Cycles
It's her son's third birthday.
There are colors and noises and movements, and oh my god, children. They move too fast for Clove's eyes sometimes that her hands begin to crawl to her thigh. Only, there is no knife. Or dagger. Only skin underneath the silk dress. Only empty pockets that are often filled with restless hands and searching fingers.
She talks her heart into calming down as she catches a glimpse of his blonde hair. He's there, she repeats to herself, he's there and nobody's going to take him.
"Shall I bring out the hors d'oeuvres, Madam?"
The waiter's crisp white dress shirt blinds her for a moment as she recovers.
"Yes, yes."
She hears a scream from far away and she tenses. Clove half expects the sound of a cannon but she wills the thought away. There will be no cannons. Not here. Not yet.
She slips out of the kitchen and into the living room. Half of her mind mechanically commands her body to arrange the vase in her path, the painting on the wall, to pick up a toy left beside the stairs. But the other half has already gone right back under the trees, in the brush, and if everybody could just be silent for a moment, Clove thinks she can hear him breathe.
"Madam, the cake is ready."
Another waiter motions for her to follow and her feet do. Her hands once again find themselves on her hips, on the same spot he held when he wanted her to shut up, calm down, relax, listen.
"I am calm," she tells no one. I am calm, she tells him.
The people around her gather in various states of happiness. Their laughter seems to steal the breath from her own lungs. She is careful that none of them touches her. Because if they do, if they do, she wouldn't have anywhere to run.
Then she sees him, him with the different eyes, different mouth, same hair; with the father who is not him, and she smiles. Because he is there, and they will not take him.
"Cato," she calls. "It's time to blow out your candles, baby."
A/N: New fandom, new OTP. My Muse doesn't seem to want to shut up.