Southern Comfort (25/?)

Author- Midnight Faith

Spoilers- none

Distribution- FF.net, AOH anyone else just ask :)

Pairing- Lilah/Lindsey

Rating- R

Summary- Lindsey knows…

Disclaimer- not mine… yadda, yadda

Lindsey wrapped the orange fleece blanket around Lilah's shoulders and handed her a glass of water.

"Better?" he asked her, somehow emotionlessly.

She nodded.

"I'm sorry… I haven’t actually been able to keep down anything that vaguely resembles food in the last two days…"

"You should see a doctor… just in case there's something wrong with your baby…"

"I don't have the money…"

"Then I'll pay for you…"

"You'd still do that?"

"This baby might not be mine but it's still yours… which means however much I don't want to I still actually care…"

"Lindsey…"

"Do you love him?" he asked her apathetically.

"What?"

"Gunn. Do you love him?"

"No."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes."

"How long's it been going on for?"

"There is no 'been going on for.' It was only once…"

"I guess that makes everything OK then…" Lindsey explodes suddenly, suppressed emotion bubbling to the surface, "For Christ's sake Lilah!" He leapt off the desk and began to pace angrily.

She flinched slightly against his words, thinking that maybe she's made him irate enough to hit her. But somehow she knows he won't this time.

"There is a tiny, tiny chance this baby is Gunn's… less than zero." Somehow she still managed to make her voice as cool and as calm as ever.

"You had sex with him…"

"Not… fully…" she told him, her voice faltering.

"I guess that makes everything OK then…" he snapped sarcastically, "Not only have I had to share you with half the attorneys in California but with Gunn now as well… but oh no it's fine… because you didn't let him get off inside you…"

His words had reduced her to tears but strangely he felt the need to hurt her. Like she had hurt him.

"It was that night you went out on patrol…" he said in realisation, "You didn't get attacked by vampires. You lied to me. That's where the friction marks came from. You had sex with Gunn the night you told me you loved me…" he sank to the floor.

The water glass long forgotten on the edge of the desk, she was on the ground next to him instantly, unusually cautious.

"I still love you…" she told him, although there was no conviction in her voice; "I want us to work things out."

"It was here when you told me you were pregnant," Lindsey mused, "That was the happiest day of my entire life. My beautiful girlfriend pregnant with my kid. I felt so loved, so protective, so responsible… How can that have only been two days ago? It might not be mine now…" he looked at her steely, "You don’t even want it do you?"

"I don’t know…" she told him truthfully, "I feel like my body is being taken over. And besides… you don’t want our baby anymore… do you?" she asked him, her voice suddenly bled of emotion.

"Stop saying our baby. It's not ours. It's yours. Not mine."

"Yes it is…" she said positively, tentatively touching his arm. He didn’t shrink away from her. "You think I wouldn't be able to feel it? This baby is yours. He or she is ours. You said it yourself…" she took his hand in hers and gently laid it across her stomach, "Half you and half me right?"

"No," he told her, shaking his head, though he made no attempt to pull his hand away, "Half you. Not me. Half it's genes are uncertain. Maybe they're marked with an X."

"I can't do this without you…" she said, not battling to be unemotional anymore, "I can't cope with our baby alone. I want to marry you. I want our baby. But without you it means nothing. I can't do this by myself…" she clung to his hand tightly. "So if you're not in… there's no baby. It's over. I need protecting, Lindsey. I can't even look after myself let alone a whole other person. So without you… that's it… it's finished."

"You're asking me to give or take a life…" he told her disbelievingly, "You’re asking me to play God with your child. It's not my place… it's not my place to destroy a heartbeat…"

"We used to do it all the time… choose who lived and who died…"

"I left that all behind…"

"What if I didn't? It's your choice, Lindsey. You stay and I'll have our baby. If you go… if you walk out on me… again… it's over… I'm not having it…"

"Don’t do this…"

"Do what?"

"Stop blackmailing me… half of me is telling me to walk away. That's it's not my problem. That I was right to leave you in the first place. I shouldn't have come back… and that you deserve everything you get. And I don’t care if this baby lives or dies. But then the other half… the better half I guess… is telling me I still love you. That I still want this baby. That I still want you to be my wife…" He buried his face in her shoulder and clung to her tightly. "I love you. I want to salvage everything we had…"

"What if it's irreparable? What if I'm so evil that not only have I destroyed myself I've destroyed you too…"

"You haven’t destroyed me… if anything you've made me stronger…"

"Everything you've said… maybe this baby is better off dead than with me as a mother…"

"What are you talking about? You're gonna make the best parent ever…"

"Lindsey… I don’t know my baby anymore. It feels like I have an alien growing inside me. It's killing me… I can’t stand it…"

It was his turn to comfort her, his arm around her shoulders in compassion.

"If that's how you feel…" Lindsey said disjointedly.

"I couldn’t stand if this baby wasn't yours… I wouldn’t want it…"

"Yes you would. The minute you see your baby you'll want it… You'll love it…"

"No I won’t… I don't…"

"I still want to get married… do you?"

"Lindsey… I'd ruin you…" she took her engagement ring off her finger and handed it back to him.

"So this is it…" he asked her, "We ended up how we started… alone."

"We're always alone… in the end you're all you've got…" she paused for a while, "I'm leaving, Lindsey. I'm going to my sister's tomorrow."

"Are you coming back?"

"I don’t know… when we've all healed."

"Are you keeping that baby?"

"Possibly…"

Lindsey got up off the floor and headed for the door.

"We're breaking up aren’t we?" he asked her.

"He didn't turn back… he knew she nodded anyway…