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If there was one thing Max was absolutely sure of, it's that he didn't ever want to have kids.
He doesn't hate kids, no. Far from it, really. He adores his sister's children and can never get enough of them. He's not terrible with kids either given he works in paediatrics. He just didn't want to have kids of his own.
Because, having kids of his own meant being completely responsible for the functioning and upbringing of a tiny human who relies on you for everything. And if you fuck them up, that stays forever.
That's the kind of burden Max just can't live with.
So when it came to dating, he had one rule: no kids. That meant not dating someone who has or wants kids of their own. And he'd been following this rule of his pretty well till the day he walked into his regular cafe, eyes on his phone, and crashed into a man who then proceeded to curse in rapid French. He lifted his head to try and apologise but the words died in his throat when his eyes landed on the man's face.
And that was that.
In a display of rare finesse and smoothness, Max immediately asked the man if he would let Max buy him another cup of coffee and the man, thankfully, said yes.
His name, he learnt, was Charles. And Max was thoroughly fucked.
He found out he was even more fucked when he woke up in Charles' apartment six weeks later to find a tiny human pattering around the apartment, shoving her Legos into a giant box in an attempt to clean up before Charles woke up.
“You're not Papa,” the girl had said.
“Um…No. I'm not,” Max had replied while trying not to freak out over who ‘Papa’ probably is.
Charles had stumbled out of the room a few seconds later, seen the look of barely concealed shock on Max's face, and pulled him aside to explain everything.
She was three years old, her name was Julia, and she was the most important person in Charles' life.
He'd only been in this for six weeks. Logically, Max could still get out of this. Say that kids were never in his plan so he really can't do this.
But then Julia glared at him from across the dining table the entire time they were having breakfast like she was sending him silent threats, so Max backed out of the talk. He told himself he'd bring it up later.
But a week went by. Then another. And another. ‘Later’ never came.
Julia crawled in and made space for herself in Max's heart before he could fight it. She pushed her way through all the guards Max had put up, she held Max's hand like she trusted him with everything and grinned up at him like he was the funniest person she'd ever met.
Max had been afraid that maybe Julia would start feeling jealous and get possessive over her father. Turns out, Julia did get possessive and jealous.
But over Max.
So most nights, it was the father and daughter fighting for cuddling rights while Max lay between them, giggling to himself in absolute disbelief of how this was his life now.
He thought he never wanted kids. That he would be so awkward and wrong most of the time and would mess it up completely. And he feared that if he ever hurt Julia, Charles wouldn't forgive him ever either.
But it had been three years and they were doing just fine, and Max cannot imagine his life before Julia.
sunday
It was Max's rare day off and Julia had planned the entire day out for them. They were to go to the park, then get pizzas, then ice cream, and then come home and watch three movies minimum.
“Jules, non . One movie and that's it.” Charles stood by the dining table, hastily packing his bag. He is late for work and Max might've had something to do with that, but he is going to neither confirm nor deny those allegations.
“But Papa, Maxie is home today,” Julia whines. Six years old, brown eyes, pouty lips just like her father's being deployed as weapons to get her way. “Papa, please .”
Alas, Charles has grown immune.
“ Non . You have school tomorrow, mon petit . You will need to go to sleep on time.”
“That's not fair, Papa!” Julia crosses her arms, huffing. She walks over to Max, who's sitting cross-legged on the carpet by the couch, and plops down into his lap. “Maxie, tell him!”
Max brings his arms around Julia, gently kissing the top of her head. “I'm sorry, darling. Your father's rules apply.”
Julia's mouth falls open dramatically. And then, while maintaining eye contact with Max, she says, “ But Papa ,” right before turning her head towards Charles, “you promised you'd let me do whatever I want when Maxie stays home.”
Charles exhales before trying to reason with his daughter again, but Max doesn't hear any of that.
His heart is beating so fast he prays and hopes that Julia cannot feel it because what was that?
Of course Julia hadn't meant to call him Papa. Of course. She has a Papa, that's Charles. Max is Maxie. Those are established facts.
Then why did, for those two seconds, Max's heart soar when Julia called him Papa?
Julia gets off his lap to kiss her Papa goodbye. Charles leans down and kisses Max too, and Max kisses back reflexively, but his mind isn't there.
Julia grabs the list from her room, thrusting it in Max's face as she repeats their goals for the day. Max nods along, his eyes on Julia’s face.
She is truly Charles' daughter in so many senses. She has the same brown hair that curls at the end, her eyes are brown but with a hint of green, and she has the same long lashes and puppy-dog eyes as Charles which she uses to convince Max to let her have two scoops of ice-cream right before bed. And Max is so in love with her.
And the brief acknowledgement from her as her father left Max yearning for something he didn't know he wanted yet.
The rest of the day went just as Julia had planned. The park was sunny but chaotic, the ice cream shop was a welcome relief, and the pizzas were the kind Julia loved. She complained when Max tried to trick her into going to sleep after only watching one movie and could only be convinced when Max promised to read her two stories before bed instead.
She drifted off right after the first one. Max smiled, kissed her forehead and whispered ‘goodnight’ before leaving.
the nurse’s office
The call from the school came right as Max had sat down for his lunch. He sped through the roads, trying his best not to break many traffic rules.
“Hello, Mr. Verstappen? I'm calling from the nurse's office. Julia is here and….”
To be frank, Max hadn't heard anything after that. He doesn't know exactly why Julia is there, all he knows is that she's in the nurse's office and something is wrong and it's wrong enough that they had to call him instead of Charles.
He bursts through the doors and breathes a sigh of relief when his eyes land on Julia, sitting quietly on the little bed, her little legs swinging back and forth.
The moment she spots him, her face breaks into a huge smile. “Maxie, you came!”
Max spares no time in crossing the room and scooping the little girl in his arms. He pulls back only to assess her to his own satisfaction.
“What's wrong? Are you hurt? Does something hurt?” he frantically asks Julia, who doesn't say anything. “What’s wrong?” he asks the nurse instead.
“Well, Julia had a stomach ache this morning so brought her here and tried to help but she refused any of the treatments and asked us to call her parents so she could go home.”
That makes sense, Max thinks. “Was Charles busy?”
“Oh, we didn’t call him,” the nurse answers. “Julia mentioned one of her fathers is a doctor and insisted that we call you.”
Max didn’t know which part of that sentence to focus on first—the fact that Julia asked the nurse to call Max first instead of Charles or the fact that the nurse referred to Max as her father .
“Maxie.” Julia’s voice breaks Max out of his thoughts. “Can you fix my tummy ache, please. Like you do at the hospital.”
Max melts like he always does. He smiles and picks her up in his arms. “Of course. I’ll drop you off at home and give your Papa a call, yes?” Julia nods.
Charles is somehow already home by the time Max and Julia get there.
“ Oh, mon coeur, come here.”
Julia gets transferred from Max’s arms to Charles’ and he can tell she’s enjoying being carried around very much.
“Where does it hurt? Was it something you ate in the morning? Maybe pancakes and scrambled eggs weren't a good combination. Okay, here,” he lies Julia down on her bed and starts gently rubbing her belly. “Does that feel better? Does it still hurt?”
Max walks in just then with a glass of water. “Here, drink this slowly.” And Julia does so.
The worry doesn’t leave Charles’ face. “You don’t think it’s appendicitis, is it?”
It is such a wild assumption that Max has to laugh.
“ Schat , no, it’s not appendicitis. It’s probably just a little indigestion.”
Charles nods. “Okay, okay. ‘Cause I was reading some articles and—”
“Charles, how many times have I told you not to read those damned articles when I’m right here ! You’re dating a paediatrician. You don’t need Google for a diagnosis.”
“I know, I know. I just wanted to make sure.”
“ Lief , I have a medical degree . Do you need me to bring it out and show it to you so you’ll believe me?”
This is not the first time they’ve had this fight. Whenever Julia gets sick, Charles panics while Max tries to figure out what’s wrong and tends to her. Eventually, Charles calms down and joins Max after he tells him for the third time Charles, this is my job. I know what I’m doing. Only upside is that this fight always makes Julia laugh.
“Papa, you’re being silly,” Julia remarks, earning a chuckle out of Max. “That’s why I asked Miss Dala to call Maxie first.”
Charles gasps dramatically, even placing a hand over his chest for good measure. “Betrayed by my own daughter. I cannot believe this.” Julia giggles.
“I told them Maxie is a doctor and then they agreed to call him.”
“Yeah? You like that Maxie is a doctor?” Charles asks as he gently brushes Julia’s hair off her face. The little girl nods with such force that the glass almost slips from her hands. Max feels something warm bloom in his chest.
“Then, will you listen to Maxie so that you can get better soon?” Max asks her, and the little girl nods in agreement. “Alright then, come on. Let's go to your room.”
But Julia refuses to move. “Julie?”
She puts down the glass in her hand and stretches her arms out towards Max instead.
“You want me to carry you to your room?” Max asks just to make sure.
“I'm sick. I can't walk,” she simply explains. Max can't help but laugh. From the other side, Charles tries to pick her up instead, but Julia swats his arm away.
“Woah—hey!”
“You're not the doctor, Papa.”
“Hey, I still raised you, you know.”
And Julia sticks her tongue out as Max finally picks her up in his arms.
He shrugs casually, saying, “Sorry, Charles. Rules are rules.”
Charles gawks at them, then throws his hands up dramatically as he walks away. “Unbelievable. My own family is turning against me. You work and you work and you work but you get nothing —”
They hear Charles' voice disappear and he walks across into the living room and they giggle. “Come on, let's get you some rest.”
the principal’s office
Calls to the principal's office were very rare for Max and Charles, especially since Julia was such a well behaved kid.
So when Charles called Max in the middle of the day, sounding panicked about the call he received from Julia's school, Max rushed.
“What could it have been?” Charles asks as they make their way over to the principal's room. “She's never really been in trouble. What if it's something else?”
“Relax, Charles. I’m sure she’s alright. What if this is about her academics instead?”
Charles’ eyes suddenly go wide. “Do you think she’s struggling? Both of us have been busier than usual this past month. Do you think it affected her studies? Fuck , I knew I shouldn’t have agreed to go on that business trip to Miami. I should’ve just stayed—”
“ Schat , breathe, Max puts a hand on Charles’ face trying to calm him down. “We’ll find out in a bit, yeah? I’m sure it’s nothing wrong.”
The principal greets them with a curt smile.
“Mr. Leclerc, Mr. Verstappen. Please, take a seat.”
They are not the only parents in the room however. The chairs next to theirs are occupied by Mr. and Mrs. Dubois. Charles gives them a polite nod which neither of them reciprocate. French people , Max thinks to himself.
“I have called you all here today because we need to discuss an incident which took place in the playground today.” The principal then takes a deep breath, possibly for a dramatic effect, before he turns to Charles and says, “Your daughter punched their son. Twice.”
Neither of them can believe what they have just been told.
“I’m sorry,” Charles starts. “Did you just say that my Julie punched someone?”
“I’m afraid so, Mr. Leclerc.”
“You must be mistaken. My Julie doesn’t even like to squash bugs! She cries for the entire day if she accidentally steps on a caterpillar. Why would such a girl punch a kid?”
“Maybe you should ask her yourself.”
On cue, the teacher brings both the kids in. Julie lights up on seeing them and immediately runs to them both while the other kid, Felix, runs over to his mother crying. Max hers his mother trying to soothe him in quiet French, the way Charles often does with Julia at home. Then, the boy says something and points towards Julia, to which she tries to lunge at him.
“Julie, non . What are you doing?” Charles holds her back.
“See, this is exactly what we needed to discuss,” the principal then chimes in. "In the playground earlier today, Julia punched Felix twice. A kid playing nearby went to inform the teacher and by the time she got there, Julia was sitting on Felix’s back, refusing to move even though the boy was crying.”
Max cannot believe any of the words leaving the principal’s mouth right now. None of those things sound like something his Julie would do. Surely there must’ve been a misunderstanding.
“I didn’t do it for no reason,” Julie says. She’s sitting in her father’s lap, little arms crossed across her chest, and no fear in her eyes. “I punched him because he was being mean about me and my family.”
The principal raises his head at the teacher, waiting for her to explain.
“Well, when I found them, Julia was pulling on Felix’s hair telling him to ‘Take it back and say sorry to me’. I asked a few kids who were around what had happened. They said that Felix had come up to Julia and started saying some things which irritated her to the point that she punched him twice and when she was going for a third one, Felix tripped and fell so she sat on him instead.”
Max listens to the teacher recount the incident with his jaw hanging open in disbelief. Then he looks at Julia smirking , like she’s proud of what happened.
“Julia,” the principal looks at her now, trying to sound like he’s her friend. “What exactly did Felix say to you?”
Julia takes a deep breath, something Max had taught her to do whenever she felt overwhelmed. “I was playing out on the ground when Felix suddenly came up to me and started saying that I only have one dad. I said, ‘No. I have two dads,’ then Felix kept saying, ‘No, you only have one dad,’ and started teasing me even though I kept saying that I have two dads. It made me very angry and so I punched him.”
She recalls the incident with such an air of nonchalance that if people didn’t already know her they’d think she goes around beating kids up all the time.
The principal hums, nods, and then looks over to the boy.
“Felix, why did you say what you said to Julia?”
Felix is shaking and he refuses to meet Julia’s eyes or even look in her direction. Julia seems oddly proud of that. “My Mama and Papa are married. But, her Papa isn’t married. So that means she only has one Papa, right?”
Charles has to hold Julia’s arms down before she runs off to punch the poor kid again.
The principal hums, thinking over it. After about five minutes of silence, he speaks.
“Alright. First of all, Felix, you must apologise to Julia because what you said wasn’t very nice. Your parents don’t need to always be married for them to be your parents, okay? Different kids can have different families.” Felix nods, still clutching on to his mother’s blouse. “And Julia, you also have to apologise to Felix for using your actions before using your words. Hitting someone when you get angry at them is very wrong, okay?” Julia huffs, but nods nonetheless.
In the end, both the kids shake hands and say sorry. Mrs. Dubois says something in French to Charles to which he politely shakes his head and pats her hand. They exchange smiles and Charles waves to Felix before walking out. Max might need some time to form any opinions on Felix. The parents leave as the kids get taken back to their classrooms.
Charles comes to the dinner table with a proper rundown of how he’s going to handle this ‘situation’. Max tells him that he’s being overly dramatic, Charles brushes him off.
“Julie, we need to talk about what happened at school today,” Charles says, immediately tamping the excitement the little girl had upon seeing that it’s spaghetti for dinner tonight.
She groans dramatically, throwing her head back. “Papa, I said sorry to him. I won’t punch him again, okay? I promise.”
“Yes, I believe that, mon cher , but I just wanted to know why you punched him.”
“Because he said I don’t have two dads,” Julie says as she shoves a forkful of spaghetti in her mouth.
“Mhm. And that made you feel angry?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because we’re a family and that stupidhead was trying to tell me that we aren’t.”
She says it so matter-of-factly that Max almost misses it. Almost, though. In reality his fork stops mid-air as he tries to take in the words she just said.
“Oh,” Charles says softly. “You didn’t like it when Felix tried to say that we aren’t a family?”
Julia shakes her head. “It made me very angry. That’s why I punched him. You know I don’t like hurting people.”
Charles smiles and leans over to kiss Julia’s cheeks. “No you don’t, mon petit sucre. ”
Max feels a lot of emotions swirling inside him. He feels an overwhelming urge to both take Julia in his arms and squeeze her tightly while also wanting to run straight into a wall at high speed. He instead decides to do neither and just sits in his seat as he watches Julia eat her dinner like she hasn’t just turned Max’s world upside down.
He feels Charles’ hand slowly slide into his, squeezing gently as if to say, she’s just fine, and so are we .
max’s office
It was ‘Bring Your Kid To Work’ day at the hospital, and Max had only offhandedly mentioned it at the dinner table while complaining about how he’ll have to deal with a lot of ruckus in the halls tomorrow. And then Julia had piped up, insisting that Max take her with him.
“Are you sure? The hospital isn’t as exciting a place as it might seem.”
“Yes, I’m sure. Papa has taken me so many times to his office. I wanna see your office too!”
And well, Max has been famously unable to deny Julia anything she wants.
And so on Tuesday morning, Julia is sitting on Max’s desk, swinging her legs as Max goes through his patient files and his appointments for the day.
“Maxie?”
“Yes, schatje .”
“Do children come to you everyday to get their booboos fixed?”
Max lightly chuckles at the use of the word ‘booboo’. “Yes, darling, they do.”
“And do they get a lollipop too at the end?”
“Yes, they do.”
Julia hums at that, the tips of her shoes lightly hitting the cabinet on the floor in front. She looks around the room, taking in the different charts and posters on the walls. She scans the stuff on Max’s table—his stethoscope, a blood pressure monitor for kids, thermometers, sanitizer, and of course, the bowl of lollipops. She thinks about asking Max if she can have one now when his buzzer goes off.
“Patient here to see you,” a voice says.
“Send them in,” Max replies. “Okay, Julie. I need you to sit on this stool here next to me, okay?” Julia nods and does so.
A woman walks in with a little baby in her arms, and Max immediately smiles on seeing them. He takes the baby in his arms, gently cooing over it as he presses the stethoscope to hear its heartbeat. The baby giggles and smiles again. He then passes the baby back to its mom before writing something down on a pad and tearing off the paper to give it to her. The woman thanks him before walking out.
“Do you see a lot of babies everyday?” Julia asks once the door closes.
“Sort of, yeah. I see a lot of children every day,” Max answers. Julia just nods her head.
The next patient that comes in is a little older than a baby. The boy seems to already know Max because he immediately runs over to him and tries to climb into his lap, which Max lets him do .
Julia finds it thoroughly unprofessional in her six-year-old opinion.
The boy then hands Max a drawing that he, apparently , made of him. Max answers it with gratitude. Julia thinks the artwork is rather bland and boring. Where are the bold brush strokes? The daring use of colour? Honestly, the crayons look like they were bought from the bargain bin at the Dollar Store. No passion put into the artwork at all. Fairly mediocre work.
But Max puts it on his desk under a paperweight and then goes on to check the boy. Julia makes a mental note to tear up that lowly piece of art when Max isn’t looking.
The boy gets a lollipop before he leaves for ‘being brave’ or whatever. All he did was sit in Max’s lap while Max asked him a few questions. Julia does not think that warrants a lollipop.
But then the boy has the audacity , the absolute gall , to pull Max into a hug. Julia almost scoffs. That is not how you behave with your doctor! Does Julia hug her doctor? Yes. But that’s only because her doctor lives in the same house as her and reads her bedtime stories and tucks her in bed with a goodnight kiss. So she’s allowed to hug him.
Whatever. The offending creature is now gone out of the room, and Julia has managed to keep her cool. She deserves a medal for that. And like five lollipops.
The next patient is what makes her snap.
It’s a girl about Julia’s age. She walks in with her father and on seeing Max immediately lights up.
“Dr. Maxie! Hi!” she runs over to Max to give him a hug, which he accepts fully. Julia feels this weird burning feeling in her chest and stomach that she hasn’t felt before.
The girl sits down obediently on the little stool in front of Max’s chair and answers all the questions Max asks. She says that yes, she has been brushing her teeth twice every night and yes, she has been eating all of her green veggies and yes, she did try eating fish last week and it wasn’t as bad as she thought it would be. Max gives her a high five for that. Julia clutches the cushion of her chair a little too tightly.
Once she’s done with her checkup and has taken her shot—during which she cried a little which Julia happened to enjoy very much—she was all ready to go. Max handed her one lollipop, as was the rule. But then she asked, “Dr. Maxie, can I have two lollipops today because I was brave when you gave me my shot?”
Max smiles widely. Then, he pulls out a second lollipop and hands it to her. The girl squeals in excitement and immediately throws her arms around screaming, “Thank you, Maxie.”
And then, in a display of the most horrendous act committed in the history of mankind (or for as long as Julia has been alive), she kisses Max on his cheek.
Julia has had enough of this nonsense.
She jumps off her stool and marches over to the pair hugging, blissfully unaware of the furious five year old charging towards them. And then, Julia pushes the girl off of Max so hard that even Max stumbles a little out of his seat.
“Go to your own dad!” Julia all but yells at the little girl, who is now fearfully clutching her lollipops.
“I was just thanking Dr. Maxie,” the girl replies in a weak voice.
“You don’t need to kiss his cheek to say thank you. Go away!”
“Julie!”
The girl hides behind her father’s legs, terrified and unsure of what she’s done wrong.
“Mr. Hopfman, I am so sorry. Tina, hello darling, would you come out here please?”
The girl—Tina—shakes her head, her eyes darting over to Julia.
“She won’t hurt you, sweetheart,” Max says and Julia immediately counters his words by saying, “I will.”
Max attempts to glare at Julia but she doesn’t take him seriously. Tina tugs on her father’s shirt then, insisting that they leave. Max gives them an apologetic look.
“I’m so sorry for her behaviour once again. I don’t know what got into her.”
“It’s alright, doctor. She’s a kid,” Mr. Hopfman smiles. “We’ll see you later. Say bye, Tina.” She weakly waves goodbye, and Max waves back.
The door closes and there’s silence for about ten seconds before Max speaks.
“Julie, that was not right what you just did.”
Julia furrows her eyebrows, her hard expression falling away just slightly.
“She hugged you and then gave you a kiss. And you gave her two lollipops.”
“She had to take a shot today, darling. And she was very brave. Don’t you think that deserves a reward?”
“She can have the lollipops, I don’t care. But why did she have to kiss you?”
“She just wanted to say thank you.”
“She can say it with her mouth.”
“Julia.”
Maybe it’s the strict tone of Max’s voice, maybe it’s the memory of Tina smiling while in Max’s hold still fresh in her memory, or maybe it is just this entire God-awful day, but Julia feels like she’s at her limit.
“What you did today was very wrong, Julie. You know you shouldn’t push or shove others like that. Tina could’ve really gotten hurt.”
“Well then it’s a good thing she has you as her doctor then,” Julia snaps. Max looks taken aback, his expression going from one of disappointment to one of absolute shock.
“ Julia .”
“You’re not her dad, and she needed to know that. You’re not her dad and she’s not your daughter!” Julia yells before running out of Max’s office.
“Julie, wait,” Max calls after her.
the hospital break room
Max has been looking around for Julia for the past ten minutes but can’t seem to find her anywhere. He asks the nurses and the staff outside if they’ve seen her, but she seems to have missed everyone’s sights. He looks under the carts, behind couches, in the spaces between vending machines but Julia is nowhere. He is on the brink of panicking and calling Charles for help when he sees her.
More specifically, he sees her little bow peeking out from the break room window.
“Julie.”
Julia turns around on hearing Max’s voice. Her eyes are puffy and nose red. She has tears and snot running down her face and the sleeve of her white t-shirt is wet from how many times she’s used it to wipe her face. Max’s heart twists painfully in his chest.
“ Liefje , I’m so sorry I got angry at you.”
Julia sniffles once before running into Max’s arms, colliding with his chest so hard that it knocks the breath out of him. She cries into his shirt and Max gently rubs her back with her head tucked under his chin.
“I’m sorry too, Maxie,” Julia mumbles against Max’s chest. “I didn’t want to be so mean. But, I felt very bad when I saw her kissing you like I kiss you, and I got angry.”
“Oh,” Max says as he slowly begins to understand the situation.
“I felt very bad. It all felt so wrong in my heart and my stomach. I did not like seeing her, which was weird because I don’t even know her.”
And then it all clicks in Max’s head. He slowly separates Julia from his chest and wipes the tears off her face.
“Sweetheart, what you were feeling back there was jealousy. It is when we feel angry or sad because someone has something that is ours or something that we want to be ours.”
Julia blinks, slowly taking in everything. “Oh,” she says, “that makes sense.”
“It does?”
“Yes. I was angry because you aren’t her dad. You are mine.” She states it so normally as if this admission of hers didn’t just tilt Max’s world 49º on its axis.
“You…,” he starts, suddenly unable to breathe very properly, “you think of me as your dad?”
Julia nods. “Yeah. And I'm your daughter, right?”
Max wonders if he ever even knew how to breathe because none of the oxygen in the room seems to be making it into his lungs now.
“Maxie?”
“Yes. Yes, you are, schatje .” He feels tears forming in the corners of his eyes. His throat closes up as he tries to get the next words out. “You are my daughter.”
Julia beams like the sun on a bright summer morning.
And then, as it they hadn't had enough moments in the day which sent Max's heart running faster than a Ferrari, Julia asks,
“Can I call you Dad?”
It's a good thing Max is on the floor already because he definitely would've fallen otherwise.
Max thinks about all of the decisions in his life that have led up to this moment right here. He didn’t grow up in a stable home, his family wasn’t complete. He got used to collecting bits of love wherever he could get them from and then sewing them together into a blanket to keep him warm when the world got a little too cold. He saw others with their well woven blankets, made with love in every thread carefully put together. He felt jealous, yes. Of course he did.
As he grew up he decided that maybe a family of his own wasn’t something that he could do. He has no idea how a family even works, how would he keep his own happy. And he didn’t want to risk being the cause for another kid growing up with a broken home. So, he decided on no kids.
Paediatrics hadn’t even been his initial choice for a speciality. But during his rotations he was stationed in the paediatric ward for a few weeks. And the first time that a kid gave him a little drawing as a thank you for making his tummy ache go away, Max felt his heart soar. And he got hooked on that feeling.
He has a folder with every single drawing, every single present his patients have ever given him. He’s known as the best doctor for paediatrics in his area. He loves working with kids more than he ever imagined he could. But his own kids? That was a different question. Fate had answered that question for him.
And now he had this little girl he met when she was only a toddler, who asks her school nurse to call for him to pick her up from school, who beats up boys in school if they try to insinuate and he isn’t her father, who got so jealous over another kid hugging him that she acted irrationally, and who is now asking him if she can call him Dad.
Max feels the tears flow, and Julia’s face immediately takes on a concerned expression.
“No, why are you crying? Do you not like it? Should I call you something else?”
Max lets out a wet chuckle. He shakes his head. “No, darling. You can just call me Dad if you’d like.”
Julia grins. “Okay then. From now on you’re my dad.” She hugs him tightly, kissing both of his cheeks two times each before bringing her hand up to wipe Max’s tears.
“Now stop crying, Dad. We need to tell Papa about this too.”
“Yes, we do.” God, wouldn’t Charles be thrilled. He remembers the conversations they’ve had over the years, Charles noting how he’s so glad Julia loves him so much because she had never been so comfortable with anyone else Charles had dated since having her. And Max would feel honoured.
Truth be told, he’d been waiting for Julia’s approval before he could propose to Charles. And this whole thing felt like he’d gotten it. Still, he’d like to formally ask her some time later.
“Also, Dad?”
“Yes, liefje ?”
“I love you.”
Max smiles and kisses her forehead. “I love you too, my little girl.”