"the ceremony of innocence"
A/N: A few days ago, my sister and I were discussing Broadchurch, and I said that I didn't feel like the second season had enough of Beth in it to please me. My sister replied by saying, "Yeah, but that's because Beth's your favorite character" despite hearing me talking nonstop about David Tennant in general for several days. But she's heard me talk about Beth enough to know that, yes, Beth is my favorite character. She's simply amazing.
So I thought about that, and the fact there seems to be a serious lack of Beth-centric fanfic on this site, and this story started to form.
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The process of learning requires not only hearing and applying but also forgetting and then remembering again.
John Gray
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It wasn't often that Broadchurch had such a severe ice. But this winter had been particularly snowy, and with snow there was inevitably ice caused by several days of below average temperatures. School had been either delayed or closed four days in a row, and a bus had become stuck during a turnaround; the people living in the town were practically skating from place to place when they went out (which honestly wasn't very often). It was an unspoken rule that only people with jobs needed to go outside.
Mark Latimer was one of those unlucky people. After all, burst or clogged pipes weren't something that could just be ignored and so in all hours of the day he was carefully navigating the streets helping with an overflow of water or broken valve or such problems. The cold affected plumbing something awful.
It was early on a Tuesday morning that he received the call. He had practically crawled halfway into a network of old plumbing pipes that half frozen and started to crack when, quite innocently, his phone started to go off. Jumping from the sound, cursing when he hit his head, he crawled out of the wall and grabbed hold of his phone, yanking it to his ear with perhaps a bit more force than was absolutely necessary. He was dirty and sweaty from his work, however, and was in no mood for chitchat.
"Mark Latimer."
He only listened a moment before the phone slipped from his suddenly slack fingers and the blood drained from his face. The sound of the phone's casing shattering on the floor barely made him flinch. Leaving his tools and bag and barely remembering to grab his keys and of course the bloody phone he leapt to his feet and flew out of the room out into the cold winter air, skidding to a stop to fling open the van door. The roads were still too slippery to be speeding but that's precisely what he did, praying that he wouldn't crash and kill himself. When his phone rang again, he was ready.
"Dad!" Chloe's voice was choked with tears; he could tell she was struggling not to lose it completely. "D-Dad, Mum is-"
"I know, Chlo, I know, I got the call." Mark swallowed hard, "I'm coming now, just hold on. Stay right where you are, I'll be there—"
"Oh god, Dad, there was so much b-blood—and the baby! They don't know if the b-baby will be okay—"
"The baby is fine," Mark said through a suddenly-tight throat. His heart flipped alarmingly. Oh dear god, please no! "You hear me, Chloe? The baby will be fine, and so will your mum. I'll be there in a minute. Just hold on."
The hospital had never seemed so far away.
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The automatic doors barely opened fast enough for Mark, who careened through them without pausing or looking where he was going. Panic and fear were warring against the level-headedness he was so proud of and he was practically choking on his dread, intent on only finding his daughter. She would be here somewhere, terrified and surely just as panicked as he was. He paused only a moment to demand directions and then was off again. Room 243B, room 243B, room243B—
Chloe was huddled in one of the hallway chairs, clutching her phone, when he finally found the right corridor. Seeing him she shot to her feet, mascara stained own her cheeks and her eyes puffy and red from crying. "Dad!"
They met in a wordless hug, Mark crushing her slim frame against him and burying his face in her hair. He heard a low sob escape her and struggled to force down his own tears, focusing instead on the one person he had at the moment to look after.
They waited impatiently for news, for a doctor to show up and tell them what the hell had happened; but an hour came and went and still they saw no one. Chloe had exhausted herself from her tears and had settled herself as comfortably as she could in a chair, laying her head on Mark's shoulder. With her primary outburst done with, she was able to at least marginally explain what had happened.
"She was just lyin' there, in the driveway. I think she slipped on some ice, but I dunno how long she was there, I just called for an ambulance… I saw the blood on the ground and I panicked."
He stroked her hair soothingly. "You did right, Chloe, that's all you could've done. Your mum will be fine. You'll see."
"But the baby…"
Mark said nothing but privately he was just as unsure as his daughter when thinking about what had happened. The blood not been from an external wound. Chloe had been afraid it was from the baby. Beth, after all, was nearly nine months pregnant with their fourth child; for that reason Mark couldn't calm his heartbeat. Could a woman miscarry this close to the delivery date?
Finally a doctor showed up, looking worn. "Mark Latimer?"
Mark stood. "That's me."
The doctor's expression gave nothing away as he approached. "Your spouse is Elizabeth Latimer nee Roper?"
"Yes."
The doctor sighed softly. "Mr. Latimer, I cannot hide how serious the situation your wife is in right now. She appears to have slipped on ice while outside earlier this afternoon."
Mark gritted his teeth. "Yes, I know. Why was she bleeding?"
"Mrs. Latimer is eight months and one week pregnant, as you know. The fall she sustained caused a rupture in her uterus wall and sent her body into shock. We nearly lost them both while on the operating table."
Chloe moaned. Mark stiffened. "And?"
"We were able to save the child. We performed an emergency cesarean section; your new daughter is being monitored in an oxygen tank at the moment, but we'll see about letting you see her later."
Mark swallowed, suddenly terrified. "And Beth?"
The doctor barely blinked. "She's also being monitored. What's most concerning at the moment, Mr. Latimer, is not the injury to her uterus; we were able to stitch that up and it should heal nicely. What's concerning is that she sustained a severe blow to her skull when she fell."
His knees weakened and he had to sit, trembling. "So she's- what? Is she awake?"
"No. And I don't know when she will be. It could be tomorrow. It could be a week from now. We're watching for swelling on the brain and there appears to be very little but until it heals enough she won't wake."
Mark felt like he was going to be sick. This couldn't be happening. It just couldn't be. "Are we- are we allowed to see her?"
The doctor took pity on him. "For a moment. No longer."
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The doctor's words proved true. Beth was unconscious for six days in the hospital, hooked up to numerous machines that did only God knew what. Nurses came and went, checking her injuries, feeling the flesh of her stomach for the heat or stiffness of infection. Her abdomen was still swollen from her pregnancy but the doctors had no immediate concern over it since they had removed the placenta and fixed the tear in her inner wall, focusing instead on the wound she had received on her head.
Mark had little experience with head wounds. He had never had to deal with such things being a plumber and therefore was completely unprepared for what his life was shortly to become.
When she finally did wake, it was with Chloe and a nurse there. She seemed disoriented and uneasy, but calmed when seeing Chloe there. When asked if she remembered what had happened she couldn't remember but the nurse said that that was very common for those with such head injuries.
It wasn't until Mark came in later that day that any of them realized the extent of that head injury. Beth had been uncharacteristically quiet for most of the day, merely holding Chloe's hand, but Chloe had seen a slight frown of confusion playing on her mother's face several times.
When Mark finally made it in to the room, Beth's first question to him stopped both father and daughter in their tracks.
"Where's Danny?"