"I can't say no to such a project, can I?", the photographer chuckled. "Of course.", he smirked.
"Thank you.", Lana grinned, making her way to Amélie on the chair. "Look princess… can you hold that in the camera for me?", Lana asked.
Before Amé gave any answer, she looked at the picture in her hands. Of course, she didn't know what it was but she was still fascinated by it. "Bean!", she grinned, pointing at the fetus in the middle.
"Yeah… that's kinda true.", Lana chuckled, going behind the tall man. "Alright now show the picture to me Amé.", the woman instructed, making Amélie giggle.
She rearranged the photo in her hands before showing it eagerly in Lana's direction, so the camera could capture it. Her sweet smile was shining bright when the man took the perfect shot of the proud big sister-to-be.
"Got it", he confirmed with a grin.
*****
"Mama tate!", Amélie said, already on her way into the kitchen.
"No…. Amé… we can't bake a cake now.", Lana said.
"Why?", the little one asked.
"Because I am helping Flynn with his project for school. You can go and play… maybe auntie Trish plays with you.", Lana suggested, looking over to her friend, who nodded.
"No…", Amélie said, looking at the two of them. "Tish bake?", She grinned.
"She is smart.", Lana mumbled. "No, Trish doesn't wanna bake. It's too late for that. It's almost dinner time. Still don't know where daddy is, though.", she confessed, having a look at her phone.
"Still no messages?", Trish asked, slightly recognizing Lana's tension.
"No, still nothing… he wrote this morning that he is going out with Colin. That's it. We'll let's see. They probably forgot the time.", she said.
"Mama!!", Amélie now got impatient since nobody paid attention to her anymore. "Bake!!", she yelled.
"Amélie. I said not today. Do you wanna scoop? I can give you a bowl of rice to practice your scooping if it's what you want.", Lana sighed, already getting a headache since Amélie was getting loud quite quickly today.
"Yeah. Soop.", she said and grabbed her kitchen equipment to sit down at the table, where Lana and Flynn were still trying to build a structure out of play dough and toothpicks.
"Alright.", Lana sighed, standing up again to grab some rice and bowls for Amé to scoop from A to B.
"Are you okay?", Trish asked, not liking how quickly her friend was out of energy, which was probably connected to the pregnancy. Except for the tiredness, Lana was quite lucky until now. The only symptom she experienced other than exhaustion was nausea that was coming and going, depending on the smell of the food.
"Yeah… just getting pretty tired.", Lana confessed, petting Lola who made her way up to the woman, before changing the topic. "What do you think we should eat for dinner, Flynn? What would you like?", She said, looking up at him.
"Ehm… can we order Pizza? I really like your cooking but… I would like some pizza.", he confessed.
"Yeah… why not. I don't feel like cooking anyway, to be honest. Let me get the tablet.", Lana said, before getting it from the living room. "Let's see. What would you like? Pizza with ham?", She asked.
"Yeah! Please. But just a small one.", Flynn answered.
"They have a kids menu. It comes with a small pizza, a small salad, pizza balls, dessert and a small drink. I think I will take that for all of you, yeah?"
"Yes. But what dessert and drink do they have?", the oldest asked.
"Ehm… let me see. Only brownies for delivery. But that's fine, right?", She asked, seeing Flynn nod. "And for a drink… apple juice?", Lana said, raising one eyebrow.
"Jep. Thank you.", Flynn grinned, whilst Lana tapped some different icons on Sean's tablet. "Alright.", she finished. Lana continued with Leo, who was playing in the living room and sorted out a kids menu for Amélie as well before asking Trish.
"Ehm… do you think I should get a pizza for Sean too?", Lana asked, having a glance at her watch. "Maybe I will just get a big one and he can eat my leftover in case he hasn't eaten when he comes home… is that fine?"
"Sure! Why not.", Trish answered.
The pizza was delivered just half an hour later, perfect for dinner time.
Lana cut it for Amélie and Leo into small pieces, placing them together with their vegetables and brownie on a plate.
Just when they were about to start eating, Sean finally showed up, tossing his keys in a corner at the entrance. "I am home.", he yelled, following the noises into the kitchen. "Hey…", he said with a small smile. "Ohu pizza. Can I have some?", he asked straight away.
"Sure… sit down.", Lana slightly smiled even though a lot of questions were popping up in her mind. "Where were you? How was your day?", She finally asked.
"Good until I lost my phone.", Sean mumbled. "Colin and I were at a football game… and when he went home, I realized my phone was missing. I searched everywhere.", Sean confessed with a long sigh.
"That's not good. It's locked with a password, right?", Lana asked, looking up at him with a concerned expression.
"Yeah… it should be. But it also has a face Id…if anyone finds out that it's my phone, they could simply use a picture from Google to unlock it.", Sean answered.
"What's your background picture? Could people tell by that?", Lana questioned.
"Ehm… it's you with Amèlie... but I think it should be fine. Nobody should trace it. Hopefully.", he said.
"Anyway… how was your day? How do you enjoy Vancouver, Trish?", Sean smiled. "Where have you been to?"
"Ehh….", Trish started, not really knowing what to say since Lana and her literary just had lunch, talked, went to the doctor and printed those pictures in the end. "We had… lunch? And walked around talking. Ehm… she showed me Storybrooke.", Trish nodded, hoping he would believe her since she didn't even know what the real name of that town was that portrait Storybrook.
"Oh, I see. It's quite a nice little part of Vancouver, isn't it?", he chuckled.
"Yeah. Very pretty.", Trish smiled.
Thank God Sean didn't question her furthermore, instead, he asked the kids how their day went, before cleaning the kitchen whilst Lana and Trish made the kids ready for bed.
"Alright. Good night, sweetheart.", Lana chuckled, giving Flynn a goodnight kiss."
"Night Mama…", he answered. "Are you feeling better now? Are you not staying in the bedroom anymore?", he finally asked shyly.
"No… no, I will not stay there anymore. I promise.", Lana smiled.
"Okay… because I really missed you.", he chuckled. "And can my friend come tomorrow? Dad has his number.", Flynn asked.
"We'll see about this tomorrow morning okay? If they have time, we can probably arrange something.", she smiled. "Okay. Now close your eyes. It's late.", she said, giving him a last kiss before saying goodnight to Trish and moving to the bedroom, where she was nervously waiting for Sean with the pictures in one hand and the other one resting on her stomach.
"I would have loved to keep you a surprise, but I can't, little one. And the next weeks of filming are going to be intense, okay? But after that it will be easy.", she chuckled, before having a last look at the pictures Trish printed after the photographer sent them by Mail.
Lana was just about to think through what she would like to say, when the bedroom door opened, revealing a freshly showered Sean with still wet her and a towel around his waist.
"You okay?", he chuckled, when he saw Lana with a bright smile on the edge of the bed, whilst walking up to his closet under her gaze. "Seriously.", Sean laughed when her eyes didn't leave his body. "What is it?", he chuckled.
"I just received some of Amélie's shots from picture day and printed them out for you.", Lana grinned.
"Why is that? Shouldn't we get the results in like 2 weeks?", Sean frowned, just putting on some boxers, since it was too warm for anything else before sitting next to his girlfriend.
"Yeah… these were just the first promo pics, you know? They won't be in the official ones. I just came to collect Amé when it was her time to do the pictures since I was a bit early and thought they might have finished. So yeah… I had a little chat with the photographer and he sent them out to me, so I could print them anyway.", Lana explained in the best way possible and since she was an actress, not even Sean could tell that she was actually lying.
"Alright. Can I see?", he grinned. "It's so exciting… can't believe this was her first picture day. I mean… look how big she is already. Trying to form sentences and walking up and down the stairs. It's crazy.", he laughed.
"Yeah… that's true.", Lana laughed. "Remember last year… around that time I was still carrying her… trying to guess what she wanted. Now she has like a very clear opinion about everything.", she laughed. "And those pictures show as well how big she is. How great and… just herself.", Lana chuckled, giving Sean the first photo.
It showed how curious their daughter looked at the unknown picture in her hands, not revealing yet what exactly she was looking at.
"That's so cute. Honestly. But what is that? What does she have in her fingers?", Sean laughed. "Is it something she made? Or like her name?", he questioned with a chuckle but instead of answering, Lana gave him the second picture, showing Amélie with a big grin, leaning forward to hold the ultrasound picture into the camera.
At first, Sean was only looking at his daughter's precious face, before his gaze shifted to the blurry black and white picture in her hands, making him frown. "What does that mea–", he just stopped in all of his movements, causing his and Lana's breathing to be clearly audible. It seemed like the world had stopped spinning for a second or two, whilst Sean's hands suddenly began shaking.
He placed the picture down on the bed, trying to focus and sort his thoughts before he stood up, almost getting hectic. "Where are my glasses??", he squeaked, not trusting his vision anymore, especially not in such an intense situation. He walked around the room, finally getting a grip on them before hurrying back to the picture.
He literally threw himself in front of the bed, kneeling down, to rest his head on the edge of the mattress, holding the picture with shaking hands in front of his face to get a glimpse of every inch of this paper, whilst tears were making his sight blurry.
"Is this true?", he asked, finally looking at Lana, who had the same amount of tears in her eyes and a small smile on her lips.
The amount of adoration in Sean's voice sent her over the edge, letting go of several tears whilst nodding gently. "It's true.", she managed to say whilst giving him the last picture of the day, which was the ultrasound scan. "I am pregnant.", she cried out with a laugh, wiping away the tears with her fingers.
Sean took the photo from her hands but still remained almost frozen to the spot, sitting on the floor, whilst letting one finger travel across the sonogram as gently as possible to not destroy any of it.
His mouth stood slightly open, whilst his eyes sparkled in astonishment, before his gaze shifted from the picture in his hands, right to Lana's stomach, which was basically right in front of him. Without another word, he placed his head on his girlfriend's lap, his forehead softly touching Lana's still perfectly flat stomach, whilst he closed his eyes with a peaceful grin on his face.
"You have no idea how loved you are already, little bean.", Sean grinned, gently rubbing over Lana's abdomen to acknowledge the moment even more, whilst his girlfriend was letting her hand go through his hair.
"I can't believe it.", Sean said, breaking the silence after a while. He finally stood up from the floor, pulling Lana down with him on the bed for a gentle hug. "I love you so much.", he grinned. "It's just… perfect… I… I can't describe it.", Sean grinned. "When did you find out?", he curiously asked, even though he had his guesses.
"Saturday… after the Convention… I… I wanted to tell you but… all of the sudden my thoughts took over and… All I felt was fear. I had nightmares about that time… when I lost the baby but instead of Fred it was you holding my hand. You crying next to me. I… I was just so afraid of not going to make it. And the chance of miscarriage or any disabilities is still high –", Lana said, already getting noticeably anxious again, so Sean squeezed her hand a little bit.
"Pshh. It's okay. It's okay. We are in this together and we will face whatever our future will bring to us. The only important thing right now is our little munchkin, who only requires to be loved.", Sean smiled. "And maybe fed, so I will make sure that you will eat properly from now on. And no alcohol anymore. Even though I think the little one already took care of that. You didn't enjoy your wine at all in the past weeks. It was mostly me drinking.", Sean chuckled.
"Yeah… that's right…", Lana smirked, much calmer now with Sean's hand drawing circles on her stomach.
"How do you feel?", Sean asked. "The fainting… it was the Baby, right?", Sean asked.
"Most likely… yes… hormones, lack of food… etc…to be fair I am feeling quite alright. I felt nauseous pretty much just once… at the convention with all the various foods. But other than that…only tiredness. No throwing up, no sore breasts, no nothing. Either I am VERY lucky or it will hit me in a few weeks like there is no tomorrow.", Lana chuckled.
"Hopefully not.", Sean laughed. "Oh my gosh… I… still can't believe it.", he laughed. "We're going to have another baby.", he grinned. "Another beautiful little Lana running around.", he chuckled, making his girlfriend giggle.
"We don't know the gender yet, Sean…we don't even know if it's going to make it.", Lana sighed.
"First of all. I am convinced that it is a girl. Even though my family consists basically just of boys. But that doesn't matter. It is a little baby Lana. And secondly… please… try to think positively. I know it seems hard and frightening but there is soo much scary stuff in the world. And? Does it drag you down day by day? No…so come on.", he grinned, smiling when Lana showed her elusive smirk. "Yeah. That's what I wanna see. You're pregnant. There is a baby growing and… gosh… it's one of your biggest dreams come true!", Sean laughed. "And I am allowed to be part of it.", he added softly.
"Yeah…", Lana giggled. "It's… everything is so overwhelming. I don't know what to think.", she laughed. "But yeah… it's… a miracle.", she chuckled, pulling up her shirt to place a hand on her bare skin, whilst Sean was putting his on top.
"It is. The best one of all the time.", he grinned.
"Can we just… not tell people just yet? I mean people who don't NEED to know.", Lana asked, looking at him with a questioning expression.
"If you want to… of course… We could wait like another week or two. Why not.", he grinned. "We just need to tell Adam and Eddie asap…and Eduardo otherwise your costumes might get even more uncomfortable.", Sean giggled.
"Yeah... But...No… not a week or two. I meant until the second trimester. Until the 12th week… so 5 more weeks before telling people. Except for the ones who need to know.", Lana confessed, looking straight into Sean's confused face.
"It's just… the risk of losing it is smaller in the second trimester and…"
"--It's okay. Pshh. I understand. I will not tell anyone. I promise… but I am not sure if we can keep it a secret that long. Be prepared that at least Bex or Ginny will find out. They know how it is to be pregnant and I am pretty sure they will get suspicious when you have any clear symptoms.", he confessed. "You might even show by then… depending on how your body is responding."
"I… I will just try to hide it.", Lana sighed.
"Okay… but… can you just explain to me what would change when Bex for example would know?", Sean asked. "I just want to understand.", he gently confessed.
"I want to keep it to ourselves because... I want to talk about my former experiences and feelings and want to get less anxious. All my emotions of my miscarriage came back up with that pregnancy and showed me how deeply I am still haunted by that. I need to talk it off…and I wanted to ask you if you could help me. Honestly… just be yourself because I am pretty sure you will make me forget about any doubts.", Lana chuckled.
"I would love to. And I think that's the right way to approach it too. I am proud that you wanna talk", he grinned, gently packing Lana's lips. "You know what I just realized?", Sean chuckled.
"What?", Lana grinned, mirroring his mischievous smile.
"I think I know now why our love life has changed over the past weeks.", he grinned. "Your hormones like it more intense I guess.", Sean said, biting his lip.
"Yeah and I didn't let you near me for quite some days… so... I am sick of pushing you away, if that's what you wanna hear.", she grinned. "Come on… don't look at me like that Maguire. Just take what's yours.", Lana chuckled.
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A/N: Just to inform you, I might not be able to upload on Thursday.
Also... I am probably skipping quite some time in between chapters, so is there anything specifically that you would like to read about whilst Lana is pregnant?