Author: Molize.

Story: Dubliners

Summary: The life of the Bransons, beginning with the day they found they weren't two but three.

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Chapter One: What to expect when you're expecting.

She was an independent woman, she was an independent married woman.

Sybil Branson mumbled this mantra time and time again as she left the building where the doctor's office was located. Or should she say her doctor's office; because she would have to visit him regularly from now on.

The mantra she continued to repeat had been the answer to her doctor when he had asked why she had come to his office all alone with her predicament.

Her mantra of independence was all she could depend on to convince herself that there was nothing wrong in not having mentioned anything to Tom yet.

Tom.

Now, she would have to be the one to tell him the news.

Sybil walked briskly through the streets of Dublin towards their home. It was a cloudy, rainy day; something not at all strange during that time of the year and much less so in that part of the world. She smiled softly. Since they had married (or even since they had left Downton with her family's approval) everything was them, theirs, Tom and hers, hers and Tom's,… In that moment everything felt so long ago when they struggled to understand their own feelings, each other feelings, when they met at strange hours in the garage, when she made excuses to visit places only to talk to him while he drove the car, when they had tried to elope…

How different things would be if they had achieved their plan to get married in Gretna Green. How different things would be if her parents had disinherited her or Tom's mother had been ashamed of his son. How different things would be if they had had to start their lives in an unknown place, with no money, no job, nor support.

How different things would be if they had had nothing and then brought an innocent child into their mess.

But thankfully only half of this was their case.

Tom and Sybil Branson were going to have a baby.

Sybil approached the stairs that led to their flat. They lived at the top of a beautiful four floor brownstone in the vicinity of Dublin's downtown. Despite the good location of their home, the rent was surprisingly affordable for the couple. She had offered that they spent the money her family had provided them with for the monthly payments, but stubborn as her husband only could be, Tom had insisted that the money Lord Grantham had given was exclusively for her, so he refused to pay anything for their enjoyment (as the word 'their' included 'him') unless it came from his own savings.

Sybil chuckled at the memory of Tom arriving at his mother's house, where they had lived until their wedding, proclaiming treason from his fiancée because his modest bank account had increased by more than a few zeroes. Her only response to this was that that way he couldn't tell which money in that account was his or hers so he would have to use it whether he liked it or not. Later that evening, before each of them went to their separated bedrooms he questioned into how she had found where his money was to which she replied sweetly with a simple:

"You wanted to spend the rest of your life with an intelligent woman, didn't you?"

After that, he promised that he wouldn't touch a pound until he personally wrote a letter of gratitude to her family.

Opening the door, there she was, in their home. Even better than the prize, the location or its beauty, because as simple as it was compared to her old mansion, it had all they needed with their touches of personality in every corner (more from her, she had to admit, as she loved to decorate), was that it radiated a warm that made her more comfortable and at home that the place she had lived in during her first twenty-one years of life.

Sybil put her umbrella in its place to dry near the small cabinet at the entrance where she then hung her coat. She crossed the hall and headed to the door that led to their bedroom.

It seemed that it had stopped raining and the sky was clearing a little bit, which allowed a soft golden glow to creep into the room through the beige drapes covering the window.

She walked to their bed and sat on the crumpled comforters on Tom's side. She looked around her.

Their bedroom was fairly neat except for the unmade bed.

Looking at her hands that lay on her lap (pretty near her abdomen and their baby), she discovered that they were trembling.

It had been a quite stressful day.

Once she had given time for her late period to appear after two weeks and it hadn't had the decency to show, she had decided to make a visit to a doctor. The problem was that there, in Dublin, she didn't have a family doctor or previously the need of one, so she had no idea where to go. With the excuse of delivering some curriculum's to the hospital and clinics in the area, Sybil had been able to talk to some of their doctors and made her decision to make an appointment with a Dr. Neil, who kindly left room for her in his busy schedule the next day. The suddenness had put Sybil in a state of disturbance that Tom detected the moment he arrived home that afternoon, but she convinced him that she was just nervous because nobody had contacted her about a job jet.

Sybil hadn't slept much that night. After a couple of hours turning in bed, Tom had taken upon himself the duty to calm Sybil the only way he knew, by showing her his love. He turned her in his arms until they were face to face. Both of them were wide awake as she was too nervous to succumb to sleep and he was too worried about what was in her mind. A few minutes passed in which they simply looked into the eyes of the other, grey and greenish blue. Then, what started as a few tender and soft kisses became something more lustful and well… it ended with what had caused the situation where Sybil now found herself.

Sybil blushed at the memory of the past night and sighed, trying to wash away the heat on her cheeks. It was evident that they were too young, too in love and too newly-wed to have thought of the consequences of the marital bed.

She should have talked to Tom before. She should have talked to him the instant she had suspected that she could be carrying his child. That way, both of them could have prepared in the time before the doctor confirmed her suspicious; and the most important part of all, she wouldn't be the one telling him that they were indeed expecting a baby.

Sybil was afraid, afraid of how he would react to the news.

They hadn't spoken at all about family and children. They had had too many other things in mind, what with their travel to Ireland, the organization of the wedding, finding a house and a job, that the family topic, albeit important, hadn't surfaced. Even Sybil recognized that she hadn't thought about it. She supposed that she had some of her head had been filled with a younger mentality.

But it was expected, wasn't it? Young couples did have babies. But so soon? They were barely three months as husband and wife.

This was the reason she hadn't said a word of the pregnancy to Tom. This was the reason that when he had kissed her forehead when he woke up this morning and disentangled his arms from her as he got up to get prepared for work, she had pretended she was still sleep; and once she hear the sound of the front door closing she get up to go to the doctor. Her appointment was early enough that she would arrive home before him.

The main reason she hadn't said a word of the suspected pregnancy to Tom was that she was scared that he didn't wanted children so soon, or at all. She hoped that maybe being late had another explanation and that when Tom got home from work she could act as if nothing had happened.

They were so happy after all they had had been through that she couldn't bear being the one that had to destroy their joyous bubble.

As she raised her trembling hands to her face, she discovered that she was crying, which only made her cry harder to the point that she could bet that her sobs could be heard in the farthest corner of the house.

Sybil lied down on the bed and grasped his pillow as if her life depended on it. She could smell him on the fabric, and that soothed her to the point that she was unaware that her eyelids had begun to flutter more and more slowly.

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Tom Branson sighed as he put a foot on the first step that led him home. As the word home resounded in his head he couldn't help the smile that crept across his face.

His day at the newspaper had been quite tiresome but the prospect of returning home to her was worth it.

Sybil.

He couldn't have imagined that he would have fallen so in love with her. But even more incredible was that he would spend the rest of his life with her. Every day, as he woke up with her in his arms he couldn't prevent himself looking at her intently while she slept, trying to tell himself that this was real and not one of the dreams he had frequently fallen into not so long ago.

He reached their door and opened it. But what he found took him aback.

The flat was in complete darkness.

He turned on the light of the entrance. Sybil used to go to work in the mornings as a volunteer in a military hospital, but in the afternoons, as she arrived home earlier than him, he usually found her reading a novel in the living room or arranging some thing or the other to make the house to her taste. Soon after he got home they would start to prepare dinner while they discussed about the events of the day.

Tom took a look at his watch. Actually, it was even later than when he used to come home.

There was no light in the living room and no sound that revealed her presence at all.

Tom's heart started to beat increasingly faster.

"Syb?" He called, waiting for an answer. As none came back, he entered the living room and turned the lights on, only to find she wasn't there.

His breathing rate joint his racing pulse.

"Sybil?" Still no response. His brain started to fill with the worst thoughts.

Someone has taken her. Someone knows who she is, who her father is. Dublin is not for her. Ireland is not for her.

As he reached the farthest door of their apartment, the one to their bedroom, he instructed himself to stay calm, but all he could do was pray for her to be there.

He couldn't remember the last time he had prayed in his life.

Tom opened the door, the room was as dark as every room in the house, but her silhouette could be seen in the moonlight. There she was, slowly sitting up on his side of their bed.

He just stood there, in the threshold, looking as she turned to her side to switch on the light of the small lamp on his nightstand, waiting for his heart to behave. He could bet that she could hear his heart murmur.

Sybil didn't look at him directly, but the angle that her face had taken was enough for him to see her red puffy eyes and the tracks of her tears.

"You awoke me." She said softly with a broken voice. If his world didn't revolve around her, Tom was sure he wouldn't have heard her.

True to her words, his voice had awoken her from her deep slumber. She was confused for the late hour it seemed to be but not enough to be unaware of the way she looked due to her recent sleeping state and her earlier tears.

In a few long steps Tom was kneeling by the side of the bed.

Are you alright?" Tom rushed as he gently lifted his right hand to cup her face, regarding her properly to see if she was harmed.

At his question Sybil couldn't look into his eyes. She was alright, but was everything alright? She glanced down at his damp coat. It was raining again.

"You should take this off, you will catch a cold". She said in almost a whisper as she reached for the buttons to take off the offending piece of cloth.

When she succeeded with that, Tom pushed away her hands as he wanted to concentrate on finding out what had happened.

"Sybil, please." He begged. "Tell me what's wrong?" He was looking straight into her eyes as he had the night before, but this time although she found love in them, she didn't find lust with it but fear and concern.

"Nothing is wrong." She assured him with all the confidence she could muster as she caressed his hand. However, as it traveled from her face, towards her arm and landed in the side of her abdomen, she couldn't help the sobs that she had tried to keep at bay.

"I…" Sybil opened her mouth but no sound came out clearly.

"Syb, please, tell me." Tom implored. He too was on the verge of tears as she remained unable to tell him what had happened.

She had to tell him, it didn't matter what happened next. After all, he was as 'culpable' as she was.

"I… I went to a doctor." Sybil finally said not wavering as she looked into his eyes. She wanted to catch every emotion that crossed his face, good or bad.

"Alright." He exhaled as he got up from the floor and sat in front of her, as close as he could, not losing the contact of their eyes or hands for an instant.

She took a deep breath. "I'm late… you know? That kind of late." She continued tentatively.

He took a deep breath too and nodded. He was having a heart attack. He could feel it.

"I'm pregnant."

And that was all she could announce as her husband's embrace cut off her words. They stayed like that for a few minutes relaxing in the warm of the other. Finally, Tom broke their embrace but not putting an excessive distance between them. Sybil bit her lip as she waited for a verbal response from him. But all she could see was how Tom regarded her lovingly with a little smile upon his face until he dropped his head to where her neck and her shoulder met.

"Did you want to become a single mother, you silly woman?" He murmured on her skin.

At his words all her fear dissipated to be replaced with some kind of force that made her want her to cut off her husband's head.

"How could you say that, Tom?" Sybil said indignantly.

"How could I?" He replied when they were face to face once again. "Syb, I came home from work and there was no sign that you were at home. I haven't seen you all day, and I started to think the worst…" He paused and looked down, which prompted her to lift his face. "Then I find you here all disheveled and sad and… I almost fell dead to the floor." Sybil chuckled at his dramatics, but at the same time was sure that if the roles had been reversed she would have felt the same way. Tom pinched her arm lightly in response to her little laugh. Then he stammered "And then you say that you… that we are…".

"That we are having a baby." She ended for him.

"Those are the best words I've ever heard in my life." He ended his confession with a huge smile on his face that was so contagious and charming that she couldn't help but lean forward to kiss him.

Their need for oxygen made them break contact. Tom took her in his arms and rested on the soft pillows against the headboard of the bed, Sybil laid her head on his chest as they played leisurely with their intertwined fingers; over the place where their baby was growing.

After a while, he spoke again. "Why were you so upset?"

At the sound of his voice, she turned in his arms so that she could see his face. "It isn't that I don't want a baby." Sybil assured him. "I guess I didn't think that it could happen so soon." She chuckled.

"I guess I didn't either." He removed a stray hair that had fallen over her blue eyes and encouraged her to continue.

"I was afraid that it wasn't what you wanted." She said as fast as she could. It was a harsh truth, because somehow it was a way to tell him that she hadn't been sure of him.

"Sybil…" Tom sighed, an understanding washing over him.

"I'm so sorry but… we had never talked about it. How I was supposed to know?" She interrupted him with fresh tears shinning in her eyes.

"Hey…" She was getting emotional again so he kissed her hair and then compelled her to look at him.

"Don't worry about it, we are both new at this." Tom said as he caressed her belly. "I love you." And at his words she blushed. "All of you. And that includes this little one."

"I love you too." She sealed her words with a kiss. She couldn't be happier as she rested her head once again on his chest.

Sybil heart him sigh loudly.

"Your father is going to kill me, you know?"

"Yep." She answered sincerely as she laughed.