Saying good-bye is no simple matter, especially when half of her just wants to spend her remaining time with Henry, but she can't do that.
She needs to say good-bye to the baby she'd picked up from a box on a cold spring night, left with no parents or family because of a horrific war.
She needs to say good-bye to her son.
He's wearing a surgical mask over his face – on Henry's insistence, to be sure – but she doesn't need to see anything other than his eyes to tell he's been crying.
"Hello," she says, smiling weakly at him.
She can't see his mouth, but she's sure he's attempting to smile back. "Hi," he replied quietly, voice definitely choked.
She can feel the tears coming. After years working together to keep their ridiculous immortal husband/father high and dry, the idea of permanent death had sort of slipped their minds. It seemed he had been trying to accept it on his own.
"Oh, get over here!" she orders, coughing quickly into her fist before opening her arms wide.
He needs no other prompting; he surges forward, barely avoiding crushing her as he wrapped his arms tightly around her frail body, a keening noise coming from somewhere low in his throat.
She swallows her own tears and sighs, "Now, now, don't be like that, dear. It'll be alright."
"No it won't!" he protested vehemently. "I thought I could do it; I thought I could keep this up without you! But father is falling apart and you can't come back it's not fair-!"
"Hey," she interrupts, pushing him back with her failing strength; he obliges, if reluctantly. "None of that! You're stronger than that; you can do whatever it is you want to do without me!"
"But I don't want to!" he gasped, swiping roughly at his cheeks as the tears rolled down.
She smiles sadly. "Your father's condition has spoiled you. Abe, we don't always get what we want. No matter how much we might pray for it, it doesn't always work out. I'm sorry."
His breathing hitched. "I know that." He shook his head and lifted a hand to his face. "I know that, but still-"
"I know dear," she sighed, enveloping him in a hug once more. "I know."
And if they could both hear the badly hushed crying in the hall, neither of them mentioned it.
~Persephone