Author: Sparkle Itamashii
Title: Inheritance
Warnings: Respect the rating. Please see my profile for details.
Disclaimer: Gungam Wing AC is NOT MINE
Chapter Fourteen
I wish I'd thought to bring a camera because the look that Heero turned to me when that little girl said "papa" was priceless. It was crystal clear to me how badly he wanted to turn around and walk back out the door but I grabbed onto his wrist, flashing him an innocent smile when he scowled. There was no way I was letting him just walk out like that, though. Talk about giving the poor girl a complex… Luckily for everyone, Sasya didn't appear particularly concerned about Heero's reaction.
"That's right sweetie. Papa." She smiled in a very sweet way toward the girl. "Can you say 'hello' to them?"
She tilted her head the slightest bit, dropping her chin and looking up at us as if she was suddenly uncertain about what to do. When she spoke it was quiet and shy. "Hello."
"How does…?" Heero managed finally, his voice strained in a distressed way. "I've never…"
Sasya glanced to him for a brief moment and then stepped across the room to crouch beside Mara. "You should show Papa your book, Miss. He would like to see it, don't you think?"
With a slightly furrowed brow, she looked both Heero and I over before turning to the table she'd been sitting at. She very carefully closed the book she had been looking at and walked it over to us; slowly because it was almost as big as she was. She presented it to us with a shy, silent look. When it didn't seem like Heero was going to do anything, I reached down and accepted the outstretched book with a big smile.
"Thank you Mara." I glanced quickly to Sasya. "What is it?"
She smiled and gave me an encouraging gesture. "Go on, open it."
So open it I did.
Wish I hadn't. The book was not a storybook as I'd first expected.
It was a photo album.
Beside me I felt Heero stiffen as I began flipping through the pages. It was a little surreal, like I was flipping through a book that shouldn't exist, of people and times that weren't real… and yet they were photographs so they had to be, right? There was Heero, fencing at Relena's school. Horseback riding. Sitting on a garden bench, facing Relena and ignoring the rest of the world. There were images of me and Trowa, Quatre and Wufei, Milliardo, Noin, Sally, Hilde… everyone. People I knew, people I didn't; it was all there, labeled with gold pen in Relena's handwriting.
My throat had closed and my hand stilled of its own accord before I'd gotten even halfway through the book. I felt like I'd been dunked in cold water. For over three years I had buried my past, the entire past, as best as I could. I think I had maybe three photos and my favorite gun left over as keepsakes and I hadn't looked at those pictures in months. This? Just seeing everyone the way we used to be brought everything crashing back…
A hand on my shoulder snapped me back to reality. "Can I speak with you alone for a minute?" Heero asked fingers clasping around my wrist.
"Um… sure." I managed a polite to Sasya, despite the sick feeling coiling in my gut. She accepted the photo album when I tipped it into her hands. "Please excuse us. We'll be back in just a moment."
As soon as we were in the hall, Heero practically collapsed back against the wall. Worried, I set a gentle hand on his shoulder and waited in silence for a moment. He probably only needed a minute or two to collect himself. When Heero couldn't handle reality around him he began to ignore it and the last thing anyone needed right now was for him to ignore Mara in any way, shape, or form. That was part of the reason I'd wanted to leave him at home.
"Heero, hey," I shook his shoulder and he looked directly at me… and yet not directly at me. I felt almost as if he was staring through me and it was unnerving enough to silence me again.
"It's just like her, don't you think…?" He asked me softly, hands circling around my neck and pulling me closer to him. I caught myself with one forearm against the wall behind him. "It makes so much sense that she wouldn't want to let her child grow up not knowing anything about the past... It makes too much sense." He released me to roughly scrub at his temples with the heels of his hands. "I just never thought… I mean, seeing all of that…"
I nodded, settling in front of him and smoothing back his hair with a smile. Of course he was thinking about Relena. He was probably thinking about a whole lot more. I know that if I'd been as close to Relena as Heero had been… I wouldn't want to deal with any of this. But he had to; we both did.
"Pull yourself together, hey?" I said quietly, eyes meeting his. "They're just pictures. It's just past now. Relena…" I trailed off, swallowing at the way my stomach leapt into my throat. It was still so strange to hear her name and know she wasn't there anymore. "It was a good idea, right? She'll know who she is and where she came from now. Relena did us a favor."
"Sirs?" Sasya poked her head out of the door. "I called to have the last of her things brought out to your car." She pursed her lips for a second and then audibly let out her breath as though resigning herself to something. "They've also added her car seat."
"Will she just… come with us?" I asked, peering around Sasya to where Mara was standing in the room. She had picked up a stuffed animal and was sort of… dancing it in the air. I didn't know how else to explain it- I'd never seen anyone do it before. Somehow I thought I would be seeing a lot of firsts in the near future.
"The situation has been explained to her to the best of our ability." She followed my gaze and shook her head sadly. "You'll probably have to tell her many more times and she may not understand much of it until she's older. She's asked for her mother several times now and no one is quite sure what to tell her."
I gawked at Sasya. "You mean no one's told her about-" I managed to stop myself, lowering my voice. "No one's told her about Relena? She doesn't know what happened?"
"Mr. Maxwell, would you want to tell a three year old that she will never see her mother again?" She gave me a look that clearly displayed how offended she was.
"Don't you think she deserves to know?" I hissed, moving past her. Heero followed wordlessly at my heels.
"Duo." He lay a hand on my arm, grabbing it after a second to stop me. "Duo, wait." Waiting until I faced him, he took a deep breath and spoke carefully. "Maybe it's better to leave it for now. I mean… it's not going to make sense and it'll just get the kid upset, right? So just… let's get her and go."
I gave him a hard look for a minute before letting my shoulders drop in defeat. He was absolutely right. There was no way telling her right now would do any good. I wasn't even sure how long three year olds remembered things. If I told her I wasn't even sure she would remember the next day and it would really suck to have to explain it over and over again. He let go of my arm when he saw me relax.
"You're right." I turned around and looked to Mara, who had stopped moving and was staring at the two of us with wide eyes. I extended one hand to her and smiled as gently as I could. "Mara, would you like to come home with Papa and me?"
She nodded and gave us both a wary look as she edged over to me. Very slowly she shifted the stuffed bear to one arm and took my hand- even through she could only grab onto a couple fingers. I controlled the urge to retract my hand because hers was so small; I was afraid of hurting her. I had never considered my hands to be large but against hers they were monstrous.
There was a moment of tension when she surrendered the bear to me and held her free hand out to Heero. He turned to me that same, bewildered glance he'd given me when she called him "Papa". Hoping that he would not blow this chance, I nodded encouragingly. Reluctantly, he extended his hand, though it was a jerky motion and looked as if he would withdraw. She grabbed onto his fingers and he very, very gently curled his hand.
"You ready to take a drive?" I wasn't sure who I was asking, but I got answers from both of them. Heero nodded silently and Mara responded with an enthusiastic 'yeah!'.
Sasya handed me the photo album again as she held the door open for us and smiled. "I'll walk you down to the front doors."
The trip through the manor seemed less haunting on the way back, though it was still not the same. The hollow feeling that something was wrong or missing seemed diminished, but not gone. Mara remained relatively quiet, relinquishing my hand to take hold of her teddy bear again. I smiled, glad that she seemed attached to Heero- even if he looked like he was going to be sick with the inability to deal.
When we reached the car, he tried to pass her off to me. "Oh no," I said, grinning in a devilishly innocent way. "You've got her hand, why don't you put her into the car seat, Papa?"
He scowled. "I'm not putting it in the car seat, Duo." He cast a dubious look in the direction of the open car door.
"She's not an it, Heero," I said warningly. "Now put her in the car seat. Surely it can't be that hard." I contained a snicker at the 'I'm going to kill you' look I received, but he moved to help her into the car.
Indeed, getting her into the car seat was not a problem at all. She held her arms up for Heero to pick her up and he set her in the little booster chair thing. She scooted around for a second until she was comfortable and then leaned back so that he could secure the buckles. That, however, was another story all together. Heero picked up the buckles and ties and stared at them for a second before trying to figure out how they went together.
When he hadn't gotten it after another minute, I tilted my head to the side, smiling. "It's not that hard, Heero."
Heero made an exasperated noise and dropped the pieces to the child seat. "Fine, you do it," he growled, back-stepping to give me a sulky glare. "It keeps coming undone."
Rolling my eyes, I picked up the buckles and tried to fit them into place. But he was right; there were too many buckles and not enough strings. Obviously it was either designed by an idiot or it had been broken. Giving up, I eventually I just tied them all together in a knot she wouldn't be able to undo while we drove. Probably. When I turned around, Heero was smirking at me.
"What's wrong; it's not that hard," he said.
I smacked his arm, closing the door. "Shut up- I did it, didn't I?"
"Not the right way." He moved around the car and climbed into the driver's seat.
Opening the passenger side door, I clambered in as well. "You could have tied it."
"You could have said that in the first place."
"Well I didn't know it was broken in the first place." I shook my head as I leaned it back against the headrest. "Let's just get home," I said quietly. "I'm starving." I sat up and turned in my seat so that I could look at Mara. She stared quietly back. "Are you ready?"
"I haffa go a baffroom…"
/End Chapter Fourteen, Inheritance/
