Author's note. These characters are not mine, I'm only borrowing them.

This story starts in series 4 episode 8. So if you haven't watched series 4 you might want to avoid this fanfic until you have seen it! To start with it follows the original story, but I've added in some missing scenes, and I'll be continuing beyond the end of series 4, beyond the kiss and the question! I wanted to explore a bit about what Jean in particular might have thought about these events.

I recently came across the Robert Frost poem 'On a Tree Fallen Across the Road', and I loved what it says about obstacles in our lives, how we deal with them, and what they show us about ourselves. Seemed relevant to Lucien and Jean too! Hence the title of this fanfic. The first verse is below:

On a Tree Fallen Across the Road - Robert Frost

The tree the tempest with a crash of wood

Throws down in front of us is not bar

Our passage to our journey's end for good,

But just to ask us who we think we are.

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"And get this one to the Colonists' Club so I know she's safe," said Lucien finally, and waited for the blistering reply he knew would come.

"Get yourself to the club, I'm staying right here," Jean protested, as he had known she would. Secretly pleased to have her there with him, he nodded, and when the others had set off on the rather unnecessary jobs he had given them, Lucien and Jean had a few minutes to prepare for Hannam arriving.

Door open, tea ready, they sat in silence for a while, with thoughts swinging between how to deal with Hannam, and reviewing all that had happened in the past two days.

Although he knew he was putting Jean in danger by keeping her with him, he also hoped that she might diffuse the tension a little, and he wanted her beside him, steadying him and believing in him. He watched her drink her tea and realised there was a new confidence in her, underneath the nerves. What had changed, he wondered?

Jean felt a knot gnawing at her stomach. Probably the thought of facing Hannam again, she told herself. She was unsure how Blake would resolve this, but she realised she was sure he would. And it was good to be involved, to be useful, rather than just be Lucien's sounding board for ideas.

She knew that something had shifted in their relationship. It wasn't just that he had said he was ready to follow his heart, it was that she had never doubted for a moment that he was innocent, she'd known that without thinking. Lucien had seen it. And their friends had seen that she believed in him, and had acted accordingly.

Charlie had phoned her, and then let her go down to the cells, against all protocol, to see Lucien, when by rights it should have been Mei Lin, if anyone were to be allowed there. And Rose and Alice had made their way to Jean's kitchen, to talk to her, to try to work out what to do next. Even Lucien had just accepted she was staying with him when the others were sent away.

It seemed that, without discussing it, everyone had acknowledged that Lucien and Jean were together, really partners, as if they were the married couple, not Lucien and Mei Lin. She sighed a little; that would not be so easy to resolve.

The night that Jean and Mei Lin had spent at the club had strangely bonded them. Jean had come to understand why Lucien had married Mei Lin, and in return Mei Lin now knew why Lucien loved Jean. Neither could dislike or blame the other, but how to solve the problem?

Then Sergeant Hannam arrived, and after the initial shocking moment of the gun in his hand, they had settled to talk, calmed by the familiar ritual of pouring and drinking the tea. As the Sargeant asked Lucien why he had killed Alderton, Lucien realised that the very question meant that Hannam hadn't killed him either. With a voice filled with sarcasm Lucien outlined how he could have done it, but Jean's mind screeched to a halt immediately at the phrase "he seduced my wife".

Really? Alderton and Mei Lin? That rather changed things, didn't it? For the last few weeks, since Mei Lin appeared at the door, Jean had felt ashamed that she was so obviously in love with Lucien, that she had 'stolen' Lucien from Mei Lin, that he lived at home with her while his wife stayed in a hotel. Yet if Mei Lin and Alderton had slept together, and Lucien knew about it, that might partly explain why he wanted to leave his wife in the past and be with Jean.

And it made a divorce possible too. After the weeks of pain and disappointment, a little spark of hope glowed.

Then Hannam leapt to his feet at the sound of Frank Carlyle's voice outside, and Jean's mind returned to the reality of the situation in their living room. As the soldier disappeared through the back door, Jean and Lucien went to speak to Frank, and again Jean spoke out, chiding them both for using Blake as 'live bait'. Lucien looked at Jean in surprise. Yes, something had changed. She was claiming him as her own, asserting herself as his partner, not just his support. Was it his declaration that he wanted to be with her that had done this? Or was it that her courage over the last weeks and days had made her more sure of what she wanted?

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