Mal and Ben ~ Parenthood

Who you want to be

Once Mal had thought life was all about being the best, most evil, and gaining yourself respect through fear. She had thought that life was all about proving you could survive it, fight yourself to the top, and show people that you would never break down. She had thought that life was all about surviving.

Her friends had changed that, Ben had changed that, but most importantly Lily had changed that. She now knew that life could be about so much more. There were no rules about how to live your life, no one deciding what you wanted to do. Life was not about making other people proud or doing what other people found important, it was about making yourself proud and doing what you found important.

Mal had known the moment she met her friends that what was important to her was being there for them, helping them, maybe she hadn't always done that in the best kind of ways, but she had gotten there in the end. Meeting Ben she realized that she could make her own decisions, that even though her mother thought love was a waste of time didn't mean she had to. And Lily had thought her that you had your own will to decide who you wanted to be. You didn't need to be like your parents, didn't need to do what everybody told you, when it came to your child what was important was helping them through life and helping them to realize everything life could be for you.

Lily was starting to grow up, she was starting to get stronger opinions on what mattered to her. Mal knew that she may not always share the same interest as her, but also knew that Lily wasn't her. She was her own person and her interests were right as important as her own.

So Mal was happy. Everything was going alright, and everything would always be alright as long as they would always be there for each other.

Ben, however, was in a really bad mood lately, and even though Mal did her best, even she was starting to get scared of getting to close to him.

With Mal now being the queen they usually shared all the work and it had been good on both of them. Neither of them were stressed out or feeling guilty anymore. But lately Mal had kept far away from everything work related, not really wanting another lecture on why being organized and professional was oh so important.

What he was freaking out about not even Mal knew. She found this whole situation really difficult. She wanted to be the one supporting him and being there for him, but if was just something she didn't have much experience with. She was better than she had been, and with Lily it was easy, with her it just felt right. But with Ben... she barely knew what to say.

"Lily sweetie," Mal said running her hand through her hair, "It's time to get ready for bed."

"No," she said in response.

Mal took her hand, "Come on, let's go get you ready for bed."

"No," Lily said again, this time a bid louder and pulled her hand away from her moms.

"Lily that's enough," Mal said a little louder than intended, "It's late. It's already past your bedtime."

But Lily didn't even react to what she was saying. It wasn't the first time Lily was refusing to do something or the first time she wasn't listening, but for some reason Mal didn't have the patience for this right now. She lifted her up and carried her to bathroom, while Lily started to cry very loudly, fighting to get out of her arms.

It took twice the usual time to get her ready, because she was fighting to get away the whole time.

"Want me to read you a story?" Mal asked trying to calm herself down, knowing that she was making things more complicated than they needed to be.

Lily was looking angry and didn't even answer the question.

"Okay," she then snapped, grabbing her way harder than intended and got her into her bed, "Goodnight," she said as she left the room.

As soon as she heard Lily starting to cry, she took a deep breath and went right back in there. She wasn't crying to get things her way, but she was crying because she was actually sad, and Mal had rarely felt more guilty.

As soon as Mal kneeled beside her bed, Lily threw herself into her arms still crying. Mal kissed her on the head and held her close to her. "I'm sorry," she whispered to her, "I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to yell at you."

Mal ended up sitting there until Lily had fallen asleep. She almost broke down crying herself, so mad at herself for not being able to control her temper. Even though it had only been for a short moment, in that moment she had felt like her mother, and that was the last person she wanted to feel like. She knew she had to talk to Ben.

Not wanting to leave Lily alone she asked Ben's parents to look after her.

She had been scared of confronting Ben all this time. Not knowing which way to approach him, but she realized know that it affected her more than she knew, and the last person she wanted to take her anger out on was Lily.

She didn't even knock on the door as she went into his office. She walked over and stood in front of his desk, before he finally looked up. "We need to talk," she said.

"What happened?" He asked, barely seeming to care.

"I hurt Lily," she said, her voice almost a whisper.

"You did what?" He said with a raised voice, finally giving her his full attention.

"Not physically. But..." she stopped, not exactly knowing how to describe what she wanted to say, "For a moment I felt like my mom."

Ben looked at her in disbelief, "Why?" He asked.

"Why do you think?" She asked, suddenly sounding mad again, "You haven't really been the one keeping a good mood around here lately."

Ben didn't answer.

"What is going on Ben?" She took a deep breath, "I'm sorry I haven't been the support you probably needed but I'm still learning, and you're not exactly making it easy for me... I can't take this Ben... not knowing what to do. I wanna be there for you as you're always there for me."

Ben seemed to understand what she was trying to say because he nodded slowly, "Well I'm sorry too," he said, "It's not like I want to... be like this. I just... I feel like I need to prove something... prove myself good enough. I don't know why. I guess... I want Lily to look up to me the same way I looked up to my father."

"She already does," Mal said, "She doesn't need you to be organized of professional or whatever it was you told me about, she needs you to be there for her and to love her. That's what makes you a good father."

"I know," Ben said almost snapping again, "I guess it's not only her. What if I can't be the king people expect me to be?"

"Ben..." Mal said, carefully taking his hand, "We don't need to be what people expect us to be. We need to be who we want to be. It doesn't matter what other people think, if you're not happy doing what you do."

"You're right," Ben said, "I'm sorry, I wanna help people and help Auradon, but most of all I want to be there for you and Lily."

Mal smiled and kissed him, "Then I think that is exactly who you should be."

Ben smiled back at her, and nodded, "Thank you."