A/N: Okay, so I got a few details wrong, including that Glocks do not have a safety, and why naming the baby Henry might bring scrutiny upon both Vic and Henry. So be aware of the Glock issue. As for naming the baby, Vic really does believe Henry brought Walt back off Cloud Peak,so she names the baby after him. I concede, though, someone could point fingers.
I really, truly am clearing the Season 4 decks to sail on the new ship tomorrow, so there might even be a bonus gift later today, not this one. BTW, this has a fourth part partially done.
Everyone enjoy Season 5 Sept 23d, tomorrow!
Rememorize
Part 3
Nine and one-half months Along
He sat in the waiting chair in front of the pastel sunset mural. It seemed like he had been there a dozen times in the past few years. They had wheeled Vic back, but some very nervous aides had come up and been whispering together just a few minutes earlier.
Cady joined him in the hard chairs. "It'll be okay, dad. I'm really excited to have a little brother. I always wanted one."
He peered down at her. For more than a month, now, he hadn't wanted a succession of beers to get, as Bob put it, numb and dumb. "You really mean that, Punk?"
"You bet. You do know that Ferg and I gave Vic babysitting chits at the shower, right? We both want you two to have some quality time alone together a few months from now?"
"No. She didn't say anything."
"She's still pretty mad at you, dad. Something about Moretti women being unforgettable."
"She was. She is." And then he stopped, not wanting to divulge details of that nature to his daughter. Hell, he had barely been able to talk about it with Henry, or Vic, herself, for that matter.
Omar came in, twisting his designer beanie, stomping his feet, removing his gloves and generally shaking off.
"You're not going to give me a ticket for parking the helicopter in Freddy Jenkins' field, are you, Walt?"
Despite his agitation, his lips curved up.
"No, Omar, and thanks for the lift. I expect Vic will eventually get around to thanking you."
"She's one feisty Italian tomato for sure, Walt. I have a place she could raise that kid up—"
"Just leave it, Omar."
Omar's eyes narrowed. "Did she mean it, little Henry Longmire, Walt, or was she just in labor?"
Walt glowered as Cady tried to hide a grin, unsuccessfully.
A nurse with a badge that read Lippin who appeared to be in her early forties walked up in front of them. She seemed uncommonly nervous.
"You Sheriff Longmire?"
He stood up immediately, twisting his hat in his hands. "I am. She asking for me?"
"No. The doctor has requested you to come back in professional capacity."
"Prof—as Sheriff?" His heart chllled. "Vic did something?" Up to and including pointing a scalpel at or shooting someone? He wouldn't put it past her if she were riled up enough.
"She punched a doctor, used a martial arts thing on a nurse's wrist, and won't let them touch her to put an IV in. We thought maybe you could…er, restrain or handcuff her or something. Also…sheriff?"
He was already striding off. He turned his head. "Yeah?"
The woman winced. "Could you try and convince her to keep the language a little, uh, cleaner? Some of the orderlies back there are pretty young. She knows some that I haven't even heard."
In a Vic kind of way, that was pretty funny. The corners of his mouth turned up despite the gravity of the situation.
"Normally," she chattered on, trying to keep up with his long stride down the hall, "HIPAA would keep you out front, since you're not family and she hasn't put you on her HIPAA list…"
"She's my deputy. Let me see her."
"Okay," said Lippin, "but we still shouldn't…".
"And the baby's mine." He turned away from her and increased his speed.
Behind him, he heard Omar shout, "You dog! She really meant that about Little Longmire?"
That shut up the chatterboxes, both of 'em. Let them sort it out between themselves.
A Few Days after Remembering
Walt had heard about the baby shower, and knew he should contribute. Ruby dutifully took forty dollars from him for their joint purchase.
"Don't put my name on it," he said. "She might not accept it."
Ruby pursed her lips and glared at him. "Whatever did you do to cause that, Walter?" She enunciated every word, and he knew he was in dire trouble with his dispatcher.
He hung his head, but let her stew in her suspicions. He couldn't let this impasse with Vic eat at him. He elected to do something he should have done long ago. See Henry.
Henry was not front man at the Pony that night. Instead, he was in the kitchen.
As Walt pushed through the swinging door, Henry gave him an apologetic smile as he turned buffalo burgers. "Staff turnover has increased since Malachi's ownership."
Walt twisted his lips. It was only to be expected. Henry's staff had always been loyal, and when they left, they often went on to bigger and better things. The new staff, without Henry's hiring practices and careful supervision, was often lacking.
"I wondered if I could talk to you about something, but if you're busy…"
"Give me five minutes."
They no longer had Henry's office to retreat to, it was now Malachi's domain. Instead, they went outside and leaned against the porch rail running along the front of the building. He held the obligatory Rainier, while Henry cradled a mug of coffee. The slight chill of early autumn and a promised storm hung in the air, too soon to tell if it would be rain, sleet or snow.
"So, Walt, what is eating at you?"
He looked sharply at his friend of forty-plus years. "Why do you say that?"
He gave that supercilious little head shake. "You rarely seek my advice if something is not."
"Oh."
"Yes, oh. Do you know, I had the most remarkable visit from Vic a couple of weeks ago?"
His lips curved upward, just hearing her name. "Remarkable, how?"
"She asked if I would mind her naming the baby after me."
He looked sharply at Henry. "What did you say?"
"I replied with the truth, of course, that I would be honored, but I wondered why."
Here it was. She had spilled the beans, to Henry of all people, and he was going to hear about it right now.
"Do you know what she said?"
He clenched his fists subconsciously. He thought he had a pretty good idea.
"She said it was because I had brought you back off Cloud Peak alive, and more recently helped her survive morning sickness, that every time she said the name, she would think of that true friend who did those things for her."
"For bringing me back?"
"And supporting her in the early days of her pregnancy. She really does not have many friends in Durant, especially woman friends. I suspect she is too rough for them."
So she hadn't told Henry. "I thought she had me, until she took up with Eamonn." He tried to keep the peeved note out of his voice.
Henry began tapping his fingers against the rail. "She said the baby is not Eamonn's but she worries if she names him after me, ignorant people may think he is mine. She wanted me to be prepared."
"What did you tell her?"
"Again, I told her truth, that I would be honored if he were mine, but knowing he was not, I was sure he would carry the name well."
'I don't know what to do, Henry."
"About what?"
"About Vic."
"What is there to do? She will have the child and raise him."
"It's all my fault." There. It was out. If anyone would, Henry would understand, and know what to do.
"What is your fault?"
"The child. The baby. One night together, but I was blind drunk. I didn't…remember at first. Well, for a while."
"You and Vic." he sounded unsurprised. "I had thought things might be headed that direction, you two have grown close over a long time. I wondered especially after I found her at your cabin just before we intercepted Jacob at the airfield."
His eyes darted to Henry. "Vic was at the cabin?"
"Looking very pretty, and carrying beer. I thought maybe she wanted to support you or celebrate freeing me and finding Martha's killer."
"Oh."
"Then of course, you found Branch, and the whole department descended into a tailspin. I also had my own preoccupations at the time."
"You could've told me to steer clear of Donna instead of popping me in the nose."
"Ah, yes, Donna. I did not understand the gravity of that situation. A single dream."
He tried to defend it. "Indians are always having dreams which mean things."
Henry peered down his nose at Walt. Walt believed that was more effective when Henry had his glasses on. "You are not Indian, my friend."
He made a noise through his nose. "Sometimes I wish I were."
"Was that the only dream?"
"I dreamed about Donna again, and then…I dreamed about Vic. Dreamed and dreamed and dreamed. Pretty lurid stuff."
"Dreaming, or…remembering?"
He swallowed. "What do you mean?"
"Were you possibly just remembering your night together? The one you could not remember, except in your dreams? Your subconscious did not want you to forget that night until some trigger recalled it?"
He shut his eyes and hung over the rail. "I don't know. I offered to marry her, I want to be part of Henry's life."
"Do you want to be part of Vic's life?"
"Of course."
"Did you tell her that?"
He stopped. Had he? Or had he just talked about the baby, and her coming to live with him?
"I—" His indecision must have shown.
"The Vic dreams served to keep the memory of your night together fresh. Unless you and she figure out how to get past those, you will not be able to make new ones or rememorize her, or that night."
He breathed out, defeated. "I don't know how to do that, not after what I did. You should have heard her, 'How could you not remember me?' It cut me, Henry, to the quick."
"You will have to do some heart-searching to figure out how to keep that from happening again, and how to move things forward."
Malachi ambled out the front door. "Break time's over, Hank. Back to the kitchen with you."
Walt gave Henry a look, like how could he stand it, but Henry moved away from the rail and followed Malachi inside.
So much was so wrong.
XXX
Nine and one-half Months Along, Four Hours Earlier
Of course the blizzard of the year hit, and of course her water broke in the thick of it. The Bronco couldn't compete with two feet of snow.
"I know we should have stayed with Cady a few days, or even at the station. I'll call Omar." Walt was grim over the weather, nervous as a cat, and he transmitted both of those. Couldn't he transmit kumba ya and peaceful meditation instead? She was already wound up and beginning to feel pains.
Then she acknowledged that, fuck, no, this was Walt.
The contractions had started, but she didn't want him to know, yet. "Oh, don't bother him, and just for future reference, I don't think I could have made it up and down the station stairs." Yes, she was fretful, but each contraction almost sent her over the edge, and she just didn't want to send him over the edge as well.
"I would have carried you." He grinned and leered a little. She thought he probably could have, but she deflected it. Still, it was reassuring, that although the size of a truck, he still seemed attracted.
"And what, give you a heart attack? Not from shoveling snow, carrying a gravid Moretti."
He came up close, kissed the top of her head, and put his hand on her belly. "Gravid Moretti is pretty exciting stuff."
"Yeah, yeah." A contraction hit, and she reached for the table bent over it. He immediately stilled, but rubbed her belly through it. He had to feel that.
"How frequent?"
The gig was up, of course he'd felt it.
"Last one was seven minutes ago."
"More than time to call Omar."
An hour later, Omar set his helicopter down carefully onto a scoured area. Fortunately, he wouldn't have to fly very high to the hospital, the buffeting winds had died down, and he only had to clear some foothills, no mountains in the way.
Despite her protests, Walt carried her out to the helicopter, ducking for the whirling blades. A tall man in snow, she worried at that. He barely seemed to notice her weight.
"Well, Vic," Omar said as she tried to get the seatbelt around her, as Walt clambered in to join them. "None of us should be out in this, but here we are."
She held in the urge to bite his head off. She had been doing really well at refraining from cussing, practicing for the baby.
"Let her be, Omar. Contractions are four minutes apart."
His eyes widened. "That's pretty close."
"Yep, she's not feeling great, so let's get moving, please?"
She wondered if they would stop referring to her in the third person, as though she weren't there.
She'd fix that. "Little Longmire wants out today."
She heard Omar's shock. "Walt?"
"Just fly," he gritted out, but he kissed her hand as it clenched with another contraction.
"Fuck!" she said, as the newest contraction hit, hard.
XXX
Two Weeks after the Remembering
She finally figured out the origins of the dirt in her mug when she tried standing on a stool and peering up and into her cabinet. It was a branch sticking through the siding into the cabinet. There was definitely a softball-size hole, which wouldn't keep out either critters or weather.
Not great environs for a new baby.
She called her landlord. He promised to get right on it, but in another week, he still hadn't done anything.
Walt showed up again the night she thought she might have to take some action on it. A storm had hit, and her kitchen cabinet had developed a trickle of water down to the counter.
"I just wanted to see how you're doing." The nights were much cooler, and she had shortened her walks again. The first serious storm of the season was overdue, and she was really nervous how the trailer would take it. The weather reports were currently predicting it in the next couple of days, and here she was, vulnerable.
"What's wrong?" he asked, after a few minutes.
"Um." She tried to be casual. "I called the landlord last week, there's some damage to the outside."
"Hmmm. Let me have a look."
She directed him around to where the branch had pierced the structure.
"This is no good, Vic, it's already leaking, no barrier to wildlife, and it won't keep you warm this winter."
By you, she knew he meant her and the baby.
"I can call him again." She knew she sounded weak, that the Terror would have had the guy out there in twenty-four hours.
"Thing is, I don't think he can fix it, it's not the branch or the hole, it's the siding. It's gotten water in it, it's weakened. The whole thing will eventually give way."
"Huh." Her hopes for a safe, warm home for the baby to come home to suddenly went up in figurative smoke.
"Look, Vic, I know you're mad at me. Hate me if you want, but you can stay with me until we can find you both somewhere safer." He lips bunched, his voice was low. "Do it to be warm, and for the baby. This place won't survive the winter."
She made a noise through her nose, of discontent. She felt maneuvered, but she was pretty sure he was right, had been when she'd seen what a puny branch had done to the siding.
"You don't have room for all of Henry's stuff." She was sort of right, it had taken over most of the trailer.
"We'll make room, and I have a washer and dryer. You're going to need that."
"And it's just until I find something?"
"Yep. First snowstorm's supposed to come in this weekend. Let's get you out of here before then."
She chewed on her lip. Maybe it was her pregnant brain. Maybe it was Henry's incessant kicking at night. It didn't take much these days. "All right."
But she wasn't happy about it, and it would only send another wave of speculation around town. A baby named Henry, and living with the sheriff…
