March, 2003

"Pietro," Magda admonished for the umpteenth time. She watched in exhaustion as the toddler ignored her warning tone. "Pietro, no. What did momma say about little hands touching the screen?"

The plump-bellied toddler lowered his head to hide his toothy grin. He wriggled his diaper-clad body in giddiness as he deliberately made eye contact with his mother, and then proceeded to swipe a dirty finger down the expensive television screen once more. He giggled at what he thought was a game, and Magda found it was just another thing to deal with.

"Lehn!" he announced gleefully as a stock clip of his father skating backward was shown. The older Lehnsherr, almost unrecognizable through the layered amount of tape on his evidently broken nose, flipped an off-screen player the middle finger; the younger Lehnsherr mimicked the movement in present time.

Magda wanted to swat his behind and scold him for the gesture, but Wanda was contentedly sitting between her legs on the floor, and any sudden movement would startle her into a tantrum that rivaled her father's. Instead, Magda's lips pulled into a severe frown. "No," she said somewhat more forcibly. "You do not do that Pietro Lehnsherr."

"Lehn!" he crowed again. He bent his dimpled knees and ineffectively attempted to shuffle his body backward. Magda supposed it was just another effort to mimic his usually absent father.

"Papa," she corrected. Although she couldn't help but find it was getting harder and harder for her to correct the twins. It wasn't unusual for them to see their father through various media outlets: candid interviews, matches, behind-the-scenes training sessions, magazine photoshoots, and so on. Nine times out of ten Erik was referred to by his surname, and occasionally "The Shark" was thrown before it. The nickname had begun to gain traction with the fans; Magda hated it.

Erik carefully peeled away the browned gauze from his hand with nothing more than a twitch from his upper lip when some of the dried blood caught to the gash on his palm. He wadded up the material and tossed it into the wastebasket as he grabbed a pair of scissors and placed them between his teeth. He unspooled a new roll of the pristine white gauze, and carefully worked it around his thumb and across the inflamed and puckered wound. When he was satisfied with his work, he reached to grab the scissors and cut.

He made quick and efficient work of placing all of the items back into the medical kit in the correct locations before he put it back underneath from where he had initially yanked it out from. With his laceration cleaned up and taken care of, Erik paused and wasn't sure what he should do next.

He was home now. In Germany. Magda and the twins were home as well. In New York. Erik was glad he was making enough money to more than support his family, and that he was able to afford a home in two different countries, but he never realized how lonely being relatively rich was going to be. Although he hadn't set out in the athletic field for the fortune, it didn't certainly didn't hurt; until it did.

Erik scratched at the back of his head, his hair starting to grow out a little too long for his personal preference. He made a mental note to schedule an appointment to have someone hack off the little auburn wisps that were currently curling around his ears. He exited the bathroom and padded down the carpeted hall until it gave way to the smooth, black wood-paneling of the bedroom.

He sat on the edge of the bed and cast a baleful look at the cellphone he had carelessly tossed on the mattress several minutes earlier. He picked at the edges of the gauze and licked at his lips in his nervousness. He knew what he should do; he needed to call her. They needed to talk. To catch up.

But Erik Lehnsherr was stubborn, and he was prideful, and he didn't want to hear Magda tiredly gush about the twins. He didn't want to hear about them at all. Out of sight and out of mind. But he so dearly missed his wife, and the guilt was almost enough to make him pick up the phone and dial her number.

He never did in the end.

TBC...