As you've seen, "The Lady Frost" chapter was damn long (11k, guys!).
Everything happening in the chapter below was supposed to happen in TLF and it certainly would have if only had I learnt how to keep things short! SO, consider the 27th and 28th as ONE long chapter.
Are you ready for a flashbacks dance?
Warning: messy timeline.
Chapter 28 – Tidal Wave
Part 1 – Present Time
Thursday, the 22nd of November.
Basically, everybody around affirmed it was Thanksgiving Day, starting from the smiles on his relatives' faces, off to everyone posting things on social media. Still, Chris couldn't find anything to be thankful to nor for. It was out and away the worst day of his life.
It wasn't even twenty-four hours since he'd arrived at the cottage and he'd been through hell and back so many times already. Probably he wasn't even back. No, he'd definitely fallen into the deepest pit in hell, where the evil is so dense that everything's just frosted up. Even the Devil himself had left him alone in such icy landscape his life had crashed into. He couldn't know yet, but he was still far from hitting the rock bottom.
His fall was unstoppable and he'd bring so many down with him.
Chris had barely touched his food – which gives away the cosmic degree of his malaise. He peeled his eyes off the plate and glanced at the rest of his family, who sat around the big table and chattered merrily between a spoonful and a forkful. He hated every single laugh, every smile, every oblivious chat.
Above all, he hated himself.
That's precisely what he'd just realised. He hated himself, viscerally. Nevertheless, he couldn't accept Claire hated him as well. He failed to imagine hatred coming from her. It was simply unnatural.
Unnatural.
Chris painfully raised his look at his sister, who sat at the other end of the table and gladly ate the turkey in big mouthfuls, careless to check how her brother was doing. He wondered how they had come to such a state of things. How could it all happen? How could he let it happen?
How many things had happened and overlayered in the turn of a few hours – night included?
Things were already going shit the previous day, when Claire had kicked him out their room before dinner. He'd been so upset right then, but now he knew it'd been only the beginning – or maybe not, just the continuation of undisclosed chagrin. The siblings just alternately hurt each other and stopped caring. At least, Claire had! She'd stopped caring about him days ago, Chris knew it now. In her eyes, he was just a burden to get rid of – among others.
She wanted him fucking gone.
What have I done?
His new mantra.
Part 2 – Last Evening
"Claire, please, let me in..." Chris begged, speaking in low tones against the maple wood of the bedroom door. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean it..."
On the other side, curled up against the door, Claire sobbed uncontrollably, though barely audible. Her chest twitched in erratic rhythm, small wheezes rifled in and out her mouth. Tears rolled down her cheeks in copious rivulets, no matter how often she'd wipe them with the hem of her sleeve. Beside an appalling sorrow, she felt terribly betrayed. Like… like everything occurred in those last weeks was now bound to turn against her, merciless. Even her confidences.
There were so many bills to pay on the line – Chris's betrayal wasn't even the first.
The bulky boy knelt down and whispered his plea against the mute wood again, raw and soft at once. Hearing his voice so close, just one inch away from her ear, Claire wished to smash a fist onto the door pretending it was his face and claiming the wood to fucking bleed, but she resisted the tempting urge. No need to draw unwanted attention upstairs, she needed – or rather wished – to be like a ghost, a presence barely acknowledgeable. Clenching her jaw until her pursed lips disappeared, Claire commanded herself to calm down before other beasts were summoned.
You said don't panic, remember? Grow up! Grow up! Grow up!
"Go away." She sniffled.
"I won't until you let me in." He said, reaching up and tossing the handle unsuccessfully.
"Fucking go away!" Claire repeated.
She wouldn't let him in, not ever again. He'd only caused trouble, more than he could imagine. Claire thought it was time to carry on by herself – the only remaining option. All in all, there was nothing he could do or say to make her feel better. He'd caused enough harm. He'd fucked her up too much. What he'd said and done in Moon's Donuts had been only the tip of the iceberg. There had to be no coming back for them. Any other option was dangerous to a degree she could hardly put into words. That's why he ought to stay out.
Chris needed to leave her life, her mind, her body, forever.
"Please, I don't…" Chris sighed with a headshake. He rested an open palm on the wood and curled against the door, obliviously mocking his sister's position. "I don't want anyone to raise their eyebrows at us. If you don't feel like forgiving me, fine. I don't deserve it. But Dad's been asking things that… Please, Claire!"
His rough, deep voice spoke tenderly and desperate at once. He was scared to take a misstep and ruin forever what, in his eyes, looked like a terribly precarious position. The mere fact that his father had even wondered about what had happened in the intimacy of the switched bodies was enough to scare Chris to the bone. If, until then, the fear to be caught had existed only in his head, now it'd materialized right in front of his eyes in the shape and voice of his old man! Chris's alarm had never been higher. The bourbon inebriation only sharpened every negativity within.
By no means inebriated by his tone, Claire scoffed in scorn as a rush of pure rage kicked in. "Don't worry, Chris. I won't expose you if that's what concerns you so much!" Meaning by far more than her words carried and, certainly, more than he could imagine. "You're the asshat in the building not me."
The quiet thud of his forehead hitting the door was his only reply. Anyway he'd put it, he was going to make things worse. Claire was upset – too much in his opinion, but undeniably upset. So he decided to give up, in the hope she hadn't changed her mind about the couch. If so, he had the whole night to talk her into forgiveness.
A whole night with her.
Normally, it would've sounded like the sweetest thing but now it sounded more like the hardest. He might be dizzy but he hadn't become stupid all of a sudden. That night wouldn't be much more than hours and hours of silence torture, glaring looks and snorts and he wasn't naïve enough to believe otherwise.
No, he couldn't build any hope on the shared bedroom.
Chris stood up and went to the near bathroom to spray some fresh water on his face. As he wiped it, something moving in the window above the bathtub caught his attention. An indistinct yet fast dark shape sped through the trees, along the same road he'd come from earlier. He didn't need to hear the rumble to smile widely.
"Auntie!" Chris cheered as he dashed out the front door and walked towards Matilda, who had just parked her motorbike next to the car.
"Chris!" Matilda loudly cheered as she unclipped the helmet and took it off, revealing a perfectly shorn hair, dark like the night and shiny like horse coat. "Howdy, kiddo?"
The two exchanged a warm hug.
Matilda was the youngest of Mary and John's kids and, despite she was the only girl they'd had, she couldn't have been more of a carbon copy of her father than that. Only the moustache and the wrinkles were missing, but the temperament was all there. Among the three kids, she was the most Redfield of all – even more than John himself!
Tall, sturdy and badass, she was the son John had always desired – especially after his first two sons had shown other vocations in life. Certainly, she'd been the only one who asked for shooting lessons since childhood and burped "like a real man" – whatever that means. Following her Dad's steps, in fact, Matilda had soon enlisted in the army and her achievements always enlivened John's pride and patriotism.
Wrapped in her thick leather jacket, Matilda patted her nephew's shoulders and arms and nodded in approval. "Getting thicker and thicker I see, lil' boy!"
"You too!" Chris snickered.
"Oh, don't make me blush. I hate it!" The woman tittered, heavily nudging at his side.
"How are the other jarheads treating you in San Antonio?" He asked, massaging his side since the nudge made him realise it ached where Claire had hit him.
Matilda let out a sound snort and, smiling, she looked down her nose at him. "You better thank God you're my favourite nephew or Mike and Tyson here," she said nodding at her biceps, "would teach you good manners the jarheads' way for calling me that."
"I love you too." Chris smiled and draped an arm around his aunt's broad shoulders to draw her closer and kiss her temple as they walked home.
When Chris was born, Matilda was barely fifteen and such narrow age difference all reflected in the special relationship that made her Chris's dearest relative – aside from being the one who secretly passed him cigarettes during the holidays back when he wasn't supposed to smoke yet.
"Your breath smells like a whorehouse." The young woman said. "God, I need some of whatever it is!"
"I'll only tell you it's thirty years old."
"Can I just hope you're talking about a real whore? 'Cause I may need some of that too."
A glass of bourbon wasn't exactly "all" that Matilda needed, yet it invigorated her after the long ride. It's good to be home sometimes. Especially if no one is yelling at you to run faster, aim higher, shoot harder, salute quicker but only smile at you to hug them once more. A break from the military for the holidays is necessary even for a dedicated worker like her.
Turning down the offer for another shot, Chris eagerly listened to his aunt talking about the new weapons she'd had the pleasure to try. Messily splayed upon the couch, the woman loudly cackled about the ridiculous recoil of a new rifle the Gov bigwigs purchased when Claire's ankles made their appearance in the cracks between the stairs. A lump of expectation grew in Chris's throat with every step she took as she descended. When she was finally wholly visible, the boy dared to look at her in the face to check she wasn't crying anymore.
Much to his surprise, she looked as fresh as a daisy.
Claire didn't give him the time of day and smiled only at her aunt's direction.
"My little princess!" Matilda cheered as she stood up. "I was just wondering where they hid you!"
Claire approached and beamed. "I wasn't hiding anywhere. I'm happy to see you, Auntie!"
Matilda drew her niece into a tight hug and heavily swayed as she buried Claire into warm greetings and love.
"Chris said you were asleep, I almost came upstairs to fucking haul you out the blankets, you lazy ass!"
"He's just jealous I got the upper bed!" Claire exaggeratedly eyerolled.
Matilda cackled again and pulled a funny face at them. "At least your room hasn't turned into a fucking storage room! I doubt I'll even find the bed once I get there!"
"Now you sound like Grandpa!" Chris commented.
"Oh, you can always sleep on the couch, Auntie!" Claire exclaimed and, as the woman walked to the dining table to fill her glass again, the girl added in low tones, "if there's still room for you on it."
Matilda didn't hear her or, if she did, she didn't give it much credit. Anyway, Chris didn't miss to listen and see the bitter frown on his sister's face as she unashamedly stared at him while speaking.
His backbone already ached in anticipation.
Sitting on the stool by the window in the desert kitchen, Claire scanned the sky.
It grew cloudier and cloudier with every minute that passed. Any blue was long gone – except for the blue around her soul. Even the sunset gold had vanished. Somehow the view overwhelmed her. Like in superhero movies or videogames, when the evil is about to power up for the final battle, minacious clouds always gather, spiralling above the boss to defeat. Why can't apocalypses happen on sunny days? Would she feel better on a sunny day?
Claire snickered at her own self.
Alright, she hella needed a distraction from all her obsessive troubles, but she was tripping now. She didn't even know why she was so calm. Apathic is the right word perhaps. Everything happened around her and she believed, if she didn't move too much, troubles wouldn't hit her and she'd be spared. It was like being at the centre of a hurricane: your world's spinning fast and crashing down all around you, but you just don't move because you've got nowhere to go and nothing's strong enough to move you. You're paralysed and caged and you can only wait for your turn to be destroyed as soon as the storm will rail you.
She looked back at the clouds. Were they whirling above her head? Was she the villain of the situation? She was about to be, sure, but was she already? She'd done nothing bad. Not yet at least. Claire felt like she was doomed to fall. She already knew it. It was a matter of time. Evil is always defeated. Always. Her heart ached for she was so full of it. If Chris had caused harm to her… Claire shuddered at the thought of how much she'd cause to anyone if she ever gave up.
The sudden noise of the oven's see-through door creaking open startled her. Grandma Mary had just come to check the roast, interrupting the girl's loneliness. Claire simply pretended to be busy texting her friends when, instead, she just randomly scrolled down on her phone and wished Mary would go away soon and freed her of any bothersome presence.
If Chris sought comfort in the family, Claire instead shied it away as much as possible. She wanted to be ten thousand miles away from everybody – herself included. Crashing her unsaid wish, Mary's reflection grew bigger in the window as she approached the stool instead of leaving.
"Would my baby girl like some snow?" Mary said, mocking a witch's speaking. "I see her already shiver!"
"Is it gonna snow?" The girl asked, casually and without turning. Who knows what the old woman could read in her face if she did so?
"The crystal ball says so." Mary continued, and draped a bony hand around Claire's shoulder, pretending to look at the sky. She drew her into her abdomen, gently caressing her hair. "I saw in it you and Chris making a pretty fat snowman, hot cocoa and snowballs battles. Tomorrow's gonna be a great Thanksgiving!"
The mere idea of tomorrow broke Claire. The clock was ticking and it was getting harder and harder to pretend everything was fine.
The girl failed to curb her tears.
She sank her face into Mary's belly and quietly sobbed, urging herself to stop but to no avail. She knew that each of her tears would just elicit insisting questions and suspicions, therefore, more truckloads of trouble, but she couldn't find enough strength – or rather cowardice – to stop.
"Tell me what's wrong, honeybee." Mary cooed. "I can keep secrets."
Oh, Granny! This one's not for you to know.
Claire wanted so bad to let it all out and empty her heart and soul of her burden. Had it been only about her, she'd have already confessed everything and prayed for her grandmother to break the imprisoning enchantment and set her free – and possibly don't report her to anybody.
But it wasn't only. About. Her.
"So do I." Claire muttered, wiping tears against Mary's apron and forcing a smile to crack between her flushed cheeks. "A girl must've her little secrets, isn't it?"
The old woman slid two fingers under Claire's chin and angled it upwards. Her grey eyes scanned Claire's carefully. The girl opposed no resistance, although the intensity of Mary's stare gave her the shivers. It was like being scanned down to the bottom of the soul. Notwithstanding, the woman cast a tender smile. This time, though, wrinkles didn't fade. Differently, they seemed to become more evident, as though Mary didn't need to appear young and wished, on the contrary, to enhance all her senile authority. The smile was tender but the frown was earnest. Her granddaughter was just so close to break down and spill it all out, Mary felt it. She'd only have to insist and discomfit her a little and Claire would tumble down like a sandcastle to a tidal wave.
"What has Chris done to you?" the woman asked.
Claire flinched badly. Her forehead corrugated in concerned surprise. How could her granny be so insightful? "How do you know it's about him?"
"Crystal ball." Mary deadpanned.
"Then you already know it all." Claire murmured, concealing the real meaning of her sarcasm and trying hard to keep a straight face.
Retracting like the sea before a tsunami when it tricks you with the lie of a wider seashore to make yourself comfortable into to outright swallow you when the waters rise, Mary chuckled and took half a step back to have a better view of her granddaughter and, momentarily changed the subject to make Claire feel comfortable by reminding her everything special there was in their relationship, the lady chuckled. "Remember when you were a child and believed the snow was real when you tossed the ball?"
A sombre shadow clouded Claire as her look dropped to the ground. "I'm no child anymore." She whispered, saddening.
Mary's features hardened and a gloom of seriousness fell onto her. She had a hunch like she was about to finally figure out what Chris had done to Claire. Or what Claire had done to Chris. Or what they'd done to each other. Or whatever nastiness they wouldn't confess. Or... or whatsoever were the trauma's consequences affecting their personalities...
"I know. You're a woman now." Mary spoke in earnest although without letting down the softness in her voice. "Womanhood is not just about tits, periods and sex, Claire darling. It's taking decisions. It's movement. It's being accountable for your own mistakes. It's standing on your own feet. It's paying your own bills. Are you paying yours, Claire?"
The girl listened dumbfounded, unexpecting such calmly-whispered yet heated-up speech. What was happening? Where was all that sudden seriousness coming from? It wasn't like Granny! Feeling urged to answer, Claire fumbled for words but her grandma didn't concede her time.
"Are you? Or are you sneaking away not to have to?" Mary continued.
"I, uh…"
"You won't make it by sitting on that stool." The old lady wisely warned. "You can't escape whatever Chris did to you when you were vulnerable. Then why do you keep escaping him?"
"I just…" Claire stuttered. "I just want to be left alone."
"Tell me what he did." Mary commanded.
"He did nothing!" Claire hastily exhaled, alarmed by those subtle accusations implied in Mary's words. What did she even mean by "vulnerable"? Oh, God had she got a crystal ball for real? Could she read minds? Was she, in the end, the witch Claire had loved to fancy about in the past? Calm down, Claire-bear. Calm down. She can't know. You're making too much out of her words. More calmly this time, to soothe herself first, she repeated, "nothing."
"Then, what have you done to him?" Mary urged. "He looks beaten. In a way that only a woman can reduce a man."
Claire's eyes widened as she audibly gasped. "I did nothing! I'm innocent!"
"If you both did nothing, then don't play the victim or you'll never be the woman you wish to become." The lady scolded, fanning a pointy forefinger in the air.
"What if I don't want to be a woman?" Claire muttered, confused and daunted by that reproach that literally came out of the blue.
Something in Mary's face seemed to light up and click. There, the tidal wave impended and she believed to see a crack in the sandcastle's foundation already, hopefully big enough for her to sneak in and conquer her granddaughter's fort of secrecy.
"You don't feel like a woman?" Mary asked and softened her tone to a caring whisper of apprehension. She stepped onward and knelt before Claire's stool. "Who do you feel like, Claire? You can tell me, there's nothing I won't understand."
Claire's eyebrows furrowed in pain as though that question had touched a soft spot inside her. "Like a little girl." She whimpered.
Relief and disappointment danced upon Mary's features but she stretched a loving smile anyway. "There's no hurry, little Claire." She cupped Claire's cheek and gave it a stroke with her thin thumb. "You've got time to grow up and I'm sure you'll be a great woman one day. But it'll only happen when you'll be ready. Not a minute earlier, not one later."
Claire pursed her lips but couldn't prevent them and her chin from shaking. Two big teardrops rolled down her cheeks and Mary took care to wipe them away, gently.
I got no time to grow up.
"Don't let anyone command you when to grow up, little girl. Or why." Mary said. "Not even Chris." Especially not him.
Later that same evening, the seven of them had dinner all together, savouring the special roast Mary had prepared with some spices she'd brought from Morocco – and obviously Lily's extraordinary pumpkin pie. The Lady had kept the menu pretty light, since the following day had a real luncheon planned, with many courses.
Unlike how little he'd eat on the following day, that evening, Chris ate his food gladly and ravenously.
Things seemed to have slightly improved – just a little, little bit – at least in his eyes.
He and Claire had laid the table together, which allowed him to be a sappy concentrate of gallantry throughout. She danced around the table to lay the napkins and Chris deluded himself she danced around him too. He talked to her gently, tenderly, to somehow convey his apology but he didn't really expect it to… actually work! They were all a whirl of "please", "thank you" and "I'll do it". Moreover, when dinner was ready and screwing any ten-thousand-miles rule, Claire sat right next to him and dispensed smiles all around. When it happened that she'd need to address him, Chris never read a single ounce of rancour in her eyes. Whatever had happened after she'd left him on the couch with Aunt Matilda, must've been a true blessing.
Too good to be true.
In retrospect, it wasn't true. All the well-mannered words, smiles and the good actress in her fooled Chris up to a point that he utterly overlooked the exaggerate eagerness and overjoy in his sister's demeanour. She hadn't even danced. The appearance of delicacy in her movements was only due to the ballet training. She rather dragged herself around as if her heart was made of heavy lead. When she was sure nobody looked, she'd often take deep breaths as if she were running out of air.
Claire had put on a real show, for her mother, father, grandparents to watch and fall for.
According to what Chris had told her and what she'd eavesdropped herself, Daddy had been making upsetting and unexpected assumptions. Then Granny made all those straightforward questions… The girl was too smart not to get the Universe's suggestion to be fucking careful.
Good-humoured, Chris offered to wash the dishes and hardly believed his ears when Claire stated she'd join him so Grandma Mary could rest and enjoy her children's company. Let the second act of the play begin!
"I wash, you wipe?" Chris proposed, once they'd brought all the dirty dishes and trays in the kitchen.
"Okay."
Once the water jet was hot enough, Chris began soaping up and rinsing it all accurately and passed every piece to Claire to diligently finish the process with a wiping cloth. To have her so close and "friendly" was heart-warming – if to be as silent as the dead ever means so. But he needed to make sure no more grudge lay between them, since all that positivity on her face was quite gone now that they were alone side by side. Backstage, the "all too well" show was over.
The boy broke the silence first.
"I didn't mean to hurt you in any way. I'm sorry if I did." Chris said low and gingerly glanced at her as he handed over another glass.
Claire enveloped it in the cloth. "In my world, badmouthing is meant to hurt someone." She bitterly commented.
"Dad was grilling me."
"That's irrelevant." She grunted.
"How much have you overheard?" Chris asked. Claire had certainly missed the worst parts of the conversation, he thought, otherwise she'd have already understood!
"Enough to know you weren't supposed to say that."
After a few moments of intensive cerebral activity, he asked "would it make any difference if I told you I was quite drunk?"
"Not a bit." She spelled.
Chris sighed in surrender. He hadn't forgotten the rancour that got him when talking with Robert so why was he trying to justify himself? No matter how much he'd talk around it to himself, he'd precisely wanted to say those things. He just wasn't ready to admit that he'd wanted to hurt Claire when she wasn't around to speak up for herself.
"I'm sorry. Do you at least believe that?"
Claire knew there was no reason for her not to believe it. Chris may act like a douche sometimes, but when he said he was sorry, he always meant it. Nevertheless, she didn't answer. Her brother took her silence as an assent anyway.
A few moments passed in which the running water and the tableware clinking were the only audible sounds in the small room – aside from the Redfield chit-chat coming from the near living room. While doing his job, Chris often side-glanced at his sister to relish in her closeness. Hadn't he got foamy hands, he'd have already hugged and squeezed her like a big stuffed animal to implore forgiveness.
"It was nice to see you smiling at me again, you know?" He bashfully murmured, a lopsided little grin creased his face.
"Whatever."
"I'm glad you're here." He added, ignoring her bitchy shrug. Even that annoyed talk was better than her recent standoffishness.
Claire pursed her lips and reduced her voice to a whispering grunt. "I'm here only not to make a federal case out of it so stop seeing things, Chris." She said nodding at the kitchen door and all the people on the other side. "I couldn't care less about dishes and…"
"And about me, right?" Chris said, finishing the sentence where she'd trailed off. He felt utterly misused. He was just a supporting actor in someone else's play and he only needed to be there, smile and let the show go on. In Claire's eyes, he thought, he was as important as the child playing the tree in the background at every school recital.
Claire neither denied nor admitted a thing.
"I'm a fuck up, I know," Chris whispered just a little louder than the running water, "but I believe we'll get over it sooner or later and become friends again." If there was something that evening of pure blindness had showed him, is that a comeback was possible, not as lovers but as siblings at least. "I believe in us."
"There is no us." Claire roughly remarked.
"Not in that way-" Chris tried to clarify but trailed off as he got the implied meaning in her statement. "Yeah, right... I forget." He lamely muttered and slammed the sponge onto a porcelain baking tray.
As her brother silently rubbed the encrusted roast juices, Claire glanced at the darkness beyond the window above the stool she was sitting on earlier in the evening. She all but heard Mary's words echo in her head. Was she paying her bills? Not yet. Was she about to do it? She hoped not. One thing Claire knew for sure, the price she got to pay was too high. Secretly, she hoped she could shift the blame and the bill on someone else.
A few snowflakes briefly waltzed in the feeble window beam before being engulfed by the dark again. She couldn't help but see her own reflection on the glass. Pale, sad, scared. Claire was a ghost. One with heavy chains dangling from the neck, clearly not the one she wanted to be.
"It's probably gonna snow." She absently mumbled.
"So, you're up to small talk now." Chris grumbled.
Claire peeled her eyes off the glass and turned, looking down her nose at him. "Isn't it what you wanted? To act normal for a day?"
"I wanted it for them… not for me." He muttered, downcast.
"I don't want any of them up my ass."
"So do I, but-"
"Since we're stuck here," Claire interrupted, a tone of annoyance gruffing her voice, "I smile, I fake, I lie." You have no idea how much I do! "I'll even talk about the weather if that will get me rid of any pain in the ass."
"Is it what I am to you?" Chris asked, finally seeing things for what they were. A lie. A staging. "A motherfucking pain in the ass!"
"You are." Claire conceitedly hissed.
Chris scoffed and shook his head. "After all we've been through."
Sickeningly overwhelmed, Claire brusquely hurled the wiping cloth on the countertop and addressed him a pointed look. Bad temper clicked, Redfield blood boiled. "Listen, I didn't believe I'd have to explain but, here we are. I am not over it. You hurt me. You fucking hurt me!" She lowly grunted. Her voice shook in anger and something else, but she didn't stop speaking. She'd just let it all out, careless he'd probably not get the real meaning of her words. "You have no idea. You keep pretending we're fine, you kiss ass all the time but I wish you never put your hands on me in the first place!"
Claire watched Chris sulk darkly and turn again to the sink to carry on his duty in dignity. His hands trembled for an anger he struggled to contain. Had self-control been like fuel, Chris would've run out of it for the rest of his days for how much he consumed then. The girl watched him literally bleed inside in silence.
Claire wanted to cry. She wanted to run away. Deep inside, she didn't want to hurt anyone – let alone him – but, somehow, she couldn't help it. She couldn't avoid hurting Chris as long as he tried to get back into her life. Why didn't he just give up? For his own sake, she needed him to stay away as far as possible from herself. If not physically, at least mentally. But how hard it is when he still seeks you and needs you because he's still madly in love with you. As if she hadn't already enough reasons on her own to suffer, he was always there, hovering around her and every single move, look, smile, word of him was a declaration of unrequited love and a subtle blaming her for not returning it. And it tore her heart apart. Hadn't they been surrounded by so many witnesses, Claire would've gladly kicked him out the cottage, dishes flying and tables turning, to eventually get an illusion of the loneliness she craved so bad.
"No matter what you say, I still love you." Chris murmured, thinking out loud.
"I hate you." Claire snarled, tiny tears pricking in her eyes.
Chris turned the hot water faucet and the silence became total. He unhooked a towel from the wall and wiped his hands. The calm in his movements was scary. He docilly let those sharp words transfix his heart slow and painfully, not a single moan of pain escaped his terrific silence.
He was dying inside.
If Claire ever wanted to kill him, then she'd just succeeded.
As the girl took in a breath to speak again and try to smother the terrible truth she'd sputtered out, Chris spoke first. "Thanks for making it clear. I won't delude myself anymore." He murmured in a shaky voice, his look still dropped to the sink below. "Your ass is safe from my kissing." Turning only the head in her direction, his look slowly raised and darkly pierced her. "But don't come at me when you'll miss it."
Averting his gaze once more, Chris nodded at the clean tableware piled upon the countertop and grumbled "you can put those in the cabinets on your own," then left.
Part 3 – Present Time
"Anything wrong with your food?" John asked, staring at Chris from the chair he was sitting on, across the table.
Chris did his best to put on a serene face, with little to no result. "My stomach's a little upset…" He mumbled.
"That's because your Grandfather thinks that an eighteen-year-old boy can just have breakfast with whiskey." Mary prickly pointed out, regarding her husband with a scolding look.
"It's bourbon." John lamely protested. "Tsk! As if! A little alcohol never killed nobody."
"Go tell that to all the road fatalities and cirrhotic people." Robert snickered aloud.
"In fact, I said a little." John specified. "Moderation in all things. I even poured a little in the feeding bottl-"
"You did what?!" William squealed with the fork halfway through his lips, looking in disconcert at his eyerolling mother for any sort of refutation.
"If only you let me finish my sentences, Will!" John sighed. "I put some in your feeding bottles when you were kids and kept me up all night! You wouldn't believe how good it works!"
"Oh, well, that explains a lot." Robert mumbled to a sneering Lily.
"You fed your children alcohol to get them to sleep?" Serena gushed as she gently rocked the pram where Riley slept into.
"Parenting methods have changed during the years, sweetie. John comes from different... times." Mary intervened, unwillingly having to side her beloved husband. "During the War, commercials even encouraged pregnant women to smoke tobacco!"
"God." Serena gasped. "How can one even believe...?"
"Now that was some kind of bullshit- oops, pardon, my bad, ladies." John snorted and covered his mouth as soon as he spoke. "I may have made you taste a little innocent whiskey, but I sure kept my children's lungs safe." He said, casting a forbidding look around his guests until it stopped onto his wife. "Unlike others... am I right, honey?"
Mary blew him a kiss and downright stopped paying him any attention afterwards. The turkey was certainly more interesting than unearthing stories dating back about forty years.
"Wanna bet he's gonna say-" Robert whispered into his wife's ear, but he couldn't finish his sentence that his father preceded him.
"Seventy-three years on this world and never had a single drag of smoke!" John proudly uttered.
To prevent his father from resuming any back-in-his-days raving, William grabbed his glass and proposed a sarcastic toast. "To my therapist and the yacht he bought thanks to your parenting methods!" He joked and burst in hearty, loud laugh. "Cheers!"
"Cheers!"
Chris was the only one who didn't raise his glass. And honestly, he couldn't understand how Claire could even think she was supposed to cheer.
Part 4 - Earlier that Morning
Wasn't Riley the cutest baby on Earth?
That's basically what everyone wondered since Uncle William and his family had arrived right after breakfast time. That little bundle of cuteness in a diaper called Riley had already catalysed all the attentions on her by doing absolutely nothing.
It was the first time Matilda met her second-born niece and, in spite of all her snarky comments about getting her drunk with their stinky alcoholic breath, nothing could wipe the heart-shaped eyes off her face.
Showing the rarest of qualities in the Redfield genealogy, the baby girl patiently underwent all the cuddles, tickling and funny voices without weeping. Hadn't she been too young to speak, who knows what she'd say about adults literally fighting to get the chance to cuddle her for a while. Everyone but their parents claimed their right to hold her. Well, everyone but Claire, since she'd gone upstairs right after breakfast and hadn't met her yet.
When the girl walked down the staircase to finally greet her aunt and uncle – not before a long series of self-encouraging deep breaths – it was Chris's turn with Riley.
Sitting on the couch with the thick arms crossed upon his chest to hold the little bundle, Chris's heart literally melted when his baby cousin grasped his forefinger with her tiny, chubby hand. Perceiving something moving with the corner of his eye, he instinctively cast a glance at the stairs. Claire stood in the last step with the face like thunder and stared harsh, bewildered and unforgiving as though he shouldn't be there, in their grandparents' cottage, in their family trip, in her life. When their looks met, for the usual fraction of a second, tension almost blasted in the air like a shock of electricity.
Chris looked back at his little cousin and smiled on the spot. It was impossible to keep frowning when it came to such a precious little thing. Impossible to keep replaying in his mind the frosty awkwardness that had permeated every single minute of the night before.
The few words he and Claire had exchanged in the kitchen had been also the last.
Once they had been done with the dishes, in fact, Claire had overly flashed a few more fake smiles at their relatives and had waved goodnight to everyone.
For a while, Chris had stayed with the others around the fireplace, pretending to listen to whatever ongoing conversation and waiting for the agony inside him to finally end.
But it didn't. He would never stop dying. Not after the deep wound those three words had sliced open into him. An arrow shot square into the heart would've hurt less. Because it'd have killed him immediately instead of making him bleed forever.
Three words, eight letters, one whisper and it'd been the worst blast ever.
Even worse than the one in his father's underground lab. There, the explosion had left him blind and numb. He was numb as well now but, he could see it all clearly.
He'd lost her.
The pain stung harder.
For his own sake, he needed a break.
It was snowing outside, and probably it was freezing too, so he couldn't just go out and run until his lungs bled. Maybe he could distract himself with a little gaming but the unfortunate sight of the dead battery icon on his phone struck him. Dammit. He looked around, there was a free socket right below the staircase. He could sit on those exotic pillows his grandma had stored in there to fill up the empty space, and amuse himself a little while charging up his phone.
Yeah, good call.
Chris totally needed some brain unplugging not to listen to his heart break and bleed.
The idea was good but to accomplish it required unpleasant things: to see Claire again since his charger was in the travel bag. If he simply despised her company or rather also feared himself and what he'd do or say is not meant to be known.
Grunting inwardly, Chris briefly excused himself and rushed upstairs.
The sooner, the better. If I'm lucky, she's already asleep.
Surprisingly, he found the bedroom with the lights on but no one on the inside. The upper bed hadn't even been touched when, instead, he supposed to find it occupied. Chris dashed forward, his heart suddenly hammering. Where had she gone? He forcefully turned on his heels to check if the window was open. The window was reasonably closed but nothing could erase the thought that Claire had just run away from home.
It was freezing outside! She'd have died of hypothermia! Chris bolted towards the entrance and almost crashed against his sister as she unexpectedly appeared in the doorframe. As a matter of fact, he actually crashed against the solid wood not to smash onto her slim body.
With the toothbrush in her hand, Claire grunted her annoyance and walked past him, as though he was suddenly invisible to her eyes and deliberately ignored the look of fear fading fast from her brother's face as he exhaled a breath of short-lived relief.
As another wave of anger rushed through him, Chris grasped his bag, extracted the charger, and half-heartedly grumbled a "good-night" on his way out, getting no answers back. Once by the doorframe, Chris turned, glaring at his sister's direction. He pulled the key out the keyhole and shoved it into his pocket under the confused look of his sister.
"Just in case you want to lock me out." He had harshly said. "I won't sleep on the couch tonight or any other night to come. You better get used to it."
Claire had simply climbed on the upper bed, sunk into the blankets, faced the wall and given him the last cold shoulder of the day.
That's how Wednesday went by. In a frosted atmosphere.
Riley instead, she was so warm and soft and bubbly. She nestled perfectly in his big arms, so vulnerable, so tremendously lively. Chris hadn't seen her since the day she was born, when Fate had appointed on the new-born human to deliver the consciousness of sin to him for having just fucked the blood of his blood. Just like on her birthday, today-Riley reminded him of baby Claire with her reddish hair and devastatingly-blue eyes, but this time the sight of her inspired anything but fear. She remined him of a lost past, when his life – and Claire's as well – were free of evil, when things were simpler, genuine, natural.
With Riley in his arms, Chris felt like the ghost of who he ought to be and who he had once been. The good older brother. The hero. The protector.
He'd failed to protect Claire. He'd rather become the biggest threat to her. The object of her hatred.
Since the same day that tiny, rosy baby he held was born, Chris had only exposed Claire to danger. How could he become the exact opposite of the good older brother?
I won't let anybody harm you, little girl.
Chris tapped Riley's little nose with a most delicate fingertip and mirrored the baby's smile as he did so.
I fucked up with Claire but I won't let you down.
He played with her tiny lips and made a funny sound to entice another bubbly laughter of her.
You're the only baby I have left.
Part 5 – Right before luncheon
The snow had come.
Grandma Mary's crystal ball had been right. The cottage and the whole forest were enveloped in a layer of white, fluffy powder. The ominous clouds were gone and a bright sun shone through the icicles hanging from the roofs. Dark brown, pale yellow, bright white, sky blue. The perfect palette. It was a beautiful day. Ideal for becoming the worst.
Standing behind the wooden cabin in the backyard, well hidden from the cottage not to be seen, Chris stood in the frosty air to have a cigarette in peace. After all those years, he still had to hide not to let Grandpa John know he smoked and he still chose the same hideout until it'd become his favourite. Hadn't it been covered in snow, he'd sit on the same old stump where he'd made his sister smoke her first – and hopefully last – cigarette a few summers before.
The big boy leaned against the wall and reclined his head till his nape rested on the frozen wood and closed his eyes. The sunrays were luminous but feebly warm, insomuch that their touch on his face resembled a soft kiss, given with a mere brush of the lips, and they painted a faint purple hue through his eyelids. Chris exhaled every puff with a quiet sigh, enjoying the smell and the taste like a drug addict after a long abstinence.
Loneliness.
Quietude.
Nicotine.
No sounds but the far burble of the placid river.
Breathe in, breathe out.
Suck in smoke, blow out candid vapour.
The abrupt muffled noise of compressed snow compelled him to open his eyes and cast away the cigarette.
"Fuc- Claire!" He gasped as soon as the comer revealed itself. "I thought you were Grandpa!"
Chris gave her a dirty look full of reproach and made haste to pick up the cigarette before it'd get wet and flicked the lighter to enliven the combustion. His sister stood just a few steps away, next to the cabin corner, with the hands shoved deep into her oversized coat's pockets and a strangest look on her face. The lower part of her face was hidden behind the raised collar, only her blue eyes peered. As much as her pose suggested naivety and inspired a sense of cuteness, there was that certain, usual note of accusation in her eyes, still quite visible in the remains of a frown on her forehead. Aside from that, there was something more. Something Chris could hardly tell. It was a vague shadow, yet clear enough to make the boy inwardly rise a brow. It was the despondency of the loser. Defeat. As though to be there cost her a big deal of effort and inconvenience.
"Have you come to warn me you'll going to rat me out to Grandpa?" Chris pricked, annoyed by the unwanted intruder. "To revenge on me, uh?"
Claire didn't reply. She just kept staring at him. Immobile.
Chris took the cigarette to his fleshy lips and observed her as he sucked in. They locked gazes for a long moment, hard to tell which look was more earnest. "Is lunch ready?" He casually asked, more to check her reactivity than to know.
"No… not yet." Claire whispered.
An eyebrow finally raised on Chris's face. There was something not alright about his sister's voice, it contrasted too much with the hardness in her look. She hadn't talked that softly to him in days. If she was regretting what she'd said, well, it was too late to hope for a few words and a pair of batty eyes to do the trick. She had to fucking apologise like she meant it!
"So what? Wanna smoke?" He gruffed. "Or do you wanna talk shit a little more?"
"I just… followed your footsteps and…" She mumbled, absentmindedly, waving an elbow to the trail of footprints behind her.
"Oh, yeah!" Chris evilly snorted. "You sure did follow in my footsteps! And you even outdid me!" He roughly grunted, evidently taking advantage of the situation to remark her hurtful words of the evening before. "Congrats."
If his former "kiss ass" displeased her so much, she'd better get used to his raw, uncouth new approach. He'd made up his mind he'd just not care about her feelings anymore, since she clearly didn't.
Claire pulled a hand out of the pocket and rested its side against the cabins' corner. The pose might seem quite casual, hadn't it been for the terrible look on her face. Something had mixed up with the despondency in her eyes. Overall, whatever it was about, it made her look rather anxious.
"Listen, just…" Chris said pursing his lips and shaking his head. "Just leave me be. Find a spot on your own. This one's mine."
Claire glanced over her shoulder to check no one was around. Her eyebrows were arched in concern when she turned her face towards him again and a little, delicate ruffle of vapour left her shaky mouth as she susurrated "I'm pregnant."
:D
Now you know what my plan has been all along. Since day one, every word I wrote was meant to get us to this point. Please, though, don't tell me you didn't see it coming! With all those clues I left around…
Also, excuse me for the annoying, boring chapter(s). I did it on purpose to create the contrast with the ending. So, uhm… Ta-dah! Claire's pregnant.
P.S. Yes, Matilda is basically Chris with boobies and a tougher attitude. And she's my favourite easter egg so far.