Chapter Text
She was only days past her eighteenth birthday on the day she married her husband. This was not intentional - simply a matter of convenience; a way to settle a merger between their fathers’ businesses. Besides, the eighth of May 1896 seemed a good day for a wedding: warm and fair, with hazy blue skies up above.
With her long white dress, perfectly tailored to her frame, and her long blonde curls carefully styled into an elegant updo, her husband thought she was every bit the beautiful bride. He knew that someday, perhaps in no time at all, he could learn to love her. He only hoped she could come to feel the same for him. Of course, he was too old for her - at twenty-nine, almost thirty, he was nearly twelve years her senior - but he knew couples who had overcome far more. In the face of his doubt, he reminded himself that he was a wealthy, respectable, passably attractive man… surely that would count for something.
As she walked to the altar, her dress grew heavier, weighing her down further with every step. The soft music played by a trio was of musicians seemed to her a requiem - a song of mourning for all she was to lose. Her freedom; her childhood. But she could not think that way. She pasted a sweet, pleasant smile upon her face, fiddling with a pearl button on the sleeve of her dress. She told herself it was a happy day. She was binding herself to the man whom she would one day fall in love with; putting into motion the future in which she would be so protected and provided for by her husband. This was what she told herself.
The ceremony flew by. Under the piercing gaze of the gathered crowd, he announced, “On this day, I take thee to love, cherish, and protect. I vow to be faithful to thee until death parts us,” and slipped a ring onto her finger. She too said her vows, instead promising her love, admiration, and obedience, as the minister prompted. Their marriage was sealed with a chaste kiss - their first - and their families' polite applause. The reception was similarly brief: they ate a chicken dish of some description, appeased their inebriated guests with a gracious smile, danced a delicate waltz.
When night fell, they retreated to his house to begin their new lives together.
At this house, their lives fell into a dreary routine. Each morning, he woke at dawn and took the trolley to his factory in Mamaroneck, which had not yet reached the level of success that allowed him to leave it unattended for the day. She stayed home, doing so much and yet so little; she frequented luncheons at the houses of her various lukewarm acquaintances, taught herself embroidery, pottered around the garden - the only place where she would truly feel at home for years to come - weeding flowerbeds and planting the dahlias that her husband so loved. They had not yet moved into the house on the crest of the hill of Broadview Avenue; after all, it was still only 1896, and his business had still to reach the level of success it would come to claim.
She was still eighteen when her stomach began to swell with their child.
She did not realise it, at first. Her mother, having died giving birth to her younger brother, had not been around to teach her the signs as a mother should. And so, when she began to vomit, and when her head spun, and when she was so exhausted that her own two feet could hardly bear her weight, she dismissed it as a winter cold and continued on as she usually would. It was only when her husband returned from work to find her unconscious in the garden that a doctor was consulted. He would never have told her this, of course - how could he admit to having such a situation any less than entirely beneath his control, especially when he, much older and more experienced than she, had foolishly failed to notice all of the warning signs? - but when he had seen her lying there, curled up beneath the dahlias, his heart had momentarily stopped. Breathing uncomfortably quickly, he had scooped her up and run inside, desperately crying for Kathleen, their newest maid, to fetch the doctor who lived next door to examine her.
The half hour spent waiting outside their bedroom door for the doctor to reach a diagnosis was agonising. He had not known his wife for long, nor were his feelings towards her defined in any way. They had not yet had a conversation about whether they were in love or simply liked each other in the way that two people living in such close proximity were bound to do. Of course, they did everything that was expected if a married couple - she kissed him on the cheek every morning when he left for work, and every evening when he returned; she never strayed far from his side at social functions, always hanging off his arm, or entwining her hand with his, or else he would clasp his hand around her slender waist and pull her close to him; and, of course, they did that which was expected to occur behind closed doors fairly regularly (they had to, if they were to have the children that had already become a topic of great interest for their respective parents and a frequent subject of conversation at get-togethers). They even slept in the same bed each night. But even that felt innocent, in a way - there was, after all, a great difference between sleeping next to someone and truly sharing a bed with them. To his dismay, his feelings were all in a great muddle, one that would take an actual conversation with his wife to settle. He would have to be the one to bridge the gap that still existed between them, to suggest moving from a relationship that was cordially friendly to something more.
He dreaded that.
But, more than that, he dreaded the conversation that he was to have with the doctor when he finally finished his examination. Was she sick? Dying? She was a young woman, a healthy one - he knew that, of course, but his mind seemed set on convincing him that she was fighting for her life behind their bedroom door. He fished out his pocket watch and consulted the time; it had only been ten minutes since he had last checked it. Just under forty in total. In that time, a couple of the house’s servants had passed by, voicing their well wishes and concern for their mistress, a few of the ones he was closer with even clapping him on the shoulder and offering to sit with him a while as he waited. He rejected them all, of course; he had always been a private man, and this above all seemed something he had to face alone. He had sense enough to know that if anything were to be wrong with his wife, the news would spread around the house regardless, but he saw no point in accelerating the process. He wanted to ensure they had time to come to terms with whatever the doctor discovered; to grieve, if need be.
After what was, in his eyes, far too long a wait, Doctor Brown emerged from their bedroom. Before he could ask any questions of his wife, the doctor assured him, “Your wife is alright. Better than alright, actually.” Before he could ask for any elaboration, the doctor continued, “She is with child.”
Once again, his heart stopped. “With child?” he asked, his voice low. “How far along? Does she know yet?”
“Eight weeks, maybe ten - later than average to find out, of course, but not terribly so. And no, she doesn’t. I thought it would be better coming from you.”
He nodded, thanking the doctor and sending him home with a crisp ten-dollar bill in his pocket. This would not be an easy conversation, he knew instantly. His wife was young, somewhat naive - a consequence of her dead mother and overly distant, conservative father. Perhaps she would not understand what he was trying to tell her, at first. He would simply have to be patient.
He pushed open the door, spotting her curled up in their bed, hugging herself tightly. Her dress, once spotless white, was stained with dirt from the flowerbed she had collapsed in. Her eyes were wet with tears. Noticing her distress, he climbed up onto the bed and pulled her into his arms. This sort of contact - comforting someone, letting them cry into his shirt while he rubbed small circles on their back - was new to him, and the motions were still slightly awkward. Letting out a sob, she buried her face in his chest, letting his hand come up to cradle the back of her head. Hesitantly, he hushed her, whispering soft, hopefully comforting phrases beneath the sound of her tears. “What’s wrong with me?” she cried. “I’ve felt this way for weeks. I keep feeling sick and dizzy; I’m so tired that I can barely drag myself out of bed in the morning. And now, apparently, I’ve fainted in the garden, in full view of the neighbours and everyone! And the doctor was asking so many questions. Am I dying?”
“No, my love,” he answered, suppressing a smile. He ran his fingers through her hair - had he really never done that before? - revelling in the silky feeling of her soft blonde curls. “You are not dying. You are going to have a baby.”
“A baby?” she echoed, turning her face towards him. Her eyes were wide, searching. “Truly?”
He nodded. For the next hour, he sat with her in their bed, propped up against the headboard with one leg outstretched as he held her in his arms. As soon as she had heard his conformation, she had started to cry again, burying her face back into his shirt and only emerging after several more minutes. It truly astounded him how little she knew about the matter as a whole; of course, her absence of a mother complicated matters, but her father was a sensible, educated man - it had seemed like a given that he would teach her about the basic facts of biology. But being staunchly traditional and far too impatient to spend much time with either of his children, he had neglected to do so. That complicated things for both of them. Mostly, she was scared. The whole concept of pregnancy was foreign, the idea of giving birth seemed to be straight out of a horror story, and that was to say nothing of the entire process of raising a child. As a girl, she had been passed between nurses and governesses following her mother’s death, spending much of her time alone. It wasn’t an awful childhood - she had explored the gardens, searched the house for hidden corners and secret passageways, taught herself to play piano, all pastimes that were relatively enjoyable for a young girl - but it was a lonely one, and she was fiercely determined that no child of hers would ever feel the same way. As she curled into her husband’s arms, she voiced all these fears in a soft tone and let him brush the tears from her cheeks. She found herself wondering what had changed. He had never been cruel, but always slightly cold. Before that afternoon, there had seemed a gap between them, a distance that could never be breeched. But now, she allowed herself to melt into him, to seek comfort in his gentle words and warm embrace.
After their hour of conversation had passed, he stood, gently reminding her that he had paperwork to complete in his office. She allowed him to press a kiss to her forehead before she returned to their bed, climbing beneath the heavy sheets. She pressed a hand to her stomach - for now, it was still flat, but she was bowled over by the realisation that deep inside her, out of sight, there was something so wonderful growing.
By the time the year had ended, she would be a Mother.