We just need to hold on tight...

[protectingwishes]

Who: Asbel and Hubert
Where: Graceshouse
When: June 17th, Father's Day.
Style: I'll switch to whatever you want to use.
Status: Closed

Asbel had been sitting in bed listening to and reading about what other residents of this place had been talking about. That had been his only pastime since he’d arrived in Vatheon. At Cheria’s behest, Asbel had given up on trying to leave the house until he was feeling better.

Today he felt much of his former strength return, but he was still troubled. Of the many topics on the network, one in particular cropped up a few times. Father’s Day.

It was only now that Asbel was unable to focus on his duties as the Lord of Lhant that he let his mind wander to his parents. It had been seven years since he’d left home. Even when he’d finally returned to Lhant, he hadn’t had much time to speak with his mother about his reasons for running away from home. As for his father, Lord Aston, the chance to reconcile would never come.

“Dad...”

Even as he pulled on his coat and turned toward the door, he could feel his eyes begin to sting.

Comments

[dualbladepaladin]

Hubert had been seeing the messages on the network as well, but he watched and listened to them silently with much more conflicting feelings than Asbel had.

Lord Aston had given him away to another family for a multitude of reasons, but he was too young to fully understand it all at the time and as such a resentment towards the man had grown inside him and festered for years. But alternately, he found it difficult to love a man like his adopted father. He wasn't a bad person, just... so very different from Lord Aston. At least that was how his mind had perceived it as a child.

The time spent with Asbel, the talks they had during their travels had tempered much of his anger towards Lord Aston in to regret that so many things had gone unsaid. But there was little that could be done about it and all he and Asbel could do was push on.

But the talks on the network did get him thinking, and quietly wondering how Asbel was doing with it all.

He had just put the book he was reading down when he heard the door open, standing up from the couch to see Asbel coming out.

"... going somewhere?"

[protectingwishes]

"Hubert!"

He was genuinely surprised to see his brother home. The house had been so quiet that Asbel thought he was alone.

"I was just going to take a walk."

He knew Hubert held a lot of resentment toward their family, particularly their father. Asbel often wished he could have spared his brother those feelings particularly after hearing Hubert talk about his upbringing in Strata.

Still, seeing Hubert made him wonder whether his brother had known that today was Father's Day. Asbel stepped away from the room door, but instead of leaving he paused. He looked toward the window.

"Hubert." He started. "Did you know what today is?"

[dualbladepaladin]

Hubert was good at many things. Being deceptively quiet was just another one. Though he wasn't actually trying to deceive anyone of his presence - he simply had no one else to have a conversation with currently as both Cheria and Sophie were out and Asbel was supposed to be resting.

He didn't call Asbel out on it (surely if he pushed himself, Cheria would see fit to lecture him later) and addressed the question that had been directed at him instead.

"Yes," he said with a nod, studying Asbels expression closely. "Father's day, according to the network."

[protectingwishes]

So he'd been watching the network too. Asbel took a few steps toward the window and stopped a few feet from Hubert. He still didn't look at his brother, hesitant to ask his next question.

"I wonder if..." If dad cared? No that wasn't it. "I wonder how dad felt about today for all those years."

His gaze dropped from the window to the ground, like a child being reprimanded. Asbel had looked this way before, many times, many years before. It seemed like he was always fighting with Lord Aston back then. He smiled sadly at the memories, almost forgetting that Hubert was in the room.

[dualbladepaladin]

"How he felt?" Hubert echoed the question, an eyebrow quirking up for a moment. He approached Asbel, standing behind him, but keeping his gaze to the window with a finger to his chin in thought.

"I imagine... it was quite a sad time for him."

He sighed after that, shaking his head slowly.

"But... for whatever it may be worth, Asbel, I don't believe he ever hated you."