Mister and Missus

A fresh dusting of snow had fallen during the night-time reign of the skies. The swirling, brooding clouds, afflicted by the tension and the erratic magic bubbling up uncontrollably amongst the inhabitants of the home buried in the Irish countryside, had sputtered out an iciness of its own, draping the house and the surrounding grounds in a thick covering that made all of those inside the walls shrink a little more into the bedclothes they had been cocooned in. The chill made the fires in their bedrooms glow that little bit brighter and the animals huffed and sniffled about as they tried to find somewhere warm to sleep in amongst their humans as the humans themselves fought off the remnants of the days prior and the tumultuous emotions that had gone along hand in hand with the events that had gone on.

Finally, exhaustion had set into the bones of the Hayes couple and before the dishes and mugs of cocoa could even be sent back into their cupboards after being scoured, one half of the coupling ascended the stairs to their room, disappearing into the mingling scents of their figures that their duvet and blankets held onto steadfastly. When the younger of the two finally arrived five minutes or so after her husband, sleep had alright seemed to capture him and once she had changed, the young woman joined her husband under the covers, winding her arms around him as she snuggled up close behind him, allowing sleep also to bring her eyes to their close.

Outside the window, the branches laden with crisp snow and icicles were disturbed by the fluttering birds calling out to their friends and family. A bright sunshine had descended down from a clear, clean sky, an Eastern wind having chased away the last of the cloud, and when Melissa Hayes aroused herself from her slumber that brisk morning she found herself rapt with contentment and the vaguest, lightest, queerest feeling that didn’t soothe her inner turmoil but certainly seemed to hold promise to her. The day was one that only arrived and was received as enthusiastically as no other once every year: it was Christmas and everyone, from the mice snuffling in the stables to the witches and wizards curled up asleep in their beds seemed to know it.

Turning a little, Millie rolled into Kieran’s chest, her arm coming round to rest over his which had crowded around her little frame at some time during the night. Her fingers travelled soothingly over his skin, traipsing down to draw the sheets over them properly before sliding back up to cross his cheekbones and his lips. Over the latter, Millie pressed her own, lingering a moment before lifting her head to place another small kiss to the space between his brows which even in sleep had grown furrowed and laden with worry. His expression seemed to soften then but he still seemed troubled, understandably, and in sleep Millie could not reach him to bring him some comfort.

It wasn’t long before some form of slumber returned to the witch, her head nuzzling into Kieran’s neck where from then on, basking in the combined warmth of the bed and his frame, she drifted in and out. During this small lapse in time, a little creature appeared at the window. All white, it could’ve been made entirely out of snow had it not been for the bright blue eyes staring into the room. It cast its eyes about quickly before nudging open the window with its nose, pushing it off of the latch in order to allow the little animal to sneak in. The creature, thankfully, had the grace to close the window again and once it was in, hopped down off of the window sill to assess the world it had arrived in.

Little tufts of snow were lost as the little animal moved into the warmth of the room. It took stock of dying embers in the hearth and the clothes dotted about along with other aspects worth investigating. However it was the intertwined bodies of the other creatures the little one discovered were hoomins that truly grasped the little animal’s attention. She hopped lithely up onto the bed, giving it a rather long run from the fire but landing well never the less, and slid in underneath the covers, finding an adequately warm area between the feet of the hoomins and there it was that she curled up, her tail thudding idly against the mattress as she, Narcissa Black cat, fell into her own, contented snooze.

When the stress of everyone yelling, combined with the pain of his refusing to heal the wound caused by Robin with whatever spell it took (he didn't really deserve the ease that could come with his fixing it that way), became too much, Keiran bid everyone goodnight and passed Millie an apologetic smile for leaving before her. Upon reaching the bedroom, he changed into a pair of pajama bottoms, pulled off his shirt, and went through his evening ritual of teeth brushing and general bed-time prepping. Regardless of his intent to stay awake until Millie had returned, the exhaustion of everything was catching up to him and before he could even register the fact, he was out like a light.

Sleep was hard to find come morning as he drifted in and out of the darkness. At one point he was certain he could feel and smell Millie – ah. She must have come to bed, then. What time was it? He could tell, and it was too late, because he was falling under again. It wasn't until Keiran realized that half of him was warm and the other was freezing that it was probably morning. Christmas morning.

A stretch was in order, but when Keiran's eyes opened he first saw Millie's hair, and then a frosted window. No wonder he was so bloody cold. He shivered a bit before tucking into Millie's hold and wished that the chill would stay outside where it belonged. He couldn't bring himself to be angry about it, though, when it meant that Millie was curled around him to keep them warm. This was far better than the stressful dreams that had been prodding at his mind. This felt more like a dream than what he'd woken up from.

Keiran simply relaxed until Millie shifted, fingers pressing into his side and chin nuzzling into his chest. His finger moved to brush against her nose in greeting. “Happy Christmas, love,” he whispered into her hair on the chance that she was still asleep. “Today will be better. I promise.”

Stretching his leg, Keiran nearly jumped at the realization that Millie must have left something under the covers the day before. Maybe a shirt or socks. Except it felt far too soft. And warm. What in Merlin's name was down there? He nudged it hesitantly with his toe and actually did stiffen when something poked him back. It almost felt like-

“Lucy..?” He breathed quietly, staring at the covers by their feet. It couldn't be. Lucius was far larger than the creature that was between Millie's feet and his own. Then he remembered. There was a rather small, fluffy, kitten that had reminded him so much of Lucy-cat that it was amazing. Perhaps with a less-squished face. But the poor thing had been so lonesome that Keiran had been completely unable to help feeding it. Apparently she had found her way back.

A grin broke out over his face. It certainly made up for his inability to let himself bring one home earlier in the week only to have to hide it for a couple days. He wouldn't have felt quite right about it. This felt far more like a Christmas surprise.

“Missie,” He started, sitting up so she had to roll onto the pillow they'd been sharing. “before we have to go down and deal with everything, I have to show you something.” Keiran leaned over her, pressing kisses to her eyelids before sitting up and searching under the blankets. His gaze landed on the kitten before he offered a hand to the kitten to pick her up.

“I know we've got Lucius Malfoy the cat,” He grinned, turning to her and setting the kitten on the sheets between them, “but this little girl followed me the other day, and somehow got inside. Looks like she's taken a liking to the Hayes family, hmm? What say we take her in? We already have a grumpy child in Lucy, but this lil' one can be our second.” The words fell out without his really thinking, instead going by the idea and memory of his train of thought from a couple days before. Maybe that was a bad idea. She might not have wanted him to say anything. Too late, Keiran figured.

The feel of Kieran’s warm breath over her face, whispering the first greeting of that morning, roused Millie with sleepy finality from her slumber. Her eyes flickered open, the soft blue gaze she wore glassy and laden heavy with her fatigue. She curled her legs a little and shook her head, a smile alighting on her features as she snuggled closer to his chest, inhaling the scent of her husband that was surrounding her, on her skin and hair, clinging to the sheets and imprinted in his body. For the young woman, his presence was more reassuring than anything in the world but it certainly wasn’t enough to make her want to wake up. She would have rather stayed in bed with him forever.

As ever though, her husband had the unhelpful habit of moving and rolling her off of whichever part of him she’d made her pillow over the course of the night and with a huff, Millie rolled over onto her back, throwing one arm up over her head, the other coming down to rest gently over her stomach. She smiled sleepily at him, her dismay evaporating from her face as he shuffled along, disrupting their nest that their bodies had curled the sheets into.

Millie looked up as Kieran took from beneath the covers what was essentially a small ball of fluff, snow itself bar from the two ovals made of clear sapphire which opened wearily to greet her as a yawn drew up the animal’s lips. Delight spread over Millie’s face as she gathered up the kitten in her arms, cradling the animal against her chest as she smoothed down the disarray of fur on the little critter’s head. Millie popped a kiss onto the kitten’s nose and she mewed a little, reaching up to pat her little paw against Millie’s jaw.

“Oh Kieran she’s precious,” She whispered, revelling in the feeling of an animal who actually seemed to like her.

Millie looked at the critter with an indulgent smile and laughed before expressing, “Well how about Narcissa, then? Narcissa Black the kitten.”

Millie set the newly christened Narcissa down and smirked a little as she began to pull at the coverings, finding a warm spot for herself. Millie slid out of the bed and hurried across the room to the fireplace beside which she had put all of the little gifts she had gotten for Kieran, an assortment of boxes wrapped up in shiny paper covered in reindeers, set off with scarlet ribbons.

She set them out on the bedclothes, four little boxes, and joined him back on the bed. Millie took the first one and set it down closer to Kieran, a hesitant smile gentle on her lips.

“Open it.” She encouraged. “I have something to tell you. It’s a spoiled surprise, a little bit, but I think… I think it’s a good one.” Millie took a breath. “Narcissa…actually would make it four grumpy children.”

Keiran didn't even bother trying to hold back a laugh at Millie's astounding ability to name cats, grinning as his wife practically curled herself around the little fluffball in question. Before he could announce that he had other things for her besides the accidental adoption of Narcissa-cat (as Keiran would inevitably call her, if not 'Cissa-cat'), Millie had left the warmth of their bed behind in search of her own packages.

His index finger reached out to rub over the top of Narcissa's head, wondering vaguely how Lucius would take the new arrival. Of course, as the mattress sank, his attention was re-directed to Millie and the little boxes she set before him. He was grinning and reaching for the first one in the line when her words distracted him.

She had to tell him something? His smile broadened. So he was right? At least he was sure, now. She suggested that she was aware of his having figured it out, which sort made him stumble over his thoughts.

“Well, yeah, I thought you were, but that doesn't mean I'm not happy to-” Keiran stopped, open-mouthed. “Um, what? … Four? I-” He shook his head in surprise. He couldn't find any words for a minute, torn between laughing and gaping at her. Instead, he picked up all of the boxes and set them next to Narcissa-cat, then turned to look at her again. Keiran reached out to pick up her hands, feeling both dazed and absurdly excited. “Missie, this is.. this is perfect. I mean, I'll have no idea what I'm doing. But two little Millies running around? I'd love to see that.”

A moment of dread fell over him at the realization that he was so happy in the wake of Aiden's death as well as the fact that Aiden wouldn't be there to see their twins. Keiran pushed it away when he decided that Aiden would be proud just to have his son have kids, regardless of if he ever met them.

His eyes fell to the boxes as Narcissa shifted a bit beside them. He passed her a smile before picking up the first one she had set down. Keiran unwrapped it carefully, having picked up the habit of saving the paper from his mum over the years. He tipped it over and caught the squares that fell into his hand. He flipped them over and stared at the pictures he held in his grasp.

“Millie, is this..?” He asked, looking up to search for her affirmation. He searched back and forth between her eyes and the photos, holding them like they might disappear. Keiran's hand brushed up Millie's arm to weave his fingers into her hair. He leaned over to kiss her, setting the photos to the side before pulling her towards him. “I love you,” he breathed against her lips, fingers brushing over her cheek. “So much.”

In time, he forced himself to pull away, reluctant to reach for the other boxes. She had already given him so much. She probably would say he was being silly, or pass them to him anyway, though, so he picked up the next one, unrolling the paper as he had for the previous. A chain fell into his hand with an emblem of a Saint on the piece attached. He lifted a brow, unsure what Millie was getting at. Surely it meant something important that he just didn't understand.

If the others were like that one, Keiran figured she would want to explain. So he went on opening the last two. The third box held a pair of cufflinks with numbers on each. After looking at them for a time, he realized what it was. A sort of sad smile passed over his face as he set them back into their container to keep them safe.

Their anniversary. He hadn't expected that, though he perhaps should have. They were so much better than he had anticipated through the law and the mess that came along with it. The only problem was how he felt looking back at the day. It wasn't like the ceremony or reception had gone as intended. Keiran, looking back, wished vehemently that it could have been different. Maybe one day, when the world was a little less chaotic, he could suggest they renew their vows and actually go on a sort of honeymoon. They hadn't really had any sort of time they could call a honeymoon. Even on break, things had gone wrong. A laugh almost rose in his chest at the idea of asking his mum to watch their twins down the road when they could go on a trip like that. The idea stuck in his head, and he determined to save it for her birthday. Maybe by that point things would be more normal. Hers came right before his, so it wouldn't be hard to find time to come up with something she'd like. Clearly, they wouldn't be able to go for some time.

The last box held a recording by Celestina Warbeck, and Keiran laughed outright before casting a disbelieving glance at Millie. He had jokingly suggested that she was the greatest singer he'd ever heard, and she had either taken it seriously or was enjoying the idea of teasing him about it. “You're ridiculous.” He laughed, putting it back in the box.

Keiran picked up Narcissa-cat gently, amazed at how small she was in his hands. He imagined it would feel something like this with their kids. Surely it would feel more magical than a cat that followed him home, though.

“Although I wish I could say I planned this little one showing up, I do have something else for you.” He murmured, standing to reach into his bedside table. From the drawer, he pulled a little booklet of things he had made the morning before everything happened with Avery. It was thoroughly embarrassing, and probably not very interesting after Melissa's announcements, but it had seemed appropriate at the time. “I, um, did try actually shopping for things. But in the end I just figured this might be a bit more.. personal. More us.”

They were still working out bits and pieces of their relationship, as well as the small parts of himself that he found along the way, thanks to her having intervened in his life (not that he was complaining at all). But the thing he had realized recently was that they weren't ever going to be normal, in any generic sense of the word. But he didn't think he really wanted to be. In time things would feel right, but not necessarily normal. All he could understand in that moment, looking at his wife as she flicked through the pages he'd made, was that he wasn't sure he would have ended up with anybody else. Even if he had, there was no way, his mind proclaimed, that they would ever be as happy as he was with her. Because regardless of why or how, they were far more put together as a team than separately.

(OOC: Not my best, sorry. :c )
“This is okay?”

The fear hadn’t abated itself from her system, regardless of Kieran’s spluttered exclamations and her god-awful hints and his equally tactless attempts at reassurance. She loathed the fact that their match was perhaps the only real success story that the Ministry could boast. That riled her more than anything in the world and she couldn’t deny the unsettled fluttering within her, the worry that perhaps regardless of their children there would come a point when the doors would be opened again and they would part ways without a second thought. The thought of Avery still hung absently in Millie’s mind and the concern along with it.

However, when Kieran drew her against him, the feeling of his lips on hers seemed to throw out the ideas that were still tormenting her. Her fingers crawled up to curl around the back of his neck and she smiled a little, reopening her eyes when he pulled away. Something in her registered the loss of his presence suddenly but she put that to one side as the cat resumed its sitting position in her lap, mewing mournfully before dropping her head on Millie’s thigh.

Millie’s hand came down to draw circles on Narcissa-cat’s back as she watched Kieran intently, waiting for his reception of the gifts. The necklace was one she took from the somewhat obscene amount of packaging and carefully undid the clasp. Millie leaned forward and drew it around Kieran’s neck, buttoning it back up behind his head before letting it fall to where it would rest against his skin. It gave a bright green wink of magic and Millie smiled a little before looking up at Kieran, choosing her words carefully in order to try and explain.

“Something our darling deputy minister said the other day got to me. I was packing up some of my stuff and he breezed past in that stupid way he does and said: ‘it’s a funny old world we’re travelling on, isn’t it?’ And… I thought, yeah. Yeah, it is. So I wanted to make sure that it would be a good road and that it would be alright. So, Saint Christopher is the patron saint of travellers and it’s charmed with old runic magic. I didn’t do it. That’s a bit out of my depth but Gisele knew who to get to do it so .. yeah.”

Millie smiled impishly, deciding to leave out the part where it was actually Cordella who, during her time in Azkaban, had learned many of spells that other inmates coveted. It was old magic. Something that the Ministry couldn’t battle against or keep them from using. Cordella had runes of her own littering her body and her mind had stored away every last spell, a few of which had come to good use, imprinted into the pliable gold of the necklace so that Kieran would always be safe. Azkaban magic probably wasn’t something that he wanted to hear she’d been utilising – even if it wasn’t technically her – so she left it out.

The young woman laughed a little at the cufflinks and conceded that they were just the slightest bit tacky, though that, too, wasn’t voiced aloud.

“I just thought they could be a good keepsake. Silly but quite a good keepsake. I don’t think I actually got you a wedding present anyway. I was too busy being mopey.”

The last gift made Millie’s day and she laughed openly, even stirring the cat into taking a glance at what Kieran held.

“I expect you to play it, too!” She insisted.

The book that Kieran presented Millie with sobered the blonde and after slowly lifting through the pages, she looked up and set the book – and the cat – down before curling her arms around her husband’s neck.

“Thank you,” she murmured, pressing a kiss to his lips before nudging his nose with her own. “It’s perfect.”

(OOC: Shorter than I wanted. But my muse has been hiding lately.)

Guilt gnawed at Keiran as Millie explained the gifts she had put together for him. How was it she managed to get just the right things while he was left to question everything and end the end still just fail? It was embarrassing, to say the least, but he had never been one to know what to get anyone. Avery had long since made him promise to stop buying her gifts since everything she received was basically useless or bizarre. Sure, he sometimes hit the nail on the head, but more often than not he figured words and actions were better than some gift the person might throw out a few years later or pack away and forget.

The chill of the necklace as it settled against his chest returned him to the present, taking in her explanation. He picked up the charmed bit and looked down at it, a smile breaking out across his face. This wife of his, she really was something. Perhaps the Deputy Minister knew what he was on about. But Keiran had said that before.

Millie seemed to take his attempt at a gift well enough, clinging to him as he had her after the news. “I wish it was, love,” he sighed, letting his head drop to her shoulder. “It's very Hufflepuff of me. I'm pretty awful at figuring out gifts for people.” He sighed and put on a front of disappointment and embarrassment as his fingers toyed with her shirt. Keiran glanced briefly over at Cissa-cat, took in the fact that she was a decent distance away, and grinned into Millie's neck.

His arm swept around her waist, spinning her just enough so that her back was pressed against his chest. “I'll tell you what, though,” he chuckled, fingers brushing over her middle. “Someday, when things make more sense in the world, we'll go on holiday. Maybe mum will keep the kids,” he suggested, passing his lips over her neck as he spoke, “or they could come with. It's not exactly going to make up for us not planning any sort of honeymoon, or having a perfect wedding. But it's something, y'know?” He shrugged.

He glanced to the door, wondering if his mum or Elliot or someone was supposed to come get them. It felt later than it probably was, but something told him they wouldn't be having an early morning after everything the past few days. The house itself seemed tired, though Keiran kept that bit to himself. It was strange to think that he and Millie were the closest thing in the Irish home to a completed family or a working relationship. Why was he so worried that Christmas wouldn't be going very well?

“Are you trying to get rid of them already?”

The inquiry was playful and as the words tumbled into the air, Millie’s fingers crawled over Kieran’s, lacing between his larger ones. She smiled brightly and pressed a kiss to his jaw. It was easy like this: the two of them (technically five if you counted the little ones and the cat who had found herself a snuggle spot in the duvet) just relaxing, simply. There was a great peace about just sitting with Kieran and Millie couldn’t quite put her finger on why. She supposed it was their not-so-secret penchant for domesticity. She could foresee a home in the countryside in the not-too-distant future: a mischievous cow in a field providing all of the excitement.

“Jamaica would be good,” Millie joked with a laugh.

There was the distinct prospect that if Millie ever showed her face in Jamaica again she’d be back behind the beachfront bar she’d spent the year before last in before noon. Her hands hadn’t forgotten the way to shake up the cocktails and certainly not the recipes, either, and all of the tricks that got the sun worshipers to part with their money. Paper umbrellas tended to be the key but Millie had always kept a clean bar and the music on as loud as it would go. Party time. Thus, possibly not Jamaica.

“Or Greece!” She exclaimed after a thought. “Anywhere, really, actually.” She added finally. “I think you need one more than I do, though. To be quite honest. You’re getting a little bit pale and pasty.”

She couldn’t keep the smirk off of her face and she knew the double-standard as soon as it came out of her mouth. Kieran wasn’t quite as pale as her. He still had a slight summer tinge to his cheeks but she’d washed out as soon as the season had turned, seemingly: her hair darkening with the changing colours. She was ready for the summertime and all of the mischief that would come along with it. She wasn’t about to let Gisele and Cordella get away for long and they couldn’t go far with the baby – but they, too, would want the sunshine. Bournemouth it would have to be!

“It is fine, you know. About the wedding, I mean. It wasn’t fab but the whole scenario sucked so it was never going to be this joyous occasion. Ultimately, it matters not. It’s just one day. Things are so much better now. It’s only going to get worse when these nightmares have finished cooking,” she drummed their fingers over her stomach and laughed. “You bit off more than you could chew, Mr Hayes.”

“Me?” He replied, feigning surprise, “Never!”

Keiran let out a laugh, tucking his face into the juncture of her neck and shoulder. “I mean,” he added, “why in the world would I want to send off a couple folks who are going to take your time away? That’s just silly.” His hands splayed out over her stomach protectively, regardless of his joking response. It didn’t matter if he didn’t know how to raise children; he refused to be the sort of father that let his kids feel unloved. Keiran had seen how that path turned out, and it wasn’t pretty. He wouldn’t wish it on anyone.

He nearly commented on the suggestion that they head to Jamaica, but his wife seemed to be going over some inside joke in her head, so he kept quiet until she took a teasing stab at him. He stared at her, eyes portraying mock hurt, before cracking a smile. “Wherever we go, I’d like to put in a vote for making it a winter trip. I’m not sure I want to spend a summer in a place far hotter than here on it’s coolest summer day. As you so kindly pointed out,” he nudged her in jest, “I’m pale as it is. No need to turn me into a lobster.”

Her reply sobered him enough that he sat up straighter, hands drifting to her sides even as her own tapped along her middle. Things were better now? That was a good sign, he mused. But it didn’t answer the question that had been nagging him since he saw how Avery and Robin looked at each other. Somehow, Avery’s eyes held fear, regret, and love all at once. It really had been right for her, as he and Millie had worked out, too. But where Keiran and his wife seemed to get on for the most part, his two best friends seemed downright miserable.

Keiran couldn’t tell if it was that Avery loved Robin and he couldn’t love her back, or if it just stemmed from the confusion that rose with their fight. The man had never been one to show his feelings openly, anyway. But Melissa did, didn’t she? Keiran didn’t imagine the looks she gave him, right? He was fairly sure. But again, there was a difference between actually loving someone and accepting one’s fate. While Keiran couldn’t tell which of those applied to his best mate, the ex-professor certainly knew where he stood.

“So,” he started, watching one of his hands fiddle with the sheet they sat on, “you’re happy, then? With all of this, I mean. You don’t feel… trapped, or stuck or anything?” A frown fell over his face, eyebrows tugging together at the idea.

Millie always seemed happy enough, but if she was putting up some kind of front for him, as Keiran imagined Avery probably was going to during the Christmas festivities, he would never forgive himself for not noticing. It had been at least three, almost four months since they had met as something other than professor and student, and the idea that he didn’t know her by now was a painful one. Their row had been quite enough to prove to him that Millie being hurt meant his being hurt. That definitely didn’t sit well. At all. The idea that she would storm out the door, do something as rash as Avery had, made his stomach churn in panic.

Keiran’s eyes flashed to her face, knowing (for he had realized it some time ago, in the back of his mind) that if he woke one morning and was told he would never see her again, he would see no reason not to go back to sleep. Even the thought of her confirming his fear that she didn’t actually want this made him almost sick.

The idea of Kieran covered head to toe in a ripened tomato shade of scarlet did more than tickle his wife’s sense of humour, it in fact saw her laugh heartily at the image stood in her mind looking thoroughly unimpressed. She lifted her head and pressed a kiss to Kieran’s jaw, barely able to suppress the giggling that rattled through her.

“You’d be an adorable lobster, babe.” She cooed at him, nudging his cheek with her nose as she settled back against him. She doubted that slathering Kieran in sun cream would do him any good, either, and while she would have argued that as long as he wasn’t out baking in the sun he’d be fine, she doubted she’d be able to sway him to take to the beach during the summer.

The best holiday that she’d ever had, running ever so slightly behind the Jamaican jaunt, was had when she was perhaps ten or eleven. The year it had taken place had been one wracked with uncontrollable heat. Lavender often didn’t leave their room, for fear of burning, which meant that the twins could roam with their father. In between frolicking in the sea they got to see ruins and museums and it was at that point that Millie decided she’d make it her business to see as many as possible. Of course, she’d been quite lapse in fulfilling that goal as of late. Things had definitely changed.

Millie looked up at her husband, her eyebrows furrowing a little over her eyes. Her expression smoothed out after a moment or so and she smiled, bringing a hand up to stroke her fingers through his hair.

“I am happy, Kieran. Happier than I have been in a long time.”

Millie rose and turned, leaning on her knees. She placed her hands on Kieran’s cheeks and pressed her lips against his forehead, her thumbs smoothing across his cheekbones.

“But are you? Happy, I mean? I don’t want you to feel trapped or stuck either. I feel like a broken record but I want to make sure. I don’t want you to think you have to do anything just because of me or because of …”

Millie smiled weakly and dropped her gaze to the bedspread before briefly lifting it once more.

“I do love you, Kieran. I don’t want to keep you if you don’t want to stay. I think it’s fair to say I’ve gained a lot more from the Ministry’s fiddling than you. I don’t think I give much, just more burdens.” Millie smirked a little. “I’ll admit, I’d be at a loss but if you want something…someone else then that’s…that’s fine. But … if you’d like to keep me, and like me to keep you…I wouldn’t complain.”

Keiran.

Had it really been so long since Millie had just called him by his given moniker? He didn't think so, but the man was left reeling from the sound of it even as she turned and leaned towards him. Another reason to refuse any desire of hers to leave: his name didn't sound quite the same when anyone else spoke it.

He leaned into her touches, somehow desperate for them, where before he would have been nervous or confused by them. Keiran didn't realize his eyes had closed until she pulled away and he forced them open to look at her.

Keiran's hands swept up and down her thighs as she spoke, trying to hold onto their physical connection. At her questions, he found himself nodding without even realizing it until he had stopped to frown at what seemed to be both reasoning for his leaving as well as asking him to stay. "Missie," he started, his hands settling themselves into the dip of her back just above her hips.

"I made a decision the other night," he pointed out, regarding her seriously. "During our row, I kept mentally going over the fact that you couldn't leave, because then I wouldn't have known what to do with myself." Keiran frowned at the outright admission of both his wrongs and how his thoughts betrayed any attempt at hiding dignity or feelings. Not that he could help any of that around her, though. "I don't care how this started, or why, but you're my wife, Millie, and I won't see you taken from me."

Possessive, much? Keiran chided himself silently.

Yes, well, he had been sorted into the snake's House for a reason. It was massively strange, Keiran realized as he looked her over, to think that she was in the room he had as a teenager. It was still basically his own room, but the sentiment wasn't exactly the same anymore. Teenage Keiran wouldn't have been this nice or protective of a girl on his bed, he was fairly certain. The thought probably should have embarrassed him, but Mr. Hayes instead felt only more protectiveness surge through him alongside a sudden wave of some intoxicating mixture of love and lust.

"I don't know how to be a father, Love," he began, leaning into her even as he pressed his thumbs into her sides to nudge her into lying back on the sheets. "But the last time I said something like that-" Keiran thought back to his claims that he didn't understand or really do the whole touch thing "-you proved me wrong far more quickly than I expected. So let's just say I'll work at it and we can go from there, hmm?"

His lips found her collarbone as he hovered over her, fingers curling between her own. After a moment, he sat back on his heels and ran his thumbs over her hands as he looked down at her. His eye fell to her middle, where two miniature Millies were waiting to greet them, and dropped kisses there as well. "Hey, little guys," Keiran greeted her stomach, his expression and tone quite serious considering he was in all actuality just speaking to her torso. "You two better not give your mum any trouble while you're in here, because then she'll get mad at me, too, since I put you there." He grinned and squeezed her hands to show that his words were in jest. "But that'll be fine. I'll take the trouble for you. 'Cause I'm in love with your mummy. And Daddy loves you two already."