Tom Hardy Character Imagines

Strangers (Part Three)- James Delaney x OFC

James Delaney had never really imagined himself as a father. He had never even truly imagined what it would feel like to hold his child and feel love whenever his hands had cradled Ariadne's protruding stomach. He had felt protective of his unborn child but he hadn't felt love; not like Ariadne whose face would beam with such a feeling whenever she touched her stomach or felt the baby move. When he had built the crib with his own bare hands and carved symbols of protection into the wood, he hadn't really thought of the babe who would sleep in it.

Even now as Ariadne laboured upstairs, surrounded by women who had become firm friends in their short time here in this new land they called home, James found he wasn't eagerly anticipating meeting his child.

The only thing that concerned him was Ariadne.

Women died in childbirth; it wasn't uncommon and sometimes even the youngest and fittest succumbed to death while bringing a child into the world, and James found himself suddenly regretful that he didn't show Ariadne enough of the love and tenderness she craved from him. She never told him it in words, but he could see the hurt in her eyes sometimes when she professed her innermost feelings of love to him and he responded in his usual curt manner. He told her he loved her when he was inside of her and when he departed the house to attend to business, but there was nothing romantic or frilly about it. It was three words that he said because he meant them and for him that was enough. But now he was beginning to think that perhaps it wasn't.

He climbed the stairs before his mind even registered that his legs were moving, and upon reaching the closed doorway he heard the mewl of newborn life. Pushing open the door, he ignored the cries from the other women of impropriety and his eyes met with Ariadne's.

"You are well?" he demanded, his voice strangely hoarse as he sat down on the rickety chair at the head of the bed.

"Tired," she murmured. "But well enough."

Ariadne's face broke out into a beaming smile as one of the women handed her a blanketed bundle who was crying lustily for all to hear. Cradling the baby against her chest, her tiredness was forgotten for the moment as her eyes fell upon her child for the first time. James' own eyes hadn't left Ariadne, seeing the way her entire being radiated an emotion that couldn't be put into words and he wondered if his own mother had looked at him this way when she delivered him.

"Look at our daughter, James," Ariadne looked at him, tilting the baby who quietened upon being in the comfort of her mother's arms.

His daughter. Those two small words made a strange sort of feeling appear in his chest and with horror, he realised that the lump in his throat was one of intense emotion that he only usually felt upon thinking of his mother.

"James?" Ariadne whispered, her brow pinching into a frown as she looked at him in concern.

Without another word, he stood up abruptly and hurried from the room as though the devil was on his heels, leaving Ariadne confused and hurt as she stared at the open doorway as his heavy boots stomped down the stairs. Tears fogged her vision as she stared back down at the baby, and she was so swept up in the confusion swirling throughout her body that she didn't even notice when the afterbirth was delivered and taken away. One of the women with her smiled sympathetically which only made Ariadne feel worse and it was with tears dripping down her face that she nursed her newborn baby against her breast for the first time; unable to enjoy the bonding moment because her heart was outside in the front garden with the man who owned it.

... ... ...

Night fell and the house was silent and free of the women who had been there to help Ariadne through her arduous labour. One of them had offered to stay to help during the night, but Ariadne had refused in favour of being alone with her child. She knew that many women chose to stay abed for at least a week or two after giving birth, but that was not the way of her mother's people and neither was it hers. Nor did she care to have a nanny or a wet nurse to look after her child. She would do everything herself just as her mother had and grandmother before her.