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"Oh God, it's too early!" Evelyn gasped, "It's too early, Ben! I can't have the baby now, I can't! It'll be like Christopher all over again. I can't go through it again, I just can't!"

"It's all right, Evelyn," Ben tried to reassure her as he drove through the streets to the hospital, "It's going to be fine."

"It's my fault. We shouldn't have gone to the damn party!"

"It's not your fault," Ben said, "If it's anyone's fault it's mine."

"Why do you say that?" Evelyn turned her head to look at him.

Ben didn't reply, but he knew what he was talking about. He should never have made love to her. If anything it had probably brought on the labour. It was his fault this was happening.

"Ben…" she started crying, "Ben, is the baby going to be all right?"

"I don't know," he replied, reaching over and gripping her hand, "but I'm going to get you to the hospital, ok?" She nodded mutely and he turned back to concentrate on the road. It wasn't busy at this time of night, but it seemed as though every traffic light was against them, turning red the moment he drew near. He was tempted to just drive through them, but all he would need would be a cop car to start chasing him.

"Oh God, I'm sorry! I'm sorry about everything I ever said or did! Please, please don't let me lost my baby!" Evelyn closed her eyes and sobbed, "Please don't let me lose my baby!"

"Evelyn, it's going to be all right," he reassured her.

"You don't know that! You told me you didn't know that! Oh, Ben, please, make it stop!"

"I can't!" he said, sharper than he intended, "I wish I could." Evelyn cried out as another contraction swept painfully through her, "Evelyn? Evelyn?"

"Oh…God…" she replied, before slipping into unconsciousness.

"Evelyn?" he tried to rouse her, but to no avail, so he put his foot down and drove as fast as possible towards the hospital. He didn't even stop to think about finding a parking space, instead drove straight into the ambulance bay and pulled the car to a screeching halt.

"Sir, you can't park here," a well meaning paramedic informed him almost immediately.

"It's my wife!" Ben replied, climbing out and running around to the passenger side, "She's in labour!"

"Yeah we get that a lot," the paramedic replied, "but that still doesn't mean…"

"She's unconscious!" he retorted, pulling open the passenger door, "and she's not full term!"

"Ok," the paramedic replied, "ok, bring her in here!"

Ben leant in and lifted Evelyn out of the passenger seat and hitched her up into his arms. He followed the paramedic inside who shouted for someone to come and help them. Two nurses hurried forward, one pushing a gurney.

"Put her down here," she instructed him, "What's her name?"

"Evelyn," Ben said weakly as a doctor came forward.

"How many weeks along is she?" he asked brusquely.

"Uh…twenty eight," he replied, "is she going to be all right?" The doctor didn't answer him, "Is she going to be all right?" he asked again.

The doctor turned to face him, "I believe your wife has suffered what we call a placental abruption."

"What's that?"

"It's where the placenta begins to separate from the uterine wall," the doctor continued, "it can be very serious for both mother and baby."

"What can you do?" Ben asked.

"We need to perform an emergency c-section right now…or they could both die."

The words sunk in and Ben felt himself gripped with fear, "But…can the baby survive this early?"

The doctor frowned, his grey eyebrows knitting above his watery eyes, "I can't tell you for certain, but I can tell you that neither will survive if we don't do this."

Ben nodded, "Ok."

"What's happening?" Evelyn mumbled, slowly beginning to come round.

"It's ok, Evelyn," the nurse soothed her, "we're going to have to perform a C-section to help your baby."

"No…" she moaned, "no I don't want a c-section."

"There's no other option, Evelyn," the doctor said, "we have to do this or your baby's going to die."

"No…" Evelyn started to cry, "No…Ben…"

"They have to do it, Evelyn," Ben said gripping her hand and leaning in to her, "they have to do it to save the baby." The nurses started to push the gurney along the corridor and he hurried along beside it, still holding her hand. "You're going to be fine, sweetheart, you're going to be just fine."

"You'll have to wait here," the nurse told him as they reached the doors.

"No!" Evelyn said forcefully, "No, I want him with me!"

"You can't, Evelyn, I'm sorry."

"No, I want him with me!" she gripped onto his hand with such force he felt pain, "No!"

"Evelyn, I'll be right here waiting for you, I promise," he told her, "I promise."

"No, don't leave me!" she screamed as the nurses tried to pry their hands apart, "You promised me you'd never leave me! You promised me!"

"Someone will come down and speak to you," the nurse told him, "once the operation's completed."

"You promised you wouldn't leave me!" Evelyn screamed, "You bastard, Stone! You promised me!" Her hand slipped out of his, "You promised me!" They pushed the gurney through the doors and Ben could only stand and watch as she flailed wildly on the gurney and screamed back at him, "You promised me!"

When she had disappeared from sight, he sank down wearily in one of the nearby plastic chairs, put his head in his hands and sobbed.

SSSS

"Mr Stone? Mr Stone?" he felt hands shaking him, "Mr Stone, wake up."

Ben jerked suddenly awake and saw the nurse standing in front of him. She smiled gently. "Evelyn…" he bolted upright.

"She's fine. She's recovering well."

"And the baby?" he held his breath.

"You have a little girl," she told him.

"A girl…" Ben echoed, "She was right…" he looked up at the nurse, "Is she all right?"

"She's premature, and her lungs haven't properly developed, so we've put her in the special care baby unit. Would you like to see her?" He nodded, and the nurse led him up the stairs to another part of the hospital. They stood outside a door which had a secure entry system. "You'll need to put one of these on," she handed him a gown, "It's to stop cross contamination."

Ben nodded and did as he was told. Then he followed the nurse inside, past rows of incubators to the far corner. All he could see was a tiny bundle of pink lying in the middle, with wires and tubes seemingly coming from every orifice. He felt his heart contract violently.

"I know it looks frightening," the nurse said, as if reading his thoughts, "but they're all helping her."

He looked down at his daughter, "How long will she have to stay here?"

"At least a month, assuming she gains weight as we would hope. Of course there's always the risk of complication with premature babies…" she broke off at his look, "but there's always great joy too." He smiled tightly. "Why don't I take you to see your wife?"

They headed back out of the unit and towards the maternity unit. Evelyn was in a room by herself and there was an IV running out of one arm. When she saw him, she looked up fearfully, "Ben…?"

"The baby's fine," he told her, "she's a little fighter."

"She?"

"Yeah," he said, sitting on the edge of the bed, "it's a girl."

Evelyn smiled, "I told you so."

"How are you feeling?"

"Like I've just had a baby ripped out of my stomach," she joked. Then her face grew serious, "I shouldn't have said…I mean I…"

"It's ok," he reassured her, pushing a lock of hair back from her face, "It doesn't matter."

"No, it does," she insisted, "I shouldn't have said it. I know it wasn't your fault and I know…you would never willingly leave me."

"No," he agreed, "I wouldn't."

"I want to see the baby," she said suddenly.

"She's in the special care unit," the nurse who had been standing in the background stepped forward, "and you're not well enough to leave bed…"

"I want to see my little girl!" Evelyn demanded angrily.

"Evelyn, you should listen to the nurse." Ben said.

"I want to see her!" Hot tears poured down her cheeks. "Ben, please, I want to see her."

Ben looked helplessly at the nurse who shook her head, "Maybe later."

"It's not fair!" Evelyn buried her head against his chest and sobbed, "It's not fair!"

"I know," he said, stroking her hair gently, "I know."

SSSS

It was the following morning before Evelyn was allowed to get out of bed and go to the special care unit to see the baby. She hadn't wanted to go in a wheelchair and had kicked up such a fuss that Ben had had to tell her sharply to knock it off. She had shut up almost instantly, cowed by his bad temper.

"I'm sorry," he said, almost instantly, bending and kissing her, "I didn't mean it. Come on, let's go." He pushed her down the corridors along to the unit.

"How small is she?" Evelyn asked.

"She's…small."

"Does she have lots of tubes and things?"

"Yes."

"Oh God…" Evelyn put her hands over her face, "I'm not sure I can bear it!"

Ben stopped the wheelchair and crouched down in front of her, "I know it's frightening," he told her, "but she's our little girl, and she's here, and she needs us to be strong for her."

Evelyn nodded mutely and they continued on their way to the special care unit. At the door, they gowned up and then he pushed her inside. When they reached the incubator where their baby was, he could see her expression of fear reflected in the glass.

"There she is," he murmured gently.

Evelyn didn't say anything for a long moment. She sat looking in at their daughter, one hand gently touching the sides of the glass crib. "She's tiny." Ben nodded, "She's got hair."

"I reckon she looks like you, what do you think?" he asked her.

Evelyn smiled tearfully, "She's certainly good looking. But I reckon she takes after her daddy too." She turned to look at him and he dropped a soft kiss on her cheek. "We never did decide on a name."

"Well, once you got passed your Lucinda's and Marilyn's…"

"I like those names!" she protested.

"Well I don't, and neither does she. I'm her Dad. I've gotta stick up for her," Ben replied.

"What would you want to call her then?"

"What about Jennifer?"

Evelyn wrinkled her nose, "It's not very…"

"Very what?"

"Very…grand…"

"It doesn't have to be grand," he told her, "it should be simple."

Evelyn paused, "Jenny," she mused, "I like Jenny."

SSSS

Jenny Kathryn Stone was a fighter. The doctors and nurses were amazed at her progress. She came on in leaps and bounds and suffered few of the ailments that traditionally affected premature babies. She opened her eyes quickly, she gained weight rapidly and when Evelyn was preparing to leave hospital, she joked that she was afraid to leave Jenny behind in case she caused trouble.

Being in the apartment without the baby felt strange for both of them. Ben would often catch Evelyn standing at the window just looking out at the view, oblivious to whatever he said to her.

"You know we're going to get her home soon," he told her as she lay in bed one night staring at the ceiling, "You should get some sleep while you still can."

Evelyn looked over at him, "She's doing well, isn't she?"

"You heard what the doctors have been saying. She's a little miracle."

"What if that's just because she's in hospital?" Evelyn's face was worried, "What if when she comes home it all goes wrong?"

"It's not going to go wrong," he pulled her into his arms, "she's going to be fine and when we bring her home, it's going to be the best day of our lives."

He felt her smile against him, "What would I do without you?"

"Be poor and hungry?" Evelyn laughed, "and I promise that I'm going to give you all the support I can. Albert says I can take as long as necessary off work." Evelyn didn't say anything, "We're in this together, remember?"

"Yeah," Evelyn replied quietly, "together."

SSSS

"Your grandmother hates me," Evelyn told her daughter a fortnight later as she sat with her in the hospital nursery.

"Don't tell her that!" Ben protested, "It's not true, Jenny. Your mother's lying."

"I'm not lying," Evelyn said, "she's never liked me. But she loves you," she told Jenny, "I thought I'd never see you again when she grabbed you that day."

Helen, one of the nurses who had helped to look after Jenny appeared at the door, "Giving Mom and Dad a hard time?"

"No, she's great," Evelyn said.

"You can take her home tomorrow," Helen said.

Evelyn and Ben both looked up sharply, "Really?" the former asked.

"Absolutely," she said, grinning, "Jenny's a little fighter and she deserves to go home with her mom and dad."

"Hear that, Jen?" Evelyn whispered, "you're coming home with us tomorrow." She looked up at Ben and smiled, "We can take her home."

"Just think," Helen said, "It's the first day of the rest of your lives together. As a family."

Evelyn hugged her daughter to her, "That's all I've ever wanted. A proper family."