The day before they were leaving for home, Sarah and Jane were upstairs packing the suitcases. They had sent Thor and Loki out to the beach with Fen so that they could do what they had to without the boys under foot but more importantly, Sarah had wanted to talk to Jane alone. She walked into the bedroom and looked out the glass doors at the beach where Thor and Fen were playing in the surf, Loki sitting on the sand cross legged, not even glancing up at them, head bent down, hands clasped in his lap.
Sarah had nearly been asleep the night before, curled onto her side, against Loki who was laying on his back, arm behind his head when he spoke, his voice flat,
"Did you ever wonder what it felt like to lose your mind?"
Sarah's eyes opened slowly but she didn't move, "That's an odd question." But Loki didn't respond and Sarah finally turned over onto her elbow to see him, lying there, still awake staring at the ceiling, seeming as if he didn't even know she was there until she put her head on his shoulder and draped her arm across his chest, he slowly pulling her to him in a tight hug.
That morning Sarah had tried to get him to tell her why he'd asked that question the night before.
"What question?" Loki had replied. Sarah had told him what he'd said and he'd given her a thin lipped grin, "I don't remember saying anything last night." But Sarah was sure he did, when, after she had said something about it, he had risen out of bed, got dressed and gone downstairs without another word.
"Something is just not quite right." Sarah was sitting on Fen's bed folding the clothes she'd brought up from the dryer in the kitchen. Jane hesitated, then nodded,
"I know, I've seen it too, and have you seen the way Fen sometimes looks at him, kind of like he's trying to see him, he turns his head and squints."
Sarah put another stack of clothes in the suitcase beside her, watched Olivia and Madison playing in the playpen for a moment. "Fen and Loki have a special bond, I found that out early on. When Loki would be gone in Asgard, on a campaign or hunting trip, anything, I would always know when he was home before anyone else would." Sarah picked up one of Fen's shirts and smiled, "When Fen learned to walk and Loki was on his way home, Fen would cry to be let out of the nursery, he would sit there and just stare at the door until Loki walked through it."
Jane zipped up one of her bags, "He wouldn't say why he said that either?" Sarah shook her head,
"I was even considering not stopping at my parents in Rutland because of the way he's acting." It wouldn't do for him to have an episode in front of her father as they had only just managed to be cordial to each other that past Christmas. As much as Daniel disliked his son-in-law, the feeling was mutual. Sarah and Loki had been Christmas shopping one day when she had said aloud that she had to find something for Dad and Mom. Loki had walked up to the cart and dropped in a pair of boxing gloves, saying, "Well now that your father's taken care of…." Sarah had slugged him on the arm, telling him that he didn't help the situation any.
"But my mom wants to see Fen, it's been a month since we saw them at Lizzie's house last. I think we'll stop just for an hour or so. I can go back up next weekend to see them." Jane shrugged, "It's fine with us. If anything goes really wrong, Thor will be right there." They heard the doors to the bottom balcony slide open and shut a bit hard, open and shut again, then voices raised but indistinct. Sarah stood up and walked into the hallway with Jane behind her, listening.
"What are you thinking, brother? He was only playing with you." Sarah could hear little hiccupping sobs and she looked at Jane,
"According to you, I wasn't thinking at all. I didn't know what…." Loki's voice stopped short
She could hear Thor again, "What, Loki, what didn't you know?" then the sound of heavy footsteps up the stairs as her and Jane backpedaled into the children's room just in time to avoid Loki as he sailed past them into the bedroom and slammed the door, then Thor as he walked into the children's bedroom with Fen in his arms. He walked to Sarah and handed Fen to her, then leaned over and in a low voice,
"When we return to New York, I am going to try to convince Loki to return to Asgard with me, there is something very wrong."
Thor would not tell Sarah what had happened on the beach, only that it had frightened even him and he suggested she not ask Loki as well. "He does not recall doing what he did, it is useless to trouble him about it." But Sarah stood up, handing Fen to Jane,
"I'll be back," She walked across the hall, opened the bedroom door and closed it behind her. Loki was sitting on the edge of the bed facing away from her, arms wrapped around his stomach. Sarah had been ready for a fight when she walked in but when she was finally standing in front of him, her heart nearly broke. Great wracking sobs shook his body as he slowly rocked back and forth. Sarah knelt on the carpet in front of him, put a hand to his chin and lifted his face up to hers, seeing the fear in his eyes. He brought a hand to her face, caressing it. "Sarah, please help me." She stood, crawled up to the pillows and pulled him back to her, he wrapping his arms around her waist, head against her chest while she stroked his hair, not moving until his sobs had slowed and quieted, his shallow breath telling her he had given in to sleep.
She untangled herself from him and slipped out of the bedroom and down the stairs to the dining room where Thor, Jane and the babies had retreated to, Fen now asleep also having cried himself out. She sat down in a chair,
"Loki cried himself to sleep." Sarah put a hand to her forehead suddenly feeling as if she was going to start crying as well, "Would someone like to tell me what the hell is going on?" Thor and Jane exchanged glances.
"On the beach today, for the briefest moment, I believed I was looking at the brother I brought to Asgard chained and muzzled, five years ago." Thor said. Jane put her hand atop his on the table. "It is settled, he must go to Asgard when we arrive home."
Sarah put her head down on her arms. "Is it safe?" She felt sick to her stomach to ask the question, "Are the kids safe to be around him?" She didn't see Thor raise his eyes to the ceiling.
"I think we must leave the first thing in the morning."
When she went upstairs to wake Loki and tell him supper was ready, she hesitated outside the bedroom door, then opened it slowly. Curled up facing Loki was Fen, two fingers in his mouth, his other hand raised above his head, entwined in Loki's hair. Sarah leaned over the bed, gently untangling Fen's fingers and lifting him from the bed, cradling him in her arms. When she looked to Loki again, she was startled to find him staring at her.
"He came in a while ago." His voice was low, toneless. He rolled onto his back and sat up at the edge of the bed. Sarah was quiet, the low hiss of the surf outside the only sound through the screen on the glass doors. "What did you want?"
Sarah tried to ignore the abruptness of the question, "To tell you that we were having supper. Are you hungry?"
Loki looked up at her, "No." he ran his hands through his hair, looked away.
"Okay, but it's a long time until breakfast and we're getting an early start. You're just going to sit up here alone the rest of the night?" Sarah put Fen over her shoulder, suddenly stepping back as Loki rose from the bed and walked over to her,
"Don't you think I should stay up here, Sarah?" She had to find another place to look other than at him, afraid of what she was going to see but she persisted,
"I think you should join your family for supper, that's what you should do, what you do is up to you."
Sarah was stroking a still sleeping Fen's back and she felt Loki's hand join hers.
"Go downstairs, Sarah."
Sarah handed Fen to Thor and sat down at the table, pushing the plate of spaghetti away from her. She felt Jane put a hand atop hers as it set on the table. "That's not my husband up there, I don't know who it is but that's not the man I married."
Sarah lay with her arm around Fen, the house quiet. After she had fed Madison and put her down for the night, she had tried to get Fen to sleep but he was restless, kept sitting up in bed and staring through the doorway to the closed bedroom door across the hall, an odd expression on his face. At one point he said
"I can't hear daddy a lot." Sarah had said to him,
"Because daddy is probably asleep too." Fen had frowned and shook his head , frustrated, had gotten up and peered into Madison's playpen where she slept, as if to check on her. When he had hopped back into bed, she had ventured to ask if Fen wanted to say goodnight to daddy but he'd shook his head and cuddled up to Sarah, finally giving in.
Sarah had closed her eyes, telling herself she had to sleep, there was going to be a lot of driving tomorrow when she heard the bedroom door across the hall open, then the bathroom door in the hall shut. After a minute, the bathroom door reopened and she waited for the bedroom door to shut again but heard nothing, suddenly aware that he was standing behind her in the dark bedroom, staring at her. She felt his hand on her face, stroking her cheek with the backs of his fingers, felt his lips against her temple and he was gone, the bedroom door finally closing behind him, only then did she reach up and brush her tears away with the palm of her hand.
"Mom, I know, listen," Sarah was trying to balance the cell phone against her shoulder as she dragged one of the last suitcases out to the car, handing it to Thor who stacked it in the rear cargo hold of the car.
"I can't promise we'll be able to stop, I can see maybe for an hour but we have to get home to New York." Sarah refused to worry her mother more than was necessary, "It'll be late when we come through and you know how traffic can get. Why don't we make a date for next weekend okay? I'll bring the kids up." Loki had walked by while she was talking, "Hello Annie," He had shouted into the phone, causing Sarah to give him the evil eye even if she had been relieved that he was engaging in a little friendly banter. She had, in fact, found Fen and Loki laughing and wrestling in the bedroom that morning after she'd taken her shower, while Jane watched the babies. She had shooed Fen from the bedroom so that she could get dressed and Loki had taken that opportunity to come up behind her and kiss her on the back of her neck, his hands on her hips which she had pushed back against him, making him chuckle and nip her shoulder. She had turned around to look at him and he was smiling at her.
"How do you feel today?" She waited for a clipped answer but he responded, "I feel fine, dearest heart. Perhaps my dark cloud has passed." When they had kissed, it was as if she had never kissed him before and was trying to make up for lost ardor and she began to hope that whatever had happened to him had indeed left them alone.
"I'll talk to you in a while mother. " Sarah said, and hung up the phone. "Okay do we have everything? Everyone's been to the beach to wave to the ocean?" Loki had Madison in his arms and he turned her to the glass doors leading to the deck,
"Wave bye, Maddy." He took her hand and waved it for her, "I think we're good now."
"Okay, we've got to drop off the keys at the rental place and we're off for home." Sarah followed everyone out the door of the beach house and locked it.