Can we please get some bodyguard au content? Preferably some fluff. I've had a rough week and I love those two.
I'm nothing if not accommodating so...here you go. 11k of fluff.
Kinda :)
//\\
WEEK ONE - FRANCE
Time stops obeying the rules. Life shrinks to 90 minute increments, Natasha’s feeding cycle, and everything else gets crammed into the spaces between. Sleep, showers, food, coherent thought…optional. Mostly forgotten.
Between the days of labor and the nightmare of now having three kids under five at home, Kate doesn’t know when she last slept properly. She doesn’t think Yelena does either. Yet her wife still manages to do everything. Too much, always. She hasn’t had actual rest in days. Just passes out in pieces, ten minute micro-naps between toddler chaos and newborn cluster feeds. She crashes wherever she lands: curled on the couch, a burp rag on her shoulder, a pacifier somewhere in her hoodie pocket.
Kate often finds her like that. One arm curved around the baby. The other flopped over the edge of the couch, like she meant to get up and never made it.
Yelena claims she can't sleep, says it like fact, like biology. “I’m fine,” she insists when Kate begs her to go lie down. Which might be true, if “fine” means running on caffeine pills, maternal adrenaline, and the fact that this tiny newborn only wants her.
Natasha refuses the bassinet. Refuses Kate’s chest. Barely tolerates a bed, and only then if Yelena’s body is touching hers. But Yelena? Yelena she sleeps on, stone still for hours, like she’s trying to reenter the womb. Melted into her mother’s ribs, cheek flattened to her collarbone, fingers gripping her tank top with newborn death strength.
Kate pretends it doesn’t bother her. She definitely doesn’t sulk about it. And when she does, it’s silent and dignified. It would all be poetic if Kate didn’t feel like chopped liver wrapped in a nursing bra.
She gets the feeds. Of course she does. The middle-of-the-night sobbing-in-the-dark ones. The white noise machine and “why is she still crying” feeds. The cracked nipple, spit up down the shirt, hunched on the couch like a cryptid feeds.
But naps? Naps belong to Yelena.
That’s where Kate assumes Natasha is when she peels herself out of bed at 5:04AM, breasts overfull, sore, and way past eating time.
She shuffles barefoot into the living room wearing nothing but a damp bra and Yelena’s flannel pajama pants. Too short on her legs, but oh so soft. The house smells like coffee. Real coffee. Not the decaf bullshit Yelena usually pushes when Kate’s pregnant or nursing. The actual thing. Probably made under duress because if Kate can't have coffee neither can anyone else in the house, but someone clearly made an executive decision overnight. Someone who was up pacing with a colicky baby and said fuck it.
Kate finds them where she always finds them: the couch. Yelena reclined into the corner, too upright to be comfortable but too exhausted to care. Natasha sprawled across her chest like a sleepy burrito, one arm wormed out, hand latched to Yelena’s tank like it’s her birthright.
Kate crosses her arms. Glares.
“She won’t do that for me,” she mutters.
The baby sighs, shifts. Yelena, eyes barely cracked, adjusts her instinctively. Moves her without thinking, like she’s memorized her weight. Kate glares harder.
“You’re cheating.”
Yelena’s voice comes gravel rough, thick with sleep. “I’m mostly unconscious. How could I be cheating?”
Kate tiptoes closer. Natasha’s face is smushed into Yelena’s collarbone. Her tiny lips part, a dried milk blister under her nose. A dimple. On the left cheek. That one’s new.
“She won’t sleep on me like that.”
“She will.”
“She screams when she’s not on you.”
“It's not as pleasant as you're making it sound. My lower back promises.”
Kate brushes a blonde tuft of baby hair from Natasha’s forehead. “I carried her for nine months.”
“And she repaid you by being cute as fuck. You’re welcome.”
Kate flops down beside them, body aching in ways language hasn’t caught up to yet. The kind of deep bone ache that only hits when you finally sit still.
She’s healing. Technically. Bleeding less. Crying more. Her boobs are a war zone. But she can at least be vertical. Showering most days. Laughing, sometimes. That’s something.
Natasha is barely a person. Barely five days old. Just a squeaky, goat noise blur who smells like milk and some impossible sweetness that makes Kate ache.
She looks nothing like Mila, who’s all Kate. This one is all Eleanor which means she’s also all Yelena. Blonde, pale, with that underlying sternness Kate would recognize anywhere. Kate is starting to take the resemblance personally.
“She’s ungrateful. You’re not even the food source.”
Yelena let out something halfway between a snort and a groan in response. That only irked Kate more.
Kate tries to lift the baby from Yelena’s chest. Yelena’s hand covers Natasha’s back, anchoring her.
“She likes where she is.”
“She also liked being inside me. Doesn’t mean it was sustainable.” Kate leans against her wife’s shoulder, snuggles into her heat. “I’m right here,” she stage whispers to the baby. “I’m literally your factory. And yet.”
“I think she just likes my heartbeat.”
Kate frowns. “I made her heartbeat.”
Yelena tilts her forehead to Kate’s. Soft. Solid. Unmoving.
“I know.”
The baby squints one eye, looks at Kate for a mere second, then closes it again. Nuzzles back into Yelena’s chest.
Kate throws her hands up. “Unreal. I wreck my nipples for her. Let my vagina become a clown car. And now I don’t even get to hold her because you’re…squishier?”
Yelena doesn’t open her eyes. “Do you actually want her?”
Kate hesitates. “Does she want ME?”
“Go with mommy for a bit.”
Yelena attempts a handoff. Natasha protests. Loudly. Kate groans, stands, and stomps toward the kitchen…though it’s more of a shuffle seeing as everything below her belly button is still tender.
Behind her, Yelena calls: “She loves you. In a nutritional way.”
“Fuck you.”
“I’ll let you if you don’t wake her up.” Yelena adds as a barely-there smile appears on her face while her eyes close again.
From the hallway, Ellie appears in a princess nightgown and tiara. Her hair is tangled. Emanating far too much energy for this time of night.
“You should be asleep.” Yelena say, unmoving. Doesn’t even open her eyes.
“Can Natasha have a crown?”
“No,” Yelena and Kate declare at the same time from separate rooms.
Ellie has been an angel since her little sister was born. A hyper-verbal, over-empathetic, still-slightly-feral angel. She’s also beyond obsessed with the baby. Full-blown, cannot-be-trusted-around-the-infant obsessed.
She’s gentle, mostly. Overwhelmingly excited. Likes to sing lullabies that are 80% gibberish and 20% Elsa. She insists on brushing Natasha’s full head of hair every morning. She demands to sit next to whoever is holding the baby and narrating everything like she’s a very tiny royal.
“This is Natasha,” she tells her doll with authority. “She can’t do anything yet. But she’s nice.”
“Oh, she’s beautiful,” she makes the doll reply kindly.
“Yes. Because Mommy made her.”
Ellie wants to help with everything. She brings Kate water during feeds, fetches burp cloths like it’s a sacred duty, and gently pets Natasha’s hair while whispering things like, “You’re MY baby now, okay?”
Ellie invents songs for the newborn. Tries to teach her colors. Asks daily if the baby can play yet. Kate doesn’t have the heart to tell her how long that's going to take.
Ellie rushes over to where Yelena holds the tiny, scrunched up human with a beaming smile on her face. She leans in close, examines her little sister’s face.
“But she’s a queen. Queens have crowns.” The girl retorts while trying to place the oversized crown on the sleeping baby. Yelena twists away to stop her from placing the hard plastic on the baby’s non-existent skull.
“She’s a soft spot with VERY SHARP nails. She doesn’t need accessories yet. Go back to bed, please.”
“I’m not tired.”
“Eleanor…” Kate pops her head out of the kitchen. When the child doesn’t move, Kate raises her eyebrows. “…Bed.”
“Can I play with her?”
“No.” Her mothers retort in unison once again.
The blonde girl studies them, holds her ground firmly.
“I’m not tired.”
“I’ll read you something in five. Go, please.”
Ellie huffs, stomps back down the hallway.
Kate comes back with her steaming mug. Watches Yelena, smile softening. That’s hers. The woman half asleep on the couch with their brand new human.
“God,” she whispers. “You’re a goner.”
Yelena kisses the baby’s head, eyes still closed. Doesn’t argue.
Kate leans against the wall and watches her for a long beat. “You’re so good at this.”
Yelena makes an effort to open her eyes and looks over at her wife leaning against the wall, staring at her.
“So are you.”
Kate breathes that in. The rise and fall of Natasha’s chest. Yelena’s hand cupping her whole back like she’s glass.
“You wanna switch?” Kate asks before taking a sip.
“Desperately.”
Kate takes an extra long sip before setting her mug down and carefully attempting another transfer. Natasha frowns, shifts, doesn’t scream. Yelena slumps deeper into the couch.
“You go sleep too,” Kate murmurs. “I got ‘em.”
After a beat, Yelena musters enough energy to stand and kisses Kate's lips on her way to the bedroom. Yelena hasn't even made it all the way to the bed before Natasha screeches from the living room.
"Oh, come on…” Yelena hears Kate grouse right as she does a one-eighty and heads back to the living room.
—
Mila is not pleased. She wasn’t pleased six days ago when they introduced her to her little sister. She’s not pleased now. She may never be pleased again.
The little brunette stalks the house with a pout that could level governments. She throws herself on the floor any time Kate picks up the baby. If Yelena’s holding Natasha, Mila must be on her lap. Must be. There's no compromise. If there's a lap in use and she's not in it, it's the end of the world.
So Mila stages a coup.
She doesn’t have the language for it yet, but the intention is crystal clear. A rebellion. Full toddler tyranny. Because apparently, Mila has decided that any time Natasha is being held, Mila must also be held. Immediately. No exceptions.
She clambers into laps with the grace of a drunk spider monkey, launches herself into arms mid-sentence, and physically wedges her entire body between any adult and the baby. If Kate is feeding, Mila is climbing. If Yelena is burping, Mila is tackling knees and screaming “UP! UP! UP!” until someone breaks.
Which is exactly the situation they’re in now.
“Up,” Mila demands as Kate tries to nurse on the couch.
“I got the baby right now, honey.”
“Up!”
Kate sighs. “You’re literally sitting on my foot. How much closer can you get?”
Mila scales her like a jungle gym, wedges under the baby, and plants her cheek against Kate’s thigh with a defiant glare aimed directly at Natasha.
“I’m going to sell her,” Kate mutters.
“She’s very cute. We might get good money,” Yelena says serenely, pulling Mila off her wife and into her own lap.
Mila smashes her body into Yelena’s torso and wails.
Kate rolls her eyes, unlatches the baby who was already done feeding, and passes her to Yelena, who begins to burp her.
“NO MAMA! MILA UP!”
Kate groans, hoists Mila onto her lap now. Her back screams in protest. Her core, still shredded from labor, threatens mutiny.
“MAMA! ME!”
Mila snuggles in, clutching Kate’s hair while glaring at the baby with renewed vengeance. Mila abruptly hops off the couch and rushes to Yelena.
“Up, Mama!”
Whatever Yelena answers in firm Russian makes Mila backpedal immediately. She sulks her way back to Kate, eyes still burning with silent murder toward her little sister.
That evidently disgruntled glare screams: ‘I see you, interloper. And I will have my revenge.’
Ellie wanders in and hands Mila a doll, expertly diffusing the toddler murder plot.
But even with Ellie’s help, the cracks are showing. Probably in part due to Mila’s emotional terrorism.
Kate’s body is still bleeding. Still sore. Her legs and ribs continue to throb from the hours of pushing. Her sleep debt is biblical. She’s cried four times already and it’s not even lunch.
Then Natasha starts wailing again. Kate’s boobs leak. Mila screams for juice she’s not allowed to have. And Kate breaks.
“I want to go home,” she whispers, eyes burning.
Yelena turns, studies her, rocking the baby against her chest. Kate means it.
“Okay,” Yelena agrees softly. “Okay…Let’s go home.”
She’s in motion within minutes. Calls their pilot. Arranges the flight. Starts packing the baby essentials in neat little piles beside the white noise machine in case of in-air meltdowns.
They’ve been gone for nine months. It was supposed to be a few weeks and turned into seasons. But they’re ready now. Or maybe not. But they can’t hide anymore.
—
The villa looks dimmer the next morning. Like it already knows.
Kate doesn’t cry. Much.
She helps Ellie wave goodbye to the lavender. They thank the sheep. Mila insists on kissing the gate goodbye. No one stops her. Kate tries not to sob as they walk through the door one final time.
By afternoon, Yelena is helping the driver load suitcases while Kate re-tucks Natasha into the wrap carrier, her tiny face pressed to her chest.
“She won’t sleep like that,” Yelena warns.
“She will,” Kate insists.
Natasha squirms. Her mouth opens. A whimper starts to build. Kate sighs and hands her over. Yelena takes her, folds her in, and the baby goes instantly limp.
Kate glares. “Unbelievable.”
Yelena grins. “I’m her mattress.”
Kate stomps toward the car. “Well I fuck her mattress,” she mutters.
Ellie and Mila skip after her.
—
They make it exactly forty-two minutes into the flight before Mila pees through her second pair of leggings, Ellie spills her juice, and Natasha starts crying for absolutely no reason except that she is not currently in direct contact with Yelena’s body.
Kate reaches across Yelena’s lap, lifts the baby from the bassinet anyway. “Give her to me. Rest. I’ll hold her.”
Yelena doesn’t argue. Just shrugs and lets Kate take over. Kate half expects the baby to scream in protest mid-air.
For a moment, all is well. Natasha blinks up at her with those unfocused green eyes. Makes a soft snuffling sound. Nuzzles her neck. Kate breathes, long and deep, like it’s the first real inhale in days.
Then the writhing starts.
Not full-on screaming at first, just that squirmy, ominous buildup. Could be gas. Could be rage. Could be nothing. Kate adjusts. Swings side to side. Whispers something soothing.
Natasha’s mouth curls. Her eyes squeeze shut. Her whole body twists like she’s being exorcised.
Kate stands. Walks the aisle. Bounces. Hums. Tries the yoga breath thing her doula had insisted “babies respond to”. Nothing helps. The cries sharpen, raw and accusatory. Like Kate has personally offended her.
From the couch, Yelena watches with one eye open. Ellie snores beside her. Mila is passed out with one of Yelena’s boots under her cheek.
Kate stops bouncing. “She’s not hungry,” she says, sharper than she meant.
Yelena just holds out her arms. Kate hesitates. Then, sighing, surrenders the baby.
The second Natasha hits Yelena’s chest, she goes still.
Kate slumps into a seat. Says nothing. Watches the window.
—
Natasha sleeps the rest of the flight on Yelena like she’s never belonged anywhere else.
Mila draws on her own leg with a smuggled marker. Ellie asks to meet the pilot. Kate eats half a croissant and cries at a paper towel commercial playing on the in-flight screen.
It’s chaos. It’s quiet. It’s theirs. But…it won't be long until it isn't anymore.
Yelena’s phone buzzes. Then again. And again.
Kate knows the rhythm. Sharp, short bursts. The kind of buzz that means something. Back in the day, she memorized every alert Yelena assigned to her team.
This one means ‘heads up’.
Yelena unlocks her phone. Her body shifts. Nothing dramatic. Just a change in posture. A hardening of the jaw. A familiar steel creeping back in. Kate feels it before she sees it.
She straightens. “What?”
Yelena keeps reading. Cradles the baby in one arm, already dialing with the other.
“We’re not going home.”
Kate blinks. “What?”
Yelena murmurs rapid Russian into the phone. Ends the call. Finally looks up.
“Leak. Paparazzi are staking out the house. One of the neighbors let them onto their property. There’s a fucking drone.”
Kate’s mouth opens. “We haven’t told anyone.”
“Doesn’t matter. Someone at the airport. Driver. Flight crew. Someone tipped them. A blurry photo hit Twitter an hour ago. They’re dissecting our body parts in reflections.”
Kate rubs her face. “Jesus.”
“I’m diverting us to Big Bear. I’ll have the team clean the house, get it stocked and locked down. We wait this out.”
Kate wants to say: ‘Can’t we just go home anyway?’ But one glance at Yelena stops her.
The softness from France is still there. Now buried. But not gone.
Kate folds her arms. Watches the baby sleep. Watches the woman holding her slip quietly, completely, back into soldier mode.
“I miss France,” she mutters.
Yelena says nothing.
//\//\\
WEEK TWO - BIG BEAR
By the time they land at the small regional airport and make the drive, it’s already the middle of the night.
Their Big Bear house hasn’t been used in almost eighteen months, but it’s immaculate when they arrive. Someone has gone ahead, cleaned everything, and done a full security sweep before they even touched the ground.
It’s cold, but the heat kicks on before they reach the door. A fire waits in the hearth, already burning. The fridge is full. Diapers are stocked in every size. There’s formula they don’t need and organic oatmeal in the pantry with Mila’s name written on it. It’s impressive (and more than a little sexy to Kate) what her wife can make happen with just a phone and thirteen hours of flying time.
Yelena sets Natasha in her bassinet before beginning her own sweep. It isn’t that she doesn’t trust her team. It’s that, since the bombing, she doesn’t trust anyone completely. Not with Kate’s life. Not with their girls’.
The moment the baby is down, Mila lunges.
“No,” Kate says, catching her mid-pounce. “We talked about this. Gentle hands. We’re not jumping on the baby.”
“Up!” Mila wriggles, voice cracking with toddler outrage.
Kate blocks her with her whole body. “No up. She’s sleeping. You should be too.”
Mila throws herself backward onto the carpet in protest. Screams. Kicks. Ellie peers over the couch like she’s narrating a nature documentary.
“She’s loud,” Ellie observes.
“This whole family is.”
“I’m cute-loud.”
Kate doesn’t have the energy to debate.
Yelena reenters from outside, the duffel that was left in the SUV on one shoulder and a diaper bag on the other. She pauses long enough to shuffle both bags into one hand and scoop a still shrieking Mila off the floor, then redirects her to the toy corner with a packet of fruit snacks. Instant silence. She’s pouting, but chewing.
As Yelena works her quiet magic, Natasha begins to fuss. Hates being down. Hates not being on her favorite person. Yelena lifts her, settles her, and the baby melts into her shoulder like a switch flipped.
Kate stands there, hands on her hips. Her body is heavy and strange. Her heart hurts in small, stupid ways.
“Why do our children hate me?”
Yelena chuckles. Kisses her once, quick and soft. “She’s two. She hates everyone.”
Kate follows her into the kitchen, still sulking. “What about the new one? Hmmm?” she snaps, louder than she means.
Yelena turns. Calm. Quiet. Solid in that way she always is when Kate feels least steady. “She’ll want you too…Eventually.”
“Yeah? When?”
Yelena steps close. Presses another kiss to Kate’s frowny lips. Loving. Patient. Irritatingly calm. “I love you. But you’re being a little crazy.”
Kate doesn’t answer. She’s starting to feel crazy too, but has no idea how to verbalize the haze overtaking her mind.
—
When the house finally goes still, Kate stands in the dark hallway outside Ellie’s room. Both girls are crammed into the tiny twin bed when they each have their own perfectly good ones. Mila snores. Ellie mumbles in her sleep the same way Yelena does. It should be peaceful. It feels like defeat.
She moves to the nursery.
Yelena sways in the rocking chair, hair messy, hoodie stained with something unidentifiable, head tipped back. Natasha sleeps against her chest, mouth open, fist under her chin. Yelena’s hand rests protectively across the baby’s back, her thumb tracing small, unconscious circles.
Kate stops in the doorway. Watches them for a long time.
She knows this version of Yelena. Delicate. Sleepless. Reverent. The kind of awe that feels holy. She’s seen it before, with Ellie. With Mila. But this time it’s different. This time it feels like Yelena cracked open something ancient inside herself and let it pour out.
Kate pads closer. Leans down. Kisses Natasha’s forehead. The baby stirs, sighs, then settles again. The smell of her milk-sweet skin nearly undoes her.
Kate’s throat burns. Her chest feels hollow and tight at once.
“You get all the good bits,” she whispers into Yelena’s temple as she presses her lips to her wife’s warm skin.
Yelena’s hand finds hers without looking. Fingers twine. A silent tether.
They rock together. No words. The fire in the other room fades. Mila now also mumbles nonsense in her sleep. The world is dim and still. Kate’s back aches. Her body feels foreign. Her heart feels fragile. And something deep in her…something that’s been barely holding together…starts to slip.
The baby stirs again. Kicks once. Grunts.
Yelena winces. Groans. “You want to take her?”
Kate reaches down. Lifts her gently.
The baby screams.
Kate freezes. Hands her back.
“Nevermind.”
Yelena smirks weakly, exhausted. The baby’s cries stop the instant she’s against her chest again. Kate watches them, standing there in the half-light, feeling something too complicated to name. Not just envy. Not just sadness. Something heavier. Something that tastes like loss, even though everything she loves is right here.
She goes to bed alone. The sheets are cold. The pillow smells like Yelena. And for the first time since giving birth, Kate wonders if maybe she isn’t built for this part of motherhood…the waiting to be wanted.
—
Yelena doesn’t pace unless something’s wrong.
Today, she’s halfway down the long upstairs hallway for the third time in under five minutes, boots from their morning walk still on, baby strapped against her chest, voice clipped and cold in Russian as she hisses into her earbuds. Natasha is fast asleep, tiny cheek smashed flat against Yelena’s sternum, wrapped tight and secure, barely stirring. The baby doesn’t notice how her mother’s whole body is tense. Doesn’t clock the slight twitch in her jaw that only shows up when Yelena’s deciding whether someone needs to be fired or not.
The house is quiet except for the faint noise of an iPad left playing bleeding out from under Ellie’s door. Everyone else is napping. Or should be.
“Four hours,” Yelena grits in Russian, low and furious. “Four hours between when that motion alert went off and when you pulled the footage.”
The man on the other end tries to respond, his voice tinny and nervous. Yelena listens for three seconds. Then cuts him off with a disgusted, “I don’t care. Handle it. Then call me back and tell me you did. And if you can’t, don’t call at all.”
She ends the call, swipes to the next message, doesn’t even pause.
Kate appears before the second call connects.
Silent. Barefoot. Hoodie half-draped like she gave up midway through getting dressed. Her hair’s wet, damp strands stuck to her forehead, curled at her collarbone. There’s a mug in her hand.
Yelena doesn’t notice her until Kate is right there. A breath away. Kate doesn’t say a word. Just lifts the mug, slow, and presses it gently into her palm.
Black. No sugar. Still hot.
Kate’s fingers skim Yelena’s wrist. A soft squeeze. Then she turns and walks away. Not a single word exchanged.
Yelena stands frozen, call still ringing in her ear, as she watches Kate disappear back down the stairs.
Thirty seconds later, she finally lifts the cup to her lips. It’s perfect. Exactly the way she takes it. No cream. No sweetness. Bitter as the mood she’s in.
She never asked for it. Kate never asks if she should.
Which is the only reason Yelena knows: she’s watching her.
Not the kind of watching people do when they’re nosy or paranoid. The kind you do when you’re trying to decode something you love but don’t understand anymore. When you're desperate to solve something before it fractures.
Downstairs, a cupboard creaks open. A drawer slides. Then nothing.
Yelena huffs through her nose and takes another sip.
She handled twenty-nine active threats across her years of field deployment. She once disarmed a bomb with nothing but wire cutters and a flashlight. She broke her femur falling off a roof and still finished the mission.
None of that prepared her for whatever is going on with Kate. Because Kate is trying so hard. Trying to be present. Trying to be good. Trying to stay soft.
And failing.
Yelena saw it in her eyes this morning when she couldn’t remember if she’d brushed her teeth. When she stood at the sink with a washcloth in one hand and stared blankly at the wall like the thought had slipped through a hole in her skull. When Mila dropped her stuffed bird in a backyard puddle and Kate just…cried.
The baby stirs against her chest.
Yelena adjusts, presses her lips to Natasha’s head. The second call goes through. Another team lead this time.
“Tell me you fixed it,” she says.
But her heart’s not in it anymore. It’s still in the kitchen. Still curled in the shape of a girl with wet hair and a half-on hoodie, too quiet for how loud her brain must be.
—
The kitchen smells like soap and damp formula. Steam fogs the window above the sink. Kate’s hovers by the sink in sweats, sleeves pushed to her elbows, hair scraped up and half falling out again. There’s a bottle nipple clutched in one hand and the ring that’s supposed to hold it in the other, and they refuse to screw together.
“Of course,” she mutters. “Why would it fit? Nothing fits.”
Yelena crosses behind her toward the fridge. “What doesn’t fit?”
“Anything.”
Kate sets the bottle down hard enough to make it clatter. “I can’t even get a fucking bra to cooperate. Every time I move, it slides down like it’s trying to make a run for it. I smell like sour milk. And soap. And…”
She’s not crying, but her eyes look wet. She laughs once, bitter, and shakes her head. “You ever just feel disgusting?”
Yelena leans against the counter. “No.”
Kate shoots her a look.
“Neither should you,” Yelena says simply, reaching into the bowl on the counter and plucking a grape. She pops it into her mouth, chews, swallows. Then she gives Kate a long, measured look…up from the damp curls at her neck to the curve of her back bent over the sink. A slow, obvious once-over. “Still would.”
Kate turns, caught off guard. “What?”
Yelena shrugs. “You’re not disgusting, Kate. You’re the hottest thing in here.”
Kate laughs once, disbelieving. “Easy when the room is full of crusty bottles and baby vomit.” Kate stares at Yelena. There’s no smirk. No flush. Just a deadpan stare over her shoulder and a beat before she quietly adds: “You haven’t touched me in two weeks.”
Now the air shifts. The ease drains out of it.
“You had a baby two weeks ago.”
Kate turns fully now. Bottle parts clatter into the sink.
“So?”
Yelena studies her face. Sees what’s under it. The tremor. The question that isn’t about sex at all. She crosses to her slowly. Close enough that Kate has to look down at her.
“You want me to fuck you over a changing table?” Yelena adds with a smirk, trying to lighten the mood.
Kate’s eyes flick down. “I’m not not saying that.” Her voice wobbles on the last word.
It’s not a joke, even though it should be. Even though a version of her might’ve meant it that way. But now it just hangs there…raw, offbeat, too much.
She doesn’t want sex. She doesn’t even want to be touched. Her skin doesn’t feel like skin anymore. It feels borrowed. Overused. The thought of peeling her clothes off for anyone makes her stomach knot. But what she remembers, what her body remembers, is what it feels like to be wanted. Desired with a kind of reverence that only Yelena has ever made real. Sex with her never felt like performance. It felt like gravity. Like being caught. And right now, untethered and half-invisible in her own home, Kate needs said gravity.
Yelena watches her for a long moment. Eyes scanning again…not with hunger, but with something sharper. Recognition.
She presses against her wife. Slips the bottle out of Kate’s hand. Sets it gently in the sink as her smile softens.
“Let me put El and Mil down for a nap,” she murmurs while pressing a kiss to Kate’s neck. “Twenty minutes.”
They don’t make it that long. Yelena’s proximity cracks something inside Kate. She yanks her wife into the laundry room, arms locked around her waist before the door even clicks shut. There’s no grace to it. No ease. Just need…messy and instinctive…and the quiet, frantic press of lips that don’t quite know how to ask for help.
Yelena lets Kate lead. Understands she needs to. Doesn’t try to turn it into something more than it is. Just holds her. She lets Kate press her back against the cool metal of the washing machine. Lets Kate’s hands roam, trembling, desperate, unsure of what they’re even reaching for.
The kiss isn’t hot. It’s hollow. And Kate knows it. Feels it. But keeps kissing anyway, like if she can just get the angle right, the weight right, something might click into place. That she’ll remember how to be a person again if Yelena touches her like she used to.
Yelena breaks away for a beat. Presses her forehead to Kate’s. Breath shaky.
“You with me?”
Kate’s eyes flutter open.
“No,” she says. Honest. Bare.
But she doesn’t let go.
Yelena’s hand comes up to cradle the back of her neck. “Okay,” she whispers. “That’s okay.”
Kate presses her lips against Yelena’s again. Desperation emating from her every move. Her hand slips under Yelena’s top then…
The door creaks behind them.
“Mommy, Mila…” Ellie, blanket dragging, blinking blearily. “Oh. Are you playing the hugging game?”
Kate startles. Yelena freezes. Kate almost lets out a frustrated ‘fuck’ but catches it just in time.
Yelena, somehow unbothered, breathes a laugh and pulls her shirt down. “Yeah,” she says smoothly. “Hugging game.”
Ellie considers that.
“Can I have a turn?”
Kate opens her mouth. Nothing comes out. She looks to Yelena for backup.
Yelena nods solemnly. “Of course. But only the very best huggers get turns.”
Kate doesn’t move. Her arms still around Yelena. Her breath stuttering. Yelena locks eyes with her, offering a silent apology then slips out from between Kate and the washing machine and lifts their daugther into a hug.
The hugging game had started a little over two years ago, after the third time Ellie caught them having sex.
The first time, they froze like deer in headlights, mid-kitchen hookup, and tried to pass it off as a wrestling match. The second time, Kate panicked and yelled “SURPRISE!” loud enough to make Ellie cry. The third time, Yelena took a beat, smiled calmly, and said, “Oh no. You caught us. We were…uh…playing the hugging game.”
Ellie, almost three and deeply invested in the moral structure of turn-based systems, had immediately demanded a round of her own. Ever since, it had become an accidental family code. Any time someone walked in at an inopportune moment…hastily rearranged clothing, tousled hair, guilty expressions…it was always: hugging game. Now it was muscle memory.
After a beat, Kate feels Yelena’s toned arms wrap around her waist. Feels their daugther trapped between their bodies. Hears Ellie’s quiet laugh. Feels her wife’s pull her as close as she can with a child between them.
And for the first time in hours, maybe days, Kate’s knees stop shaking.
—
The screaming wakes Yelena.
For a moment she thinks it’s the baby. But the baby nuzzled against her is sound asleep. The sound’s coming from the main bedroom. Lower. Raw.
Kate.
Yelena sets the baby down in the crib before she even registers the movement. She’s sprinting through the dark, bare feet silent against the wood. She’s next to the bed in seconds, crouched low, her face level with Kate’s.
Kate’s locked up. Every muscle rigid. Fists clenched, throat tight, body coiled like she’s bracing for impact.
“I’m here,” Yelena whispers. “I’m right here, Kate. You’re safe.”
No response. Just that shallow, panicked breathing. The sound of someone halfway between fight and flight.
Yelena doesn’t touch her yet. She’s learned not to. She just stays close, breathing slow and even, syncing their rhythm the way she’s done a hundred times before.
“Nightmare?” she asks quietly.
Kate nods once. Barely.
“Shooting?”
A shake.
“Bombing?”
Another nod.
Yelena exhales through her nose. Lets her hand hover before lowering it, carefully, onto Kate’s knee. Kate doesn’t flinch. Just swallows, blinking fast, eyes darting around the room like she’s checking for exits.
“It’s the Big Bear house. You’re home. Okay? Just a dream.”
Kate blinks again. Tries to focus on her voice. Her breathing starts to slow.
Yelena waits. Doesn’t move. Just stays kneeling by the bed, watching her wife slowly come back from wherever her mind had sent her. Finally, Kate loosens. Her shoulders drop an inch. Her hands unclench. Yelena brushes a strand of jet black hair from her forehead.
“There you are.”
Kate stares at the ceiling. Voice small. “I hate this.”
“I know.”
“I should be better by now.” She swallows. “I’m sorry. Did I wake you up?”
Yelena shakes her head. “I have nightmares from long before that day. You never let me apologize for them. So don’t.”
That cracks something open. Kate turns her head toward her, eyes wet and wide. The moonlight cuts across Yelena’s face…all sharp lines and quiet patience…and that’s what undoes her. The sight of someone moored when she isn’t.
She starts to cry. Not loud. Just broken.
Yelena’s on her feet instantly, circling the bed, sliding in beside her on the empty half. She pulls Kate into her chest, holds her there. Lets her sob until the shuddering slows.
In the nursery, Natasha starts to fuss. The soft, rising cry of a baby who’s realized her favorite heartbeat isn’t nearby.
Kate’s voice comes out in fragments. “Go get her.”
Yelena doesn’t move. Tightens her hold. “She’s fine for a bit.”
Kate shakes her head weakly. “She wants you.”
“I want you.”
That only makes Kate cry harder.
Her face presses into Yelena’s shoulder, the words muffled against her skin. “Stupid fucking hormones. I feel like I’m underwater. Like I’m watching someone else do my life. And it’s a nice life, I know that, I do. But it doesn’t feel like mine.”
Yelena doesn’t try to fix it. Doesn’t tell her it’ll pass. She just holds her tighter.
Kate’s body is trembling. Not from fear anymore, from exhaustion. From all the ways she’s stretched thin. From loving everything she’s supposed to love and still feeling hollow.
Yelena presses her lips to the top of her head. Kate presses deeper into Yelena, eyes open, staring into the dark.
The baby cries again. Louder now. Yelena doesn’t move. Neither does Kate.
And for a long moment, the house is just that: the sound of a baby calling, a mother breathing, and a woman trying to remember how to be whole.
//\//\\
WEEK THREE
The newborn novelty wears off somewhere around the twelfth diaper blowout.
They’re still in Big Bear. Still technically “off-grid”. Still hiding. But the house feels smaller now. The air thicker. The fridge less magical without the sorcery of a french private chef who restocks them with everyone’s favorites. No lavender fields here. Just pine trees and a half-cleared trail behind the cabin that Ellie insists is full of lions.
Kate still hasn’t slept more than three hours in a row and it’s not even the baby keeping her up anymore. Natasha still screams if Yelena’s not in her line of sight. Mila has figured out how to climb onto the kitchen counters. Ellie won’t stop asking when they’re going to their “real home”.
And Yelena is still trying to do everything.
Kate watches her sometimes. Holding the baby in one arm, unloading groceries with the other, swaying without even noticing it to keep Natasha soothed. She used to find that kind of efficiency hot. Now it just makes her feel obsolete.
She tries. Breastfeeds when Natasha will take it. Pumps when she won’t. But the baby wants Yelena. Mila’s clingier than ever, whiny in a way she never was before, crawling into laps she used to ignore. Kate’s lap? Sometimes. But mostly Yelena’s.
One morning, Kate walks downstairs and finds all four of them passed out on the couch. Yelena on her back, Natasha stretched across her chest, Mila curled into her hip like a barnacle, and Ellie draped across both of them with a juice-stained blanket over her legs. There’s a sippy cup jammed under Yelena’s thigh. A swaddle tossed over her shoulder like a cape. Her mouth slightly open. Hair in a half-fallen bun. She looks like hell.
She also looks like she was built for this.
Kate almost takes a picture. She decides to be useful instead. She walks into the kitchen and tries to make breakfast. Eggs. She burns all of them.
Later, when the kids are momentarily occupied…Ellie with a coloring book, Mila chewing on a wooden block like it owes her money, Natasha asleep in the wrap across Yelena’s chest…Kate leans against the counter and murmurs, too quiet:
“I think I forgot how to be your wife. How to be me.”
Yelena doesn’t look up from the carrots she’s chopping.
“You haven’t. You’re exhausted and a little overwhelmed. But we’ll be over the hump soon. They don’t stay this little forever.”
Kate blinks. Her eyes fill with tears.
“I miss you.”
Yelena finally lifts her gaze. Meets her eyes.
There’s no kiss. No swelling romantic moment. They’re both sticky with breast milk and marker and whatever was in Mila’s hands last. But Yelena reaches across the counter. Fingers brush Kate’s wrist.
“I haven’t gone anywhere, Kate Bishop. I think we just have our hands a little full. But I’m still here. And you’re still here.” She tugs gently, just enough to bring her closer, and pecks her once. Soft. Solid. “It’s just the newborn chaos. All we gotta do is wait it out.”
Kate nods. Tries not to cry.
That night she dreams she’s onstage again. Spotlights blind her. Applause swells. There’s a mic in her hand and nothing behind her ribs. No voice. No breath. No words. Just static.
She wakes up tangled in sheets. Guilty for dreaming of being elsewhere. Angry for waking up alone.
Yelena’s not in bed.
Kate finds her in the nursery. Asleep in the rocking chair, still rocking somehow. Natasha heavy on her chest, one tiny fist curled in the neck of Yelena’s shirt.
Kate tiptoes in. Tries to help. Picks up the half-empty bottle from the floor. Moves to tuck the blanket tighter around them both.
Then she sees it.
The way Yelena’s hand is curled around the baby’s back, even in sleep. Her brow is furrowed. Her feet are braced. Even now, asleep, her body is still in protection mode.
Kate doesn’t touch her. Just slides down to the floor beside the chair and stays there. Knees pulled to her chest. Breath shallow. She watches them sleep and cries quietly into the blanket bunched in her lap. The white noise machine hums softly. Natasha stirs once. Yelena shushes her without waking.
Kate doesn’t move. Her back starts to ache. Her neck twinges. She stays anyway.
This, she thinks. This is what love really looks like. Not the glossy red carpet shots or the syrupy declarations. This. Just…staying.
—
Mila throws a block at Ellie the next morning. Kate doesn’t see what starts it. Maybe Ellie used the wrong spoon. Maybe she dared to look at the same toy. Either way, Ellie shrieks and Mila starts crying immediately. Loud, furious tears, more about wanting to stay out of trouble than remorse.
Yelena appears from the kitchen without being called. Lifts Mila with one arm, places her in timeout without a word, and returns with a bag of frozen peas for Ellie’s forehead.
Kate watches the whole thing happen like a practiced routine.
“I don’t know how you do that,” she mutters, bouncing a crying Ellie on her hip.
“Do what?”
“Keep them alive without losing your mind.”
Yelena raises an eyebrow. “Who says I haven’t?”
Kate smirks. But only for a second. Then her voice goes flat again.
“I miss you.”
Yelena’s smile drops.
“I haven’t gone anywhere.” Yelena reiterates what she said the night before.
“No. But you’re…in the trenches. Holding the line. And I’m just standing behind you, feeling useless. I miss us. The old us. When we had time. When it was just you and me.”
They stare at each other over the top of Ellie’s head. In the distance, Natasha starts to cry.
Kate sighs. “Go.”
Yelena does.
—
That night, they still don’t have sex. They don’t cuddle.
When Yelena finally gets to bed, Kate is already there. Curled around a pillow like it’s the only thing keeping her together.
Yelena lays Natasha in the bassinet, leans over, kisses Kate’s temple, then climbs in behind her. She presses her forehead to the back of Kate’s neck. Wraps her arms around her. Breathes her in.
Kate closes her eyes. Tries to memorize the moment. This weight. This heat. This quiet. This tiny, hard-won piece of their life.
The second her shoulders start to loosen, Natasha cries again. Yelena untangles herself and moves to grab the baby.
—
The next morning, Kate wakes up alone.
The house is quiet. Too quiet.
She knows what that means. Yelena has taken the girls with her on her morning walk. Probably strapped one to her chest, pushed the other two into their stroller designed for terrain. Probably left before dawn.
Kate drifts. Paces the empty kitchen. Refills the coffee machine even though it’s already full. Opens the fridge, then closes it.
When she wanders into the bathroom to finally shower, she finds the note stuck to the mirror.
It’s not flowery. It doesn’t say ‘I love you’ but it communicates it either way.
‘Thursday. You. Me. Two hours. No kids. My mom’s driving up.’
Kate reads it three times. She should feel relieved. She should feel grateful. Instead, she grips the edge of the sink and sobs until her legs give out.
—
Kate’s been counting down to this for two days.
Melina shows up with grocery bags of snacks, a planner full of activities, and exactly zero questions about why she’s driving three hours to the middle of nowhere to babysit. She shoos Kate and Yelena out of the house like she’s clocking in for a shift. They don’t hesitate. Yelena grabs Kate’s hand and pulls her toward the SUV with the kind of quiet urgency that almost makes Kate laugh. Almost.
They don’t go far. Just down the trail, across the ridge, to an AirBnB Yelena rented for the day. No cribs. No toys. No baby monitor static. Just a clean bed, four walls, and silence.
They walk into a bottle of wine, a note from the host on the nightstand, two real glasses…no sippy cups…waiting.
For the first time in almost a year, it’s just them.
“There’s a hot tub out ba…”
Yelena doesn’t even get to finish before Kate’s on her. Pushes her back onto the bed, climbs into her lap like her body’s been waiting for clearance to come alive again. Their mouths crash together. Kate’s hands are under Yelena’s shirt before they’ve even said a word. She’s desperate and wired and needy in a way that makes no sense, even to her. But she can’t help it. Her whole body feels like a live wire.
Yelena breaks the kiss just long enough to brush Kate’s hair back and cup her face.
“Hi,” she says softly.
Kate exhales like she’s been holding her breath for weeks. Laughs, breathless. Then kisses her again.
“Hi.”
They fall onto the bed in a tangle. Kate straddling her. Mouths hungry. Breath catching. Shirts are peeled. Pants are half-off. Yelena kisses her like she’s starving. Kate moans into her mouth.
But somewhere in the haze…between kisses and breathless laughter, between Yelena’s hands in her hair and Kate’s thigh grinding slow and firm against her…there’s a lull. Not a stop. Just a shift.
Yelena’s hand slides around Kate’s back and holds her there. Kate exhales into the crook of her neck. Their skin pressed flush, heartbeats syncing. They don’t move. Don’t speak. Kate closes her eyes. Yelena does the same.
Neither of them means to fall asleep. But the stillness wraps around them like a weighted blanket. The silence isn’t lonely…it’s decadent. Their bodies are warm, limbs tangled, breath slow. And just like that, they’re out.
—
Kate wakes first. Groggy. Disoriented. The light in the room’s changed. The wine’s untouched. The clock ticks too loud. Yelena is dead asleep underneath her, one arm slung heavy across Kate’s bare midriff. Kate stiffens.
“Fuck…”
She untangles herself, slides out from under the weight of her wife’s arm, sits up too fast, stares in the mirror across the room like it might offer an answer.
They had time. They had freedom. They were alone. And they fucking slept through it.
Her heart’s pounding. Her chest feels scraped out. Her hands won’t stop trembling.
Kate feels a slow, rising fury. Not just at the wasted time. At herself. At her body. At the overwhelming, numbing sense of failure she can’t name. She knows she’s not mad at Yelena. Not really. She knows they’re both running on fumes. She knows this was supposed to be about rest.
But it still hits like a slap. All that build up. All that anticipation. And now? Now they’ve wasted it.
She paces. Her stomach twists. Then she crashes onto the couch like her body gave up mid-step. She lies there for a long time, alone with the silence she thought she wanted. Pulls the throw blanket around herself and folds into the shape of someone trying not to disappear. Her body aches…not from want anymore. From grief. A kind she doesn’t have a name for.
When Yelena wakes later, Kate’s quiet. Distant. Her face unreadable. Yelena sits up slowly. Rubs at her face. Clocks the unopened bottle. The shift in temperature. The vibe.
“We fell asleep,” Yelena states. Kate doesn’t look at her. Just nods. “I’m sorry,” she offers gently.
Kate shrugs. “I mean…we needed it, right?”
Yelena watches her closely. The blank tone. The clench in her jaw. The way her shoulders twitch like she’s holding back a scream. The way her eyes are glassy but dry. The way she keeps wringing her hands like there’s blood she’s trying to scrub off. Kate’s breaking, but no one’s given her permission to say it out loud.
Kate flips toward the ceiling like she can stare hard enough to make it all go away.
“We finally get time alone and we fucking sleep.”
Yelena crosses the room and lowers herself onto the slim edge of the couch beside her. She doesn’t crowd her. Just sits. Then reaches for Kate’s hand and laces their fingers together.
“I wanted to feel you,” Kate whispers, barely audible.
Yelena feels her throat tighten.
Okay…Okay.
Suddenly, something clicks for Yelena. A knowing. This isn’t only exhaustion or about missed sex or a ruined afternoon off. This is something else. Something deeper. Something darker. Something chemical. Her stomach turns.
Disconnection. Numbness. Guilt like poison…This is postpartum depression. Probably. Possibly.
She doesn’t say a word. Doesn’t shift her weight. Doesn’t let Kate feel seen in a clinical way. She just holds her hand and rubs slow circles into her knuckles.
“I love you,” Yelena declares. “You know that, yeah?”
Kate nods. Doesn’t speak.
Yelena doesn’t let go. In her head, she’s already planning.
If this is what it is, they can’t stay here. Not much longer. Not without help. Not without support. LA has doctors. LA has friends. LA has her mother, Kate’s OB, that therapist who helped Jemma when she spiraled after her mother died.
Kate needs more than rest. Kate needs to be held up until she can stand on her own again. And Yelena’s going to make sure she gets it. Quietly. Completely. Without making her feel like a problem to fix. Yelena will handle it. She’ll handle everything.
Yelena shifts so she’s lying beside Kate. Pulls her close. Their foreheads rest against each other’s. Yelena kisses Kate again, softer this time, and lets her hold on.
Kate’s eyes close anew. But this time, she doesn’t disappear. And Yelena stays wide awake. Thinking. Planning. Holding.
They don’t speak for a long time. But Kate doesn’t let go. And that’s enough. For now.
—
It starts small.
Yelena casually mentions the girls are growing out of everything.
“Mil needs real shoes,” she says, folding a onesie that no longer fits Natasha. “And El’s leggings are basically capris now. We probably could use a coat for Nat too.”
Kate doesn’t refute it. She hasn’t bought herself anything since before the pregnancy so it would make sense the girls haven’t gotten new things either.
The next day, while Kate’s loading the dishwasher, Yelena slides up behind her, wraps her arms around her waist, and places a series of kisses on her neck.
“I was thinking…maybe we do a weekend run to LA. Stock up. Swap out clothes. Just a couple days.”
Kate shrugs. “Sure. Whatever.”
Yelena nods like it’s no big deal.
When they get to Los Angeles late Friday afternoon Melina’s already at the house, groceries in the fridge, girls’ favorite snacks on the counter. She hugs all three kids like she’s been waiting months. Kate watches from the edge of the room, still. Disconnected. She doesn’t say it, but the house feels foreign.
They were supposed to go back Monday.
But Monday comes, and Yelena “forgets” to schedule a team to escort them back up the mountain. Make sure no one follows them.
She unpacks the diaper bag like it was never a question. “We should just stay the week,” she says offhandedly. “They seem happy. My mom’s around. Mila’s got the playroom again. I think Ellie missed the yard.”
Kate gives a small nod. Doesn’t push back.
Yelena books the pediatric checkups. Then over coffee, gently: “You should probably check in with your OB too. Just to close the loop?”
Kate’s eyes flick up. Something flashes…not anger, not quite shame…but she nods.
The appointment goes quietly. Yelena drives. Walks in with her. Waits beside her through intake. Sits through the whole visit. Doesn’t say anything when Kate sidesteps the obvious. Doesn’t correct her when she tells the doctor she’s “fine.” Just squeezes her hand once on the way out.
Kate doesn’t say a word on the drive back. But Yelena keeps one hand on the wheel and one where Kate can reach it. Just in case she needs it.
//\//\\
WEEK FOUR - LOS ANGELES
The pediatrician’s out in Pasadena. Not ideal, but trusted. Private practice. High-end clientele. A staff that understands discretion. She helped with Mila’s birth paperwork, so there’s loyalty.
It’s not supposed to be an ordeal.
Yelena booked the appointment under a fake last name per routine. They take the garage elevator, park underground, use the side entrance. The staff lets them in ten minutes early, just like planned. All three girls get checkups. Natasha gets weighed, measured, and declared “absurdly healthy.” Her lungs work. Her stomach’s a machine. She pees on the nurse. All excellent signs.
Coming out is when it shifts.
Kate holds Ellie’s hand. Yelena carries the car seat with one arm and balances Mila on her hip with the other. They round the corner and run straight into a pap.
Just one. But one is enough.
He doesn’t shout. Doesn’t chase them. He lifts the lens, fires a burst of quiet, precise shots, and lowers it with a smug little nod. Like he expects gratitude.
Kate yanks Ellie toward the car. Straps her in fast. Yelena shoves the carrier into the back and drops into the driver’s seat like it’s a drill. Which, to be fair, it kind of is.
They drive home in silence.
At the house, Natasha naps on Yelena’s shoulder while she paces on a call. Ellie makes a card “to protect Mama from the bad camera guys.” Mila eats a sticker. Kate doom-scrolls.
The photo is already on six gossip blogs. It’s wide, off-angle, not exactly revelatory. But the pieces are all there.
Yelena: tight-lipped, sunglasses on. Recognizable anywhere. Kate: barefaced, small postpartum belly still clinging to her, hair in a braid, sweatshirt that says ‘Ask Me If I Slept’ which she’s owned since she was pregnant with Ellie, letters now peeling off. Mila and Ellie: clearly visible.
And then the carrier. In Yelena’s grip. Pixelated, but unmistakable. Mila and Ellie are much too big for a newborn car seat, so…what’s in that?
The baby blanket does the rest. Pink. Covered in tiny bees. The internet has seen it before. Had already obsessed over it during the first two pregnancies. Fan accounts finally sourced it after Mila was born. They’d posted links, affiliate codes, dupes. So when it shows up again now, draped across an unknown carrier…Speculation starts immediately.
#BishopBelovaBabyGate
“Secret Baby Confirmed”
“What Are They Hiding?”
Kate stares at the screen. Her mouth tastes like panic.
—
They try to ignore it. The girls’ chaos does a good job at keeping them distracted for a day.
Ellie decides she’s a cat. Only answers to “Meow.” Mila draws on the fridge with a Sharpie. Natasha cluster feeds until Kate’s nipples feel like they’ve been through a meat grinder, then refuses to sleep unless she’s curled into Yelena like a marsupial.
Kate’s body doesn’t feel like hers. Her stomach is soft. Her hips ache. Her hair is somehow both greasy and dry. But she doesn’t care about any of that. She cares that the world knows. She cares that it was supposed to be theirs. Just for a little while longer.
That night, Yelena sits next to her wife on the couch. They’re barefoot. The baby sleeps in her arms. Mila starfishes on the rug, slack-jawed watching cartoons. Ellie clutches three plush animals, a crayon drawing labeled “us with extra arms in case hugs,” and an open book she pretends to read.
“They don’t know anything,” Yelena says.
Kate gestures at the phone like it’s radioactive. “They know enough. They know something. And they’ll keep digging until they get the full picture or someone from our team confirms it. And I’m…not ready.”
Yelena adjusts the baby and softens her voice. “Then we don’t confirm anything.”
“Yel…that’s not how this works.” Kate turns to her.
“I’m serious. Let them spin out. They can keep dissecting a blur. The internet eventually always burns itself out.”
“They won’t stop.”
“Then they’ll wait. She’s not content. She’s a person. She’s ours.”
Kate closes her eyes. Leans into Yelena’s shoulder. The baby sighs in her sleep. Yelena threads her fingers through Kate’s hair. It’s not a fix. But it’s somewhere to rest.
—
Kate’s team is spiraling.
Her assistant texts: ‘Emergency PR meeting. 10am. Please don’t ghost.’
Her agent leaves six voicemails.
Yelena ignores her messages. Kate doesn’t.
She takes the call at 10am. Her hair’s still wet from a three-minute shower. In the background: the baby screams, Ellie is insisting she's an elephant who needs a banana, and Mila runs around naked while pelting raisins at the wall.
“I’m not doing press,” Kate says immediately.
“I figured. But there are…murmurs. About misleading the…” Her agent tries to argue.
“I’m not a fucking politician.” Kate snaps.
“No. You’re a brand. And right now you’re a brand with a fourth baby no one knew about.”
“Third.”
“Right. Third. Of course.”
Kate almost yells. Instead, she hangs up. Throws the phone in a kitchen drawer. Doesn’t answer it again for the rest of the day.
—
The tipping point comes when Ellie sees a video. She’s watching cartoons on YouTube while coloring. The episode ends. YouTube autoplays a new clip. A blurred version of the photo. A voiceover. A man speculating.
“It’s unclear if the baby is theirs. We don’t know yet. Could be a surrogate…could be adoption…”
Kate fumbles for the iPad. Pauses it. Too late.
“Mommy, is Natty not ours?” Ellie turns to her, perplexed.
Kate pulls her in. Kisses her forehead. Holds her too tight.
“She’s ours. She’s very, very ours.”
Ellie nods. Accepts that. Goes back to coloring.
Kate locks herself in the bathroom. Cries silently for six minutes. Then washes her face and pretends it never happened.
—
That night, they talk. Really talk.
The baby’s asleep in Yelena’s lap. The house hums with the sound of white noise machines spread out in the different rooms where sleeping children lie.
Kate lies flat on her back, staring at the ceiling like it’s a question she can’t answer. Yelena sits cross‑legged at the foot of the bed, hand gently tapping Natasha’s thigh to keep her asleep while trying to read her wife without scaring her off.
Kate speaks first. Her voice sounds small. “I think I’m broken.”
Yelena shakes her head immediately. “No.”
Kate’s eyes stay on the ceiling. “Then why do I feel like I’m watching someone else live my life? Like I’m… floating above it. I should be grateful, and I am, but it’s like the signal doesn’t reach. I just…I can’t feel anything right now.”
Yelena scoots closer, rests her free hand on Kate’s arm. “You’re not broken. You just had a baby.”
“I’ve had three,” Kate mutters. “You’d think I’d be good at it by now.”
Yelena smiles softly. “No one gets good at it. We kinda…just survive them.”
Kate finally turns her head. “When does it stop feeling like this?”
“I don’t know, babe.” Yelena answers honestly. “Probably when you sleep more than two hours in a row. I’m not sure.”
Kate laughs quietly. “I sound crazy, don’t I?”
Yelena squeezes her arm. “You sound like someone who needs help.”
Kate’s throat tightens. “Help from who?”
“From whoever can give it. Doctor. Therapist. Me. You don’t have to white‑knuckle it.” Yelena pauses, voice soft. “You carried her. You brought her here. Let me carry you for a bit.”
Kate’s eyes fill but she doesn’t look away this time. “You already figured out what it is, didn’t you?”
“I have a theory.”
“What’s the theory?”
Yelena doesn’t flinch. “PPD.”
Kate nods slowly. The tears fall anyway. Yelena climbs up beside her, readjusts the baby, and gathers her in, arms around her, chin pressed to her hair. Kate sobs against her chest, quiet and exhausted, like she’s finally letting something go.
“I should be happier,” Kate whispers. “I shouldn’t feel like this.”
Yelena kisses the crown of her head. “It’s not something you’re doing intentionally.”
Kate’s breathing steadies. For the first time in weeks, she feels grounded. Held. Seen.
After a while, the silence shifts into something easier. Kate wipes her face on Yelena’s shirt, kisses the chubby baby leg between them, and exhales.
“We should say something,” Kate murmurs.
Yelena frowns. “You sure?”
“No. But maybe it’ll feel better than hiding.” They sit in the dim, quiet between them. “She deserves to be real,” Kate says finally. “Not a rumor. Not a secret. Someone with a name. A face. A place in our family.”
Yelena nods. “Okay.”
They won’t do an interview. No glossy cover spread. Maybe just a single post. A photo that says nothing and everything all at once.
Kate exhales. Yelena leans forward, presses a kiss to her knee. “We’ll do it when you’re ready.”
They don’t decide anything else that night. But something eases. The hiding’s not over, but it’s no longer all encompassing. They’re finding their way back to normal.
//\//\\
WEEK FIVE
A few nights later, after wrangling the kids into bed, after the fiftieth feeding, after Mila has finally surrendered her rebellion and gone limp on the couch, Kate finds her wife in the kitchen. Yelena stands by the sink, frozen, watching the baby monitor like it's a live feed of incoming disaster.
"You okay?" Kate asks gently.
Yelena doesn’t turn. Her voice is low, flat.
"They're running a story. TMZ. They have a photo of her. From the walk today. They reached out to my office. Wanted a comment.”
Kate exhales. Leans against the counter. “And?”
“I told them no comment. Doesn’t matter. It’s going live first thing tomorrow.”
Kate rubs her temples. “Maybe it’s time.”
Yelena turns. Her face is a mask of stillness. That terrifying calm she gets when she's holding too much and pretending she isn't. She crosses the space between them and wraps her arms around Kate. Kate lets herself fall into it. Lets herself be held.
“I’m trying to protect you,” Yelena murmurs.
“You always are.” Kate threads their fingers together. “But I think it’s time.”
They stand like that for a long moment. A soft rustle over the monitor. One of the girls turning over in her sleep. Then a small snore through the static.
Yelena presses her forehead to Kate’s. “If we do this, we do it on our terms.”
Kate nods. “Always.”
—
Kate talks Yelena into waking the girls. Bribe them with candy into staying up because they have work to do. TMZ is not one-upping Kate Bishop.
The post goes public within the hour. No fanfare. No press release. Just three black-and-white photos on Kate’s Instagram.
The first is carefully framed. Cropped just right to keep the girl’s faces out of the image while still being present. Natasha is curled on Yelena’s chest, face turned away. Ellie’s bright curls spill into one corner. Mila is half in the shot, a blur running across the bottom like a storm in progress. Kate’s hand rests gently across Yelena’s arm and the baby’s back. It’s the first photo with all five of them together. Somehow they hadn’t managed that yet.
The second is a candid Kate took earlier this week. The girls on the couch. Natasha asleep between her sisters. Ellie “reading” aloud to her. Mila gripping one of the baby’s socks like she might eat it.
The third is just Kate. Hallway mirror. Nursing bra. Joggers. Hair up. Skin bare. Natasha pressed to her chest, impossibly small and utterly at peace. The two seconds of calm the baby will tolerate being away from Yelena, caught and saved.
The caption reads:
“We made a person. She’s perfect.”
It’s past midnight and the post still manager to get two million likes in under a minute.
The internet catches fire. But the tone changes. Less speculation. More awe. More warmth. Less “are they hiding something?”, more “holy shit, they did it again.” Suddenly, everyone understands where Kate has been.
The next morning, Kate’s team asks about a statement. She says no.
The internet is melting down. Kate doesn’t check the comments. For once.
—
That night, five weeks after Natasha was born, they finally have sex.
It’s awkward. Clumsy. Interrupted twice. Once by the baby. Once because Kate forgot she put a heating pad in the bed and thought she peed herself.
They laugh until they cry. Then cry until they laugh again.
Afterward, Yelena kisses Kate’s stomach. The place that gave her all of this. Then her hip. Her collarbone. Her hand.
“Don’t ever think you’re not needed,” she says.
Kate doesn’t answer. She just pulls Yelena in and holds her like she means it.
Later, when the room is quiet and the baby’s finally asleep again, Kate stares at the ceiling and whispers, “I think I should see someone.”
Yelena shifts. “A therapist?”
Kate nods. “I think I need help.”
Yelena doesn’t say anything. Just laces their fingers together under the blankets and squeezes. That’s how they fall asleep. Not yet healed. But fighting to be.
//\//\\
By the time Natasha is eight weeks old, they have a routine. Kate handles the showers while Yelena handles breakfast.
Natasha still hates the car seat. Mila still throws her food. Ellie still asks at least once a day if they can have sheep again.
The days are loud. Messy. Relentless. But the house starts to feel like theirs again. Not a hiding place. Not a bunker. A home.
Kate watches Yelena cross the living room. Shirt inside out. Baby sling over her shoulder. Bottle tucked into her hoodie pocket. Hair tied back with one of Mila’s sparkly clips.
She feels something fall into place. Not peace. Not yet. But something close. Something solid. Not perfect. Not easy. But real. And theirs.
For the first time in a long time, “home” doesn’t feel like something temporary. It feels earned.