#;rothane

“Where the fuck did that baby come from?” 

Vivian looked up, wondering if there was an echo, because she had just thought exactly the same thing. But no, instead, there was Rowan Thane walking down the street, looking with curiosity into the basket at Vivian’s feet. 

“That’s what I wanted to know,” she grumbled, bending down. She moved around the blankets a little bit in the basket, causing the baby to gurgle happily, and reach its arms out towards her. “There’s no note,” she muttered, half to herself. She waggled her fingers at the baby, but did not pick him up. Vivian was not exactly a baby person.

Putting her hands on her hips, as she straightened Vivian looked around. As if the person who dumped the baby here would still be hanging around. But no one was in sight. And it wasn’t Rowan’s baby. Was this someone’s idea of a joke? She was hardly the maternal type. Her uses were in the courtroom, not the nursery. 

“Does this look like a firehouse to you?” she asked rhetorically. Her toe tapped impatiently on the step as she tried to think of what to do. 

Geoff snorted and laughed, shaking his head. He was over for dinner, as he often was–along with half the town it sometimes seemed like. As he tossed the Caesar Salad he had made to go along with the pasta Rowan was working on, he threw a crouton at his cousin. “We’re having Italian tonight, not Chinese. I don’t need any fortune cookie wisdom, thanks.” 

He turned when Maddie tugged on the hem of his shirt. 

“Look Uncle Geoff, it’s you!” she said proudly, holding up her paper. She of course waved it around too fast for him to actually see the picture, but that was beside the point. 

“Looks great, kiddo! Definitely one for the fridge,” he said, ruffling her hair. She ran off again, her attention caught by something else, and Geoff turned his attention back to Rowan. 

“Seriously, where did that come from?”