Ben tensed at the mention of their child. He'd purposefully not mentioned Nora, because if Melody didn't remember the last two years there was no way she remembered anything about their daughter. After accidentally dumping the news of their elopement and her subsequent estrangement from her family all at once, he'd been cautious about telling her anything else that would alarm her, and he'd decided you have a baby at home definitely fell into that category. He hadn't realized that the healers would tell her, or that they would even have any way of knowing.
"I — you already seemed pretty upset," he started haltingly. "I didn't want to — I guess I wanted to give you some time to adjust first?" What he didn't say was that he hadn't exactly been ready to spearhead the conversation on that one before he'd left for the tea room. This was a massive adjustment for him, too, and he was still struggling to grasp what it would mean for the two of them. It wasn't a clean start, because they still had to interact with all the same people who'd observed the roller coaster of their marriage the last two years. She'd hear sooner or later that things had been rough. Even if he could somehow isolate her from that, he still knew. The idea of being the only person who knew about something like the potion, or what they'd done in Paris, or the conversation after the duel, was enough to make his stomach sick. He'd needed some time to process.
"I mean, it's a lot to handle, right? Learning about two whole years all at once. I didn't know if... but she's fine. Nora. Eleanora Hazel Crouch. She's at home with the nurse. She's, ah — I guess she's five months old today, actually," he said, counting the months out on his fingers quickly to ensure he'd done the math right. "Yeah, five months old today."
"I — you already seemed pretty upset," he started haltingly. "I didn't want to — I guess I wanted to give you some time to adjust first?" What he didn't say was that he hadn't exactly been ready to spearhead the conversation on that one before he'd left for the tea room. This was a massive adjustment for him, too, and he was still struggling to grasp what it would mean for the two of them. It wasn't a clean start, because they still had to interact with all the same people who'd observed the roller coaster of their marriage the last two years. She'd hear sooner or later that things had been rough. Even if he could somehow isolate her from that, he still knew. The idea of being the only person who knew about something like the potion, or what they'd done in Paris, or the conversation after the duel, was enough to make his stomach sick. He'd needed some time to process.
"I mean, it's a lot to handle, right? Learning about two whole years all at once. I didn't know if... but she's fine. Nora. Eleanora Hazel Crouch. She's at home with the nurse. She's, ah — I guess she's five months old today, actually," he said, counting the months out on his fingers quickly to ensure he'd done the math right. "Yeah, five months old today."
MJ made this <3