Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The kitchen clock ticked too loudly that night. Its rhythm was steady, almost mocking, but beneath it Orm could hear the uneven beat of her own heart. Every second stretched longer than it should, echoing against the pale walls of the dining room.

She had learned to live in silences; seven years of marriage had taught her that not every quiet moment meant peace. Sometimes it meant distance. And tonight, the silence pressed down on her like a weight she could no longer carry.

Lingling sat across from her at the dining table, shoulders relaxed, posture casual, as though this space, their home, was nothing more than a waiting room. Her eyes were fixed on the glow of her phone, the screen painting her face in a light Orm couldn’t reach. Her lips curved faintly, a small smile flickering at something unseen. Something or someone not in this room.

Orm’s chest tightened. She didn’t ask who it was. She didn’t need to.

The signs had been there for weeks. Ling coming home late with excuses that tasted like lies. Perfume lingering on her clothes, delicate and sharp, one Orm didn’t wear. The way Ling’s laughter had changed; softer, brighter, threaded with an intimacy that was absent when they spoke.

But if she was honest, it hadn’t started weeks ago. It had started long before.

It was the night you stopped holding my hand at the movies. You didn’t even notice when I reached for you, and my fingers found nothing but the cool leather of the seat. You were too busy checking your phone, smiling at messages I never saw.

It was the morning you left for work without finishing the coffee I made for you; the one you used to say no one else could make right. You didn’t kiss me goodbye that day. I told myself you were late. I told myself it was nothing.

It was the way your voice softened on phone calls I wasn’t part of. The way you carried a joy in your eyes that dimmed the second you looked at me. I noticed. God, I noticed everything. And still, I kept pretending.

Orm wrapped her hands tighter around her mug of tea, letting the steam curl against her face. She willed the warmth to anchor her, to keep her from shaking. She wanted to ask: Why? wanted to demand if all their years together had already become too small for Ling. But the words were heavy, thick in her throat, too dangerous to let escape.

“Don’t wait up for me tonight,” Ling said suddenly, sliding her phone into her bag. Her voice was smooth, practiced, as though the line had been rehearsed more than once. She didn’t meet Orm’s eyes when she added, “Work dinner.”

The lie hung in the air, sharp as glass.

Orm blinked slowly, forcing her lips into a curve that barely resembled a smile. “Of course.” Her voice came out even, but her fingers tightened against the mug until her knuckles paled.

Ling stood, smoothing down the sleeve of her blazer. She leaned over to press a kiss against Orm’s cheek, light, almost polite. It felt less like love and more like obligation, a habit performed out of muscle memory.

Orm held still, her body rigid under the touch. When Ling pulled away, their eyes met briefly; Orm searching, Ling avoiding.

“Don’t wait up,” Ling repeated, softer this time, as though trying to soften the edges. Then she was gone.

The door clicked shut. The sound seemed louder than it should have been, final, echoing in the apartment.

Orm sat there long after, staring at the untouched tea. The steam had already thinned, gone cold, much like the warmth between them. Her chest rose and fell in shallow, uneven breaths.

Her mind whispered truths she didn’t want to face: It’s not breaking. It’s already broken.

She pressed her palm against the table, grounding herself, but her body trembled anyway. Memories of the years they had built together flooded in; late-night talks, laughter in bed, whispered promises made when the world felt too heavy. All of it now felt like fragile glass, shattering silently piece by piece.

And yet, even as the raw ache of betrayal carved through her, Orm clung to the remnants. She wasn’t ready to let go. Not yet. Not while the ghost of what they once were still lingered in this home.

She lifted the mug, forcing herself to sip the now-bitter tea. The taste made her wince, but she swallowed anyway. If pain was all that remained, then she would carry it alone.

Later, when the clock announced midnight with a hollow strike, Orm was still at the table. The apartment around her felt too large, every shadow stretching, every corner whispering absence. Ling should have been home by now. Once, Orm would have called to ask if she was safe, if she was still coming. Now she sat paralyzed, phone within reach, heart too heavy to dial.

If I call, she’ll lie again. If I don’t call… I’ll still know the truth.

She rose eventually, her legs stiff, the mug abandoned. She drifted through the apartment as though it were someone else’s house, her fingers grazing familiar objects—photographs on the shelf, their wedding picture on the wall, a scarf of Ling’s draped carelessly on the sofa. Each one felt like a relic, a reminder of a life that had begun to rot while she wasn’t looking.

She paused at the bedroom door. Their bed was neatly made, untouched. It looked enormous without Ling there. Orm crawled into it anyway, curling to one side, clutching Ling’s pillow against her chest. It no longer smelled like her.

Tears welled before she could stop them, spilling hot against the pillow. She buried her face in the fabric, muffling the sound.

How do you grieve something that’s still standing right in front of you?

The clock ticked on, indifferent. The silence pressed closer. Orm cried until exhaustion pulled her under, her arms still wrapped around the ghost of someone who no longer belonged to her.

Chapter Text

Orm sat on the edge of the bathtub, the cool tile pressing into her legs. Her skin was clammy, damp with sweat despite the morning chill seeping through the bathroom window. She gripped the porcelain sink for balance, waiting for the dizzy spell to pass.

The nausea had come in waves for the past week; at first she thought it was stress, the sleepless nights, the meals skipped while waiting up for Ling. But that morning, the scent of fried garlic from the neighbor’s kitchen had sent her retching until her throat burned.

And now, the test in her trembling hands confirmed what her body had already whispered.

Two lines. Faint but undeniable.

She stared at it for what felt like hours, her reflection in the bathroom mirror hazy through the fog of her tears. Her mind refused to wrap around it, though her heart was already racing ahead. A child. Their child.

But her first instinct wasn’t joy; it was fear.

Her stomach churned again, though she couldn’t tell if it was from the pregnancy or the dread pooling in her chest. She remembered the way Ling had smiled at her phone the night before, how easily she had slipped out with that excuse of a “work dinner.” How Orm had stayed up past midnight waiting, only to hear the soft click of the door at three in the morning. Lingling hadn’t even bothered to explain.

Orm’s other hand slid unconsciously to her stomach. Inside her, life had already begun. But outside? Her marriage was unraveling.

She pressed her lips together, biting down on the sob rising in her throat. She couldn’t tell Ling. Not now. Not when her wife’s heart already belonged to someone else.

If Ling knew, would she stay out of duty? Would she resent them both; the child and Orm for tying her down? Would this tiny heartbeat become nothing more than a chain around her neck?

Orm shook her head, clutching the test tightly before tucking it back into its box. No. This was hers to carry, hers to protect. For now, it had to be a secret.

She stood slowly, catching her reflection in the bathroom mirror. Her eyes looked tired, ringed with shadows, but there was something else too, something quietly fierce. The faintest glow of defiance beneath the grief.

“Don’t worry,” she whispered to the tiny life within her, her voice breaking. “You’ll have me. Always.”

And though the words nearly shattered her, Orm knew she had made her choice.

She would bear this truth alone; until she no longer could.

That morning, the table felt colder than usual.

The soup on Orm’s plate had long gone lukewarm, the steam curling faintly into the air, ignored. Across from her, Ling sat with her phone balanced in one hand, chopsticks in the other. Her laughter, soft and private, slipped between the clink of utensils and the hum of the refrigerator.

Orm’s gaze lingered on her wife’s bent head, the way her lips curved at something glowing on the screen. The sight struck a chord so deep it left her breathless.

Just like him, she thought. Just like my father.

The memory clawed its way back uninvited. She was eleven again, sitting at another dinner table, watching her father lean too close to his phone, smiling at messages her mother would never see. She remembered the way silence thickened in their home, how her mother’s eyes dulled with each passing day until, one evening, his suitcase was simply gone.

He had left without looking back. For another woman. For another life.

And Orm had sworn that she would never repeat her mother’s fate. That she would choose someone who stayed. Someone who loved her enough not to leave.

Her fingers trembled against the rim of her bowl.

Now here she was, married, pregnant, and watching history write itself again across her own table.

Her stomach lurched, not from the pregnancy this time, but from fear. She pressed a hand discreetly to her middle, her palm hot against the thin fabric of her dress. I won’t let you grow up with the same scars I carry, she promised silently. I won’t let you feel this kind of abandonment.

“Orm,” Ling’s voice broke through, distracted, almost an afterthought. She didn’t look up from her screen. “You’re not eating.”

Orm forced her lips into a small curve, shaking her head. “Not hungry.”

The truth was she couldn’t swallow even if she tried. The bitterness in her throat was heavier than any food could be.

Ling hummed, unconcerned, already back to whatever conversation glowed in her palm.

Orm sat there in silence, her chopsticks untouched, her body still. She wanted to scream, to ask who was worth more of her wife’s attention than the home they had built together. She wanted to confess about the child, to throw the truth across the table like a lifeline or a weapon.

But the words tangled in her chest, caught between fear and pride.

So she said nothing. She just sat there, her hand pressed against her stomach, her eyes burning as she whispered a vow she would never speak aloud:

I will not let you be left behind, the way I was.

And the clock ticked on, merciless, as Ling’s laughter filled the silence where love used to be.

That night, the apartment was darker than usual. Ling had slipped out again “work dinner,” the same tired excuse and Orm hadn’t even tried to argue. She listened to the sound of the lock clicking shut, then to the emptiness that followed, the silence pressing against her chest.

She drifted into the bedroom alone. Their bed looked far too large without Ling in it, the sheets smoothed flat on her side. Orm crawled to her edge and curled up tight, clutching Ling’s pillow against her chest. It no longer smelled like her.

The tears came before she could stop them. Hot, relentless, spilling across the fabric as she buried her face to stifle the sound.

This is how it starts, she thought bitterly. This is how my mother must have felt, waiting for a man who had already given his heart to someone else.

Her hand slid to her stomach, trembling. The life inside her was still too small to be felt, but she imagined it anyway; tiny, fragile, depending on her.

I’ll stay. I’ll stay.

The words were silent, carved into the marrow of her bones.

The clock in the living room ticked on, loud and merciless. Orm closed her eyes, exhaustion dragging her under, her body curled protectively around the secret she carried.

But even in sleep, her chest rose unevenly, her dreams fractured by the ghosts of the past and the shadow of a future she no longer trusted.

The night stretched endlessly. Orm drifted in and out of shallow sleep, her body too restless to truly surrender. Every creak of the building, every groan of the pipes made her flinch, her ears straining for the sound she dreaded most.

It was just past three in the morning when she finally heard it.

The faint scrape of a key in the lock. The hesitant click of the door. The soft shuffle of footsteps trying too hard to be quiet.

Orm’s eyes snapped open in the darkness, but she kept her body perfectly still, her breathing slow and steady. Pretending. She knew the routine by now, Ling always slipped in like a shadow, careful not to wake her. As if secrecy could soften the truth.

From the bedroom, she listened. The muted thud of Ling’s heels being kicked off. The rustle of fabric as she slipped out of her blazer. The delicate clink of glass as water was poured in the kitchen.

Each sound was a knife, confirming what Orm already knew but couldn’t bear to say aloud. Ling wasn’t working late. Ling was coming home from someone else’s arms.

The floorboards creaked closer. Orm’s chest tightened as the bedroom door opened, spilling in a thin slice of hallway light. She shut her eyes quickly, feigning the deep even breaths of sleep.

Ling lingered for a moment at the threshold. Orm could feel her presence; warm, familiar, and yet impossibly distant. Then the light vanished again as the door closed softly.

The mattress dipped slightly as Ling slid in beside her. The faint scent of unfamiliar perfume clung to her skin, too sweet, too sharp. Orm’s stomach lurched, bile threatening to rise.

She kept her breathing steady, though her pulse thundered in her ears. Ling shifted once, then stilled, her back turned to Orm. No arm reaching across the sheets. No whispered goodnight.

The silence between them was vast, louder than any argument could have been.

Orm lay there with her eyes shut, every nerve awake, her hand pressed to her stomach under the blankets. She thought of her father. She thought of her mother’s tears. She thought of the child she carried, fragile and unseen, already wrapped in the consequences of history repeating itself.

Her lips parted soundlessly, the words she would never say caught in her throat: Please stay. Please love me. Please don’t leave.

But in the end, she said nothing.

She just listened to the quiet rhythm of Ling’s breathing, willing herself not to break.

And when her own tears slipped silently into the pillow, Orm told herself it was better this way—better to pretend she was asleep than to face the truth wide awake.