Playing with fire (Amelia Shepherd) ABANDONED

Twenty six

"So," Mallie sighed, flopping beside Amelia on the sofa. "Corona virus," she said.

Amelia groaned loudly, turning to bury her face in Mallie's neck.

"I know," Mallie chuckled, running her hands through Amelia's hair. "I spoke to Maya. She said I could take maternity leave with the kids and I can stay home with them all while you, Mer and Maggie go to work," she said.

"It's not fair for you to have five kids on your own," Amelia said. "We'll take shifts. Two weeks. We'll test and, when we're negative, we'll swap over. Bailey said we could do that," she said.

"Is that safe?" Mallie asked.

"I don't know. We don't know anything about the virus, really," Amelia said.

"I know," Mallie said. "I don't know what to do. I don't want to leave them, but we need more doctors than firefighters right now. And, I was thinking, I'm still a doctor," Mallie said.

Amelia looked up at her with a frown.

"You want to come back to medicine?" she said.

"No, god no," Mallie scoffed. "Not forever, anyway. But, if Bailey needs a few more hands, I have a pair. I could speak to Maya, talk about doing an exchange with Grey Sloan so I can help out there when I can. She'd probably go for it, considering how bad the pandemic is going to get. But I don't have to do it, if you don't want me to," Mallie said.

"Do you want to do it, baby?" Amelia asked.

"Well, no, but we're fighting a deadly virus. If I can help, I want to," Mallie said.

"Well, how about we both take a month to stay at home with the kids together and then we can talk again when we know how much worse this thing is going to be?" Amelia said.

"That sounds like a good idea. I'll call Maya later, you call Bailey, and then we'll tell Maggie and Mer," Amelia said.

"Sounds good," Amelia kissed Mallie softly. "But, I've just realised, Zola's busy in an online class, the other four are all down for naps and my sisters are still at work. We have a bit of private time to ourselves," Amelia said, peppering kisses down Mallie's neck.

"That sounds amazing, but your sisters will stab me if we have sex on the couch, so we'll have to go upstairs," Mallie said.

She got off the couch and lifted Amelia up. Amelia wrapped her legs around Mallie's waist, arms around her neck, and kissed her with a smirk.

"I love you, baby," Amelia whispered.

"I love you, more, mi vida," Mallie whispered back, carrying her up the stairs.

"Zola, mija, dondé está tú deberes?" Mallie called to Zola as she sorted through the pile of schoolwork on the table from the kids' online school.

"In my room, tía Mallie," Zola shouted back downstairs.

"Bring it down, por favor, so I can put it in the folder for this week," Mallie said.

"Why are we shouting?" Amelia carried Scout and Myles into the kitchen, Bailey and Ellis following her as they carried Microwave and Blender, dressed up in costumes the kids had found.

"Because I'm trying to be organised for school this week because I have the Captain's memorial service tomorrow and I don't want there to be any problems for you," Mallie said.

Amelia walked over and kissed Mallie.

"I love you," she whispered.

"Ew," Zola rolled her eyes teasingly, carrying her homework book into the room.