AN: I had thought I posted this chapter a while ago, (As in before I posted two other chapters, oops!) but it turns out, it didn't post. Because it is a flash back, I decided I'd put it in now, and give you a bit of insight on what happened that caused Mary and Matthew's split. Thank you for reading, sorry it's been so long since my last update!

October 1914

Mary pushed her hair back from her forehead, and wiped her mouth with her sleeve. She felt absolutely horrid- the world span, and her stomach churned. She took a few steps back and sat on her bed with a thud. What could she possibly have eaten? She laid back, and covered her eyes with her hands.

"Mi'lady? Have you been sick again?" Anna asked as she entered the room.

"I'm afraid so, Anna. In the waste basket." She grumbled. Anna nodded and went to the basket. Quietly, she opened the cupboard door, and counted the sanitary supplies she had left for lady Mary...and there were none missing, for the third month.

"Lady Mary, have you been using some other stash of supplies for your monthly?" Anna asked.

"Huh? No, I haven't." She groaned. Anna bit her lip and looked over to Mary.

"For three months?" Anna asked.

"For three- are you serious?" Mary gasped, and sat up a bit too fast. "T-three months?" Anna nodded. "Oh no! Oh no, no, no!" She leaned forward and put her face in her hands. Already she felt tears spring to her eyes. Her hands trembled as she raised them to her lips and then to her forehead.

"Are you pregnant?" Anna asked bluntly.

"I don't know- I think I must be; Gah, I can't very well go to visit Clarkson to find out." Mary sobbed.

"It's...it's Mr. Matthew's, if it is...isn't it?" Anna asked. Mary didn't say anything, only just leaned back against her headboard. "I know it's not my place to ask. It's only just to say that morning when Mr. Crawley went to enlist- well, he was here awfully late the night before, and he left when everyone was already asleep. Not to mention the fact that that day I changed your sheets, and there was...staining on them. At the time I thought it must've been your monthly, but looking back...Lady Mary."

"Yes. Yes, if, if there is an it, it's-" She found that she couldn't say his name,not without choking on tears. "No one can know about this Anna, because if they did…"

"It's no one's business but your own, Lady Mary." Anna nodded. "But if you'd allow me to, Lady Mary, I can arrange for you to visit a doctor in Ripon, or perhaps London if need be."

"Yes Anna, thank you." Mary nodded. "And I know you'll be discreet."

"Of course Mi'lady. You can count on me for silence. I won't breathe a word of this to anyone." Anna nodded, took the basket in her hands, and ducked out the door. Once she was alone, Mary reached for the letter she kept tucked up in her bedside drawer. Not a day had gone by since she had found it on her bedside table, that she didn't look at it. She unfolded it with trembling hands, and read it again.

Dearest Mary,

This isn't easy to write, beautiful Mary, especially not after the night that we shared. Actually, as I am writing this, you're asleep. You look so very peaceful- did you know that when your eyes are shut, your lashes brush your cheeks?

Mary, beautiful Mary, I'm very sorry, because I'm still leaving. Even after what we shared, Mary...I know that it can't have meant the same thing to you that it did to me. And yet I can't be angry with you, not after…

Mary, I know you don't want to marry me. And I will not ask you to, will not insist it. I will not contact you again, won't make you feel guilty for this. I will always lo- always care for you Mary. You've nothing to fear from me. No one ever needs to know about what transpired here, and perhaps this is for the best. I wish you all the happiness in the world.

Fondest regards,

Matthew.

She threw the letter down as if the words had burned her. That night, when she had fallen asleep in his arms, she had dreamt of him- of telling him everything about Pamuk, and begging for forgiveness. As she had waken, she had resolved to tell him the truth. But he was already gone, nothing but a folded piece of paper on the pillow beside her. True to his word, she hadn't heard a thing from him in three months, not even a fond message passed through Isobel. It was clear that he didn't want anything to do with her- and now she might be carrying his child. Scratch that, she knew she must be carrying his child. She had all the symptoms. And somehow she knew, had known for a while. But she had pushed the very possibility from her mind, and had tried to go on as normal; a fruitless effort on her part. Every passing day had only intensified the emptiness in her chest, and the hollow feeling in her heart. He had abandoned her, wanted nothing to do with her, and yet she loved him still. And now she was carrying his child. The center of her world seemed to shift, and she felt warmth fill the hollow of her soul for the first time in months.

…..

The training he had received hardly seemed adequate now he was in the trenches. Though it had taught him how to shoot, how to follow and give orders, it had done nothing to prepare him for the cold, damp conditions, and the gloom of death and blood that hung over everything.

And yet none of this had distracted him from the thing he was escaping from- or rather, trying to escape from.

"Mary." He spoke her name into the night air, and a cloud came from his lips. God, how he missed her. Everything about her, her laugh, her smile, her charm, her interesting and worth conversation, the way she challenged him; and sometimes in the dead of night, he thought about another thing he missed. Her body. He had had her only the one time, yet it had felt as if he had known her this way forever. And oh, how he wanted her again, not just her body, but her mind, her heart, her very soul.

To call what had happened between the two of them merely an act of lust was wrong. It had been making love- at least, it had been for him. How he adored her that night, had held her so close against him, had loved her in the most urgent and passionate way man is capable of. The idea that this was wrong hadn't occurred to him until after, when Mary slept, for as she had lain in his arms, her hair cascading around them, her lashes brushing her cheeks, she had spoken in her sleep. The words she had spoken had killed him; had dashed any hope of a future for them. Even now they echoed in his mind, and drove him insane.

"Please- no, 'sorry. So sorry- meant nothing to me, I made a mistake. Forgive me, please. I love you- it was always you. Never him- nothing, meant nothing."

Even thinking of the words she had spoken made him seethe with jealousy. Who was this person Mary dreamt of? The man she loved? He expected he would have to find out eventually, because she would become engaged, and then… He shook the thought from his mind, and went back to the letter he had been reading. A sweet little letter from the pretty little thing he had met in London. Lavinia Swire was pretty, and kind, but she was no Mary. And perhaps that was why he was drawn to her. She was too delicate, too shy and sweet to be contrary or coy- she would never hurt him the way that Mary had.

Mary. Even thinking the name made the scar across his heart flare with pain. He looked to the pile of letters beside his bed, some that went on for pages, and others that were five words. They were all sealed, and addressed, as if ready to be sent off. Lady Mary Crawley. No, they were never to be sent. After all, he had promised her that he wouldn't write, wouldn't contact her again. But each day it seemed he came nearer to doing so. And today, for some strange reason, he felt as if his very soul was calling out to her. And there was nothing he could do but lay there in his cot, and stare at the mud ceiling.