September 2nd, 1891 — Crouch Home, Swallowbury

Even after the midwife had explained it all, Ben still wasn't sure he really knew what had happened. Melody had told him the baby was coming, except it wasn't. Not yet, anyway. Their house had been thrown into complete chaos for the past three hours as he'd owled the midwife and rushed to get everything set up. He'd asked too many questions at every point, probably irritating Melody to no end in his efforts to ensure he was doing everything he could to make her more comfortable. He'd stayed by the bedside until the midwife had pointedly kicked him out of the room, and then paced the hallway, waiting for some word from inside. This was it. It was finally happening. From the moment he'd learned Melody was pregnant, he had seen this moment as something of an end point — the finish line of a race. Now it was here, and they were about to cross it, and he wasn't sure if he was ready.

Except it wasn't here after all. When the midwife finally emerged, it wasn't with news that he had a son or a daughter, or even that something had gone wrong. Just that nothing had happened yet. The midwife said it was normal, but Ben couldn't believe that was true. He felt like he had emotional and mental whiplash as the midwife talked through it, but he was able to pull himself out of his own head enough to realize that whatever he was feeling had to be doubly strong for Melody.

She probably didn't want to see him.

He was going to go in anyway.

When the midwife left, Ben returned to the door of Melody's room and knocked lightly. He waited a beat before cracking it open enough to poke his head in (with his hair sticking out at all angles from how often he'd been running his hands through it while he paced in the hallway). "Hey," he said softly. "Are you okay?"

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Melody Crouch

  

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The pains were sporadic for days leading up to this morning. A breathless contraction before lunch, a handful in the middle of the night. The midwife said to expect them and to wait for a pattern, for consistency in the timing and the pain, and so she had. Melody had weathered the past week and a half with grace, making hardly a peep to anyone about how close she thought her time to be. Reuben wouldn't be a source of comfort for her, he wouldn't hold her hand and help her through. That was a mother's job and Melody might as well have not had a mother anymore.

That morning the pains hadn't let up. Every few minutes she was breathless, nauseous and lost to the pain. Standing helped little, nor did her white knuckled grip on her bedposts. It was then that she signaled to Reuben it was time, hoping he would ignore that it was several weeks too soon. The baby would be fine and she would live, it had to be so.

Only, once the midwife was summoned and the room set up for her incoming arrival, the pains had gone as quickly as they came. Defeated, Melody sank into her bed in both disbelief and sadness. She thought today would be the day she met her child, she thought she would be successful and do something right at least once in her marriage. And she'd failed, once again.

Reuben's appearance minutes after the midwife's solemn departure had Melody wishing to pull the covers over her head. Was she alright? Not at all. Would she confess as much to him after all that had happened? No. "I'm sorry for causing such a ruckus," she told him instead. "I thought it was time."

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Ben shook his head to signal that she didn't need to apologize. While this certainly hadn't been how he was planning to spend his day, it wasn't as though he could fault her for it. If the baby had been coming, he would have wanted her to tell him as soon as she knew. He wasn't going to begrudge her a false alarm if it meant that he got to be a part of the birth of his child when the time came.

"You didn't know. We haven't done this before," he pointed out. It was a paraphrased version of what the midwife had said; first time mothers often called for a midwife too early.

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We weren't doing anything, Melody thought to point out. Reuben wasn't the one who would be birthing a child, nor would he even have to deal with washing the babe or feeding it. By the time Reuben was brought in, the disgusting mess would be dealt with and the baby all snuggled up in its blanket. Meanwhile, she would either be dead, exhausted, or in perpetual fear of making another mistake so grave he sought to take the baby away from her. Melody sank further into the bed, embarrassment and exhaustion still plain to see on her face.

"No, we haven't..." she replied. "...I really thought today would be the day."

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Ben nodded to acknowledge that he'd thought so, too. It had been hard to think otherwise in the bustle of everything earlier today. There had been no room for doubt in his mind, and he was sure not in hers, either. "I didn't even know this could happen," he admitted, hoping that this didn't sound like some sort of accusation or dig at her. He was just being honest; he'd never heard anyone talk about anything like this, and he had a handful of friends with children. For all the midwife said it was normal, he had no clue if anyone he knew had ever experienced it.

There was something else nagging at his mind since she'd responded, though. She'd thought today would be the day — and had she thought that was a good thing, or a bad thing, or something else? For all the time he'd spent thinking about it over the last nine months, Ben hadn't really been expecting the feelings it would bring up in him. After the panic, anyway. At the first, he'd just been bustling around, too busy to think about anything. Once he'd been kicked out of the room and left to pace in the hallway, however, he'd had plenty of time alone with his thoughts. And... he didn't know. It was complicated. He wanted the baby, and fully expected to love the baby the first moment he saw it, but he wasn't really sure if he was ready for the baby.

"How did you... when you thought the baby was coming," he began a little clumsily. "How did you feel about it?"

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There wasn't an adequate word to describe the distinct sense of dread and excitement she felt when requesting he send for the midwife. On one hand, she was elated that the pregnancy would soon be over. On the other, she was convinced the birth would bring her death and with it a tragic life for her child. Melody glanced towards the cradle abandoned in the corner of her bedroom. Would she even live to see a baby resting in it? Would the baby?

As always when charged emotional moments happened to her these days, Melody felt the familiar sting of tears in her eyes. She hid the erratic moods of pregnancy from Reuben as best she could, and would have continued on successfully had he not come in so soon.

"I ... scared, mostly. Going through this alone wasn't ... I'm just scared."

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Ben hesitated in the doorway. He thought he knew what she meant. The specifics would be different, and the reasons behind the feeling would be different, but he'd felt something similar. The moment the realization really sank in, that this was really happening, it felt as though the bottom had fallen out of his stomach. It was like the whole rest of his life was starting in the next few minutes, and he had no idea what it would be like, and he wasn't ready for it.

"Can I hold you?" he asked. He stayed where he was in the doorway, half convinced she would say no and not sure what he was supposed to do if she did.

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Her immediate thought was to refuse his request. Reuben had made his priorities clear earlier this year when he'd valued his honor over her and their child, and had reinforced her perception these long few months when they've been living such separate lives. If he was wanting to hold her it was for his benefit, not hers.

However, Melody had never anticipated going through labor without her mother or sisters. It was a choice she'd made when abandoning the plan to marry Samuel, but the weight of her decisions hadn't hit her until recently. There would be only the midwife and whatever assistants she had helping Melody through this. There wouldn't be anyone dotting the sweat from her brow or holding her hand. She was in this as she always was: alone.

Perhaps that made her touch starved. Perhaps Melody saw the flicker of what their relationship could have been in his question. Perhaps she was simply too lonely to refuse. Whatever the case may be, Melody softly nodded and inched over some to allow him room. What his intentions were or how long she intended to stay, she didn't know, nor did it matter in the long run.

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She'd hesitated, and Ben stiffened. He tried to think through how he could flee this situation gracefully once she found the courage to come right out and tell him she didn't want him there... but then she didn't. Ben let out a breath he'd been holding, and with it a good deal of the tension in his shoulders. He made his way into the room and hesitantly crawled up onto the bed next to her. It had been months since he'd held her properly, and he didn't know how to do it with the way her body had changed shape. Was she sore? Tender? Was he going to accidentally hurt her if he wrapped his arms too tight on any given piece of her? He felt awkward and blocky, the opposite of himself — he was supposed to be suave and smooth, but he just couldn't muster it right now. Haltingly, he put his arms around her and hugged her up against his chest.

Ben closed his eyes and took a deep breath. "I wish there was something I could do to help."

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After having spent her pregnancy largely untouched in even greeting by anyone other than her midwife, Melody foolishly sank into Reuben's embrace. She didn't want to rely upon him, nor did she think he would ever be there for her in any such capacity. So to ignore her boundaries against him so easily left her feeling unsettled. Tomorrow morning he would be off staying with his brother again or helping Arthur or doing anything else that he deemed more important than being here with her. Melody hated herself for wishing he would support her because of her and not because she was the mother of his second born child.

She hated herself even more for wishing he would just stay with her until the baby finally did come.

Her tears fell in two rivers down her cheeks. For the first time in months, Melody wasn't isolated and alone. It was as though the dam was broken on her tightly held resolve, leaving her open and broken. "I know I'm not perfect, but I love this baby. You'll make sure they know that if something happens to me, right?" She whispered in an increasingly distressed voice.

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Something clenched in Ben's chest. He pulled Melody in tighter, a little less worried about possibly hurting her now that she'd leaned in to his touch. "Nothing's going to happen to you," he said. "The midwife said this is all normal. It's all going to be fine, alright? Nothing's going to happen." These were the assurances that he'd wanted to give weeks ago, but couldn't find the voice for, flowing unhindered now — but they didn't answer her question. As much as he would have liked to have ended on reassurances, he could tell from the urgency in her tone that it was important to keep going. He'd said that he wished there was something he could do to help, and if this was what Melody needed in order to feel safer and more calm about everything that was happening, he could do this.

"Of course they'll know," he assured her. He reached up to smooth back a piece of her hair that was stuck to her forehead, and for half a second it was almost like they were a couple again, like they hadn't just spent the better part of a year avoiding each other so they didn't end up fighting. "If something does happen, I'll tell them. I'll tell them every day."

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"Lucy was healthier than I and died." She attempted to say, though it likely came out more like a gibberish mess. It'd been three days since she last managed to hold down more than broth, as the closer the end drew the sicker she became again. Lucy wasn't weak or ill, and she still bled to death in front of Melody, Ace and her newborn son. Death from birth was just as common as false alarms, not that the midwife told Reuben that.

Her hands fisted in his shirt as a small whimpering sob escaped her. The scent of his cologne once would have comforted her, now it was just another reminder of what they had lost.

They had lost so much.

  

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"You're not going to die," Ben said, pulling her even tighter. "Shhh. You're going to be fine. The baby's going to be fine."

Of course, there was no way for either of them to know that. He wasn't going to be able to convince her of it when he couldn't even convince himself.

"We're going to get through this," he promised, hoping it was one he could keep. "We're so close now. It'll all be alright. We're going to get through it."

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The fear wouldn't leave her until the baby was born, they both knew that as surely as they knew the sky was blue. Still, Melody clung to him until her cries subsided enough for her to appear calmer. Even if her breaths were still punctuated by hiccups and her cheeks tear stained.

"Will you stay with me today?" She pleaded quietly, wholly prepared for him to reject her. He likely had to head into work or somewhere else that was now more important. But, Merlin, she hoped he would at least stay long enough for her to doze off.

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"Of course." Ben's response was immediate. He'd written to Jewell that he was going to be out all day after the midwife had kicked him out of Melody's room, because if the baby was arriving he certainly wasn't going to risk being off in some dingy London office when they did. Even though he knew it wasn't the case now, and he'd have to tell his boss sooner or later that the baby wasn't here yet, he had no desire to go anywhere today. Especially after she had just cried on his shoulder for so long. He didn't even want to let go of her, much less leave the room. This wasn't them, anymore. They didn't do this sort of thing. But maybe just for today, they could. They'd spent so long avoiding each other because there was no comfort to be found there, but in a moment like this, the only comfort they had was what they manufactured for themselves.

Ben shifted away from her enough to unbutton his suit coat and slip it off, to be a little more comfortable. Then he went right back to holding her. For several moments, he said nothing. Eventually, when the air around them both seemed to have calmed significantly, he tentatively began, "Hey, Melody?"

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[Post]Relieved she wouldn't be left to deal with the emotional whiplash alone, Melody relaxed her grip on him, choosing instead to rest her palms on his chest. When he untangled himself to take off his jacket, she remained perfectly still so that he may reinstall himself without effort. This wouldn't fix anything, they would still be broken in the morning, but tonight they could be quietly content. Tonight, they could be supportive.

Or so she thought.

The way he addressed her caused the alarm bells to begin ringing in her head. What could he possibly wish to tell her that wouldn't further ruin them both? With great hesitance, Melody lifted her head to look up at him and said, "yes?"

  

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