WARNING: Un-detailed manslaughter, Mentions of sexual intercourse

Clear blue eyes opened at the noise downstairs – Arthur must have come home. A smile showed upon the young woman's lips as she soon heard his footsteps upon the stairs. Their house was not very well isolated and small to be kind. Nearly every little sound could be heard throughout the building, but at least it was... home; this was theirs solely.

Upon hearing the news that morning at the doctor's, Rosie's reaction had not been one of happiness – worries over changes ahead overruled. Changes would be necessary to accommodate the life inside her. Arthur and she both worked because of necessity – one loan was not quite enough for them to afford living together – and they could still barely afford their house and basic needs. Would they be having room enough, money enough to feed and dress the child?

Luxury was a word she had not known in years. Her life had actually been less complicated once. Daddy dearest was far from poor being a reverend, but he hadn't approved of her and Arthur, and she had been stubborn... Only years later Rosie would realize her old father had been entirely right all along. Either way, her worries over the accomodating the child would never have to be addressed in the end.

The day she went home early from work because she wasn't feeling well due to her condition, she was still clueless and very gullible, and had still had an image of a nice happy family in her head. Throughout the day the impact of worries had decreased, and a semblance of happiness and excitement had settled in. Rosemary knew how much her husband liked children, always giving them a smile upon passing by them on the street. She knew that he would make a great father one day. He never got a chance to prove it, though.

As he slid into bed next to her that night, she first smelled the hint of perfume – a woman's... not hers. She never did wear any, for they had no money to afford it. All excitement about telling him of her secret was gone... had wafted away as the perfume had wafted to.

Fortunately enough, he was – as always – so tired from work that he fell into a sleep nearly immediately. Arthur must have thought that she were still asleep. She was glad enough for that. As his soft snores filled their small bedroom, she rolled onto her back, hands instinctively moving to her belly while gazing up at the ceiling... beginning to count the cracks in it... until she lost count and fell into a disturbed sort of sleep as well.

Of course, Rosie Jones didn't have any proof whatsoever, of her husband cheating. She didn't feel very comfortable with the smell of cheap perfume lingering upon Arthur when coming home every other day. The perfume was distinct... was everything that she wasn't. She imagined it on a woman with vivid red nails, adorned with loads of cheap jewellery and heavy make-up... possibly dyed hair as well, most likely black.

Arthur, who had always been very physical in their marriage, lately wasn't very interested in being intimate. That was... maybe the most alarming that she had noticed on him in the last few weeks. It wasn't that she necessarily minded, though... because being intimate was the very last thing on her mind. Having to go and vomit each morning was exhausting. Arthur never noticed, because most of the time he was already gone when her alarm sounded to get ready to go to work. She couldn't afford not to go despite how ill and weak she felt due to the life inside her womb.

A part of her maybe tried to ignore any evidence for as long as was possible. After all, Rosie had left her family for the man... was carrying his child. The most important reason maybe was that Rosemary Jones still loved her husband – dearly so.

As she found she began to show three months after the doctor confirmed her being with child, Rosemary figured she could not keep her condition secret much longer. Maybe a sense of responsibility and guilt would overcome him and lead him to ending any possible relations with another woman. His reaction was far from her initial anticipation.

That night she no longer tried to make believe she were peacefully asleep. She sat leaning lazily against the headboard, waiting for him to come home from work – well... 'work'. She had not gotten any the wiser since first having smelled the female perfume on him, so...

To say that Arthur was surprised to see her sitting upright waiting in bed would be an understatement. He halted in the doorway gobsmacked. "What's the matter?" Rosie asked.

"You're..."

"Yes," she said and continued watching as he seemed to recover and advanced into the little bedroom, taking off his blazer on the way. Rosemary quietly watched as he stripped down to his boxers, neatly folding everything on the chair by the end of the bed for their next use the morning after. She patiently waited until he had slid into bed and under the covers beside her before speaking. His back was to her as she announced, "There's something that I've been meaning to tell you, and I'm hoping that you'll take it all well." Her vivid blue eyes fell shut as the smell of the now familiar perfume reached her nostrils. "I'm with child."

A pause, before the rustle of fabric could be heard as her husband rolled over, facing her... raising himself on one elbow to look at her better. "You're what? I thought that... We've been careful every time."

"Yes, love... I know, but it seems that this little boy or girl..."

"A boy," Arthur interrupted. "Everyone in my family has had sons."

"We'll see," Rosemary whispered.

"How... far along?" Arthur asked all of a sudden, his eyes trailing down from her face to the bump that was partially hidden by the covers. Still if you knew about her condition it was hard to miss. Arthur internally wondered how he could have missed it.

Four months, she had had to say. Upon that, he had wisely not spoken... before rolling over once again and not saying a word anymore.

Arthur did not begin treating her any different from that moment. However, from then... the smell of the familiarized female perfume remained absent and all seemed to return to how it used to be minus sexual intercourse – which was not so weird in that time when the wife was with child... until.

Rosemary certainly did try to involve her husband, telling him when she first felt the baby move and asking him whether he wanted to try and feel. He never did show any interest, and she kept on hoping that he was merely reluctant because he didn't want to risk hurting her or just had to get used to the idea of becoming a father soon still.

About in her eighth month, it happened one day that Rosemary's sore spine had her unable to keep working until the end of her shift. She sewed, you see. She usually sat in a chair behind an old sewing machine all day long, making robes and dresses for ladies and gentlemen of far higher ranking than she. Her superior was a very harsh woman but beside that a mother of four as well. She was quite sympathetic and sent Rosemary home that day.

She arrived home hours earlier than usual – hours before Arthur normally would as well. The agreeable thought of sleeping for a bit on the couch was diminished from the moment she walked through the door. The sound that the bed had used to make when Arthur and she made love on it could be heard from upstairs, just like the groans Arthur used to release then... combined with the sound of a woman in the throes of sexual delight.

She knew immediately what must be going on up there. All her hopes of him having seen reason disappeared. A mixture of emotions ran through her upon the realization: anger, sadness... disbelief but at the very same time a form of relief as well. The sole sound of blood rushing in her ears, Rosemary walked through the kitchen, dropping her bag upon the nearest chair and going into the little garden attached to the house they rented.

In the corner stood a tree butt and a pile of un-chopped branches – those that had been chopped already for the winter had been piled into rows against the wooden fence shedding their little garden from the neighbors'. She went for the axe that was buried into the tree butt.

Arthur and his mistress seemed too occupied with each other to register the sound of Rosemary ascending the stairs with the heavy weapon. The sight that she was greeted with upon walking in was disgusting. The strange woman was shagging her husband like a donkey, moving atop him like a cheap whore.

The axe came down between her shoulder blades first, her neck following suit. As the still and lifeless, nearly headless, body fell to the side, dark red blood dispersing on the sheets, Arthur's shocked expression was revealed. A thick mist of blood was visible on his bare chest. He clearly hadn't expected her home.

"Rosie..." he uttered in fright. "Rosie. Please put the axe away... You don't want to hurt me." At that her weapon lowered, and she most likely would have listed to him had he not continued. "I love you, and you love me too, remember?"

WHACK!

At eight months along already, Rosemary Jones was locked into a mental institution where she would be staying for the next four decades.

No one had told her what would be happening to her child, everyone always having surmised that she knew... her doubtlessly having assumed she would keep the child with her. After all, the innocent child resting within her womb hadn't killed, and Rosemary firmly believed that any child needed or at least deserved a mother. That was, however, far from how it all happened.

She first began to realize it the night when she woke in such intense pain that she seemed to have peed herself. In fact, that was her water that had broken already. An hour long she managed to deal with it all alone until two nurses came bursting in to her screams of anguish. By then she had quite advanced in childbirth; the baby's head was crowning already.

She never got the chance to hold her daughter. She barely saw a brief image from her, all covered in blood and slime before they took her away from her exhausted mother... She couldn't have fought for her child even if she'd tried. The screams she released at that point were incomparable to the ones she had painfully let escape during the delivery itself; they went through morrow and bone.

Rosie Jones cried herself to sleep often over her daughter... and not knowing where or how she was most of all maybe.

She did not get the chance to name her, but Rosemary was glad with how the nuns had named her daughter. A week after the delivery she heard that the little girl had received the name Gloria and would be raised in a convent. Pleadingly she begged doctors and other personnel for occasional pictures. Grudgingly, they agreed, and occasional pictures she eventually got. They came far less often as time passed by, but her daughter never was from her mind.

To go and look for her daughter upon release seemed not abnormal. Logically she began her search at the convent in which she knew that her daughter had grown up. From there she was being redirected to Little Wallop, to her daughter and the latter's family.

She had not meant for Gloria to discover their relation like she had... In a way Gloria had been all that she had imagined, yet not. She had been successful and happy despite never having had the kind of family with a loving mother and father. She felt like she was not needed – apparently had not been in her youth either. She should have left then, but she enjoyed to be with her daughter and her family too much.

A dog and two and a half murders later, of course she had no other choice...

She moved to work as a nanny and maid in a little village a bit further away while keeping contact with her daughter and visiting occasionally. She did not cause any more deaths.