Always

"You know, I can't tell if this is going to reflect on our parenting or not, but we probably shouldn't have waited until 2 weeks before the due date to start setting up baby furniture…"
Liz and Adam sat in the middle of Dougies old room, what now was the nursery, pieces of un-made furniture scattered around them.
"If I could understand these freaking instructions that would probably help us a bit more."
Adam groaned as he glanced from the pieces of wood, to the instructions and then tossed the paper beside him.
"I thought the guy at the store said that this crap was easy to put together. I would have bought the already set up shit if I knew this was his definition of easy."
Liz chuckled and rubbed her now massively swollen stomach.
"You know, I was going to suggest that, but I didn't want to question your manliness."
"I don't think I would have classified it as questioning my manliness, so much as saving my sanity."
"Toss me your phone." She said as she stretched her hand out in in front of her.
"You think my phone is going to help solve this?"
"I have an idea to save your sanity, now just toss me the freaking phone hotshot."
He obliged and reached into his pocket grabbing and tossing her his phone. He watched her press a couple buttons and then put the phone to her ear.
"Hey Andy, quick question for you. What are you up to right now? Perfect! How do you feel about saving your teammates sanity and making sure my baby has a place to sleep before it's born? I knew there was a reason I loved you. Oh! And bring pizza."
She smiled and hung up, tossing the phone back to Adam.
"Problem solved!"
He looked at her with a slight frown on his face. "Why couldn't I think of that three hours ago when I tried to start this?"
"Because you're not nearly as smart as I am."
"Oh really? Is that so."
"For the past three hours we've had no crib and no food. In the next twenty minutes we're going to have a crib builder and a pizza. What do you think?"
He stared at her for a second before chuckling and leaning over pressing his lips to hers.
"I guess I'll give this one to you."

A couple hours later and Adam and Andy walked into the living room and plopped themselves down on the furniture.
"Well kid, you've got a crib. Even managed to get the changing table and dresser put together too."
She glanced up at the clock on the wall and then back to Andy.
"Amazing. Took him three hours to realize he needed help and two hours to get it put together after the help arrived."
"You know, I hope this increased sarcasm thing is just a side effect of pregnancy."
Adam playfully glared over towards Liz. She put her hands up and looked at him.
"Hey, I'm just stating facts!"
He shook his head at her and wrapped his arm around her shoulders pulling her towards him and pressing a kiss to her temple.
"So, you two ready for this kid to come out?"
Liz groaned, "oh my god, I can't wait. I'm excited to find my feet again," she wiggled her legs trying to see her feet over her stomach. "I've contemplated taking out a missing persons."
Andy chuckled at her, "that's definitely going to be a bonus. But I was getting more at the whole parenthood aspect of things."
"Well it's a little late to turn back now, don't you think?" She raised an eyebrow and looked down at her bulging stomach.
Adam chuckled at her answer and lazily put his hand on her stomach. "You worried about us screwing up this kid or something Andy?"
"You and Liz as it's parents? She's already doomed."
Adam laughed, "thanks for the vote of confidence there, bro."
Before anyone could get a response out, there was a knock on the door. Adam was about to get up before Liz put her hand on his leg.
"I wanna get it, I've been sitting in the same spot for 2 hours. I think I've made an imprint in the couch."
She scooted to the edge of the couch and heaved herself up, steadying on her feet and putting one hand on her lower back and the other on top of her bump.
"That's getting harder to do every day."
Adam and Andy both chuckled at her as they watched her waddle to the door. She pulled it open as she glared back at the two boys on the couch. When she turned back to see who was standing in the door her face automatically went blank.
"Mom?"
"I'm sure you'll enjoy how much of a surprise it was for me to knock on your real apartment door and have a lovely young ginger fellow open it."
"What are you doing here?"
"That was a nice hello."
"Just about as nice as the one you gave me."
They were both quiet for a second before her mom spoke again, "Can I come in, or do I get to spend the rest of the day in the hallway?"
Liz stepped back letting her mom in and closing the door behind her.
"Andy, this is my mom. Mom, Andy Ference."
She looked over at Andrew and back to Liz. "The Andy whose girls you babysat?"
She smiled thinking of the two little girls, "yep, that's him."
Her mom looked back to him and smiled, "nice to meet you."
"You too." Andy responded as he looked between the colourless look on Liz's face and the guarded look on Adam's.
Liz crossed her arms and looked back at her mom.
"So what are you doing in Boston?"
"What, I can't come see my pregnant daughter?"
"Not exactly after the way you took the news." Adam spoke as he stood from the couch. He turned towards the direction that Liz and her mom were standing.
"I was in a mild stage of shock after getting that phone call. But it doesn't change the fact she's my daughter."
"You all but kicked her out of the family when we called you, but now you're going to pull the 'she's my daughter' card?"
Liz took a couple steps towards Adam, placing herself in between him and her mom.
"Adam."
"No. I'm not going to stand here and listen to God knows what she has to say to you, especially not when you're only two weeks away from having this baby."
She took another step towards him and placed her hand on his chest.
"Adam, stop."
"Why are you even here? To tell her she's stupid in person? To try and drag her back home?"
The stern look on her mom's face kept intensifying and Liz could all but feel the heat radiating off of Adam. Before anyone said anything else, Andy came up behind Adam and put a hand on his shoulder.
"Hey man, how about we go cool down for a bit?"
"I'm not leaving Liz alone with her."
"Adam, just go with Andy."
"Liz-"
"Adam please."
He threw his hands up and turned heading in the direction of their bedroom. Andy threw a look at Liz, silently questioning if she was okay before following his teammate down the hall.
"Well that was quite the warm welcome."
"Why are you here mom? And please don't give me some bullshit answer about me being your daughter, because if that's the answer you're going with now than maybe that was the answer you should have went with 5 months ago."
"I just want to make sure you're okay."
"Not good enough."
"I missed you, okay?"
"And what, you couldn't pick up the phone?"
"Would you have answered my calls?"
"I don't know, because you never tried. Do you know how much that sucked, mom? Adam's mom called me AT LEAST once a week to make sure that I was doing okay. Twice a week after I got out of the hospital. But my own mom couldn't even pick up the god damn phone."
"You were in the hospital? Is everything okay?"
"Little late to play the concerned parent card now, mom."
"Are you okay?"
"I'm fine! She just decided that she wanted to come out a little early."
The look on her mothers face softened.
"She?"
"Yeah, another thing you were too busy yelling at me about to find out."
"Lizzie, I'm sorry-"
"I don't exactly know if I want to hear this right now, mom." She turned, walking further into the living room away from her. "I've been just fine without you, coping with the idea of not having my mom around for this, and here you are two weeks before this baby is due finally deciding that you care about me?"
"I'm sorry, that's what I came here to tell you."
"Well I don't want to hear it. And just a tip, maybe that's what you start with instead of criticizing me, yet again." She put a hand up to her face, rubbing her eyes. "I think you should go."
"Liz-"
"You heard her." Liz opened her eyes to see Andy standing at the beginning of the hallway. "And considering she's already almost went into early labor once, we should probably just do what she says to avoid it from happening again."
Her mom glanced between Liz and Andy before nodding once and turning heading back towards the door. As soon as the door closed, Andy walked over to Liz putting his hands on her shoulders.
"You okay, kid?"
She looked up at him.
"Fine."
A small smile spread across his face, "I'm proud of you for standing your ground there."
"I just didn't want to hear anymore bullshit right now."
He chuckled, "I don't blame you."
She looked towards the bedroom, "how's Adam?"
"Little fumey, but okay."
"I should go talk to him."
"Probably a good idea. I'm gonna head out, unless you need anything else?"
"No, I think we're good from here." She stepped in and hugged him, "thanks for everything."
He gave her a squeeze, "anytime kid."
She followed him to the door and locked it behind him before letting out a sigh and heading in the direction of the bedroom. She walked in the doorway and leaned up against the doorframe.
"She gone?"
Liz nodded, "yeah, and Andy too. Headed home to the girls."
He nodded and looked up at her for a minute before opening his arms up. She smiled and waddled forwards, stepping into his arms and pressing a kiss to the top of his curly head.
"You okay?" He mumbled into her chest.
"I'm fine. Are YOU okay?" She pulled back and sat on his knee.
"Yeah, I'm good."
"You sure about that? Kinda lost your temper back there." She said playing with the shaggy curls at the back of his neck.
"Yeah well." He sighed and closed his eyes at the feeling.
Liz could tell that he was still angry about what happened earlier, but instead of pushing the matter she leaned forward and pressed a kiss to his forehead.
"Well, since all the work is done today how about we make it an early night? Might be one of the few we have left." She smiled down at him.
"That," he leaned up and kissed her lightly, "sounds like a brilliant idea."
"I'm just full of those today." She smirked before hoisting herself off of Adam's knee and headed towards the dresser grabbing her now not so oversized Bruins shirt and swapping it for the current clothes she was wearing. Once she had changed she walked over to her side of the bed and slowly lowered herself down.
"You know, it's going to be a lot easier to get into this bed with a baby in my arms instead of my belly."
Adam chuckled and crawled into the bed beside her, propping himself up on his side and resting a hand on Liz's stomach.
"As much as I love this, I think I'm going to like her in your arms better too."
She smiled at Adam and rested one of her hands on top of his.
"Soon. But for now, let's just enjoy this."
"I can go for that." He reached over and turned off the light.
After a few minutes of silence he spoke again.
"I'm sorry that I blew up at your mom like that."
"You don't have to be sorry, Adam."
"No, I do. I shouldn't have said those things but the only thing I could remember was the way she talked to you that day and I wasn't going to let it happen again."
"I know, baby."
He was silent for another moment.
"I'm always going to protect you, you know that right? Both of you."
"And we're going to be the safest girls in the world."
"Damn straight."
"Night hotshot."
"Night."

Notes

Well folks, this is the last chapter that will not include a baby!

HOW EXCITING IS THAT?!

I figured that there was 2 people we hadn't heard from in a while and that was good ol' Andy and bad ol' momma, so there they are! I hope you all enjoyed it!

I have most of the baby chapter already written, so hopefully it won't be too long until she makes her appearance!

vote and comment all, thank you thank you!