Times that I've seen you lose your way
You're not in control and you won't be told
All I can do to keep you safe is hold you close
Hold you close 'til you can breathe on your own
'Til you can breathe on your own

—Keeping Your Head Up, Birdy

Gregory had always known that she had always been the stronger between the two of them.

It came with the territory—being someone with a naturally weak constitution, she had no choice but to try and teach herself how to be mentally stronger, or else risk breaking at the touch of a finger. She had always been the bolder one, the struggling one, less than happy in her weakness. So she chose to play the role of his adamantine wife. When he was plagued with indecision, she was usually the one who grabs the reins and steers them further along the metaphorical circle.

At first he wondered how someone so physically frail can be so headstrong, but as a year of marriage slipped by and he learned more about the spine of steel that existed beneath that small back of hers, he had come to accept it as one of the understated reasons why he chose to marry her. Gregory only liked to think that he can keep it together—he was so admired by his colleagues for being levelheaded—but if not for her, he doubted he would have even bothered to know how to cook the dinners she so favored, keep the house orderly for her when she cannot.

He still burns an occasional fritter when he gets random phone calls from work or decides to daydream about that morning's trial while cooking, but he's getting better at the chore, and her praise has become more and more sincere as time went by. It was his favorite sight in the world—when she licks her slender fingers after a meal and looks up at him with a satisfied smile curling her thin lips, her beautiful hair framing her face, the pale cheeks almost glowing.

"It was really good, Mr. Edgeworth," she would say in a teasing tone, and he'd feel his eyebrows draw together in an embarrassed scowl, because even after all these years together he had never really known how to take a compliment. "Thank you, Mrs. Edgeworth," he'd return because two can play at that newlywed game, making her giggle, and oh how he loved to hear her carefree, childlike laugh.

If there had been an onlooker in this little domestic scene, he or she'd have wondered how these two people can tell each other "I love you" without actually saying it.

"Father, I found… this box… um, on the shelf. I wonder what it could be."

"Oh, that's your mother's. I haven't told you yet, huh? Okay, let's open it. Here is the clasp, and you pull it so… and then it opens. See?"

"Ah… it's so shiny… b-but Father, what is it?"

"It's a flute. Your mother played it to you a lot when you were inside her tummy, don't you remember?"

"I… I'm sorry…"

"I was kidding. Ha ha ha. You were always sleeping then anyway. Well, let's go look at it. It hasn't been cleaned in a long time, though…"

"You don't know how to play it, Father?"

"Not really. The neighbors would complain if I did."

"…"

"…Miles, would you like to learn, though? I bet you'd be better than me."

"Y-Yes, please!"

"…Then, let's go find someone to teach you, okay?"

She filled their little house with music, a lot of it, the flute and her own voice being the more frequent mediums it manifested in. Back in college, when they were still just dating, she had been proficient in a lot of instruments, but she had to leave the piano and the cello behind in her old home. Now only her flute remained in her possession, but she kept it busy everyday, as if to make it up to those she had left behind.

When they found out that she was pregnant with their first child, music became the primary tool with which she communicated to the little being now slowly growing inside her. She always composed and wrote lullabies with nonsensical lyrics, partly to keep herself busy and partly to make Gregory laugh at his wife's childish silliness, the sight of his brow smoothening becoming a rare gift during this frantic preparation they were making to properly greet their baby into the world.

Whenever he was cooped up in his study and hear the soft strains of the flute from the nursery, Gregory couldn't help but smile and imagine how she could have looked right now—maybe she was in a white sundress, her long hair and her skirt flowing upon the entrance of the evening breeze through the open window, blowing her music onto the hallway and reaching her husband. Maybe in that red turtleneck sweater that he loved seeing her in, her pale face lightly pink because of the cold, her lips pressed determinedly against the flute, fingers numb but moving insistently, persistently, gray eyes drifting closed, lost in the moment.

Sometimes, when imagination wasn't enough, he would silently come over and watch her play, watch her stroke the little swell beneath her clothes whenever she paused to rest between songs, a sad little smile on her thin lips, and when he couldn't bear the impatient, wistful look in her eyes any longer, he would finally intrude into the room and embrace her from behind.

They had decided not to have the baby's sex identified. She thought that such matters are better left as surprises. Gregory, the more cautious person, didn't really like being surprised, but he'd heard somewhere that pregnant women aren't supposed to get upset, which sounded like a lot of sense, so he had no choice but to leave it up to fate whether the child would turn out to be a girl or a boy.

For now, the nursery was left bare, its pale walls unpapered and the room empty except for the stand where her sheet music rustled in the occasional stray wind that found its way through the high windows. The wooden flooring was kept immaculate and polished, and the empty shelves anticipated the toys that would soon decorate it. For now, nothing filled this empty room but his wife's songs and incessant, impatient longing.

"Miles, can I request you to please not practice the flute tonight? I need to concentrate on finishing these reports by today."

"Alright, Father. But, but, can I help you with anything if I am not to practice tonight?"

"You're really looking forward to becoming an attorney, huh?"

"…y-yes…"

"You blush the exact same way as your mother. Ha ha. She gets the similar expression when she gets embarrassed, you know."

"B-But don't they say that I look more like you?"

"Well, I guess you got my eyes. Everyone tells me we have the same eyes. You did get your mother's nose, though. And the hair, and the eyebrows, I think. She had very cute eyebrows."

"I, I am not cute. I don't think I look like mother."

"What's wrong about looking like your mother? She was a very beautiful woman."

"…But I'm a boy."

"Well, I don't think it's a bad thing. I always get reminded of her when I look at you."

"I like the sound of 'Miles.' What do you think?"

"Well, I guess it's good and sensible and short. Although… I don't think it's in any way unisexual. A daughter of yours would probably hate being called by such a hard-sounding name."

"A daughter of mine would have no say, because I like it and I'll fight tooth and nail to get it on the birth certificate if need be."

"What an oppressive parent you are, and the child not even out of the womb. Are you raising 'Miles' to be rebellious at such an early stage?"

They were lounging in the bedroom in a rare lazy afternoon, Gregory idly rubbing soothing circles over her exposed bump. The child was gradually growing inside, sleeping and doing a great job of staying healthy, as previous check-ups had proven—Gregory can almost swear that the baby was raring to go out of its mother and do whatever it was meant to do. It can be any day now, he mused. She was always complaining about how she felt so big nowadays. I'm a whale, he remembered her griping as she waddled down the hall earlier in her loose dress and slippers, looking annoyed. You married a whale, Gregory Edgeworth.

"Hmm…I might concede the point…" he decided after that one thought, a corner of his mouth quirking up. "…if you can convince me to your side."

"You and your lawyerly tricks," she teased.

Shaking his head at her, he squinted at the names book she was perusing and murmured, "It means…"

"Soldier," she giggled. When she did, the toll of pregnancy on her features melted away, and she was again the young woman he met in university all those years ago. "Although, despite its very serious meaning, it sounds like a charm for happiness when you do something to it."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, try saying it repeatedly. What do you get?"

Gregory stared at her, but she just grinned at him, and knowing how bullheaded she can be at the silliest things, he obliged. "Miles miles miles miles…"

"…smile smile smile." She finished him off with a proud wag of a finger. "See, it's like a mantra for happiness. So that when you look at them and call their name, they will make you happy." She pushed the corners of his mouth upward. "Please smile or I'll feel stupid."

"That is the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard," Gregory said slowly, and as if the charm was already working, his mouth traitorously curved into a smile, appalled and amused as he was at her train of logic. "Don't ever tell Miles how you chose their name, alright? We're going to be out of a kid if that happens."

"I love you too," she said gravely, and chortled as he bowed his head and let his shoulders shake in silent laughter. Under his fingertips, he can almost feel Miles shift sleepily in her stomach.

"Sometimes I wonder if you do love me, Father."

"…I see. Can I ask why?"

"…Because I've noticed that sometimes you look so sad when you look at me. Do I cause you pain, Father? Did I do something wrong?"

"Nothing, nothing. …I'm sorry if I ever made you feel unloved. But I do love you, Miles. I'm sorry if I've been bad at expressing it. Give me another crack at it, okay? This single dad is still learning something new everyday."

"…Alright."

"Besides, you've been a really good kid. Better than most. I'm not really good with children so I couldn't have known what to do if you have grown up rowdy."

"…"

"Hey, you're blushing again."

"It's very rare that Father compliments me, so of course I'm not used to it."

"…I've been a very clumsy dad, huh? Your mom would have laughed to see me like this. Ha ha. …And angry if she knew that you've seen me like this."

"Whatever might you mean, Father?"

"Ah… well, it's a long story. But know this, Miles—scold me if you ever see me sad again, okay? You were supposed to be a charm of happiness, after all."

"A… charm?"

"Never mind."

He received the call from his younger sister during a recess in the trial. Wondering if she was calling to reschedule her visit to their house because of a conflict, Gregory took the call and was unprepared to hear his sister's usually calm tone in a state of near-incoherence.

"Hello? Can't you speak more clearly?" he said impatiently, even as a frisson of nervousness shot through his chest, because any moment now the judge will resume court, and he either has to risk looking unprofessional to the officials if he continued the call or seem cold and dismissive to his sister if he hung up.

"W-Where the hell are you, Greg?" she was saying shakily. "Your wife's going in labor right now! Get yourself over here!"

For a moment, Gregory was stunned into silence. Then, the thought of her going through this alone made his fingers tighten around the receiver. "I'll be there," he said, absently, already thinking of how best to tell this to the judge, and the moment he dropped the phone back to the cradle, he had already thought everything out, from his exit from the courthouse to the shortest route to the hospital that his sister had named.

Even the other 5.5 billion people in the world would have wished that someone else replace them in such an event as this, Gregory mused wryly, his footsteps heavy as he broke out of the cab into the gentle morning drizzle. Taking off his dripping hat but keeping his damp coat on, he dashed to the emergency room, and caught his sister and her husband standing outside the doors, her tight face brightening as she noticed him coming up, panting.

"She called me immediately," was her curt greeting, and Gregory nodded. "Thank you for being here for her," he told her gruffly, and she nodded tersely. "I'm going to be an aunt soon," she joked, "I damn well should be here."

He smiled despite himself. "Yeah. Does that dock off points from me for not being the one who took her to the hospital?"

She rolled her eyes at him. "Hey, you've been working for this day. Although… you're not going in there, then?" she asked him tentatively, her eyes fixed on his face.

"My wife's a bit delicate," he answered, and his chuckle was dry. "Even if the doctors allowed me in there, I might make everything worse if I barged through the doors and made her too nervous. …I expect it's hard enough for her already," he added bitterly, silently praying that the strength she sorely needed be granted her for once.

"I see." His sister dropped it at that. "We'll keep you company then, alright?"

"Yes." He nodded gratefully at her.

After that short preliminary exchange between the Edgeworth siblings, the painful hours trickled slowly by. Gregory was slowly losing track of time, and he didn't feel like peeling back his sleeve to look at the watch. How long had he been thinking? Engulfed in the only refuge he knew in a time like this, Gregory recalled and remembered and thought, compartmentalizing his anxiety in one of the many rooms in his mind and gently stowing it away. For now, the only thing keeping time is his heart, still beating off the seconds in its unperturbable rhythm. He visited memories, the scent of the laundry detergent they wash their clothes in, the softness of the fluffy blue bedsheets she had spread over their marriage bed, the tinkling of the wind chime hanging outside the window to the empty nursery, the soft drizzling rain that echoed inside this hospital corridor, silent but for the sounds of busy pattering feet and the hushed voices of nurses talking amongst themselves as they made their rounds.

Lost in his mental space, he almost felt as if her suffering was occurring in another universe that had momentarily made contact with his own, and then steadily drifted away again, almost like intersecting lines…

The sound of the opening double doors startled Gregory out of his reverie, and he stared up at the doctor. Her face was neutral and scarily detached. It was like she was trying to tell him the bad news with the blankness in her eyes. "Are you Mr. Edgeworth?" she asked, and he could only nod, his throat dry after hours of not speaking. "Please… hurry. Your wife is asking for you," she added, and he felt someone give him a push from behind to make him stand up. Behind him, he could hear his sister anxiously asking the important questions about the condition of mother and child. For his part, Gregory couldn't get into the room quickly enough to escape the doctor's answers.

I really am a coward at things like this, he thought sadly. Even when already faced with the reality…

He went into the partially-dark delivery room. Whatever lights there still were have been toned down, to give the resting mother some comfort, and it was cleaner than he had expected—the merest traces of blood still remained, but they seemed insignificant to someone who turns crime scenes upside-down for a living. Should my insensitivity to the marks of my wife's suffering bother me? he thought, perturbed, and approached the single unmoving figure on the bed.

"Gregory? Is that you?"

"I'm here." The feeble sound of her voice was an electric shock throughout his body—all remaining traces of hesitation forgotten, Gregory closed the distance between them with a few strides, her hand immediately in his firm grasp, trying to reassure her that he was finally here, by her side. "Don't worry."

"Sorry, I… I must be a m-mess right now." Her face was tearstreaked, her eyes puffy, her mouth drawn tight from the past suffering. Her sweat made it hard to hold her hand tight, it was so slippery. What worried Gregory the most, however, was that he couldn't almost feel her grip. To comfort the both of them, he squeezed tightly back, trying to convince himself that this reaction was normal. "I'm so tired… I…" She chuckled, a faint, sick sound.

She was so, so pale. Too pale. Was she still bleeding? "I'm here," he repeated, reassuringly, pushing her beautifully pale hair back from her sticky forehead, from her trembling eyelids.

"Miles," she whispered, softly, relieved, directing her groggy gaze at the little bundle in her arms that Gregory had only noticed now. "He…"

So Miles turned out to be a boy, after all. Gregory's faint memory of the day when they jokingly decided on the name suddenly flashed across his mind. "He's a beautiful child," he whispered.

"Yes, yes," her teeth showed momentarily as she grinned, but her downward gaze finally drooped, and her eyes closed. "Now Miles n-needn't rebel against my tyranny, like you s…"

He laughed quietly, partly to cut her off and let her save her energy, and partly because he couldn't think of any other way to respond to this situation. Even his usual rationality is failing him now. He must be going insane. "I, I think there's no danger of that. He seems… very well-behaved."

"Must've… taken… after you." Her words were already slurring, and inside, Gregory was starting to panic. Miles slumbered on, impossibly innocent of the world. "He… he…"

"Should I… hold him?"

Her still smile was all the answer he needed. Her gray eyes opened to watch as he carefully scooped up the baby boy in his arms. In doing so, he had to let go of her hand, and it flopped back on the mattress without a sound.

"Go to sleep. We'll be here when you wake up," he lied.

Disturbed by the movement of being lifted up to his father's chest, the baby woke up and instantly began screaming. Plagued by the infant's wails and the heavy expression on his wife's face, Gregory wondered how she could bear to carry Miles in her weak arms as she had moments ago—in his embrace, carrying the child felt like carrying the whole goddamned world.

I am forgetting, of course, that she had always been the stronger between the two of us.

So strong. So frail. So…

If Gregory Edgeworth could have been honest with himself during that fateful day, he'd have realized how cruel it was of her to choose to leave their newborn son behind in his trembling arms, the child's gray eyes squeezing out all the tears that Gregory himself cannot shed—crying furiously, as if little Miles can somehow recognize that the wound that remained when he was cut from his mother forever was the cause of his suffering, and is angry at the world about it.

But because he was too weak to be honest right now, he could only stand still and support Miles's little head as the child cried, almost choking—with sorrow? with loneliness? with something else?

"Miles," she called, weakly, her last breath spent in an attempt to remind the child of his name. "Miles…"

"Smile, smile," Gregory replied, even as his heart was breaking into a thousand pieces, and it was a small mercy that she did, before her eyes slid closed and she slept.

"It's alright, Miles. Shh. It's okay. It's just a dream."

"…"

"Do you want some milk?"

"…Please…"

"Miles?"

"Don't go. Please…"

"Alright. I'll stay here, okay?"

"Thank you."

"Won't you tell me what you dreamed about?"

"I can't remember exactly. But it was so dark, and I felt like my heart was about to…"

"I see. That kind of nightmare…"

"They say that nightmares don't ever come true, right?"

"Well, not necessarily. Some people's nightmares are from past memories, you know."

"I don't think that was a memory, though…"

"Hm. Then I guess it's like what you said. The kind of nightmare that won't come true."

"Do, do you have nightmares often, Father?"

"Not really. Your mother does have them occasionally when she was alive, though. I'd always bring her milk. It helps ease her back to sleep."

"Mm…"

"…"

"…"

"Miles? Have you calmed down?"

"I-I think so."

"Then can you smile for me?"