I know nobody wanted to wait long after that last chapter so here I am! I'm also atoning for my sins of not writing in forever. I hope you like this. It was interesting and difficult to write at the same time. I hope you enjoy!

TW: Childloss/mention of abortion

Chapter Eleven

Bill and Fleur sat straight up in bed when they heard the pounding at the door. Even over the wind coming off the sea, whoever it was was nearly shaking the cottage down around them.

"Go to the kids," Bill told Fleur, grabbing his wand off of the nightstand.

"Bill." She looked worried, thinking they had long been done with such fear. "Be careful." She also grabbed her wand and went to Louis' room who had started crying at the noise. She took him into Victoire's room as Bill slowly went downstairs.

His heart was pounding as it hadn't in over five years. He gripped his wand tighter as he opened the door.

"Bloody hell, Charlie!" he exclaimed, pocketing his wand and rubbing his hands over his face. "What are you doing here? You woke Victoire and Louis and scared the hell out of Fleur and I!"

His brother's long hair had been blown free in the strong winds.

"I'm sorry. I didn't know where else to go," he said, his voice slow and thick.

"Are you drunk? What's going on? Aren't you supposed to be in Toronto?"

Charlie shuffled past his brother into Shell Cottage's small kitchen. He immediately began rifling through the cabinets.

"What are you looking for?" Bill asked, eyebrows raised in his brother's direction.

"Firewhiskey."

Bill had never known his brother to be a big drinker, but something was obviously wrong. He pulled a half empty bottle from above the stove and plunked it down on the wooden table along with one glass.

"Charlie, what is happening?"

"Charlie!" Fleur had come down with Louis on her hip. "'Ave you lost your mind?"

"I'm sorry, Fleur. I really am."

She glowered at her brother-in-law, before turning around to put her kids back to bed.

"What happened?" Bill asked again. "You're supposed to be in Toronto for the World Cup. We heard Adair got hurt so what are you doing here?"

Charlie put his face in his massive hands. He eventually ran his fingers through his wild hair, looking across the table at his older brother with bloodshot eyes. "She was pregnant."

"Adair?" Bill asked, flabbergasted.

Charlie nodded. "The healer asked me if I was the father of the baby she'd lost in the accident during the match."

Bill just stared at his brother. "Did she know?"

"How could she not?" Charlie replied. "With a job that relies on her body, I'd think she'd have to."

Bill had to agree with his brother. Even Fleur, who wasn't a professional Quidditch player, had known very early on when she was expecting both Victoire and Louis.

"Why didn't she tell you?"

Charlie shrugged. "She's always been secretive." He took a long drink from his tumbler of whiskey. "Part of me thinks she wasn't going to tell me and not keep it." He looked down at the grain of the wooden table.

"You don't know that," Bill said quickly.

"Then why would she play if she was worried about her health or the baby's?"

Bill was quiet for a moment. It seemed like his brother might be right in his suspicions, but he didn't want to help him jump to conclusions. He liked Adair, but he knew they'd already broken up for a short stint once.

"You have to talk to her," Bill said. "You can't sit here getting drunk and acting paranoid."

"I can't right now. Can I stay here for just a few days?" Charlie looked at his brother desperately. "I took off from the sanctuary to spend with her, but obviously that's not happening. I can't go to Mum and Dad's like this," he said. "Imagine the gloating from Mum."

"Of course you can. But only if you see her before you go back to Romania."

Charlie sighed. "I knew I shouldn't have done this. I was perfectly fine on my own." He poured another glass of Firewhiskey, not looking at his brother. "I just kept looking at you all and you looked so happy with your partners. I mean, even Percy, who is an absolute prat, and George, that goofball, found people to pair off with."

"I didn't think you cared about all that, Charlie."

"I didn't! And then I met her and I thought it might not be so bad. And then we got together and I didn't hate it. I didn't mind having someone to write to and visit and think about. I loved it and I loved her. I told her that right before her match, not knowing she'd been bloody lying to me for months!"

"We don't know that she was lying or if she even knew." Bill tried to calm his brother. He had never known him to be so open, but the Firewhiskey was also making him angrier than he might have been without it.

Bill stood up and filled a glass with water for his brother before going into the living room and pulling out a spare pillow and blankets and arranging them on the sofa.

"Why don't you try and get some sleep and we can see what all of this looks like in the daylight," Bill suggested gently.

Eventually, Charlie nodded and rose heavily to his feet. He merely kicked off his boots before dropping onto the sofa. Bill stood over his brother for a minute, making sure he was alright. When he had turned to go and had one foot on the stairs, Charlie spoke faintly, "I wouldn't have done this if I'd known it was going to hurt so bad."

ooooOoooo

It was late, long after the match had ended. The healers had not wanted to move Adair while the break in her hip was so fresh as was the blood loss. Oliver had been sitting with her ever since that afternoon. He was still in his dirty clothes and Quidditch robe. Katie had been with him for a while, but he had sent her back to the hotel to get some rest. Mr. and Mrs. Wood had popped in briefly, but didn't seem overly concerned about the state of their daughter.

Oliver had shaken his head after they left and then threatened the healers within an inch of their lives that it was not to get out to anyone that Adair had been pregnant. The media coverage would be devastating.

After midnight, when Oliver was dozing in the chair next to his sister's bed, Adair woke up with a groan.

Oliver's head snapped up immediately.

"I feel like I got run over by a train," Adair said hoarsely.

"Only a Bludger. Don't be dramatic," Oliver said with a small smile.

Adair closed her eyes again.

Finally, Oliver asked, "Did you know?"

His sister didn't answer immediately. "Yeah I knew," she said finally.

ooooOoooo

In the morning, Bill and Fleur stood over Charlie and watched him sleep on the sofa.

"Ze poor zing," Fleur said quietly.

Bill nodded in agreement. "He was about out of his mind last night," he whispered. "I've never seen him like this."

"I liked Adair very much, but perhaps zis is for ze best."

"I don't know," Bill replied. "I'm at a loss."

Before either of them knew what was happening, Victoire had come flying down the stairs, zipping between them and heading straight for her sleeping uncle.

"Uncle Charlie! Uncle Charlie!" she exclaimed, landing right on his stomach. "What are you doing here?"

Bill swooped in and scooped his daughter up into his arms as Charlie gasped for air. "I suppose I deserve that after waking everyone last night." He rubbed his bleary eyes. If possible, he looked even worse than the night before.

"We listened to the World Cup! Was it amazing? Is Adair okay? We heard she was hurt pretty bad."

"That's enough of that for now!" Bill exclaimed, practically tossing his daughter over the sofa to his wife. Fleur immediately took the little girl back upstairs to get dressed for the day.

Bill went into the kitchen and came back out with two mugs of steaming coffee. He sat on the opposite end of the sofa and handed his brother one of the mugs. "I'm sorry about Victoire. I would've told her not to ask if she'd woken earlier."

Charlie waved it away. "She's just a kid. She doesn't know." He winced as he drank the hot coffee. "I'm sorry about last night. I didn't know where else to go."

Bill shook his head. "You're always welcome here. You know that."

The two brothers sat in silence for a long while.

"I can take the kids outside after breakfast if you and Fleur want some alone time," Charlie offered. "Make up for waking everybody up last night."

"You don't have to do that," Bill replied.

"I know, but I want to. It'll give me something else to focus on for a bit."

Fleur came back downstairs with Victoire in front of her and Louis on her hip.

"Sorry for hurting you, Uncle Charlie," Victoire said, sitting as close to him as she could on the sofa. She had obviously been instructed to apologize, but she seemed rather shame-faced.

"What? Hurt me?" Charlie asked, draping a heavy arm over her bony shoulders. "Impossible."

Bill and Fleur couldn't look at each other as they went into the kitchen to start breakfast. Charlie and Victoire eventually joined them, Charlie sitting next to Louis in his high chair.

Victoire chatted away at her uncle. It wasn't often that they had visitors to Shell Cottage and so both of the children were quite animated.

Charlie helped cut up Louis' food and chuckled as the boy rammed it into his mouth with his chubby fists.

Bill and Fleur were uncertain as to what to say so they remained quiet.

"Do you two want to walk by the water with me?" Charlie asked after the dishes had gone zooming to the sink.

"Yes!" Victoire exclaimed. Louis just held his arms up to his uncle.

"Be careful!" Fleur called as the trio headed out the front door.

Bill wrapped his arm around Fleur's waist with a sigh as they watched them through the window heading down the path to the rocky beach. Louis was happily on Charlie's hip and Victoire clutched his massive hand.

"It makes me even sadder because 'e is so good wiz zem," Fleur said quietly. "I never zought of Charlie as a partner or parent, but 'e could 'ave been very good at it."

"He still could be," Charlie replied. "Just maybe not right now or maybe not with Adair."

ooooOoooo

Two more days passed and finally Charlie was ready to leave his brother's house.

"Where are you going?" Bill asked, coming downstairs. Everyone was still upstairs sleeping.

"You said I had to go talk to her, so London I guess."

"I just think it would be a good idea. You never know what you might find out." Bill didn't actually think the prospects were good. No word from Adair or Oliver had come to Charlie after his abrupt departure from Toronto, which led Bill to believe that Adair probably had known she was carrying Charlie's baby.

Charlie nodded. "Thanks for letting me stay here," he said quietly.

"You're already leaving?" Victoire whined when she came downstairs, her platinum hair a tangled mass around her face.

"I'm afraid so, but I'll be back," he promised. Victoire wrapped her arms around her uncle's middle tightly.

"Tell Adair hello and that I think she did a great job even if they lost."

Bill screwed his eyes closed and shook his head. "We didn't know what to tell her, so we just didn't. That's our fault," he said quietly walking with Charlie to the door.

"It's okay."

The two brothers hugged and then Bill clapped Charlie on the back as he headed down the path to Apparate to London.

ooooOoooo

Charlie knocked on the door to Adair's flat and waited a moment until the door swung open.

"Oh." Katie answered the door. "Hi Charlie," she said gently.

"I need to see Adair," he replied without pleasantries.

"She's asleep right now. She's only been awake for an hour here or there for the past few days."

Charlie moved past Katie and towards Adair's bedroom. "I'll wait."

Oliver turned around from where he was sitting on the couch and then followed Charlie. "Where are you going?"

"Just to see if she's really asleep. I don't trust any of you right now." However, when he got to her room, he lingered in the doorway, going no further.

Adair was truly asleep, but it did not look peaceful. Her unwashed blonde hair was fanned out around her on the pillows. Her brow was furrowed in her pain and once or twice she gave a small noise of discomfort.

"No one is lying to you," Oliver said as they all made their way back toward the living room.

Charlie turned around and faced both of them. Oliver stood there, looking back having spoken his own truth.

Under Charlie's hard gaze though, Katie cracked. "I had my suspicions," she said quietly, not looking at Charlie or Oliver.

"What?" Oliver exclaimed. "Why didn't you tell me?"

Katie shrugged. "I'm a healer! We deal in confidentiality. She never said anything to me, I just had a hunch and noticed some symptoms, but it could've been a dozen different things."

"So she wasn't nervous before the match?" Charlie asked.

"I don't know! She certainly could have been. She probably wasn't the only player who would've been sick with nerves." She sighed. "It wasn't my place to talk about it."

Oliver rubbed his jaw. "Our world, the professional Quidditch world, is different from what you're used to, Charlie."

"Different how? Different in that it lacks basic human decency and morality?"

"Morality?" Oliver shook his head. "Let's not go there. That is not my conversation to have with you."

"Well then why don't you leave me here until she wakes up so she and I can have that conversation."

"Can't it wait? She's still really beat up and she will be for a while," Katie said.

"No it can't. I"m tired of bending to the Woods' world and its rules."

Oliver stood there, conflicted, for a moment. "Fine. But you will understand that outside of all of this, she's still injured pretty badly."

"I understand."

Oliver and Katie exchanged a glance and left silently.

Charlie sat on the couch and tried not to look around at the flat that he had been so impressed by in the beginning. He tried not to think about all of the times that he had visited her and lounged on the very sofa he sat on, cooked in her kitchen and slept, or not, in her bed.

He sat on the sofa for hours not moving. His mind wandered to the concept of a baby. He had never given it much thought, if he were to be honest with himself. He adored his nieces and nephews, but when he had spent most of his life not thinking about ever spending his life with someone, he hadn't really expected to be a father, but after his very visceral reaction to Adair losing his child, he felt differently.

He felt himself growing angry once more and began to wring his hands. He stood up and began to pace around the living room. When he began, he couldn't stop.

Night was falling, when Adair finally emerged from her bedroom. Charlie stopped abruptly, facing her, arms crossing over his barrel chest.

"Were you not going to tell me, Adair? Did I not deserve to know." Charlie stared down at her.

In her lack of immediate response or protestations of innocence, he knew that she'd known she was pregnant.

"Charlie," she said quietly, not looking at him.

"Bloody hell," he ran his hands through his long, unbound hair. "I came here with the tiniest bit of hope that you might not have known you were pregnant that early. How long did you know?"

"A couple of weeks at most," she responded.

Charlie was silent for a moment. "I don't understand," he finally said.

"What was I supposed to do, Charlie? What do I do or say here that makes you happy?"

"You can't make me happy now!" he shouted. "You should've told me! You shouldn't have played!"

"Shouldn't have played?" Adair exclaimed. "What are you talking about, shouldn't have played? I've worked for this for my entire life!"

"It was dangerous! Obviously, it was dangerous! You lost our baby!"

Adair stood there before him, mouth opening and closing trying to figure out what to say to him.

After a long moment, realization dawned over Charlie's face. "You weren't going to keep it anyway," he said in a dangerously quiet voice. "Even if you'd made it out of the match uninjured, you weren't going to keep it. You weren't ever going to tell me."

"You have to understand that I'm not a woman that can just have a baby. I don't go and sit in an office every day. I don't come home every night. Quidditch is how I make a living, Charlie. I can't just quit doing it."

"So that's it? Your life is only about Quidditch and money? That comes first?"

"It's my livelihood and I enjoy it, so yes it does come first!" She shook her head. "What if it was you? You'd just stop working at the sanctuary?"

Charlie stared at her. "I would've told you! It wasn't just your baby! It's not just your decision!"

"Charlie! Get your head out of your arse! This was the World Cup! It may never happen again for me. And even though up until now I've never heard you express any interest in having a baby, that can happen again at any time."

Adair gripped the back of the chair she was standing behind. Her hip was throbbing and she rubbed it with her other hand. She really wasn't supposed to be on her feet, but she wasn't going to sit down in front of Charlie.

"It's not just this disposable thing, Adair! Does it mean nothing to you? We made a baby together." His voice lost its strength toward the end.

"Does the work I've put in towards my career for my entire life not mean anything to you?" Adair returned.

"Of course it does, but that's not the only thing in the world that matters."

"Maybe in my world it is. I never said I wanted to be a mother. Quite frankly I don't think I'm cut out for it, not do I think I want to have a baby."

"What about me?"

She sighed. "We've never had this conversation. Again, you've never said anything about wanting to have a baby. We've only been together for a year." She shook her head. "I don't know what you want from me. I should have told you. I should have been more careful and remembered my potion when I came to Romania to get you back, but I didn't. At the end of the day, especially since I play a sport to make money, it's not your decision to make. It's not you that would have to miss out on an entire season or what could be the biggest match of a career. It's not you who would have to train twice as hard to get back into shape and back to the level of playing after carrying and giving birth to a baby. It's not you who potentially doesn't ever get to work how they want again because you can't get back into playing shape."

"So in your world, we forget this ever happened and just move on like normal?" Charlie asked.

"I might've said that before this particular conversation." Adair looked down and chewed on her bottom lip. "We're not going to agree on this, Charlie. We can yell at each other and shout our opinions, but at the end of the day we saw this situation going much too differently to reconcile our beliefs." She looked back up. "I shouldn't have lied to you. That was wrong, but I'm not sure what you would've tried to make me do and I can't go on knowing how you feel about all of this."

"So that's it?"

Adair shrugged. "You left after I broke a hip and fell 40 feet from a broom. I think you made it pretty clear what you think about me and what I deserve. I'm not going to beg for your forgiveness."

"Are you trying to make me the bad guy here, Adair? Are you serious?"

"No! Clearly I'll never change your mind on who's at fault here and I don't think I'm really interested in doing that. It is what is. I can't change what I've done or how I handled this and you can't change how you've spoken to me about it."

Charlie began to speak, but Adair held up the hand that wasn't white knuckle gripping the back of the chair.

"I understand now that we're fundamentally different. We've led different lives, we have different upbringings and belief systems and that's fine. I can't say who's right or wrong here. What I can say is I don't see all of those differences coming together cohesively."

"So you're breaking up with me?" Charlie asked, folding his arms over his chest.

"You're never going to understand or respect what I did. Or me as a person and a woman, it seems. And that's fine. You don't have to. I did what I did with my body and you don't ever have to deal with it again. I'm sorry it wasn't what you wanted to happen, but I don't want to deal with your anger or disgust. There's nothing I can do to appease it except be someone I'm not prepared to be or apologize for something I'm not exactly sorry for." She bit down harder on her lip when tears welled in her eyes. She looked down and they rolled down her cheeks.

When Adair finally looked up, Charlie was walking it out the door and closing it behind him.

There you have it! I hope I conveyed the characters and their beliefs acurately and fairly. I've never had a fic deal with something of a modern day controversial issue. I don't know what else to say. I hope you loved it.

Happy reading,

Avonmora