#feeling it.

He was startled from his thoughts by an unhappy cry from the room next door. Muttering a curse word to himself, he tossed the shirt back on his desk chair and made his way toward the neighboring bedroom.

What had once been the tiny spare room in the apartment months ago had been transformed into a nursery, painted the exact shade of lavender that Jane had insisted on from the moment they’d been told their child would be a girl. On the wall above a dark wood cot, the name ‘Mary’ was sprawled in golden spindling calligraphy, curtesy of Pattie’s roommate, named Cynthia. 

Through the bars, Paul spied a shock of dark hair squirming about and babbling discontentedly to the ceiling.

With a slight curve of his lip, he swept over to the crib and easily lifted the sweet girl into his arms. Paul still marveled a little every time he held her at how perfectly Mary seemed to fit into his arms, as if the genes he’d passed on to her had somehow encoded it to be like that.

“Ready to be awake now, little darling?” Brushing his lips over the soft skin of the baby’s forehead, Paul mumbled, “Don’t worry, Daddy’s got you.”

Mary calmed instantly, ending her own fussing by stuffing her chubby fist into her mouth as Paul made his way back to his own bedroom. Carefully propping the infant up against his pillow and securing her enough to be sure she wouldn’t roll off the bed, Paul waved to his daughter before going back about his tidying. Mary cooed in response and reached her fists out for her father.

As Mary continued her near constant stream of baby babble, Paul’s eyes flickered back to the damn t-shirt just sitting there on his chair. Reluctantly, as if it would poison him if he touched it, he plucked it back up between his thumb and finger.

Paul could remember how indignant he’d been to realize, upon moving in together, that he and his girlfriend could exchange nearly all their separate wardrobes. Jane had laughed and assured him that it was absolutely adorable to her, but he’d still scowled. For fuck’s sake, she fit in his button-ups and he fit in her goddamn jeans...

But it had always been the Elvis t-shirt that she took most often. She’s said it was the article of clothing he’d been wearing when they met.

He’d rolled his eyes at that; he’d loved the girl to death but how could she possibly remember that? Paul himself couldn’t recall much of their fates first meeting — he’d only been 14 — and didn’t really believing that she did either. 

Still, Paul had let his hazel eyes linger on the way her bright red hair cascaded over those fading letters, ‘Elvis Presley: Live’. He could even remember the way the soft cotton fabric had stretched over her swelling stomach in the later months of her pregnancy, when she’d started wearing it every night to sleep, how soft the fabric had felt on his face when he’d tucked his face against her back.

But all that was over now.

And logically, Paul knew it was just a fucking t-shirt. His fucking t-shirt, at that, not Jane’s. He shouldn’t be thrown off by finding his own belongs in his bedroom. He guessed he’d just thought that since he hadn’t seen it in weeks... Well, he’d just thought that maybe Jane might have taken it with her. 

You’re a fucking idiot, McCartney, He mused silently to himself, Why would she take your stupid, ratty, old t-shirt with her? She don’t want to remember you. She left to get away from you.

With a resigned sigh, he stood and contemplated tossing the shirt completely.  Next, he thought about checking to see if it still held any of Jane’s sunflower perfume that she’d taken to wearing once she’d gotten into acting school. 

Instead, he threw it in his hamper to go to the wash. Maybe it was pointless to hang on to the memories but sometimes Paul just couldn’t help himself. Besides, it had been his favorite shirt before it’d been her’s. And yeah, maybe he didn’t feel quite ready to let it go but could he really be blamed?

Two months didn’t easily erase six years.

Shutting the hamper, Paul gave the room a quick glance and nodded to himself. The space resembled its natural state more than it had in a long time. There were no more clothes tossed about, no cloths stained from spit-up, no textbooks or notebooks messily bookmarked with a pacifier, no old unfinished baby bottles or uncapped highlighters. It nearly looked like it had when he’d kept it clean regularly, instead of at request, back in the ‘before’ days.

“What do you think, Mary?” He asked, settling his gaze on his daughter. 

The infant turned her big blue eyes to him upon recognizing her name and gave a single, “Eh!”

Grinning, the weight on his shoulders from finding his old t-shirt lifted a bit. Maybe he’d kept the shirt... but he’d cleaned the room and Mary was, as far as he could tell, proud of him. Five-month-olds could be hard to read.

Ruffling his hair to make it fall flat against his forehead again, Paul swung his daughter into his arms and made his way out to the living room. He was relieved to see his roommate was still not home from work, as he settled Mary into the high chair next to his usual seat at the kitchen island. Paul felt a bit guilty for his happiness at his friend’s absence but he just knew George would take one look at him and ask him what was wrong. It would be fucking pointless, too, because George knew exactly what was wrong and knew Paul wouldn’t want to talk about it anyway.

It was humiliating at this point, honestly, still being so hung up on one bird. But then again, it wasn’t just some bird... It was Jane.

Jane, who was now long gone and moving on, as they say, and Paul knew that. He’d come to accept it, sometimes even figured Jane was right in leaving him. She wanted more than she could have with him, what choice had the poor girl really had?

He could understand that.

But then Paul grabbed an empty baby bottle from the counter and glanced back at Mary, who was gumming at her fingers and following him with her eyes, and shook his head.

Nah, actually, he didn’t understand.

If she had just left him, well, things would be different but she hadn’t just walked away from him, had she? She’d turned her back on her own goddamn baby, too. Jane had been wrong.

He knew all that, ‘course, repeated it to himself ten times a day but it still felt like a socking to the gut to think of her.

Two months ago—right after she’d packed and gone—Jane had been all Paul could even think of. For days after he’d come home to that empty closet and that damn letter, all that had run through his muddled and confused mind was JaneJaneJaneJaneJaneJane. He’d think he heard her call for him or he’d start making food for an extra person who wasn’t there anymore. It had even hurt to look into Mary’s eyes, the very same shade of her mum’s.

But luck would have it that all of that got better with time. 

Now, he could almost forget he missed her until something, like an old t-shirt or one of her favorite songs on the radio, would hit him in the face and he’d think about throwing up or screaming. He would look at his phone, he would contemplate calling her—just to hear her voice—and then he would stubbornly refuse to let himself do it. If Jane could move on from him and Mary, he and Mary could move on from Jane.

So instead, he’d find his baby wherever she was—in her cot or in someone else’s arms— and hold her tight. He would count her toes and fingers, like he had the day she was born, lean in close to hear the little pitter-patter of her heart in her chest, listen to her breathing and her babbling. Mary grounded him, reminded him that his priorities laid with her now and nowhere else. 

Jane wasn’t his once in a lifetime, as he’d spent so long believing. She was now just a part of his past, one he was even thankful for. Having had Jane once upon a time meant having Mary and so Paul would make himself be okay with that. He didn’t have much of a choice, after all.

Ten minutes or so later the door to the flat flung open and George came hustling in, about ten bags of groceries in his arms. Paul quirked an eyebrow from his perch at the kitchen island, eyeing Mary as she held up her own bottle, but made no move to help. 

Nearly dropping everything to the floor, Geo managed to get to the counter across from his flat mate and slumped down in exhaustion.

“Fuckin’...hate...havin’...to...climb...those bloody...steps,” The boy managed between pants. 

Paul smirked and shrugged, “They’ve only been telling us they're gonna fix the lift since we moved in, Georgie, give ‘em another year or so.”

George shot him one of his signature scowls. “Piss off, McCartney. You didn’t even fucking help me, prat.”

“I was...” Paul trailed off, glancing around for some excuse before shrugging and meeting his friend’s waiting stare, “I was feeding Mary. Figured you had it handled.”

George rolled his eyes and gestures to the infant suckling contently, “Kid seems to be managing well enough on her own.”

Looking back over at his daughter, Paul felt the quirk of a proud smile curl the corners of his lips and let out a little laugh, “She is getting the hang of it, ain’t she?”

It was so odd, the things that impressed Paul these days. Two years ago, he’d have been just as proud to have successfully won a drinking contest or have rolled a joint perfectly and now here he was, dotting because his baby had figured out how to hold her bottle on her own... Fuck had happened to his life?

Seeming to be thinking the same thing, George huffed and turned back toward his groceries but Paul, having known the other so long, had spotted the glint of endearment in his friend’s eye. That was George for you, always playing the part of a grump but underneath one of the most genuine blokes there was. Besides, the bugger was probably just as excited as Paul for Mary.

“When’s Pat gonna come ‘round?” Paul asked, leaning his elbows on the island as he observed George shuffle about the kitchen. It was pretty shit and cramped but for two young men living on their own with baby still on a liquid diet, it did fine. Jane had hated it and Pattie wasn’t particularly fond either.

George took the jug of milk that had previously been sitting in the fridge, sniffed it, grimaced and set it aside, before answering, “She’s not coming ‘round till later. We’re meeting her at the pub with some others and then she’ll be coming home with us.”

“We? Us?” Paul asked, the whine in his tone clearly evident.

His best friend narrowed his eyes on him, a determined look in his dark eyes, “Yeah, us, Paul. You haven’t gone out since—“ George’s eyes trailed to Mary and Paul flashed him a look of warning that was clearly just daring him to say the wrong thing. 

Paul got downright mean when someone dared to hint at him being better off without his baby. George figured it was half from his father’s drillings before Mary’d even been born about how Paul was just too young to be a father and the other half from Jane actually expressing that very sentiment in her farewell letter.

“Well, like, it’s been a while, hasn’t it?”

Well, yeah, it’d been a while. It’d been... whenever Jane had dragged him away from his textbooks last, he guessed. Before the baby was born... Probably a few weeks before they’d even riddled out that Mary was on the way... so, well over a year then?

Something along those lines, Paul supposed.

Jane had loved to go out, to have fun, and Paul had loved Jane, finding the pub scene decently entertaining. They’d gone out nearly every free night they had, sometimes with a group or sometimes just the two of them like any normal Uni students. 

Then, when the home pregnancy tests had come back with pink lines, that lifestyle had been put on the back burner. Now, without Jane to gravitate towards, mountains of assignments due and single fatherhood to face, Paul didn’t think going out sounded all that appealing anymore.

He shrugged, noncommittally, because there was no point in giving George more satisfaction in being right for once. Shaking his head, Paul made a noise of frustration, “Well, so what? I got Mary—“

“—I already asked Mike and you’re off duty until midnight.”

“I’m her Da, George, I’m never ‘off duty’,” Paul rolled his eyes, using air quotations, “Besides, I don’t want—“

“You’re bloody well going, Paul!” George snapped. “It’s gonna be the whole lot of us. It’ll be great!”

“Like who?” Paul asked, scrunching up his nose. The idea of the ‘whole lot’ didn’t tickle his fancy the way it seemed to get George. 

George paused to give Paul another exasperated look, “Me and Pats, obviously. Ritchie and Mo. Oh! And we’re gonna meet Ivan there cuz he’s working tonight,” He ended in a shrugged, “He can work us out a discount.”

“Discount alcohol,” Paul mused, sarcastically, “My favorite.”

Beside him, Mary finished off her meal and let her bottle crash to her tray. George jumped and nearly dropped a carton of eggs while Paul just grinned at her, running his hand over her silky hair before taking the bottle back. 

Something about having a kid made a person a lot less sensitive to loud, startling noises. Maybe it was the screaming at all hours of the night?

Pulling down his sleeve, he wiped some formula from the baby’s cheek and bopped her tiny nose, getting up to rinse the bottle out. 

“That’s fucking disgusting,” George muttered, “I mean, like, use a cloth or something! Not your bloody sleeve!”

Paul laughed, “Ah, piss off.” Setting the clean bottle on the rack to dry, he turned back to his best friend. “And Mikey’s okay with Mary duty?”

“Told you already he is,” Geo muttered before clearing his throat and saying louder, “Oh, go on, Paul! Just come with us! Just for a few hours!”

Mary broke in with a loud squeal, slamming her chubby hands down into her tray, “Bah!”

George pointed to the baby and raised an eyebrow, “I think Mary’s agreeing with me, mate.”