000 Disclaimer, I own nothing, at all, not a sausage 000 Huge thanks to The Libran Iniquity for her help with this chapter and huge thanks to Cha Oseye Tempest Thrain for betaing this for me. Also thanks to the following for their reviews! Gabi2035, windrider (you made me blush so badly!), lilmizzcleo, KUgirl, Lieutenants-Lady (Yeah, messing with Malcolm is fun!...that sounded wrong actually...:P), tata and The Libran Iniquity (Look! Look! Look at the updating joy and happiness! This is actually ruining my slow updating rep, but maths exam left me depressed :P) 000

The day after I'd finally broken down I convinced Trip to go home. I wanted to be alone with my children – after spending a sleepless night dwelling on all my shortcomings as a father I finally had some idea of what to say.

I faltered at Jonas' door. We hadn't exactly been on speaking terms recently; in fact he hadn't said a word to me since he walked in on me in the kitchen. I didn't even know why he had come downstairs in the first place.

He was reading when I entered, sort of curled up on his bed with his back facing the door.

"Jonas?"

He sat up and stared at me.

"Can I sit down?"

He nodded and made space for me to perch on the end of his bed.

"I heard what you said to Uncle Trip," he said gazing at me. "I've never heard you cry like that before."

I shifted uncomfortably. "I don't cry like that very often." Very true, I didn't cry like that on a daily basis and certainly not in front of people like I had done the night before last. "I didn't mean to scare you."

"I wasn't scared!" Jonas visibly bristled and he glared at me.

"Startled then," I amended, resisting the urge to smirk. He really could be so like his mum sometimes...

"Was it because of mum?" he asked shifting a little closer.

I nodded. "I miss her."

"I didn't think you missed her," said Jonas sounding surprised. "You didn't cry or anything and you never talked about mum. You didn't even like it when somebody else talked about her!"

"That doesn't mean I don't miss her." God only knows how much I miss Hoshi. I do anything to have her back…anything.

Jonas seemed satisfied with my answer. But he still kept his distance.

"Are you angry because you thought I don't care…or are you angry because she died and not me?" I asked finally.

Jonas looked away and said his response so quietly I couldn't hear it.

"What was that?" I asked lightly, touching him on the shoulder.

"Why did she have to die?" he whispered looking up again. "Why couldn't it have been someone else?"

This I had an answer for. "Because accidents happen. We can't predict when and where and we can't predict who will get hurt. It wasn't someone purposely setting out to hurt mum. It was a terrible, terrible accident and there hasn't been a day gone by that I haven't asked why she was taken and not me. If I could've taken her place I would've done. But I didn't and now I'm left to do the best job I can."

He didn't have anything to say to this and I panicked momentarily wondering if I'd said the right thing-if there was ever a right thing to say.

"I don't hate you," he said eventually. "A little bit before, but I don't hate you now."

"I know." Blatant, blatant lie, I thought, he hated me with every fibre of his being. Still, I might as well persevere with the conversation, considering I still had a million and one clichés to trot out yet.

Jonas suddenly crawled into my lap and hugged me. "I want mum back," he whispered burying his face in my shoulder.

"Me too, Me too."

I held him a while then said "We still need to talk about the fighting though…but not right now."

Jonas pulled away and stared at me. "Daaaaaad!"

Ok, so I had almost made it through a conversation without doing something stupid. I had almost managed to talk through some emotion, and I think I'd made a weeny bit of progress regarding my relationship with Jonas.

One small step for me, one giant leap for fatherkind!

"You can always talk to me Jonas," I said.

"What if I don't want to talk to you?" he asked a ghost of a grin on his face.

"I haff vays of making you talk," I replied smiling. Jonas grinned, then his grin faded slightly.

"Dad?"

"Yeah?" I stared at him expectantly.

"Can we go visit mum?"

Whatever I was expecting him to ask it wasn't this. I knew he'd probably want to go see Hoshi's gravestone one day (not that there was anything in the grave beneath, it was more a memorial, her ashes had been spread elsewhere) but I didn't think it would be this soon. Ok, I was lying; I didn't want it to be this soon.

"Sure," I managed.

"Tomorrow?"

I nodded, although my heart sank. I wasn't ready to face Hoshi and if I may be completely childish here, there was a small part of me somewhere that was holding out for never having to face Hoshi. But then again, I'm a Reed, and so are my children. We don't run from anything... well, we might hide for a while first, but we always come out cannons blazing in the end!

He gave me a wide smile and another hug. He returned to his book and I got up to leave.

Sure, all our problems hadn't been solved. The best, most comforting words in the world couldn't solve the problem. At the risk of sounding clichéd, and like one of the buffed-up, idiotic Yanks in those stupid, stupid films they used to show on Movie Night, you never know what you've got until you come this close to having it pulled right out from under your feet. OK, so my kids weren't perfect. Honestly, I'd have been disappointed (and not a little suspicious!) if they had been. And it took something like the death of the one person I truly fell in love with for me to bond properly with my children.

I took the kids so Hoshi's gravestone the next day. Everything seemed so peaceful as I stared at the engraved words. Harry sighed and kept tight hold of my hand.

Jonas stared at the gravestone, his lips moving slightly but no sound escaped them.

"Is this where mummy is?" Harry asked quietly.

"Nah," said Jonas quickly. "But we can talk to her here, right Dad?"

"Of course," I agreed. Jonas seemed to have aged right before my eyes. In that moment he reminded me so much of Hoshi it hurt.

"D'ya think she was hurting?" Harry asked, louder this time.

"No." I knew that in her final moments lying sprawled out on the pavement Hoshi was probably in more pain than any person had any right to be in…but I wasn't going to tell Harry that. I might not have used the old 'Mummy's gone away' story when I told them Hoshi had…died. But I wasn't going to tell him that his mother probably died in agony.

He nodded apparently satisfied. Ella shifted slightly in her sleep and I adjusted my grip on her accordingly. Jonas moved slightly closer to the gravestone and just stared at it for a moment.

"Are you going back to work soon?" he asked suddenly whipping round to face me.

"I've got a little over a month left before I have to go back," I told them.

Jonas nodded, Harry walked over to him dropping my hand. I watched them cautiously.

"Bye mummy," said Harry quietly, gazing at the engraved words a moment before returning to my side. "Daddy, can we go home now?"

I watched Jonas a second. "You ready to go home, Jonas?"

He turned and nodded.

The journey home for once wasn't silent. Harry talked about everything; including the thoughts that popped into to his while he was speaking. It made for…interesting conversation to say the least, a conversation Jonas participated in minimally.

I finally understood why Harry had been so withdrawn though. Seeing him at Hoshi's gravestone had made me realise that all he really wanted to do was to say goodbye.

I suppose goodbyes bring closure.

I remained undecided about the psychologist though. It seemed to me like the psychologist was an easy way out, a way of understanding what was going on in their heads without actually making an effort to understand in the first place.

After the visit, Harry certainly seemed more like his old self, chatting away about anything and everything. Jonas was more reflective, but he didn't seem angry anymore. He didn't seem like he was ready to fight against me anymore and for that I was grateful.

I still had to discuss his behaviour at school though. I waited till Harry and Ella were safely tucked away in bed before broaching the subject.

"Jonas, remember when I said we needed to talk about you fighting at school?"

He sighed and flopped down on the sofa. "I didn't start it; it was all Danny Riley's fault."

I blinked. For one, I wasn't expecting him to say that and I also had no idea who Danny Riley was. "Why? What did he do?"

And so the entire story was poured out. It was a story of tragic heroes fighting vicious enemies who were seemingly relentless in their attack. I had to admit, Jonas could spin a good story when he wanted to.

"Alright," I said simply. "No lecture. But if I ever, ever get another call from school about you fighting son, the best story in the world wont save you from being punished, whether he provoked you or not."

"But you used to fight!" Jonas argued.

"Entirely different situation," I said. "Besides, I am trained to fight and you aren't."

"Can I learn then?"

I smiled. "Sure, son." Jonas beamed. "But not until you learn to stop scrapping on the playground."

Jonas scowled and switched on the TV. I watched him, grinning to myself.

I'm no fool. Jonas and I have still got a long way to go before we can get through all of this, wade through all of the problems and deal with them. Only Hoshi could solve the problem and she wasn't here so I'd have to improvise. Still, we had at least made a step in the right direction, a tiny, baby step…but it was progress none the less.

000 Please review! 000