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Her words left a loud ringing in his ears.

Noah stared up at Odette from his position on the top step, mouth twisted tightly and eyes focused, but blurry with exhaustion and hot, angry tears. How could she be saying this to him? How could she---she was doubting everything about them, the two of them, their relationship. Noah hadn’t pushed her into anything, he’d--she’d went more than a year before deciding on a wedding date, he had told her he would support her through everything when it came to the baby, he’d---it was hard taking care of two kids and a planetarium when she was on the pitch but he’d never----His house? He’d asked her if she had wanted---this---

How long had she been feeling like this? Odette had been pretty fucking happy when he had come back from Hogwarts in June, how long had she been doubting their marriage? There was no way Kate could have started all of these feelings, they must have been developing, creeping into her mind every time she had to get up in the middle of the night for one of the kids, or at family dinners that she didn’t want to be at---was that it? Did she feel restrained by them? She loved them, sure, but she doubted the very foundation that their lives stood upon.

He ducked his head, looking down at his shaking hands. Odette had met Noah at a very good point of his life. He had finally, finally found himself in a good place and it had taken him bloody years to get there. He had never thought he’d find someone he was willing to spend his life with however; he had been sure he and Terry would be it, he’d raise Terry and they’d live as father and son and make it on their own. Odette had made him like the idea of having a wife, a mother for Terry, a future, and now suddenly it seemed like she blamed him for making her those things.

His house? That didn’t---it had been a big and empty house until Odette, until Anna. It had been a constant reminder that his parents were no longer there for him, but he and Odette had made it a home. Or at least Noah had thought they had. Now, she didn’t even consider it her own. Was he supposed to feel bad that she was feeling so lost and confused? Was that was she was looking for, sympathy? Noah realized the ringing in his ears was not a signal from his brain that things were spiraling out of his control, but Anna’s cries from the upstairs. He shook his head and stood.

He was sure he’d never felt more miserable in his life than when he had to once again look Odette in the eye.

“I don’t know how you can be thinking those things,” he said, his face heating up. Noah would’ve given her everything. “I have to go get the baby,” he mumbled, shaking his head and going back in the house. The urge to slam the door closed coursed through him but at the last second he left it open, unable to fully shut her out even though she felt like she already had been.