Maris' insomnia was usually a result of a mind that was constantly turning rather than nightmares. She rarely even remembered her dreams, save for the very good or very bad ones, but on this particular night, she woke with a start, panic buzzing through her until she took a few deep breaths and reminded herself where she was and that it wasn't real.

But it could be.

Dream Maris had been sitting in a rocking chair in the nursery, its walls painted a soft brown. A large wooden crib was under the window, but she couldn't see the baby inside it.

She could hear him. Keats was crying, loudly. His wails were piercing, louder and frankly more obnoxious than any she'd ever heard before, but she hadn't done anything about it. She sat frozen, staring straight ahead while Rory's voice drifted down from the upstairs bedroom.

Maris!? Why aren't you taking care of him? Its your job to take care of him.

It was a dream manifestation of her worst fear. An instance of history repeating itself because during her talk with John Maris realized something she hadn't really put together before. She knew her grandfather had helped out with her from the very beginning. It was why moving in once Christina left was the next logical step and not really much of a shift since he had been over the house so much anyway. Eli's mother had let on that she'd sometimes watched Maris as a baby, bringing Eli with her so she could keep an eye on both of them at once.

Maris knew her mother had stuck around a year or two, but Christina had never really been present. John seemed reluctant to tell Maris, but he'd eventually said she wasn't very attentive, Maris. I...was relieved she left. She wasn't in a place to take care of you.

Other people had to watch Maris because her mother, while there, never really did.

Maris knew her mother was sick. She knew she couldn't help it. But the idea of being ignored and neglected was bound to sting no matter what the circumstances. Especially for someone like Maris who hated the idea of being brushed aside. She'd always liked attention. Taking up space. Was her past the reason why?

It wasn't going to happen to Keats.

She untangled herself from Rory with ease, a well practiced move over the past few nights. Since she was only wearing a baggy t shirt, she snatched her robe off the floor and shrugged it on as she padded down the hallway. Even though their heat worked pretty well and actually reached all their rooms (something she couldn't say for her grandfather's place back in Maine) the house was still chilly, much chillier than the warm blanket and Rory cocoon she'd left moments earlier. But there was no time to head back for her slippers to ease her now ice cold feet. It was too risky on the waking up Rory front.

Maris eventually ended up in the art room, though it mostly housed larger items they hadn't found a place for yet. Maris cello was propped up on its stand in a far corner, a chair behind it. She played it sometimes and on one particular occasion, she'd played it for Rory, but for now she just borrowed the chair, pulling it closer to one of the room's many glass windows to gaze outside. It was still pitch black out, but Maris wouldn't have been able to focus on the view even if there was one.

She covered her face with her hands and took a deep breath to sort of center herself, her hands automatically coming upward to rake themselves through her hair before she settled back in the chair again.

Somewhat calmer, she leaned over to grab her book from a nearby end table. She'd placed it there the week before, along with glasses that were last year's prescription, but good enough to read with. She stood up, flipped on the light and settled in to start reading again, even though she'd been stuck on the same chapter since she'd arrived home, too distracted to let anything really sink in.

For the most part, things had settled back into a normal rhythm. For the most part. There were still times that Rory would get a prick at the back of her mind, something off, a tone a little different, a bed empty. Something that would make her think back to the day Maris got back and that same gut twisting feeling that she had tried to ignore.

Rory was anything but distant, in fact she might have been even more (if that was even possible) affectionate, more attentive, more supportive of her wife every day. While not exactly approaching helicopter wife territory, she wanted to be around her wife. Something of her instinct made her think that Maris needed to be reminded how much she loved her, wanted her, was her partner in every sense of the word.

If her wife was in bed with her, Rory slept mostly like a rock. Their bodies fit together in whatever state of undress they were in, and soon enough sleep took over. Their mid-night rendezvous were some of Rory's favorite things, but she'd woken up a couple of times to find Maris just slipping back into bed.

Tonight as she stirred, Rory reached out instinctively and found a cold side of the bed. She huffed a little, looking around for her wife only to find an empty room as well. A little bit of that heavy feeling settled in her gut as she slipped out of bed. Pulling on a sweatshirt that happened to be her wife's, she padded barefoot through their house, the darkness illuminated by ambient light from outside.

It took her a few minutes to actually find her wife, seeing her sitting out in the art room. She worried all the more, pausing just outside the door to watch for a few moments. "Hey." She said gently as she stepped into the room, moving across the space until she stood behind her wife. She brushed her fingers through her hair and bent down to kiss the crown of her head. "Can't sleep? I missed you."

Maris was as startled as anyone who thought they were alone in a dark, quiet house would have been, but Rory's kiss soothed her somewhat.

"You scared me," she said softly, reaching up to hold her in place for a moment before guiding her hand down to let her feel just how fast her heart was racing.

Her adrenaline rush was quickly replaced by another feeling: guilt and the slightly irrational notion than she'd been caught. She'd tried so hard to be so careful when slipping out of bed. She'd always taken care not to wake Rory when things got so bad she couldn't stand to stare up at the celing a minute longer, but she'd extra vigilant lately.

Maris didn't want to be a burden on her wife.

That was the crux of this entire thing, wasn't it?

"I didn't mean to wake you," she murmured, slipping off her glasses and putting them on the end table again before rubbing her eyes. "You should go back to sleep. I'll be up in a minute."

Maris was used to running on little sleep because even under the best of circumstances she probably got less than she should, but she did look tired, exhausted with the sort of weariness that went beyond her body just needing rest, but her smile was genuine when she noticed what Rory was wearing. "Especially since you're wearing my sweatshirt."

They had been married for months, and together far longer, but there were times (even often, actually) where Rory would feel almost bowled over by how much she loved this woman.

"I'm sorry honey." She said with a slightly sheepish smile, just letting her lips rest against the top of Maris' head while she held her there. She smelled of shampoo and her, that warm feeling mingling with how tired she was. It was almost enough to stave off the stone in her gut.

Almost.

"I always have a hard time sleeping without you, you know that." She said gently, kissing her just next to her ear one more time before moving around so she could look at her wife's face. Her lips were twisted into a soft smile as she glanced down at her sweatshirt. "And next to nothing underneath it, of course."

She crouched after a moment, brushing her hands over Maris' thighs and resting them on her hips. As cheeky and sweet as she wanted to be with her, the nagging at the back of her mind wouldn't let her fully succumb to it. She looked up at her wife, the person she loved most in this world. "I'm worried about you, Mar." She said gently, squeezing her hips gently. "Have you not been sleeping again?"

Maris may have been distracted lately, but she hadn't been blind to her wife's concern. She'd caught Rory watching, studying her to make sure she was alright which had made her all the more cautious during the past few weeks, but hearing that Rory was worried about her out loud caused a pit to form in Maris' stomach. Seeing the concern in her wife's eyes as she looked up at her added a healthy dose of guilt too, especially for what she was about to say next.

"Just happens sometimes, Rory," she whispered.

That much was true. Maris had always had trouble sleeping. John had noticed when she was teenager, suggesting doctor's visits and even therapy, but Maris, as stubborn as she was never let her father go through with any of them.

She was fine. Sometimes she couldn't sleep and there was no rhyme or reason to it. Plenty of people had the same problem, but there was something under the surface this time, a root cause she didn't want to have to deal with.

And she really didn't want it to have to fall on Rory's shoulders.

"Come on," she said, pulling Rory up and rising from her chair. "Let's go upstairs and rest."

Rory liked to think that she knew her wife better than anyone, and vice versa. But they of course, were individuals, independent in their own rights despite how dependent and attached they were with each other. Ignoring her gut feeling had just left her on higher alert, before she'd even realized it, actually.

"I know, love." She said gently, her thumbs brushing gently against her wife as she held onto her.

It was in Rory's nature to want to help, to want to support her wife however she could, but she always erred on the side of not being too pushy. Well, almost always. She could sense that Maris wasn't telling her something, and while she imagined that was for good reason, it still didn't quite sit well in her gut.

"Okay," She said gently, standing up and taking her wife's hand. But she didn't move just yet, instead just holding her hand in hers, eventually raising it to kiss her palm. "Maris, you know you can tell me anything, right?" Her tone was gentle, not prodding, but open. She was laying bare her concern, as if her wife might need the reminder that there wasn't anything in the universe she wouldn't do for her.

Maris knew what Rory was doing. She was trying to remind her that she was there for her. They had both promised to always be in each other's corner, but it was the opposite of comforting right now.

All it did was remind Maris that she hadn't been completely up front with her wife.

Proud as she was, Maris rarely felt guilty about anything. She hadn't felt even an ounce of shame for going after Rory when she was engaged because she knew she was hers and she always had been.

Maris could be selfish. She could be vain, self centered and closed off, but the way Rory was looking at her so earnest because all she wanted was to make sure she was alright made her feel more than guilty.

It made her feel vaguely sick.

But the sort of things she wanted to tell Rory would probably bring her wife down right along with her. There really was no decent outcome.

"I think we should dial it back on the baby front," she said before she could stop herself.

Communication was a big thing for them, and had been ever since their lack of it caused the worst period of their lives. If Maris didn't want to talk to Rory, she at least wanted her to know that she was there. It had been her nature at one point to distance herself or even shut down, and that hadn't helped anyone.

But they were married now, and Rory had grown so much, they both had. If Maris was holding something back, she knew that it was something serious. Rory wasn't going to pressure her wife, but she was going to make sure she was easily accessed if and when she needed.

The concern however, was real. It hung heavy in the small space between them. It was a surely a burden, but Rory couldn't help it. Her wife was going through something, and she didn't want her to be alone.

When Maris mentioned something similar several nights before, Rory had mulled over it. It had stung a little bit, but Rory eventually waved it off as exhaustion from the both of them. "Okay." She said gently, her head tilting a bit to the side, her gaze on her wife.

The process of their would-be family would be a long one to get started. Maris had seemed so excited about it for a time, but she didn't know what had changed. "We can do that. We have plenty of time." She was trying to be gentle, logic winning out as much as it could. "What brought this on?"

"Nothing brought it on, I just don't think we should get too far ahead of ourselves," she said shortly, defensiveness starting to creep into Maris' voice.

It was an argument that didn't hold water when she and Rory could hardly just go out and get pregnant tomorrow. She knew it would take time. She knew Rory suggesting she go to the doctor to get checked out really wasn't asking for much in the grand scheme of things (and that technically, her wife hadn't even asked or pressured her to go at all).

But it felt like a lot. It felt like a lot really fast and Maris was angry with herself for being the one to get the wheels going in the first place.

She knew it probably seemed like an about face that came out of nowhere. She knew Rory would probably have questions and she had no idea how she was going to answer them because she had questions of her own and wasn't sure even a doctor would be able to give her peace of mind.

There was no way of knowing everything would turn out alright and she knew better than anyone just how often history repeated itself.

A seed of doubt had been planted in the back of Maris' mind and it had dug its roots in pretty quickly.

"You're right, we have time," she said, not looking at Rory as she snatched her book off the end table.

"I didn't think we were." Rory said, reflexively crossing her arms over her chest not so much in defensiveness, but in feeling it coming from her wife. Her hackles were up, for lack of a better term, sensing, now seeing that something was amiss. "Planning for our future doesn't mean getting ahead of ourselves."

Just a few weeks ago, they were fawning over the idea of little Keats and Jane, months and months of joking about what their children would be like made them feel real. The apparent 180 confused her, and worried her all the more.

"Babe, this doesn't make sense." Rory was as gentle as she could be, but it felt like a wall was building up and it was such a foreign entity since they'd gotten back together, that she wanted to kick down the intruder-barrier. "Just the other day we were painting the spare room and talking about a nursery. I'm not in any real rush, it'll take a while for us to even get there just..." She paused, her voice cracking the slightest bit as she said what she felt. "It feels like there's something you're not telling me, Mar."

Maris knew a family was something they both wanted, but there was no denying she had been the one championing for it, just a little more insistent that it needed to happen soon because she was the one with baby fever. She was the one who insisted on going through the process first.

Her rational side (usually stronger than it had been in the weeks following her New York trip) told her they could go back on that now. Rory was fine. The doctor said she probably wouldn't have any trouble getting pregnant so maybe she should be the one to do it first.

What Christina had was the result of hormones and stuff right? If Maris didn't go through the physical process then maybe...

It was little comfort. Not a real solution. She'd bailed after childbirth was over and done with, after all. Maris could still do that, leave Rory with a baby to look after all on her own if she couldn't handle it. People did it all the time without any illness to speak of.

Maris was sure she had that in her, family history or none.

She could be selfish. And cruel. Her coldness toward Rory because she just couldn't admit how much she missed her and wanted her to stay with her rather than in Maine was just a small taste of how she could be.

Rory had never really seen the worst of her, but other women had.

Because as terrible as it sounded, she'd cared about them less.

Maris didn't want to tell Rory what her father had told her. There was a level of shame to it. She knew her wife had also come from a broken home, that she understood growing up without one parent, especially one who had left was like, but Maris' mom had, if you got down to the heart of it, left because of her.

She'd been the new part of the equation, the one thing her mother couldn't take. She'd made her sick. Even if Maris knew it had hardly been her fault, there was no getting around it.

There was more to it than even that. What if Rory put two and two together and started having the same fears that she did? What if she started worrying that Maris would behave the same?

"Why does there have to be some grand conspiracy?" Maris snapped. "Maybe I just changed my mind. Wouldn't you rather me say so now before we got in over our heads?"

It wasn't just the middle of the night that had thrown something off. Rory felt wide awake now, worried, a rock in the pit of her stomach.

The hours that they'd spent dreaming of their little family growing never felt like pressure to Rory. It had always felt like something natural that they both wanted, that they'd get to when it felt right. It had indeed been Maris who first mentioned getting the ball rolling sooner rather than later, but as soon as her wife said it, Rory was more than ready. So much of her did want to savor the time they had together and just with each other, but their process might be long, and months or even years ahead of them.

Rory and Maris had come so far together, and been through what felt like literal hell to be together again. Rory liked to think that she knew her wife better than anyone and vice versa. So whatever she expected from Maris, the tone she took with her was certainly not it.

"Maris." Her own voice took on a bit of a sternness to it it, her brow knit together. "I'm not saying there's some grand conspiracy. I'm just saying that none of this makes sense all of a sudden."

Rory took a step towards her wife, gentle almost as someone might approach an animal that might snap or bite. "Of course I wouldn't want you to wait for that, and I wouldn't want you to keep something like this from me for that long or any amount of time for that matter." She let her hands fall by her sides, huffing a little sigh. "I just didn't expect you to change your mind. I don't know what happened, can you help me understand?"

Maybe even hinting that she'd changed her mind was a bit much and a doctor's visit really wasn't the best move. Maris could get checked out and ask Dr. Shapiro all the questions that were weighing so heavily on her mind. She could ease some of her worries in an instant and there would probably be no need to worry Rory, but Maris already had.

And there was just as much of a chance she'd tell Maris that her worries were well founded.

So made up her mind to keep avoiding Dr. Shapiro's office and this conversation for as long as she could.

Maris knew when her wife was getting frustrated. She hated to see her upset in any way and hated herself whenever she was the cause of it, but she didn't have it in her to be empathetic tonight.

She could only do what she had once been so used to doing: run. Dodge and avoid things, especially feelings when times got tough.

Which was only further proof she wasn't doing great on the whole don't become your mother front.

She spoke slowly, trying her hardest to choose her words carefully, but her mind was going in about five different directions, frustration and just plain weariness seeping into her voice. "I'm saying it's better that we stop and take things slow. Because it's not like we can take them back once things are set in motion. I just don't want to do anything we'll regret."

Rory wasn't someone who liked to push people outside of their comfort zones, except maybe her students when she knew they weren't applying themselves. She didn't like that Maris was clearly feeling a certain kind of way, and yet she didn't want her wife to feel unsupported or pressured in any kind of way. Which just left Rory a bit more in the dark of how to help ease her.

It frustrated her that she didn't seem to know the right thing to say. She couldn't fathom why this was all coming about, not when Rory and Maris had both been so excited about it.

But Rory wasn't going to entirely harp on the moment. She wasn't going to guilt trip her wife or pout about it - no matter how she really really wanted answers. And felt like shit that she couldn't seem to get to the root of the problem. They could argue about things, and did surely just because of their natures, but it wasn't like this. It didn't feel so bad. She wouldn't say that this was triggering, but it certainly felt bigger.

"I don't know what makes you think we might regret it, Maris." She said just as gently, raking her fingers through her hair before she shrugged and sighed, letting her arms drop to her sides. "But yeah. Sure. We can cool it." She couldn't stand still, her arms crossing over her chest almost in a defensive manner. "We didn't even start, so it's not hard to stop."

Maris angry with herself in more ways than one, but mostly because she was the one who started this. Rory was right, they hadn't exactly gotten far with their family planning, but there was really no going back now. The idea had been planted and there was no forgetting about it because she knew Rory wanted Keats and Jane as much as she did and that kind of want, longing, really, hardly just went away.

Maris had let them get too far ahead of themselves and that just wasn't like her. And if there was one thing she should have thought about from every possible angle beforehand...

"But people do," Maris said before adding, softly: "Regret it. And that's not fair to anyone. So yeah, I'm... going to need a little more time, Rory."

The conversation seemed to be going in some sort of circle, but it was Maris' tone that made Rory pause. The softness of her voice struck something in Rory's chest, taking the breath from her lungs for a second. Her worry went into hyperdrive, but instead of sending her spinning, all she wanted to do was soothe.

Something was very wrong, and Rory could tell. Whatever it was, Maris might not be willing or ready to tell her. There was a time she'd push and refuse to set herself back, but that wasn't who she had evolved into being with her wife.

It was her words as much as her tone. Little clues laced through her words that Rory couldn't decipher fully.

"Mar." She said gently, slowly closing the space between them and gingerly reaching for her wife, almost as though she were afraid she'd spook her if she moved to quickly. "We don't have to do anything until we're both ready." Rory was earnest in that, her hands gently gripping Maris' wrists as she stood in front of her.

She wanted to be a mother. Rory wanted Keats and Jane. She wanted the life they had in mind for a long time now ... but only when the time was right. Only when they were able to work through whatever this was. "I love you." She said, her words felt fierce as they left her, full of conviction that she felt with her whole chest. "I don't know what you think might happen, but however it takes for us to get there, that won't change. I want a family with you, but we have to do it when you know it's time, too."

Would she ever be sure? People said there was no right or perfect time to start a family. Even people without her specific type of baggage were worried about what ifs and maybes. Any good parent worried just how they'd handle becoming one. How they and their partner would change, how their kid would turn out.

Worries like that never really went away, even after children arrived and a person found their footing as best they could, but they faded. Maris' own hang ups about marriage and babies had faded over time, thanks in large part to Rory and the knowledge that they could overcome anything, that Maris wouldn't let herself ruin anything this time, but there was no avoiding this. No way to predict that it would or wouldn't come to pass.

And uncertainty was the last thing Maris wanted Rory or their family to face.

She'd heard things that couldn't be unheard or unlearned.

Whenever Rory told her she loved her, Maris knew that she meant it. Maybe it was the conviction with which Rory said it. Maybe it was because it was exactly what she needed to hear after what her father had told her.

But this time it caused Maris' throat to tighten. So naturally she looked away, her body turning in Rory's grasp because every cell in her screamed to run before the levee broke and tears came.

Or at least before Rory could see them.

"I don't think its gonna happen, Rory," she said softly, eyes wet when she opened them again. There was something so defeated, vaguely pitiful, very unMaris about the way she said it. Like she'd already made her choice and given up.

For better or worse, Maris wouldn't let it.

There was nobody in the world that Rory loved more than her wife. It was simple and true that she would do anything for her. She never thought that she'd been the type of person who would have her own happiness so wrapped up in another person, but here they were, married with several months as wives under their belt and still as madly in love as they were before their wedding. It was natural to think about what came next, about what they wanted next. Even before they'd gotten married, those things were on their minds.

Was this just cold feet? Worrying over the ifs and maybes of pregnancy and motherhood? That was a natural thing, it had to be. Of course when Rory thought about motherhood in any real-world scenarios, her own chest would fill with a little panic. She thought it was natural, the body's response to the unknown.

Rory was in the dark here. She could only fill in the blank parts with her own mind spinning, which wasn't a healthy thing on her end, either. She worried, and that worry put big scary things in those spaces. She was trying to remain focused and in the moment, but it was harder to do than she'd like to admit.

As Maris turned from her, Rory's heart lurched painfully in her chest, that kind of ice in her veins feeling making her almost dizzy from the suddenness of it. "Maris," She said quietly, the fear that seemed to strike her to the core too evident in her voice.

"You...What?" She tried to make sense of it, the shutting down that was happening right before her eyes. "Babe, you're scaring me." She said with shaky voice, her fingers reaching out for want of touching her, but stopping just short, for the first time in a very, very long time, unsure if her wife wanted her to touch her. "This just happened so suddenly. If you're worried about it, we can talk about it. But it's something you, something we have wanted for so long. I don't understand." The crux of it was that she didn't understand, and of course her mind spun awful, scary things to fill in those blanks. Her voice shook and she felt her own emotion come in too strong. She would give her wife anything, but starting a family together had been something they both wanted. "Please help me understand why."

The idea that she was scaring Rory is what caused Maris to fully break. Tears fell, which meant a bitter laugh at her own weakness soon followed.

Tears were ridiculous. Maris thought they never accomplished anything.

She was mad at herself for giving into them. She hated that she let Rory see them, see her being anything but the strong person she'd promised to be for her and anyone else who came along when she said her vows. On some level, was even mad at Rory, for being the one person she couldn't keep up some sort of untouchable persona with. With anyone else, maybe she would have forgotten all about it, resigned herself to not having a family without any sort of explanation because her past was too painful and frankly, none of their business. Let's be honest, with anyone else, she would have been long gone, this uncomfortable discussion, as personal as it was, more than enough to send Maris packing before they found out things about her that made her seem like less than the perfectly pulled together person she wanted everyone to think she was.

And the key word really was perfect.

But Rory was Rory. Her wife. And she'd promised herself she wouldn't turn her back on her long before she'd made promises to her in front of everyone else.

"Because I don't want to hate them." The confession was soft, vaguely bitter and she knew how terrible it sounded. But it was the truth. The one thing she worried about most. Resenting their children the way she had been.

Saying things aloud had a way of making them more real. It only made Maris feel worse, sick. And that's when she started crying in earnest. Audible sobs that no one, not even Rory or Eli had ever heard come out of her before.

Because she'd never let anyone see them before.

Maris wasn't putting up much of a front when she said she wasn't a crier. Displays of emotion were a rare thing for her, but everyone had them. Everyone fell to pieces sometimes. Maris hadn't cried like this since her grandfather died.

Rory hadn't been around for that, but even if she had been, Maris wasn't sure she would have let Rory comfort her. She'd cried alone. Away from her father, Ramona and her friends, not just because of her pride but because she didn't want to upset them too.

She didn't want to upset Rory. The idea that seeing her like this would made her cry harder, but Maris needed to cry, so she fell into her, her voice shaky as her body shook. "I talked to my dad..."

The amount of times Rory had seen Maris cry were few and far between. Even then, she knew that it was a privileged thing that her wife opened up to her like she did, with good or bad tears or anything in between The times Rory had seen her break down like this was even rarer.

She'd known in her gut something was wrong. She'd known it since Maris had returned from New York. In this very moment, part of Rory wished that she had pushed her wife a little harder to open up to her. Then of course, she knew that Maris had to get there on her own. Maybe just with a nudge.

But Rory didn't know whatever was weighing on her wife was this severe. Those words broke Rory's heart, the confession that seemed to split open into a bigger issue. She didn't want to hate their children. It startled her in a way, that that was even in her head. But of course, Rory knew Maris' history. They'd both been abandoned by parents, but she wouldn't even try to compare. The implications here were starting to connect.

"Honey," The term was once a joke, too saccharine for them, but had become more of a sacred term between the two of them, reserved for moments of intense passion or feeling. With the word, Rory stepped closer to her, gently putting a hand on her wife's back and sliding it across her shoulders. She wasn't going to pull her into an embrace, not if her wife wasn't ready.

But she was there. And the way Maris crumpled against her broke her heart even more. Rory's arms were quick to tighten their grip around her wife, holding her closely, unwavering. She wasn't going to tell Maris it was okay, or paint some kind of platitude to her. She was going to listen, and soothe in any way she could. "I'm here." She whispered gently against her wife's ear, clutching her even tighter. Her lips rested against the crown of Maris' head, just holding her, waiting patiently. She'd stand there all night with her, her own tears pricking at her eyes. "What did he tell you?"

Movies got it wrong. When a person cried, really and truly cried about something, they couldn't just stop. They couldn't even speak, really. Conversations through tears while tears gleamed on their cheeks almost never happened. It was hard to look at someone, even someone trying to help you when you were upset and when you finally did you were usually a snotty, splotchy mess.

Maris was all of those things when her breathing gradually slowed and she found the courage to look up at Rory, automatically swiping under her eye and down her cheek with the back of her hand. Her breathing was still shaky, erratic as her lungs noisily tried to bring air back into them again.

She thought about apologizing for soaking through Rory's (okay her) sweatshirt, but she knew there was no real need. Rory was there for her, the way she would have been for her wife if the situation was reversed, but she found herself wishing for some sort of stalling tactic.

She didn't know where to begin. She'd barely wrapped her head around her conversation with her dad herself.

"I knew I shouldn't have asked," she said softly. "But I wanted to know about my mom." It was yet another thing she was angry at herself for. She'd known better. She always had. Why else would she have put off having the conversation for so long in the first place? Maris had always known it was going to be painful, that the reasons behind her mom's absence couldn't possibly have been good.

A person was bound to be curious and no matter how good Maris had gotten about pushing her mother's absence to the back of her mind, no matter how capable her father and grandfather had been and no matter how genuinely well adjusted she was, it was something she'd wondered about over the years.

But she hadn't really asked for herself. She asked about her mother for Keats, desperate to know if there was something in Christina's genes that might make him sick, never realizing that her mother's flaws might effect her instead.

Suddenly very tired after crying and letting the events of the past week fully sink in, Maris took a few steps backward toward an old couch they were keeping in the paint room until they found a place for it, collapsing back onto it and pulling Rory with her.

She was quiet for a moment, unsure where to begin before just deciding to tell the story the way it had been told to her.

"She um, was really sick. When she was pregnant. For most of it, my dad said. She had to stay in bed toward the end it because apparently I wanted to come early?"

If Maris' origin story was happier, she might have laughed at that. It made sense. She was stubborn, headstrong. And early to everything. Why would her birth have been any different?

"But I was fine. They managed to hold things off until it was safe but she..."

Maris swallowed. "She was really depressed. After. You know, the way some women get. My dad said it was really bad. And um...." Maris ran a hand through her hair, fidgeting in a way she rarely did because she was uncomfortable, unsure of what to say or do. "She never really got any better so....yeah. That's why she was never... there. And apparently she wasn't really present even before she..." She trailed off, knowing her wife knew how the story ended. Her mom left.

Maris had always thought it was for the best that Christina was out of the picture before she could really remember her, but she would have been lying if she said that sometimes, she liked to think about the fact that her mother had apparently stuck around for a year or two. When she was very young, she liked to imagine that they'd spent some time together. That her mom had done all the usual, cliched things like read her stories or pop her in a stroller to take her around the park, but apparently that had been too much to ask for.

It was a bit of a punch to an already sore stomach to learn that she'd never had a mother.

Not really.

Maris had charisma. She could tell a story like no one else and reveled in the attention she received when doing so. This wasn't one of her best stories. Her tone was flat. Her sentences were choppy. Her word choices were... childish and she wasn't as quick, straight and to the point as she usually was. She knew it was vague, but her father had tried to be too, telling Rory only what she needed to hear because he didn't want to hurt her.

But it was easy enough to fill in the blanks. And she would for Rory, because she knew there were bound to be questions that followed.

In all things, Rory’s main concern was her wife. It could be a silly thing, even just as simple as picking a restaurant she knew Maris would like for dinner take-out. Priorities shifted when someone was without a doubt the most important person in her life. The only thing she cared about right in this moment was hearing her wife, and truly hearing everything that she had to say, if and when she chose to say it.

Her fingers came up to help Maris brush away her tears, gentle as she touched her wife’s face. Her heart pounded, a kind of aching settling in before she even knew what Maris was going to say. Maris was hurting, so she was hurting. It was simple as that. She held Maris, trying to help by keeping her own breathing steady, her own stance firmly planted.

Pieces settled together. Her mother, of course it was. Whatever John had told Maris had so clearly rattled her. It made sense that Maris would want to know about her mother, particularly as they were contemplating starting their own family. It made sense medically, but it made sense emotionally as well. She had sometimes wondered if Maris had questions about her mother, but it was a subject they didn’t often dive deep into.

Rory followed Maris to the couch, not letting an extra inch between them at all before they sat down. She tugged her wife closer to her, an arm around her shoulders, resting her elbow on the couch so her fingers could gently, soothingly drag through the short hair at the back of her neck.

With her free hand, she took one of Maris’, giving her a squeeze. Rory didn’t say anything though, giving Maris the space she needed to gather herself and say what she needed to.

It made sense. And that was just as painful if it was something completely out of the realm of possibility. Postpartum was no joke, and she knew from her own research and friends who had gone through pregnancy, that it could take many forms. Some more severe than others. What Maris’ mother had gone through seemed worse than most. It was heartbreaking, but she also knew none of it was Maris’ fault. Did it mean that Maris would be destined to follow suit? Rory really didn’t think so.

Maris telling her all of this, laying her burden bare before her meant a lot. Rory knew that. It wasn’t easy, and she knew that too. Rory wasn’t about to give her some platitudes or ease over her pain with some kind of shallow “it’ll be fine!” Kind of comment. She didn’t know that, nobody did.

“Oh Mar, that’s so much for you to take in.” She said softly, bowing her head to press a soft kiss against her wife’s shoulder. It broke her heart that Maris thought she had to carry it herself. “I’m so sorry.” She said in earnest, holding her wife a little tighter.

Rory just held her for a moment, unsure what to say, or if there was anything she could say. “I understand, why it threw you for a fucking loop.” That was an understatement to be sure, but god, how much could one shoulder of their parents’ burdens, too? It was a wallop of a revelation, knowing that Christina hadn’t been present. How much the woman had missed out on Maris, the beautiful, smart, incredible woman that Rory loved? It sent a fierce wave of protectiveness through her, one unparalleled to anything she’d felt before.

“You’re afraid if the same thing will happen to you?” Rory asked gently, her voice quiet, thoughtful. She wasn’t prodding as much as she was connecting the dots. As much as this was a scary set of circumstances for Maris to deal with, Rory couldn’t see it. She couldn’t see a life without Maris. She couldn’t see it in the other woman to disappear on her, on what could be them. But that wasn’t the point. The point was that her wife was scared, and hurt, and Rory felt that.

"Everyone says I'm like her," Maris whispered. The worst part was, she didn't even really know what that meant. She'd always been able to get bits and pieces out of her aunt Ramona, who made no secret of just how much she disliked Christina and disapproved of her choices even though they had apparently been friends once upon a time. But even she had never told Maris much. Once Christina left, it was almost as if she'd never been there at all, even though she'd left something of hers behind.

Someone that Maris' family didn't want to upset by bringing her up.

As far as Maris knew before her conversation with John, her mom had simply left and never looked back. She'd never called or written to see if Maris was doing alright.

Now she knew that wasn't true.

She wrote once, when you were getting ready to graduate high school.

And you didn't think to tell me?

She asked me not to. And we both thought it would be better you didn't know.

Maris couldn't really argue with that.

What did she want?

She asked about you. How you were doing, what you were like.

What did you tell her?

That you were beautiful. Brilliant. Stubborn. I sent her a picture.

Did she ever answer?

No.

Then how do you know if she even got it?

Maris...

Does she...know I'm gay?

I didn't mention it. Does that matter?

Maybe. Because it might have mattered to Maris' mother.

Was she okay? She's not...there's nothing wrong with her now? She's healthy and...

As far as I know. She said she was doing well. She was living in-

Don't tell me. I don't care.

Maris didn't want any contact with her mother. If by some miracle she called, out of the blue to say she wanted to finally meet face to face and try and have a conversation to explain herself and maybe even make amends, she wouldn't have agreed to it.

Christina was sick. The funk she'd fallen into was common. It wasn't her fault. The choices she made after were. Plenty of women fought through it. And didn't leave their babies.

"I don't know if it's genetic, Ror."

She knew there was an easy way to figure that out. Dr. Shapiro (or even a specialist if need be) could probably answer her questions and set her mind at ease, but it was common. Something that happened with no rhyme or reason and that bothered Maris. She liked to know what she was getting into and she wasn't about to leave something so important to chance.

"Apart from that we should be fine though," Maris mumbled. "She was fine."

John had filled in the gaps on Christina's history, medical and otherwise as best he could. Maris' mother apparently kept a lot of things close to the chest (well, that sounded familiar). She wasn't terribly close to her family. Her father had never been in the picture, but her mother was in fairly good health, living in Arizona when Maris' parents married. John had only met her once and apparently, the meeting hadn't gone well. Her father's introverted nature could sometimes come off as snobbishness and that was apparently how Maris' grandmother read it.

Was she...depressed normally?

No, only after-

Only after me.

That obviously didn't make Maris feel any better. Her mother had migraines. Allergies. (Again, familiar.) But was otherwise perfectly fine.

And she was black.

Biracial, yes. Your grandmother was black.

Maris wasn't sure how to begin to unpack what that meant. She'd only ever been exposed to the Greek, Jewish portion of her family. If Keats and Jane ever did enter the picture she sort of hoped they'd have more exposure to that part of their heritage than she ever had.

Not that she blamed her father. He'd done the best he could. And probably wasn't sure where to begin either.

Maris hadn't just been robbed of her mother. There was an entire part of herself, her culture that was entirely missing. Maybe even family she didn't know about. For the first time in a long time, she was beginning to wonder if she had siblings.

Even if that didn't seem likely. After such a rough pregnancy and everything after, she had her doubts Christina would put herself through that again.

Especially if she wasn't the mothering type.

"I don't want you to have to deal with that, Rory. Everything falling on you."

Rory knew her wife, she liked to think that where it counted, she knew her better than anyone. But there were facts that she didn’t know - like how exactly she was growing up, how she might resemble her father or her grandfather in moments and traits she hadn’t witnessed herself - or most of all, how she might resemble her mother. Rory exhaled slowly as Maris whispered, her forehead touching to the side of her wife’s face as she hugged her even closer. She was clutching onto her wife, needing to hold onto her so Maris knew she wasn’t alone.

Was Maris like her mother? She imagined in some ways, anyone in her family who said so meant it in a good way. Maybe her mother was stubborn but tenacious, maybe she was brilliant, maybe she was kind but in a way that wasn’t gooey and soft on the outside. Whatever qualities Christina had given Maris, Rory found herself feeling grateful for the traits that her wife had inherited. It was an odd feeling, but one that she wouldn’t shy away from. The other part of her, the bigger part was fiercely protective of her wife. She was angry at the elder woman she’d never met for putting Maris through even a second of pain.

“If you’re like her in any ways, that doesn’t mean that you’d be like her in this way, babe.” She said softly, finally gathering her thoughts enough into words. There was a lot unknown about being parents, or even pregnancy itself. It was something that neither of them could control and honestly, neither of them were particularly good with that, either. For all they knew, hormones could wallop Rory worse than Maris, or Maris could inherit what her mother had, of course. Doctors could help predict it, but would they know everything? It was hard to tell.

Whatever came for them, Rory had faith that they could handle it - together. “I hate that you had to find this out without me.” Would Rory have been able to help had she been there when John told her all of these things? Probably not. Maybe that conversation wouldn’t have even happened had she been there to begin with. But it still settled like a rock in the pit of her stomach that her wife had shouldered this burden by herself since New York.

The thing that utterly shattered her heart and made her tear up (not for the first time) was what Maris said next. Because in the wake of this revelation about her mother, Maris was worried about her. She worried about leaving her behind to pick up the pieces. She loved her that much. “You wouldn’t.” Rory said with such conviction it almost startled her. She hadn’t put a lot of thought into saying what she did, just her gut reaction as she looked at her wife.

It wasn’t so simple, nor would it be if Maris indeed had any type of depression with pregnancy or afterward. But Rory felt it in her very bones. “The fact alone that you’re worried about me. Maris. That is so much of who you are.” She touched her fingers to her wife’s cheek, catching her gaze. “Thank you, for telling me and letting me in.” It wasn’t a trite way of thanking her, but something she meant so seriously. It meant the world to her to share this burden, and maybe help alleviate some of her wife’s pain.

“We can take our time, and if you don’t feel like you can do it, we will deal with that, too. But don’t you dare let someone steal from you the things that you want in life. Not motherhood if that’s what you want. Not your happiness, and certainly not me.” She brushed her thumb against her chin, her other hand squeezing her wife’s knee. “You really think I’d let you leave me?” As much as it was her attempt at some small reprieve of levity, her conviction was serious. “We’re in this together, every part of our lives. If you need time, we’ll have that. If you need me to hold your hand every step of the way … well you might not have a choice cause I’m gonna do that anyway.”

Rory was emotional, but that wasn’t new. She knew in her heart and soul that Maris would be an incredible mother, and that they’d get to have that, together. Just one step at a time.

You really think I’d let you leave me?

The words (and all the others that came before them) were almost enough to make Maris start crying again.

Her voice was soft, crackly as she leaned into her wife's touch and answered with a faint. "No?"

Maris wasn't that worried about running away from Rory, their children or the promises she'd made and responsibilities that came with them. In the midst all her current uncertainty, she knew she could never leave Rory.

When they broke up the first time around, it had been a mutual decision, but she'd been cruel, all but goading Rory into breaking up with her because she thought that would somehow feel better on her conscious.

She knew what it was like to be left behind and she knew she could never do that to a kid, especially her own but... Rory could still be left doing everything even if she did stick around.

"But what if I'm mentally checked out?" she whispered. Maris had lost most of the defensive tone she'd had earlier. There was a hint of sadness in her voice, but for the most part she was talking pretty calmly about a possible scenario.

"I don't want you to have to take care of them all by yourself. It's not fair."

One of the things Maris' father kept reminding her was that things had been different when she was born.

Help just wasn't as readily available and if Maris and her mother really were as alike as everyone said, maybe Christina wasn't the type of person to take it.

Maris didn't really like doctors. She hated the very idea of therapy.

But she knew she would try if worst case scenarios became reality. No one would ever call her a sunny person, but she'd never been depressed. She'd want to get back to normal for herself as much as she would Rory and their kids, but... what about the meantime?

And would missed time with the baby mean she wouldn't be able to bond or even love it?

Was that why it was apparently so easy for Christina to leave?

What if she never got attached to Keats or Jane? What if they could sense she...

No. No, that was another scary nightmare scenario that would only pull her right back down again. She swallowed the lump in her throat that it had caused and focused on Rory. She still felt shaky, vulnerable, kind of sick because she'd never quite laid more of herself and all the things she'd carried (even before she learned quite how heavy they were) bare before to anyone.

Even her.

But just seeing her face, so fierce and supportive and full of love made her feel better. Stronger, even.

She sighed, raking a hand through her hair before gripping it a little too tightly for a moment, the little twinge of pain she inflicted half punishment and half vain attempt to tell herself to snap out of it and pull herself together. "It's good. That you know. Important. So you're not surprised if... things don't happen the way we want them to."

Because they were both stubborn, independent women, they had once had to learn the hard way just what life was like without each other. And they'd both made the decision, day after day, that that wasn't going to happen again. Rory trusted Maris, more than she had ever trusted anyone. She certainly loved her more than she thought she was even capable of loving another human being.

"No. I'd drag your ass back to me." Rory affirmed, hugging her wife a little tighter as she leaned in like that.

But truthfully Rory wasn't worried about it, and that's why she could state it like that. She knew that they'd already been through that particular hurdle in their past, and neither of them was looking to ever be without each other again.

There were other factors, of course. And Maris brought them up as she thought about it. Rory was careful not to answer quickly, instead being far more thoughtful with her responses and actually thinking about them.

"Honey I know your mind. I don't think even on your worst days, anyone could ever accuse you of being mentally checked out. I think even in the event of something happening..." She paused, trying to actually wrap her head around that possibility. "No, I don't think that's anything we can't handle."

Of course Maris was worried about the burden falling on Rory. Her wife was a goddamn warrior and she loved her more than anything. "If and when you need me to, I'll step up. It's what we do. Pick up where the other one leaves off. Fair doesn't even come into the equation."

They were getting ahead of themselves, but Rory meant that with all the conviction she had in her. Nothing would be insurmountable, as long as they were together.

She couldn't imagine it, quite literally, a world where Maris would completely check out from their potential children's lives. If she needed time, Rory would give her that. If she needed Rory to take over the bulk of parenting while she worked on whatever she might need to, she'd do it. It wasn't so easy and not a quick-fix right here and now. She wasn't going to always say and do the right things, and there was not entire fix-all switch to flip. But this was a big, big step.

Rory brushed her hand up and down Maris' spine, soothing her with touch as she felt her wife start to collect herself back up. "I think it's good we both are prepared, just in case." She wondered if Christina had absolutely zero idea of what was to come. She might not have been able to prepare for it mentally, emotionally, look for the signs. "No matter what, I've got you okay?" She brushed her thumb against her wife's cheek and kissed her other one, gently. "We'll take everything one day at a time, one step at a time. We'll cross those bridges when we get to them."

Maris bit her lip. "The next time I have to go in for a check up I'll talk to her about it," she said, fairly relieved that she'd gone to see Dr. Shapiro a few weeks before her trip so she'd have enough pills on hand. She probably wouldn't see her (or have that particular, potentially devastating conversation) for a couple months yet.

But maybe that was a blessing and a curse. The anticipation and anguish of not knowing might drive Maris crazy in the meantime. Especially if she kept imagining worst case scenarios or even worse, starting hitting up google for answers to her health questions in the middle of the night.

That never turned out well. No matter what you were curious about.

But Rory knew now and as scary was it was to be vulnerable, Maris knew it was ultimately a good thing and that her wife would reel her back in if need be.

So much had been said. So much more needed to be discussed, but Maris just looked at Rory for a moment before deciding that ultimately, they'd done all they could at the moment. She was as contented as she could be and exhausted from a night that had hardly turned out the way she imagined it.

"C'mon," she said softly, leaning forward to press a kiss to Rory's temple before gently lacing her fingers in hers. "Let's go back upstairs and try and sleep."