No Matter What

Tom walked into the small yellow-lit living room of his and Sybil's small house and sighed slightly. It had been a very long and stressful day at work, utterly jam-packed with meeting after meeting and barely a second to stop and breathe. Sybil was sitting at one end of the sofa, next to the lamp, with her legs curled up beneath her, reading a book she had intended on reading for months but had only just got around to due to work and family getting in the way. "How are they?" she asked, looking up from the cream coloured pages.

"Oliver didn't give me any fuss," Tom said, referring to their three year old son, who had his father's hair and his mother's eyes. "Elliot took a bit of persuading, though." Tom sat down next to Sybil and wrapped an arm around her.

"That sounds normal," Sybil said. It was normal for Elliot, their one year old, to take a bit of convincing when it came to bedtime. "He's got his stubbornness from you."

"Me?" Tom asked in good humour. "You're just as stubborn as me, if not more so!"

"Oh, alright, alright!" Sybil said with a small, charismatic laugh. "I suppose you sang Irish lullabies to calm him down?" Sybil asked, thinking fondly of how Tom calmed her down when she was unwell or upset with Irish lullabies sung to him as a child by his own mother.

"Aye. He fell asleep eventually," Tom said, pulling a blanket over the two of them to cut out the cool evening air that engulfed and filled the house at this time of year. Sybil slipped a bookmark, made by Oliver at nursery, between the pages before she shut the book and placed it on the side by the small lamp that filled the room with light. As she leant back into Tom's hold, he said,

"Good book?"

"So far," Sybil nodded. She'd only managed to read a few chapters, but the book seemed to agree with her so far. Tom kissed the top of her head and she turned so that she could have one arm draped lovingly over Tom's torso. She sighed lightly as she listened to the sound of the clock ticking methodically from the wall into the rest of the room.

In the silence, Tom's attention soon moved to Sybil's pregnant belly. At five months pregnant, her bump wasn't huge and Tom knew from experience how big his wife would get, but Tom loved it. He ran a hand gently over Sybil's bulging tummy under the blanket and Sybil covered his hand softly with hers, going with him as he caressed her skin gently. They'd been told that they were expecting a girl for the first time. Both Sybil and Tom loved their two boys dearly – no one could deny that, but neither could truthfully say that they didn't want a girl as well. "I love you," Tom mumbled down to Sybil as he nuzzled his cheek into her soft, silky, vanilla-scented hair. Sybil smiled fondly and ran her hand off his, and up his arm, stopping at his elbow and running back down again. Tom knew this as a sign of affection from Sybil. Though she could sometimes appear to be very blunt and almost stand-offish, she always became extremely tactile when she and Tom were together alone.

"I love you too," she whispered. No matter how articulate Sybil was, she had found that declarations of love were often better shown than said, so she tended to use physical contact to make Tom aware of her love for him, rather than using her words. She pushed herself up and took her hand away from Tom's arm to bring it to his cheek, cradling his jaw, as she brought herself up to kiss him. Though not a particularly spectacular kiss, it was one filled with love and sincerity and warmth. As Sybil pulled away and fell back into Tom's arms, he stopped her to place a soft kiss on her forehead.

"You're beautiful," he whispered gently. Sybil said no words in reply, but held him tighter, feeling that words couldn't do justice to what she felt for him. Even when she didn't feel beautiful, Tom would tell her that she was and she couldn't very well deny the fact, as Tom would always come up with plenty on unarguable reasons as to why her beauty was so worth noting.

Tom started to hum quietly, his hand resting lightly on Sybil's stomach. Sybil struggled to keep her eyes open with the soft murmur of Tom's hums. She felt the vibrations through his chest and it comforted her to have him next to her, seemingly protecting her from anything that might happen. She always felt safe in his arms, no matter the situation. Her breathing deepened and steadied and her movements became minimal. Tom saw the slow rise and fall of her chest and admired how lovely she looked, even when asleep. Her hair partially covered her freckled face, and her clothes, though nothing special, suited her perfectly. Tom felt so incredibly fortunate to have her in his life. She was the perfect woman and he loved her so very much. He loved her and she loved him. That's all that mattered. No matter what. The rest was detail.

So that was my fic for the theme of couple fluff for LSL week. Please review if you liked it.