I thought I'd do a chapter from Rayna's perspective. I know it's a little sad, but hey it's TV, the promise of future happiness is why you keep watching (or reading in this case).
Rayna lay in her bed trying not to let the tears trickle down once again. She hated crying, always did. It made her feel weak, and there was nothing she detested more than feeling weak. Her father had always tried to cast her in that role, and hell, even sometimes Tandy did as well. Rayna was the weaker one, the one who needed to be taken care of and protected. But despite her best efforts the tears still came.
She was alone in a hospital bed with two metal walkers by her bedside, black and blue bruises covering such a high percentage of her body that she wasn't sure what her real skin color was anymore. The man she loved was just inches away from her on the other side of the wall, but she'd never felt more far away from him in her life. Even when he was in rehab all those years ago, when she couldn't speak to him for weeks on end, when she wasn't sure he'd ever be the gentle, sensitive, and sober man she'd fell in love with again, she had always known that they loved each other, and no one could take that away from them. No matter what else was going on around them they could rely on each other, they could escape to their own private bubble where everything was okay.
Since Deacon had found out about Maddie everything had changed. The lost look of a man in love had disappeared and been replaced with first a drunken sneer, and most recently, a deep sadness that she knew could only be blamed on her. She hadn't lied when she'd told him she loved him more than anything. That was true, and the last thing she ever wanted to do was hurt him, but more important than not hurting him was not hurting their daughter.
She saw how growing up with a drunk as a parent affected Juliette, and she was sure she'd made the right decision all those years ago, but it didn't make her feel any less guilty now. Deacon was right, he'd been sober for 13 years, she'd had ample time to tell him about Maddie. What had she been waiting for? At first she told herself she had to be sure, but how long does someone have to be sober before you're sure they're not going back? One year? Two? In Deacon's case it was thirteen years before the utter destruction in his soul emerged once again.
She knew she had the right to say I told you so, but she wouldn't do that to him. Teddy will though, and she was sure that even if they make it through this, Teddy will try his hardest to keep Deacon away from the girls, from them leading a normal life. "I should have told him years ago," she thought to herself. But back then she was entrenched in her marriage to Teddy, trying to make that work, and keep the promises she'd made to him, one being that he would always be Maddie's father.
Early on, after Deacon had been sober a while, and had continued to play in Rayna's band she could tell that Teddy wasn't comfortable with it.
"He's my band leader," she'd told him. "That's just the way it's always been, and it's always going to be. You need to be ok with that."
Teddy had agreed, but she knew he wasn't comfortable. And if Rayna were really being honest with herself Teddy had a right to be uncomfortable. Yes she'd felt responsible for Deacon, and didn't want to kick him out in the cold just as he fought to get sober, but she also couldn't bare the thought of living without him. She needed him. For so long she'd lived with him as a drunken presence in her life, longing for the early days when he was relatively sober and reliable. Now that he'd become that person again she couldn't deny herself the reward of having him near her. Being able to run to him whenever she needed that reassuring presence in her life.
When she touched his hand in his room earlier she could feel that he still needed her too, but he was fighting it. Deacon didn't like to let himself be happy. He liked to hold on to his anger, he'd always been like that. When they were young he just couldn't let something go, he'd hold onto it forever. It caused a lot of drunken bar fights that she thought were ridiculous. At first she'd try to stop him, then she just learned to turn the other cheek until he started ending up in jail. But that was a long time ago, and he'd been better about it as he got sober and grew older. She just hoped that he'd grown enough that he'd be able to let go of his anger towards her.
They could have everything he ever wanted if he would just let go of the anger. She and him, together, raising Maddie. Yes he'd missed out on the first 13 years, but what was 13 years in someone's lifetime. They had the rest of their lives to be her parents. Plus, she'd always made sure that Deacon was in Maddie's life, she'd always loved him.
Before he'd found out about Maddie she'd started to let herself fantasize about the two of them moving in together, getting married, sharing custody of the girls with Teddy. Now that seemed so far away, maybe impossible. Why couldn't she have told him earlier, why hadn't she kept that box in her closet locked, hell, why hadn't she burned the paternity test. Her aching right leg would have thanked her for that.
So she laid back in her bed, hugged her standard issue hospital pillow and let the tears flow freely down her face. She cried for the pain in her hip, she cried for her daughter's turbulent future, she cried for the sadness that consumed the man next door, and most of all she cried for them, for a true love that seemed so close, but kept missing its chance at happiness.