Author's Note: This one is a LOT of dialogue, but I wanted to develop a relationship here so we can use it down the line. I hope you like the fluffiness of it all. Sorry for waiting so long to update… this is my busiest time of the year, so it's hard to get chances to sit down and write a lot. Review if you would like!

We've been in the house less than two hours and she already figured it out, so I stand up from the bed to check on some things. I step in front of the full length mirror and take in my appearance. I look slightly disheveled from my nap and still a bit tired, but not terrible. Then I stand so I can see my profile, looking to see if there was a hint of a baby bump, and finding my stomach still flat.

I'm perplexed. I'm mostly nauseated. Not from any kind of morning sickness, but from that feeling of worry. Worried that Harm's mother is going to think we just got married because of the baby. Worried for the same reason why we weren't outright telling anyone back home.

When I walk downstairs, Trish is standing in the kitchen placing different vegetables around a round serving dish.

"Looks wonderful. What are we having for lunch?" I ask in a soft voice as to not startle her.

"I've got a nice big salad in the fridge and some small roast beef sandwiches to go with them. Does that sound okay?" she says, looking up at me with a smile from her work.

I just nod my head, not knowing how to approach this with her. She obviously wanted confirmation of her suspicions. Then I thought to myself about how maybe she was really thinking that is the only reason Harm could marry me, because I was pregnant.

Apparently, my face was telegraphing the fear I felt, because the next thing I hear is Trish beside me with a hand on my arm, "Why don't you and I go sit out on the porch and talk, dear. It looks like you need some fresh air."

"Sure." I say, following her with the glass of water she had poured for me while I was in my short daze.

"I know you don't know me very well, but I can tell that something's wrong… was it my comment? I had just assumed about the baby. If you aren't—"

"No. I'm pregnant."

"Oh, well that's wonderful!"

I nod in response, not knowing how to read this woman very well. I can read a jury and an entire courtroom, but I could not read the hidden meaning behind this woman.

"Sarah?" she says, and I can feel that my face is once again showing that I'm upset.

I decided then and there that I may as well come out with all of it all or nothing. It's worked for me and Harm… maybe it will work with Harm's mother.

"We didn't get married because I got pregnant."

"Okay… I didn't think that you did." She says hesitantly, placing a hand over mine.

"You didn't?"

"Why would you think that?"

"I just couldn't figure out how you figured it out unless Harm told you, which I can't see him doing. I told him that I'd kill him Marine style if he told anyone before I got to twelve weeks. So I thought that maybe you had assumed that it was the only reason Harm would get married."

She just smiles at me, which irritates me just a bit.

"Thank goodness for hormones…" she starts with a laugh before taking my left hand in hers. "Do you want to know how I knew that this was more than anything like that?"

I nod and she points her finger at my rings. "I know because he gave you that ring. He wouldn't have given just anyone that ring. Do you know the history behind it?"

"He told me that it was yours and his Grandmother's."

"It was, but there's more to it than that. Whenever Harm's father went off to sea for a spell we would all sit down as a family and talk about what was important. Harm Sr. would always tell Harmon that the most important thing in this world was family. He would tell the story of his grandfather telling him all that while informing Harm Sr. that his only job in life was to be there for his family, whether it was his mother and father then or his wife and children later. Now Harmon would laugh at that part because he was so young and didn't want to think about having a wife and kids of his own. He was five. He just wanted to come with me to the ship to see his dad off. Harm Sr. would always tell him though that he may be laughing now but one day he would find someone who made him happy. He would find someone like grandpa found grandma and his father found me. Then he said that since the ring I was wearing brought such good luck to love, that Harmon had to ask for it when he needed it. His father went MIA shortly after that last family time together, but I would always remind him of that story. So the ring on your finger is not just a symbol of your love for each other, but something that goes way deeper for Harmon."

I'm staring at the ring now, thinking about how he told me that he had gotten it after we got back from Sydney because he knew then that we were supposed to be married.

"So tell me how did all of this finally come to be?" Trish asks, drawing my attention away from the ring and back to her.

"I was set to marry another man when Harm had his accident. After the accident we broke off the engagement. A few more unfortunate circumstances led me down the path of running away to the U.S.S. Guadalcanal."

"Yes, I do remember Harm talking to me about this, then telling me that he needed to see you. I still don't know why he couldn't just come out and say that he was madly in love with you."

"Well, he came out to see me and I wanted nothing to do with him. Part of the reason I was running was to get away from my feelings for him."

"How did that work out?"

"Two days after I got home, he was knocking at my door with a proposition."

"A proposition? What kind of proposition?"

"You know your son and how devoted he is. I'm the same way. If I really want something I go big or go home. So, his proposition was that for two weeks we try being together. Move in together, come home to each other, and all that it entails. If we decide at the end that it wasn't meant to be, then we would go back to being friends. If we decided that we were in fact meant to be together, we would."

"How long did it take you to figure it out?"

"About a day. I think for both of us. I'm…" I pause then, wondering how this woman sitting in front of me has turned me into an open book. "I'm not good about expressing my feelings and taking big leaps like that. I couldn't really get around my past and all that made me believe that I didn't deserve to have the happily ever after ending."

"Harmon has told me about your past, Sarah. I told you as much. Frankly, it is a badge of honor for you to come from a past so rocky. Everyone has skeletons in their closets. Some have them larger than others, but we all have them. Some overcome it and shine through the mess, and some are forever trapped behind it. You have decided to shine, which Harmon obviously saw in you."

"I see where he gets his heart now… He has told me the same, that I should be proud of what I came from and see the person I am today. I'm still working through that, but he's helping me figure it out."

She nods with a smile, and I feel like she really does accept me for everything that I am. This is a hard concept for me to digest, but I keep talking anyway.

"At the end of the two weeks, he left. I woke to an empty apartment on Saturday morning, and didn't know what to make of it until I found the ring and a letter on the kitchen counter. He proposed and gave me space to think about it."

"Two weeks of kind of being together and he proposed?" she asks with surprise etched in her features.

"Can you believe I said yes, considering the last man I thought I was marrying proposed before going on a date with me?"

"What about the wedding… why so soon?"

"Is it horrible of me to say that I just wanted it over with? I wanted to be married to the man I love without having to wait around to plan some big fancy wedding for everyone else. Our dating life was two weeks long, so I figured that our engagement only had to be about a week."

"And the baby?"

"Harm went away for a week out to the Patrick Henry and I was sleeping like a rock, which is not something that I was able to easily do before Harm came into the picture. When I thought back to other things in the past few weeks I realized that there was a strong possibility I was pregnant. I got a test and sat the box on the bathroom counter for a full day before I took it. Then when I took it, I couldn't flip it over and Harm walked in when he wasn't supposed to."

"You didn't want him to know?"

"I needed processing time before I shared."

"When I found out I was pregnant with Harm, his father was out at sea. I remember taking the test and immediately losing my breakfast afterward. It scared the crap out of me. Things we different then too, without many ways to communicate. I had to wait for about five months before I could even tell him I was pregnant. Can you imagine the thoughts going on in my head."

"I probably had them myself… and I lost my lunch right after we found out too. Nothing has ever scared me as much as that word showing up on that little screen."

"What did Harmon say?"

"He was over the moon and proceeded to wake me up the next day because of talking to my stomach."

"He's going to be an amazing father."

"I know." I say simply, finally glad that I had someone to share this with. I didn't realize how much I wanted someone else to know until I told Trish all about it.

"Sarah, I know that you don't want a lot of people to know, so if you need anything or have any questions, please call me. It was a long time ago that I had my son, but the mechanics and the cravings are still the same. It forever bonds us as women to share in that experience."

"Tell me one thing?"

"Anything?"

"Did you think that you were going to suck at being a mom? Did that thought go out of your head?"

"The whole pregnancy and the majority of his first month home I figured that I was doing everything wrong. Any time he cried I knew it was because I messed up. When he kept me up at night while I was pregnant and I was a walking zombie during the day, I knew that I couldn't handle it. I was a mess, and I think that's normal."

"Well, you did a great job."

"And so will you."