Terrorcest one shots

(Pt 9) language barrier

3 weeks later

Nikki sinks onto the floor, balling his fists up and shoving them into his eyes, trying to stop a flow of tears. Beside him, Ruby wails, and to be fair, Nikki wants to wail too. "Please, STOPPPP stop fucking crying..." he begs, shakily reaching up to the counter to find Ruby's bottle yet again. She keeps rejecting the bottles that he tries to give her. He hasn't had a night this bad with her since they got back to Los Angeles, 2 weeks after Tommy was transported to LA for care.

As he tries to feed her, she just keeps screaming. He's rocked her for hours, fed her, bathed her, changed her diapers, but nothing is helping tonight. "Oh my fucking god." He mutters to himself, bouncing her as he walks around the room. "Was I this hard as a baby? No wonder my mom didn't want to be near me." He kneels on the ground and keeps her close to his chest with one arm, and starts up a Kinks record, to hopefully clear his mind. 

Ruby continues to sob and baby talk in his arms, and Nikki just keeps walking around the living room, crying as well. Every few seconds he lets out a raspy breath, and she does the same. Nothing is helping and Nikki is helpless. After almost 30 minutes, Nikki goes outside with Ruby, and he wraps her in a blanket. He paces around the balcony, and then collapses in a chair, closing his eyes and looking for a little bit of peace. Ruby just keeps on crying. How do such small things have such large lungs? He stares at her through teary  eyes. "Please...please?"

A loud bang echoes through the complex and Nikki almost dives to the ground. His mind instantly goes back to Greece, being  caught in the forest in the middle of the night. The light filtering out over the ground, just reminds him  that someone just opened their back door. He heaves, trying to get the mucus out of his throat and slow his breathing, and Ruby just screams louder.  "HEY!" Someone yells. "CAN YOU SHUT THE FUCK UP?!"

"YOU SHUT THE FUCK UP!" Nikki yells back, peering to see who is yelling at them.

The man who yelled at him doesn't seem to have a response, so Nikki relaxes back in the lawn chair, kicking beer cans off of the edge of the chair, and adjusting Ruby to where she's laying down on his chest. After another hour of crying, Ruby finally falls back asleep, and Nikki carries her back inside, wincing from the pain of having his child attached to his still healing body for so long. He lays her on the bed, and then flops down beside her, turning over on his back and staring up at the ceiling. I don't deserve to be a dad, Nikki thinks to himself, I can't take care of her, especially without Tommy.

Nikki gets a full 2 hours of sleep, before the cries wake him up again. By this time, the sun is peeking above the horizon and bathing the street in a warm glow. After Nikki feeds her, he puts her back in bed, and then grabs a beer and dials his aunt and uncles house. Someone picks up after a few rings. "Y'ello." Don mutters on the other end.

"Can I talk to Sharon?" Nikki asks.

"It's a little early Nikki," Don sighs. 

"Please?"

Another heavy sigh on the other end. "Come over for lunch. We've got some of your friend Tommy's paperwork anyways."

"O-okay." Nikki feels his voice tremble.

"Nikki?" He hears Don ask as his head snaps toward the bedroom, thinking that he hears Ruby. "Are you okay?"

"Oh y-yeah, I...i'm okay...having a mental breakdown..." Nikki lets out a weak laugh, and then puts the phone back on the hook, and sitting on the ground.

He doesn't think that he can keep Ruby. He's not equipped to take care of her. He can't raise his baby without Tommy. He just...he just can't. Nikki bangs his fist on the ground, and the sobs that he was holding in, come rushing out of his mouth. He doesn't want to be like his dad and not be in Ruby's life, but he can't keep doing this. He can't raise her without Tommy. His brain is already so fucked up, being terrified and paranoid of everything in his house, and only functional on his pain medication. Is it possible to have post partum depression when you aren't the one who gave birth?