Right part 2 of the one-shot :D This entire fic (though it doesn't really come in to effect until this bit) was inspired by something got shared on facebook :D. It is honestly just fluff and I'm not sure the voices are right but hopefully it is ok :)
"And what happens when we get back?" he questions gently, not wanting to ruin this time between them but needing to know all the same. They've had a good few hours together and now they've return to the path along the wall. She breathes deeply, breaths designed to steady her shaking nerves though he doubts their effectiveness.
"We keep things quiet" there is the slightest hint of an apology in her tone and for that he is surprised. It is the answer he expected, delivered in a way he did not. It is a tone he so rarely hears her adopt. She offers him the tiniest hint of a smile as she adds, "for a time"
He raises his eyebrows in a question he cannot quite bring himself to speak as the bubble of hope builds within. He needs clarity, needs to be able to stem that hope if need be to prevent further pain should her meaning not quite match what his no longer rational brain is thinking.
"It's just" she pauses for a moment trying to collect her own thoughts, trying to make sense of things that appear to make no sense at all. This all seems too good, a dream which will shatter as soon as they return to reality. Only this feels so much more real. Here she has less to prove, less to hide. Despite his assurances she has to prove herself and here, right now, that doesn't seem so impossible.
"Jac" he speaks her name softly, imploring her to continue. She blinks having not realised quite how long she had paused for.
"There's so much that could go wrong" she sighs and shakes her head slightly as her mind whirls. He frowns having returned to this aspect of the conversation once more, "I don't want their pseudo-sympathy knowing all the while as soon as my back is turned the barbed comments will resume" comments such as these would normally roll off of her back, the background commentary of her life to date but this is different. All ready it has twisted her emotions, left her mind dizzy and disorientated and despite efforts to prevent it already she has started to feel something for it. But she doesn't want to feel, worried that by feeling something she will jinx it; she fears it is too good for her and that like everything else she will destroy it.
"We can tell people when you're ready" he reassures her. He would love to shout it the news for all to hear but for her, he will zip his lips though he is certain it will pain him to do so especially with Mo, "though if you're not careful junior will give him or herself away" he adds with what he hopes is a cheeky smile – though he thinks of her aversion to coffee that morning – before a momentary look of horror passes across her face.
"I'm going to get fat" there is something like fear in her tone. The reality of losing control over her own body, of changing and seeing an unfamiliar form reflected in the mirror. Though she tends to hide her true self away, isn't sure she even knows who that person is a lot of the time further change to her own self-image is a terrifying prospect.
"Pregnant, not fat" he corrects her, thinking of the rough sketch he had found showing her round bellied from the growth of their child. He tries to picture her figure changing, already he sees a glow about her and he wonders how he had not picked up on it as even though he had tried to blind himself to her, she had always drawn his eye.
"That's just code for fat" she frowns, "fat and shiny. I'll be a sight"
"You'll look beautiful" he rests his hand over hers, imagines doing so when the skin is stretched taunt and he can feel movements – kicks and rolls – from beneath it. He sees disbelief in her face, "you always look beautiful" he feels daring speaking the words and he sees the shifting emotions in her face, the glisten of moisture in her eyes.
"and you must be blind Maconie" she speaks softly, though he can hear a forced edge to the words, an attempt at her normal manner which is betrayed by her emotions – something he is certain she'd blamed on their child rather than any real feelings she has, "I'll be booking you an appointment at Specsavers on your return" he laughs lightly trying to make it more of a joke though he is struck by the familiarity of the words, of how to anyone listening that would seem like something she would say to her partner.
"Blinded by your beauty perhaps" he concedes. This is probably true. He has always struggled with settling though he has dreamed of doing so. With those women whom he had dated, had mucked about with, he had found his eye wandering to other women and yet with Jac, he didn't – he only ever saw her.
"You're an idiot" she informs him, knowing he is only trying to make her feel better, because that is the type of person he is.
"and you cannot accept the truth" she shakes her head. She is not beautiful; can list every fault and imperfection. Someone like her cannot be beautiful and yet this man tells her she is and unlike those who came before him, she doesn't think the word have an ulterior motive though she still doesn't want to accept them.
"I would if you were telling the truth" the response comes quickly to her lips, and she sees the way he rolls his eyes at the losing battle he faces with her. To the world she is confident, self-esteem sky high and yet scrap the surface and she is so very different. She cannot see herself in anything other than a negative light and that destroys him because his Jac is nowhere near the person she sees.
"You just can't see it" he pulls her towards a bench, looking out towards the beach, "I want to tell you of a girl I know" she looks at him with a raised eyebrow, expects a story of one of his conquests. He gives her a smile as he takes her hand in his.
"This girl, I've not known her all that long but it feels like I've known her my entire life. It's funny that but true. Like she has always been a part of me, and I've had to find her. Only she's not been all that easy to find, because it hard to find this girl even when you know her. She's amazing see? Absolutely indescribably amazing. She's beautiful beyond belief, but her beauty is more than skin deep. On the surface, oh she is gorgeous, striking. Perhaps not classically beautiful but oh she is perfection. But she is real, she is not one of these plastic people who are false, their perfection paid for. No she is perfection in a way that is real and incredible, scars tell parts of her story and add to the person she is. Oh and her eyes, eyes that tell a million stories and yet speak no words. But that's kind of her all over, she struggles to tell her stories in words, and yet she tells them in other ways that don't quite give you the full picture. She's a mystery, an enigma. Beneath the surface, life has marked her, left scars that will never fully heal though with time and patience I think they can be fixed a little so they hurt her less. Only she is scared because the hurt proves she can feel, and if they are fixed, then she may become numbed. She may no longer feel. But even though she hurts, she hides it. Hides the pain, because it is easier to pretend that she doesn't feel, because then she has control over herself and the world around her. She needs control, because it is something she didn't have for a very long time, but control steals from her. She lets so much steal for her, because she is so very frightened of so many things. But fear is vulnerability, and vulnerability is weakness and that is her biggest fear of all. Only she could never be weak. Even at her most vulnerable, the moments when she struggles the most, there is a strength within her that I envy though I wish she could let someone in to help her because sometimes even the strongest person needs someone by their side. Even though this beautiful girl would never admit it" he pauses, breathless and sees the strange look on her face. The look that tells him that she doesn't quite understand what he has said, or that she doesn't want too. He squeezes her hand, "but despite of this, despite her not wanting to admit that she needs him, despite her trying to push him away, he loves her"
"I don't understand why this is relevant" he turns away from her for a moment, wishing she could see the truth in his words, that she could want to see them.
"Don't you want that, one day" his gaze comes to rest on a sight further up the pathway, she turns to follow the direction in which he looks, trying to understand what he is looking at and why she would want it.
"I still don't understand" she shakes her head, she isn't sure what she is looking at only that somehow it has affected him. This is why she doesn't deserve someone like him, he sees things she doesn't, is able to see beauty where she cannot. He sees beauty in even the small insignificant things, whereas beauty barely exists in her world and that which does practically has to knock her out in order for her to recognise it.
"Look at that couple, Jac" he points, and finally she can see what he is looking at though why it matters makes no sense. They are a couple. From this distance she can tell they are grey haired, an older couple. They are seated much like them on a bench though further up the pathway.
"what about them?" Still she struggles with their significance. She hears the sigh that escapes from Jonny's lips. She knows this disappoints him, that she cannot see this. This is why he deserves so much more.
"Wouldn't you like that? To still be sitting together, holding hands. Jac, look at them you can see how much they love each other despite a lifetime together and yet watch them and every so often she scolds him probably for something he has done for that lifetime and continues to do, see his smile as she does it because it is a habit" she watches the couple and in spite of herself she finds herself smiling at Jonny's assessment, he has to have been watching them for a while to have picked up on these things. She turns back to him.
"I don't deserve things like that" she shakes her head sadly. One day that older man will be Jonny and by his side will be a woman unlike herself, who has given him the love which he deserves. Perhaps they will have children together, half-siblings for her baby though it worries her. If he finds that woman, her child may be forgotten when theirs come along.
"That's the other thing about this girl, the one I was telling you about" he smiles, "she seems to think that nothing good can come for her, because she thinks she is bad, that she is damaged and evil. She has been taught this by life, and still believes it even though a man – who loves her – tells her differently. Even though he is honest and kind, and loves her still she believes the lies of those who did not know her in the way he does. He wants to teach her about the person he sees, he doesn't know everything, of why she is this way. He would listen to her story but he doesn't need to hear it because he knows the truth. And he thinks that one day, he would like to sit with her on a bench, her hair greyed and her skin wrinkled but still to him she will be the most beautiful girl in all the world. The most moody too by all accounts. But she will be his girl, his girl for ever more. And even when they sit old and grey, shouting because they can barely hear each other and yet somehow knowing what the other means they will know what it is to have been loved"
"It's a nice story, Jonny"
"Only it's not a story. Jac, I love you. You are the girl I have spent my life trying to find, who I will spend a lifetime chasing after if I have too because I love you"
"No you don't" she shakes her head once again, glancing back at the older couple before returning to look back at his face. His sweet, sweet face. She thinks that he thinks he loves her, maybe even believes it but it isn't a real love. It's a love built on a physical relationship, a love which now exists because they share responsibility for creating an embryo.
"I've loved you since I saw you at that stupid people skills course" he pulls a face before he flashes her a smile, "In spite of everything, I cannot stop loving you. I've tried to move on, but no other woman is ever going to compare to you Jac, how could they?" he dares to raise his hand to stroke the side of her face, he looks over his shoulder to see the older couple are watching them, sees the movement of their mouths and he wonders whether they are talking about him and Jac, as they had done about them.
"You could have so much more than me" she looks at him, "you could have any woman, a wonderful woman who will be everything you need and don't worry that I won't let you have access to our baby when you chose her, because you will always be daddy but I'm not the woman who you'll sit on that bench with"
"You are more than I could ever wish for" he holds her face in his hand, smiling, "You, me and our baby that is all that I want. Not some other woman who exists only in your head, because in my head the woman you describe is you"
"I'm not cut out to be that woman" she tries to argue, she wants more for him and yet she wants him. She wants him, loves him though she doesn't want to tell him that. She wants him to have perfection, and that means denying herself of him and yet he doesn't want to let go of her. She doesn't understand it.
"You already are that woman" he grins "one day that'll be us, and we'll be watching young 'uns like us now and thinking back to how we were on this day and I will remind you of how you once told me that would never be us – and you will, for once in your life, have to admit that I was right. The fact it'll take until we are in our 70s perhaps 80s is a little bit of a pain but it'll be worth the wait" he laughs lightly and she finds a slightly titter escape her own lips though she had tried to prevent it. He is the man who can make her laugh regardless.
"and when I am fat and crying because my hormones are entirely out of control and you catch sight of a woman in a short skirt who flirts with you shamelessly" she questions.
"I'll be trying to make you laugh and if all else fails I'll cry with you" he grins, "and we can enjoy your late night cravings together provided you don't go for wacky combinations, of course you'll lose the weight when the bub comes, while I'll be forced to the gym but we'll do it together" she laughs shaking her head at his idiocy and yet feeling so much affection towards him.
"and when I cannot talk, when my words dry up because I fear you knowing too much" she knows that one day he will want to know her story, that it'll come in drabs and that she will grow quiet as he waits for words that won't ever be forthcoming.
"Then we will sit together, quiet and safe in each-others arms" he wants nothing more than to hold her now, "and when you are ready to talk, I can listen"
"You know that one day I'll panic don't you, that I'll try to run?" she asks, fearing what she could one day do to him. He smiles softly, running his finger over the skin of her cheek. He wipes something away and she fears a tear has slipped free from her eyes.
"I can't promise I'll stop you" he says the words honestly, and she nods accepting. She knows that she'll push him beforehand, that she'll end up walking away and leaving. He wipes her cheek again, and gently leans forward, "I'll run with you instead" the words whispered in her ears. Tears fall more freely now as she realises his meaning.
"I love you" the words quiet, but truthful. Torn from her mouth, and spoken with a smile.
"and I love you" he places a kiss on her forehead, "and when you are ready, we will tell those back home that we are together, in love, and that we are going to be a family. We'll take it slow and if you need to cry, to shout, arms to hold you, or your feet itch to run – call me and I'll come. I'll come to you for the rest of our lives and one day when I need you I hope you'll come to me"
She submits herself to his arms, his hold. It is safe. The soft breeze coming off the sea and the whispers of the couple passing them, about young love. She is safe, and for once not alone. She rests her head against him, for the first time in a long time her mind stilled. For once she doesn't feel that ready to run, knowing that there is someone by her side willing to follow. His words ring in her ears, and she fears she cannot do what he can for her, and yet something in her is telling that maybe she can. She smiles, "I can't promise you, but I'll try" she whispers.
"That's all I ask" he whispers placing a kiss on the top of her head, hands coming to rest over her abdomen. She curls in to him, and for once she trusts the words.