And so we come to the final chapter of this story. I hope you have enjoyed it, despite the technical hitches around chapter 9. Hope you're all well and stay safe.
She Knew
Chapter 10
Hard.
She knew it was gonna be.
She had expected that.
Draining; she knew that too, but she also knew it was doing some good. Well it was doing her some good at least. Each session she came away more confident, less muddled than before. More certain that those mistakes of the past would never be repeated again.
However, it wasn't like that for both of them. Molly wasn't so sure about Charles benefiting from it at all, but still he went. For her, for them, and each fortnight after their counselling session he came away drained, exhausted and full of remorse. For hours afterwards he was quiet and unable to connect with her for a while. He needed time to recover, and she knew she had to respect that.
Still he continued to go with her. He saw, and he knew how it helped her. The confessions, the discussions, and the contrition they both admitted to had helped. He knew it helped heal her heart and it helped to easy her worries. And he knew each step helped with their new future together.
So, they stuck at it. He did it all for her, she knew that.
And so, every other week on a Friday afternoon Molly was give time off by the Army and drove the long journey down to see Charles. To see Charles and the counsellor they had chosen to work with. Fitting in to the last session of her working day to discuss their inner feelings and thoughts.
They never missed, not once, and this week's session had been no exception. It had been long, draining and emotional. They had confronted a complexed demon in their heads, and had broached the disconcerting issue of their future together. It was scary and enlightening stuff.
Yet she knew his feelings on this most recent session varied from hers, and as they walked into his home that evening she saw the utter deflation he was experiencing, and she knew no matter how beneficial she found it the sessions couldn't go on forever. She couldn't have him suffer, feeling guilty about everything when maybe just maybe he wasn't wholly to blame.
If she was honest, and if he was too, she knew that lately there were some sessions when he'd actually come away a bit brighter than he had today. And the fact he seemed to have taken a step back after today's session worried her. It always worried her when she saw how he started to withdraw.
"So, think I've decided on the pram." She said as he flicked through the TV channels absently .
He had said very little to her all evening, so she tried to engage him in a conversation.
"It's the one your Mum said we should get." She joked.
He only nodded and made no comment. This surprised her. He had so far wanted to be involved in everything to do with the baby. And had enjoyed the numerous conversations they had around buying stuff for their child.
Molly was now 27 weeks pregnant, and very much showing. They was no avoiding it now.
Both his Mum and hers had for the past several weeks been busy telling them repeatedly that they needed to start buying for the baby. Both sets of parents were anxious about their futures and plans, and frequently pushed them to consider things both Molly and Charles were too relaxed about to consider. Or too scared to address.
Still his mum, Jenny had always been an organisation freak, and wasn't to be put off. Having made her presence very much known throughout all of Molly's pregnancy, she even presented herself at Molly's one weekend to force the issue of preparing and took them both shopping.
"Of course, it's the most expensive one." She continued to joked. Anything to try to get him to smile. "Just as well they are buying it." She teased.
He briefly nodded but didn't smile. It hurt. It brought back memories.
"What's up?" She kindly asked snuggling onto him. Trying to gain a connection. "Was today too much?"
"Yes. But no." He answered. "Sometimes it helps. Others it doesn't." He tried to explain. "But todays wasn't that bad."
"So, this?" She cricked her neck to look at him. "Your silent brooding act ain't about today then?"
"No." He shifted from her and moved slightly forward. Effectively causing her to involuntarily roll off him and away from him.
"I've my next set of orders." He said quietly as he focused on a patch of carpet in front of him. Scrubbing his hand through his hair as though it would help.
"Catterick?" She asked hopefully, moving forward with a burst of premature excitement, but as soon as the words were out of her mouth she knew.
"No." He turned and stared at her with an utterly sorrowful face. "Cyprus."
"Cyprus?" She belated out. "You're being deployed there?"
"No." Again he shook his head. "I'm being posted." He added with sorrow.
"Crap. Posted!" She knew that mean it was all going to shit.
Postings meant long spells away from the UK. Leaving behind the old and starting afresh. He'd need to build a new life, in a new world.
A new world away from her, and away from their baby.
"When?" She asked trying to process it all. It all was wrong.
"In about 6-9 months." He answered passing her the file with the details over to her. "No definite leaving date as yet. But one's coming."
"Do you know for long?" She asked the question, but she knew she didn't want the answer.
"Two to three years." He hung his head and he announced their separation sentence. "That's the minimum."
"Oh." Was her only reply, and she sat next to him in silence chewing her nails.
Cyprus. It had been a posting, something they had discussed years ago. In the early days of their marriage when everything seemed possible. It was a posting that they had both seriously considered. She knew he had wanted this then; she just didn't realise that he still did.
"Did you ask for it?" She believed she knew the answer.
"Yes. Years ago. After you... after we. Thought it would be good to get away." He admitted. Still with his head turned away from her he added. "I forgot it was still even an active request on my file. Until yesterday."
"Can you appeal?" She hoped. "Extenuating circumstances and that. You know me and the baby?"
"I can. And I bloody will." He turned and squeezed her hand. "But I doubt it will do any good though." He stood and walked to the window. "After all I asked for it. My boss very much reminded me of that when he told me of the news."
"So, no Catterick!" She confirmed. "That's a non-starter?"
"No." He turned and looked at her leaning on the windowsill. "No Catterick."
"Oh." She knew she needed time to process.
Their plans, their future has just taken a huge step change and they both felt powerless and bruised by it.
They said no more for hours. She knew there was no point. She knew he was angry. Hated losing control and she knew he'd be hurt that he'd disappointed her, them and their future again.
She watched him move around the bedroom that night. Slowly getting ready for bed.
"I could come with you." She said brightly. Her only option she felt. "Ask for a transfer too."
She looked at him hopefully as he walked across the bedroom and sat down in front of her on his bed.
He kissed her slowly and briefly.
"Thank you." He managed to say. Then pulled away. "Yes, I guess you could." He smiled kindly at her, and then she saw his face cloud over. "But I don't know if that would help."
She went to speak and he gently placed his finger on her lips. Smiling at her.
"It's taken me two years for my request to be approved." He explained. "I could be over there for months before you were even considered. Besides your role out there... well it may not exist. The RAF usually have that area covered."
She knew what he was saying was true. Even if she requested tomorrow there was no guarantee that it would happen for her at all. Besides she was pregnant, due to give birth soon, all things that potentially could hold back her posting potential for a while.
She watched his sad face. They both knew how damaging this was to them. That it was potentially the worst that could happen to them. Her heart hurt thinking about losing him all over again, and she could see his was too.
"I was planning to do this alone." She said bravely. Hoping that the words would make it alright. "I guess now I'm just going to have to do as first planned."
She hadn't meant to anger him, she was trying to make light of the situation, and her mouth engaged before her brain did.
"For fuck sale Molly. This isn't something we can just brush off." He shouted at her. Then he spun around. Doubt crossing his face. "Unless this is what you wanted after all."
"No! No it ain't Charles." She moved towards him, shocked he could even think that was how she meant it. "Don't you know me?" She held on tightly to him. "Don't you know that's not what I want."
She watched him calm down and sink once more on to the bed. She hated that he had misunderstood her intentions. That he hadn't realised she was just trying to be brave. For him. For them.
"We'll find a way." She went on as she joined him on the edge of the bed.
She smiled when he nodded. Feeling as though he had calmed down. His next words shocked her though.
"I can only think that there's one way this can work." She looked at him with curiosity. Wondering about the solution he was to suggest. "I leave. Simple." He stated.
"You leave? The Army?" She watched as he nodded. "Don't be stupid Charles."
"Why?" He asked with utter wonder. "Why is that stupid Molly? I want a life with you. I want to be in this baby's life. I can't do that if I'm a fucking Cyprus now can I?"
"You love the Army." She spat out still shocked.
"I love you Molly more than the Army." He threw back.
And she knew he did, and she knew what he was doing.
Once before he had chosen the Army over her, and he lost her. She knew it was something he was never going to do again.
She understood the truth of his words and she knew at that moment she had no argument.
They stared at each other. Waiting. Hoping the other had something, some way out of it all, but neither spoke.
"I'm sorry Charles." She sobbed onto his chest after a while. "I'm so sorry."
He stroked her hair.
"I am too Molly. So sorry, but I'll sort it I promise."
She nodded as her tears wetted his t shirt further.
"How about we just think about it. For a while." She offered. "We've got nine months or so. Let's just see what happens."
"Yeah." He said with total false hope. "Let's just see what happens." But he knew. He knew that there was only a few options open to them and each one would cause heart break of its own.
She kept the news from her Mum, and he kept it from Jenny. For now.
They both knew they did not need the extra complication of their options in their lives.
For the next few weeks they went about life with what they could control and planned and prepared for the arrival of their child.
Both pretending that the grey cloud of doom his posting had cast over them wasn't really there as best they could.
Still it didn't stop them from catching each other's mood every now and then and a sadness fell about them.
She watched him struggle for weeks.
She knew he tried everything. Pulled every string he knew, but nothing helped. Captain Charles James was being posted at the end of October of that year, and the Army expected him to stay there for a minimum of three years.
She tried to.
She knew she had to. She talked to her bosses but was kindly turned down. Her role, her skill were not necessary out there for now. She was given only a tiny sliver of hope when they suggested maybe one day in the future... just not now.
"It's hopeless." He said one night after his final idea had been turned down and given the negative. "I'm going."
She sat watching him. He stroked her rounded belly as chewed on his bottom lip. Deep in thought.
"No hope at all?" She asked.
He shook his head.
"The only hope I've been offered is if we were married then things might be different."
She said nothing. The same had fleetingly been suggested to her. That as a married couple they'd have more chance of going together.
And that when she knew. She knew that she needed once again to consider what she wanted and the future she needed.
She had watched him as the weeks went by.
He ran a little bit harder and faster each day. He spent more hours on his e mails, and phone each night. He spent more time searching through documents and files at night as they sat on the sofa. All attempts to find something. Anything that would keep them together.
She knew leaving him would be hard. And so together they made the decision that she would start her maternity leave early and move in with him. Spend as much time as possible together that they could. While they still could.
Each day they both tried but there still was an unhappiness to everything that they did.
When it came, she knew it was a brilliant idea. She was a little bit annoyed that she hadn't really thought about it before. She knew that this was the answer to the problem but had never taken it seriously before.
But she also knew that she wasn't doing it just to solve their problem. She was doing it now because she really wanted to.
It had been Sam who had first put the idea into her head. He didn't mean to do it, but once he had the idea grew and grew in her mind. She knew she needed to act on it.
It had all started at a James' family get together. One Sunday afternoon at his parent's house. Standing in the front room, 36 weeks pregnant, tired and uncomfortable she put on her best show laughing and joking with his family. His mother's idea. A pre baby celebration and one Molly and Charles couldn't say no to.
It was then it happened. The answer to their problem.
Sam was trying to introduce Molly to a second cousin twice removed, someone she hadn't met before, and she knew he struggled to do so. She watched as Sam struggle to know just how to introduce her exactly.
She didn't step in immediately. She tried to get him to figure it out on his own. Her thoughts were elsewhere momentarily as she threw a distracted smile to Charles at the other side of the room.
Sam was now a growing teenager, a carbon copy of Charles and just like his father his social skills were impeccable and he was trying to do the right thing.
As he brought Molly over to meet the errant relative Sam struggled to define exactly who Molly now was in their lives again. Unsure whether or not to introduce Molly has his ex stepmother, or his Dad's girlfriend, and in the end he just introduced her as just Molly. A friend of the family. Who was having his Dad's baby.
The second cousin twice removed struggled with an appropriate reply to this declaration as to who she was and moved away unsure and embarrassed.
And that's when she knew. That's when she knew she had to do something about it. She had to define who she was in Sam's, in Charles', in everyone's lives once again. For their future, and their baby's.
And so, she set the wheels in motion. Determined and certain this was the right thing for them. To show the world once again who they were.
As she made her plans she kept it simple. It was how she wanted it, but she also knew if the tables were turned he probably would've come up with exactly the same idea too. She knew this was his true hearts desire, but she also knew that potentially he was still too scared to ask her again for that commitment. Never wanting to scare her again so she would run. So, this option, the only sensible option was one he didn't, hadn't, wanted to broach.
"Married." He almost shouted at her when she explained the news to him. "Married?" He said again, totally confused by her statement. "In two weeks?"
He turned and stopped what he was doing. Molly thankful that he did so as she was fearful of the work shirts he was ironing bearing the brunt of his emotions.
"Is that honestly what you've just said to be Molly? That you want to marry me in two weeks time?"
She smiled and moved closer to him. Hardly unable to contain her giggles of happiness. Moving the iron out of harms way, she held his hands.
"Yes, that's what I said. And I really mean it." She stood her ground looking at him. Searching his face for a response.
He shook his head and she could see her words had quite shocked him. She could only smile the more as she watched his brain compute what she meant.
Finally, he asked, and it surprised her.
"Why Molly? Why do you want to marry me?" He asked and his self doubt was painful to hear.
"Bleeding hell!" She threw her arms up in the air in mock exasperation. "I thought I was being romantic going ahead and organising it. I thought this is what you wanted?"
He moved closer to her and squeezed her arms for reassurance.
"Yes it is. You know it is." He reassured her. "But with everything that's going to happen Molly why?"
"Because I love you, you numpty!" She said definitely as she stepped up to him, held on to his arms now giving him a brief kiss on his cheek. "Because you're going to be the father of my baby. And because I don't want to lose you again; and if we're married there's a bigger chance I can come with you!"
He dipped his head down and rested his forehead on hers.
"Is that why you want to do this? Because you think you're going to lose me? You think this is the only way the Army will allow you to be with me? To marry me!"
"No!" She said quickly, then paused. "I guess well... yes I am. We're up against it, you me and this little one. Aren't we?" She moved her hands to her bump. "Seven months time you're going to be there... in Cyprus... without us. I'm going to be left here alone with our baby. And I don't want that. I want to be with you. We want to be with you. Always."
"You know I'm still trying Molly. I'm trying to come up with solution. I'll leave the Army if I have to." He tried to reassure her. "But if you want us getting married just so you're not alone that's not the reason...that's not how I want to do it. We'll work something out. Something else instead."
She pulled away and held onto his face. She knew he was scared.
"Listen to me Charles James. I want to marry you. I want to marry you because I love you. I want to marry you because it's what we should be to each other in our lives. Man and wife. Please believe me the first and main reason I want to marry you is because I love you. I want to be your wife." She stepped back a little to watch him.
"I really don't know what to say Molly. I'm just so shocked." But she saw a smile start to appear at the corner of his mouth as he really took on her words.
"Well you could start by saying yes!" She giggled. "Here I am proposing to you. Trying to be romantic and that, and all you can do is to throw problems at me."
He threw his head back and laughed. Then grabbed her into a happy hug, and slowly breathed out with his chin resting on her head.
"Of course, I'll bloody marry you Molly." Charles laughed out. "I'll marry you tomorrow if you want." He said stroking her hair.
"Nah. Two weeks. That what I'm asking." She tipped her head up to look at him. "Any sooner and folks will think we rushed into it." She laughed as they eyed the bump stuck out between them.
And so that's just what they did. And she knew it would be perfect.
She had planned a simple registry office ceremony. It wasn't attended by anybody apart from Brains and Sam who were the witnesses.
She knew neither of them wanted their families to be there this time.
She knew they both wanted it to be so very different from last time.
The first time they had got married it was a big wedding. Lots of guests, lots of military and lots of fuss. It hadn't been them. It had been more of their family's day than theirs. But they loved it anyway despite it all.
This time she made sure it was the opposite. It involved just the two of them, their witnesses, and no one else. And by doing it this way she knew; they both knew it meant so much more.
The first time they married they truly believed their promises to be with each other for ever. They both meant it. It was just that life had gotten in the way.
But this time. The second time they did it, they knew now they had the love and determination to face anything life threw at them. They knew that they had survived the worst and they knew that they could survive it together again. And this time it really would be for always.
And so, on the 13th of April Molly Dawes became Molly James once again.
A name she knew she'd keep forever. Heavily pregnant but very happy. Charles in a nice smart suit and Molly in a fancy dress that she worried to the last moment as to whether she'd fit into it.
There was no reception, there was no celebration. There was just the two of them happy together walking hand-in-hand, planning their future together again.
Before, the first time, they had married, he had given her his heart and his name. This time she knew she had both of those again, but she also knew she had so much more.
She knew that she really had somebody who she could walk through the rest of her life with. She knew that they were meant to be together. And she knew no one and nothing would ever come between them again.