It was the fun part of postpartum. The baby had settled into somewhat of a schedule, the bandage had come off, and the hair had started falling out.

Christine rinsed the shampoo out with a sigh. As she ran her fingers through her long, dark hair, strands seemed to come out by the handful. It was just another change post-baby, adding to a growing list. Everyone had said that everything would change, but she hadn't truly expected everything to change.

Another strand…

Least of all, she had not expected things to change so drastically between her and her husband. They had never been, shall we say, a typical couple. They'd met under strange circumstances, fallen in love under stranger circumstances, and gotten married under the strangest circumstances. Despite all that, what they had was real and Christine couldn't imagine life without her Erik by her side.

More strands…

That was...until the baby was born.

Reaching for the conditioner, Christine liberally applied it to the mass cascading down her back, mind tracing back over the last three months. It was arguable that she and Erik's courtship had been so strange because he was so strange. Erik was not like other men, he had been different from birth, a fact that had continued to terrify him until they had laid eyes on their healthy and whole son. Erik's...unique physical traits had not been passed on. Which, the doctors had told him that they were likely a birth defect and not something genetic. She didn't think he ever truly believed it.

Another handful of hair…

Still, things had been good. They had both adapted to parenthood rather well, all things and sleep deprivation considered. Erik was a wonderful father, stepping up to the role with such ease even Christine was a little surprised, not to speak of Nadir and Meg's astonishment. He was always ready to jump in with their son and change a diaper or rock the baby to sleep. He would take the night feedings if Christine didn't already have that job cornered. Instead, he let her nap whenever she could, and often she would wake to hearing his voice through the baby monitor, singing softly to their son.

Yes, it was all wonderful. It was just…

More hair as she finished rinsing the conditioner out.

Things had changed between the two of them. She couldn't remember the last time he had reached for her, done more than brush his lips across her forehead. She couldn't bring herself to reach out to him, afraid to push the harmony they seemed to have established as a family of three. Maybe it was exhaustion from only sleeping three and four hours at a time, but she just didn't have the energy to try, especially when he didn't seem at all interested to begin with, more concerned and wrapped up in the baby, as he should be. As they both should be.

Christine quickly washed her body, fingertips lingering an extra couple of seconds over the line on her lower abdomen where they'd cut. Maybe it was her fault. She knew Erik's history, knew that he had struggled enough just to let her in. Perhaps adding a child to the mix was too much and there was only room for one…

Tears threatened in the back of her throat and she hastily choked them down. If that was how it had to be, then so be it. She would be a wonderful mother and friend to her husband, even if she could no longer be a wife in the truest sense. At least she had her family healthy and home with her, the rest could come and go.

Making sure all the hair that she had pulled out was set aside for her to dispose of instead of letting it go down the drain and clog it, Christine cut the shower off and stepped out.

She had toweled off, dressed, and was brushing her teeth when the bathroom door opened. Erik entered, sans mask and wig, only to draw up short when he saw her standing by the sink in her night shirt. Christine froze, waiting to see what he would do, if he would leave. He usually did, these last few months.

Tonight though, Erik hesitated only a moment before he came fully into the room, baby monitor in hand. He set it on the counter beside her without a word. Her chest constricted, but she didn't speak either. She just spit out the toothpaste and started to rinse. Behind her, she heard the shower start. Just as she began to wonder if he would undress in front of her for the first time since before Gustave was born, her husband gave a cry of alarm.

Christine's eyes whipped to the baby monitor and its small screen, but everything seemed fine. She whirled around just as Erik pulled his arm out of the shower, a clump of hair almost the size of a small mouse held in his outstretched palm, a look of complete and utter alarm on the distorted features of his face. Christine felt her entire face go bright red. She left it in the shower?

"Are you sick?" he demanded.

She heard the panic in his voice and instead of being calm and reasonable as she would have been before the baby, in a blend of her own panic and plain embarrassment, she snatched the hair from his hand and tossed it in the trash can. She turned to walk out of the bathroom without taking the conversation any further, but Erik reached out and grabbed her arm, halting her escape. His long and thin fingers wrapped around her wrist with a strength she'd forgotten he possessed, but was quickly reminded of when she tried to pull free. "Let me go, Erik."

"Tell me what's going on! How could you not tell me you were sick?" His face fell into a familiar expression of self-loathing. "I did this to you, didn't I?"

Christine barked a laugh, a sound that seemed to wound him because he suddenly let go of her. But she was in this now. She turned to face him, glancing at the baby monitor to make sure Gustave was still sleeping. "If you must know, yes. Yes you did." She saw the way he flinched and immediately regretted her tone. All the months of frustration seemed to boil out of her anyway. "It's just a natural part of postpartum," she explained.

Shoulders sagging in relief, his face remained a mask of worry. "How do you know that for sure? This is a lot of hair, Christine!" he snapped back, irritation masking an emotion that anyone else would have missed but she saw it.

Fear. Her husband was afraid. Oh...Erik…

Christine took a hesitant step forward. "It's just postpartum stuff, my love, I swear. I've googled it, I've even called my doctor to make sure." When it didn't stop after a week, it had freaked her out a little too.

"You didn't tell me," he accused. "Why?"

She spread her hands out in a placating gesture. "It wasn't that big of a deal."

"That big of a deal," he scoffed. "It was a big enough deal that you called your doctor but didn't see fit to tell your own husband."

"It was such a small thing that I didn't…"

"Maybe you're regretting your choice. Thinking that that fop Raoul could have done better by you, been a better husband and father."

That made Christine stutter in indignation. "Excuse me? How can you say that!" She grabbed his left hand and raised it until the plain gold band glinted under the bathroom lights. "I chose you! I always have."

Erik jerked his hand away to sneer down his considerable height at her. "You chose me before I sullied your body with a child."

"And you think I think Raoul would have been better?" she bit back. "You've been nothing but a model father since we came home. How could you think I could ever want for something different?"

He snickered cruelly. "I'm no fool, Christine. You think I haven't noticed that things have changed between us?"

Her eyes widened before her own temper kicked in. "What?"

"I know your doctor cleared you at four weeks. I know you've been thinking about it, I see you using Incognito on your Chrome app at night." He stated it so calmly, yet it was like a whip across her skin.

If it was possible, her face flamed brighter. "It's not as if you've been reaching for me either!"

"You've been exhausted and healing! How could I subject you to that, especially if the attentions are unwanted!" His voice reached that point just below a shout, but from the way he glanced at the baby monitor, she knew he was being conscious of their baby sleeping in the next room. It was an improvement from the way he used to lose his temper and yet… "It's obvious to me that you don't want this repulsive carcass anymore! Perhaps childbirth finally brought you to your senses!"

"Then you are an idiot, Erik Garnier!"

He took a step back. "I've been called worse." By the Daroga. Just within the last week.

Christine glowered, sensing that he was about to retreat to the music room downstairs. They'd had it soundproofed before the baby came so he could still play down there without disturbing the rest of the house. If he went down there now, she might not see him again for hours if not a day or two, and this rift between them would only grow larger. So in a fit moment of fury and hurt, Christine decided to lay it all out on the table.

"It's not that I don't want you, you just don't want me because I'm not perfect anymore."

Suddenly, it was as if everything in the room just stopped. The only sound was the roar of the shower still going and the slight static coming from the baby monitor. Erik stared at her for a minute, disbelief flowering over his face. Then he slowly reached out and cut the shower off, leaving them in near perfect silence. He broke it a heartbeat later. "How can you ever think that?"

Those tears from earlier threatened again and Christine barked out a defensive laugh. "I know that I've changed since before I got pregnant and there's no going back now. I'm not what you bargained for when you married me, I know that."

"What exactly do you mean? You're still the most beautiful creature I know."

Her eyes softened a little at that. "My body," she said quietly, "it's not what it once was. It's...I'm not perfect anymore."

Erik stepped closer, suddenly towering over her as the energy in the room shifted from anger and frustration to something else entirely. "Show me? Show me what you think has changed so much that my affections for you have faded." Those golden eyes stared down at her, a quiet dare in them.

Christine swallowed, hands fisting at her side. In spite of everything, in spite of the fact that this was Erik, her husband and the father of her child, she hesitated. Hadn't she been avoiding this for months? Showing him what her body had become? Maybe some would say her fears were silly, given Erik's own physical deformities, but she knew that part of what had attracted him to her in the first place was how beautiful she was and now…

Her body wasn't, not anymore. Yet she couldn't run from this forever. If he was going to reject her, she needed to know now.

Slowly, carefully, Christine's hands fisted in the sides of her night shirt and dragged it up her body, bunching it just below her breasts. She blew out a breath, squeezed her eyes shut, and waited.

At first there was silence. She could feel his eyes moving over her though, she always could. She knew what he was seeing for the first time since they'd been in the delivery room.

The uneven line where she'd been cut for the emergency c-section. The slight sag of loose skin around her belly, accented by the lightning strikes of stretch marks dancing around her belly button and down her hips and thighs, some of them deeper and more noticeable than others. Her thighs were bigger as well, no longer slim and unblemished.

She had no regrets about the damage done to her once smooth and thin dancer's body, yet she knew it was not what her husband had bargained for when he married her. So she waited for his reaction with trepidation, fearing the worst.

In the silence, she heard Erik kneel at her feet. She held her breath, waiting.

His fingers suddenly traced the lines around her belly button, following the jagged indents of the stretch marks. Christine let herself ease her eyes open, sneaking a peek down at him.

Those gold eyes were staring up at her in utter amazement. "You're even softer than before, beloved."

Her breath caught in her throat and she felt the tears finally escape, one long track running down her left cheek. "I'll never look like I once did," she whispered.

Erik's lips pursed and he surged to his feet, towering over her once again. "No," he agreed, "you won't. But you're more beautiful now than you've ever been."

"How can you say that?" she asked, voice still low.

"Because it is true."

Christine scoffed out a laugh, crying in earnest. Her menacing, oversized, and damaged husband smiled softly, the expression easing the harshness of his deformity. He bent down enough to scoop her up into his arms and carried her out of the bathroom and into their bedroom, setting her down at the edge of their king size mattress. He left her just long enough to grab the baby monitor, giving Christine a moment to collect herself and wipe away her tears. She was sucking in a shuddering breath when he returned, the light from the bathroom casting him in shadows as he set the monitor on the nightstand and put one knee on the mattress beside her. He held his weight up, wiping away the remnants of her tears with his own finger. "Nothing has changed for me," he said softly, "I just thought you were upset with me."

"I thought you didn't want me anymore."

His shoulders lifted once as he chuckled. "That would qualify as being upset with me." He leaned in. "You're still perfect to me, Christine, and you always will be, no matter what happens to your body."

Her laugh was wet but she smiled at him, leaning up slightly. It was all the invitation he needed and he was on her. His mouth ravaged hers, his body pressing hers onto her back. If she wasn't convinced, the way he pressed against her and the sudden bulge digging into her hip nipped any remaining doubts in the bud. Christine wrapped her arms around his neck and sighed, opening her mouth to his questing tongue. His hands moved over her body all the way, caressing her over her night shirt until he suddenly yanked his mouth away, breathing hard. "Christine, please."

"Yes."

He didn't hesitate from there, sitting up just long enough to yank her night shirt up and over her head. It disappeared somewhere over his shoulder, but when he saw her night time nursing bra, he stopped and stared until she started to squirm under the scrutiny, his golden gaze glowing in the darkened room. "Erik?"

"They're so much bigger. I could tell they were, but I...I had no idea." Then he couldn't wait anymore. He yanked the bra up and off, her nursing pads going flying with it. Her cheeks reddened in embarrassment. He gave her little chance to pull away before his mouth was latching onto one breast and sucking deeply. A groan rumbled up from deep in his chest as he got his first taste of her. She cried out, her body undulating against him as her hands came up to hold him to her. For a few minutes, there were just the soft sounds of him drinking, then a soft plop as he released one breast and moved to the other. She arched against him with a cry.

Erik yanked himself off her just long enough to get fully undressed and then he was back at her side, hand snaking down her body so his long fingers could slip into her. She groaned, pushing against him in growing desperation. It was impossible to miss the smug look on his face. "You're already so wet, you've missed your Erik."

"Yes," she whispered, and that seemed to be the end of his patience. He yanked her underwear off and they disappeared to the same place as her shirt and bra. Erik shoved himself between her thighs and paused, taking a minute to study her face. "I love you, Christine."

She put a hand on his cheek, loving the contrast of his cooler skin against her warmth. "I love you too, Erik." Her fingers gently traced the dips and bumps of his deformity. "Always."

With a cry born of desperation and love, he thrust inside her. Christine gasped, body arching beneath his. It had been so long, her body clamped down and she could tell from the noises he made, he felt it too. He gave her a moment to adjust, quivering with the effort of holding back.

Eventually, she leaned up and kissed him softly, gently rocking against him to show she was fine. It was all the encouragement he needed. His body surged over hers, moving at a pace she could just keep up with.

Christine had forgotten this feeling, the sounds they made together, the way he would cling to her and she to him, arms wrapped around his neck as she threw her head back. Erik suddenly growled and flipped over so she was on top. His hands gripped her hips, encouraging her to move. She pushed herself up off his chest and began a rocking motion she knew drove him crazy. His eyes glowed under her watch, a special gleam in them as one hand slid from her hip to that spot where they were joined.

She gasped again, jolting forward as he stroked that small spot that could send her over the edge. "Keep moving," he growled. Her hand fisted on his chest but she did as he commanded, working them both and pushing herself against his touch harder and harder. His hips began to move with her and the pressure mounted until she couldn't take it anymore, her body spasming around his as she climaxed. Erik gripped her hips and ground her down on top of him, slamming into her until his entire body went stiff with his own release.

In the quiet of the aftermath, Christine lay curled against his side, tracing the scars that lined his entire torso as his fingers combed through her drying curls. She knew he'd pulled out some more hair when he suddenly lifted his hand, staring at something only he could see in the dark. "Are you sure you're well?"

Christine burrowed deeper against him with a contented sigh. "I'm sure, my love. I told you I consulted multiple sources." She cracked one eye open at him. "I'm not always looking at naughty stuff when I use Incognito."

Erik chuckled and flicked the strand off the side of the bed. He tumbled her onto her back once more, kissing her softly as the two became entangled once more.

END

This is the first story I've posted online in several years. I hope you enjoyed this sweet little look into what their lives could look like as parents and I hope I did both characters justice in this incarnation. Thanks for reading!