A kind of Chenford fic but more of a 'found family' fic
Notes: Hello everyone ! I know, this is insane, I'm actually posting 🤣. I'm sorry I've been so MIA, I've just really not been in the frame of mind to write at all. But finally, I got some motivation and inspiration so here I am. I know you'll all be used to be Chenford centred fics, and while this does have Chenford in it, this is mostly a Lucy Chen fic. I hope you all give it a try and maybe even like it :) Thankyou for not giving up on me ❤And a special thankyou to my partner in chaos @chenfordspiral who is literally always there for me and has encouraged me all the way, ily ❤
Summary: Lucy wakes up sick and alone. Tim is on an op with Metro, Tamara is out with friends. Who will take care of Miss Lucy Chen?
Inc: Fluff, angst and then just lottssss of fluff. A lot of Lucy, Grey and Luna. And quite a bit of Angela and Nyla too.
Warnings: talk of childhood trauma and illness but nothing explicit.
You don't have to be sorry
Her eyes open hastily, the brightness of the morning sun immediately forcing them closed once again. As Lucy turns to her side and reaches out for Tim, the coldness of the sheets reminds her of his absence; the Metro op that he had to leave for last night. He was going to be there for a few days, so she’d be alone. Normally, this thought wouldn’t have bothered her too much; of course she misses him when he’s gone, but they’re both adults and they’re both aware that their work will sometimes take them away from each other for a couple of days. It was nothing. Two days. But as Lucy awakes more, she notices the splitting pain travelling through her head. She notices the clammy sheen on her skin, the heat radiating up her cheeks and forehead, and the nausea swirling in her chest and up to her throat. She was sick. As she begins to push her face into her pillow for comfort, the blaring sound of her alarm interrupts her. She didn’t know why, but as soon as the sound went off, the tears started to stream.
Lucy was used to looking after herself when she was sick, she’d done it a lot of her life. Whenever she was sick as a child, her Mother and Father seemed to care more about her going to School and not ‘missing out on important learning’ than they did about their Daughter getting better. She couldn’t count the amount of times she’d had to go into School ill, coming home worse than when she left in the morning. The most affection she’d gotten from them when she was sick, was a quick feel of the forehead and a spoonful of medicine to quicken the recovery; so it’s safe to say, she knows how to look after herself. But at this moment, she doesn’t want to look after herself. She wants to be looked after. And this thought is how her tears become more rapid. Tim being away for two days now seemed like the worst thing in the world. She’d only been ill once since being with him, and it was more of a ‘hangover illness’ than an actual one, but he’d spent the day cuddling her, bringing her water, and giving her a scalp massage to ease her banging head. She cried for an hour after he’d fallen asleep, overwhelmed by the kind of affection she never received as a child, the kind of affection she was now craving. Her loneliness sunk in, not helped by the knowledge that Tamara was with her friends for the weekend so right now she had nobody.
Groggily, Lucy lifts her legs over the side of her bed and sits up, the pounding in her head worsening at the shift in positions. As she looks around the empty, quiet room, she knows she’s going to work today; sick or not.
—
As Lucy trudges her way into the station, she doesn’t miss the worried glances that are being sent her way, and it’s not long before Nyla’s grabbing her arm and pulling her into the locker room to sit down. “What the hell is going on with you ? you look like you're on death's door”. Lucy lifts her head carefully to meet eyes with Nyla, but the bright overhead lights only cause her to squeeze her eyes shut. With a concerned sigh, Nyla reaches her hand and places it onto Lucy's forehead; the way only a mother would know how. The tenderness of the touch relaxes Lucy almost instantly, despite the blinding pain not subsiding.
“Okay, you need to go home. I say this with love, but you look like crap” The comment isn’t untrue, and Lucy knows she’s not well enough to be here, but the alternative? The alternative is being alone and being reminded of her strangled relationship with her parents- so that's not happening. Nyla sits down next to Lucy and furrows her brows at the state of her. “Lucy, don’t be stubborn about this, there’s no way you can even do your job well like this”.
Lucy shakes her head in disagreement, the motion coaxing her to wince in discomfort. Nyla scoffs at the action, knowing instantly that Lucy is going to be way too stubborn to go home today. “Alright, if you’re not going home, then you’re sitting with me and Angela today. You will not be going on patrol, and Grey will agree, so” She pushes herself up from the bench and pulls Lucy up by her hands, guiding her slowly to the detective's desks. Nyla pushes Lucy gently down into a chair and grabs a bottle of water from under her desk, along with some Tylenol and offers them to her. “Drink this, and take these. Be thankful that i had a lot of migraines when i was pregnant with Leah” She chuckles at the thought, and watches Lucy swallow down the pills with a frown, clearly not in the right frame of mind to share in Nyla’s humour. Nyla raises her brows and rubs Lucy lovingly on the shoulder. “Okay, I'm gonna go and check in with Grey. Don’t move” She looks to Lucy to confirm that she’ll stay, but the image she is met with is Lucy’s forehead flat against the table, little snores leaving her mouth. Nyla shakes her head in amusement, chuckling at her friend's condition, before turning and making her way to Grey’s office.
—
Grey and Nyla walk up to the detective's desk to go and check on Lucy, only to be greeted with her head nuzzled into Angela’s lap, her fingers stroking her hair protectively. Both of them watch with the biggest smirks on their faces, highly entertained by the scene. Angela looks up at the sound of their snickers, her hands halting in place, eyes rolling at their expressions. “Shut up, she fell on me like this. I swear, I come to work for a break from my motherly duties, and here I am mothering this stubborn idiot”. Although she calls Lucy an idiot, the small smile on her face gives away the affectionate tone behind her words. She looks back towards them both with a questioning glance “So what are we going to do with her ?”. Grey crosses his arms in thought, Nyla soon after mirroring his actions, hoping to come up with an idea herself. Not even a few seconds later, Grey clicks his tongue and nods his head as if in confirmation to himself. “I’m going to take her back home with me. Luna’s there too, and she’d kill me if she found out Lucy had been in the station sick all day. Angela, can you be acting watch commander for the day?” Angela nods assuredly in agreement.
Grey kneels down to Lucy’s eye level, gently shaking her shoulder to wake her. “Lucy, wake up. Wake up.” At the sound of Grey’s deep and commanding voice, her eyes flutter open in confusion, her voice raspy and tired. “Mmhhh, what?” Grey wraps his hands around her arms as Angela pushes her up softly by her waist. “Chen, we're going somewhere. Get in the shop.” Lucy furrows her brows in puzzlement, but manages to stand herself up and drags herself achingly slow towards the shop. Nyla peeks a look at Angela, tickled to find that her amused smile is the same as hers, both know what the other is thinking; Grey is about to go all ‘Dad’ on Lucy, and they can’t help but love the thought.
—
The drive to Grey and Luna’s home is particularly quiet. As soon as Lucy laid her head on the headrest, she was out like a light. Grey couldn't explain it, but he felt incredibly protective of Lucy. He doesn't know when it happened; maybe after she got kidnapped ?, but it had certainly deepend since Jackson’s death. He couldn’t lose another. He'd lost Jackson who he thought of as a son, he wasn’t willing to lose Lucy too- and this is exactly why Grey’s eyes switched from the road to his passenger seat every 30 seconds; just in case.
Grey pulled the car into his driveway and parked in his usual precise manner of taking 5 minutes to park- that Luna constantly made fun of him for. ‘You do realise this is our driveway right ? you don’t have to prove you're good at parking here?’. He chuckles at the recollection and refocuses his attention back on the sick ridden girl in his car. “Lucy, we're here”. Her eyes flutter open once again, only this time, her confusion is evidently more clear. “Where are we ?” Grey looks towards her with a warm smile and points his head in the direction of his house. “I've taken you to my home because you're too ridiculously stubborn to take care of yourself and I also don’t need you getting my other officers sick. So you’re going to follow me inside and let Luna and I take care of you. Sergeant's order.”
Lucy throws her head back, eyes closing in relief. She may not have admitted it, but she felt like hell at the station, and she sure was glad she had somewhere warm and comfy to go now. “Thanks Sarge. I’m sorry. You don’t need to look after me though, I don't want to impose, and I know you’re busy”. Grey wonders to himself for a moment. He notices the guilty look on Lucy’s face as if she's ashamed to need help; as if she feels that she doesn’t deserve it. The realisation of this clenches his heart- he’s heard stories about Lucy’s rocky relationship with her parents, but he hadn’t realised it was like this. He’s been in the police force a long time; he knows trauma when he sees it, and this is childhood trauma without a doubt. “Lucy, it’s my pleasure. Now come on, Luna will be waiting on tenterhooks to nurse you better” They both laugh at the speculation, Grey knowing his wife to a tee, and Lucy having met her enough to know that this is absolutely going to be the case.
—
“Oh sweetie ! Look at you, you’re not fit for work, Come here.” Luna greets Lucy with a maternal expression of sympathy, and a blanket held open by her arms to wrap Lucy tightly in. She hurries forward to the doorway and envelops her into the fluffy blue blanket that usually lays on the arm of their sofa. Rubbing her hands up and down Lucy’s slender and cold arms, she ushers her over to the couch and sits her down. “Honey, go get her some of your sweats. She can’t stay in this uncomfortable uniform all day.” Grey nods at his wife's request and makes way to their shared bedroom for the clothes.
Luna raises her hand to Lucy’s forehead, frowning at the scorching heat that's radiating off of her. “Oh, sweetie, you’ve got a fever, let me go and get you some medicine and then I'll make you some soup.” Lucy looks at Luna with slight tears in her eyes, but shakes her head to rid of them. “Oh, you don’t have to go to that trouble for me, honestly. You’ve done enough.” Luna’s brow’s furrow deeply at the words, knowing that she’s barely even scratched the surface of looking after her. “Lucy, I've barely even done anything yet. Now, you go and get those sweats on” she says as she spots her husband walk back into the room “and then you can lay down and watch TV and I'll sort the rest.” She cups Lucy’s cheeks lovingly, and pulls herself up towards the kitchen.
—
Once she’s all covered in Grey’s oversized sweats, Lucy can’t help but feel incredibly overwhelmed and emotional by the hospitality she’s being shown. She takes the moment of alone time when Luna is in the kitchen to glance her eyes over the house. The walls are cream with family pictures scattered all over. She notices one of Grey and Luna on their wedding day and can’t help but smile at the happiness that’s been captured. Her mind drifts to Tim; she wonders what their wedding will look like, and what their pictures will be like. She laughs to herself at the thought of Tim being told to pose; deciding then and there that a candid photographer is going to be a must for their wedding- whenever he decides to ask her. She lets the thought go for a moment and continues her search of the room she’s in. The sofa is a warm beige, with an array of soft and patterned pillows. The coffee table has a romance novel bookmarked on it, and Grey’s ‘best dad ever’ coffee mug is sitting proudly upon it. The house feels warm. It feels like home. Lucy wouldn't have even had to know the owners to know that it’s a place filled with love.
Before her mind can float to an unhelpful place, Grey walks towards her with a steaming warm cup of lemon and honey. “Here you go. This should help with your throat- i noticed your voice starting to sound raspy.” He sits beside her on the sofa, passing her the drink with one hand, and occupying his other by picking up the side of the fluffy blanket that had started to fall off of her shoulder. Lucy smiles at the act, pulling the blanket more tightly to herself to ease his concern. “Thank you. I really can’t tell you how much this means to me. I was… I was dreading having to be at home alone whilst feeling like this. It reminds me of” she clenches her eyes shut and takes a deep breath “It just makes me feel crappier because I know that Tim would be taking care of me right now if he was here. But.. this is really cheering me up, so thank you.”
Grey sends her a knowing smile, nodding in acknowledgment without pushing her to reveal any details she wasn’t yet comfortable with. “No need to thank us Chen, that’s what you do for the people you care about.” A genuine smile plasters across both of their faces, and a moment of comfortable silence falls upon them.
—
About an hour later, Luna serves the homemade soup into a bowl for Lucy, blowing on it faintly as she makes her way to Lucy's sleeping figure on the sofa. As she lets her eyes wander on the scene in front of her, she turns to her husband, her voice barely above a whisper “Aww, bless her. I feel bad waking her up, but the soup is really going to help her throat and her fever.” Grey nods in agreement, an old family memory coming to the forefront of his mind. He looks up at his wife from his spot on the opposite couch to Lucy “Remember that labor day weekend when Dominique threw up for the entire two days, and we spent all weekend in her room watching Princess movies with her?” He smiles fondly at the memory, Luna cutting in to share another tender anecdote from the time. She giggles at the recollection, a fond smile etching onto her face also. “Yeah, I think we watched Aladdin maybe 50 times” Both of them laugh and nod their heads in agreement, the dreamy tune of ‘A whole new world’ flowing through their minds.
Grey looks over to Lucy’s foetal curled up silhouette, her body positioned to the TV where an old Disney movie is playing. He smiles at the sight “It’s almost as if she’s still here” he smirks. Luna can’t help but spit out a loud laugh at her husband's comment, soon after covering her mouth with her free hand as to not wake the sleeping girl. She looks down towards the soup, noticing the lack of steam emanating from the bowl. “It’s the perfect temperature now. We need to wake her up.” Grey nods and shuffles over to the couch, kneeling down at her side, and begins to lightly shake her shoulder. “Lucy, wake up, soup’s ready.” Her head snaps up in an instant, the smell of warm vegetable soup clouding her nostrils. She hums in satisfaction, the scent cushioning her insides with a warm and cosy sensation. “That smells amazing!” she grumbles out. Luna follows Grey and walks over to the couch, handing her the warm bowl of soup. “I’m glad you think so; this is an old family recipe, my grandma would swear by it!” Grey and Luna each sit either side of Lucy on the sofa, resting their attention on the Television as she swallows down the contents. Both of them are gripped by the musical number flashing before their eyes, until the heartbreaking sound of sniffles and small sobs break through the air.
The worried glances of Grey and Luna flip instantly to the shaking shoulders of Lucy. Without a second thought, Luna bundles Lucy into her arms, cupping her head into her chest as Grey takes the near empty bowl and places it onto the floor. “Oh sweetie, what’s wrong ?” Luna begins to rock her slowly and lovingly, trying her best to soothe the racking of her chest. As Grey begins his search for the tissue box, Lucy tries to stumble out a response to Luna’s question, her throat constricting her from forming a full sentence. “I.. its..my..it’sjustthatyoumustbereallygoodparents” Luna and Grey look at each other puzzled, not quite understanding the words that just came out of her. Grey gets off his spot on the couch and kneels in front of her once again. He looks at Lucy with a tenderness in his eyes, one that reminded Lucy of how he looked at his daughter when she’d come and visit him at the station. It made her heart flutter and clench. “Okay, look at me and copy my breaths okay?” Lucy nods and follows her sergeant's lead and takes several deep breaths, aware of the fact that his title at this moment is very unimportant to him.
Luna has not once let go of Lucy since she began to cry, the tears falling from the sick girl drawing a break through her heart. It’s times like this when Luna understands where the phrase ‘Maternal instincts’ comes from. Lucy notices the tight but protective grip that Luna has on her, her heart swelling at the act, as she begs herself to never forget this feeling. She can feel the cold metal of Luna’s wedding rings through the small holes in the blanket. She can smell Luna’s feminine and rich fragrance as she envelops into her. But the thing she notices the most, is how the parts of her body where Luna’s hands don’t occupy feel cold.
Grey keeps eye contact with Lucy as her breaths become less shaky and staggered. “Okay, now tell us what you were going to say. No rush. Take as much time as you need.” He places his hand affectionately beside her, hoping for her to take it as a promise that he’s here for her.
“I just” Lucy takes a deep breath and everything begins to pour out “I said you must be great parents. The way you've looked after me, and I'm only your officer. It’s been really sweet. Your daughter is a lucky girl.” She looks to both Luna and Grey with a sad smile before continuing with her confession. “I’ve never really experienced anything this family-like before. I don’t have a great relationship with my parents. I never really have. They um, they expect a lot of me, and no matter what, It's just never good enough.” At this, Luna squeezes Lucy’s arm in comfort, an encouraging rub of her arm following to assure her that they can trust her with this information.
“They’ve never told me that they’re proud of me. They hate that I'm a cop; think I can do ‘better’. But I'm used to that- I mean, it's been my whole life. But this, now, with the soup and the blankets and how you’ve both gone out of your way to take care of me; I’ve never really had that from them either, and I guess it’s just brought up some stuff for me. I'm sorry, this is so embarrassing.” Grey shakes his head immediately, the expression on his face alerting her that she has nothing to be embarrassed about. “You have got nothing to be embarrassed by. What you’ve just told us- that’s some real trauma Lucy. It’s not fair that you’ve never felt that kind of love from your parents.” He thinks to himself for a moment, before deciding that he cannot let this go without telling her. “I know I'm not your Father, but for the record, I am immensely proud of you. You are an outstanding woman and an outstanding Cop. I’m proud of you every single day.” He says it with such conviction and confidence that Lucy’s eyes begin to well with unshed tears. She sniffles at his words, grateful and overwhelmed to be hearing this. “Thank you, Sir.” He takes a moment to rub Lucy’s free arm, more affected by her tears than he’d initially thought. “No need to thank us Lucy.” Luna nods in agreement with her husband, her voice now matching the same tone as him. “He’s right. We were more than happy to take care of you today, and every single word that my husband has just said is true. And for the record… If you ever need a Mom and Dad, you’ve got two right here” Luna’s smile is achingly sweet as she says this, Grey following with a sweet and bright smile of his own not long after. Lucy cannot believe she’s even hearing this, but she doesn’t question it anymore as both of their arms wrap tightly around her.
—
As Lucy settles herself in Grey and Luna’s guest bedroom, where they both insisted she stay tonight, her phone begins to ring. Her eyes locked with the picture of her and Tim that popped up on his caller ID. It was a picture from their first official ‘uninterrupted’ date. Tim’s arms were cradled around Lucy's waist as they both looked at each other like the other had hung the stars in the sky. She smiles at the picture before picking it up, excited to talk to her boyfriend who she already misses (not that she’s going to let him in on that secret). “Hey Babe” Her normal voice hasn’t quite returned yet, the hoarse croak replacing her usual smooth and sunny voice. “Hey Sweetheart, you don’t sound too good. Angela told me you were sick-I’m sorry I can't be there for you.” Lucy wanders her mind to today- the caring nature of Nyla and Angela, the decision from Grey to take her home. The way both him and Luna doted on her; it all brings a warmth to her chest “It’s okay. Turns out I have some family to take care of me after all”.
