A/N: I just died realizing that the famous "For this child I prayed" is 1 Samuel 1:27. They really chose a name with a lot of meaning.

Jackson leaned back in the car seat with a sigh. He allowed himself a few seconds of keeping his eyes shut before he opened them to take a look at the clock. April would expect him back any minute now. He couldn't put it off for very much longer. Another sigh filled the car.

How was he going to tell her this? It wasn't exactly something to greet her with upon getting home. Maybe he should wait until dinner. If he poured her a glass of wine and they had some nice conversation beforehand she might not take it as badly as he anticipated she would. It wouldn't be lying per se. Just keeping the cat in the bag a little longer.

But this wasn't just anyone he was thinking about. This was his wife. April had a way of seeing fifteen sides to everything. It was hard to tell how she'd react. Jackson didn't have her gift of looking at things in so many ways, and, even if he had, who knew whether they'd see the same fifteen sides to the story he eventually had to tell her.

His phone vibrated with a text message, pulling him from his thoughts. As he pulled it out of his pocket to check Jackson wondered what would be worse: a message calling him back to work or-

April. This time he sighed out of relief seeing it was his wife, who'd texted him.

Did you get hold up at work?

After a minute of consideration – taking the car somewhere, perhaps the cinema, cool down, then come back and talk to April did sound tempting – Jackson replied with a simple: No, I'll be right up. Putting off the inevitable just wouldn't do. Not with what they had to talk about.

At least the sight he came home to was far more pleasant than his day had been so far. April and Samuel were seated at the kitchen counter, both with a plate in front of them. He'd made it in time for lunch. A great time to be present at right now, because their thirteen-month-old was trying a lot of stuff for the first time. His reactions were hilarious to watch. Also, it was about time those teeth that kept them awake for a few nights in a row were finally put to some use.

"Hello, you two", he greeted as he shed his jacket, "Seems like you're having quite the party over there."

"Hello to yourself", April replied with a broad smile. "We're having tortillas. There's one for you, too."

Jackson walked over to greet both of them with a kiss. April first, on the lips, Samuel second, on the cheek. The baby squealed when he saw him, dropped his food and reached out his hands to him.

"I missed you, too, buddy, but you shouldn't drop your food like that. It's rude", Jackson told him kissing his chubby cheek. Afterward he pulled out a chair and sitting down on the other side of Samuel.

"So, how's it going? Can he chew the dough?"

It only took a second for April to break out into a rant about how she googled a recipe with extra soft dough that would be easy to chew, which, however, did not meet her expectations when she tried chewing the first one she'd made, which, in return, led to her calling her mom, who, luckily, could offer some advice on crêpes dough, that, thankfully, had only to be altered a little bit to upgrade it to tortilla class, but was totally chewable for their son. Jackson found himself enjoying this. Listening to her and watching her finding so much joy in the little tasks of parenthood. He seriously couldn't imagine life without Samuel anymore. Although it had been touch and go in the start and the hard days were still incredibly hard, the happiness he brought them was totally worth it.

Seeing his wife so happy with their current situation made Jackson feel even worse about the news now. He chose to postpone them until Samuel's afternoon nap. Their son didn't have to be present for a possible fight. Shouldn't be, really.

"I think he really likes it, though", April finished her tale. She widened her eyes as she returned her attention to the infant. "You like it, don't you, Sammy? You really do. C'mon... tell me whether you like it, please."

Samuel responded like most one-year-olds would. He babbled back to her in delight.

"April, you know what they say", Jackson told her, amused but serious, "Either an early walker or an early talker. You can't have both."

"Yeah, well. Apparently we can't have either", she disagreed with a stern look at their son's legs, which were both stretched out in full casts.

"He walked a few meters when he was barely ten months", Jackson argued in a playful manner, "That has to count for something."

"Yeah", April sighed. "I guess."

His hand worked – seemingly – on its own accord, reaching over to grab hers and stroke it. "Hey. That's why we're having the consult today, right? To see if we can do the surgery now."

"If, that's right." She ran a hand over her face. Whenever she slipped out of her positive demeanor it was just for a little while, and only ever with Jackson. "I'm sorry. I'm just a bit stressed about it, that's all. I mean... even if it works it would still mean putting him under general anesthesia for quite some time, and after what happened last week with the Taylor case I..."

"Hey, hey, hey, April. Babe, look at me." He only continued once she did. "We don't know any of that yet. So let's not stress about it, okay? Not until we know."

It was a rule for them. With a child like Samuel stressing before they knew would mean locking themselves in a completely padded room all day. Life was as unpredictable as Samuel's bones were breakable. If they anticipated any injury they wouldn't be able to continue a normal life. Of course, some things like concrete ground playgrounds could be avoided. But they also believed that some things shouldn't be avoided, not until they'd tried. This way, they hoped (and in April's case prayed), for their son to have the closest thing to a regular life possible. Not a life governed by rules based on assumptions enough people outside his family would continue to make as he grew older.

"I guess you're right", she surrendered. "I just..." She shook her head. "It's been a long day."

"It's lunchtime, babe."

She didn't say anything, he'd already said enough.

Jackson continued to rub circles on his wife's hand as he watched her feed their son. There was nothing he could say, not yet. He wished he could comfort her with words, but he didn't find any. How did you comfort someone who took a forced leave of work because their son had broken both of his legs again after the surgery to prevent them from breaking was canceled because of a common cold? Maybe he'd only knew if he'd had been the one staying home with their child.

Hitting her with the possibility that her period of staying home with Samuel would likely be prolonged was not something he wanted to right now. However, when she rose from her seat to clean up the baby and take him to the nursery Jackson just knew he wouldn't be able to put it off for very much longer. He was so bad at keeping secrets from her she'd guessed all of his presents last year: birthday, Christmas, Valentine's Day, Easter and then some.

April's frown immediately disappeared when she focused on Samuel. Her every expression was exaggerated as she communicated with their son. And for a minute there Jackson thought -

But then he remembered. He remembered her telling him her dream: a family, a house, and being chief of trauma. He couldn't ask her to give up one third of what she'd always wanted. Not when he wanted to give her everything that would make her happy.

"I'll put Sammy down for his nap. Can you take care of the dishes?"

"Oh- uhm. Sure", he nodded, ripped from his thoughts.

"But maybe finish your tortilla first. You've barely touched it", she said. Her nose scrunched up a cute little bit when she asked: "Is it bad?"

"No! No, it's fine. I was just watching the two of you earlier", he admitted sheepishly.

Red hair flew around as she made her way to the nursery calling out: "You're a weird man, Jackson Avery."

Oh how he wished to be just that. Some random weird man that barged into her life with terrible news. But he wasn't just that. He wasn't.

It took April twenty minutes to put Samuel down, which was a miracle considering the difficulty he had sleeping with the casts on his legs. Something Jackson supposed he'd never get used to. She let herself fall on the sofa with a sigh. "I'm so glad your day off is tomorrow. I think I've cleaned every last bit of the flat."

"You didn't have to", Jackson told her truthfully. They had cleaning services come once a week.

"Yeah well, what else was I supposed to do?" She shrugged. "We can't even play properly with the casts. It's just lying around reading the same books over and over, waiting for his first word... at least I'm sure I won't miss it, so that's that."

"And he won't get injured speaking his first word", Jackson put in.

"Mhhh... thank God his teeth are healthy", April agreed. Her head slid to the side, resting between his own head and shoulder. The silence was comfortable. Almost too comfortable. Jackson just couldn't bear it.

"Babe?"

"Mh?"

"You know how Hunt's going to Jordan for this doctors without borders thing?" He looked down at her as she lay nuzzled against his neck.

"It's the military, Jackson," she corrected, as she would. He smiled.

"Yeah... yeah, you're right, babe. Military."

"What about it?" April asked, her voice already getting drowsy. She was usually sleepy with him lately, because she spent every waking minute of Samuel's life awake herself.

Jackson swallowed. He wasn't ready to approach this. Hell, he had no idea how to approach this! But he had to. For April. He'd promised. He had to.

"So... he said that people can still join if they want to..."

April said up abruptly, eyes full of fear. "No, Jackson. Absolutely not." She shook her head. "Please don't. You can't do that to me, to us, we need..."

He stopped her with a finger against her lips. "April, calm down. I'm not going."

"Good," she sighed unaware of what else he had to say, "Because..."

"I think you should go, though."

The blank stare of hers spoke volumes, she only croaked: "What?"

A/N: So this might seem a little bit OOC. In the show we saw April and Jackson exhibiting very different coping mechanisms. Where Jackson desperately wanted to get back to "normal" (suggesting they have another baby, assuming April was fine as soon as she was back at work), April was holding on to the what ifs (sitting in the nursery cuddling plushies, standing in front of the babies in the maternity ward). Jackson wanted to escape the world April wanted to live in. I think if he'd really understood why she needed going to Jordan (to get back to reality where, among others, her husband lived) he wouldn't have discouraged it as much. But since those two suck at communicating. So...