A/N: And here we are, finally at the last chapter! It's been a long time coming, so it's a relief to get this out of the way.

As always, your thoughts are welcome. :)

5. 1924

He heard the discontented whimper from the cot as he shifted onto his back to relieve some of the pain in his right knee. Groaning a little as he levered himself up on his elbows, he peered through the darkness at the little cot situated on Anna's side of the bed. By now, that sound had become one of the most natural and memorable noises in John's life: their little man was getting ready to wail for his feed. Glancing down at his wife, sleeping peacefully by his side, he slid out of bed and padded round to the cot. Anna did not stir, even when he stubbed his toe on the end of their bed in the darkness and hissed an expletive, obviously worn out from trying to keep up with their little boy's demands. On top of his usual complaints, he had just started to teeth. His ear-splitting wails over his discomfort were enough to exhaust even the most experienced of mothers.

Shushing him softly, John carefully picked his son up and held him to his chest, gently rocking him in his arms as he grew accustomed to the shift in his surroundings. Mindful that he could begin to cry at any moment, John quickly slipped out of the bedroom, gritting his teeth against the pain in his knee as his stiff muscles protested against the movement without the aid of his cane. He moved into the kitchen, squinting in the dark as he attempted to balance his boy in one arm and open the cupboard door with the other. His little lad whimpered again in discontentment, tugging rather painfully on his mussed hair, signalling his impatience, and John cursed quietly under his breath as he pulled out the baby bottle that had been presented to them up at the big house by the servants, alongside various toys and baby clothes. John had decided that it should be used on the nights when Anna was just too tired to drag herself out of bed to tend to their son naturally; on those nights, he himself would see to their boy, he'd declared enthusiastically. It hadn't really worked like that, though; Anna usually couldn't bear to listen to their son's muffled wailing while John hurried about downstairs attempting to warm milk in a pan, and usually she'd come downstairs to wearily tell him not to bother, already moving to the table where he'd been laid, ready to nurse him.

But tonight he was determined that Anna should get a full night's sleep. He couldn't remember the last time she had slept properly. He had had years to grow accustomed to not sleeping much, what with his years in Africa, his years in prison and his injured knee, but Anna had always enjoyed staying in bed. During the couple of days that they'd been allowed to share off together just after his release from prison three years ago, she'd slumbered well past eight o' clock, and he had lain beside her quietly, tracing his eyes over her perfect form and enjoying the novel feeling of her naked skin pressed deliciously against his; now, she was looking tired and drawn from retiring late, fitful nights of sleep and early starts. He had done everything he could to ease the burden, but it was difficult for him to pitch in as much as he wanted to due to him being needed up at the big house most hours of the day; sometimes, when he was returning to their home at almost one in the morning, all he wanted to do was collapse into bed and sleep. On his half-days, he tried to insist that Anna take the time off to catch up on her sleep and leave him to look after their boy, but she always refused, stating that they didn't see enough of each other as it was, so most of his free afternoons found them taking walks around the village with their son, or else simply spending a lazy few hours together at home, sometimes reading quietly, sometimes curled up on the little couch together, passing time with conversation, sometimes catching up on odd jobs, like weeding the garden, while their son slept in his crib, or else watched them with wide-eyed wonder from his pushchair. These indulgences were taking their toll on Anna now, though.

John opened the cool storage and found the little carton of milk that he'd put aside earlier. Gently hitching his son more firmly against his shoulder, he retrieved the carton and set about prising it open – a feat he was proud to achieve one-handed. He was just about to pour it into the pan to warm when he heard a noise behind him and then the unexpected sound of his wife's voice.

"Jesus, Anna," he said as he turned towards her. "You startled me."

"Scared of the dark?" she teased, moving forward to flick on a switch. Light flooded the room at once, forcing him to squint until he'd grown accustomed to it. Still, electricity made life much easier, and he was grateful that Lord Grantham had had it installed.

"You should be in bed," he told her gently.

"I can't sleep when you're not there," she replied, tucking her shawl more securely around her shoulders.

"You looked content enough when I left you."

She sidled up to him, wrapping her arms around his middle and pressing her forehead against his back. "I woke as soon as you got out of bed, actually. I'm not used to sleeping alone anymore." She inhaled his scent deeply, muffling her words against his back. "What's wrong with Jack?"

"Just hungry, I think. His teeth don't seem to be bothering him at the moment, but I don't want to chance setting them off by giving him anything solid. So I thought milk would do for the night. Go back upstairs. I'll follow you up just as soon as I've seen to him."

Anna shook her head, pressing a kiss against his shoulder blade before nudging him to face her. "Give him here, I'll sort him out. You're just as tired as I am."

"I opened the milk especially for him," John pouted in mock regret, and Anna giggled as he passed their son over.

"Have a cup of tea, then, if you don't want it to go to waste," she told him with a cheeky grin as she set Jack to feed. "I know it's pained you to cut down on your tea consumption these last few months."

"Not to mention that tea is one of my saving graces, beside you," he said, and dipped his head to kiss her before moving towards the sink to fill the kettle, and she laughed again. "Do you want one?"

"Why not?" she sighed, sinking down into a chair by the table, jostling Jack gently as she watched John's progress around the kitchen.

Peaceful silence reigned while he set about his work, broken only when he slid a cup of tea towards her, exactly how she liked it, with that sneaky slip of extra sugar.

"Thank you," she said quietly. This time, her smile was tired.

"If he's finished feeding, I'll hold him for a bit," he said equally softly, and she nodded gratefully.

Jack whimpered a little at being disturbed again, but soon settled down in his father's secure arms. Anna watched the way that John cradled their son, silently marvelling at how perfect they looked together. She had known it since the first time that she had seen her boy, barely a few minutes old: he was the absolute image of his father. It was all in the shape of his eyes, the shape of his nose, the shape of his lips. Jack had even inherited his father's dark hair. Oh, he'd inherited aspects of her character, it was true. His eyes were the same light blue rather than John's dark brown. His skin was pale – she knew he would burn easily in the sun, just like her. But in that moment after his birth, she'd known that there was only one name for him.

John. John, after the man who had helped to bring him into this world, who had passed on so much of himself to the little boy, who had given her life so much meaning and joy since he had entered it more than a decade ago. She was in no doubt that their boy would grow up to be just as noble, trustworthy and esteemed as his father. Under their gentle guidance, she was certain he'd be a fine young man in time.

John had protested when she'd broached the topic of the chosen name with him, of course.

"Haven't you had enough with just one John Bates in your life?" he'd said. She'd detected a hint of cynicism and self-loathing in his tone. "Shouldn't this child be named after someone more worthy of the honour?"

"How can someone be more worthy of the honour?" she'd shot back. "You're his father. He wouldn't be here without you. And if this is about your past sins…well, I think you've more than repented for them now. It's time to let them go, John, and start believing that you deserve this happiness. Our son is going to be a John Bates, so you should start getting used to it now."

He'd been a bit indignant at that, but she'd stood her ground, and when she'd reminded him that she'd been the one to endure hours of agonising labour to bring him into the world and therefore she was entitled to name him, he had relented, on the condition that he'd be their little Jack so that he'd at least be able to differentiate between who she was addressing when she was talking to them and that he'd be able to choose the middle name. She'd accepted this, simply because she'd wanted him to be at least a little satisfied with the name – and he had helped to give her this perfect gift. He'd chosen William in the end, in memory of the young lad he had always liked and looked out for, who had not lived to have a family of his own. It had been a sombre moment.

Still, John William Bates had a nice ring to it.

Not long before little Jack's birth, on darker nights when the demons found it easier to prey on her insecurities, while her husband slumbered peacefully by her side in one of his rare, restful nights, she'd lain there wide awake, wondering what sort of father John would be. She'd been in no doubt that he would be loving and caring, but she worried that he'd think himself too old for the finer points of fatherhood, that she'd be left to raise their child almost alone beyond the cursory involvement. John had never mentioned any of these things to her, of course, but he was over fifty now, and it was a strange age to be beginning fatherhood. She'd worried that Jack's arrival might, in fact, make things worse for him. Perhaps it would throw his insecurities into an even harsher light – there were things that his age and infirmity would prevent him from teaching his son, after all. Her worries were completely unfounded, of course. John was as involved in Jack's life as she could have wished for. He always got up with her when she was feeding him, no matter what time it was, he took him off her hands when she was struggling to get the housework done, and he'd even shown great enthusiasm when he'd learned how to change his son. He'd spend hours limping around the room without the aid of his cane so that he could cradle him securely in his arms (and she knew that he paid for that later from the way that his movements were stiff and agonisingly slow) and he liked to read to him, a book in one hand, Jack propped securely against him while his father spoke in a soft rumble, even though he was only babbling incoherent sounds and certainly wouldn't be able to understand a word that was being said to him.

"A lot of things have happened in my life to put things in perspective for me," he'd told her enigmatically when she'd mentioned how much she loved seeing them together. It was as much as he'd ever say on the subject, and Anna never pressed.

Back in the present, she glanced at the clock with tired eyes. Half past three.

"Come on, let's go back to bed," she whispered, aware of the fact that John had to get up for work in two hours and that Jack had settled quietly against his father's shoulder, sleeping at last. John nodded in reply, cautiously rising to his feet, biting back a wince as his knee protested. Anna knew better than to offer assistance as they switched off the light and quietly made their way through the little house. She watched his clumsy journey up the stairs, wishing for the millionth time that she could help to ease the pain he suffered daily.

At last they reached their bedroom again, and Anna slid wearily between the sheets, watching as John carefully lowered Jack gently into his crib. Then he rounded the bed and slipped in beside her, snaking his arms around her waist and burying his head in the side of her neck. She could feel the weariness coming off him in waves. His head was heavy.

"We really should move him into the other room," he mused tiredly, the words muffled by her skin.

"I know," she murmured, pressing herself as far into his arms as possible. "But I don't like the thought of him being all alone in there."

John chuckled. "He's going to have to move at some point. He needs to learn to sleep through the night. And we need to start feeling comfortable in our own room again."

Now it was Anna's turn to giggle, knowing what he was alluding to. It had taken them four months after Jack's birth for them to finally give in to their desires, which had been persistently demanding for a good few weeks before then; however, both of them had felt awkward making love while their son was lying asleep in the corner of the room, and their ardour had been cooled significantly when they'd heard the protesting whimpers from the cot barely a few minutes into their foreplay. It had felt wrong to continue on when they knew that he was awake, and both had gone to sleep that night snappish and irritable. The infrequent subsequent times after that had always happened while Jack was taking a nap downstairs – although even those were dampened by the fact that they were both expecting to hear a disgruntled wail from Jack demanding his feed. In fact, it had been an absolute blessing when Mrs. Hughes had offered to take care of Jack on her half-day a couple of weeks ago so that Anna might catch up on a few chores that she had been behind on, or whatever else the young woman needed to get done (Mrs. Hughes' words, not hers, stated with a twinkle in her eye). John had ensured that he had finished his duties early (and rather shoddily, it had to be said, but he'd supposed that no one would blame him if they'd known that his wife was probably lying naked on their bed right then) so that he could also sneak home – the following few hours had been absolute bliss, an outlet that they had both been desperately needing. Both had suspected that Mrs. Hughes had known that John would mysteriously go missing, and this had been confirmed when she had innocently commented later on that evening that it was kind of him to carry her out her errands in the village. Any rumours that might have been circulating about Mr. Bates' convenient disappearance soon died down. Anna and John were forever in the housekeeper's debt because of that, though they suspected that it was for at least partly selfish reasons that Mrs. Hughes had offered to look after little Jack – it was clear that the housekeeper doted on the baby, treating him as though he was her grandson. John and Anna weren't about to complain, especially if it was to give them an afternoon of undisturbed lovemaking to look forward to perhaps once a month. Still, Anna knew that it was time to move Jack into his own room. He was six months old now, old enough to be away from his parents' bedside. Perhaps then they'd be able to make love whenever the need overtook them, instead of quelling it until they had an off-chance afternoon alone.

"We'll do it today," she said into the darkness.

"What?" John's voice was sleepy. Clearly he'd been on the verge of slumber when she'd spoken.

"Jack can move into the spare room tonight."

It took the words a few moments to register, but she felt him shift against her. "What?" He sounded a bit more alert now.

"You must have heard me that time," she teased, smiling widely.

He dug his fingers into her side playfully. "You know what I mean."

She wriggled in his arms to face him, lips finding his briefly in the darkness. "Yes, I do. Now go to sleep. You know what day today is."

"Our anniversary," he murmured dutifully, moving to kiss the shell of her ear. "I'm not going to forget that."

"I might ask Mrs. Hughes if she'd mind watching Jack for a couple of hours this evening."

He was definitely awake now. "And why would you need to do that, pray tell?"

Her fingers traced their way down the front of his pyjama top. She resisted the urge to slip them down the tantalising opening at the neck, where the beginning of his chest hair peeked through. "Maybe because we're going to be going out for a lovely meal to celebrate our fifth wedding anniversary," she said mischievously.

"And are we?" John's breath hitched as she gave in to the temptation of feeling the coarse hairs between her fingers.

The impish grin widened. "Well, Mrs. Hughes doesn't need to know that our romantic meal can be brought up and consumed in this very bed, does she?"

He bit his lip to stifle his whimper. "Oh God, Anna."

"Sleep," she commanded, though she was feeling the effects of her words just as keenly as he was. "I don't want you tired later on. I'm fully expecting you to use our time together wisely while Jack is away, and I'm certainly expecting you to keep me awake all night to make up for lost time when Jack is put in the spare room."

He groaned against her skin. "How do you expect me to sleep now when you've filled my head with such thoughts?"

Anna smirked, tucking her head beneath his chin. "You'll sleep if you don't want to be a disappointment to me later." Although the thought of keeping him awake now and to hell with the baby boy in the room was extremely tempting. She was sure she could deal with having barely any sleep if she'd been thoroughly satisfied.

John chuckled. "You really are a naughty girl."

Heat flamed within her. It had been their private joke for years. She loved to hear those words escape from his lips.

"Goodnight, John," she said with an air of mock finality, and he grinned over her head.

"Goodnight, love," he replied, letting his eyes drift closed.

Anna listened as her husband's breathing evened and eventually deepened, warm and comfortable in his embrace. She had never known such contentment could exist; this peace which permeated her life had been something that she had only dreamed of a few years ago with a fevered kind of desperation, certain that they were doomed to unhappiness, a dream that had seemed almost foolish when her husband had been on trial for his life and she had been alone in a cold room with a hope had that deserted her in the darkness. Even now, years on, she could barely believe that they'd been blessed with such good fortune. She and John were able to sleep tangled together every night, and they had even been graced with a family of their own. Little Jack had entered the world in one of the easiest first births ever known, according to the midwife (and she shuddered to think what a difficult first birth was like), and he had served to bring his parents even closer than they already were. Anna finally felt complete in a way that she never had done before. They had a modest life; the most exciting thing that ever happened was gossiping about if the next door neighbours were contemplating moving away, or else discussing the goings on at Downton Abbey, but she supposed that they'd had enough excitement in the last twelve years to last them a lifetime. There was nothing she loved more than waking up to the dawn of another simple day with her husband by her side.

Of course, the last five years had not been easy. Adjusting to a normal married life after the turmoil of his imprisonment had been hard, but they'd thankfully emerged from the darkness stronger. And then, of course, there were the arguments that littered their relationship. They weren't common occurrences due to the way that they naturally got on with each other, but of course there were things that irritated each of them respectively. She grew tired of his habit of leaving his clothes anywhere when he'd decided that they were dirty; he could never understand her obsessive system of ensuring that his clothes were stacked in a specific order, especially since he'd usually leave them in an order more suitable for him, only to return to find it changed – there had been countless frantic mornings where he'd been running late and missing a precious sock and he'd cursed her silently as he threw the contents of his wardrobe over his shoulder in search of the elusive item. She liked to talk in the afterglow of their lovemaking, with the sheets flung from their bodies and the sweat drying in the cool breeze from the open window, and couldn't comprehend that he didn't want to spend the time between the realm of waking and sleeping whispering sweet nothings and planning their future; he liked nothing better than to savour the sound of his wife's breath in his ear and her warm limbs wrapped around his body while they both slipped nearer and nearer to the welcoming arms of sleep, and was unable to fathom why she would want to spoil such a perfect moment with needless words. Anna liked to stay in bed for as long as possible and grew irritated with John's habit of shifting restlessly and waking her up when he rose for work; John, in turn, couldn't see how, especially after years of being trained to rise at six, she could possibly want to stay in bed and while the morning away.

(Occasionally, however, she tempted him to change his view by keeping him between the bed sheets until he was past late for work, her sirenesque charms too hard to resist.)

These bumps in their relationship only made them love each other more. Anna was reminded every day of how close she'd come to losing her husband; because of this, she had learned to embrace every part of his person, even the more disagreeable traits, like his huge sense of honour. She vowed that she would never take him for granted or neglect him in any way again. Life was too short and uncertain for that.

Now, she sighed contentedly in his arms, hooking her leg over his, drawing them as close together as possible. John mumbled something incomprehensible as he moved closer to her, his breath ghosting across her cheek. She bent in to kiss him once more, mindful of disturbing him, then ducked her head under his chin, closing her eyes, waiting to be lulled to sleep with the sound of her husband's breathing, the warmth of his body, his comfortable weight.

The first five years of their marriage hadn't been easy, but Anna wouldn't change them for the world. Every mishap, every struggle, had led them to where they were now. Every tear, every agonising bit of heartbreak had been worth it, because it made their happy memories even more precious.

Anna hoped that there would be many long, happy years of marriage to come.

A/N: Thank you to everyone who has reviewed/alerted/favourited this throughout its course; it is much appreciated. :D

I'll now be moving back to Made to be Broken. Expect the second chapter in about a week's time.