cannot bring himself to say out loud that his daughter is gnawing at his muscles in hopes of quenching her thirst. Some things you just don't say. Some things you carry alone.

“God. Is she trying to — feed from you?” Robby throws his head back in a bashful laugh. Jack feels his hands itch to put him in a chokehold, the only thing keeping him away from doing that being his current object of affection, his lovely daughter. The laugh alone tells him this is a story that'll be recounted many years to come. Told at every bar they ever drink at, Christmas, at the next three people's weddings, at Jack's funeral probably, Robby having outlived the former purely out of spite. “Told you to go easy on the weights,” Robby continues, pushing past Jack’s glares. But the latter can only seem so intimidating with little sunshine on his arms, babbling with spit oozing from the corner of her mouth.

“You know what, why don’t you take her?” Jack practically shoves the baby into Robby’s arms, the latter immediately straightening up to hold her without missing a beat.

As Jack sorts out the spit situation, little bug has found residence in Robby’s chest, pawing at his scrub — worse condition than Jack's — as she tries to figure out a way to milk. So, the shape and geography of the area wasn’t the problem; your daughter is. If she’s that hungry, shouldn’t she latch onto the bottle? Apparently bottles are beneath her, as she pays them no mind, only snuggling deeper into Robby’s embrace now.

"See, it's not just me."

Like always, Robby ignores Jack's tantrums and rocks her, swaying from left to right as he eyes Jack, who now seems very victorious about establishing the fact that his daughter needs to be latched no matter the anatomy and physiology, and maybe is a little dumber than he’d thought. That is a terrible thing to think about a baby — much more, to think about his own baby — but that’s where Jacks head is at.

Thank god you decided to walk in that exact moment, confusion painting your face as you raise one eyebrow at the situation. Like a sunflower finding sun, your baby slots herself against Robby, straining her neck to find you, her own North Star. “What’s going on here?”

Jack has never felt luckier. That’s an overstatement, he knows. He’s felt lucky everyday since you came into his life, but particularly now with you glancing up at him with smile laced lips, and soft sighs from working for four hours straight without feeding.

“Our beloved daughter missed you, is all.” Missed you and your boobs, and tried to burrow into mine and Robby's, is what he doesn't say. Like she was summoned, your baby raises her arms from Robby’s hold, babbling a string of bah-bah-bah, exact to her social development, the little genius she apparently is, now that she has you in her sights.

The same child who spent twenty minutes trying to nurse from two men with no relevant equipment is now performing perfect developmental milestones on cue. Fine. She'll be fine.

Walking closer to both men, your own arms open, reaching in the air, a laugh bubbling up from your throat, the soft kind, the honest kind, the full kind. Jack sees your body sense little bug, smell, sound, and everything heightened. Coupled with the laughter, your letdown reflex makes itself known as two perfect patches of wetness coat your blouse, the warmth of it you register almost immediately, eyes darting between both Jack and Robby, a little insecure, a little flustered.

While Jack has seen you in everything and nothing, Robby hasn’t — of course, why would he? — and a redness climbs up his face, tinging his ears pink, as he tries to divert his gaze from your chest to the baby in his arms, who is now oblivious and content now that she has you within grasp.

Jack watches this unfold in real time. Robby, undone by a biological reflex. The ears going first, embarrassment creeping up from behind him, working its way forward.

Robby hands her over to you, immediately taking a step back, putting distance between you both as he rubs the nape of his neck with his hand, stuttering, “uhmm — I think— I should go.”

Not waiting for a response, Robby walks past you both, still completely red. Jack had never thought a biological response would petrify his friend, what with the countless number of bizarre things they've collectively and individually witnessed during their careers. A man who has genuinely seen everything emergency medicine has to throw at a person, walking very quickly away from a breastfeeding-adjacent situation like it might follow him into the hall.

Little bug throws her arms over your face, trying to grab your attention from her godfather.

“Poor Robby.” You mutter as you start feeding your daughter.

“He’ll live,” Jack replies instantly, though he knows the image of Robby's ears going full red while he stared intensely at the crown of the baby's head will sustain him through at least two more shifts. Maybe three.

When your baby is almost done, Jack takes that opportunity to ask you one thing that's been plaguing his mind forever. Forever would be a stretch, let's say almost six months. Six months of being in the general vicinity of a thing and very much not included in it. Watching his daughter treat this like the most obvious arrangement in the world, and Jack, who understands the oxytocin, the prolactin, the whole cascade, understanding perfectly well why, and still experiencing what he can only describe, clinically, as being left out. “You know, now that she's old enough to start complimentary feeds…” He looks at you expectantly.

“Mhmm?”

“It’s only fair I get a taste… since she's this addicted.”

A swat lands on his arm before he can close his mouth. But your face tells him a different story. And he knows exactly what it means.

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