ArchivedLogs:Babydaddy

Babydaddy
Dramatis Personae Hive, Melinda
In Absentia	2014-04-12 '
Location <NYC> Rang Phueng Design - SoHo
Located on the third floor of a narrow brick-faced office building in SoHo, the lobby of Rang Phueng Design is a comfortable place to wait. There are a number of paintings hung on the walls, brightly colored though somewhat fantastical cityscapes. A large aquarium on one wall, clean and carefully tended, hosts brightly colored marine life swimming through a number of plants and coral. The table amid all the large cheerfully blue-and-silverygrey microsuede couches has a sampling of architectural magazines as well as popular ones, magazines and newspapers generally actually up to date. The receptionist desk is a large black wood one, though it is unmanned. Off to the side a small table has a little refreshment stand set up, a Keurig coffeemachine with a large selection of tea-coffee-cocoa choices and a minifridge beneath the table with juice and water and soda. Through the door in back of the lobby is an enormous workshop space, wide and airy. Spacious drafting tables take up much of the center of the room, a number of glass-topped desks edging the sides though only one of them against the back windows actually boasts a computer. Walls painted white and paneled in glass turn most of the wallspace into whiteboard, generally covered with notes and measurements. The back wall's large windows look out onto the streets. Two side doors lead to office space at the side. One leads off to an office space that, though comfortably large, is dwarfed by the workshop beside it; currently unfurnished, it is just a bare empty sweep of potential uses. The other door, has been given -- no name plaque, yet. Just a tacked-up piece of paper reading "J.M. Investigations". Hive's building is quiet, on a Saturday afternoon, the rest of the offices in the building largely jus deserted. In the front lobby of /his/ actual office, Flicker is asleep on one of the couches, still dressed in his red-and-black Mendel Clinic guard uniform where he's evidently just passed out cold after his shift, dead to the world after what's been a /very/ long and harrowing week. The room is quiet, except for his soft breathing and the bubbling of the filter from the aquarium. The doors to the workshop in back are open, though. Hive is back there, seated at his desk where -- perhaps he's been working. At some point. He's not anymore, though, just slumped in against the table, kind of faceplanted onto his keyboard, eyes closed, cheek mashed against the keys. He's in plain white undershirt, plain blue jeans, a pair of black socks. One hand rests on the table beside him, fingers twitching slightly; the other has fallen down into his lap. Melinda had reason to leave the safehouse today and has one doctor's appointment under her belt. They told her that things were good, but they also continued to recommend bed rest. The sun is shining and the weather is amazing, so Melinda is less inclined to return home and reacquire pajamas. Instead, she is running errands. She has picked up a couple of boxes of cookies from Happy Cakes. She's feeling okay, so chooses to take one last jaunt to SoHo, half desiring to stop in at work and make sure the place hasn't burned down. Instead, she finds herself in the office building where Rang Phueng is located, making use of the elevator as she makes her way to her friends' place of work... and home, apparently. She slips in quietly, half expecting to be safe enough waiting to knock when she gets through reception, but is flush with embarrassment when she finds Flicker asleep on the couch. She frowns, but stands still for a second, offering a mental << knock, knock >> before moving further in. Flicker doesn't really stir when Melinda enters; there's a very faint shift as he adjusts position and then promptly continues to just sleep, something he hasn't done nearly enough of, lately. Deeper into the office there /is/ a stirring, though, a mental pressure up against Melinda's mind that reacts with a faint surprise. << Huh? Mel? You okay? Thought you were -- >> Hive's thudding words break off into a fumbling, a sense of /worry/ that grasps for words and misses. In the end he turns up a picture of /bed/ and a lingering feel of concern. /He/ doesn't exactly stir either, though, still just draped across his keyboard in the back of his workshop. Melinda continues to waddle in, setting down the boxes of cookies on some free space on the desk before grabbing a chair and moving it closer to Hive. "Had a doctor's appointment. Things are progressing. Kid's pretty much fully developed, but they always recommend more waiting, just in case." She wets her lips as she begins the careful process of settling herself into a chair, everything slightly complicated by the large weight on her front. "But now I am being a bad kid and deciding to see the outside world at least a little bit before returning to my cave." Once settled, she reaches over and rests a hand on the back of Hive's neck, gently rubbing. "Internet tells me s'a good world today." Hive's mind presses a sensate image of -- at least what he /imagines/ it might be like outside based on what his phone has forecast to him and what the large windows just in front of him /show/. Sunny. Seventy. Warm sun on skin. He hasn't been outside today though he did shakily drag himself to the construction site for a couple hours of overseeing yesterday before taxiing back to collapse. He turns his head slowly, neck pressing up against Melinda's fingers. Though hammer-heavy as his mental touch ever his, the actual /voice/ it carries with it is -- softer, hesitant, almost, when he speaks next. << Will you -- tell me. When it happens. When they come. >> "It's a glorious day." Melinda shares the bits of her day that don't involve lubrication gel being smeared all over her belly. The sunshine, the smell of the taqueria next door, the thrum of people in the streets, the taste of herbal tea at Happy Cakes, the one 'special' cookie she snuck out of the box, chocolate chip and comfort dancing across her tongue. When Hive responds to her rubbing, she turns her chair just a little to place both hands on his neck and continues rubbing. The touch is still gentle, but it's a little more comprehensive, finding the spaces that need a little relaxation and coaxing them into it. "Of course, I'll tell you. Keep your phone charged and you'll know as soon as I go into labor." There's quiet, for a time. Hive's arm shifts, slow and discoordinated, fumbling futilely a few times before he manages to push his keyboard out of the way so that he can just rest his head on the /desk/ instead of mashing it down into the keys. And then just sit, quiet, breathing slow as Mel's fingers work in against his neck. There's a squeeze-pressure of mental /lean/ up against her mind that carries with it a jumble of thought, of feeling, that -- is trying to resolve into words he can't quite find. Is /trying/ to find, struggling, /missing/ just as he had fumbled and missed the keyboard a minute or two before. Thoughts of Mel and a hospital bed, warm homesick thoughts of the way his younger siblings looked almost alien as tiny new-formed people, awkwardsweaty (also warm?) thoughts of a hot summer night eight months ago in Mel's apartment Jim's rough hands and the feel of Mel's mouth. Other thoughts, too, less well-developed; a still-forming mind who currently mostly thinks in shades of sensation or need, pleasant or unpleasant, familiar and unfamiliar, though Hive's been conversing -- for a given value of conversation -- with it, as well. Watching it grow, listening as its tastes start to develop. These things come easier, through mental connection, when /words/ are hard to find. Eventually he gives up on them, shoulders sagging. And says instead: "... I don't know if. You'd want me. /There/. I mean, /with/-you-there. But if you." And here he stops again, evidently at the end of Words, breath shaking out in almost a pained exhalation. His mind presses back to hers again like this is /easier/. << (with you) >> comes in concept more than speech, and once he manages this thought he seems to find it again: "-- be with you. For it. If you'd have me." Melinda's hands slow as Hive begins swirling more thoughts, images, impressions, and memories into her consciousness, with a dose of headache. She closes her eyes and leans against Hive's side, arms wrapping around him in a hug. "Are you asking to be in my mind, or are you asking to be my partner?" She's trying to associate each bit of Hive he's expressed with meaning for himself. Responsibility in the child's existence? Does he think he influenced the situation? Was he just along for the ride? Does he /want/ to be there for the child? Muddy questions keep shifting around inside her, but in the end, her feeling end up answering. He shouldn't feel obligated, but he's welcome. Hive slowly pushes himself up from the desk, sagging in against Melinda; his arm snakes up around her shoulders as he leans back in. His face is sallow, when it finally lifts enough to be seen, eyes sunken-hollow; his cheeks are lined with impressions marked deep in red from where the keyboard keys have pressed inward for apparently quite some time. His lips curl upward into a smile, and he exhales a quick breath of laughter before the smile fades away again. "I want --" he starts, and then snorts. "Fuck it, Mel, I don't even know if I'm going to /be/ here this time next /year/, let alone --" He shakes his head, lifting his other hand to grind knuckles hard against his temple. "Let's just -- start with the birth, yeah? I don't -- feel obligated. I feel." His head tips in against hers. "I was /there/," he says, quietly. Then stops again, teeth grinding slow as he searches once more for -- "when they were --" There's another memory, of hot summer night, and hands, and kisses, and skin on skin. "I was. There. And I want to be there for them." << Even if, >> he acknowledges afterwards, << it's not -- for. Ever. >> "Okay, babydaddy." Melinda inhales deeply and keeps Hive close, a small smile on her lips. "Though, given the internal dynamics of bonding at this stage, the kid might regard you more as mother." She stays close, her nose turning to brush gently against his. Inwardly, she's glad. She wants this child showered with love, tied in affection to as many people as she can muster and is very touched to have that happening so soon. She also quietly enjoys being this close to Hive, and hugs him a little tighter. "That make /you/ the daddy?" Hive's lips twitch again, and then he falls back into silence. His arm curls in against her; the drape of his bony-thin weight at Mel's side is negligible. Eyes closed, his forehead resting against hers, the touch of his mind now doesn't come with much except a slow squeeze of weight, heavy and familiar, that then withdraws, leaving behind only physical presence. Arm (slightly shaky) around shoulder, forehead to forehead. His breathing slows, heavy, slightly strained, but steady. "Yes. Finally someone recognizes the truth. I was the father all along." Melinda revels in the nonsensical nature of her statement and closes her eyes, part of her mind wishing they were laying down. She is horizontal so often these days, she is getting acclimated to it. The longer they rest like that, together, the stronger the impulse inside of her is, until she finally puts words to the feeling. "I'm glad you were there." Hive's head lifts, tipping over towards the side door which -- /should/ lead to a side office, but at the moment leads to makeshift living space. Futon mattresses have been dragged in. There are backpacks and a duffel bag with some clothing and personal items kind of haphazardly strewn on one side (in Hive's case) and neatly packed and stored on the other (in Flicker's.) "Could lie down," he suggests; there's an /exhaustion/ in his tone, a slight pained clench to his teeth, that makes it seem /he/ wouldn't find this an unpleasant suggestion /either/. And, with a small, tired smile: "... Yeah. Guess I am, too."