takecourage | (no subject)

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hopper

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It's been a weird few days. Pregnant doesn't honestly feel like not pregnant, really - she's been told that, for most women, the sickness and shit kicks in around week six, so she's got a few weeks to go. It's early days yet, and Alex knows that a lot could go wrong between now and the end, so she's trying not to think about it as a thing that's too permenant. With her belly still flat under her hoodie, it's easy enough to ignore.

When Hopper texts her to ask her how she is, she asks him over to Black Elm. He hasn't been out to the house yet, and Danny's at the museum all day, so it feels like a good time to catch up. The sun hits the back of the house just right at this time of the day, and there's a tonne of pleasant places to sit.

Honestly, she could do with the company.

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"Oh, shit," she says, a surprised laugh hiccuping out of her, both her hands up. "Yes. God. I mean me."

"Shit," he says, then laughs. "Shit. Okay, so how're you feeling about this?"

He knows Alex isn't a kid the same way he knows Laura isn't a kid. When he treats them like they are, he knows they hate it, it's just that they're both so young. And they've both seen too much shit already. It makes him want to keep them from having to see anything else, even when he knows that isn't fair.

"Better than I was?" says Alex, skimming one hand over her still flat belly. "I was fucking terrified, but Danny took it better than I was expecting, and now he's buying books and shit, so..." She shrugs. "I guess I'm figuring out how the hell to be someone's mom."

"You'll figure it out," Hopper says. He knows it sounds simplistic, saying it like that, but that's how everyone does it at the end of the day. Books are fine, but until you're in the thick of it, you really have no idea what the hell you're going to do.

"Just, uh... maybe go easy on the books," he suggests. "Read some stuff, but don't be too hard on yourself if nothing ends up being as perfect as some of those things say they should be. That's not really how it works."

"You don't know Danny that well, so you don't know that there's no way that I can stop him reading every book that he can get his hands on." She sips her tea. "Honestly, I'm just scared it'll be a boy, and I'll have to talk him out of naming him Daniel Tabor the fucking fifth."

"The fifth," Hopper says in a dry voice. "Shit."

As for the books, he figures they can't really hurt, but it never turns out like the books says it will. He knows that first hand. Those first few months with Sara had been harder than he ever could have figured, first with her refusing to feed well, then with Diane hitting the postpartum blues, as her doctor had referred to them at the time. Hopper knows better now, but in the mid-seventies it had been different.

"Just... don't beat yourself up if the books make it seem like it's supposed to be one way and it isn't," he says. "Either of you."

"Yeah. It's a whole thing. A really fucking stupid thing."

She nods at that, curling her hands around her tea cup again. "I was such a fucking shithead," she says. "And then there's..." She looks down at her wrist, the silver bangle sitting there. "I'm so fucking scared she's going to be like me."

"You know you're having a girl?" he asks.

That sort of thing comes later, he thought, but then again, it's been a really long time since he's been in a situation like this. Maybe technology has changed enough that people can find out really early on.

"And I think she'd be pretty damn lucky to be like you," he adds.

"I don't know anything," she says, softly. "But I've been thinking about my grandma since I found out. Did you know that Judaism passes from mother to daughter?" She brushes her fingers back through her hair. "I just don't want them...whoever they are...to grow up afraid because they're like me."

"Guess that's why you're here to teach 'em," he says. "I mean, shit, kid, you can't stop 'em from being afraid. That's... part of the package. A shitty part, but still a part. All you can do is just make sure you're the safe space they need."

He had been that for Sara. With Eleven, he had failed more than he wants to think on, but he's going to do better now. He has to. He's been better for Beverly.

Sometimes, Alex thinks about that - how Mira must have so desperately wanted to make it better, how Alex left her with no choices in the end. But Alex won't be on her own doing it, will she? Alex will have Danny.

She fiddles with the bracelet on her wrist. "I'm going to do my best."

"Yeah, of course you are," he says. "And you're not alone. You got Danny, though I suggest you get veto rights for the naming process in writing. You got your friends and you got me."

He smiles a little and shrugs. "Helps that you're not stupid either. You'll figure it out."

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