Erin Ptah (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
ptahrrific) wrote2007-09-02 01:15 am
ptahrrific) wrote2007-09-02 01:15 am
Entry tags:
Fake News: Expecting, Epilogue
Title: Expecting, Epilogue: Whom Anchors Guard And Pundits Sing
Series: The Colbert Report
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Heavy stuff. And, y'know, sex.
Words: ~3000
Disclaimer: Two.
For the Report characters: They and their universe are property of Stephen Colbert, the other Report writers, and of course Viacom. Not mine. Sue me not, please.
And for the real people, the poem:
Please, make no mistake:
these people aren't fake,
but what's said here is no more than fiction.
It only was writ
because we like their wit
and wisecracks, and pull-squints, and diction.
We don't mean to quibble,
but this can't be libel;
it's never implied to be real.
No disrespect's meant;
if you disapprove, then,
the back button's right up there. Deal.
Notes: This story has been a blast to write, and the feedback has been incredible. Thank you all for reading, commenting, encouraging, enjoying, and taking a chance on mpreg in the first place.
Here, at last, it comes to a close. Enjoy.
Clips referenced: Stephen and Steve's arrangement.
For the full table of contents to this story, click here.
Epilogue
Whom Anchors Guard And Pundits Sing
December 25, 2007
Six Months (And Counting)
Every wall on the ground floor was adorned with pictures: portraits, photographs, and paintings, of all shapes and sizes, in all types of frames.
At one time each of them would have been a variation on the same subject. And, it must be admitted, most of them still did; Stephen had enough images of himself to wallpaper the place. But the bulk of these were packed away, and in between the ones still hanging, new things were starting to appear.
After his father, George was the most common subject. He was in everything from professional portraits to glossy photos to hundreds of everyday photographs arranged in massive collages.
Other pictures included high-quality stills from the 2007 Emmys, the largest showing Stephen holding aloft the Report's first; a photo from Stockholm, featuring Dr. Moreau and colleagues accepting their Nobel Medicine Prize; that year's school pictures for Stephen's older children; and a portrait of Jon standing in front of a portrait of himself, in which each version of him was giving the other a dubious look, as if to say, "Why did I agree to this, again?"
Pictures were not limited to the walls. A desk in the den was crowded with little frames and Christmas cards. Foremost of these was the one with the family picture from the Fey-McGee household, and right behind it one with a photo of Tad and Bobby on a beach wearing Santa hats and colorful leis. It was a wonder there was any space for the Christmas decorations at all.
But somehow there were streamers, and baubles, and tinsel, and ribbons, and lights, and mistletoe (real mistletoe, not plastic, not holly), and the biggest fir tree Jon had ever seen. Until this morning, there had been space to walk around, but not much.
Now you couldn't take three steps without running into some of the debris that will inevitably be left by the opening of enough presents for four adults and three children, plus packages from thousands of eager fans across the country, plus all the extra gifts that Stephen had pressed upon Jon in his self-appointed quest to make up for every Christmas that Jon, as a Jew, had "skipped".
Rather than try to navigate the mess, Jon was leaning contentedly back in one of the plush chairs in the living room. Lights in the tree sparkled. Charlene, two chairs down, was in the midst of a story about the time she got lost in Aix-en-Provence.
She had moved in with Stephen, to the delight of the Colbert Nation. Even if her stories were as exaggerated as Stephen's usually were, she had had enough adventures that Jon could believe she was content to take care of a house for a while.
And the joint Christmas celebration had been Stephen's idea, because the Colberts and the Stewarts were exchanging so many gifts that it made sense to pile them under one tree.
"You all right, hon?" asked Tracey from the chair beside him.
"Hm? Yeah, fine. Sorry, did I space out?"
"A little." She was giggling a bit; Charlene must have ended the story on a joke. Jon had missed it completely.
And the story was over, because Charlene had stopped talking. She and Tracey exchanged a look as a slightly awkward silence descended.
"Hey," said Jon, "don't let me keep you two."
That had been Stephen's idea too.
("Steve and I used to do it," he had explained, when he realized that the other three were giving him slightly scandalized looks. "Except then Lorraine and Nancy decided they liked each other better, and that left me with Steve, and we had angry sex a few times but it didn't really work out, so we called the whole thing off."
This kind of arrangement had never occurred to Jon, but when he thought about the first thing his wife had said to him after meeting Charlene — "I think I understand what you see in Stephen now!" — it made a weird kind of sense. Still, everyone but Stephen was surprised when, after the two women had gone out a few times, it fell smoothly into line.
The four of them ran on basically the same model that Stephen and Steve had used, except that with this group there was no pot involved, and when they were all in their own homes Stephen and Charlene did not actually sleep together. Most of the world assumed that they did, and that was fine with Jon. It drew attention away from the fact that, when they all spent the night at one house or the other, Charlene was Tracey's, and Stephen was his.)
"We can't just take off," protested his wife. "You'd be left by yourself."
"He's right in the next room. It's no big deal. And besides, if it doesn't go well, he might not want a crowd around."
"That's true," agreed Charlene.
"If you're sure," said Tracey. "We're on Nate duty tonight, right?"
"I think so. Yeah."
All three children were in their respective bedrooms, which for Jon's kids meant guest rooms permanently reserved for them. The adults could have been guaranteed full nights of sleep on occasion if one couple had been responsible for all of the kids at once, but Stephen refused to to let anyone else be responsible for George, so the women were generally in charge of Maggie and they switched off on Nate.
This, too, had been working remarkably well.
"Got it." She climbed out of her chair and waded through drifts of wrapping paper to his, where she leaned over and gave him a light kiss. "Merry Christmas."
"Merry Christmas, Trace."
He watched the two shuffle through the mess towards the hall. As they were turning the corner he saw Tracey's arm curl around Charlene's waist and squeeze; then he closed his eyes entirely and listened to the muffled voice of Stephen from the next room.
♦ ⋅ ◊ ⋅ ♦ ⋅ ◊ ⋅ ♦
It wasn't long before Stephen came out, grinning in that helpless way he had when he was happy about something completely innocent.
"How'd it go?" asked Jon, grinning back.
The news poured out of Stephen as he waded over to sit down on the arm of Jon's chair. Sally had been in the Christmas pageant, and Mary had gotten an A on her last test, and John Paul was speaking in complete sentences now, "and they all loved their presents, Jon, they never used to do that, but I sent the things Lorraine suggested and they loved them!"
Jon let his arm rest around the other man's waist. So rarely seen in public without a tie and a pressed collar, tonight under his robe Stephen was wearing only his favorite flag boxers and an Alpha Squad 7 T-shirt. Jon himself was in khakis and a blue patterned shirt, which was one of those presents from Stephen, "because you can't wear solid grey all the time, you need to branch out a little."
"That's great," he said every time Stephen paused for breath, which wasn't often. "Wonderful. Fantastic."
"And I got to talk to them, Jon, all of them, even..."
He trailed off at last, smile fading a little.
"Even Ty?" prompted Jon.
"Yeah. Even...Ty."
Stephen looked at the floor. "I can't call him that, Jon! He hates it when I call him Stephen, or Steve, or Junior, but he's not a Tyrone!"
Jon didn't push the matter. He understood all too well why the name set Stephen off, more so even than Caesar salads and the collected works of Edgar Allen Poe.
On their first few nights together Jon had found it hard to remember his own name, let alone pay close attention to Stephen's emotional state — for while Jon admittedly hadn't had much to compare it with, he could tell the man was talented — but eventually he had started to notice that, during what you might call key moments, Stephen was simply not there.
They talked about it, because if Jon had learned anything in the past year it was that he and Stephen had to talk about things. At last it had come out that Stephen had dealt with those behaviors that he was ashamed of by cutting them off from himself. He didn't just use the name "Tyrone Hunnibi"; he became Tyrone Hunnibi.
It was, as defense systems go, brilliant. After he moved into mainstream industry, every so often he would turn into Tyrone again and log on to a certain type of web site or hook up with someone in the restroom of an Outback Steakhouse, and it didn't matter what happened next because when it was over he would turn back into Stephen T. Colbert and it wouldn't have been him.
And so he surrounded himself with that name, the respectable name. He carved it into the studio set, he wrote it into his segments, he shouted it to his audience every night. It was his way of building a wall, a shield, to fortify his role as a man beloved by the people and respected by himself, to block out all those undesirable things that belonged not to him but to Tyrone Hunnibi, or even to little Stevie Colbert-with-a-hard-T, the boy who couldn't even get his parents' attention, much less their approval.
It had all fallen apart in those first few months with Jon. He was only just starting to come back together.
"Why couldn't he be called something else?" moaned Stephen.
It was a discussion they'd had several times. There wasn't much Jon could do except repeat, "He doesn't know, Stephen. He has no idea."
"But I know!"
"Doesn't matter. None of it has touched him. Listen to me, Stephen. None of that has touched your kids."
He squeezed gently. It was the wrong thing to do; Stephen froze.
(He would do this in bed, too, when Jon inadvertently touched him the way someone else had touched him, during some past encounter that was ultimately unpleasant. Stripped of his armor, he would freeze up, falling back into that memory, until Jon could bring him out of it.
And there was only one way to do that...)
"Stephen," said Jon. "Stephen. Stephen. My Stephen."
Nothing happened at first; and then Stephen drew a shuddery breath and said, "Don't stop."
♦ ⋅ ◊ ⋅ ♦ ⋅ ◊ ⋅ ♦
"Stephen," gasped Jon as they crashed into their bedroom, "Stephen, Stephen, you're Stephen, the one and only Stephen, the Emmy-winning Stephen, Time's influential Stephen, my Stephen, Stephen, he's a handsome man his name is Stephen, Stephen..."
The Emmy winner and handsome man in question was writhing in his arms, breathing hard, covering his face and neck with kisses, and every time his lips came near one of Jon's ears he would whisper Don't stop, and Jon would focus anew on the chant.
They tumbled onto the sheets, Stephen pulling back for long enough to shrug off his robe. Jon took the opportunity to slip his glasses off of his face and toss them onto the nightstand before reaching for the T-shirt; Stephen beat him to it, and Jon found his hands stroking bare skin, which was, except for the scar, nearly good as new. As fingertips brushed up his sides Stephen gasped — but it wasn't out of fear of a memory, it was a gasp of pleasure at the here and now — and then he pounced on Jon and fell to it again.
"Stephen, Stephen," it was too much, too good, "you are still Stephen, aren't you?"
"Jon, it's me, I'm here, don't let me go, don't stop!"
He obliged instantly. "Stephen, Stephen, my — ah — Stephen, wonderful Stephen, dear Stephen, Stephen, lovable — oh — Stephen!—"
Stephen had left Jon's shirt on and was going straight for the khakis, which was just as well, they couldn't have stood to get much tighter anyway—
"Stephen, God, Stephen—"
And then a wail, crackly with static, split the air.
Stephen sat up. Jon shut up.
There was another squall from the baby monitor, and an instant later Stephen had snatched his robe from where it had fallen and was pulling it on as he ran out the door.
Jon flopped back against the pillows and suppressed a groan.
Stephen had an almost supernatural ability to shut everything else down when the six-month-old needed something. Jon was not so lucky. Heart still pounding, he forced himself to take slow breaths, and thought very hard about Ann Coulter.
♦ ⋅ ◊ ⋅ ♦ ⋅ ◊ ⋅ ♦
The problem, it turned out, was the diaper.
Fixing it was a dirty job, but someone had to do it, and Stephen felt as though he could swim through a swamp in a new designer suit if George needed it. Of course, swimming was easy, while diaper-changing had lots of steps and all these complicated little tabs to hook up in the right order. But Stephen, to his own surprise, had been determined to learn; and by now he'd even gotten the hang of it.
Unfortunately, being clean and dry did not by itself make the baby go back to sleep again, so Stephen cradled the fussing George against his shoulder and rocked gently around the nursery, which had eventually been decorated around the very simple theme of "ducks". Eagles were rather scary and fierce for an infant to deal with; Stephen had reasoned that George ought to start with something easier and work his way up.
He'd tried singing in Korean, but he only knew one song in the language and it was all addressed to "girl", so he switched to an old standard.
"Hush, little baby, don't say a word
Daddy's gonna buy you a mockingbird
And if that mockingbird don't sing
Daddy's gonna buy you a diamond ring
And if that diamond ring turns brass
Daddy's gonna buy you a looking glass
And if that looking glass should break
Daddy's gonna buy you a chocolate cake
And if that cake should be too dry
Daddy and some feminists will bake a pie
And when that pie is eaten up
Daddy's gonna buy you a...
Jon, what comes after the pie?"
He didn't have to look to know that Jon had appeared in the doorway.
"I don't know. I think you got away from the usual lyrics at some point."
"I guess so."
George had stopped crying, but he was still fussy, and without knowing what (if anything) came after the pie there was nothing for Stephen to do but pick another song.
"What child is this who laid to rest
In Stephen's arms is sleeping?
Whom Nations greet with cheering sweet
While eagles watch are keeping?"
♦ ⋅ ◊ ⋅ ♦ ⋅ ◊ ⋅ ♦
They really had to pitch a Christmas album to someone, Jon thought, as he thought every time he heard Stephen sing a carol. Stephen's voice was rich and clear, and as he hit each note it resonated with love and belief.
"This, this, is George the king,
Whom anchors guard and pundits sing;
Haste, haste, to bring him laud,
The babe, the son of Stephen!"
At last George drifted off; switching out the lights, his father placed him gently back in his crib and drew the fluffy duck-patterned blanket over his slumbering form. Only then did Jon approach, wrapping his arms around Stephen and standing on tiptoe to rest his head on the taller man's shoulder.
"Did you make that up yourself?" he asked gently.
"No, Jon, it's a traditional Christmas song, probably hundreds of years old..."
"I know, I know. I mean the new lyrics."
"Oh. No, they're from someone on the Colbert Nation forum. Some of the heroes write these things for fun, and Avery sends me the best ones." He paused. "Except the bit about 'anchors guarding'. They don't know about you, so that was mine."
"'Anchors', plural? How many do you have?"
"Just you. But it wouldn't fit the song otherwise."
Jon kissed him, just below the ear, and he began to tense.
"Stephen...."
"It's okay, Jon, it's okay. I know who I am in here."
So for a while he just held Stephen, silent in the moonlight, and together they watched George sleep. At last he said softly, "Would you like to stay here all night?"
"No. Oh no. Definitely not. The things I'd like to do...." Stephen laughed a short, knowing laugh, and covered Jon's hands with his own. "I can't do them in here, that's for sure. But a little bit longer, Jon. Let's just stay here for a little bit longer."
THE END,
or, rather,
THE BEGINNING.
Series: The Colbert Report
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Heavy stuff. And, y'know, sex.
Words: ~3000
Disclaimer: Two.
For the Report characters: They and their universe are property of Stephen Colbert, the other Report writers, and of course Viacom. Not mine. Sue me not, please.
And for the real people, the poem:
Please, make no mistake:
these people aren't fake,
but what's said here is no more than fiction.
It only was writ
because we like their wit
and wisecracks, and pull-squints, and diction.
We don't mean to quibble,
but this can't be libel;
it's never implied to be real.
No disrespect's meant;
if you disapprove, then,
the back button's right up there. Deal.
Notes: This story has been a blast to write, and the feedback has been incredible. Thank you all for reading, commenting, encouraging, enjoying, and taking a chance on mpreg in the first place.
Here, at last, it comes to a close. Enjoy.
Clips referenced: Stephen and Steve's arrangement.
For the full table of contents to this story, click here.
Epilogue
Whom Anchors Guard And Pundits Sing
December 25, 2007
Six Months (And Counting)
Every wall on the ground floor was adorned with pictures: portraits, photographs, and paintings, of all shapes and sizes, in all types of frames.
At one time each of them would have been a variation on the same subject. And, it must be admitted, most of them still did; Stephen had enough images of himself to wallpaper the place. But the bulk of these were packed away, and in between the ones still hanging, new things were starting to appear.
After his father, George was the most common subject. He was in everything from professional portraits to glossy photos to hundreds of everyday photographs arranged in massive collages.
Other pictures included high-quality stills from the 2007 Emmys, the largest showing Stephen holding aloft the Report's first; a photo from Stockholm, featuring Dr. Moreau and colleagues accepting their Nobel Medicine Prize; that year's school pictures for Stephen's older children; and a portrait of Jon standing in front of a portrait of himself, in which each version of him was giving the other a dubious look, as if to say, "Why did I agree to this, again?"
Pictures were not limited to the walls. A desk in the den was crowded with little frames and Christmas cards. Foremost of these was the one with the family picture from the Fey-McGee household, and right behind it one with a photo of Tad and Bobby on a beach wearing Santa hats and colorful leis. It was a wonder there was any space for the Christmas decorations at all.
But somehow there were streamers, and baubles, and tinsel, and ribbons, and lights, and mistletoe (real mistletoe, not plastic, not holly), and the biggest fir tree Jon had ever seen. Until this morning, there had been space to walk around, but not much.
Now you couldn't take three steps without running into some of the debris that will inevitably be left by the opening of enough presents for four adults and three children, plus packages from thousands of eager fans across the country, plus all the extra gifts that Stephen had pressed upon Jon in his self-appointed quest to make up for every Christmas that Jon, as a Jew, had "skipped".
Rather than try to navigate the mess, Jon was leaning contentedly back in one of the plush chairs in the living room. Lights in the tree sparkled. Charlene, two chairs down, was in the midst of a story about the time she got lost in Aix-en-Provence.
She had moved in with Stephen, to the delight of the Colbert Nation. Even if her stories were as exaggerated as Stephen's usually were, she had had enough adventures that Jon could believe she was content to take care of a house for a while.
And the joint Christmas celebration had been Stephen's idea, because the Colberts and the Stewarts were exchanging so many gifts that it made sense to pile them under one tree.
"You all right, hon?" asked Tracey from the chair beside him.
"Hm? Yeah, fine. Sorry, did I space out?"
"A little." She was giggling a bit; Charlene must have ended the story on a joke. Jon had missed it completely.
And the story was over, because Charlene had stopped talking. She and Tracey exchanged a look as a slightly awkward silence descended.
"Hey," said Jon, "don't let me keep you two."
That had been Stephen's idea too.
("Steve and I used to do it," he had explained, when he realized that the other three were giving him slightly scandalized looks. "Except then Lorraine and Nancy decided they liked each other better, and that left me with Steve, and we had angry sex a few times but it didn't really work out, so we called the whole thing off."
This kind of arrangement had never occurred to Jon, but when he thought about the first thing his wife had said to him after meeting Charlene — "I think I understand what you see in Stephen now!" — it made a weird kind of sense. Still, everyone but Stephen was surprised when, after the two women had gone out a few times, it fell smoothly into line.
The four of them ran on basically the same model that Stephen and Steve had used, except that with this group there was no pot involved, and when they were all in their own homes Stephen and Charlene did not actually sleep together. Most of the world assumed that they did, and that was fine with Jon. It drew attention away from the fact that, when they all spent the night at one house or the other, Charlene was Tracey's, and Stephen was his.)
"We can't just take off," protested his wife. "You'd be left by yourself."
"He's right in the next room. It's no big deal. And besides, if it doesn't go well, he might not want a crowd around."
"That's true," agreed Charlene.
"If you're sure," said Tracey. "We're on Nate duty tonight, right?"
"I think so. Yeah."
All three children were in their respective bedrooms, which for Jon's kids meant guest rooms permanently reserved for them. The adults could have been guaranteed full nights of sleep on occasion if one couple had been responsible for all of the kids at once, but Stephen refused to to let anyone else be responsible for George, so the women were generally in charge of Maggie and they switched off on Nate.
This, too, had been working remarkably well.
"Got it." She climbed out of her chair and waded through drifts of wrapping paper to his, where she leaned over and gave him a light kiss. "Merry Christmas."
"Merry Christmas, Trace."
He watched the two shuffle through the mess towards the hall. As they were turning the corner he saw Tracey's arm curl around Charlene's waist and squeeze; then he closed his eyes entirely and listened to the muffled voice of Stephen from the next room.
It wasn't long before Stephen came out, grinning in that helpless way he had when he was happy about something completely innocent.
"How'd it go?" asked Jon, grinning back.
The news poured out of Stephen as he waded over to sit down on the arm of Jon's chair. Sally had been in the Christmas pageant, and Mary had gotten an A on her last test, and John Paul was speaking in complete sentences now, "and they all loved their presents, Jon, they never used to do that, but I sent the things Lorraine suggested and they loved them!"
Jon let his arm rest around the other man's waist. So rarely seen in public without a tie and a pressed collar, tonight under his robe Stephen was wearing only his favorite flag boxers and an Alpha Squad 7 T-shirt. Jon himself was in khakis and a blue patterned shirt, which was one of those presents from Stephen, "because you can't wear solid grey all the time, you need to branch out a little."
"That's great," he said every time Stephen paused for breath, which wasn't often. "Wonderful. Fantastic."
"And I got to talk to them, Jon, all of them, even..."
He trailed off at last, smile fading a little.
"Even Ty?" prompted Jon.
"Yeah. Even...Ty."
Stephen looked at the floor. "I can't call him that, Jon! He hates it when I call him Stephen, or Steve, or Junior, but he's not a Tyrone!"
Jon didn't push the matter. He understood all too well why the name set Stephen off, more so even than Caesar salads and the collected works of Edgar Allen Poe.
On their first few nights together Jon had found it hard to remember his own name, let alone pay close attention to Stephen's emotional state — for while Jon admittedly hadn't had much to compare it with, he could tell the man was talented — but eventually he had started to notice that, during what you might call key moments, Stephen was simply not there.
They talked about it, because if Jon had learned anything in the past year it was that he and Stephen had to talk about things. At last it had come out that Stephen had dealt with those behaviors that he was ashamed of by cutting them off from himself. He didn't just use the name "Tyrone Hunnibi"; he became Tyrone Hunnibi.
It was, as defense systems go, brilliant. After he moved into mainstream industry, every so often he would turn into Tyrone again and log on to a certain type of web site or hook up with someone in the restroom of an Outback Steakhouse, and it didn't matter what happened next because when it was over he would turn back into Stephen T. Colbert and it wouldn't have been him.
And so he surrounded himself with that name, the respectable name. He carved it into the studio set, he wrote it into his segments, he shouted it to his audience every night. It was his way of building a wall, a shield, to fortify his role as a man beloved by the people and respected by himself, to block out all those undesirable things that belonged not to him but to Tyrone Hunnibi, or even to little Stevie Colbert-with-a-hard-T, the boy who couldn't even get his parents' attention, much less their approval.
It had all fallen apart in those first few months with Jon. He was only just starting to come back together.
"Why couldn't he be called something else?" moaned Stephen.
It was a discussion they'd had several times. There wasn't much Jon could do except repeat, "He doesn't know, Stephen. He has no idea."
"But I know!"
"Doesn't matter. None of it has touched him. Listen to me, Stephen. None of that has touched your kids."
He squeezed gently. It was the wrong thing to do; Stephen froze.
(He would do this in bed, too, when Jon inadvertently touched him the way someone else had touched him, during some past encounter that was ultimately unpleasant. Stripped of his armor, he would freeze up, falling back into that memory, until Jon could bring him out of it.
And there was only one way to do that...)
"Stephen," said Jon. "Stephen. Stephen. My Stephen."
Nothing happened at first; and then Stephen drew a shuddery breath and said, "Don't stop."
"Stephen," gasped Jon as they crashed into their bedroom, "Stephen, Stephen, you're Stephen, the one and only Stephen, the Emmy-winning Stephen, Time's influential Stephen, my Stephen, Stephen, he's a handsome man his name is Stephen, Stephen..."
The Emmy winner and handsome man in question was writhing in his arms, breathing hard, covering his face and neck with kisses, and every time his lips came near one of Jon's ears he would whisper Don't stop, and Jon would focus anew on the chant.
They tumbled onto the sheets, Stephen pulling back for long enough to shrug off his robe. Jon took the opportunity to slip his glasses off of his face and toss them onto the nightstand before reaching for the T-shirt; Stephen beat him to it, and Jon found his hands stroking bare skin, which was, except for the scar, nearly good as new. As fingertips brushed up his sides Stephen gasped — but it wasn't out of fear of a memory, it was a gasp of pleasure at the here and now — and then he pounced on Jon and fell to it again.
"Stephen, Stephen," it was too much, too good, "you are still Stephen, aren't you?"
"Jon, it's me, I'm here, don't let me go, don't stop!"
He obliged instantly. "Stephen, Stephen, my — ah — Stephen, wonderful Stephen, dear Stephen, Stephen, lovable — oh — Stephen!—"
Stephen had left Jon's shirt on and was going straight for the khakis, which was just as well, they couldn't have stood to get much tighter anyway—
"Stephen, God, Stephen—"
And then a wail, crackly with static, split the air.
Stephen sat up. Jon shut up.
There was another squall from the baby monitor, and an instant later Stephen had snatched his robe from where it had fallen and was pulling it on as he ran out the door.
Jon flopped back against the pillows and suppressed a groan.
Stephen had an almost supernatural ability to shut everything else down when the six-month-old needed something. Jon was not so lucky. Heart still pounding, he forced himself to take slow breaths, and thought very hard about Ann Coulter.
The problem, it turned out, was the diaper.
Fixing it was a dirty job, but someone had to do it, and Stephen felt as though he could swim through a swamp in a new designer suit if George needed it. Of course, swimming was easy, while diaper-changing had lots of steps and all these complicated little tabs to hook up in the right order. But Stephen, to his own surprise, had been determined to learn; and by now he'd even gotten the hang of it.
Unfortunately, being clean and dry did not by itself make the baby go back to sleep again, so Stephen cradled the fussing George against his shoulder and rocked gently around the nursery, which had eventually been decorated around the very simple theme of "ducks". Eagles were rather scary and fierce for an infant to deal with; Stephen had reasoned that George ought to start with something easier and work his way up.
He'd tried singing in Korean, but he only knew one song in the language and it was all addressed to "girl", so he switched to an old standard.
"Hush, little baby, don't say a word
Daddy's gonna buy you a mockingbird
And if that mockingbird don't sing
Daddy's gonna buy you a diamond ring
And if that diamond ring turns brass
Daddy's gonna buy you a looking glass
And if that looking glass should break
Daddy's gonna buy you a chocolate cake
And if that cake should be too dry
Daddy and some feminists will bake a pie
And when that pie is eaten up
Daddy's gonna buy you a...
Jon, what comes after the pie?"
He didn't have to look to know that Jon had appeared in the doorway.
"I don't know. I think you got away from the usual lyrics at some point."
"I guess so."
George had stopped crying, but he was still fussy, and without knowing what (if anything) came after the pie there was nothing for Stephen to do but pick another song.
"What child is this who laid to rest
In Stephen's arms is sleeping?
Whom Nations greet with cheering sweet
While eagles watch are keeping?"
They really had to pitch a Christmas album to someone, Jon thought, as he thought every time he heard Stephen sing a carol. Stephen's voice was rich and clear, and as he hit each note it resonated with love and belief.
"This, this, is George the king,
Whom anchors guard and pundits sing;
Haste, haste, to bring him laud,
The babe, the son of Stephen!"
At last George drifted off; switching out the lights, his father placed him gently back in his crib and drew the fluffy duck-patterned blanket over his slumbering form. Only then did Jon approach, wrapping his arms around Stephen and standing on tiptoe to rest his head on the taller man's shoulder.
"Did you make that up yourself?" he asked gently.
"No, Jon, it's a traditional Christmas song, probably hundreds of years old..."
"I know, I know. I mean the new lyrics."
"Oh. No, they're from someone on the Colbert Nation forum. Some of the heroes write these things for fun, and Avery sends me the best ones." He paused. "Except the bit about 'anchors guarding'. They don't know about you, so that was mine."
"'Anchors', plural? How many do you have?"
"Just you. But it wouldn't fit the song otherwise."
Jon kissed him, just below the ear, and he began to tense.
"Stephen...."
"It's okay, Jon, it's okay. I know who I am in here."
So for a while he just held Stephen, silent in the moonlight, and together they watched George sleep. At last he said softly, "Would you like to stay here all night?"
"No. Oh no. Definitely not. The things I'd like to do...." Stephen laughed a short, knowing laugh, and covered Jon's hands with his own. "I can't do them in here, that's for sure. But a little bit longer, Jon. Let's just stay here for a little bit longer."
THE END,
or, rather,
THE BEGINNING.