One Month
"Michelle, just try to look at this objectively, all right? You're pregnant, you have no job and no family you can really rely on for support. I'm gonna be stuck in here for a very long time and I don't want you to feel obligated to have anything to do with me. If we get divorced, you can find someone else to support you, someone to be a real father to our child. I'm no use to you stuck in here."
"Tony, there's no call for objectivity where matters like this are concerned! I love you, and you are the father of my child, not anybody else. I am not going to divorce you, and even if I did... I have no chance in hell of ever finding anyone half as good as you."
"Look, you may feel that way now, but--"
"But if ever I don't, I'll be sure to tell you. Can we stop arguing about this now, please?"
Tony sighed and slowly shook his head. "Fine."
"Good. Now, what exactly is wrong with the name Charles?"
They had been exchanging letters on the subject of possible baby names. It was a little early in the pregnancy for this, admittedly, but it had given them something to focus on when otherwise they would have both been tiptoeing around the subject of Tony's imprisonment and trying to pretend that everything was normal, even though it so clearly wasn't.
"Come on, Charles? British nobility? And it just sounds... blah. Charles. It's not a strong name."
"And Hugh is?"
"That's different. Hugh is a family name."
"Fine, but Hugh is not a name I want to burden our child with. It's out of the running... along with Charles, by the looks of things."
"All right, but you're gonna have to give me a minute to come up with something else."
"You can have your minute while we talk about girls' names." Michelle looked down at her stomach. "What about... Olivia?"
"No, that just makes me think of John Travolta with bad hair."
"Elizabeth?"
"More British nobility."
"Leah?"
"The hair thing again. What about Abigail?"
"Abigail Almeida?"
"...Okay, I hadn't thought of that."
Michelle smiled. "All right, this is my last one... Zoe."
"Zoe Almeida."
"It doesn't sound too bad, does it?"
"No, it doesn't... but if this ends up being the girls' name, I get to choose the middle name."
"As long as it's not something like 'Hugh'... deal."
They grinned at each other through the glass.