AN: So this is my first fanfic ever and I'm sorry if the characters seem too OOC. I just wrote this today and didn't really look over it so constructive criticism would REALLY help. I have no idea how this will turn out so if any one even reads this I hope you guys will like it.
Disclaimer: I do not own Young Justice or any of their characters in any way.
I walked into the old diner and heard the dull wind chimes announce my arrival. I took a seat in my usual booth and waited for the familiar waitress to take my order. The gray-haired lady walked up to me with her standard notepad in hand. She gave me a tired smile, "I'm assuming it's the usual for you," the way she said it made it seem like more of a statement then a question. Of course by now it was less of a necessity than it was customary. I gave her a small nod and she walked away to attend to the other customers. I looked outside to view a small lake with evergreens dotting the edges and one or two mountains towering over the lake. It was nothing spectacular, yet it brought back thousands of memories of her.
It's been thirty years since I last saw her yet I still remembered their first time at this very diner. It was our first meal as husband and wife. We had a simple wedding with our good friends and family members; it was nothing over the top and was over in less than a few hours. We didn't have a reception, but instead we hopped into my Honda and went on our honeymoon. This consisted of the two of us going on a road trip to a small town near the Rockies and staying there for a few nights. After arriving to the town at we made our way to this very diner and sat in this very spot. We had simple meal and quarreled about pointless things like the weather, her hair, my appetite, the list could go on.
Any bystander wouldn't have thought it was anything out of the ordinary. Yet I couldn't be any happier during that one moment. But the thing is; that meal wasn't anything out of the ordinary. During the entire fifty years of our marriage, that meal was exactly like the rest of the others. We would quarrel and fight and tease and taunt each other, yet something special happened there that morning, but I couldn't place it.
A year after, I decided to take her to that same diner. Nothing changed about our trip that day, we took my Honda, ate in that same diner, ordered the same meal, even the same waitress took our order. Year after year we came back to that old diner.
That is until the doctor gave us the news. She had been diagnosed with acute monocytic leukemia, a cancer of the blood-forming tissues of the bone marrow. The news hit us hard, and breaking the news to our children hit us even harder. Artemis blamed herself for everything, I tried convincing her that it was inevitable, but she was stubborn and headstrong. We broke into fights constantly and I had hit her on more than one occasion. Everything my father did, everything I hated, everything I had to suffer through as a child, I did to her.
My elderly hands clench into small fists and silent tears and fall onto my lap at the memory. And looking back on it now, I have to admire her strength for putting up with me. I expected her to leave, to take Ella and Jay, and never look back. Yet she still stayed and put up with me and my short temper.
Our children had suffered the worst of it. Every day they would act as if nothing had happened as if they hadn't the heard harsh words exchanged or violent thrashing the night before. But I could see it in their eyes, in their posture, yet I didn't do anything to change the fact that I was making them suffer. Artemis and I came back from the hospital one day to see them on the kitchen floor with a knife in both their hands and blood flowing from their chest. This evoked numerous of fights between the two of us. However when I look back on it, I know that their death was all my doing. I knew they were suffering yet I didn't make any attempt to consol them. I should have talked to them about it, should have got them to let their anger out and hit me. I should have done something instead of letting them keep all of their anger and sorrow bottled inside. I slam my hand on the table. Maybe if I had they would still be alive, maybe I would have had grandchildren, maybe I wouldn't be so alone.
I Three days after the death of our children, the day of our fiftieth anniversary, Artemis died on the operating table and I reached my breaking point. I never thought I would lose her like that, I always thought it would be a mission, or her father, or even a car crash that would take her away from me. Not some sickness or disease that we would probably find a cure for in the next few years. No I couldn't accept the fact that she couldn't call me out on my shit anymore or tease me with that husky voice of hers. I had lost everything in a matter of days and yet it felt as if I deserved it.
So I ran and ran and ran as far as my aged body could take me and I ended up at that same diner. I walked into the diner with tears running down my face. The familiar waitress came up to me and tried to sooth me but I shoved her away and asked for the usual. I sat down in the booth and sobbed to my heart's content. No one glanced in my direction or tried conversing with me, and I was grateful for that.
Every year I come back to this same booth, ask for the usual and shed silent tears of regret and loneliness. I bet I must look like a lost cause, an old elderly man sitting alone in this booth silently sobbing. Artemis would probably smack me upside the head and say something along the lines of "Get off your sorry ass Baywatch". I scoff at the image of her in my head and remind myself that I'll be with her soon enough.
AN: So there it is my first fanfic. Hope it isn't too horrible I just thought of this now so the story is probably all over the place. Review?