There were worse things than getting the woman you love pregnant.

Sandor was pretty sure, anyway. He had to remind himself of that more and more every day.

He could deal with living in an apartment where every random piece of lint was immediately exterminated, and gods help him if he mislaid his socks. He couldn't open any of the damn cabinets or drawers anymore because she'd stuck a bunch of plastic childproofing shit all over them - even the ones the kid wouldn't be able to reach for ten more years. But that was okay, too. He could live without a can opener. And food. And the knife he would've used to slit his wrists when he finally couldn't stand the slow burning agony of starvation anymore. No problem. Crib shopping had only been slightly worse than crossing open territory under a hail of enemy fire, but he'd survived it. And Sansa really had never been more beautiful.

But did she have to fucking cry all the time?

Sandor walked in the door after a long shift running security and his jaw immediately clenched. He'd tackled a junkie streaker today, a sweaty naked guy who'd wound up nearly puking on his shoes. He should've known then that this wasn't going to be his day. Sansa was sobbing in the kitchen, desperately fanning a smoking pan of burnt ... something ... with a dish towel. Another pot on the stovetop started to boil over.

"No, no, no …" Sansa dropped the towel and frantically flicked off the burner. A thin, wispy column of heat and smoke continued to waft up from the pan, and then the smoke alarm suddenly blared over her head. "Oh no!" she wailed.

Sandor threw his keys on the end table and rushed into the kitchen.

"Alright, little bird, look out," he barked. Not-so-little bird now. Only six weeks away from delivering their baby, her belly alone took up half the space.

Her breath shuddered and her cheek was streaked with wet as she finally laid eyes on him. He took her by the upper arms and shuffled around her before reaching up to push the reset button the alarm.

"Go open up a window," he said in his rough, rasping tone, coughing slightly from the residual haze.

Worrying her lower lip, Sansa nodded and fluttered away.

The alarm kept on, yet he found himself watching her over the counter as she crossed the living room. She walked different now, too. Her hips rolled along in a lumbering sway, not particularly smooth but plenty distracting. He'd take Sansa any way he could get her, but bigger tits and ass were one of the fews perks of living with a pregnant woman as far as he could tell.

And maybe there were a few others, he reluctantly had to admit. While Sansa leaned over the back of his recliner to slide open the window, she unconsciously placed one of her hands over her stomach, spreading her fingers wide like she was trying to hold the baby up. It was pretty fucking cute.

The continued noise of the alarm, however, became too hard to ignore, and Sandor glance back up at the ceiling, sure his ears were starting to bleed. He tried the reset button a few more times, and when that didn't work, he yanked the whole thing down and tore out the battery.

"Sandor ..."

Sansa's timid attempt got lost as the alarm started to beep again.

Godsdamned capacitors. The fucking thing was possessed!

Fed up with the deafening racket, he threw it on the counter, balled up his gargantuan fist, and punched it as hard as he could. Sansa jumped out of her skin. The concussive slam rocked the counter, knocking over the coffee pot and jostling the toaster. Bits of plastic and wire flew everywhere. But when the dust settled, it was finally quiet.

"Worthless pile of pig shit," he growled. Saved them from their dinner. How fucking heroic. Sandor would've bet every penny he'd ever earned the thing would never have even sounded in a real fire. He'd have to fix that. And soon.

Scowling, he swiped the dead alarm's remains off the counter. They hit the floor with a loud clatter. Sandor pursed his lips as he looked around at the mess, then lifted his eyes to Sansa. "Are you alright?"

She nodded, sniffling and smudging fresh tears from her face. "I'm sorry," she whispered.

"What are you sorry for?" he grumbled, not paying much attention to her tears. Her moods came and went faster than a summer storm. There wasn't much point in both of them getting wrapped up in it. He moved past her and grabbed the broom.

"I wanted things to be nice when you got home," she said softly while he swept up the floor. "I was going to set the table and put out some candles, maybe a few flowers. I was making a new recipe for lemon chicken that's supposed to be amazing, but I ..." More sniffles and a sorrowful whimper. "I burned it all!"

Sansa covered her mouth and burst into another fit of sobs.

Suppressing the urge to roll his eyes, Sandor dumped the debris into the trash and put the broom back in the narrow storage closet. Steeling himself, he scrubbed a hand over his chin and exhaled. Walking closer, he paused in the entry to the living room, the line where white tiles met the boring beige carpet cushioning Sansa's bare feet.

Probably would've painted her pretty toes, too, except she'd been complaining for over a month that she couldn't reach them anymore.

"Bugger it," he rumbled quietly. "We'll order in or something."

"I wanted it to be special," she cried.

"Fine. We'll get whatever's on special at Shun Lee's. Kung pao chicken and two-for-one spring rolls special enough?"

Sansa wiped her dewy blue eyes with the back of her hand, her cheeks suddenly flushed and her mouth settled into a hard line. Good. He'd rather she was mad at him. Anything was better than this.

"Don't make fun of me, Sandor," she said coldly. "I wanted us to do something nice together."

"You want to do something nice, I could just take you out to dinner. We don't need some big production."

"Me making you dinner is hardly a big production."

"Then, why are you crying about it?"

"I'm not crying," she said defensively.

Sandor scoffed bitterly. "Okay. Might want to check your mascara, then. It's starting to run."

Sansa's lips fell open, and rather than wait for the next retort, he went back into the kitchen to clean up.

The supposed lemon chicken was a blackened, congealed mess not fit for a dog, had they had one. He'd promised Sansa someday he'd get her one―a good strong type, good-tempered and well behaved―to replace the one she'd lost. When they had a bigger place, when things were more settled. At this point, Sandor didn't know when that would be. Most of his life plans had gotten tossed in the garbage a long time ago. Now, he could only take things day by day, sometimes minute to minute.

Wielding an oven mitt like a too small baseball glove, Sandor scraped the chicken into the trash with a spatula and set it off in the sink. He picked up the other pot on the stovetop and peered inside to find mushy, overdone broccoli rabe. He hated that stuff, anyway. He drained the leftover water and dumped it in the trash with everything else. He was straightening up the counter when he heard Sansa's feet padding softly across the tile.

He looked to his right where she was hanging back out of his way, no direct eye contact, only fleeting glances. When he didn't say anything, she ambled to the sink and ran some hot water onto the dirty pans. She added soap and glanced at him again, expectant, the shoosh of running water filling the tense silence.

"I'll run this trash out to the dumpster," he said stiffly.

She blinked a few times, her red-rimmed eyes peering up at him. "Okay."

She tucked a lock of shimmering auburn hair behind her ear and returned her stare to the sink. Not a new tear in sight.

Okay, Sandor's thoughts echoed with a measure of relief. Every one of those little things was a shard of glass that stabbed him clean through the heart. She could kill him with her tears if he let her, and she'd never know it. Better for both of them that they were gone.

He tied up the garbage and then trudged down the two flights of stairs to the ground floor, following the sidewalk to the far end of the parking lot to the dumpster. The whole thing only took a few minutes.

Sansa looked up from the sink when he walked back inside the apartment, her features slightly ashen yet composed. He went down the hall to the bathroom to wash his hands and then detoured into their bedroom to open up another window.

"Hopefully, it'll air out faster now," he said on his return to the kitchen, moments later.

She kept her head down, quietly scrubbing away at that pan. "Alright."

Such an agreeable little bird. As if she even knew what he was talking about.

Sandor shook his head. Like traipsing through an accursed minefield, her mood swings were. Frustration roiled up in the pit of his stomach, so he opened up the fridge and grabbed himself a bottled water.

"My ... my mother called."

Sandor pulled the bottle away from his mouth just as the first hint of moisture reached his lips. So that was what started all this nonsense. "And what did Lady Stark want to talk about today?"

Sansa sighed, her back still pointed squarely toward him. She hated it when he called her mother that, but Sansa also didn't like that he and her parents had never exactly warmed up to each other. Not that Sandor blamed them. He was an ugly, foul mouthed ex-mercenary with no family to speak of, and the one family member he could've, he'd just assume burn in the fiery pits of hell. He was a recovering alcoholic with a blue collar job. He had a terrible temper. His face was scarred and mangled and stuck in a permanent scowl. And on top of all that, he'd waltzed in, stolen their precious daughter away to live in a tiny 2-bedroom apartment with shoddy wiring and a faulty fire alarm, and put a baby in her. It was a wonder Ned Stark hadn't pulled a shotgun on him yet.

"She wants us to come over this weekend. She invited us over for dinner on Sunday."

Sandor took a quick swallow. "Not some fancy thing with their friends, right?"

"It's just dinner."

"Hmph." Sandor's brow furrowed in suspicion. "There's not a baby shower or some shit going on, is there?"

Sansa let out an exasperated groan and turned around. "No, Sandor. There are no plots, no hammers ready to drive a wedge between us. My friends are throwing me a baby shower two weeks from Saturday, thanks for asking. And it's not standard protocol to invite the baby's father, so you can skip the part where you call Bronn and the two of you come up with the most pathetic excuse you can possibly think of to get out of it. It's just dinner!"

Bugger me with a hot poker; here we go again.

"Fine. I can do dinner," he said in a lame attempt to appease the beast.

Sansa dried her hands on a rag and threw it on the counter. "You don't even have to be nice, if you think it'll be too much of a stretch," she snapped.

Sandor was really getting tired of this. "I said I'll go, Sansa. I'll play nice and we'll all live happily ever after, okay?"

"No, Sandor, it's not okay!"

His face hardening in preparation for another onslaught, he stalked past her into the living room. She could say whatever she bloody well wanted. She could rip into him like a vengeful, redheaded goddess. At least, in there, her screams wouldn't echo as much.

"They're all going to be there, Sandor." Her voice and, soon after, her person followed him. She was radiant. She was agitated. There was also a spark of something very vulnerable hidden behind her eyes. "Rickon's graduating high school a year early, did you know that? He stole Mom's car to go to a party, but the commencement speaker is going to be wonderful. Bran's finished up his BA and has his first exhibit coming up in a few weeks. Arya's got a new tattoo, but she finally found a boyfriend my parents don't hate. My cousin, Jon, is on leave and wants to spend time with the family, and Robb ..." Sansa's chest heaved beneath her top. "Robb's got his perfect life and his perfect Jeyne, with her perfect friends and her perfect career. Jeyne would never burn dinner!"

Sandor's head spun just trying to keep up. "I thought you liked your job." True, she wasn't exactly living her dream, but who did?

Sansa couldn't work in an office setting. That was a fact she couldn't escape. It was too confined; there was too much pressure. She was still prone to anxiety attacks, and after a few tries, some urgent and scary phone calls, and a few trips to the ER, they'd both decided it wasn't worth the risk. Sansa now did freelance photography for the newspaper covering local events and took beauty shots for a couple of smaller circulation magazines around the country. The money wasn't much, but her schedule was hers and the freedom it gave her made the other sacrifices worth it. She even volunteered a few days a week at a shelter for women like her, helping them get back on their feet after escaping the abusive whoresons who beat them.

Sansa had made the best of the cards she was dealt, and he'd thought she was content with that. He was damn proud of her, he thought with an uneasy shift in his gut. He tried not to appear thrown. He didn't think she was that unhappy.

Sansa fretfully kneaded her forehead. "I do, Sandor. I do like my job."

"Then, why all of a sudden is it not good enough? Did your mother say something―"

"No, it was nothing like that. She was just telling me how everyone was doing."

"Then, what has that got to do with your job?"

"Nothing!" she shouted, her voice breaking, her features crumbling. "It's fine! Would you stop doi―Will you please just leave it alone?!" A sob rippled painfully out from her delicate throat and Sansa dissolved into an oncoming wave of tears.

Great. Sandor took a long, deep breath, toying with the idea of walking out the door and coming back in some far distant future when she finally came to her senses. But he couldn't do that. Not unless he wanted her family to finally get the proof they needed to know that he was, indeed, a complete asshole.

Sansa sunk down on the couch. She had contained her cries to a dispirited whimper. Her head was held low and her shoulders were shaking. She wrapped her arms around her middle, which protruded out from the hem of her simple top, and made several attempts to steady her breathing, all to no effect. With this pale version of the woman he loved struggling in front of him, a pang of worry abruptly hit Sandor in the face. She needed to calm down. Whatever was going on in her head, she was still his Sansa and she needed him, not his anger.

Carefully, he sat next to her. He draped an arm over her left shoulder. The other joined hers around her stomach, and he gently pulled her to him. The flowery scent of her hair wafted up his nose. The warmth of her skin drew him in and he nuzzled into the delicate curve of her neck. "Hey," he said slowly. He stretched the word, long, gravelly, and deep. "You're alright, little bird. I've got you. Just breathe. Just breathe."

Sandor rubbed the soft slope of her belly with his thumb, feeling like he could've been talking to himself. He could be patient. She wasn't going to be a weeping mass of hormones forever, and with a small smile curling the good side of his mouth, he thought of the baby beneath his touch, the one who was actually driving her mad.

It was his son in there. A big, strapping boy, the doctor said, just waiting to be born.

"Just keep breathing, Sansa. I've got you." He moved his left arm from her shoulder to her neck. He caressed her there and pressed a kiss to her temple.

"I'm sorry, Sandor," she wept softly, leaning into his embrace. "I don't know what's wrong with me."

"I could have a guess."

"I'm just so ..." She tried to speak around stilted breaths. "I'm just so tired, and I broke the elastic on my pants, and then my mother ..."

"Wait, what?" Sandor's brow furrowed. "You broke your what?"

Her cheeks rapidly changed colors, alternating in splotchy hues of pink and red. Sansa covered her whole face in her hands. "I can't believe I just told you that," she moaned. "As if the rest of this isn't bad enough."

"Sansa, what in the seven hells are you talking about?"

"I bent over and broke the elastic on my waistband. Your girlfriend is so fat she can't even fit into maternity pants!"

Sansa's tears returned in full force, falling in a deluge that put all the others to shame. It was a wonder she had any tears left. He should get her some water soon. She was probably dehydrated.

Tempted though he was to chuckle at the thought of his formerly slight and fragile little bird getting big enough to break through anything, he thought better of it. He couldn't hurt her that way. Not right now. While in some ways her pregnancy had sharpened her claws and made her more fierce than ever, it also seemed to have magnified certain things, made her heart bigger and more susceptible to being wounded. She took everything he said to heart, especially the careless things, the things he wished he could take back.

"Well ... The mall doesn't close for another couple of hours. I can take you shopping. Get you a larger size."

"Wouldn't that ... be the perfect ... way to end tonight," Sansa cried. "Let you see exactly how fat I've gotten, so you won't want me anymore. You already don't, I can tell."

She sounded absolutely certain. Sandor was dumbfounded. "What?"

"You know what I mean."

"Little bird, I haven't got a godsdamn clue."

"You hate me! Every time we talk lately, all we do is argue, and I see how you look at me."

Sandor shook his head in astonished disbelief. Seeing the despair on her face made him want to curse out his balls for doing this to her, because she'd clearly gone insane. But dressing down his anatomy wasn't so effective when he looked at her sweet, rounding body and all he could think was "Good job, boys" and when could he take his cock out for another spin. How could she think he didn't want her?

She shivered in his arms and her eyes darted anxiously around the room. "I'm sorry I'm not how I used to be. I feel terrible. I'm huge and my ankles are swollen, but please ... I-I don't want you to leave me. I can't do this without you. I love you so much, I don't want to do anything without you."

"Crazy bird," he muttered against her ear. "You really have flipped, haven't you?"

Sansa Stark was the woman of his dreams. From the moment he saw her standing shy and alone in the Lannister's cavernous and austere sitting room, he'd dreamt of her almost every night―her face, her bright eyes and kind smile, her hair the only fire that could make a man want to burn. He'd thought her merely a fantasy, some trick of the mind to keep interminable loneliness from finally smothering him. But then she'd spoken to him with her chirping, angel voice, wanting to know - of all things - whether she was allowed to sit down.

Just like that, he was done. Something in him broke away and tethered itself to her. He was hers, no matter how much he resisted, and years later she was his, despite having all the reason in the world not to be. She was his love and the mother of his babe. And one day, when the gods saw fit to take one of them, he'd keep dreaming of her until they were reunited.

Sandor exhaled and hugged her to him. "Marry me, little bird."

Once he'd said it, he'd have sooner cut his own arm off than take it back.

Sansa's breath hitched. His hands shifted lightly to her waist and hip, and he turned her so he could see her, tears and all.

"Marry me, Sansa."

Sansa swallowed, her knees draped over his lap. Her Tully blue eyes searched his ruined face. "What are you doing?" she asked, her chin down and her voice unsure.

They'd talked about marriage before. They'd talked about it again when they'd found out about the baby. Sometimes it was him and sometimes it was her, but the recurring theme between the two of them was that neither of them were ready. Sandor still wasn't sure if he was ready, but he also knew that he'd never be able to look at another woman as crazy as this one and love her enough not to strap her in a straightjacket.

Sansa gently shook her head. "You're just saying that. You don't mean it."

A wavering timbre in her tone warned him of how scared she was, but a glimmer of light also capered within her gaze. The quick, rollicking motion hinted of something Sandor wanted to believe was hope.

"Put on some shoes. We'll go get your ring right now," he replied.

"But … I'm a mess!"

A slow, deep chuckle rumbled out from his chest. His hand played mischievously along her thigh. "Don't forget you're mad as a hatter and big as a bloody aurouchs. I still want you to marry me."

Sansa gasped. "You―!"

She punched his shoulder. Sandor laughed with renewed vigor as her little fists bounced harmlessly off of him. He gripped her luscious round ass and dragged her in closer. Her belly rested comfortably against his. Her breaths coming out hard, their foreheads nearly touching, Sandor's laughter died. His gaze was torn between her heavenly eyes and that pretty pink mouth.

It was too late. All those tears of hers had already sent a knife through his ribs and pulled out his heart.

"Marry me, girl," he whispered, velvet and raw. "Put this horrible old dog out of his misery and say yes. Say you'll be with me. Say you want me."

Tiny beads of moisture formed in the corner of her eyes. A tremulous smile played at her lips as her fingers crept up to brush his cheek. "Are you … are you sure?"

"Aye, girl. I've never been as sure of anything in my whole miserable life."

"Then, yes," she breathed, droplets streaming down her cheeks. Her arms wrapped tight around his neck. "Yes. Yes, yes, yes. Yes. Y―"

Sandor captured her mouth with his lips, and Sansa yielded with mesmerizing sweetness. Her lips parted and he delved into the kiss, a sweeping press of lips, her fingers ghosting over his jaw as passion ignited and conscious thought fell away.

His lips parted from hers for an instant, sliding away with a moist pop.

"I love you, little bird."

All he saw was her smile and her tears.

She was crying again, and for once, it wasn't the worst thing.