losttheright | (no subject)

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jessica huang

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This has been such a long time coming.

It's only now that they're here, that this is becoming real, that Molly has let herself think about it like that at all. She doesn't regret waiting, either, taking her time, making sure everything was right. Hell, because she did, she's wound up with a better situation than she would ever have envisioned — someone she knows and trusts, who's become a good friend of hers, whom she knows will be the kind of parent that she couldn't raising Abigail. She just also knows that this is, deep down, what she's wanted since the first morning she woke up in an empty bed, the father of her child gone. If anything, she thinks she's wanted it since before then. Her options were limited from the start, with what she was unwilling to do (again); Lee had a different approach, his own set of limitations, things he wouldn't have considered.

When it was the two of them, she could at least tell herself that maybe they could make it work, if only out of sheer determination alone. Molly isn't sure that she ever really believed that, the months after she told him she was pregnant and he walked out spent holding her breath, waiting for him to decide to do the same again, but she'd nearly convinced herself of it. Really, though, this has never been quite right and she knows it. Her days of wanting to settle down and start a family left her a long time ago, and these past months — this past year — has been more difficult than she's admitted to anyone, even herself.

Maybe now, she'll actually be able to focus on herself, to get her head on straight. She's already been approved for an apartment, ready to move out of the place she's never stopped thinking of as Lee's as soon as she's moved everything she needs to over to Jessica's. It's a step in the right direction, at least. Anything else, she'll need to work up to, but at least she'll have that chance.

She's turned it over and over in her head, and comes to the same conclusion every time: it's kind of perfect. Jessica will have a child here. She'll be able to see Abigail grow up and know that she'll be happy and healthy without having to be a parent — just a friend of the woman who's about to become her mother, a known entity in some regard but not a caregiver. And with as long as she's spent thinking about it, she knows she won't regret it. It's been almost a year since she gave birth, and never once has Molly felt like a mother. Abigail deserves better than that, and she deserves to be able to take care of herself, not wind up trapped because she missed a dose or two of her birth control pill and then her boyfriend disappeared.

Everyone comes out of this in a good position. There's a quiet sort of contentment in that, a comfort that overrides any anxiety she would otherwise feel about making this official. Besides, she knows how well this can work. As much as it hurts to think about them now, for how much she misses them, she watched Katie raise Jamie for years no differently than if he'd been her biological son, and Russell, too, once they made the adoption official on his end. They were happy, the three of them. She likes to think that Jessica and Abigail will be, too.

And if any of Jessica's family from home ever arrives here, well, there will just be one more member of it for them to meet.

"I'm glad we're doing this," she says, smile soft and warm as she looks over at Jessica, knowing as she speaks that it's true. "I'm... glad you wanted to do this." She'd have made it work regardless, but there are few people here that she trusts as much as she does Jessica, and few with whom she's been as open, too, about everything she's been dealing with. This isn't a band-aid or a temporary fix. It's what she needs to do, and she thinks — she hopes — that Jessica will feel as good about it as she does.

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Just like that, it's over. Oh, it's far more complicated than that and Molly knows it, and anyway, like they've talked about, she isn't just cutting ties entirely, turning her back on Abigail and pretending none of this ever happened. She'll be glad to know her, to watch her grow up and flourish under Jessica's parentage. She just won't be — isn't — her mother, and that's not only fine by her, but the way she prefers it. She's never really felt like a parent anyway, and she's had nearly a year now to see if that was going to change, and it hasn't. While she's never really resented — and tried not to — Abigail's existence, she also never wanted this in the first place. She made a mistake, was a little less careful than she should have been, and had no other choice, at least for herself, but to see the consequences of that through. And thought there may have been brief moments when she's wished she could have made a different decision back then, she knows now that it's for the best that she didn't — maybe even for a reason, disinclined as she is to believe in fate or any shit like that.

Jessica is cut out to be a parent in a way that she never has been herself, and very likely never will be. Had she not given birth to Abigail, or had she arranged something like this sooner, then Jessica wouldn't now get to have a child of her own again. Maybe something else would have worked out at some point, but she has no way of knowing what or when or how. This — it's as neat a solution as she could have hoped for.

"She's really yours," she says with a nod, her smile wide and pleased. The lawyer nods his assent as well, going over some of the finer points, though Molly is only half-listening. The important part is taken care of, and she's had enough meetings here over the last few months to know how things are meant to work going forward. Given her relief, her happiness, it's hard to focus on the particulars of it now. "You're going to be so wonderful for her."

The lawyer keeps on blabbing and at this point I think it's kind of silly that he does, given that we've already done all of the legal parts. But I guess he probably wants a good review, and I know that I'm a congressperson so he's probably trying to brag about that as well, not to mention that Molly's made a very good name for herself in public service too. Now that I think about it, this lawyer is pretty lucky to have landed everything about this case. We're good friends. We're both in very reputable positions. (Mine maybe a little less than Molly's, depending on who you ask, but there's always someone who hates the figureheads in government.) This is probably as smooth of a high profile case that you could ever get.

But I'm paying less and less attention to his words, and instead trying to get myself used to the idea of being Abigail's mom. I'm crying, I just realized. I'm crying, not so much that my makeup's going to run, but I'm pretty sure I can feel this damp spot in Abigail's hair and I feel a little bad about showing emotion, but not so bad that I'm going to stop everything and try to make myself stop.

Women are too often in places where they're told to stop being so emotional. I won't let this be one of them.

"She's going to be so wonderful for me," I tell Molly. And whoa, my voice is really going. "I get to be a mother here, I get to be a mother with a child. I can't... I can't thank you enough. I really can't."

Abigail starts to wiggle and whimper, and she's probably uncomfortable, so I turn my attention back to her. "Shhh, it's okay. We'll get to go home soon."

If Molly were to be completely honest, it's a little strange — though not at all in a bad way — for Jessica to be thanking her so profusely about all of this. It makes sense, of course. It's not like this is a favor, like some prolonged babysitting gig or something she had to talk Jessica into; that would defeat the purpose entirely. They all get something out of this, all wind up better off than they were before this. Still, when she's been so fucking relieved, when she never really wanted to be a parent in the first place, when she could never have predicted that Lee would up and fucking disappear when Abigail was only a few months old, there aren't any words for how goddamn relieved she feels.

That seems like a good enough sign on its own. She doesn't have any doubts or regrets, doesn't have to stop to wonder for a second if she really has made the right decision here. It's clear that she has, both for the way she feels about it and Jessica's reaction now. Molly is fairly certain she's never seen Jessica cry before, and there's no doubt in her mind now that it's for a good reason.

Some people are just cut out to be parents. Jessica, she has no doubt, is one of them. While she may have been once, though, that certainly hasn't been the case for her for a long time now, and it wouldn't have been fair to pretend otherwise and make herself — and probably Abigail — miserable in the process.

Only half-listening to what the lawyer says, having spent enough time going over all of this to be aware of what happens now and how this works, she smiles instead in response to what Jessica says, small and soft. "I'm glad," she says, "that you're so happy. That she'll be so happy. I couldn't have asked for anything more than that."

I stare at Molly, feeling... a little lost, actually. Not lost about the fact that I have a daughter now. No, that is the one piece that feels so strong and sure, that makes my heart soar with happiness. I have a little girl now, and I'll love her and raise her well, but not spoil her too much. It would be a bad thing to spoil her too much — pays in smiles in the short-term, but sets you back in the long-term.

And with that happiness comes other emotions. Fear, obviously. This is not the kind of city that I would have wanted to raise a child in. It's too unpredictable, too dangerous. Even if not many people die from the crazy things that happen here, they leave their mark in other ways. There are people who are a lot more afraid day to day after being here, or people who have given up on finding a regular order. I don't want my daughter to become one of those complacent people like the natives.

There are things that are strange about Darrow that I must raise her to consider strange.

But what makes me lost now is wondering how I should approach Molly now. She seems happy, she's almost glowing with it. And with the both of us so happy, normally I might ask if she wants to go out and celebrate, or have a nice dinner. But that's the motherly side of me, isn't it? And the relationship is a little more complicated now. I must give her the space. This is why we're here in the first place.

"And I hope you'll be happy, too. If there's ever anything that's on your mind, you know you can still come to me," I tell her softly, before I smile. "But right now, I'm guessing you might want to go out and treat yourself to something nice. Celebrate a little."

"I... Does that sound awful?" Molly asks, nose wrinkling, though it isn't enough to keep her from smiling. "Wanting to celebrate? Because I kind of do." It's been such a long year, and she feels so relieved. She just has to keep reminding herself that it isn't like she's gotten rid of something, just shrugged off some burden never to think about it again. Instead, she's found a situation where they all win, they all wind up happier, and that really does seem worthy of celebrating. Besides, it's rare enough that she feels this light as it is. She probably ought to try to make the most of that while she can, because even now, it doesn't seem likely to last.

There's too much wrong with her for that. On some level, she knows it, that her head hasn't been right for a long time now, but this is not the time to stop and try to focus on that. She'll have plenty of time later to deal with that. Right now, she's happy, Jessica's happy, and there's no law that says that shouldn't be the case. Hell, on some level, it's probably a good thing, however convinced a part of her might be that this should have been a little more difficult, more emotional, for her.

Instead, it just feels right. And it isn't like she intends to stop being Jessica just because Jessica is Abigail's mother now. She has no problem knowing her, seeing her, being around her. The right person is just Abigail's parent. She's felt detached from the beginning, anyway, never having a sense of motherhood settle on her, so it isn't as if she's lost anything here or has some arduous transition to make. As far as she's concerned, everything is as it should be. "And of course I will. Come to you, with anything."

"No, that sounds just about right to me," I tell Molly. And I mean it. She looks... at peace, I think, is the best way to put it. Someone who doesn't want to be a mother right now, but who has enough love and care in her heart to want to make sure her girl goes to a good home, a home where she'll be nurtured and loved. Not that I think Molly would have ever been the kind of parent who didn't love her child. Maybe it's naive of me, but I think Molly has enough love in her heart for that much, to love a child who did nothing wrong in the world, to love a child that she still is forever bonded to in some way.

So I let out a little exhale, because it's done, and we're both happier for it. I hope that Abigail will be happier too, in the long run. I'm sure there will be nights soon when she cries because she doesn't know where Molly has gone. But with time, she'll realize that she can depend on me for anything.

"You should go out, really. Do something just for you," I encourage her. "And we'll do something for us. And that's how we'll know that all of this was exactly the right thing to do."

"Yeah, okay," Molly says, her smile barely bitten back. There's no sense in hiding how pleased she feels, how relieved, both for her own sense of freedom and the security that comes with knowing Abigail is in the best possible care. She's seen Jessica with her plenty of times over the past months, knows just how good she is with her, natural in a way that she's never been herself. Were it a stranger standing here with her now, someone with whom she hadn't had a chance for that to be the case, she doubts she would ever stop worrying. As it is, she really can just move forward from here, and let them do so, too, and not have to try not to let their lives intersect. Jessica is one of the closest friends she's got here; if anything, this is only going to make that even truer.

And with her blessing, an encouragement that doesn't seem anything less than genuine, Molly doesn't think she needs to feel guilty about wanting to do something to celebrate — to do something for herself, which she's had so little opportunity to do since around the time she first found out she was pregnant to begin with. She's had nearly two years of being uncertain and uncomfortable, and now, finally, that doesn't have to be the case anymore. "I think I will. I... think we should all get that right now, anyway."

Jessica may have had plenty of time with Abigail, but they ought to have a chance to bond now, under these different circumstances, the way things are going to be from here on out. Just thinking about that makes Molly feel that much better about the whole thing, as if she needed that at all.

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