Work Text:
Luke’s always had a problem with being punctual.
It isn’t for lack of trying; he tries his best to be on time, honest to God, he does. But more often than not, time just seems to get away from him. He gets distracted easily - has his head constantly in the clouds, as his mother would say.
And every Tuesday and Thursday morning, ironically enough, like clockwork, Luke finds himself running late to his principles of musical form class. He isn’t even really sure why he needs to take this class anyway seeing as he basically has perfect pitch and can replicate a guitar solo after two listens but apparently it’s a requirement for his degree… or whatever.
Luckily for him, among the approximately 100 students also taking the class is one guardian angel.
Luke knows her name is Julie Molina from looking at how she’d neatly written her name on the front of her notebook. He knows that she has a penchant for colourful accessories and cool sneakers. He knows that her handwriting is impeccable (unlike his which is barely readable on a good day).
He knows that she’s gorgeous and that she always seems to save him a spot near the side of the lecture hall by the windows, his favourite spot to sit.
Every Tuesday and Thursday, Luke runs into his lecture hall no less than 15 minutes late. His eyes automatically find Julie’s and she smiles wordlessly at him, moving her backpack from the seat beside hers to the floor. She does this everytime - and every time, Luke thanks her with a shy smile and slinks into the seat, his seat.
Every time, Luke means to talk to her, means to catch her after class as she’s packing her bag and ask her out for coffee or tea or whatever just as long as he gets to talk to her… but he never does. He never gets the chance to, because as soon as Dr. Barclay dismisses them, she’s shoving her notebook in her satchel, smiling at him (with those adorable rounded cheekbones), and brushing past him, leaving behind nothing but the faint smell of lavender and peach.
To say that his crush is getting a little bit pathetic would be an understatement.
“Why don’t you just follow her out of the classroom?” Reggie asks, preoccupied as he tries to spoon mashed up sweet potatoes (or maybe it was carrots?) into Carrie’s mouth with little to no success.
Luke looks at him incredulously, spinning his pencil between two of his fingers. “Sure, Reg, I’m gonna follow a girl I don’t know out into a hallway and try and ask her out,” he says, “that isn’t creepy at all.”
Luke isn’t even sure why he’s told the guys about this. None of them are very good with girls. The most recent successful experience any of them had had with a girl had resulted in them gaining a fifth, pint-sized roommate.
He sighs and doodles a triangle into the corner of his notebook as he ponders. There are words and images floating around in his brain that would all make great lyrics if he could just write. Anything. Down. But alas, he’s been suffering from writer’s block for the past two weeks.
With a quiet clatter, Luke drops his pencil on the coffee table and walks over to the table where Reggie and Carrie are seated. He pauses for a moment before scooping Carrie up into his arms, ignoring Reggie’s indignant protests as he grabs the baby carrier off the coat rack.
“I’m going for a walk.”
“So, Care, what do you think?” Luke asks, knowing full well she can’t respond to him. “Do I ask her out? Or do I ride this crush train ‘til the end of the semester?”
Carrie babbles nonsensically from where she’s strapped to Luke’s chest. The two of them are sitting on a park bench across from a playground, a rapidly melting cup of mint chocolate chip in Luke’s hand. It’s an almost comical sight; Luke in his cut-off Green Day shirt and jeans that are more rip than denim and Carrie nestled in her carrier in a bright pink onesie with unicorns all over it. Luke knows he must look ridiculous but he’d stopped caring about that weeks ago.
“That’s exactly what I thought you’d say,” he sighs, but he still can’t help but smile at the way she’s looking at him judgmentally. She’s only six months old and she already has more personality than most people Luke went to high school with.
He feels a familiar tinge in his shoulder and he grimaces, shuffling as carefully as he can to try and redistribute Carrie’s weight. The constant pressure of the carrier-straps digging into his shoulders isn’t ideal - and he knows he’s heard Alex, Reggie, and Bobby all say the same thing - but it’s preferable to cradling Carrie in their arms for 45 minutes during their walks.
Carrie giggles as Luke moves around, letting herself move and wriggle with the gravity of his shoulders. Luke looks down at her and wrinkles his nose.
“I can’t wait ‘til you start walking, Princess,” he murmurs, tapping her nose with his index finger. “But I gotta say, I’m getting a pretty decent workout outta this whole thing.”
She wrinkles her nose too at that, blowing a bubble of spit at him that he can’t help but laugh at. He never can stay mad at her for long.
Just as Luke stands up and walks toward the garbage to throw away the remnants of his ice cream, he spots a small gaggle of moms walking down the park path towards the playground. He can’t help the strange envy that grows in the back of his mind at the sight of their pristine strollers in adorable pastel colours. He bets their shoulders aren’t aching nearly as much as his are right now.
He sighs and brushes the dirt off his hands, tearing his eyes away from the group of mothers and sighing down at Carrie. “We’ve got to get you a stroller.”
The random donation bins in the lobby of their building are both a blessing and a curse.
More often than not they’re filled with broken kitchen appliances or tattered clothing, but every so often, Luke manages to find a diamond amongst the moth-eaten hoodies and microwaves with doors completely ripped off their hinges. Like the time he found an almost brand-new Gibson Montana Hummingbird guitar in one of the saggy, sad-looking cardboard boxes; or when he found a new frying pan nestled underneath a suspiciously stained throw blanket almost immediately after burning his own pan to the point of no return.
Luke thinks, though, that this might be his best discovery yet.
He knows he probably looks ridiculous as he rides the elevator up from the lobby to his apartment, but he’s so excited that he’s practically bouncing in place. Staying still is not his priority right now.
The elevator doors open and he fishes his key out of his pocket, rolling his surprise down the hall and toward a familiar door with multitudes of band stickers and posters taped to the front of it. He unlocks the door quickly and pushes the door open, stepping into the living room where Alex, Bobby, Reggie, and Carrie are sitting.
Almost as if they’re of one mind, all of them turn to look at Luke at the same time, Carrie included (which is so adorable that Luke wishes the camera on his phone weren’t broken so he could take a picture).
Alex’s eyes flicker between the wide grin on Luke’s face and the item in front of him. His face drops. “Luke,” he says, standing up and taking a few steps back, “what is that?”
Luke furrows his eyebrows. “A stroller!” he says brightly, giving the stroller in his grip a few pushes back and forth, “for Care! I found it in the donation bin downstairs. I was thinking we could take her for a walk in the park.”
“Luke, that stroller looks like it’s being held together by a roll of duct tape and prayer,” Alex says, walking toward the cupboard under the sink and pulling out a spray bottle full of Lysol. “How do you even know that it’s clean?”
Luke purses his lips, looking down at the seat of the stroller. He supposes it does look a little worse for wear. The canopy has a pretty big hole in it and there’s rust accumulating around the open and fold joint, but it’s got a seat and a harness and four wheels that actually roll. “We can clean it up,” he says, stepping aside as Bobby and Reggie walk toward the stroller, circling it like a shark.
Alex approaches the stroller too, his arm outstretched and wielding the Lysol with intent to spray. When he’s finally close enough, he sprays the entire thing, creating a cloud of disinfectant so thick that Luke, Reggie, and Bobby all have to take multiple steps back to avoid being caught in the crossfire. Bobby even covers Carrie’s little face with his hand as they all inhale the sharp scent of lemon and chemicals.
Once he’s done spraying the stroller (and misting Luke a few times too for good measure), he places the disinfectant on the kitchen island, the can feeling significantly lighter than it had mere minutes ago. When Alex looks up, he sees Luke pouting, arms crossed and that stupid offended look on his face.
“I… I’m sorry, Luke, but I can’t be the only one who thinks this ‘stroller’ is practically a death trap,” Alex says, gesturing towards it vaguely. “Bee, what do you think?”
Bobby eyes the stroller, stroking Carrie’s back as he gently pushes one of it’s wheels with his foot. “I think… I think getting her a stroller is definitely a good idea,” he says lightly. “I mean, carrying her around is fun and all but it’s hell on my arms.”
At the mere mention of arms, all four of them begin to rub at their necks and shoulders, feeling the same muscle pain that only endless weeks of baby carrying and carrier-wearing can give a person.
“Sooo,” Luke says, stepping behind the stroller and gesturing to it, “I solved our problems! Right?”
Bobby smiles and walks toward it, pointing Carrie in the direction of the stroller. “What do you think, baby?” he asks her quietly, and Luke looks at her too, rocking back and forth on his heels as he watches her scrutinize the stroller.
She huffs at it, staring at it for a moment. Then, she looks at Luke with a blinding smile and raises an arm, almost as though she’s pointing at it. “Bah!” she squeals, waving her arm around frantically. Luke grins right back at her.
“I’m taking that as an affirmative!” Bobby says with a chuckle. Luke sees his gaze shift towards Alex, who still looks trepidatious despite Carrie’s excitement. “It’ll be a temporary fix, okay? Just until we can afford to get a new one.”
Alex sighs and looks at Carrie, frown melting into a soft smile. “Okay.” He walks toward the stroller and brushes a finger against the handle. “It would be nice to give my shoulders a break.”
Luke lets out a victorious holler and rushes over to Alex, ruffling his hair excitedly, much to his discontent. “Awesome! Dibs first ride!”
“Uh-uh, Uncle Luke,” Bobby says with a grin. “I’m her dad, I get first ride privileges.”
Luke deflates, slumping against Alex. “That’s not fair!” he protests, watching helplessly as Bobby straps her into the stroller and tickles her tummy a few times for good measure. “I found the thing.”
“Yeah? Well I contributed genetically to this thing,” Bobby says, pointing towards Carrie and smirking. “You can take it out next.”
Luke nods. “Okay. But I get second dibs.”
Luke does not get second dibs.
By the time Bobby and Carrie get back from their walk, she’s all walked out and restless so they settle her down for her nap.
From that point on, it’s almost as though as soon as the idea of taking Carrie for a walk sneaks it’s way into his mind, someone else has already scooped her and the stroller up and taken her out for ice cream or coffee or to go people watching at the pier. It’s been two weeks since Luke found the stroller and he still hasn’t gotten to walk her once.
Suffice to say, he’s more than a little bit grumpy.
He’s at his favourite park one day, the one with the huge magnolia tree, sitting at a picnic bench with his notebook and pencil in hand, when out of the corner of his eye he spots Reggie walking towards him, stroller in hand and a frantic look on his face.
“What’s up?” he asks when Reggie finally reaches him. “How'd you know I’d be here?”
“‘Cause you’re always here,” Reggie says, putting the strollers (half-working) brake on. “I need you to take Carrie.”
Luke raises his eyebrows. “What? Why?”
“I forgot I had a shift at the bar and I’m already ten minutes late,” Reggie says, trying to wrestle his flannel out of Carrie’s grip. “C’mon, Carrie, you don’t want Uncle Reg to get fired do you?”
Luke laughs and watches their strange game of tug of war which Reggie inevitably wins. “Sure, I don’t mind taking Carrie for the rest of her walk.”
“Thanks, man!” And then Reggie’s off, running away in the direction of the park exit.
As soon as he’s gone, Luke grins and looks down at Carrie. “Finally,” he says to no one in particular. He closes his notebook and tucks it beside Carrie, sticking his pencil behind his ear. “You keep this safe for me, okay kiddo?”
“Gah!” Carrie exclaims, looking practically overjoyed. Luke can tell she’s missed hanging out with him just as much as he’s missed hanging out with her.
“You’re right, let’s go!”
There are a lot of things Julie typically expects to see when she goes to the park to study (and write songs that she would never show anyone) ; dogs and their owners, the occasional homeless person, teenagers skipping classes.
But Luke Patterson from music forms class with a tattered baby stroller and an infant was certainly not one of those things.
She sees them before either of them see her, walking down the path past the playground. Luke looks happy as a clam as he pushes the stroller, mouth moving as if he’s talking to the baby who’s seemingly paying him no mind. He’s just as cute as he is every Tuesday and Thursday morning during class. It makes her smile… but it also makes her more than a little bit confused.
Luke can’t be any older than she is and she knows that he doesn’t have any siblings from that inane icebreaker game they played at the beginning of the semester. So… who is this child ?
Julie can’t find it in herself to tear her eyes away from the sight of Luke and this baby (who is frankly adorable) . It’s driving her crazy, making her realise that she knows barely anything about this guy she sees every week, smiles at every Tuesday and Thursday morning, thinks about more than she should .
Before she realises what she’s doing, she’s packing her books up in her satchel and walking towards Luke and the stroller, feet moving on their own accord. What is she doing, what is she doing, what is she doing--
“Luke?”
Luke is picking up Carrie’s stuffed tiger off the ground when he hears a familiar voice calling his name. He brushes the tiger off and places it in the seat before looking up. His mouth dries up instantly when he sees her.
Julie. Gorgeous Julie, sweet Julie, smart Julie from class. Julie who apparently knows his name and is standing right in front of him with a cute, albeit confused, smile on her face. Her hair is in two tight braids, curls puffing out on either side of her chin. The sun is shining behind her, making her glow almost ethereally.
Luke scrambles to get up, trying to fix a charming grin on his face (though he isn’t exactly sure how successful he is). “Julie!” he says. “Hey!”
Julie raises her eyebrows just a touch. “Hi,” she says, one hand fiddling with the ring on her index finger. “How’s it goin’?”
Luke shrugs, awkwardly tapping his finger against the stroller’s canopy. Quick, say something witty! “Um… it’s going!” ...Good going, idiot. “I didn’t expect to see you here.”
“Oh, I actually come here all the time,” Julie says, looking around. “It’s my favourite park, ‘cause of the--”
“--the magnolias?” Luke finishes for her, eyes widening.
Julie thankfully doesn’t seem annoyed that Luke cut her off, instead nodding with a subtle look of surprise on her face. “Yeah, the magnolias. They’re my dad’s favourite.”
Luke nods, unable to hide his grin. “Mine, too,” he says. “I mean… they’re my favourite, not my dad’s favourite. I-I don’t even know what my dad’s favourite flower is… or if he even has one.” He stops talking as soon as he can, clamping his lips shut before he can embarrass himself anymore. Great, Luke. You’re going to be single forever.
But surprisingly, instead of excusing herself as quickly as possible, Julie’s still standing there, smiling bashfully. Luke counts that as a success.
Then, determined not to be ignored, Carrie lets out a squeal from her seat. Luke can just imagine the look on her face, eyebrows furrowed and cheeks puffed out the way she gets when any of them has the audacity to try and pay attention to anything that isn’t her.
Luke won’t lie, the moment he laid eyes on Julie, he sort of forgot Carrie was there. Whoops. She holds onto her tiger and waves it around angrily before sticking her hand out of her seat and dropping the tiger on the floor. Luke sighs and gives Julie and apologetic look, bending down to pick it up.
Just as he does though, Julie does the same thing, crouching down and reaching for the stuffed animal. Their knuckles bump against one anothers as they both reach for a paw. The gentle touch is enough to make a spark fly up Luke’s arm and a light blush cover his cheeks. He looks up at her, grinning when he finds her already looking at him.
He watches as Julie picks up the toy and gives it a loving stroke before holding it out toward Carrie, whose eyes are wide and scrutinizing.
“You gonna introduce me to your friend here?” Julie asks, voice teasing and light as she wiggles the tiger in front of Carrie’s face. Carrie lets out a giggle and Luke feels the tension leave his shoulders. Giggles are a good sign.
“Um,” Luke says, “do you mean the tiger or…”
Julie gives him an incredulous look that makes him smirk.
“Julie, this is Carrie,” Luke says, gently grabbing one of Carrie’s arms and making her wave it in Julie’s direction. “Carrie, you wanna say ‘hi’?”
“Ah!” Carrie exclaims, waving her arm around.
Julie giggles. The quiet sound sends Luke’s brain into a tizzy, reminding him of the gentle tinkling of windchimes. “It’s very nice to meet you, Miss. Carrie,” Julie says, holding her finger out toward her for Carrie to grab, which she does. “She’s adorable.”
“I know, right?” Luke says, stroking the soft, downy hair on top of Carrie’s scalp. “She knows it too. She’s gonna be a total diva when she grows up, I just know it.”
Julie laughs again and Luke fears that his heart is going to actually beat out of his chest at how excited he’s getting. She stops laughing and bites her lip, standing back up. Luke does the same. “Is she… yours?” she asks.
Luke raises his eyebrows. “No!” That seems wrong. “I mean… kind of.” That isn’t right either. “She’s not my kid, she’s… she’s my roommate Bobby’s.”
“So, you’re babysitting?” Julie asks, tilting her head. Her eyebrows are scrunched and Luke has to resist the urge to reach out and gently stroke his thumb over the wrinkle in between them.
“I mean… not really,” he says, squeezing the stroller handle. “We’re all helping to raise her. It’s kind of complicated.”
Luke had expected Julie to recoil, to run away in fear or disinterest or disgust… but she doesn’t. She just nods knowingly. “Complicated. I get it,” she remarks.
Silence falls between the two of them then. There are millions of thoughts and words buzzing around in Luke’s mind that it’s hard to actually say what he wants to say.
“Listen, um…” he says, hoping his voice isn’t shaking.
“Yeah?” Julie responds, drawing out the vowel as if she knows what it is he wants to ask her.
Luke smiles. “I… Carrie and I were gonna go get some ice cream or something. Would you be interested in joining us?” he asks, nodding towards Carrie. “I think Carrie would really like that.”
“ Just Carrie?” Julie asks, smiling mischievously. A slow grin grows on Luke’s face. He’s been caught out and he doesn’t even care .
“I mean… I-I would… I would like it if you joined us. Too.” Luke says, stumbling slightly over his words. “So? What do you say?”
Julie nods at him, her smile growing wider until her eyes scrunch and her cheeks grow slightly rounder. “I’d love to join you guys.”
It takes everything in Luke not to jump for joy at that. Instead, he nods too. He doesn’t even try to conceal his excited grin though, couldn’t even if he wanted to. “Awesome!”
Carrie lets out a squeal too, her eyes resolutely on Julie as they begin to walk together.
As the three of them walk out of the park together, Luke tightens his grip on Carrie’s stroller handles, happy to listen to Julie talk about a reading they were supposed to do for class (that Luke didn’t do). Getting a stroller was definitely a great idea on his part.