Oh man. I was really not going to post this, but I've just made the spur of the moment decision to get this up. I was was going to wait another fortnight, but then I figured, 'oh what the heck - it was all supposed to be one chapter anyway!' and so here it is. All I can say is that I really don't know when the next chapter's going to be finished and up... Oh well. Enjoy this while it lasts.

Chapter 20 – The Ties That Bind, Part 2

Bella's POV

"Oh god, Bells… What have you gotten yourself into?" Will sighed, rubbing his temples as his voice softened since he'd snapped with the last statement he had spoken.

I sighed, remembering back to the night just under a year ago… Where this mess had really began.

~10 Months Ago~

I exited from the bedroom that I shared with Allie and it was a matter of a step or two before I was in the kitchen. Spacious was not the word to describe our low-end, one bedroom flat.

After an hour and a half of poor miserable Allie fighting sleep, she'd finally succumbed to the exhaustion that we were both feeling. I hadn't even gotten over the sleepless nights that were a shock to my system since she was born when Allie had fallen ill at 3 months of age. In addition to the tiredness from caring for her, which had been especially intense since she had caught tonsillitis, I was scared witless. Being a young, single and inexperienced mother with a sick baby was frightening stuff.

Since she was too young to consume the majority of medicines, I had been left to mine own vices to research and find inexpensive natural medicines to help soothe and heal her tonsillitis that had left my normally happy and content baby feeling miserable.

I had taken the week of off work considering that she was so sick. However, as I learnt after answering the unexpected knock at the door, I had forgotten to cancel my daughter's babysitter Daniel Shapiro from coming over.

"Oh! Daniel! I am so sorry, I completely forgot to text you about not coming over… I've taken the next week off work."

"That's fine, we all forget sometimes. Only human!" he smiled, brushing my forgetfulness off with a wave of his hand. "Is everything okay, though?"

I helplessly let out an un-amused laugh purely due to exhaustion. "Ha. No, not really. Allie's got tonsillitis and I'm getting pretty close to throwing the towel in."

"Oh poor baby. My son had that a few years back, he was a similar age. It's frustrating because you can't give them much medicine at that age. Then they don't sleep because they're in pain and you can't sleep because it breaks your heart seeing them so miserable, and then you can't help them because you're so tired too! Vicious circle…"

I couldn't believe what I was hearing. Every word that he had spoken described how I was feeling to a tee!

"That's exactly it!" I said with a half smile starting to spread across my mouth momentarily. That one moment of relief, feeling that I wasn't alone and that I wasn't the only person to go through that when loneliness has epitomized my feelings of late, was enough to make me smile. "No chance that you know any mystery or miracle cures for it?"

"Well, I wouldn't call it a cure, but we found that putting the juice of half a fresh lemon in milk formula really worked a treat."

Another glimmer of hope was starting to shine through. Daniel the babysitter was really turning into my knight in shining armor...

"Well I know said that I didn't need you tonight, but do you mind doing me a really big favour and just stay here with Allie so that I can quickly get a few lemons from the shop? She's asleep so you can watch TV or use my computer or whatever while you wait. "

I took a welcoming step aside from the door to let him in, but instead Daniel reversed the action and took a step back. "Do you one better. I'll go get the lemons for you if you want."

"Are you sure? That would be amazing. Thank you."

There was a wink that went along with a cheeky smile that he hadn't displayed in any of our professional encounters previously. "Anytime."

~ Present Day ~

"So what you're telling me is that he was Allie's babysitter? That's not exactly a scandal that could wrap you in the mess that you are in. I don't get where you are coming from, Bella."

I'd just tried to explain parts of the memory that I'd just had, the memory that was really the beginning of everything and the turning point with Dan.

"That's not all…" I sighed, opening my mouth to continue my explanation.

~ 10 Months Ago – Later That Day ~

It hadn't been long after Daniel returned that Allie woke up grumpily once again. During my unsuccessful attempts of settling her, Daniel had been juicing the lemons in the kitchen and preparing the milk recipe that he thought would help her. Initially Allie had had refused to drink much of the milk, which he explained was probably due to the sour taste that she wasn't used to. Eventually though, she settled and became immune to the taste, slowly drinking the whole bottle.

That was what led us to now, sitting on the secondhand lounge -all that I could only afford to buy- as I rocked Allie in a rhythm, and hopefully to sleep, while talking to my unexpected company for the last little while.

"So where did you learn that lemon milk trick?! You're honestly a lifesaver to both of us."

"My wife was a nurse" he replied softly, as I noted that he was edging deeper into the couch. "That was just one of the things she picked up at work."

I nodded, instantly feeling uncomfortable at the mention of a wife, hoping that I hadn't accidentally overstepped the mark with anything that I had done or said throughout the time we'd spent together today. I hadn't realized he was married. Was hanging out like this even considered going too far? "Oh... In that case, thank your wife for me too then."

"Ah… That's not necessary. Our divorce papers are waiting for me wherever they're sitting on the table at home."

"Sorry" I murmured, surprisingly becoming even more uncomfortable than when I thought that he was married, well happily married at least.

He shrugged. "It's okay. I've had a fair while to come to grips with it. What about you? What's your story? Dating? Marri-" he began to ask before I cut him off.

"Single."

He shot me a puzzled look as I rocked the baby in my arms. "So what happened to Allie's father?"

"He's not in the picture. I haven't seen him in a while" I returned, speaking succinctly and to the point.

"Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't realize…"

I shrugged his apology off. "Don't worry about it. Like you said, you learn to come to grips with it."

We shared a wordless murmur in acknowledgment of, and in understanding of each other until I remembered something that Dan had mentioned earlier.

"So what about your son? Are you a single dad now too or does your wife have custody?" I asked, and as soon as I saw the look on his face, I could tell that I'd put my foot in it once again. I tried to clarify myself in the awkward moment, while attempting to understand why it had been made so awkward. "You mentioned a son earlier… The lemons."

He eventually snapped out of what was acting as like some sort of thirty-second trance until he spoke again. Once again, at an even softer volume. "Nick… No, um, no Nick's uh…he's gone."

My stomach dropped. I couldn't even imagine the gut-wrenching pain that would come with losing a child; something that stole so much of your helpless heart, something that you poured so much love into. I felt terrible as I watched his eyes prick with tears. He struggled to even say the words.

"I shouldn't have asked you… I am so sorry."

Watching him made me feel even worse and I made the immediate decision to try and change the subject out of consideration for him. Holding Allie in one arm, I comfortingly touched the top of his shoulder with my free hand before he interrupted me again and just started explaining everything without me even asking another question… It was like he needed to let it out and talk to someone about it.

~ Present Day ~

I'd just finished explaining to Will about Daniel and I's early interaction and his early history that I had discovered about his wife, emotional wreckage number one. Then when I told him that he'd lost a son, I saw the first tinge of empathy that I had ever seen from Will regarding my new boyfriend.

"Oh hell. How awful…" he cringed with a display of sympathy that I could distinguish as genuine.

"I know... Nick was only three years old – that's just not right."

I watched Will as he sighed and bit his lip uncomfortably. "Geez, poor guy... What happened to the boy?"

"He drowned. Daniel and his wife took Nick for a walk, took their eyes off of him for a split second, he fell in the water and it was too late by the time Dan dove in after him... You have no idea how much the drowning has haunted him – he still wakes up crying and screaming, having nightmares of that day."

"I can't even imagine how devastating that would be" Will gaped, all personal disliking of Daniel seeming to be pushed to the side as he listened to his story and history that I was slowing revealing to him, before it was almost as if he spooked, as instantly as a horse, looking worked up and annoyed once again. "Hold on, did you say his 'wife'? Wait, don't tell me you're a home wrecker now too, Bella!"

"What?! No!" I protested with annoyance. That presumption had not won him any brownie points to say the least. "He and his wife had been separated for months before we even met! They were divorced by the time we started dating! His marriage fell apart after their son died – she started cheating. Honestly though, how low do you think I am?!"

He cringed apologetically, almost instantly. "Sorry. At this point, I don't really know what I'm thinking anymore, let alone saying."

"I know. It's a lot to take in…" I sighed simply, only being able to hope that some of what I had said had made any sense and added to any justification, even if it was just a little. "But do you see why I'm still with him? His emotions might take over from the jealousy and fear of losing us when he's with me, but I know that Allie's safe. That's what's important. Daniel would never hurt her. He's never, ever let Allie swim in open water, he probably watches her closer than I do whenever she's near water or in the bath and he always makes sure one of us carry her on the beach or by the marina and all that. He is so protective of her."

"If you're so safe with him, why have we seen him hitting you? You can't stand by him when he does that to you, regardless of what his problems are! He doesn't deserve you if he doesn't even treat you right!"

I knew that Will wouldn't be able to see the full picture. When something was in the way and when something was in his focus, there was no diluting it. Everything else, however, became a vague figure in the background. I could yell, stomp and scream my case and he would still be blind-sighted by the hitting and abusive side of our relationship. I blame the one-angled focus on all the rigorous diving for such a large portion of his life. I on the other hand knew that it wasn't right, I knew that there wasn't much worse in a relationship, but I couldn't overlook the big picture of our relationship and what direction a break up would have a domino effect towards. I could handle the abuse, but I wouldn't be able to live with the aftermath if I left him.

"I know what you're thinking – how wrong it all is, there's no excuse for the hits. I realize that, but I can handle it. Not only will the girls and I be far from exposure, if I stay with him, there are no problems then. The only times that he has hit me is when he's felt threatened or jealous. The first really bad day when I ended up with Rikki was after his mate had called him and tipped him off that I'd been out with a guy… It was that day that we bumped into each other, literally, and went out for lunch together. Ever since then he's completely lost the plot about you. It's obviously brought back all of these memories from since the drowning that made him so vicious – the idea of you taking Allie from him, and basically losing what he considers as another child and then the idea of me cheating like his wife did. He only reacts like that because he cares too much to lose us and feel the pain of having another family fall apart. If I left him, he would break down… I'm really scared that he would hurt himself or take it out on someone that's completely innocent to all of this, not to mention the photos."

"If he cares so much, then he has a damn funny way of showing it!" he muttered with annoyance that I just shrugged off. It was Will's focus again… Meaning very few ways of getting through to him.

I took a deep breath, rubbing my hands on my legs as a comfort to my nervousness while I prepared myself to deliver even harder news. "Anyway… Listen. I figure that if I steer clear from you, then Daniel will have no reason to react like that and our lives might be able to get back on track again.

"But. Allie-" he replied in an attempt with starting to debate my proposition that I hope would solve everything, before we were both interrupted.

The subject of much of our conversation came unsteadily running (if you could even call it that) over to us from the playground to the park bench.

"Mummy!" she shrieked unclearly to catch my attention, just as I had turned to watching her come over, standing up and ready to pick her. Instead, she walked straight past me, over to the bench and more importantly to my handbag.

Searching through my handbag, I watched from my stand of rejection a few metres away until I returned to my seat on the park bench. Allie pushed my purse out of the way and momentarily became distracted by my keys that are one of her favourite non-toy toys. Eventually the girl-on-a-mission found what she was looking for, pulling her plastic bright pink bottle out of the bag and stopping her rummage through my belongings. She took a step closer to the seat where I was, before holding her arms out towards me, something that proved to be a tricky mission for her as she struggled to not drop the bottle.

I picked her up, opened the bottle for her and pulled the straw that she had become accustomed to drinking out of for most of her young life. She slumped down in my lap and rested her body against my chest, using my body as a seat as she sipped away with her focus on the drink.

The three of us sat silently, Allie drinking while I stroked her forehead that was on the warm side from the running around and playing that she had occupied herself with while Will and I had been talking. I was seriously grateful for having such a placid child.

I hadn't noticed Will watching her with a small smile and with as much focus as she had on drinking from her water bottle, not until he evidently bit the bullet and spoke for the first time since the interruption.

"Can you tell me about her?" he questioned without losing the focus or expression that he displayed centimeters away on the same bench as me.

I probably knew Allie and every little detail about her better than I knew anyone else and than anyone else who knew her. However, being put on the spot like that, it was difficult to compound my entire knowledge of every detail about Allie within a few mere comments.

"Um, well, she turned one in November, she's been walking for a few months as you obviously saw before, and she was crawling for a few months before that. She can say a fair few words and names, but she can't speak in complete sentences yet, although she does try to copy a lot of words you say-" I started to explain before Will cut me off with an increase in the size of his gentle smile.

"Little chatterbox – just like you. What can she say?"

"Oh trust me; it's pretty hard to ignore the bits of you that are in her too. Um, words… Well she says mum obviously and-" This time I cut myself off from speaking, processing the following word before I spoke it at a much lower level to avoid Will hearing it and making things awkward, raising the volume of my voice as I continued after the one word. "Dad… She also says cat, dog, no and she counts to three. She tries to say Rikki and Cleo but it comes out completely different."

Again, his smile increased as he let out a short, soft laugh before his focus turned from me onto the girl sitting on my lap contentedly.

"Hi Allie…" he said, speaking softly and reaching out to gently pat her hair before retracting his hand shortly after she had looked at him, having reacted to her name that she could recognize now. That was where the recognition ended. It had been a mere moment of her blank expression before she looked away once again and turned her attention back to her drink. Allie had no recognition of him, none at all and therefore having no interest in the man that was obliviously to her, her father.

I looked over to him as he settled back in his spot again, keeping his hands to himself now as a slightly sad frown set on his face. More guilt. It seemed that I just couldn't get enough of that feeling of late. All I hoped was that by trying to lay the truth out and make things better, that I hadn't made things worse.

"Why didn't you say anything to me when you were pregnant, Bella? What made you think that I didn't deserve to know about my own child?"

I swear the questions just kept getting harder and harder and worse and worse, but really I had no one to blame… No one, but myself.

"I tried, Will. I promise you that I tried to get in contact with you after I realized I was pregnant."

"Obviously you didn't try hard enough…" he retorted quickly, the annoyance clearly written over his face.

My lips tightened and I crossed my arms the best I could considering that someone was lying against them. "That's not fair! I tried calling and texting you umpteen times, you never answered me or returned one single call. I tried visiting and I could hear you from outside telling Sophie to shoo me away – I knew you knew I was there. I tried emails; I tried getting Cleo and Lewis to pass on messages for you to contact me. Sure you didn't know what I had to tell you, but couldn't you get the picture that I was desperate to get in touch with you?! It was your decision to ignore me like that and I figured that if you didn't have the nerve to press one button to talk to me on your phone, that you didn't deserve to know about the pregnancy!"

"Well I'm sorry Bella if I didn't take our break up well. We were together for two years – I'm sorry if I didn't just bounce back from that!" Will replied with his words indicating apology, while his tone drenched the words in sarcasm.

"You weren't the only one! How do you think I felt? It was awful! I spent entire weeks after we broke up pouring all of my energy into hating you and moving on from you. Then, just as soon as I started to get my life back on track and make a fresh start, it was just bam!… 'Oh hold on, my body forgot to let me know that I'm having your baby'."

I looked over and immediately noticed that Will's face softened from the annoyance that had been blended with anger from a few minutes ago. "I'm sorry… For everything. So you didn't know before we broke up?"

"No, I would've been obliviously pregnant for a fair while but by the time I realized and confirmed it, you and me were well and truly over" I replied simply with a shake of my head, elaborating on my initial answer before Will even had a chance to respond to that. "Like remember that flight from hell?" I added, laughing lightly at the awful memory that you couldn't help but laugh at now that it was over and done with.

"Ohhh. Back to Oz from Phuket… when we had that really dodgy meal on the stopover in Singapore?"

I nodded as his face scrunched up from the same memory. The two of us had been as sick as dogs on the agonizing seven hours of flying. We had both automatically classified our illnesses as food poisoning.

"Yeah... That's the one. Remember how we thought we'd both caught food poisoning? I think that that must have been what your problem was, but when I was trying to work out due dates I realized that was more than likely not the cause for me since I'd barely eaten anything there anyway…"

"Makes sense. We were too focused on trying to save our relationship on that trip; I completely overlooked how crook you had been feeling on and off for the whole time…"

During some of the last days of our courtship, Will had still been doing the pro-diving and had reached the level of representing both Queensland and Australia as a whole in international competitions. That was what had led us both to Phuket. It was the chance that we took for a holiday too, hoping that it would be somewhat separated from our problems, leaving us together, but away from everyone else for a week. We'd used it as a far-fetched final attempt to patch up and rejuvenate the rapidly disintegrating threads of our relationship which had been rocky for months before the trip. The way history had written itself was that although we'd both enjoyed the trip as a holiday, it had made no difference on our relationship… Which I had pulled the plug on not long after we had returned from Phuket.

"I wish I hadn't been stupid enough to ignore my damn phone" Will frowned to himself, the anger passing through his eyes as I bit my lip.

"If I'm being completely honest, even if you had known about Allie from the beginning, I really don't think having a baby would've saved our relationship… At all. Our relationship was basically the Titanic – all I wanted to do was get off before I was hurt, but you insisted on going down with the ship. A baby that was thrown into our situation would've just been another iceberg that pulled us down harder and faster."

He nodded slowly, almost in acceptance. Completely different to the insistent and determined Will that I had left several years earlier. The Will who was hell-bent on riding our relationship out until it was completely exhausted and ruined. "Even still, who knows if I had answered though, you might not be in the mess you are if I had…"

"In all honesty, there actually one moment, one point when the ball was in my court even despite you ignoring me… I saw you at Pacific Fair shopping centre about a month before I had Allie. There, I had one opportunity to tell you…"

For the umpteenth time today, Will's face soured to a frown, but this was definitely one of the strongest.

"You did? Why didn't you come over to me? Why didn't you choose to say something?"

And there lay yet another hurtful truth that I had tried to forget within my mess… My mess with Will anyway, completely unrelated to my mess with Daniel. "Because you were with another girl… I always had that hope that we'd be unrealistically fairy-tale-y, thinking that we wouldn't be complete without each other, but I watched the two of you for a few minutes and I could just tell that you were happy and that you were in love with whoever she was. And now, you have Amy and I have Daniel."

"We aren't meant to be together… Are we, Bella?" he replied after a few minutes as he was taking what I had said in and digested the thought with the sad conclusion.

I shook my head, not without that sadness and that twinge of pain, but honestly. "No. But don't get me wrong… I really liked you… I even loved you Will - when we were young. But we were just that… Young.

Once again it took Will a while to respond as he reacted to my words through his expressions and his face first. I could recognize the acceptance, yet slight sadness in his eyes – it was the feeling that mirrored through me.

"So what do we do from here? What can we do about Allie?"

"Very little," I sighed. "Daniel can't know that you know she's yours for all of the reasons that I mentioned earlier. If you're wanting to see her, the best I can do is get Rikki to let you know if I come over and visit her, then you two might be able to spend a little bit of time together every now."

Will's face was almost a mini-rollercoaster as it flitted from disappointment before it settled with a small smile.

"I guess if that's the best offer that I have for now, I'll take for now…"

"It is."

So there you have it. You lot and Will all know basically everything about that now! Thoughts? This chapter really meant a lot to me personally because I've poured a lot of heart and emotion from personal experiences into this... Being an island, idealic-beach-weather country, drowning unfortunately come with the territory in Australia. But the effects that it has on families and individuals is awful and it leaves horrendous mental and emotional scars. It's truly awful. Now by no means do I want to justify the abuse, but I just wanted to clarrify that Daniel's feeling his own pain and he is working through his own problems too. When you have something as big as that haunting you, you have very little control in the way you react and deal with it when it's so fresh.

I personally think Will & Bella REALLY needed to have that chat for the sake of getting everything out in the open, but also to have that long overdue closure regarding their former relationship. I know that basically everyone that reviewed is wanting Will and Bella to get back together, but it seems like it's pretty much the end of the road for them? All I can say is that like the other's, there is still a lot left of this plot, and Allie is definitely going to be a connection for them now that the truth is out there.

Anyway, there's still so much left! I feel like this was quite a revelationary chapter (well 2 chapters), but I haven't even reached the climax!

Next chapter - Trying to work his head and feelings out, the news and shock of being a father finally starts to set in for Will; Will and Rikki's friendship is tested; and Will's inability to say 'no' lands him in hot water on a date with Amy.