A/N: This is gonna be a little arch. Maybe 5 chapters. The characters I have names below so far are the most involved :) Enjoy xx Mariah

Ages:

Ned - 39
Katie - 34
Asher - 8
Willow-5
Melinda - 56
Jim - 60
Mackenzie - 24
Scott - 28

Katie and Ned's house was quiet, which wasn't totally unusual being that it was a Monday morning. but it wasn't completely usual either. After being with his wife for well over a decade, he knew how loud Katie could be in the morning.

But then again, he knew better than to think she'd be acting as if it were any other day. Ned stood at the stove, a dish towel was thrown over his shoulder as he went about making breakfast for his family. Monday mornings were his favorite because they were his mornings to walk Asher and Willow to the bus and make breakfast for them.

Usually, he'd go to work soon after and Katie would be home alone to get the kids ready for school, (she'd

taken leave from work since the car accident to take care of the kids and help with Mackenzie get ready for Freya but now it was two years later and she still didn't want to go back yet), but not today. Today, he would get to spend some one-on-one time with his beautiful children. Willow was currently perched at the breakfast counter on her, coloring a picture in her coloring book.

He smiled as he turned to look at her, a look of pure determination crossing her features as she fought hard to color the picture of a kitten perfectly. Her look was pure Katie and that thought made his heart sing.

He caught the sight of the long hallway that led out to the bedrooms from the side of his eye and sighed when he saw the door to their bedroom still firmly closed. His gaze fidgeted to Asher as he saw him coming down the hallway and waved to him. "Hey, bud. Ready for school?"

"Mom's sad," Asher said softly, interrupting the silence of the room as he pushed out the stool directly in front of his father and sat on top of it. "What's wrong?"

He often cursed how observant their son was for an eight-year-old that was. "I know, bud. She's just having a bad morning." Ned couldn't help but feel a lump rise in his throat. His eyes skirted the calendar on the wall but he turned his attention momentarily back to the food he was cooking. "Hey, Wills, why don't you close up your coloring book, the pancakes are almost ready."

She let out an excited 'yay' as Ned scooped the last blueberry pancake on the plate, letting them cool as he moved to the fridge to grab the syrup and butter.

"Should I go see if Mommy wants some?" Willow asked softly, her little legs kicking back and forth under the stool.

Ned placed the syrup on the breakfast bar and looked at his son and then back at the sweet little girl. "Sure, baby. Just be quiet okay, I'm not sure if mommy is still sleeping..."

Willow was so much like her mother. Her fierce determination, her drive, and ambition. Her over the top need for things to be her way or the highway. And her impatience. But she had a heart, the biggest one in the world just like her mother.

He watched as his little girl nodded her head slowly and jumped off the stool. "Pancakes will make Mommy feel better… they always do for me!"

If only it were that easy, Willow.

Ned allowed his thoughts to drift as he heard his daughter knock on his bedroom door faintly. He looked down the hallway when he saw her carefully go in the bedroom before turning attention to the calendar he hadn't given much thought to before.

There, on the calendar today's date - September 10th was circled with a gold marker with the words Baby #3's Due Date! written in Katie's neat cursive. Just seeing the words made all the emotions in Ned's chest swell up and simultaneously he felt like ripping the thing off the wall and tear it to shreds.

They'd been so excited about the baby. It had finally happened for them, again, and there had been no two people in the world who were more overjoyed then Katie and Ned. When they saw the first test result, both of them had wanted to tell everyone they saw, but they had wanted to wait to tell the rest of the family until they safely entered the second trimester.

After three weeks of silence, they'd caved and told Asher as long as he'd promised to keep it a secret for now. He'd been so excited at the idea of a new baby brother or sister coming. Life had seemed so good. But it never seemed to last for very long.

Katie had only been eleven weeks pregnant when they got into a terrible car wreck with her two sisters, and once again life had thrown them a curveball. The doctor had called it the car accident a tremendous stressor, which had caused her to miscarry.

They could call it whatever they wanted. It didn't make either of them feel any better. And it didn't help the emptiness in Ned's gut or help him comfort his wife these past nine months. It didn't help the immense loss that they both felt. It didn't help him explain to his son a few weeks after they came home from the hospital that no, his mother wasn't pregnant anymore and that he wouldn't be getting a baby brother or sister after all.

Poor sweet Asher had a good understanding of death because of the gift he shared with his mother, but at just eight-years-old, it still didn't make much sense to him. He heard a bedroom door close softly and the slow footsteps that belonged to his little princess.

The frown on Willow's face indicated to him that she hadn't managed to coax her mother from their bed. "I tried, Daddy." The five-year-old whispered, walking over to him and wrapping her little arms around his legs. His heart broke when he looked down at his little girl. "Mommy's really sad. She doesn't want to get up."

Ned knelt down instantly and wrapped his arms around her and picked her up. He hugged her tightly, and just breathed her in for a minute. Willow smelled of vanilla and bubblegum shampoo, so distinctly his little girl and his wife. "I love you so much, Willow," he whispered into her ear and smiled brightly at her.

"I love you too, daddy." She pulled away from hugging her daddy and smiled a little at him.

"Ready for pancakes?" He brought her back to her stool and set her down before making a plate for both her and his son, moving between them to help Willow with the syrup.

After they were both set up and dug in, Ned escaped the kitchen for a minute to check on his wife. He took a deep breath as he walked down the hallway, coming to his bedroom door. He licked his lips and went for the handle on the door, taking one last glance at their children before entering the bedroom.

He felt his shoulders drop when he saw Katie curled up in the middle of the bed, tucked tightly into the blankets, her back to the door. He didn't speak for a minute, listening to her breathing to determine if she was awake or not.

It wasn't deep and was quite shaky, taking him only a second to determine that she was awake and quietly crying. He crept onto the bed and pulled her against him.

"Oh, Katie." He sighed when she didn't turn into his embrace but allowed him to draw her into his arms. "I love you," he leaned over and kissed her cheek softly. "I love you so much and I know today is going to be really, really hard." He ducked his head and kissed her shoulder before swallowing the lump that was in his throat. "But I know two kiddos who would really just like it if their mom got up. They don't care what you look like so you don't even have to brush your hair or teeth."

Katie rolled over and looked at him with glassy bloodshot eyes, the tear tracks on her face. "Ned," she whimpered as fresh tears appeared in the corner of her eyes. "I don't know if I can… not today."

He pulled her against him as she sobbed into his chest. Ned felt his own tears rise in his eyes and fall down his cheek as he kissed her head repeatedly. "I know, babe," he whispered, rubbing her back. "I know."

After taking a few minutes to themselves, Ned closed the bedroom door behind them, Katie nestled into his side. He detoured on his way to the kitchen to help set her on the couch before going to check on the kids in the kitchen. He smiled when he saw Willow's cheeks covered in syrup, her princess cup empty of the milk he had left her with. She looked up at him and grinned. And it was in that grin that Ned felt peace.

"Good stuff, Wills?" He asked, grabbing his plate. He knew Katie should eat and that he'd need to get Asher on the bus soon. "All done, Ash?"

"Just about," the boy said, moving to bring his plate to the sink. "Ready to walk to the bus?"

"Sure thing. Go say bye to your mom in the living room while I clean up your sister," he said, winking at him.

"Mommy's up!" Willow gasped, her little arms bursting up and shaking all around. "That means she'll walk us to the bus too, right?"

"Maybe," he said.

Asher perked up too. "Mom's up?" He looked the most surprised of all, knowing how his mother could be when her mood was really down like it was lately.

Ned nodded and then smiled at his sweet, little girl. "Wills, I need you to use your quiet voice today." He reminded her as he began to clean up. "Remember?"

After he cleaned Willow up, he sent her to her bedroom to put on the clothes her mother set out the night before. It was her new favorite thing to get ready on her own now that she was getting bigger.

Asher came out of the living room and toward the front hall where Ned was waiting, glancing at his wife from where he stood. She was laying down on the couch now, a blanket wrapped around her.

"How's mom?" He asked.

"She pretends to be happy when anyone is around," Asher sighed and grabbed his backpack. "And that's a lot more than it should be."

Suddenly Ned felt like he was talking to a teenager and shook his head. "Your mother is happy, Asher… she's just having a bad day."

They stopped just short of the line of kids. Asher faced him and it was like his wife's eyes were staring at him, reminding him that he was so much like her that he couldn't hide much from him either.

"Is it because of the baby?" Asher asked quietly.

"What baby?" Willow asked as she came running out of her room. "Is mommy having a baby like Auntie Kenzie did?" Willow was dressed in a long grey t-shirt read smile, laugh, love and had paired it with dark purple tights. Her long brown hair she had tried to pull into a ponytail but she had missed a good chunk of her hair. Either way, it was perfect.

Ned had to smile a little at the irony of her choice of shirt for today. It was one his mother had bought. He slowly crouched down. "No, sweetheart. Mommy isn't," he whispered. "Please don't ask mommy about that, okay?"

"Okay. Can I still go say goodbye?" Willow asked, beaming excitement still.

"Sure," he kissed her cheek and before he knew it she ran off towards the living room.

Ned slowly stood up, running his hands through his hair. It was so hard to talk about this with Katie, let alone to his five-year-old. "Don't think about this stuff, okay? I've got things taken care of, bud." He said, turning to face Asher now. Now he had to talk to his eight-year-old about it. "Today is just... not going to

be good no matter how hard I try to make it better for your mom."

"I know, dad." Asher hugged him. "Do you think mom will ever really smile again?"

Ned smiled, almost laughing, because even he knew the difference. "Yeah, bud. I think she will." Willow came running back, Katie slowly walking behind her. He blinked his surprise away and his wife walked straight into his arms. "You coming with?" He asked slowly.

"Yeah. I think I'll stay on the porch," she said softly, glancing down at her leggings and baggy sleeping shirt.

"Okay," he smiled, pressing a kiss to her forehead.

That was a start.

After seeing their son and daughter off to school, Ned walked the half a block back to their house and into the living room to see his wife had walked back in before he'd gotten back. He walked into the room and she was just staring at the television that wasn't turned on. He took a second before walking toward her, lifting her legs and sliding underneath.

"Hi," she sighed, changing positions entirely and cuddling up to his chest.

"Hi, love. The kids are on the bus," he said as he pressed a kiss to her head.

"That's good," she muttered into the fabric of his t-shirt. "Do they hate me?"

"Why would they hate you?" He asked

"I'm a terrible mother," she whispered, slowly glancing up at him.

After they'd laid together on the couch for a while, Ned had run to do some errands while Katie went back to bed.

He'd wanted to give Katie some space. Well, in reality, he had wanted to sink into the recesses of their bedroom and cuddle with her all day but he didn't know if that would be good or bad. So he'd chosen to go about the day as normal as he could. And Katie had seemed okay with that, sinking in sleep on the couch before the movie they'd chose to watch ended.

It was a nice day.

First, had had stopped off at the pharmacy to pick up a few prescriptions that Ned had called in yesterday, one of them being Katie's antidepressant and the other his. Shitty timing for those bottles to fall empty. Then he'd taken a pitstop to the gym and worked his frustrations out on a punching bag until his arms and shoulders hurt.

Then it had been time to pick up Asher from hockey practice, Willow from her dance class, and even some Chinese takeout for dinner before heading home. He found Katie in the kitchen, sitting at the counter with a mug of tea in her hands. Her gaze was fixed on the mug in front of her, or at least that's how it seemed.

Ned put Willow down on her feet and told Asher to help his sister go wash up for dinner before approaching his wife. He placed dinner on the counter beside her before turning to look at her.

That's when he noticed it.

Katie wasn't staring at her cup of tea, she was staring at a sonogram picture beside the mug. And he saw the tears again. He calmly walked over to her and pull against him being mindful of the mug still clasped in her hands.

He ran his own finger over the sonogram, tracing the little shape of what would have been his newest son or daughter. His throat ached with unshed emotion and just allowed himself to hold Katie, trying to offer her any of the strength and resolve he had left, which wasn't much at all. He kissed her forehead before turning her face towards his and placing a kiss on her lips, tenderly at first. The kiss escalated as the seconds ticked by, never exceeding the bounds of longing an want.

He pulled her as close to him as possible, trying to envelop her. Trying to let her know that eventually, it would all be okay; even though he didn't have much hope left in him to believe that much himself. When he pulled back, he saw a genuine smile grace her lips.

"That was nice," she pressed another peck to his lips. "I miss your kisses. I'm sorry I've been so out of it today."

"That's why I was home," he whispered and kissed her again. "Don't worry about it."

They'd eaten dinner as a family, quietly, each of them picking at the food in front of them. Both children were quiet, sensing their parents emotions much like they both had since the minute they were born. Katie had retired to the couch with Willow after dinner was finished while Asher helped Ned wash the dishes.

Then all four of them sat on the couch as they watched a cartoon show together and by the time for the kids to head to bed. Both of them had school in the morning and a bedtime to stick to. Asher was getting older now and mostly went to bed on his own besides being tucked in when he was ready, but Katie and Ned took turns putting Willow to bed.

Tonight was Ned's turn and even if it hadn't been, he probably would've taken the task out of Katie's basket because she'd had quite the day was. Willow looked up at her mom as she stood in front of where she sat on the couch, tentatively trying to decide how to say goodnight to her.

Katie gave her a small sad smile and wrapped her arms around their daughter and held her tightly for a few minutes. "I love you so much, Willow. I hope you know that," she whispered, kissing her on the cheek. "I'm sorry Mommy's been so sad..."

Willow pulled away from her mother and looked at her. "It's okay, Mommy. It's okay to be sad. And I know you love me. I love you too!" She smiled a great big grin.

Katie kissed her cheek before allowing Ned to scoop her up and bring her to bed. "Thank you," she whispered in his ear. "I'm going to get ready for bed. I'll wait for you." She stood up from the sofa and stretched languidly before going towards her and his bedroom.

When he had been tucking Willow in, making sure she had her stuffed animals and they were all tucked in too, it was his daughter's words that had absolutely shattered his heart that made tears come to his eyes.

"Daddy?" Willow whispered.

"Yes, Princess?" He said.

"I miss when Mommy sang me to sleep," she said wistfully. "Will she do it again soon?"

Ned's heart broke. "She'll sing to you again soon. I promise." She sighed a little bit before snuggling deeper into her ladybug comforter. "I love you, Princess."

He'd left her room and taken a break, leaning against her door and allowing the tears to come to his eyes. Ned took a moment before collecting himself and going to his and Katie's room to find her. He found Katie cuddled in the bed again this time with the sonogram clutched in her hands. He laid down with her on the bed and she immediately turned to lay with him. He wrapped his arms around her and allowed the tears to fall freely for the first time all day. He'd tried really hard to be strong. But he just couldn't anymore.

"Did you pick up my medication?" She whispered, her voice thick.

She didn't like that the doctor had prescribed her antidepressants. She liked to think she was strong enough to deal with her own pain. But this time, Katie had relented after her mother and Mackenzie talked her into it. They had both relented to the prescriptions, Zoloft for her and Celexa for Ned. They had kids to think about this time and both needed to be as present as they could.

"I did. They're in the kitchen." He said, rubbing her shoulders. "You ready for one?"

Usually, when Katie took her meds, she went to bed shortly after. "Not yet. I was thinking we could take a bath..." She looked up at him, her sad eyes were slightly hopeful.

He tried to give her a small smile, his emotions still running high. "We?" He smirked

"Yeah," she smiled. "Unless you don't want to…"

"I always want to be with you," he smiled. "I'll go get it set up."

He kissed her head before going into the bathroom to get the bath started. He went to work setting it up, making sure the water was warm and adding her favorite lavender bubble bath. He grabbed towels for them set them up before going back out into the bedroom to collect his wife.

When he returned, Katie was standing naked in the middle of her closet, staring at her reflection down in the mirror. Ned went and closed their bedroom door quietly and approached her, coming to a stop just behind her. "You okay?" He whispered.

She had her hands on her stomach, running up and down the various stretch marks on her otherwise flattened stomach. She shook her head no, to that she wasn't okay as her fingers lingered on a faded sliver of a scar across the top of her abdomen.

He stepped forward a half step and rested his arms around her waist and his chin on her shoulder. "Baby?"

"I miss Charlie," she whispered hoarsely. "Because other than Asher and Willow," she ran her finger across her abdomen. "He lived in here the longest..."

Katie was right. She had just barely been seven months pregnant when...the unthinkable had happened to Charlie during their first year of marriage.

He wrapped his arms around her tighter. "I miss him too," he whispered. "He would be… almost thirteen, right?"

"Yeah, next January," she said softly and turned around in his embrace, "can you believe we'd have a kid who'd double digits?" She wrapped her arms around his neck and looked up at him with devastatingly sad eyes. "Kiss me, please."

Ned didn't need to be told twice. He bent his head and gently took his wife's lips with his. The kiss was soft, romantic. Meant to show the other just how much they loved each other. They stood like that for a few minutes, just allowing their emotions to pour into each other.

He loved kissing his wife. For him, it was just another way to show her just how much he loved her. When he pulled away, he looked down at her and kissed her forehead, before leading her to the bathtub that he hoped was still warm, and wasn't disappointed. He helped her into the soapy water first and then got in himself, allowing the water to envelop his tired muscles. He closed his eyes when Katie leaned back and he wrapped his arms around her.

They had made it through today. Now they just had to make it through the rest of their lives.

Ned woke up the next day and he could immediately tell it wasn't going to be a good day. When he'd opened his eyes and blinked against the sunlight that was coming through blinds, he could almost feel the thick air trying to suffocate him. He untangled his arms from around Katie's still sleeping body and looked up at the ceiling. He couldn't help but feel sadness engulf his whole body, his whole heart as he blinked back the tears that were starting in his eyes.

This was the pain he always tried to keep at bay. The pain that he tried to keep away from his wife and daughter and he honestly had no idea why he was feeling this way, right now at this moment.

Maybe it was that he was just so tired of being strong for everyone. He rolled over onto his side again, placing a kiss on his wife's bare shoulder before climbing out of bed. He padded over to the bathroom that connected their bedroom to and closed the door behind him.

Ned turned on the shower, letting the steam fill the room as he leaned over the sink and stared at his disheveled, sleep ridden form in the mirror. He noticed some things about himself that he really hadn't had time to before.

At just barely forty-years-old, Ned felt like he looked like he was at least forty. Stubble lined his still well defined his appearance just looked...different. His eyes had large bags under his eyes, that were dark in color and seemed to make his eyes look like they sunk into his face. He looked exhausted. Even broken hearted.

To him, he looked like a man who had weathered a long storm, almost like a twister. A really bad, soul destructing twister that had ruined him rubbed his face before moving away from the mirror and stripping, to jump in the shower. He stood under the hot stream and let the water soothe his still tired muscles. He was so wrapped in his own thoughts that he didn't hear the door open and close.

It wasn't until he felt the cold air rush in when Katie pushed opened the sliding glass door and stepped into the shower with him. They didn't say anything to each other, and she didn't look up at him as she stepped in front of him and into the spray of water.

They just stood there. Together, more exposed than they had been in weeks. To say intimacy was lacking in their relationship for the first time ever, would be an understatement. And until this moment, Ned hadn't really considered the impact of the lack of intimacy in their relationship.

They had been trying to get their footing back.

They had and were still merely trying to survive the cards they had been dealt this year.

He was the first to move. Ned slowly moved his arm and brought his fingers to rest under her chin, bringing her face up to look at him. And what he saw there, made his heart hurt. Katie's eyes looked so sad, so vacant, almost like no one was home.

She bit her lip as they stared at each other, and he moved his other hand to rest on her shoulder and pulled her against his naked chest. She didn't move as willingly as he wished and could feel the resistance in her stance.

Damn that distance, damn that space they had allowed to figuratively grow between the two of them. Damn it all. Damn mother nature, science, and for what it was worth, damn their pregnancies that kept ending badly. He wasn't sure if the wetness on his chest was the spray from the shower or his wife's tears.

He didn't care. As he held her against his chest, he couldn't help but allow the sobs from his mouth as well. He just held her against him and let himself feel for once, as much as the medication flowing through his bloodstream let him. He leaned down and kissed her over and over, trying not to scare her off but trying to just be with her in a way they hadn't been able to be in months.

The water rained down on them for moments on end, until Ned decided to make a bold move. He needed to see what she would do. He needed to see her. He needed to feel her, and there was only one way it was going to happen. He had to try. He placed his finger under her chin and brought her eyes to look at him.

He saw a vulnerability there and the same vacant look that had taken shelter in his wife's beautiful eyes. So he took a chance, right there in the shower, because he was feeling just so lost, vulnerable and exhausted that he just needed to act.

He leaned down and pressed a slow kiss to her lips, allowing his hands to graze down to her waist. She was hesitant at first, but she did kiss him back. Slowly she responded to his kiss, shakily allowing her own hands to come to rest on his shoulders.

He instantly pulled her closer to him, his hands wrapping around her back and her into his embrace. They lost themselves in the kiss, allowing themselves to get lost in each other in a way that they hadn't in such a long time. Katie gently brought her hand to the back of his neck as his kiss broke away from her lips and began to trail down her neck.

As he nipped and sucked, she allowed her head to lull to the side while her fingers pulled on the hairs at the back of his neck. "Ned," She whispered.

She heard him groan a little just as the hands on her waist drifted to her ass. They stayed like this for what seemed like forever before he pulled away from her and just looked down at her, head lulled to the side, her lips swollen and neck red from his kisses.

"Only in my dreams have you said my name like that again," he swallowed hard, smiling at her.

"I'm a terrible wife," she sighed and her hands ran through his wet strands of hair.

"You could never be terrible, Katie This has just been hard on both of us," he said as he lifted her up and pressed her against the shower before attacking her lips again.

She couldn't remember the last time she'd felt like this. Sure, they had been intimate with each other in the past few weeks every once and awhile. But it had been few and far between when the sadness briefly lifted.

And it was never...like this.

All of their other encounters were more desperate pleas to feel some semblance of normalcy in their lives, most likely in the middle of the night when one of them was restless and couldn't sleep.

But this...she hadn't felt like herself in a long time. Just looking at him brought an insatiable burning that started in the pit of her stomach and spread through her entire body. And she never wanted this feeling to leave her again.

Katie just wanted to be as close to Ned as possible at this moment because she knew all too well that this feeling would escape her as fleetingly as it came. She only hoped it stayed. She needed to keep feeling this way, she remembered endless and countless different times where they'd sneak around and she needed that back. She needed to just love her husband, after everything he's done for her.

Allowing her hands to play with the hair on the back of his neck as he responded eagerly to the kisses she was pressing to him. His hands were on her hips and she felt him pull her as close to him as possible. She didn't break her grasp on his neck and pulled him down closer to her. He began to drop kisses along her jaw, and even that sweet the spot behind her ear that drove her insane.

He always managed to find that spot. She wrapped her legs around his waist and clutched him to her, feeling how much he needed her just as much as she needed him. She always needed him. Ned slid into her it was almost like she was brought back to life. She panted as their movements got quicker, the pace increasing as both of them careened towards their climaxes.

He'd let his kisses and his hands wander over her, but as they neared the end he made his way back to her mouth and pressed hot, hard kisses there eventually letting his tongue enter her mouth and explore.

When it was over he stilled against her, trying not to let too much of his weight bear down on her against the shower wall. Her hands clutched his back, lightly grazing her nails along the skin she there as she tried to regulate her breathing.

He ran his fingers through her hair, moving pieces away from before letting his knuckles run absentmindedly along her cheek. "I love you" He whispered, leaning down to kiss her.

"I love you too," she smiled.

This was what life was supposed to be like.