Chapter Text
Prologue
They had met at the end of Claire’s Foundation Years when she had just started at the hospital. A fresh-faced 24-year-old working horrible hours but desperate to move on to her core surgical training, to pick a specialty and work her way up. She had worked her bloody arse off to get where she was, and she wasn’t giving up now!
Jamie was still trying to get his business off the ground and running then. He had finished his Masters in London, where he had met Claire in the A&E after a night of too much drinking with his mates. He had managed to dislocate his shoulder and was half gone with the pain when he came too with a small English woman on his chest, cursing violently at him.
It had been instant for him. One look at her brown curls and whiskey eyes, and he was a goner. He knew there would only ever be her for him after that. It took a little longer for her.
'Dr. Beauchamp,' as she introduced herself, was still fresh in the medical field and would not even consider going out with a patient no matter how often he asked.
But he was not only her patient; he was also overall patient. Infuriatingly so. He had waited outside the hospital with flowers every day for a month. When he finally found out which one was hers he'd be waiting for her to finish her shift, leaning against her car and smirking.
It had made her furious, and she'd scowl at him, getting in the car without saying a word. But he'd only laugh and wave after her. This continued for weeks until she finally snapped, turning on him and snapping, 'Mr. Fraser, you are aware that this is very creepy, right? Is stalking encouraged in Scotland?' he had only laughed laughed, 'I can see the wee vase you have there in the back,' he said simply pointing at the flowers in his hands and the vase on her back seat and for a second, he thought her head would blow off.
But then she had walked up to him, grabbed him by the lapels of his jacket, and had kissed him so hard that he had seen stars. He was too shocked to respond when she stopped, turned on her heels, with a, 'fine! Pick me up Friday at 6,' before getting in her car and driving off without another word. And that had been that.
Friday at six had turned into Friday night… and Saturday… and Sunday. Only on Monday morning did they remember that they had lives to get back to. When she had kissed him goodbye at his door, she had looked scared, and he had hugged her tight, smiling, and promising that everything would be all right.
And it was. By the end of the month, he had moved into her flat, and they were living off Claire's meager earnings and whatever Jamie brought home from working in a pub while spending all day getting his Whiskey business launched. They didn’t have a lot of money, but Claire believed in his passion in a way no one had before her. So they made do and were happy.
When Claire got a spot for her Core Surgical Training in Edinburgh with a potential offer to do her specialty training after, they didn’t have to think long.
It was much closer to Jamie's family, and Claire had no family keeping her in England. So they packed their belongings into Jamie's beat-up truck and road-tripped up the country.
And for two years, everything was perfect. They had a flat in Edinburgh, they were in love, Claire earned more, and Jamie was starting to make his first sales and close contracts. So when he got home after finally signing that big Tesco deal, and them stocking his whiskey in all supermarkets, to find Claire sitting at their kitchen table, crying and holding a pregnancy test, he thought his heart would burst with joy.
She had been terrified, not sure what to do, terrified of not being a good mother after not remembering her own mum and scared out of her mind. He had only hugged her tight and kissed her. Then he promised that things would be all right. He got her smiling, and together they went out picking up a crib.
She hadn’t been too fussed about a wedding, but he knew he wanted her to be his wife before the bairn got there. So they did the big white wedding, with flowers and lace, Jenny’s kids running amok, and Claire very visibly pregnant. That night as they held each other in the afterglow, she had kissed him softly and smiled, telling him the most beautiful news he had ever gotten: Twins! He had cried happy tears for the better part of an hour and then made love to her holding her tight like she was the most precious thing in the world.
She wasn’t so pleased with him when her pains started, but Claire Fraser was a fighter. Cursing up a storm, she brought his bairns into the world, and he had fallen to his knees in front of her and wept. As he held his bairns for the first time, he knew that this was it. All that mattered in the world was in his shaking arms. They had decided that Claire would stay home for a year with the twins. Jamie's business was picking up, and this wasn’t the right time for him to take a year off, so she happily did it. For a while, everything was utter bliss.
It wasn’t easy to say what did it. Maybe it was the stressors of having two two-year-olds. Maybe it was Jamie's boom in his Whiskey business, with Sassenach Whiskey winning awards and slowly breaking in the European market which brought in money but also an endless loop of business trips and work calls. But he loved the work and tried his best to provide for his family, knowing that every single sale was benefiting the twins. So he sucked it up. Trying to be fine with seeing his family less and worked his ass off.
For Claire, one year had stretched to two, and she was becoming restless. She loved those babies more than anything but she was also a doctor and needed to be a doctor. Jamie's work made that impossible, and she felt increasingly cooped up.
However, she was still terrified of being a bad mom and desperately needed to put her children first, not noticing the strain that put on her mental health. They started snapping at each other and bickering, each blaming the other. Every time they finally found a minute to be together and talk, one of the twins would start wailing. At one point, it had been weeks since they had shared a bed, and both were walking on eggshells around the other.
It was that week that finished them off.
Claire had come home from an afternoon stroll with the children to find Jamie on yet another work call. The babies were sleeping, and when he finished the call, she had informed him that she was going for coffee with Frank Randall that evening.
The row that followed had been their worst one yet. He couldn’t understand why she had the urge to go out with her Uni boyfriend. She was frustrated at his reluctance to let her catch up with an old acquaintance. They both said horrible things, and it ended with Claire grabbing her coat and snarling that if Jamie was so bothered by it, then maybe he should come home from work before midnight every so often and that she wasn’t some 1950s housewife to be locked up. She had left, slamming the door so hard that it had woken the twins.
He had been furious and called Jenny while rocking the children back to sleep. He needed out. Time to clear his head. Time to think. He had walked for almost two hours, turning his phone off and just letting his mind wander. He couldn’t stand the thought of her with another man, and he was so tired and angry.
It didn’t surprise him that he found solace at the bottom of a whiskey glass in his favourite pub. If Claire could go out, so could he. That’s where he ran into Laoghaire. She was a family friend, only 23, and in Edinburgh for her master's degree. He knew she had always had a crush on him, and right now, it felt good to talk to somebody who looked at him with desire instead of resentment. They were drinking heavily, and he made Laoghaire text Jenny where they were. He still didn't want to turn his phone back on, but he didn’t want his sister to worry. When they kicked them out at around three, he offered to walk her home, laughing loudly and joking about this or that. It made him feel young and free, and, in his whiskey-addled mind, that felt amazing.
He would like to say that he was too drunk to know what he was doing, too far gone to tell right from wrong, but when Laoghaire kissed him, all he thought of was Frank's hands on Claire before he kissed her back and pulled her onto her bed.
So that’s how he found himself still drunk but feeling like an absolute piece of shit on his own doorstep.
He still felt hazy as he unlocked the door and stepped into their house. It was still dark, and he thanked God that the children weren’t up yet. He felt disgusting and all he wanted was a shower and to sleep, but when he turned right on the stairs, he saw her.
She looked tiny, how she sat there in one of his shirts, dark circles under her eyes and dried tear tracks all over her red cheeks.
His shoulders slumped as he met her gaze.
"Where the hell have you been?" she whispered with her small and broken voice, and he wanted to kick himself for hurting her. "How was Frank?" he shot back. Good, this was good. Anger instead of this horrible guilt. "Frank?" she asked, her voice breaking, but then fire blazed in her whiskey eyes. "Frank?" she shouted, raising to her feet. He had to duck as she threw her empty cup at him. "I cancelled on Frank, you goddamn bloody bastard. You didn’t want me going, so I cancelled and came here instead to talk to you," she screamed. “But did I find you here? No I found your sister telling me you had gone out drinking. With Loaghaire. So tell me, darling," she spat his nickname at him. "Where the hell have you been?"
"Claire," he started softly, but she stopped him. "No, don’t you Claire me. I'm done. It's not so much that you slept with her but the fact that you did it to hurt me, you know," she walked past him, picking up her phone and heading for the stairs. He reached out his hand and grabbed her arm. "I'm not letting you go without a fight," he gasped desperately, but she only laughed through her tears. "I didn’t need you to fight, Jamie. I needed you to not fuck other people," her words stung, and he instinctively let go of her.
When she was upstairs, he was reeling. No, this wasn't happening. He could fix this. She would go to bed, and then in the morning, they would sort this out. They would get therapy. Maybe move to Glasgow for a fresh start. But then she appeared at the bottom of the stairs, overnight bag over one shoulder, holding the twins, and he froze. "What are you doing?" he asked confusedly, but she only stared him down. "I'm staying at Geillis' until I find a flat. I want a divorce," his ears were ringing. "Claire, please," he gasped, but she only shook her head. "No, Jamie. I'm done," and she turned on him, walking to the door.
Panic seized his heart, and he lashed out. "You can't take my children from me, Claire," he shouted, and she froze as if he had slapped her. When she turned around to him, tears were running down her face, and she looked utterly broken. "I'm not," she stated. "I'll drop them off for a couple of hours tomorrow. But I need some rest now. My lawyer will contact you, and we can discuss shared custody," with that, the door banged shut, and he collapsed on the floor.