Note: This is the first half of a two-part fic, but it can stand alone. Novel spoilers.
Karan gets out of bed at four o'clock every morning to fire up the admittedly aged ovens and bake the bread, muffins, butter rolls, donuts, and cravats required for the day.
At six she wakes Shion up to help load the ovens with batter. He always seems to feel a little guilty for allowing her to do most of the work alone, but Karan insists the bakery is her work, and Shion's is elsewhere.
He agrees, and they eat breakfast together.
It's a routine they've settled into comfortably since Shion's return.
But today as she walks out of her room, rubbing the sleep from her eyes, she finds her son already up. He's sitting at the coffee table, a coffee cup in his hand, face concealed by too-long white bangs. His shoulders are shaking slightly as he brings the bitter liquid to his lips.
Karan can't remember Shion ever drinking coffee before.
His head tilts up as he sees her door open and he tries desperately to offer her a smile.
"Good morning, Mom"
Her heart clenches a little at Shion's expression. He succeeds in a smile but it locks at his cheeks and refuses to reach his eyes.
It's wrong. Shion should never have to fake happiness around her. He shouldn't have to fake happiness at all.
She wants to hold him, pull him close, and ask him just how long he's been awake, how long he's been in the kitchen drinking alone unable to escape his own thoughts, but what comes out is a casual, sweet-sounding,
"Good morning Shion."
And Shion cracks. The wrong-looking smile scrapes off his face and he brings the coffee to his lips again to keep from making a sound, but she sees the red of his eyes, and the small tracks left by his tears.
She doesn't say anything but she doesn't have to, because she is his mother and she knows him in spite of all the world's efforts to separate them.
She does hold him then. Wraps her arms around his sitting form, pulling him close because he was, and still is, a child and he buries his face in her apron and it smells like bread and safety and home. She lets him cry as long as he needs and doesn't let go.
Karan doesn't know whether he's mourning the dead or missing the living, but she can feel the wind blowing through the two gaping holes in her son as he whispers against her apron, vulnerable, and exposed.
"I'm really glad you're here."
And Karan hates that her son has known this void so early on.