dad!steve eek!!! maybe some for kbd!? no rush, anyway love you!! <3
kisses before dinner au —mom!reader, 1.1k
Bethie squirms uncomfortably in your lap. “I’m sorry, mommy,” she says.
“Well don’t be,” you say, hand to her forehead and holding her back so she can see your face, how you’re not angry. “It’s okay. You don’t like it?”
“I’m not hungry.”
You don’t get it. Bethie hasn’t eaten anything all day. She refused breakfast, snacks, smoothies, and hot chocolate. The plate in front of her repulses her, no matter how gently you plead with her to try it. “Honey, I don’t see how that can be true.”
She’s in your lap because you’d been hoping helping her eat might make it easier for her. She was thrilled to sit in your lap, but not even slightly inclined to eat her mac and cheese, or any sides. You offer her a slim carrot baton shining with honey, wiggling it from side to side.
“Doesn’t that look yummy?” you ask softly.
She looks down at her hands.
You drop the carrot. You’re genuinely perturbed. Not easily panicked, this has thrown you off kilter. Beth has been picky ever since she started school, and you don’t mind, you’ll accommodate and feel sorry that she misses out on Steve’s chicken pot pie, but there’s a difference between being picky and having a total aversion to food she used to enjoy.
Avery tries to pretend she’s not watching. Steve doesn’t bother, frowning deeply despite the baby in the high chair beside him and Dove on his thigh, the two girls giggling about something. The rest of them have cheeks covered in cheese sauce and sticky lips, but your Beth…
Maybe it’s too much to have everyone watching, you think.
“Okay. Okay, let’s leave it for later, yeah? Will you help mommy with something? Is that okay?”
Beth nods emphatically. “Yes!”
You help her down off of your lap and take her little hand. “We’ll be back in a minute.”
Steve shakes his head, at a loss. “Sure,” he says, though his face says something different. What are we going to do? “Take your drink.”
You grab the glass if only to appease your worrier.
You and Beth leave the kitchen and the living room to sit on the stairs. There isn’t much privacy to be made in the house, but this will do. You put her on the step above you to sit eye to eye, and you take her little hand, rubbing circles slowly into the soft palm of it.
“Is there something mommy can get you?” you whisper. “Anything at all. Because you’re so big now, you know you need to keep yourself nice and strong with dinner. Yeah? You need to eat so you can have lots of energy. I know,” —you smile at her startled frown— “you said you’re not hungry, but it’s okay. We don’t have to eat all of something. Me and you could go have McDonald’s, or pizza! We could have something special. We could go get donuts. Anything you want, even if it’s only one bite.”
“I don’t know, mom…”
“Anything you want, baby. Even if we get there and you don’t want it anymore, or it’s not what you thought.”
Bethie decides in whispers that she’d like McDonald’s ice cream. You could cry. You almost do when you con her into eating half of ‘your’ cheeseburger on the drive home, her little feet swinging in the footwell as she licks ketchup off of her fingers.
You show Steve the wrapper when you get home proudly.
“Good job, mom,” Steve says, reaching for you in the doorway.
Bethie brandishes the cup tray of ice creams to her sisters in delight. They scramble in screeches to get there first.
“Wren!” Bethie cheers, wiggling an ice cream at her baby sister where she lays in a bouncer. “Mom, can I feed Wren?”
“Only the plain one, baby.”
“Yeah, I know. Wren, look! I have ice cream. You want ice cream?”
“Little spoonfuls,” Avery says, reaching for her own ice cream, big sister instincts quelled by excitement. “Oh my gosh, there’s fudge.”
Steve nudges your hip with his hand. “Hey, you okay?”
“That was a bit scary.”
“It’s just a bad day for her. She’s okay. Did you eat anything?” he asks, curling an arm behind your back.
“No. I got you a strawberry-kiwi smoothie, though.”
“Anything for yourself?”
You shake your head. “I knew Beth would only eat if I was eating it, so I had a bite.”
“You’re a genius,” he says, hugging you to his side. His shirt smells like detergent under your nose. “I kept your dinner in the oven. Only take a minute to heat back up.”
“Did you eat yours?”
He puts his lips to your cheek and doesn’t answer.
“This is nice,” you murmur.
“I know.” He rubs your back. You’ve never had to ask him to do it, he just grabs you up and sets about soothing an ache you don’t have. He’s always been like this.
“I can’t believe I had to sweet talk my six year old into eating fast food,” you say, watching Beth over the curve of his shoulder. She swallows a spoonful of ice cream and crinkles her eyes at the cold. “I never could’ve imagined this.”
“Thank god. You never would’ve let me date you if you did.”
You laugh and angle your head up for a kiss. “That’s not true,” you murmur.
He kisses you but seems more eager for a hug, hooking his arm higher up behind your back and cuddling you into his neck. “I’m not sure what we’re going to do,” he confesses, “but if you keep being that gentle? She’s going to be fine.”
You brim with a weird pride. Steve knows intimately the kind of parent that you are, and how hard you try, so if he thinks you’re doing a good job, you must be. “Dinner was great,” you promise.
Steve laughs. “I know. It was fucking bomb. Honey roasted broccoli? These kids don’t get how good I am. I could go pro.”
Dove wanders over with clumsy footsteps but better pronunciation. “Smoothie, daddy,” she says, holding his pink smoothie up to him with an urgent look.
“Oh, thank you.” He pats your arm and breaks away to bend down. “Thank you, gorgeous,” he says, taking the drink and smiling huge at her. She says something in garbled kid talk and leans in to give him a hug, and then she runs back to her ice cream.
Steve looks at you adoringly.
“How’d you give me four perfect girls?” he asks, knowing he’s cheesy, his smile turning teasing.
“A lot of hard work.”
“I can tell.”
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