WHO: Holly Troy and Theo Nott
WHERE: Their house, Theodore's playroom!
WHEN: Let's say today (Monday) after work!
WHAT: Some startling ideas are put on the table!
Holly rolled the toy train along the track on the floor of Theodore’s room as the four-year-old moved the buildings about to redesign his village. He was going on about a dragon and how it had simply messed everything up, so Holly listened and acknowledged his decision making with ‘oohs’ and ‘aahhs’. He was a fairly easy child to get along with and it had taken no time for Holly to become attached enough to him to call him her own. Holly knew that normally in situations like this there would be some trepidation, some concern or worry, but Theodore had never known his actual mother and he needed someone who wasn’t going to be scared about filling the void.
“Watch your step,” Holly said calmly, putting her hand out just in time to keep Theodore from stepping on a block. He thanked her and continued on her way, and it wasn’t until he’d reached the other side of the room that she realized they were being watched. Holly’s eyes lifted and she raised an eyebrow at her husband.
“You’re home early,” she commented idly, her attention going back to the train.
Theo wasn’t the sort of man that snuck out of work early on Friday’s just to take up residence in the door frame of a play room and watch his wife and child play. Yet here he was doing just that. It wasn’t like it was difficult for him to remember a day when he would make fun of anyone who was doing the exact same thing.
Then Holly had come into his life and turned everything on its head. So much so he wasn’t even sure when exactly this became his life. For the first time ever, he actually felt a bit guilty about the part he played in what some would consider a less than legal endeavor. Not that he actually did anything, or even that he helped enable his cousin to exact revenge. But the uneasy feeling he got when he told Holly that he was going out with Tim (which wasn’t even a lie) unnerved him. It felt wrong to mislead her and he didn’t have the desire to ever do it again. This is not at all what he was expecting when he pursued the relationship, but he certainly didn’t want to change anything. “Felt like starting my weekend early.” he said shrugging a shoulder lightly.
He walked into the room picking up the blocks in his path before sitting down next to his wife. Theo stacked the blocks in a small tower, while watching Theodore construct one of his own not too far away. He had been so adamantly against having a child before Theodore was born, and maintained that stance very firmly for quite some time after as well, but now, right in this moment he felt like he was wrong in such a judgement.
“Perhaps we should have another.” The words left his mouth before he even realized what he was saying, his gaze still focused on his son. He had honestly surprised himself with the suggestion, thinking it was one thing, actually saying it was another. Another child, what was he thinking. He was changing his mind between it being an utterly insane idea and a perfectly reasonable idea so often and quickly he honestly didn’t know how he felt, but now the thought was out there in the open and there was no way to take the words back.
“Hm?” Holly looked up, not understanding, “Another what?”
Her nose scrunched in thought and it was then that she noticed how comfortably on the floor Theo was. It was something she would never have spotted him doing when they first began seeing each other and while Holly hadn’t minded the stuffiness, she certainly didn’t mind how much he’d relaxed, either. She had changed as well, of course, but it felt more like being allowed to be herself than the tough, aggressive image she portrayed to the media. She was quite nearly an Amazon on the pitch, but it had taken Holly a long time to be able to separate her quidditch life from her home life. Quite possibly because she never really had a home life; going home consisted of food and enough sleep to be well-rested for practice the next day. Now she had Theodore waiting in the window for her to come home, which freshly excited her each day. She had her husband who would literally do anything to please her and Holly knew that she would do the same for him.
Except--- “Wait, you mean another kid?” Except that! Except that! Holly jolted to an upright position, staring at Theo as if he had sprouted green antennae from his head. His comment startled her so completely that Holly felt like she couldn’t feel her tongue, her words were falling out so freely, “Where are you getting another one? I play quidditch!”
It was foolish to even hope that Holly wouldn’t hear, or at the very least catch on to what he said. It would be even more foolish to bother trying to backtrack now. She was far too keen to fall for anything he tried to cover the truth with.
He glanced up at Holly from the corner of his eye, before turning back to the blocks he was stacking while trying figure out how he wanted to go about this. He wasn’t even positive that it was something he wanted, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t something shouldn’t be discussed. “Well, its not like I plan to steal one, I was thinking something a bit more traditional. And I don’t see how one affects the other, but I suppose it is something to take into consideration.”
He lifted his sight to Theodore who was building a tower of his own, that was somehow more stable and just overall better than his own. Well, just another thing to add to the list ways his son continued to change his mind about parenthood. He knocked over his stack of blocks before turning back to Holly. “Just an idea. I figured since this one turned out alright so far...” he trailed off waving his hand dismissively.
“Something to--take into consideration?” Holly sputtered, eyes as wide as the quaffles that made up her very-important-to-her career. “Having a kid ruins a woman’s body! No one ever performs as well as they did before! I’m not ready to be done playing quidditch!”
That wasn’t true, of course, she knew plenty of women who had broods of children and still played the game. Holly, however, was incapable of not being on the pitch, whether it be for one season or one game. One minute! She hadn’t missed a game since she’d gone pro, she’d accepted a trade to the Arrows because she knew her skills would be more valued on a team that cared more about showing that they could fly instead of showing that they could win.
A kid took nine months to have, sometimes more. The season took up seven months of the year, if you made the playoffs, so that left five months to give birth in and then you couldn’t play after that for at least six weeks and----no! She couldn’t, she didn’t want kids, she never had! Theodore had been a blessing, the boy was providing the little maternal instinct Holly did have with just enough love that she needn’t be bothered by it. What was her husband thinking? He hadn’t bothered telling Holly that he had a son for months, and now he wanted another one? After they’d settled in so perfectly?
But how could she say all that to him? Theo rarely, if ever, said things he didn’t mean, so for him to come out with that must mean that he actually had thought about it, pondered on the thought of their children together and---Holly felt like she was going to be sick.
“You can’t just want a kid because you did a good job the first go around,” Holly said, her voice dropping in case Theodore overheard. “You’ve got to actually want it.”
“No you can’t,” Theo agreed leaning back on his hands. You couldn’t have a kid solely based on the fact that you did a good job the first time around. Especially when you had no hand in the first time turning out so well. But how could he tactfully tell his wife that he didn’t want a son when Theodore was born. He didn’t want children with Cordelia, he didn’t even want to married to her most days. He really had no idea how to tell her just how different things were now, without revealing things better left unsaid. “I know how important it is to actually want a child before deciding to have one. Having one when you don’t want one is---well---” He trailed off again not knowing exactly how to say what he felt. He wasn’t even entirely sure what it was either.
Looking at Theodore now though, he couldn’t help but wonder just what he missed out on. What if he had loved Cordelia like he loved Holly. What if he actually wanted a child when Theodore was born. If this is how if felt when he sat on the floor with Holly and his son, how much better would it be if it was their kid. Not that Theodore wasn’t just as much Holly’s son too, but there was still a difference. But from how this conversation was going, it didn’t seem like Holly was very keen on the idea of giving up quidditch any time soon.
“My point is, I do want to have a kid with you, Holly, but not if it isn’t something you want too.”
Holly gaped, she gaped at her husband because it was all she could manage to do. She couldn’t fathom anything that she wanted to say right now, because as much as she rejected the idea of being pregnant and having a baby, Holly did honestly care about Theo’s feelings and his wants and needs. He wanted to have a baby with her, which she supposed should not be such a shock to hear seeing as she was his wife, but she had never wanted to have a baby of her own so----how could---someone else want one? She felt like she was sitting her N.E.W.T.s again but this time had not spent one minute preparing. Maybe if he had given her a heads up, some sort of hint that he wanted to expand this family, but no! Just---just some random thought that decided to jump off the tip of his tongue, today!
Her head slowly turned toward Theodore. Once the kid was here, she could handle it, she believed, but---it didn’t seem like adoption was the way Theo wanted to go about this. He wanted to have a kid with her. Her! Them, theirs. Holly could honestly say that the thought did not warm her insides or tug at her heartstrings. It weighed too little opposite her love of quidditch to tilt any sort of scale.
“I don’t know what you want me to say,” she managed, turning back to Theo. Holly seemed genuinely upset by her conflicted emotions, but she was still as stubborn as ever. Quidditch had her main focus in life for a very long time, and she’d gone through a lot to prove herself. Having a child never seemed like it had been worth giving her dreams up, and now that she had Theodore it had seemed like she got the best of both worlds. “I never planned on having kids of my own.”
“The truth would be fine. You never planned on having kids, alright. You don’t want anymore that’s fine too. I was honestly surprised that you were okay with Theodore. There was a reason I didn’t tell you for so long.” He shrugged a shoulder lightly. He didn’t know how he was expecting this conversation to go, but this certainly wasn’t it. Spontaneous conversations unsettled him, whether or not he unintentionally started them. He much preferred speaking when he had his words rehearsed, and knew what was going to say. When he knew what he wanted at the end of the conversation. Here, he was at a loss and that just spun into a spiral of continuing to speak just to ensure there were no misunderstandings. It was such a messy way of conversing.
“I’m not going to pressure you into having a child with me just because I want one, because forcing someone to have a kid who doesn’t want one isn’t something you do to someone you love. I would know, except I didn’t have to give up something I loved in order to do so.” He watched Theodore across the room as he spoke quietly, making sure he was still more interested in his toys than the boring adult conversation. He let his gaze linger on his son for a few moments longer before turning to gauge his wife’s reaction. Sure, he was getting better at the whole fathering thing now, and did a fair job of playing the part when they had started dating, so he wasn’t sure how it was going to go over, coming as close as he ever was to admitting to Holly he hadn’t wanted Theodore.
“I love you, Holly. That’s not going to change if you don’t want children. It was just an idea. Probably for the best anyhow, some days I can’t even keep up with Theodore, I don’t even know what I would do with a second one.”
Holly felt herself growing weak. For so long it had only been herself that she had to worry about, to think about. Getting married had been a very big step for her but it had made Theo happy, and it had made her happy too. It was a lovely feeling to know that someone cared for her like he did, but...Holly's life was still very much her own. At the end of the day she was not going to do something that she didn’t want to do. Her answer was sure, but it didn’t stop her from feeling terrible about hurting Theo in that way. He said he understood, that he still would love her, but deep down, wouldn’t there be room to question why she couldn’t for him? Wouldn’t some part of him, no matter how small or tiny, feel some sort of resentment towards her?
She couldn’t go any further with this conversation. Because--now he was saying things to be nice, probably even lying about being okay about everything not to hurt her feelings. Theo was being nice and loving and all she could do was care about herself. Holly was used to being blunt, angry, and to the point when things didn’t seem to be going her way, but she didn’t want to do that to Theo or in front of their son. Maybe her emotions were stunted, maybe she was just that bad of a person, maybe it was the game, but she had no desire to continue feeling this way and needed this feeling to stop.
“I need to owl Thomas about practice tomorrow,” Holly mumbled, pushing herself up from the floor. She ran a hand through her hair, stunned that she even managed to stand and sent Theo a short, quick wave before she started out the room.
