Title: Mother, First and Forever

Author: Chaucerettescs

Rating: PG

Spoilers/Timeline: ~1972 (birth of the twins) up through post series-ish. No spoilers.

Characters: Jennifer, Ben, Robert, Oliver, Beth, & the other Fairchild kids

Note: First person POV of Jennifer. Baby Swaciteers! Angst! Lol

From the moment I learned that Robert and I had conceived that first time, that I was carrying our sweet little twins inside of me, I took the role of "Mother" and wore it like a second skin. At nineteen, all the other roles that I was proud of-- Daughter, Sister, Wife, Woman-- suddenly came second to the title I would be the happiest to fill-- Mother. Mother, first and forever.

It was what I wanted, though I could never quite ascertain why. I was independant and willful, stronger and more outspoken than most of the men I knew... but motherhood was ingrained in me, it seemed, and that made me damn proud. And from the instant the twins were born, I wanted everything that went with that. I wanted the rosy comfort children would bring our house. The sticky fingers and banged up knees. I wanted the sleepless vigils, the noisy Christmases. I wanted to cook. I wanted to knit, for God's sake.

I'd love and nurture and feed and clothe and teach and discipline and protect... I'd heal and defend and shelter and instruct and comfort and nurse... I'd take pride in, put trust in, and sacrifice for my children. Always. That was the promise I made to myself when the twins were born.

I still remember the feeling seeing them for the first time gave me. That wash of love that was so unconditional it made my eyes hurt. That love that burrowed its way into my heart, scratching out two little niches, one for each of my babies... little hollows that nothing and no one other than them could fill. It was a feeling I never wanted to let go of and I felt it six more times after the twins; eight spots in my heart permanently taken.

With Ben, the feeling had been no different. Ben, my sixth child and second son. Ben, my most troublesome pregnancy and most painful birth. Twenty-seven hours of labor. Twenty-seven hours of sterile, white walls and that horrible hospital smell. Twenty-seven hours of contractions and frustrated crying jags, of IVs and watching Robbie slowly start to look more and more like an ashen-faced hysteric.

And then, finally, finally he came. Finally, came the first, life-altering cry as he was delivered. And all of my frustration and pain (though maybe not my exhaustion) was forgotten as they handed him to me. I remember how his angry (always so angry) wails quieted as I held him against my warmth... poor little boy twisting his face up against the indiginity of being born. I remember his tiny, dark curls that were still slick and how his eyes slitted open, as if regarding me curiously, and then slid closed again, seeming satisfied as he relaxed against me. Then there it was, that familiar swell of love, as Ben wiggled his way into the core of me with the others. Ben, my only newborn whose eyes stayed blue.

I have that selfish but harmless wish that all mothers have now and again; I wish that he had never grown up. I wish that none of my children had. I miss their sweet baby voices, little clothes and littler shoes, the sound of squabbling, the sound of anything they did when the house was full of children. I miss being always needed.

I miss crayons spilling out of their familiar, goldenrod boxes while the kids colored on construction paper at the kitchen table. How Ben's little face would screw up in concentration of getting his just right and then with anger when he always "messed up". I hung his up along with the others', loving his drawings just the same. But, even at five, he'd scowl up at the icebox, at his crooked doodles and at one of Oliver or Beth or Lily's watercolors. The minute I would leave the kitchen, he'd take his down and hide them somewhere.

I miss silly things like making chocolate biscuits for them after school. How Melanie and her friends would hoard them in their pockets before sneaking off to whatever secret place they had scoped out for the afternoon. How Alan when he was small could never quite make out the letter 'J'. "Henny, can I 'ave a cookie?" God, I wish they were still little too. The wild red color Alan's hair had been before it went rustic and coppery in the sun and the explosion of freckles on Geoff's face that had faded with age. The way Geoff would always finagle away more baked goods (even at four... and, truthfully, right up until he was about twenty-three), all while Ben would sit, looking sour and cross, looking like he wanted to know why Alan and Geoff deserved any when it was his house, not their's. It was a look that Ben wore often, one that worried me... one that Paul deemed his "Damien face" until he realized that I didn't find that even half as funny as he did.

I miss seeing my husband playing with our children out in the yard or on the sofa. How Ben had worshipped his dad just as much as the others, eager to please, before that silent, unprompted change between them. Even though Robbie would never say it (never... because it would mean crushing one of his children), I knew that Ben was his least favorite of our kids. He had his little girls who he adored and two other sons who told him things about their lives... who he could give advice too. And then there was Ben, the odd duck, who never shared anything with anyone. Who had broken little Alan's arm (no matter if accidently), so that we had to tell Scott and Nicole that we all had to go to the hospital. Whose creeps had killed the son of our friends, a boy who Mel loved like a brother. Who treated Rufus and Rebecca, his own blood, like they had the plague. Who had taken to calling his sister "Heeb-Whore". Who had, after a lawyer and a line of doctors, been the first of our children to decide to take on the family business, yet still remained a disappointment to his father.

Their fights are one thing I don't miss. It was during one of those that I realized Ben wasn't a child anymore. I could hear it in the rumble of their voices downstairs, the sound of two men having it out at each other. A rumble that would get louder and louder until I would get fed up and go down there to stop it. Those were the worst moments, the moments when I wanted him to just be small again.

I miss being a nurse to my children. All of the disgusting things that as a mum I didn't mind doing; kissing scabby elbows and wiping tiny noses. Spooning out foul, grape cough tonic. Cooling foreheads. Broken bones, colds, the flu, migraines, stomach viruses, I didn't mind dealing with any of them. Me (the latenight bookworm), looking up from a novel to see Oliver, eleven-years-old and bedraggled. "Momma, Ben's up." Finding my small son in his room, pondering the sick staining his sheets, and looking ready to cry with the effort of trying to figure out how best to deal with it without bothering anyone. Washing bedsheets at two in the morning (something, I might add, which takes a great deal of practice). Holding my sick son while he buried his clammy little face against me, looking so oddly ashamed of himself.

I miss buttoning coats and tying shoes... and the funny way that, by the age of four, Ben had taught himself to tie his own, thank you very much, but not how to button anything properly. The elder children would always help as I went down the line of children; Beth and Nani with Lily and Wendy, me with Melly and the baby, and Oliver with Ben. I missed the adorably indignant look on Ben's face as he futilely slapped away his brother's much larger hands with his own tiny ones, only making Olly laugh and patiently keep trying.

Patience. Oliver always tried being patient with Ben, even more than the others did (which was saying something). When Ben would steal clothes from Olly's closet, insisting on wearing them even though they were meant for someone twice his size, Oliver would sit on the stairs and grin, watching as his sisters and I tried to chase Ben down. He was patient when Ben insisted on tagging along with him and Beth, but they were five years older than their brother, much wiser and faster and Ben would always, eventually, fall behind.

Patience was something easily worn thin with Ben, who could be snipish and bossy and selfish, and sometimes Olly or one of the others would snap and tease him, which was something Ben simply could not tolerate. He'd get so mad, his small face would go blood-red. He'd march into the house, his eyes so blurry with pent up tears that he'd bump into a table and my legs before being scooped up into my arms. Even then he was too proud, too damned proud to cry in front of anyone but me.

I miss comforting him. Miss comforting the little boy who tried too hard to be adult and saw vulnerability as indecent.

That's who I still see when I look at him, even though he is adult now and towers over me.

It's my curse as a mother; my curse to love someone I would probably never even want around me if he weren't mine. As it is, he is mine, so I'll always want him... no matter what he does. Even after everything, I don't love him any less than I love the others. His niche in my heart remains intact... though perhaps a little wilted and brown around the edges.

It's been my dogma through all these years, through all the things he's done that hurt or shamed me, that upset me or just downright pissed me off: He is still my son. He is still a part of the home that Robbie and I made together. But more than anything, he is still someone who has a part of me inside of him. And I remember that each and everytime I see my father's dark blue eyes staring at me out from my middle son's face.

And I forgive him.