“We should go in. We don’t want to be late.”

Kurt nodded.

“We know. Just… give us a second.”

She nodded back. They all took a synchronized deep breath, staring at the glass sliding doors.

“Come on,” Alex put an encouraging hand on Blaine’s shoulder, “The sooner we go in…” Blaine nodded. The sooner they went in, the sooner they could leave, hopefully with some kind of agreement.

The conference room was intimidating. It looked so official and grand, with a long mahogany table in the centre. Becca was sitting behind it, next to a man in his mid-thirties, with a dark suit and darker hair. Kurt and Blaine almost laughed; he looked like a cartoon villain, but one look at Becca and the bump put a stop to it. Every thought from last night, from the last nine months, hit them at once and they staggered to their seats and tried to catch their breath. The man in the suit stood up and offered a hand. Blaine hesitated before he took it, reluctant to let go of Kurt.

“Good morning. Scott Waverley. I know what you’re thinking – and no, not like the book. My parents had no idea why it had a ring to it. Let me guess… you’re Kurt, and you must be Blaine. I’d recognise those Anderson eyebrows anywhere.” They glanced at each other. He was being disarmingly nice. He was supposed to be evil. Becca didn’t stand. She stayed in her seat and stared at the table. Blaine sat opposite her, with Kurt on his right and Stephanie on his left, facing Scott head on.

“Good morning, Scott. How’s Nancy?” They were both being eerily polite.

“Oh, she’s great. We’re actually going to Barcelona next month; I’m surprised she hasn’t already started packing.”

“We went last year; it was divine. The architecture was breath-taking. But I take it this means you don’t want to get stuck in a lawsuit for too long.”

“I can’t imagine this would take such a long time, Stephanie.” Becca looked at him nervously. He clearly hadn’t discussed tactics with her. It’s clear what you’re trying to do. Your clients ambushed a heavily pregnant woman in her place of work demanding her child. This case wouldn’t even make it past summary judgement; it’ll get laughed out in a heartbeat.” He wasn’t smiling at Kurt and Blaine any more. His face had hardened, as had Stephanie’s. She clasped her hands on the desk, the epitome of calm apart from her knuckles whitening.

“Scott. It’s. Their. Baby.”

“Has either of them carried that baby to term? Have they felt it move and grow every day for the last eight months? No contract in the world will get a child taken from its mother, especially one who is an upstanding member of her community and a highly paid, skilled professional such as Dr Harris.”

“Dr Harris knew exactly what she was getting into when she signed on for this. She knew she would have to give him up. She had no right to leave. Never mind ‘upstanding member of the community’; I don’t know what that community would think if they knew she’d kidnapped the child of her two best friends. Because that’s what this is, Mr Waverley. Kidnapping.”

“She’s the biological mother, Stephanie…”

“Mrs Anderson, please. We are not on the same side in this. She is not a parent. A parent wouldn’t take a baby away from its rightful family.”

Blaine couldn’t stop staring at Rebecca. He hoped she would look back at him with just the slightest apology in her eyes, but she stared at the desk, her hands, the bump. She looked everywhere but at Blaine and Kurt.

“How can you just sit there, Becca?”

Stephanie laid a hand on his.

“Blaine, don’t…”

“How can you listen to this? Do you even hear what he’s saying?” Kurt tried to shush him, but he couldn’t stop.

“You can’t even look at me, can you?” His voice was a whimper, barely audible. “I was there. I… I sat on that bed with you, and I held your hand, and I had to tell Kurt. I had to let him know that we’d lost the baby, and the whole time, you knew it wasn’t gone. You knew you were wrong, like you know you’re wrong now, and you kept lying to my face, and now you can’t even look at me?”

Becca squeezed her eyes shut. Blaine noticed a tear clinging to her eyelashes.

“Blaine…” Scott tried to interject. He wanted to point out that his client was being put under stress, that Blaine was harassing her, but even he couldn’t quite bring himself to say anything. Blaine hadn’t raised his voice to her once. He was just as tearful as she was.

“No. You’re not on first name terms with me either. If I say one thing that isn’t true, you’re welcome to stop me. But you’re not. Because you know that you’re wrong, that you were my best friend and that you took our baby from us. You know you broke our hearts and now can’t even look at us.”

Kurt sniffed, squeezing Blaine’s hand and wiping a tear from his cheek with his sleeve. Stephanie put a hand on Blaine’s shoulder.

“Blaine.” He tore his gaze away from Becca to look at his stepmother, and seeing his eyes full of tears and anger and desperation was almost too much for her. She looked back at Waverley. “I think we need a minute.” He was about to protest but she didn’t let him. “You’re giving us a minute, Scott. I think they’ve been screwed around enough.”

She loosely wrapped an arm around Blaine, easing him out of his seat. Alexander and Kurt each took a deep breath in and stood up, following the others out of the conference room. Kurt swept up to Blaine the second they were in the hall, and Alexander did the same to Stephanie. Kurt managed to ignore his hatred of hospitals and the memories he associated with them and pulled Blaine close, letting his hair soak up his tears. Neither of them could speak. They just stood there.

Alexander held Stephanie’s hands and bobbed his head down to look into her eyes. She was blinking furiously. She’d been dealing with cases just like this for years, but never one this close. Alex moved one hand up to stroke her hair and stepped forwards so their foreheads were just touching.

“You’re doing really well, honestly. I mean, it looked like you were getting through. Both of you.” He looked over to Blaine, who didn’t even open his eyes. The tears never made it out. He was too angry.

They all flinched when they hear a slight creak as the door opened. Becca walked out, swollen stomach emerging first. Waverley followed her, obviously not happy about her coming out.

“Becca, you don’t have to…”

“Yes I do. Blaine, Kurt, I know you won’t believe me, but for what it’s worth, I really am sorry. If I could just…”

“You can.”

“Alex-” Stephanie tried to stop him, but it was no use.

“There’s no ‘if’ involved. You have the power to fix everything and you’re not doing it. You’ve got your asshole lawyer in our faces, while he,” he pointed at Blaine, “he begs you to change your mind. How are you going to look at yourself? Even if you win, which is pretty fucking unlikely, you’ll live every day knowing you’ve got a kid that isn’t yours.” Becca’s breathing sped up, and she turned to Scott.

“I want to go. I thought I could do this today, but I just can’t. I- I want to go home, OK?”

Kurt’s eyes widened.

“No-”

“Look, I know you’re mad at me but you can’t tell me what to do. I’m going home; I just need to get out of here-”

“But Becca-”

“What? Hasn’t he said enough?”

“Becca, I… I think your water just broke.” She looked down and saw the wet floor.

“Fuck.” It was all she could say. It was all any of them could say. And they all did. Waverley was the first one to break the chain of swearing.

“Well, I guess it’s a good thing that we decided to meet in a hospital?”

“Is that supposed to be funny?” Becca snapped.

“I don’t know; it was supposed to break the tension. So, it seems weird asking the person in labour, but where’s the maternity ward?” She sighed with exasperation, before waddling awkwardly down the corridor. Scott kept up with her, while the others hung back.

“Blaine. It’s early. He’s early.” Kurt looked back to Alex and Stephanie, who suddenly became ‘the grown ups’. "That’s bad isn’t it?”

Stephanie bit her lip. Alex rushed over to him to calm him down.

“Not these days. Especially not if you’re already in a hospital.” Blaine put a hand on Kurt’s waist.

“He’s right; and it’s only three weeks. Babies are born earlier than that every day and they’re fine. Right?” Alex nodded. “Dad…”

“Yeah?”

“Is there any way I could have… I mean, if I stressed her out, you don’t think…”

“No, Blaine. This isn’t your fault. You haven’t done anything wrong. But we… we should follow them. We don’t know how much time we have.”

“Actually-” they all turned to look at Stephanie, “I don’t know if we should stay here.” They all frowned.

“Well, we can’t do a lot in some random corridor…”

“But, Alex, technically they’re still suing her. Hanging outside the room while she’s in labour isn’t exactly ‘keeping a distance’. I know, it’s horrible and you just want to be there, but I’ll stay. You can all get some food or something, and I’ll keep you updated.”

They didn’t want food. They didn’t want to leave. But Alexander ushered them out, despite being just as disappointed as they were, because he knew Stephanie was right. He lingered behind for a second to kiss her on the cheek. She smiled at him.

“Don’t worry. The second anything happens, I’ll let you know.”