Stella was now 20 weeks pregnant and these last two weeks she's had intense cramps that have felt similar to how she imagines Braxton Hicks will feel when she has those and waves of nausea. Kelly has been making her up baths every night and every day that they've been off shift while also keeping the loft cleaned up so it can be the calm haven they love to keep it. Stella had originally planned for after this shift ended everyone come over and they would all enjoy breakfast together at the loft. Everyone was surprised but hesitantly agreed thinking it might be a prank because it's not like any of them ever really gather at one anothers houses but especially not the loft. Kelly and Stella like to keep that to themselves a lot and Kelly uses that to his advantage to unwind from society as he's not the most people person by far especially not as much of one as Stella is. Kelly agreed to it though after Stella made him a deal that she knew he would love and certainly couldn't pass up. Stella was unsure if she was going to be able to do it though as another wave of nausea had hit her and has been sticking with her pretty thick throughout the shift. The only thing that ever really seemed to help it when it gets like this is sleep.
At the end of shift she told everyone that if they wanted to still come it would need to be for lunch as she needed to get home and sleep a little bit in hopes of this nausea subsiding to which they all agreed and secretly loved because they all needed some sleep after the long shift they are coming off of. It was a shift full of calls from start to finish with no real break in between calls. They all dreaded shifts like that. Upon arriving home Stella and Kelly quickly grabbed them some showers and headed off to bed for a few hours. As they went to climb into bed Kelly asked Stella "so when do you plan on paying up for me agreeing to this get together later? Today or another day?" "If I can I would love to tonight but I'm not sure how I'll feel yet" Stella replied. "Understandable just had to make sure you planned on keeping your word" Kelly said with a wink. Since Stella's pregnancy they've lacked much of a sex life as Stella's been exhausted and nauseas a lot of it and Kelly understood enough to be good and patient with her. Stella was grateful she had a man like Kelly in her corner who was so understanding and offered so much grace to her about it all through this process but she did feel guilty because lately all she's given him is her attitude that is known as none other than pregnancy hormones. She missed Kelly intimately she did but there's been a lot of times she's just not able to do it. Kelly didn't care though he knew she wasn't feeling up to it and why she was so moody lately.
At lunch everyone came over Kelly had grilled a steak while Stella made some mashed potatoes and Mac n cheese for everyone. As everyone arrived and began taking a seat at the table and around the floor of the loft with their plates full of food chatter erupted very quickly. Joe was talking to Kelly about fatherhood while Donna and Chloe were talking to Stella about motherhood while Brett talked to her about life in general. Mouch and Hermann were talking about things Molly's needed for improvements while Gallo,Ritter,and Violet talked about firehouse gossip.Capp and Tony sat talking about how they figure the first person to discover earth did. Boden and Kylie had been talking about some new rules supposedly coming to the CFD.Everyone ate before everyone quickly rushed out and went on to their days plans after thanking Kelly and Stella for inviting them and for the food. Joe and Chloe stayed a little longer to help them clean up. Once everyone left Kelly made a bath up for Stella hoping it would help her to keep the cramps away and prayed the nausea didn't come back as lately it's been a big part of her life at times. Some weeks are better than others with it. While Stella went to soak Kelly was going to go tune into the Cubs game and wait for her to get out so they could cuddle up on the couch and watch "A star is born" before grabbing leftovers for dinner and very likely calling it a rare early night since Stella is off of Molly's tonight and Kelly doesn't have any classes at the academy to teach. On those nights they like to call it shut eye pretty early to rest up.
After watching the movie they had planned Stella told Kelly she wanted to soak one more time before bed so he just got ready for bed and went to their bedroom and turned on the TV in there as he was ready for bed but also wanted to wait up on Stella. He turned on the TV and watched some of the 6 o clock news. He was shocked to see a few of the fired they had responded to the day before actually winded up making the news. Unless it leads to an explosion or has acid involved typically it doesn't even make the cut to the news but they did have a few of just some bad fires that had fatalities make its way to tonights news. As Stella got out she decided she was going to keep her word and pay up on her end of the deal she made with Kelly for letting the firehouse join them earlier at the loft.
She walked in their bedroom in nothing as Kelly's mouth dropped wide open absolutely blown away at the sight in front of him "You mind blown or something" Stella asked "yeah yeah umm definitely something like that for sure" Kelly responded getting up grabbing Stella up and laying her back on the bed so they could have sex. After finally having some again they both just laid there Kelly finally turned the TV off and then immediately turned back over to face Stella. "I love you and I hope you know proud I am of you for how you've handled all the changes lately in your firehouse duties, me being here after not being, the sickness, the cramps, all of it really you've handled everything like a total champ." Kelly said as Stella leaned up and kissed him before saying " Thank you. While it maybe tough still it's still 20x better with you here by my side than it was with you hundreds of miles away. I love you and thank you for truly being my savior through this". "You make it easy" Kelly said as he kissed her again and told her goodnight as she settled further into his chest as they started to doze off.
* As always please feel free to leave suggestions and feedback in the comments. Hope y'all enjoyed it and thank y'all as always for reading *