A Moment

When she'd first found out, he'd had to sit by with a straight face as she told the slick-haired, pretty boy. He had to listen to her mutter up what had happened. Had to watch the woman he'd come to respect, admire and eventually love tell her teenage crush and later drunken lover that she carried his child. And the boy never said a word, just finished the warm beer in his hand, put a few caps on the counter and left with a strangely absent look on his face. From what she'd mentioned of him, it seemed even more ironic now that he was doing as his own father must have done to his mother. To her credit, it seemed she hadn't thought he'd react any better.

As he sat with her in 'their' room in Underworld, months after they'd left Rivet City that day, he found himself with his hands on her growing belly - a look of comfortable embarrassment on her face. She smiled shyly, with her own soft hand cupped on the back of his as he felt the little life inside her kick gently through her, against his palm.

"I thought it would feel strange...when it started moving," he listened to her whisper, feeling both her fingers rub with affection against the ruined part of his hand as the child inside her tumbled, "but it's sort of nice."

They had been through too much violence, and her too much sadness for him to ever have imagined her content as a mother, but the past few weeks he'd seen her hard edges soften gradually. She had always been rough, quick to fumbling rage and uncertain around people, but the better parts of her - the kind words, the need to help and better those that deserved it - they were all fleshing out by the day. He tried to ignore the effect it all had on her outward appearance, but the clothes she owned did not hide the change well.

When the baby stopped kicking it was just his hand pressed to her body by her own hand, and those fingers, now soft from the months inside, rubbing against his wrist.

"I was thinking this morning," she started but paused, leaning back but pulling his trapped hand with her. He looked up, "that I'd have liked this to be your child, not Butch's. Not anyone elses."

His throat grew dry as she spoke - the words ringing like a fast breeze as they settled in, deeper than he'd have liked. She'd always been his picture of innocence, no matter how many people he watched her kill or the sometimes harsh words that left her mouth. That night he couldn't find her, and that morning that he'd figured it out, hadn't even pulled an inch at the pedestal he had her on. The second an unclean thought crossed his mind he pushed it aside, but right now he thought of being the one that'd eased inside her, spilled himself as she whined as sweetly as he knew she would. Her eyes stared him down as he looked past her, through her, to the fantasy.

"If that made you uncomfortable, I'm sor-"

"Don't be," he blurted with a deep tenor; fingers curling into the tight fabric around her stomach.

A gentle tilt gave her lips a smile, even if it was an uneasy one. Suddenly her eyes dropped down to his hand and her own above it. Hesitantly, he watched and felt her take his wrist in hand, dragging his palm - uneven ridges and all - up her stomach, over the still harsh start of her ribs and settle it on a soft breast. The nipple was hard between his two fingers and a heat crept from her flesh through his arm, filling each vein with supple warmth.

"Maybe," she said, swallowing hard enough that he heard it in her throat, "maybe I can pretend? That it's yours. That is...if you wanted."

She was never an easy employer, if that's what he could ever call her again, but with her stomach full, his hand held against her breast, and her words asking him such things - a part of him couldn't help but look back at the old days where it was hate that kept him going with a sense of nostalgia. The emotions he had now were too muddled to know which was which. Was it the love that outweighed the insecurity? - or the lust that slapped away the reasonable answer. It'd been so long of just standing by; watching and wishing. It figured that she would offer herself when she was like this - lonely, in need and maybe a bit unsure of what she even wanted. He felt like the last resort.

With determination, and regret, he pulled his hand away. A cold settled in his palm and that sweet heat drained out of his arm.

"No. It's not."

He stood up, straightening his legs and his shoulders, willing himself to not fall back into her as her hopeful smile fell into a hopeless line. Those brown eyes, so deep and sad, burned into him while he walked out the door. There would be no running from her, but maybe for a bit he could leave her alone and when he returned it could be as it was, before she let this happen, before he loved her.

"Charon..." it was the last thing he heard her whimper before the door latched closed.

It took him two days to talk back when she spoke with him. Two weeks to accept her offer of sharing the bed, and another four days of those nights before he let himself lay his arm around her while she slept. The closeness was warm and comforting, but the resentment still lingered heavy in his chest.

One day in Tulips shop a male smoothskin had come in, trading and haughty...though pleasant enough. There had been an air about him that suggested he thought himself better than them, but when she followed him in - hand on her growing belly and eyes bright - that man saddled up to her.

It was almost funny how others hitting on her had never rubbed him as wrong as when that man offered to protect her; to take her away from Underworld...from the ghouls, where she could have her baby in peace. The moment the offer was out Charon had truly seen red - it was like a subtle crawl of blood around his vision that clouded his sight so quickly he could barely breath.

Needless to say she wasn't happy about the blood on the only dress that seemed to fit her anymore, but that was the least of her concerns.

With a rough hand around her arm he dragged her back to the room - her feet scuffing on the floor in meager defiance the whole way. Everyone looked at them, but he didn't care anymore.

When the door shut the red dimmed, but he still pushed her back on the bed too roughly for her condition. The sound she made was strange, like a moan and a hiccup, but it didn't make him pause a second, crawling over her like an animal. He kissed her first, but it was her that pressed back with hands grasping at the back of his neck. The regret, the pain, the jealousy - it all poured into her mouth as he growled and kissed without care. A part of him feared this was a way he could punish her, as if fucking her - rather than making love to her like he'd wanted - would be better than giving her everything she wanted...though that would be being both selfish and selfless in his revenge.

In the end the wetness on her cheeks when she nuzzled into his neck decided his next action. The tears made him gentle and her soft little sounds replaced the anger in his heart with, what he could only assume, was love. She didn't even seem to mind that his hands were still bloody, or that some streaks covered her thighs when he pulled them open. The soft brush of her belly against his own stomach when he thrust inside, so deep and so heated, made him stutter. That jealousy he'd normally feel at noticing it never came.

Around him, her arms hugged and on his chest she kissed while sighing with each movement. She was tight around him, as if she'd been the virgin he'd assumed she was before all this, but there was no pain on her face, only a slightly parted smile and heavy, satisfied breaths. When he grinded inside, going deep, she gasped; moaning loudly as he withdrew.

It was just as he'd thought it'd be - as rough as she was at times, yet as soft and sweet as she tried to be. Everything was all at once too hot and not hot enough. The ruined skin he had left tingled like the sun was on him - his muscles strained and that deep pull below grew taut as her lips ran the length of his sharp jaw, whispering, "I love you."

A pitiful, strangled sound raced from his throat, past his clenched teeth and right into her throat. He came as she shuddered around him, sighing and crooning his name with more pleasure than he thought anyone could vocalize. Sweet, wet heat surrounded him; from her arms and thighs to her cunt. She was all around him.

In the aftermath, while his chest heaved and his arms shook, holding himself above her, she traced the sides of his ragged cheeks, kissing his chin. He looked dead ahead, not seeing anything as his ears cleared and slowly he began hearing her repeating those three words.

When she pulled back to stare into his eyes with her shiny, wet orbs, she smiled even though he must have looked horrified at her confession.

"If you don't feel the same...don't tell me. I want to pretend for a while." - and then she pulled him beside her, wrapping herself around him as best she could while her belly fit between the crevasse of his curved body. He stayed silent as she'd asked, even though a part of him wanted to tell her she was stupid for thinking he didn't feel the same - that he hadn't loved her for much longer than she'd loved him, if she truly did that is.

It would take more than her repeating the words for him to believe them...but for now, this was more than he could have asked for. She was with him after all, not the father of her child. That had to mean something? Didn't it?

"I love you..."

'And I love you...' he thought, as the sleep covered him, just as she did...so warm and soft, and right.