Ok, so I know it's been quite a while since I've updated this… and I'm sorry :( but life was crazy for a while there, and I didn't like the computer that I was using, my new one is much nicer to type on, so there might be some more chapters punched out… but then again there might not, I start uni in about three weeks and I have a reading list half a mile long to get through before I start… so updates could be a little choppy.

So, without further ado…

Disclaimer: Checks papers littering desk… nope, still not mine.

Previously: Rick had called Lanie over to see Kate because she had been moping around: Lanie came to see her and forced her to go see a shrink…

Chapter 4: Silence – Twins about five weeks old – early April

They say silence is golden, but what they say isn't always true. Sometimes silence is so far from golden one could call it black.

"Post partum depression."

Even though Kate had known the words were bound to be coming, the shock still hit her like a ton of bricks, and since the words had come out of Dr Burke's mouth Kate hadn't said a word. She had just sat and stared at the blue striped drapes in his office.

That had been within the first fifteen minutes of the hour-long session she had with the doctor that day. Kate didn't know what to say to that; she was unsure how to respond so she didn't. She just let the silence grow. Those three words became the proverbial elephant in the room.

For the final ten minutes of the hour Kate stared at the clock on the wall. She watched the big black second hand tick slowly around large clock. Because she was staring at it so hard it felt like the hand was barely moving, so as soon as the second hand ticked over to the end of the hour she stood, nodded to the doctor, and left his office. She had resigned to the fact that she would be back there in a week's time; Lanie had booked her weekly appointments for the next two months. Perhaps she would know what to say to him by the following week.

Kate walked back through the waiting room, eyes glazed over, off in her own little world. It was only when she stopped to wait for the elevator that she realised Rick had been sitting with their children waiting for her to come out, and she had walked straight past him.

Rick had caught up with her outside the elevator; the double pram pushed along in front of him, and placed his arm around her. Rick noticed that she still didn't relax; he wasn't even sure she noticed his presence. She was so much in her own little world that when the elevator dinged its arrival she jumped, and then looked at him with wide eyes.

She managed to come far enough out of her daze to enter the elevator with Rick, she even had the slight piece of mind to take hold of his hand once they were in the elevator, but still she stayed silent.

Rick found the car ride back to the loft painfully silent, but knew better then to try and push her, if he pushed her she might not talk for days, or even weeks, so silence reigned in their car. Kate spent the whole drive home staring out the passenger window, eyes glazed over. Rick pulling the car into the parking space under their building jerked Kate out of her trance; she managed to rustle up enough energy to help Rick get the babies out of the car and up to the loft.

The rest of the day Kate continued to just go through the motions of the day. She walked around the loft, sat and read the same page of a book over and over again and stared aimlessly at the large screen television. She ate the food that Rick put in front of her and pulled herself up the stairs to their bedroom. She changed her clothes and crawled into bed, pulled the covers up under her chin and just waited for Rick to join her.

-!-!-!-

After feeding Kate dinner and watching her pull herself up the stairs Rick retreated to his office. He had talked to Lanie about what was wrong with Kate, and all he had been told was that she had to get through it herself, but that he needed to be there to support her through it, or she might never come out of the other side of it. Rick started typing on his laptop, attempting to outline the next chapter of his next book and heard someone shuffling around the loft. He looked at the clock in the corner of his screen and realised that he had been in his office for a few hours, but he couldn't remember them happening.

When he looked back up Kate was standing in the doorway of his office, leaning on the frame. He smiled when he saw the start of a small smile grace her lips, it had literally been weeks since he'd seen one; yet at the same time she still looked so vulnerable. Kate looked at him with questioning eyes, and Rick scooted his chair back and opened his arms to her. He was pleasantly surprised, but extremely happy, when Kate made her way over to him and climbed onto his lap. She wrapped her arms around his broad chest and borrowed her face into his neck; she felt his strong arms around her body, holding her close, making it feel like nothing could ever harm her. At which point she found that she needed protecting, from what she wasn't sure, and that in its self made her very unsure of her self. Kate hadn't felt like she needed protecting since she was a very little girl and needed protecting form the monsters under her bed; and the tears started falling. When she had needed protecting from imaginary monsters when she was a little girl it had always been her mother that had been there for her, but her mother wasn't there and since her mother had been gone she had always been the protector.

She had been her father's protector from the bottle after her mother's murder, and after that Kate had become so good at the role of protector that she had figured that she had to protect herself so she built a wall around her life; a wall that no one but Rick had been able to get past. Many had tried but all had failed because her wall was to thick to plough straight through, to high to climb, and the foundations to deep to burrow under that the only way to get it down was to chip away at it, little by little. Rick had been the only person in her life willing to put in the time and effort to do just that, and she had been afraid that now that their children were born that he wouldn't need her anymore, and she wasn't sure could, in fact she knew she couldn't, live without him. She needed him in her life. Without him she had no life.

Kate knew Dr Burke would be proud, she'd seen enough shrinks, and talked to Lanie enough times, to know that they liked you to get to the heart of the problem before they would start treating you, and Kate believed she had got to the heart of her problem.

The whole time Kate had been sifting through her thoughts she had been sitting in Rick's lap bawling her eyes out and he had just been rubbing his hands soothingly up and down her back. Kate forced the tears to stop flowing and looked up into Rick's eyes. "Will you come up to bed with me?" She asked him meekly.

"I thought you'd never ask." Rick told her with a grin on his face. Kate slowly climbed off of Rick's lap and he stood, pulling her into a tight embrace before taking her hand and leading her up to their bedroom.

Once into the room Kate crawled back under the covers and watched as Rick stripped down to just his boxers and slid into the bed beside her. Kate made her way over to him and found herself in his warm embrace, looking into his eyes, once again.

"Promise you'll always protect me." Kate said to him as sleep overtook her body.

"Always." He responded placing a gentle kiss on her forehead before following her into the land of nod.

So there you have it, a slight emotional overhaul for Kate. I'd love to know what you think, even if you think it was totally out of character… drop me a line :D