He wanted to pull his family back in, a flightless son, a resurrected daughter, a dying wife (blood or no blood, marriage or no marriage). This was his family and he would pull them together.
He▓d tied her with ribbons, all colour and love. Their binds scarcely inches long, so close were they now. Still he held fast, held hard even though she would never strain against them (not now, rarely before, never again).
She watched him tug on the ties between them all, begging of lords that she (not he, not yet) believed in to let his pull be stronger than theirs. Ropes and ribbons and threads and strings. She held them taut with him to call his son home, lessening the distance, for him (for her). Whatever frustrations she felt with Lee at work, she did not bring them home. She did this for Bill, for herself, for this life they were building. Kara...her hands did not hold that string, the ties gone slack (for now, not forever), but she no longer dissuaded him from his attempts at reeling his girl back in. If the Gods pulled harder than Bill, she would not leave him alone. A husband, his children (blood or no blood, marriage or no marriage). Small gestures. Breakfast.
And so it was that Lee found himself seated at a table in his father's quarters, algae moulded into the shape of food before him, the reality of their new living arrangement surrounding him. Knowing the President was staying with the Admiral was one thing, discovering that Laura was obviously living with his father was another.
Bill had made it to the table to join him, a tide of reports that had swelled up overnight flowing before him. His eyes (still a pilot▓s) picked out details of the room, a dozen inconsequential things adding up to one definitive truth. Photographs that could not be attributed to his father's collection, a couch clearly not slept on, high heeled shoes that lay haphazardly by the desk, a President humming as she readied herself in the next room, an Admiral competently at ease with all of these facts. Lee made conversation, awkward and wrong footed, a child lost in this new world.
It was the President he expected when the humming drew nearer, but it was Laura that made her way to join them. He could see it now: the differences - relaxed stance, shoeless feet, glasses hanging from the front of her shirt. She offered a smile in his direction, his name was a hello. Lee could only nod in response and watch the scene unfold before him. Watch as Laura walked to his father (not the admiral, he could see that difference now too), who met her smile with one of his own. Watch as she moved behind him, her hand finding his shoulder, slipping down the front of his uniform, along the seam where the top button was undone. The lapel caressed between her fingers before she buttoned it with such familiarity that Lee couldn't help but stare.
Bill lifted his coffee cup and swallowed a mouthful before inclining it almost imperceptibly in her direction. She plucked it from his hand and drank the remainder before lowering the cup to the table. As her arm stretched forward his fingers closed around her wrist, fingertips grazing skin, tracing up her forearm at the flesh exposed, eyes never leaving the reports.
Lee felt it then, rough rope dragging across his skin in a prickling awareness. The tug, then the pull, from both of them. This was their life they were showing him: work and rest, harmony and coffee cups. And they were towing him in. He could see it, this web of ties they were working so delicately. Pulling and pulling and pulling on bonds which should have been strong enough to withstand any force but continued to mock them all by being so tenuous, so fragile.
"I have to go." Her voice snapped him back into the room as Bill rose to meet her words.
"How's your day look?"
"Meetings all morning, Quorum at..." She trailed off and looked to Lee, gently, gently pulling him in.┘
"...13:00."
"13:00, Cottle afterwards."
"I'll meet you there."
Laura slowly morphed into the President, straightening her back, shoes then glasses in place; but Laura kissed his father goodbye, his father squeezing her hip lightly. She passed behind Lee on her way out, a hand briefly touching his shoulder in goodbye. An anointing, her lover's son claimed as her own. A family pulling. She was almost out the door.
"I, ah, actually brought you something, for both of you." A book pulled out and offered. A child handing over a self made gift, desperate for it to be right. He had known just enough before he arrived that words were the flowers, the endearments that passed between these parents of his (blood or no blood, marriage or no marriage). The book changed hands, and was gladly accepted. Small gestures. At breakfast.
They hadn▓t needed to pull.