Title: Saudade
Prompt: Grandpa/Nanna
Saudade, Portugese & Galacian, "a deep emotional state of nostalgic or profound melancholic longing for an absent something or someone that one loves [...that] often carries a repressed knowledge that the object of longing may never return."
A/N: Considering how Jake is, I bet Grandpa never went looking for Nanna after…
Summary: He's given her a wound she can't close.
...
...
...
...
It doesn't hurt as much as it used to. Somehow, over time, the pain has decreased from unbearable to manageable.
From a gaping wound to a gentle throb. If she places a hand over her heart, she can still feel it. Even now, years later, with her hair going silver and her fingers wrinkled. Would he recognize her still?
She thinks she would in a heartbeat. Despite what Crocker said, he was her brother in every sense of the word. First and foremost.
And despite that, he abandoned her.
He never meant to, she knows that. He never thought about it or realized it. But all the same, he did abandon her.
She never abandoned him though. Her album lies on her lap, filled with newspaper clippings of a famed explorer. At first, she kept the clippings as a way to stay connected, to stay strong in that house she was left in. Crocker had her, but she didn't have her brother.
And that, that was comforting. On some level, it gave her strength.
Now, years after the witch died, she still reads about his exploits. More out of habit than anything.
A part of her wants to feel independent. A part of her wants to pretend she doesn't care about him anymore.
In the way he doesn't entirely care about her He never came back for her. Not when he had the money, not when the witch died—does he even remember her? Is there a book in his house full of clippings of her, as meager as they are? Does he order gags from her store and have them mailed to his island?
In the dark evenings, while staring at the stars, does he remember their childhood and the secrets they used to whisper?
On a bright day, does he remember how he left her? Does he even know how lost she was without him?
How lost she still feels sometimes, even now. Even though she has moved on with her life. She had a husband, she has a son. It is enough.
It should be enough.
She would have liked at least a word. A letter. A goodbye, a sorry.
She knows she'll never get one. It isn't in him to think that has to happen and while she loves that carefree side of him, she hates it too.
It doesn't hurt as much anymore, but it still hurts. He's given her a wound she can't close.