Character/s: D, D -- oh, alright, Sofu and the Count we know and love. XD;
Word Count: 665
Summary: D receives a crumpled five dollar bill. Sofu is not impressed.
Notes: The other side to Many Happy Returns.
- - -
D is not surprised when Sofu stiffens, sifting through the mail, and holds out a pale hand and a small, red envelope to him. "You have a present, D," he says in his detached way. As D reaches out to grasp it, Sofu adds, "From your father."
It's almost enough to make him draw back his hands. Almost. He's a little bit afraid of his father. Or at least, of the stories he's been told. He thinks he ought to be angry, somehow, but he's a little bit sad of his father instead, and that makes it worse, somehow - harder to take the envelope held patiently before him by a loving grandfather.
He takes the envelope, thanks his grandfather, and trails away across the petshop to find a seat and a bit of quiet in which to open it.
He sits down in between a leopard kitten and a bird of paradise who is suffering from a bit of leaf mould, and opens the envelope carefully. He slides the car out carefully, skims his father's message with something that is in between disdain and regret - I hope that this and every year is prosperous for you - I miss you - I love you - always - my little one - and frowns when he reaches the bottom. "Sofu...?" he asks before he can properly think, and his grandfather looks up from tending a young marmoset.
"Yes, D?" He stands and glides across the shop - the animals around D move to allow the elder kami a seat. "What is it?"
D holds out his card, observes the tightening in his grandfather's eyebrows, and looks down at his envelope. There are Chinese coins in there, he knows from past experience, but this year there is something different - American money. He withdraws it curiously, stretching it out - despite being in the envelope, it shows marks of being recently crumpled - and discovers that it is a five dollar note. One corner looks to be stained with coffee. He looks up at his grandfather with a frown.
"I didn't know the name," he tells Sofu worriedly. "Father says it's from a friend of his...?"
Sofu's frown deepens, and he offers the card to D. "Vesca Howell is the name. A human, I presume."
D's face falls. "Father... why is he friends with a human?" He accepts the profferred card and sits staring at the characters that form the unfamiliar name. Sofu rests a hand in his hair briefly, the scant warmth gone as soon as it had come.
"I do not know, my grandson," Sofu tells him tersely. "But no good can come of it." He appears to debate with himself for a moment. "However, politeness dictates that you should thank him. Think about what you would like to say. I will get the paper and ink down for you."
"Are you going to help me write it?" D asks, still hesitant about weilding the English language. Sofu looks down at him, gold eyes gentling, mouth curving in the ghost of a smile.
"It is a private letter to your father, and his friend," Sofu tells him gently. "I will interfere, my grandson, but no more than it takes to keep you safe. It will do you no harm to practise your English toward a human who was kind enough to send you a gift, though he does not know your face."
D sits staring at the page Sofu brings him for some time, one hand curling absently in a rabbit's fur, before he starts to write anything to this strangely generous human. He wonders what his father has told Howell about him, wonders what made the human decide to send him a present. He thanks the man politely, and signs the letter.
Then he wedges a few characters between the final line and the signature - Chinese, this time, for his father.
Thankyou for thinking of me, Baba. I miss you, too.
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