Darien felt the wind blow across his face and through his scuffled jet black hair hair, as he sat at the top of the hill, where his parents laid to rest. His eye closed. Tears running down his tear stained cheeks. His hands balled up in to fists, as he kneeled by them. Angry. Sad. Worried. Lost. Every emotion one could ever feel. He was feeling them. Exhausted from crying, but so broken he couldn't stop. The last few days have been nightmare replaying over and over every time he opened his eyes, and came back to reality. The he felt a hand rest on his shoulder, it was man's hand. He looked up to his left, to see his father in law, standing over him. He then felt movement to his right, and he turned to see his mother in law kneeling down next to him. She gently laid a kiss on the top of his head, before she got all the way down to the ground.
"I always wanted to come meet your parents," She whispered. "Serena told me how coming it is here." She looked up the sky, then back to the stones. "I just wish it was under other circumstances." She rubbed her hand over their stones.
Darien again turned to see Ken bow his head, before to getting down to the ground next to him.
"How did you two find me here?" He sniffed back the tears.
"Well, we figured you would either be here or at the hospital." Ken sighed, "So we took a 50/50 shot." He just nodded.
"Honey, why are you all by yourself?" Irene asked concerned.
"Who is with Serena?" Darien turned to Irene quickly. "Is she here?! She cannot be alone!"
Irene put a comforting hand on his leg. "The girls are with her, and so is Sammy."
Darien nodded at the idea that his wife's best friends and her brother, dropped everything they were doing to be with her. And a rush of comfort came over him for but a second. "She has not let Rini out of her sight."
Ken and Irene just nodded, looking at Darien's parent's grave.
"I am okay...I just needed a minute." He tried to convince them. "Really. You should go back to your daught-" He started but was interrupted by Irene pulling his face towards her direction.
"Hey! You are just as much my son." She said in a demanding voice. "And you are not going to be here alone."
"Not when you have us," Ken added, but his voice just faded into the background of Darien's thoughts.
The word son echoed in Darien's ears, and a sudden flashback to the moment when the nurse handed him his son, trying to hide her tears. He was wrapped so neatly in a blanket. He smelled like baby wash. His eyes closed. His chest not rising. Skin as pale as paper. Not making any sound. It had to be the most deafening silence he had ever heard. And like the blood of a wound cut opened again, the tears flowed, and he started to sob.
Irene pulled him into her arms.
"I am so sorry son... I am so sorry I cannot fix this." She too cried. "I would anything to take your's and Serena's hurt away." She whispered.
"We would give up our lives, for him. In a heartbeat." Ken assured.
"Wasn't it enough that I lost them?" He pulled away and looked into her tear filled eyes. "Haven't I suffered enough? Now! I lose my son?" He felt Ken wrap his arms around him. "What did I do to deserve this? Did I work too much? Should I have been home more with Serena? Like I got A's all through school, and graduated top of my class. The doctor told me what happened, but I still don't understand why did this happen to us? It could not have been Serena, so what did I do? Why?"
"Son, you listen to me." Ken demanded, pulling Darien's attention to him. "You did nothing wrong!" He too was crying. "I don't ever want to hear you blame yourself. You are good man, and you did not deserve this! We will never know, why our sweet grandson was called back, but you better know, this was not your fault!"
"I...I just don't understand! I lost my past with them, and now I lost my future with my son...?A-And everyone just keeps saying Serena and I can have another son...And I am supposed to feel better?" He turned back to Irene. "I don't want another son, I want my son, the one that I will never get to hold again. The one that I will never see grow." He exhaled deeply. "The one Rini will never get to play with here." He pushed away from Irene and laid his head on his parent's grave. "I wanted to bring them both here to meet my parents. That was my dream." He sobbed.
Irene wiped the tears from her face. Then put her hand on Darien's back. "Darien...my sweet boy."
"I just want my son." He continued to sob. "I was going to have it all, my beautiful wife, intelligent daughter, and perfect son...I was finally going to have the family that I always dreamed of..."
Irene continued to look at the graves, she knew nothing could be said to make Darien feel better. "You two raised an amazing man." She forced a smile through her tears. "How he protects our daughter and our grandchild."
"He's never going to wake me up at night..." he mumbled through his tears. "But let me tell you this!" He popped up and wiped his nose.
Ken handed him a tissue from his pocket.
"Thank you." He said taking it. "But let me tell you this...I still get no sleep. Replaying that day in my head over and over." He rubbed his temple. "Have you ever heard a heart break?" He looked up at Ken, shaking his head 'no.' "I did, when they handed Serena him for the first time, when she put her finger in his hand, and he didn't grab it." He closed his eyes. "I still hear her cry."
He looked at Irene, "I am so sorry."
"Son, you have nothing to be sorry for." She went in to hug him.
"I promised I would take care of you-"
"And nobody has done it better than you!" She interrupted. "I watched you be her rock Darien. Don't think I did not see it. I watched you hold back your emotions to be strong your daughter." She cupped his face with both her hands. "You have been absolutely amazing! I could have never wished for a better man for my daughter, and as my second son." She wiped his tears with her hand.
"I just want my baby back." He again pushed off Irene, and hunched over his parent's grave and he sobbed into his hand.
Both Ken and Irene both put a hand on his back and too leaned over their grave.
"I promise I will take care of our son, and get him through this." Irene whispered to them. "Please take care of our grandson, until we can all be together again."