Disclaimer: I don't own 'The Bill'

The Noble Fight

She awoke without explanation, glancing at the clock to find it was a little after three and she was no longer alone in the bed. Sometime in the last three hours, Max had joined her, now asleep on top of the blankets with his arms crossed under the pillow and his face turned towards her. She realized Max had fallen asleep watching her sleep and smiled softly, pushing herself up against the headrest to notice he hadn't even removed his shoes. Smothering a small, lop-sided smile, she pushed back the covers and stepped out of bed. It was a cold night, but Millie didn't feel it, just tugging his laces undone with two quick movements then depositing his shoes on the floor. He made a move as they thudded to the ground, almost like he knew she hadn't placed them beside the bed where he usually did (she called it OCD, he called it organised), but didn't wake. With a shake of her head, she pulled a blanket up over him, not that he ever felt the cold anyway then took the opportunity to give the room across the hall a glance. Oscar was fast asleep, laying on his back with his mouth open and Millie smiled at him, pushing his teddy bear Jo Jo Bear back into his arms. He moved, hugging the bear to him, but slept on. Giving him one more look she stepped back out of his room and into hers where the small bedside lamp Max had obviously turned on when he'd entered gave the room a soft orange glow. Flicking it off, Millie rounded the bed back to her side and crawled back under the warm covers, glancing at Max's dark figure in the darkness.

Five years earlier, back when the extent of their contact had been one shared case and a few choice comments from PC Mel Ryder, she never would have imagined being here. Of course, it wasn't perfect by a long way, but it was good. Even if her mother hated him, he worked far too many hours, and she would have to face the decision of putting Oscar in full-time day-care or leaving work in a few months when her maternity leave ran out. All of it she could deal with.

Her mother was her biggest issue. Elizabeth Brown had always been a snob, something Millie reminded her mother every day, but she'd only got worse after she first met Max. It had been a meeting that gone steadily downhill from the opening sentence to the moment Millie had texted Mel to call and pretend she was needed at the station and that they'd have to leave immediately. Of course Elizabeth loved her grandson, completely ignoring the fact that apart from the hair colour, Oscar was every bit his father, but the one thing she couldn't deal with was something Millie and Oscar had picked up from Max's mother – speaking Polish. One afternoon earlier that year when Millie and Oscar had been visiting her mother, Oscar had accidently called Elizabeth 'babcia', the Polish word for grandmother. Elizabeth had over-reacted, pulling Millie aside and giving her a lecture.

"Amelia, what are you teaching this boy?"

Millie had cast her eyes to the sky and sighed. "Mum, stop it, he's still learning which word is which."

"He shouldn't even be speaking it. He's English. British. His mother is British, his father is British therefore he is British."

"No, he's one-quarter Polish and he's not going to be ashamed of his background." Elizabeth went to continue but Millie cut her off. "No mother, end of discussion. If you don't want him speaking Polish in your house, I'll tell him to watch his words, but you are not going to make him forget where his family come from." She walked away then, something she never would have done to her mother before, and returned to watch her son playing with a new toy car on the living room floor. Eventually Elizabeth had returned, focusing on the child and giving Millie a stern look every time she met her daughter's eye. Millie ignored it, feeling she'd achieved something by standing up to her mother.

Unlike Elizabeth, Max's mother Isabella was the nicest woman she'd ever met, something that had caused Millie to remark the first time she'd met her 'so where do your bad manners come from?', a comment met with the smallest hint of a smile from Max. Isabella molly-coddled her only grandchild and never let him from her sight, teaching him Polish songs and phrases. Oscar was a natural, picking up the language easily. But then he'd always been a bright boy, far beyond his years. It was a problem Millie faced with him at Preschool, facing a parent whose child had just been insulted by Oscar. Of course, Oscar's insults were usually backhanded comments the other child didn't understand and would react badly to. Nonetheless Millie forced him to apologize, at which point he'd trudge up to the child, lower his eyes to the floor, stick out his bottom lip, roll his shoulders forward then mumble out 'sorry' with each syllable (he usually broke sorry up into two, but she'd once heard it become three) dripping with sarcasm. Every time she watched him she tried not to smile. It was an apology he'd borrowed from his father, Max only using it once when he'd forgotten to pick up milk despite being reminded every five minutes before he left. She'd rewarded the move with a smack from a tea towel and he hadn't tried it again. Still, it worked wonders for Oscar and he used it regularly, even on his own parents. It never worked then, Millie disciplining him and Max teaching him the real way to stick that bottom lip out to look even more faux-sorry.

Oscar was Max's one weak point. He could spend all day locking up criminals, threatening suspects, fighting off men larger than himself with just his fists and wit, but he couldn't discipline Oscar. Whenever the two-year-old mucked up, chucked a tantrum or used the hallway walls as his own personal art portfolio, Max would simply say 'he's acting up again' then pretend he never saw a thing, leaving Millie to deal with the child. Because of that Max was Oscar's favourite and that sometimes annoyed Millie, but then Max didn't abuse the power, reminding Oscar every day that heroes are only heroes if they're nice to their mum. And because every word Max said to the boy was a message of utmost importance, Oscar was good to his mum, ensuring that in every picture he drew of his father fighting crime and saving the day, there would be Millie off to the side, watching on. He drew her as an angel and explained every time he did so that 'heroes need helpers and you're daddy's helper mummy'.

Of course Oscar didn't know that the reason he was even here was because, five years earlier, his father had been mummy's helper instead. He'd been there when she needed it, and then every day after that as well. He'd never left.

"Mill?" A whisper in the darkness caused Millie to wake from her thoughts and she glanced sideways at the figure beside her.

"Yeah?" She returned softly, letting him know she was awake.

"Sorry I woke you." He murmured, sounding very much half-asleep.

"You didn't wake me." She smiled, sliding further down under the covers and turning to face him. "Lots of paperwork?" He murmured something that sounded like a yes, but he was so tired it was almost indiscernible. "Go back to sleep, you sound horrible."

He gave a small hiss of a laugh. "Mill, I…" he paused, struggling to form the words in his half-asleep state. Millie looked at him; knowing whatever was coming wasn't what she'd been waiting five years to hear.

Still Max hadn't once muttered the three little words she'd said more than once about him. She knew he could say it, she'd heard him say it to Oscar once, but still she waited for her turn. Not that she really needed to hear it, his actions so far had told her he felt it, but it would still be nice to hear it at least once.

As she predicted though, tonight would not be that night.

She settled for what she got instead. "I miss you too." Then, with the touch of his hand on her arm, Max rolled on his back and went back to sleep. With a half-pout, half-smile, Millie rolled over, fluffed her pillow, and closed her eyes as well.