Chapter Text
heyy don't think about what happens if simon's been declared MIA on a mission and you get the call whilst violet is on her high chair and you're trying to feed her some mashed bananas with her spoon. you get the call and the spoon clatters on the floor, followed by your phone, your daughter is still banging her fists on her table but you’re going numb.
don’t think about how violet keeps babbling for her dada over and over again at night, batting at your face with tearful eyes as you try and explain to her that dada’s gone somewhere ‘very far’. she doesn’t understand it at all, all so desperate to want to see her dad again. her curls are growing out, and they look just like simon’s, just a little bit darker, and you’re so close to breaking into tears.
the first few nights when the bed is empty, which is fine usually, because your husband is on deployment for months sometimes. but now you know he’s not coming back, there’s nobody coming back for you. you can’t sleep away from your daughter, and so you end up falling asleep leaning against her crib, waking up to her wails that only simon could calm down.
price comes by a week later, a flag in his hand and sadness on his face. “i couldn’t save him love.” he says, his voice breaking when he sees little violet in your arms, you bouncing her to keep her from crying, keep you both from crying. you look exhausted, you haven’t washed your hair in ages, your tshirt has spit up on it from violet, and you just can’t keep going on like this any longer.
price takes violet in his arms when he finally urges you to take a shower, she already knows him from all the times the 141 visits, and she’s calm for a few minutes, calm with a man holding her you think, because she can almost imagine it’s her father. you rush out of the bathroom when you hear her crying again, price’s beard unfamiliar to her. she was so much used to her father’s scars and glasgow smile.
violet riley will grow up loved, three fathers even if she doesn’t get to see her own one again.