Forgiveness, Trust & Forever

Hero

When Eleanora cried again, Emily woke first.
Not me.
Emily.
I was somewhere half under sleep, half under pain, trapped in that useless space where my body knew something was wrong but couldn't move fast enough to fix it. My ribs burned. My jaw throbbed. My lip pulsed with every heartbeat. The bruises Hayden had left on me had stiffened through the night until even breathing felt like work.
Then Eleanora whimpered.
A tiny sound.
Barely there.
But Emily was already moving.
The mattress shifted beside me. The duvet rustled. Her bare feet touched the floor.
"I've got her," I mumbled, trying to force my body upright.
But Emily was already at the travel cot.
"I know," she whispered.
Not to me.
To Eleanora.
The room was dark except for the weak silver-blue glow slipping through the curtains and the orange strip of light from the hallway. Outside, Winchester was silent in a way I had never known it to be. No cars passing beneath the studio. No late-night laughter from dancers leaving Clara-Bellas after rehearsals. No distant pub noise. No ordinary life.
Just lockdown.
Just us.
Just Emily leaning over the travel cot, hair falling forward, voice rough with sleep, hands shaking as she reached for our daughter.
I stopped moving.
Every instinct told me to get up.
To help.
To take over.
To spare her if it became too much.
But another instinct, newer and harder to obey, told me to stay still.
So I did.
Emily lifted Eleanora awkwardly but carefully, one arm under her, one hand supporting the back of her head the way I had shown her hours ago. Eleanora cried harder for a second, tiny legs kicking, body stiff with overtired rage.
Emily flinched.
I saw it.
She almost looked at me.
Almost passed her over.
Then her jaw tightened.
"I know," she whispered again, rocking in tiny side-to-side movements. "I know, Nora. You're cross. Fair enough. I'd be cross too."
A laugh broke out of me before I could stop it.
It pulled at my ribs.
I winced.
Emily's head snapped towards me.
"Don't laugh and then look injured. It ruins the effect."
"Sorry."
"You're not."
"No."
Eleanora's cry broke into a hiccup.
Emily looked down quickly.
"Oh." Her voice dropped. "Was that better? Did insulting your father help?"
I smiled into the dark.
"It usually does."
"See?" Emily murmured to Eleanora. "Useful for something."
Our daughter's cries softened.
Not stopped.
But softened.
Emily kept moving.
Side to side.
Side to side.
The rhythm was stiff at first, then smoother, her body finding what her fear had kept hidden from her. She wasn't natural. Not yet. Maybe not ever in the way people wrote about mothers as if birth automatically downloaded a language no one else could understand.
But she was trying.
And Eleanora was listening.
I stayed on the bed with my back against the headboard, pretending not to watch too closely and failing completely.
Emily noticed eventually.
Of course she did.
"You're staring."
"Yes."
"Stop."
"No."
Her eyes narrowed. "Hero."
"I've waited a long time to see this."
The words slipped out rawer than I meant them to.
Emily stilled.
Eleanora grumbled at the loss of movement.
Emily started rocking again automatically.
Her face had changed.
"Don't say things like that at four in the morning."
"What time is it?"
"No idea."
"Then maybe it isn't four."
"Still the wrong time."
"There's never been a right time for us."
She looked away.
That landed.
Too heavily, maybe.
But the dark made honesty easier.
Or maybe the day had stripped us of everything else.
Eleanora's little fist bunched in Emily's T-shirt. Not mine. Hers. Emily stared at it like she didn't know whether to cry or apologise.
"She's going to need feeding," I said softly.
Emily tensed.
"Bottle?"
"Probably."
"Right."
"You don't have to-"
"I know." She cut me off, but not sharply. Tiredly. "I know I don't have to. But maybe I can make one."
My chest tightened.
"Okay."
She looked at me suspiciously. "That's it?"
"That's it."
"No speech?"
"No speech."
"No proud face?"
I tried to school my features.
She glared.
"Too late."
I held up a hand and immediately regretted it when my ribs protested. "I'll work on it."
Eleanora whined again.
Emily shifted her higher, then looked towards the hallway.
"The formula is in the kitchen?"
"Yes. Blue tin in the bag. Bottles are already sterilised in the container your mum packed."
"Of course they are."
"Mum believes preparation can defeat chaos."
"Has she met us?"
"She remains optimistic."
Emily huffed, and the sound was almost a laugh.
She moved moved out of the bedroom with Eleanora in her arms.
I swung my legs over the side of the bed.
She turned immediately.
"No."
"I'm coming."
"You're not."
"Emily-"
"You can barely sit up without looking like a haunted Victorian orphan."
"That is very specific."
"And accurate." She nodded towards the bed. "Stay. I'm going to the kitchen, not war."
"Today suggests those are similar."
Her mouth twitched.
Then softened.
"I'll shout if I need you."
I didn't like it.
But I nodded.
She left the room with Eleanora against her shoulder, moving slowly, carefully, one hand cupped around the back of our daughter's head.
I listened to every step.
Down the short hallway.
Past the nursery.
Into the kitchen at the other end of the flat.
Cupboard opening.
Bag rustling.
The kettle being filled.
A muttered curse.
Then Emily's voice, low and offended.
"Why are there so many parts to a bottle?"
I smiled despite myself.
"You okay?" I called.
"I said I'd shout if I needed you!"
"That sounded like a shout."
"It was commentary."
Eleanora made a fussy sound.
Emily softened instantly.
"I know, I know. I'm hurrying. Well, I'm trying to hurry. Your dad has packed half a science lab in this bag."
"That was my mum."
"Tell your mum she's dramatic."
"She knows."
I stood anyway.
Slowly.
Pain shot through my side so sharply I had to grip the bedpost.
"Fuck," I breathed.
For a second, the room tilted.
Maybe I had taken more hits than I wanted to admit.
Maybe adrenaline had lied better than I had.
I waited until the pain settled, then made my way to the bathroom. The mirror was worse than it had been earlier. Bruising had bloomed along my cheek and jaw. My lip was swollen. One eye looked tired enough to belong to someone twice my age.
I splashed water on my face and hissed when it hit the cut.
Down the hall, Emily was still talking.
Not to me.
To Eleanora.
"So this is formula. You probably know that. I don't. You'll have to forgive me. Or don't. That's fair."
A pause.
Then, softer, "You have his eyes when you're cross."
My hand stilled on the sink.
"He used to look at me like that when I was being unreasonable."
Another pause.
"I was unreasonable a lot."
I closed my eyes.
Her voice dropped, so low I almost missed it.
"So was he."
I smiled.
She was still Emily.
Thank God.
By the time I made it to the kitchen doorway, she had Eleanora settled in one arm and the bottle in the other. The baby was drinking sleepily, both tiny hands attempting to hold the bottle and missing the point entirely.
Emily sat at the kitchen table, shoulders tense, eyes fixed on Eleanora like if she looked away, something would go wrong.
She didn't notice me at first.
I let myself have three seconds.
No more.
Emily Dean, at my kitchen table.
No.
Her kitchen table.
Our daughter in her arms.
The world outside locked down.
The past still bleeding all over the floor.
And yet.
There.
A picture I had no right to want and every reason to remember.
Then she looked up.
Her expression sharpened.
"I told you to stay in bed."
"I got thirsty."
"No, you didn't."
"I could have been thirsty."
"Were you?"
"No."
"Then go back."
I leaned against the doorframe, because standing unsupported was becoming less convincing by the second.
"She's feeding."
Emily looked down at Eleanora.
"She is."
"You made the bottle."
"Hero."
"No proud face. I know."
"You are physically incapable."
"I'm emotionally restrained."
"You're emotionally obvious."
"That's fair."
Eleanora pushed the bottle away suddenly, milk gathering at the corner of her mouth. Emily panicked.
"Oh. What? Is that bad? Did I do something?"
"She just needs winding."
"Right."
Emily looked at me.
I looked back.
She narrowed her eyes.
"Instructions."
I walked closer, slow enough that she could protest if she wanted.
She didn't.
"Put the cloth over your shoulder first," I said.
She grabbed the muslin from the table and arranged it badly.
"Like this?"
"Sort of."
"That means no."
"It means creative."
"Hero."
I smiled.
She glared.
I reached to adjust it, and our fingers brushed.
Her breath caught.
So did mine.
Eleanora made an impatient sound, and Emily blinked like she had been pulled out of a trance.
"Right. Baby. Not whatever that was."
I stepped back.
"Definitely baby."
She lifted Eleanora to her shoulder, stiff but careful.
"Support her bottom," I said.
"I am."
"Higher."
"I hate you."
"No, you don't."
Her eyes flashed to mine.
The kitchen went still.
Too still.
The old answer hovered there.
No, I don't.
Yes, I do.
I wish I did.
She looked away first.
Eleanora chose that moment to burp loudly against her shoulder.
Emily startled.
Then stared down at her.
Then laughed.
A real laugh.
Soft and shocked and sleep-rough.
"Oh, that was disgusting."
I laughed too, then winced.
Emily's eyes shot to me.
"You're going back to bed."
"In a minute."
"Now."
"Bossy."
"Bleeding."
"Barely."
"Bruised."
"Temporarily."
"Infuriating."
"Constantly."
Her mouth twitched.
Eleanora rested heavier against her shoulder, eyes drifting closed again.
Emily noticed.
"She's asleep?"
"Almost."
"What do I do now?"
"Hold her a little longer. Make sure she doesn't bring anything up."
Emily's face went still.
Not panicked this time.
Something else.
She looked down at Eleanora's tiny hand resting against her jumper.
"I can do that."
The sentence was so quiet I almost didn't hear it.
I sat opposite her because my legs were close to betraying me, and we stayed like that in the dim kitchen while the first pale suggestion of morning began to press against the curtains.
No traffic.
No studio sounds.
No world.
Just the three of us.
Emily holding Eleanora.
Me watching them like a man starving.
Eventually, she spoke.
"Does she always wake this much?"
"No."
"So this is special for me?"
I smiled faintly. "Big day."
Her face sobered.
"Yes."
"She's unsettled."
"Because of everything?"
"Probably."
Emily's jaw tightened.
"I hate that."
"I know."
"She shouldn't know fear yet."
"No."
"She shouldn't have people shouting her name."
"They don't know her name."
Emily looked at me then.
Her eyes were fierce even through exhaustion.
"They know enough."
I nodded.
She was right.
She adjusted Eleanora slightly, more naturally this time, and my chest ached with the effort not to make a thing out of it.
"You posted the video," she said.
"Yes."
"Have you looked?"
"No."
"Why not?"
"Because if I look, I'll care."
Her expression shifted.
"You care."
"About the wrong bits, I mean."
She watched me for a long moment.
"Do you regret it?"
"No."
"Not even if it ruins the film?"
I leaned back carefully.
"The film is not my daughter."
Emily's eyes dropped.
"I know."
"Do you regret telling me to post it?"
She looked towards the curtained window.
Outside, somewhere beyond the gates, someone would still be waiting. Maybe press. Maybe police. Maybe the last stubborn remnants of a world that thought our lives belonged to them.
"No," she said. "But I'm scared of what comes next."
"So am I."
Her eyes returned to mine.
"You always act less scared than you are."
"So do you."
"I act exactly as scared as I am."
"No," I said quietly. "You act angry."
She took that in.
Then nodded once.
"Fair."
Eleanora shifted again, face pressing into Emily's shoulder.
Emily's mouth softened.
"I need to put her down before my arm falls off."
"I can take her."
She shook her head.
"I'll do it."
I followed her down the hall back to the bedroom, ignoring the way she looked over her shoulder to make sure I wasn't about to fall down.
At the travel cot, she paused.
Then looked across the hall.
To the nursery.
The door was still open.
The green walls were faint in the morning light.
"We said we'd clean the cot," she whispered.
"We can do it later."
"She should be in her room."
My heart stopped.
Emily realised what she'd said.
Her room.
She swallowed but didn't take it back.
"She won't know the difference," I said softly.
"I will."
The sentence sat between us.
Fragile.
Huge.
I nodded.
"Then we clean it."
She looked at me. "Now?"
"Now."
"You can barely stand."
"I can supervise."
"You're very good at that."
"I've been practising."
We carried Eleanora into the nursery.
Emily still held her. I gathered clean sheets from the bag and found wipes, a spare blanket, anything that might help us turn a museum of almost into a room that could hold an actual child.
The photographs were gone with the police.
The burner phone too.
But the room still felt touched by strangers.
Violated.
Emily stood near the doorway, Eleanora asleep against her, staring at the cot.
"I hate that someone put those things in there."
"I know."
"It was already hard to look at."
"I know."
"And now it feels..." She searched for the word. "Dirty."
"We'll clean it."
"You think wipes fix trauma?"
"No. But they fix dust."
A reluctant laugh left her.
I smiled.
Then regretted it because lip.
She rolled her eyes. "You never learn."
"Not quickly."
I wiped down the cot slowly, partly because my ribs hated me, mostly because Emily needed time. She watched every movement. The rails. The mattress. The mobile above it.
Clouds and stars.
I wanted to ask if she had chosen it.
I didn't.
She told me anyway.
"I bought that in Southampton."
I looked up.
"The mobile?"
She nodded.
"I went for dance shoes and came back with that." Her mouth twisted. "Mimi cried when she saw it."
"And you?"
"I told her it was on sale."
"Was it?"
"No."
I smiled carefully.
Emily's eyes stayed on the mobile.
"I used to wind it when I couldn't sleep."
My hand froze on the cot rail.
"What song does it play?"
She looked at me.
Then reached up with her free hand and twisted the little key.
For a second, nothing happened.
Then soft, tinny music filled the nursery.
Slow.
Gentle.
Familiar.
My throat closed.
"You are my sunshine," I whispered.
Emily looked down.
"Brandon used to sing it badly to my stomach."
I closed my eyes.
Of course he did.
Of course he had found a way to be there in the smallest, stupidest, most beautiful ways.
Emily's voice went quieter.
"He said Boo needed to understand early that tone-deaf men were not to be trusted."
A laugh broke out of me.
It hurt my ribs and my chest and everything else.
Worth it.
Emily smiled at the mobile.
A real smile.
Sad, but real.
Eleanora stirred at the music.
Her eyes fluttered open.
Emily froze.
The baby blinked slowly, face still half-squished against her shoulder.
The mobile played on.
Eleanora turned her head slightly towards the sound.
Emily stopped breathing.
I stood beside the cot, clean sheet in my hands, watching the first moment our daughter heard the song chosen for her before she was born.
Her eyes followed the little clouds.
Sleepy.
Curious.
Calm.
Emily's face crumpled.
Not loudly.
Not dramatically.
Tears just slipped down her cheeks as she watched Eleanora watch the mobile.
"She never heard it," Emily whispered.
I stepped closer.
"She's hearing it now."
Emily nodded, but the tears kept coming.
"I bought it for her."
"I know."
"I did want things for her."
My voice broke. "I know."
"I just didn't know how to want myself near them."
There it was.
The truest thing.
The thing under adoption and fear and court and every awful sentence the press had stolen and twisted.
I reached for her slowly.
She didn't move away.
My hand settled on the back of her neck.
Gentle.
Steady.
Not asking for more.
Emily leaned into it for half a second.
Just half.
Then she looked down at Eleanora.
"Can we put her in?"
I nodded.
Together, we lowered our daughter into the cot that had waited too long.
This time, she didn't cry.
She lay there, blinking up at the clouds and stars while the music played softly above her.
Emily stood beside me, both hands gripping the cot rail.
I stood close enough that our shoulders touched.
Neither of us moved away.
Outside, morning crept over locked-down Winchester.
Inside, Eleanora Brandon Boo Dean Fiennes Tiffin lay in the nursery her mother had once built for her and finally opened.
The music slowed.
The last notes faded.
Emily whispered, "She looks right in it."
I looked at our daughter.
Then at Emily.
"She does."
Her hand moved along the rail until her fingers brushed mine.
Accidental.
Maybe.
Neither of us pulled away.
For once, I didn't say anything.
I didn't make it a thing.
I just stood beside her while our daughter stared up at her clouds and stars.
And for the first time since thewaiting news broke, the silence in the room felt less like for disaster.
It felt like morning.