"Emma, do you ... do you have any fantasies?" Will asked cautiously, his hand making a trail across her collar bone.
"Uh-unh," murmured Emma drowsily as she curled into his body.
"You can tell me, you know. Anything."
His hand moved lightly down her side, coming to rest on her hip.
"Well, maybe. I, uh, I have this fantasy ..." she ducked her head, resting it in the crook of his arm, her faced turned away from him.
"Go on."
Emma spoke softly, her words almost too quiet for him to hear.
"We're at a school recital and we're sitting in the audience together holding hands. On the stage there are lots of children and they're singing ... I can't make out the words ... but then it's over and we go up to the stage to collect him ... our son. And he looks up at you with your eyes and asks if you think he sang good and you tell him that you think he's the best singer in the world and his face lights up. And then you swing him up on to your shoulders and ... and we walk out together and you turn and look at me and I feel ... I feel happier than I ever thought possible."
She held her breath and waited for Will to say something.
Finally, as the silence stretched out unbearably, she turned to face him.
"Is it too much, Will? Too much, too soon?" she asked anxiously, her eyes searching for clues to his response.
Will shook his head slowly, his eyes wide, steadily releasing his breath.
"No, nooo, it's not that. I'm just ... I'm surprised. I mean I wasn't expecting that."
"Oh," said Emma, unsure of what to say next and with that sinking feeling in her stomach as it occurred to her that she and Will must be in very different places with respect to this relationship.
"Um," her brain stuck on that thought, unable or unwilling to process it. Her body moved of its own accord, instinctively putting some distance between her and Will, sliding out from his embrace and moving towards the edge of the bed as though to get up.
"Hey, where are you going?" asked Will, surprised as he reached out to put a hand on her shoulder.
The words came although her brain felt numb. "I guess, if that's not where we're heading Will, if that's not how you see us ..."
"No, Em, no. I mean I do. I do see us like that. I can see us having a family together. I would ... I would seriously like nothing more," he said as his hand moved to her cheek.
She closed her eyes and let the tears she had been holding back fall.
"Please don't cry, Em. I didn't mean to upset you ... I was just surprised ... surprised that you had imagined that future for us. I knew that was how I felt ... I just didn't know that you felt like that too ... not yet at least. You see?"
She nodded her head, his hand still stroking her cheek, as he leaned into kiss her.
"And it wasn't the sort of fantasy I was expecting," he murmured as he pulled away.
Emma's eyes flew open.
"Oh. Oh." Her cheeks flushed and she looked down at the rumpled sheets.
"But it was better. Far better than anything else you could have said."
She smiled at him and he grinned back at her.
"So I guess we should talk about our fantasies more often then," he said laughing, the joy bubbling up inside him.