Chapter Text
"Two weeks," he said, staring at all of them. "We're all taking two weeks off. No crises, no saving the world, no being uploaded or travelling through time, we're just off. Even off the grid if we need to be."
Fitz and Simmons take off almost before he's done talking. Mack and Elena hold hands as they leave, smiling at each other. They're all coupley. She's surrounded by people with another half, and she's not...so...she'll just eat ice cream and like figure out what's been on TV while she's been saving the world. That show she started is probably done and who knows if she can even find it. What movies have been out? Maybe she just won't get dressed for days, eat all the chips. It'll be good.
They're still rebuilding the base around them, so it's noisy, construction people everywhere, repairing after the bomb LMD May set off. It's a good time to be gone, Coulson's good at that.
Daisy packs her bag, ready to run off to some hotel, somewhere with a pool and just disappear from the world because everyone else has a place to be and someone to be with. She even catches a glimpse of Coulson touching May's arm, of them talking in low voices.
May finally got released from medical and they said her wound was healing really well, considering, but she still limps a little because there was a huge hole in her thigh and she kept going on that filthy station.
Two weeks of healing will be good for her, good for all of them.
She's just about off the base, gone to a hotel room and two weeks and take out, when Coulson sees her, calls her name from the Quinjet. "Daisy, come with us."
She stops, turns back. May's smiling at his side, comfortable, content, and Coulson's got that look. "It'll be a boring tour of the pubs in Ireland where we read books and look out for sheep while we're hiking."
"No, I've got--"
"Come with us." May has that mom face again and Coulson smirks.
"You've got nothing, just come. I'll buy you dinner."
"Every night," May adds for him, heading for the cockpit.
The first pub they're in, the nice bartender, pub keeper, lady with the beer, whatever they're called here, looks at Daisy, then Coulson and May, and nods. "Nice to see a family travelling together. Second honeymoon or are you moving away, breaking their hearts?"
Daisy turns back, almost wondering if they've somehow started kissing while she wasn't looking, but they're just reading the guidebook together, May's hand on Coulson's arm and yes, they're really fucking married. Kind of too young to be her parents, I mean, maybe, but they would have been young and they look good for their age, especially May who is clearly an ageless immortal being.
"It was just time to take a vacation- holiday--" That's how they say it here. "Thanks."
Daisy starts to leave a few coins behind but no one tips here, so she pockets her euros instead and returns to her parents, beers balanced together. They split two bags of chips and she was fully intending to work on this coding project she's been putting off on her phone but ends up half-assedly watching the rugby match (with no idea what's going on) and watching them. Coulson has that huge old book and May's reading something in Chinese and they're so calm about it. Sometimes they pause, mutter something to each other or smile and it's not like Fitz and Simmons who always seem to want to make out or run off together to be alone, and there's none of that inside joke let's disappear stuff like Mack and Yo-yo because they're just not a couple.
Not a couple like either of them.
They're so calm it's spooky. Beautiful. Like they've been married thirty years. They go with it. Coulson and May share a room at the inn and Daisy has her own tiny little room with a soft bed and funky flowered curtains and it's really damn cute. Way better than the plain white hotel bed she could get somewhere.
There's even Netflix, with other stuff, stuff in German and weird Italian horror movies and there's no mini bar but they sell literally everything at the Tesco, and the beer is cheap and really good and potato chips come in tomato flavor, so what the hell.
She sees them at breakfast and they don't kiss, but they hold hands when the three of them go to the movies. When they go to a fancy dinner on Thursday, May wears a dress and Daisy stares more than Coulson does.
May in a dress. No the sparkly silver thing she wore undercover, this is a real dress, practical, dark. Probably has pockets and a gun, and she still has a leather jacket because it's raining (it always rains here) but maybe it's just a sign she's relaxed. That they're comfortable.
Popcorn comes in sweet and salty and it's awesome. She mixes them together and gets a beer while Star Wars drags them all back to space for a couple hours. She wonders if the Jedi are all inhumans while May puts her head on Coulson's shoulder and he rests his head on hers and they're almost too cute for fucking words. She'd take a picture and send it to Simmons but she probably won't even get out of bed and look at her phone for days so maybe it's just better if she just smiles at them and holds the popcorn bag.
Coulson misses Han Solo. May speculates about how that lightspeed trick might have worked. They could ask Fitz but-- The three of them share a look that's all "he's not going to answer his phone either".
So they get a beer in a little dive and head back to the inn. Monday, they move to a smaller town with a big old castle and they do the touristy stuff, like walk along the beach in the rain and get tea and cake that has jam inside (which is really cool but a little odd and she really should have watched that baking show with Jemma when she was into it).
Still calm, still easy. Still the quietest, nicest, least demanding trip she's ever been on. Coulson and May keep paying for things. They're both the most coupley of all the couples and yet the easiest because she never feels weird. They don't stare into each other's eyes like the world could end all around them, they don't disappear to fuck for hours. They're just there and she's here and they go to old little churches and pubs with uneven floors and eat meat pies and bangers and mash.
It's in the second week that something shifts, also gently, because everything here is soft green and their feelings are apparently as gentle as the rolling hills. May holds Coulson's hand in public, he rests his on her back when they go through doors. They're closer, somehow, like they've said something, talked about something. Daisy sleeps in on a Tuesday and doesn't see them until lunch and May's eyes are haunted.
"I can go, fly back on my own, go see London--"
"No, no," Coulson promises. "She's okay."
"She's not okay. I should go, let you two talk."
"We're talking," he says, patting her shoulder. "She just needs some time. Maybe she'll talk to you."
"May doesn't talk to me about her problems."
Coulson shrugs, then finishes his beer. "Why not?"
"Because I'm me and she's May and--"
"Having one person in your life to talk to isn't enough, no matter how good of a listener he is," Coulson says, resting his hands on the dark wood table top. "Or how charming."
It's not really a request, but neither of them would make one. May's not just going to get up tomorrow and want to talk.
In the morning, she's standing there, in the garden behind the inn, not doing tai chi. Daisy clings to her coffee and stares, because May's really just sitting there with a blanket around her shoulders.
"I'd offer you coffee, but you hate it."
May smiles a little. "The tea here isn't very good either."
"It's okay if you put milk in it, but maybe you hate that too?"
"Hate's a strong word."
"There might be some green tea around, I can look."
"Daisy, it's fine."
Which means she has no exit. Sit here, talk to May, see what's bothering her. What's been bugging her since they got back. "You okay?"
May turns her head, studying Daisy's face. "No, I don't think I am."
"Coulson helping?" She's not sure what she'll get. Some kind of confession that they're together?
Shutting her eyes, May tilts her head towards the pale sun in the clouds. "He's made it worse."
"Sounds like him."
"It is him." Opening her eyes, May looks past Daisy towards the rolling green hills. "We almost dated once, right before Andrew and I went out."
Daisy almost drops her coffee. "Seriously? I knew you were close but you dated?"
"Almost. I fell in love with Andrew."
"I'm sorry."
"Don't be." May's hand finds her wrist, warm in the cool morning. "We were happy, until we weren't."
"After what happened--"
"You've said it before, Daisy." May meets her eyes, and hers are so dark they could be the sea Coulson keeps reading about.
When I was pissed at you and my mom was manipulating me and I wanted to hurt you.
"I killed a child."
"She was going to kill you and a whole bunch of people."
"Doesn't make it better."
"Can anything?"
May lets go of the blanket a little, sits up. "I didn't think so."
She could fish, try and dig it out, or wait. With May it's always about waiting. Being patient. "Robin really made you think, huh?"
"I can't be someone's mother."
"She adored you." Everyone saw that. "I don't know what happened, but you were her mom. You were an awesome mom."
"In a post-apocalyptic, terrible scenario."
"So it would be easier in a non-apocalypsed world. You'd be better." That was stupid thing to say.
May's face crumbles, as if she can't hold her emotions together. That's almost scarier than the apocalypse.
"If that was something you wanted. You've been like a mom to me."
"I was your SO."
"You're a hell of a lot more than that. My mom tried to kill me, you- I guess you're the closest thing to a mom I've ever had. If I had one, a real mom, I'd want one like you. Even with the stupidly early curfew."
"Daisy--"
Fuck, she's gone way too far and said too much and wow she should just stop talking.
Then May hugs her, tight, really tight. May would never cry, ever. Ireland's just really wet.
"Your mother should never have let you go."
Daisy's eyes sting, and she cries. She can cry. She does that. May doesn't, she wouldn't.
"I wouldn't."
It's really late when she finds Coulson alone, after May's gone to bed, sitting in the corner of the pub, reading. He hasn't made it very far through Ulysses but it's like the densest book in the world so that's progress.
"I think May cried."
He sets down his book, gently tucks a piece of ribbon into it and looks up at her and the shots of whiskey she brought to the table. "She does have emotions."
"I just--" She shivers and reaches for the whiskey, downing it in one. "What happened?"
He drinks his own shot much more politely, smiling a little at the glass "You picked a good one." He rests his hands on the book. "You'll need to be more specific about May."
"She's shaky, and it's not her leg. She's emotional."
"She's going through a lot."
"Being a mom to Robin?"
"Not just that, hang on." Coulson stands, ordering two more glasses of whiskey, doubles. It's that kind of secret. "She won't mind that i'm telling you, so don't think that this is some kind of secret. May would tell you, if she could."
Daisy's heart thuds so hard in her chest that her fingers shake when she reaches for the glass. "That's comforting in no way at all."
"Before Bahrain, she and Andrew wanted to start a family, did she tell you that?"
Whatever Coulson bought is way too nice to drink desperately, but it is delicious. Sweet and warm, but May was going to have a kid. Fuck. "No."
"She was going to stay in the field, because she loves it, but they were trying."
Trying. Trying to get pregnant. May was going to get pregnant and have a baby and be a mom, and then she had to kill a kid who was ready to kill a whole building full of people, maybe a city after that.
Daisy took another sip, shaking her head. Her eyes stung again and she couldn't have looked at May. "And then she--"
"Then she couldn't. Could barely stand being around kids at first. Couldn't stand anyone. She was so funny, Daisy. So warm, gentle. She used to make fun of me for being uptight."
"You are uptight."
"Thanks." He lifts his glass, clinking it against hers. "She's getting back to that, she's forgiven herself a lot."
"But that's not it."
"Trauma like that you don't just get over."
"So why now? What's changed? How did you make it worse?"
Coulson half-chokes on his whiskey. "I reminded her of something."
"What?"
"It's not over."
"Huh?"
He sighs, stares at the book, then looks at her. "Field agents are exposed to strange things. Radiation, oh-eight-fours, starting a family isn't the easiest thing for any of us, so most of the high level field agents have their genetic material frozen. SHIELD has pretty advanced tech, way ahead of what was available to the general public."
"So you're saying May has eggs, frozen."
"She could still be a mom."
There's not enough whiskey in the world for that. May would be a great mom. A fucking awesome mom and if that's what she wants.
"With you, right? That's what made it worse."
"I believe what made it worse is that I'd have a child with her, not that there's anything wrong with me being--"
"The father." Fuck. "You should do it. You should totally do it, you'd be great parents."
"Thanks, Daisy."
"I mean it."
"I know. She knows, it's just not easy."
"How can I help? What can I do there's gotta be something I can--"
"Daisy-"
"Yeah?"
"Just listen."
Which is the least useful thing anyone could have said because May doesn't talk. At all. Coulson has to tell her stuff. How can Daisy listen?
She stares at him and the whiskey and her own desperately empty glass. "And you're ready to do your part. The being a dad part."
"She's always had my back."
Having a baby together was really kind of above and beyond having her back, but Coulson would see it that way. Couldn't really picture either of them having a kid with anyone else. Parents. They were going to be fucking parents. She knows fuck all about IVF and whatever came next, but she slipped around the table and hugged him, tight.
"You'll be great."
"Thanks Daisy."
"Really great." And then she was fucking crying again. Coulson's eyes were bright too, and the darkness of the pub hid it pretty well in that back corner.
"Are you excited?"
"Yeah," he said, stumbling over the word. "I really am. It's not a great time, SHIELDs a mess and--"
"It's the best time."
"It is." He held onto her, hugging her again. "Thanks for coming out here."
"Are you kidding? I love Ireland, especially the sheep, I mean...we should move here." And raise a kid. May and Coulson's kid., like. Fuck.