/ some nights

[felix harper]

louisa nicole harper. born at 3am on august 25th 2013. the tiny little girl is the picture of perfection, with sleepy blue eyes and chubby hands, and felix harper had fallen in love at first sight. he had been waiting weeks for that day, to finally meet her, to finally share this moment that he and annie had been waiting for over nine months. just like her mother she had been nearly a week late, or 'fashionably late' as annie had called it. felix was sure that he would either end up with a broken hand or a concussion as his usually high strung girlfriend hit her peak during delivery. she threatened him with castration for putting her through the pain, she begged for pain relief, she threw a glass of ice at his head when he'd asked one too many stupid questions and in the final moments he was sure she had broken his hand with her squeezing, but in the end it was all worth it. every parent will tell you their baby is beautiful, even straight from the birth canal and annie and felix were no exception. felix tried, but there wasn't any way he could physically hold back at least a few tears of joy when he saw his daughter cradled to annie's chest. i took a day or two after meeting her and some serious discussions until they finally settled on a name that they both liked, louisa nicole. flowers and messages of congratulations poured in and felix spent a night or two at the hospital, unable to tear himself away from his girls. his mother seemed to have found a new lease on life with the news of her first granddaughter and was busy running errands for the couple. the sight of his mother being independent and happy was something felix hadn't see in years, if ever, it seems that with the shadow of his father disappearing day by day after his death and the new addition to the family, it was a new chapter for mae harper. finally, the day came and they left the hospital, baby in felix's strong protective arms as they braved the paparazzi staked out the front of the hospital and returned home to their new sanctuary, the newly changed (for the fifth time) nursery. felix couldn't help but smile over all the stupid arguments that littered annie's pregnancy, including the nursery. of course, the usually volatile couple couldn't have done it any other way. they had both calmed when it came to realising they were starting a family, but they were still going to both be as stubborn as always and there were arguments that couldn't always be avoided. like names and nurserys. and whose turn it was to get up to the screaming baby at 3am. louisa was beautiful. felix couldn't get enough of her tiny fingers and toes, those thick rosebud lips and that tiny nose he couldn't help but kiss, but it was bordering on three days of non stop screaming all night and felix loved sleep. he never realised how much until he was rendered unable to by the creature he loved most in the world. he wasn't even sure babies lungs were capable of producing such a noise, but he had learnt now how wrong he was. maybe it was his fault, maybe she had inherited his singer's lungs, but one thing he did know is that it was annie's turn. "she's hungry, it's your turn" he mumbled sleepily as he buried his face under his pillow with a groan. from the basinet at the end of the bed the tiny newborn wailed desperately for love and attention it was scared it was being deprived of. he'd gotten up earlier to a diaper change that was entirely cruel to hit someone with at 1am, it was definitely annie's turn. he groaned and rolled over and he felt the bed move with her departure. he heard her cooing to their daughter as she scooped her up and paced the floor with her and then felix drifted back to sleep as the baby settled and he took advantage of the silence. silence. there was too much of it. after days and days of a crying baby the silence was almost eerie, and most definitely terrifying. he launched himself out of bed in a hurry, noticing all too quickly that annie hadn't come back to bed and there was no baby in the basinet. he forced himself to calm down, trying to forget the horror stories the nurses had told them about babies who simply stop breathing in their cribs and quietly crept from the room. in the nursery next door, he peered in and smiled into the dim 5am light. there in her plush feeding chair lay annie, fast asleep, a tiny newborn baby cuddled to her chest, snuffling softly at her mother's skin as she slept. it was a sight that made his heart swell. his two girls, all tuckered out. annie was still a beautiful sight even with her messy bed hair and the dark circles starting under her eyes, but her exhaustion was obvious. she was not only having to get up every few hours to feed but to then try and get louisa back to sleep was turning into mission impossible. he scooped the infant up slowly, hoping not to wake her. he tucked her tightly to his chest and while she stirred and gurgled for a moment she soon settled in against his shoulder and he couldn't help but smile down at the sleepy baby as he kissed her feather soft head. "annie..." he cooed softly, his free hand brushing her hair away from her face and touched her cheek gently and she slowly opened her eyes. "go have a rest, baby." he offered softly, holding out a hand to offer to help her up. she took it and when she stood he pulled her in tight, wrapping his arms around her waist and holding her close as they hug included their new baby girl. annie kissed the baby's head and felix smiled "she's just a little bit perfect, isn't she?" he mused softly "just like her mom" he smiled, leaning forward to kiss annie too. TAGGED: annie aldridge WEARING: pyjamas NOTES: BABY!

[annie aldridge]

Four forty five in the morning, and the Los Angeles horizon was just barely illuminated.

For being a heavy sleeper, Annie now slept through nothing. Any peep, any little turn, any cry or hiccup, she was awake. There wasn’t a mistake she wanted to make, nor a moment she wanted to miss. She was awake as Felix moaned and groaned beside her, waiting just a second to see if Louisa would nestle herself back to sleep, but once she didn’t, Annie was at her side. Despite the lack of sleep she’d got in even the weeks prior to her labor, and the past two nights at home with the newborn, she pushed through the exhaustion and tended to her newborn daughter’s needs. Carefully picking her up from her bed, she nestled her up in her arms, cradling her across her chest. It was still new, but Annie doubted the feeling she got with Louisa in her arms ever getting old. The tears soon came to a yield, and Annie was sure it was a mother’s touch that she had needed.

The pair quietly made their way to the kitchen -Louisa still in arm- and Annie grabbed a bottle and washcloth. It didn’t sound like the cry she made when she was hungry, but at least it would be on hand when the next surely came. Within moments, they were back upstairs in the new nursery. It was a bigger pain than anything else, but the finished product was one to be proud of, and made for the most warm and comfortable nursery possible. It had proved to be her sanctuary, with the long nights and early mornings with Louisa. Slowly she sat at the chaise lounge beneath the window, lifting her legs up at the end, and pulled the blanket over the two. Her eyes cast down on Louisa, who was already fast asleep, and couldn’t help but smile. She was such a little thing, so helpless, and innocent. She was unaware of the world around her, she knew no harm, and only the warmth of her parents and the talks they had with her while she was in the womb. And times like now, when Anne sat and talked with her, despite her sleeping and unaware state, telling her stories, singing her to sleep, and fawning over her every move.

It felt like ages ago that she and Felix would sit up talking about the baby. What she might look like, what she would want to be when she was older, how Felix wasn’t going to let her date until forty (if she was lucky) and hundreds of other questions about her. And then there were the nights they would sit up and talk about the kind of parents they did and did not want to be, remembering bits and pieces of their own pasts that they wouldn’t want their child to endure. And it all came down to this. Nothing could have readied her for this. Not the books she’d spent late nights reading on motherhood, not the countless hours worth of advice she’d gotten from friends. Of course the advice was welcomed and kept in mind, but now that she was here, it was her own learning process. All she knew was that nothing compared, and nothing else mattered compared to this over night game changer. The nine months and six days all came down to these little moments.

At the sound of her name she opened her eyes, rubbing at the corners before looking up at Felix who had come to the late night rescue. He didn’t have to, but she was happy to see that he did, already with the baby in arms. When she’d found out she was pregnant, she wasn’t sure that either of them were ready for the lifetime responsibility, but it became clear over time that they could do it. Felix had gone above and beyond throughout her pregnancy, and through these early days of Louisa’s life. Had anyone told her this would be where the two would nearly eight years after meeting, Annie wouldn’t have believed it for a second. This new life they were now experiencing was bigger and better than any of Annie’s wildest dreams. She thought she had loved him all along, as much as she possibly could, and more than she could anyone else. And she was right, with the exception of how much she possibly could, every waking second with him and Louisa that same devouring love grew a bit further and deeper. She took his hand, and rose to her feet and into his arms, a tired yawn escaping a lazy smile. Sneaking her finger into Louisa’s tiny hand, and her even tinier fingers grasped around it. “A little bit too perfect..” she mused as she kissed the infants forehead. ‘Just like her mom.’ It was still crazy to hear out loud, in the best of ways, her heart fluttering at the kiss on her lips.

“I’ll stay, I don’t want to sleep,” and despite her body’s aching need, she didn’t. Slipping from his grasp, she nestled herself back in the lounge chair, lifting the blanket for him to join her. “I told you, in it together.”

OUTFIT hereeee.
MUSIC kanye west, oops
NOTES i'm so late i suckkk

[felix harper]

this had never been an easy road for felix and annie, and that was what made the sight of her, with louisa nestled to her chest, even more amazing to him. he remembered back to a time where they had thrown it all away with jealousy and suspicions, letting their respective industry and the hollywood tabloids tear them apart. and while the singer had been heart broken, he should have known that wouldn't be the end to them. there was always something about annie aldridge and drew him in. it barely took him more then a few words of seeing her in LA again to have them in the backseat of her town car and back to their old ways. he hadn't scared her off with his commitments or his schedule or even his craziest of fans, and since then while they had fought like cats and dogs, they made up just as passionately everytime. they were passionate people, it was ingrained in them to give and love as passionately as they could, but it also came with the ugliness of when their passion soured. he had to give annie all the credit in the world, she had never flinched once, not even when she should have. not when his temper got the best of him, or he felt like taking her down a notch or two with cruel words or when she'd pushed him to his very limits and he'd snapped at her, not even when he'd raised a fist to her. they'd come a long way from those days, from the constant bickering and childish games as they tried to navigate their feelings and commitment expected of them. that wasn't to say they didn't still fight, because they could and they did, but everything had changed since the day he had found out about louisa. felix had been a father figure before, pulling his family out of abuse and poverty and trying to make things right, in the absence of a real father and a capable mother. he had made plenty of mistakes, but they were ones he was constantly learning from. he was never going to be his father, annie had told him that once, and now that he had a daughter of his own, he was determined to prove it. for months now he had been engaging in everything he could to manage his temper, he'd given up alcohol for the most part, except for special occasions and he had taken up yoga and meditation to calm himself. he bit his tongue when annie tried to stir him up, he let go of confrontations that he knew would only lead to trouble, he knew that while he loved annie with all his heart she was still typical annie and when she named the baby and learnt the sex of the baby without consulting him, it wasn't malicious, it was just her typical one track mind that made her get ahead of herself. but he could fault her on nothing now, after all the uncomfortable months and the labour pains she'd endured, they were now blessed with perfection. his girls he'd said it countless times and he would say it countless more because the thought alone gave him goosebumps. and in that moment of silence, even annie looked innocent and sweet, illuminated in the early morning light that was straining to overcome the dark. he pulled her close and she allowed him, her finger tucked into the babies tiny grasp, fingers so small felix couldn't help but smile and remember just how tiny she was and how much she needed his love and protection. a yawn escaped annie and felix couldn't help but mirror it. annie loved every second of time she could get with louisa, despite her lack of sleep, but felix was struggling a little more. but annie disentangled herself from the rest of her family and insisted that she didn't need anymore sleep. felix knew it wasn't true, but he smiled at her anyway as she sat down and motioned for him to join her. he had no doubt that given five minutes of the three of them cuddled up in the chair and she would be out like a light again, unable to keep her eyes open despite her best intentions. "i can't say no to that." he chuckled, as he tucked louisa tighter into his chest and stooped down to sit behind her on the chiase lounge. he rested back against it and wrapped an arm around annie, pulling her back against his chest, with her head on one shoulder and louisa on the other. he kissed annie's forehead before turning back to louisa and smiling as she wriggled in her sleep, her small face snuffled into his chest and then soon settled. "i was starting to think this would never happen..." he whispered softly, so not to wake her "that she might never come. i think i'm still in shock." he chuckled, pulling the blanket up around them more as the three of them managed to snuggle down on the one seater chaise lounge. "i think she's going to look just like her mom though," he cooed to the sleeping baby, before turning back to annie. "what do you think?" TAGGED: annie aldridge WEARING: pyjamas NOTES: so bad :c