Part Four: Son
Chapter Ten: Robert
Charlie looked him over, scrutinizing, trying to find faults with him.
Robert knew the old woman held a certain fondness for--or else he'd be on the streets--while at the same time, she didn't particularly like him.
"Robert, you are trying my patience!" The woman yelled before burying her head in her hands.
"I did exactly as you asked, Charlie. What more can you want?"
"Perfection!" She cried out. "What was I thinking, bringing you here?"
Robert said nothing. Charlie often went on these rants; not only in this studio, but in all her studios where she observed her dancers. She never dropped a dancer unless it was strictly necessary.
"I don't know."
Robert stopped, standing with his arms crossed against his chest, staring out at Charlie.
Her problem was that she was too attached to Torrence, and caused her to compare most people to the girl. He knew the pros and cons of Torrence, and while he did love her, he felt that the attachments she gathered to her would only make her life that much more difficult.
"I'm going to order a pizza, boy. You want the usual?"
Robby smiled. "Sounds great."
She could be a hard ass, but that woman was a mother to all. It made him think back, on his mother. She had been a kind woman, despite being so well off. His father was also a Knight of the Round, so he was able to support the family--Robert also had four younger siblings--quite nicely. But his mother... She was a prize, a gem among rocks. She cooked alongside their cook, cleaned with the maids. She was raised as a farmer's daughter and work was what she knew best.
Most of all, she knew how to mother her children without being overbearing.
God, he missed that.
Nearly everyday, when he was a servus, he wondered what had happened to his family. What did they think happened to him? Did they mourn him? Did the king speak to his family? Was he mourned as dead, feared as lost, thought of as a deserter?
He wasn't unaware of Hekate being the actual one ot birth him, but was she there to nurse him and sing him to sleep? To tend to his wounds and help him get back on his feet after an illness?
Reese was a different sort of woman, Of course, back then, Robert didn't know of Hekate or the Atrox, or the Daughters of the Moon. He only became aware of these facts when he finally pledged himself to the Dark Goddess, forever sealing his fate to that of the twins, Christopher and Torrence even before they would long exist. That was beside the point.
Point was, he missed his mother. A lot. He missed being himself from those long ago days. He had been alive for so long with nothing to look foward to but pain and anguish.
"Boy, you better get down here if you want to eat!"
A smile slid across his face. That was his Charlie. She wasn't Reese. She wasn't Hekate or Serena. She didn't even love him like she loved Torrence.
Charlene was his mother, though. She cared for him, clothed him, fed him. He lived with her for nothing but a dance.
And, every once in awhile, he saw that familiar smile on her older face. The smile of his old mother, morphed by a new face and personality.
Charlie passed him a plate of two slices of his favorite: bacon and sausage with extra cheese. She always ordered him his own large.
He took the plate from her and sat down at the table, digging into his food with a ravenous appetite. "Thanks, Charlie."
"You're welcome, Son."
A simple word made up of three little letters.
Still...
Still, it was all good.
Next Up: Chris knows he has to make a decision only a brother who loved his sisters could eventually make... To save their souls.