February Challenge, Lost

[thelorax42.livejournal.com]

Sam thought about what he had said earlier. He put down the phone, and listened to the sounds of the house quietly below. So much had changed in the last few weeks, the last few months, the last few years. It seemed that the only certainty was that today would not be like tomorrow, and then a month later would be unrecognisable to either.

It was a thought that would have terrified Sam, once. It still did, a little. But he knew he could come out of it okay. That they could survive. What more could the world throw at him? He shook his head quickly to ward off any tempting of the wyrd he might have brought on with such a dangerous thought. Anyway, now was not about him. His family needed him.

Downstairs, they were all waiting, not for him, but for some upswing of fortune to come for them all. As he walked down, he could hear Rose in her room, making small sounds as she worked out how to live in the wake of her love's death. He wanted to go to her, hold her and tell her he could make it all all right. But he couldn't make it right. He knew the pain of losing your loved one, and he knew that he couldn't take it away from her, couldn't make it right, no matter how much he wanted to. All he could do was give her time, and be there when she wanted someone again. But it hurt to not be there, not not be helping, to not take the pain. He sighed, shaking his head at his strange selfishness as he went down another flight of stairs.

Rosie was sitting at the table, working the last things out before heading out for a few days. Sam stopped at the stairs and watched, as quietly as he ever managed for a few seconds. She seemed a little sad, a little lost. So many simple things were becoming harder, and while he could not help but feel a begrudging sympathy for Drago's situation, it was Rosie's pain he actually cared for. Since his change, he found it harder to worry about the hurts of those he didn't care about, but he was loyal. That meant he had to care for the ones he loved above all else. He stared for a second, trying to think of a way to help her, but came up with nothing. She needed time, and distance, and to know she was loved. He could give her all of that, but could not help.

Opposite her was Worthy. Worthy Black. Who had come for him when he was hurt. Who had become family when things seemed darkest. Who was now confined to a wheel chair, injured, a shadow of the woman she used to be. He knew she had not diminished, but she didn't. Wouldn't listen. She'd lost a lot, as well as the obvious injuries, the loss of her brother had hurt her in a way many people wouldn't guess from the gruff ogress. She too, it seemed refused his help, turning away gifts to make her life easier, and going north to live.

He stood and looked over them all, his family. Through thick and thin they had stood by him, with a resolution he couldn't have expected and a devotion he hoped he could match. They were all hurting now, for one reason or another, and he couldn't think of one damn thing he could do for any of them. But he had to. They were his family, and he would move heaven and earth for them, if it could save them any hurt. He only wished that he could think of how.

Belatedly, Rosie saw him standing at the stairs, and rose to greet him with a hug. As he hugged her back fiercely, he thought of the one thing he could do for them all, to try and lessen their pain.

He could love them.

(Requiem) But then again...

[akonken.livejournal.com]

Occasionally, we do make friends.

I don't mean within the households of our employers, of course; that is very difficult to do. The sway of the blood makes lesser ghouls jealous, vengeful, petty. And of course we love our domitors, each in their own way, but that is not friendship, not in the same way.

Often we are not given, or perhaps more fairly do not take, time for friendship. We will ally ourselves with those useful to our employers, of course, and can appear gregarious, in the correct mode. But again, that is not friendship. Not usually.

Marcel Harfst was, at first, someone I thought would be useful to my employer. He did not have a useful job, was not in a position of official power, but he did have the ear of many important people in the area. He was an old man (he was younger than her, of course, but she did not age much - even on her recent hiatus), a night fisherman. There was something sad about him, almost apologetic. He was always kind. I never saw him lose his temper, even at times when he probably should have. I liked him. He was my friend.

We would often sit together during the day if I had nothing to do. The regular ghoul did not enjoy my presence, and as long as I had no duties in the house I enjoyed sitting by the sea with Marcel. He would whittle and I would read, and there were days when we wouldn't speak to each other at all, simply sitting in comfortable silence. To me he was a port of calm in the storm of my employer's increasingly erratic life.

Then she found him.

I don't know if she was right, that he was the man her vengeance should have been wreaked upon. My memory shies away from what happened after she found him; it has been erased, leaving only a shadow of the attached emotions, as with any brutally unpleasant event that interferes with my programming. I only know that she sent me away after that, though she still agreed to be a reference.

It was a good time for me to go. I couldn't have helped her any more.