Trying Times - Friday
Friday is a long day. I have too much energy and not enough to do with it, so the early morning ride on the Acela is long because I am restless. The bustle of New York swallows me and I opt to walk instead of taking a cab.
I spend the morning dealing with fashion editors and self-important photographers, although my heart isn't really it. Alder bar Kochba should know better, is all I can think, and I hate myself for judging and I know that Sire Cole would tell me it's not my place to even have an opinion, but I can't stop myself.
Wallace Richardson, some distant cousin in service to someone I've never heard of, isn't even waiting for me when I arrive at the restaurant, though once he does arrive he is polite and useful enough. Something about him sets me on edge, something in the way he seems to want some unseen eye to see him with me.
The man we're there to meet is a shark wearing human skin, and I briefly wonder if he actually is some sort of supernatural creature, but there's no evidence to support this so I decide that even if he is, there's no reason for me to concern myself with it. The favor he wants is innocent enough, and he doesn't even stay long enough for lunch.
I'm insulted when Wallace suggests I might poach his "friend," and I can't help but tell him disdainfully that I have better things to do with my time than steal from my own family. We strike a deal, and I hope he'll keep it if only to spare me the awkwardness of asking Cole about the protocols around whether or not I have to keep a promise if the conditions upon which its premised have not been upheld.
After lunch it's on to cocktails, after cocktails it's on to tea with James.
You will deal with your family?
Yes.
Sir Cole's command sits heavy on me as James stands when I enter and politely pulls out my chair, and I wonder if Cole has even the slightest inkling of the gap between James and I. We may have suffered similar tragedies, but he's the oldest living Crassus I know, and I am more in awe of him than I have ever been of any Kindred.
He sips his tea.
In which scenario do the unconquered and the Crassus achieve more esteem?
I suddenly feel incredibly small and short-sighted, and it's not a welcome feeling. I'm only too happy to let him change the subject, which he does with deftness and grace and he's called me on my hypocrisy before I even realize it's happening.
His gentle concern for me, his mistaken belief in our shared tragedy, almost undoes me. I fight back tears, fight back the desperate desire to tell him -- to tell anybody the desperate, horrible truth that I have been holding in. But he doesn't see the lie -- or perhaps is just to kind to make me tell the truth.
But it's not all a lie. He had over 2 centuries with the man he loved, and I had...I had less than 3 years. In the scale of things, it may as well have been 3 heart beats. But one heartbeat was all it took, and one or a thousand or a million or a billon, the pain is the same. It doesn't hurt any less. He talks brave words about time healing wounds, but we both know it doesn't. The wounds never heal. We just...forget that they hurt.
Will we ever be happy again? I desperately want to think so, and I know that in this...in this he doesn't have the answers for me. Nothing in either of our upbringings, our educations, our experiences, prepared us to lose our beloved regnants, and suddenly I understand why he doesn't want to go quietly in the night to Beckett. Because it has to mean something, because otherwise...otherwise the loss is simply too enormous and it will swallow us whole.
Our shared grief is too much much for me, and I stand abruptly. It's late, and I should go, and that these statements are true doesn't invalidate their convenience. Polite words of gratitude are exchanged, and I think we both mean them, though what reason he would have to be grateful to me I cannot fathom. Our good byes are polite and formal and as I leave without looking back, I realize that I want him to be proud of me, but that I have a long road to walk before that day comes.
I spend the morning dealing with fashion editors and self-important photographers, although my heart isn't really it. Alder bar Kochba should know better, is all I can think, and I hate myself for judging and I know that Sire Cole would tell me it's not my place to even have an opinion, but I can't stop myself.
Wallace Richardson, some distant cousin in service to someone I've never heard of, isn't even waiting for me when I arrive at the restaurant, though once he does arrive he is polite and useful enough. Something about him sets me on edge, something in the way he seems to want some unseen eye to see him with me.
The man we're there to meet is a shark wearing human skin, and I briefly wonder if he actually is some sort of supernatural creature, but there's no evidence to support this so I decide that even if he is, there's no reason for me to concern myself with it. The favor he wants is innocent enough, and he doesn't even stay long enough for lunch.
I'm insulted when Wallace suggests I might poach his "friend," and I can't help but tell him disdainfully that I have better things to do with my time than steal from my own family. We strike a deal, and I hope he'll keep it if only to spare me the awkwardness of asking Cole about the protocols around whether or not I have to keep a promise if the conditions upon which its premised have not been upheld.
After lunch it's on to cocktails, after cocktails it's on to tea with James.
You will deal with your family?
Yes.
Sir Cole's command sits heavy on me as James stands when I enter and politely pulls out my chair, and I wonder if Cole has even the slightest inkling of the gap between James and I. We may have suffered similar tragedies, but he's the oldest living Crassus I know, and I am more in awe of him than I have ever been of any Kindred.
He sips his tea.
In which scenario do the unconquered and the Crassus achieve more esteem?
I suddenly feel incredibly small and short-sighted, and it's not a welcome feeling. I'm only too happy to let him change the subject, which he does with deftness and grace and he's called me on my hypocrisy before I even realize it's happening.
His gentle concern for me, his mistaken belief in our shared tragedy, almost undoes me. I fight back tears, fight back the desperate desire to tell him -- to tell anybody the desperate, horrible truth that I have been holding in. But he doesn't see the lie -- or perhaps is just to kind to make me tell the truth.
But it's not all a lie. He had over 2 centuries with the man he loved, and I had...I had less than 3 years. In the scale of things, it may as well have been 3 heart beats. But one heartbeat was all it took, and one or a thousand or a million or a billon, the pain is the same. It doesn't hurt any less. He talks brave words about time healing wounds, but we both know it doesn't. The wounds never heal. We just...forget that they hurt.
Will we ever be happy again? I desperately want to think so, and I know that in this...in this he doesn't have the answers for me. Nothing in either of our upbringings, our educations, our experiences, prepared us to lose our beloved regnants, and suddenly I understand why he doesn't want to go quietly in the night to Beckett. Because it has to mean something, because otherwise...otherwise the loss is simply too enormous and it will swallow us whole.
Our shared grief is too much much for me, and I stand abruptly. It's late, and I should go, and that these statements are true doesn't invalidate their convenience. Polite words of gratitude are exchanged, and I think we both mean them, though what reason he would have to be grateful to me I cannot fathom. Our good byes are polite and formal and as I leave without looking back, I realize that I want him to be proud of me, but that I have a long road to walk before that day comes.