The act of his opening the door to his and his wife's bedroom chamber, and then looking in before moving on down the hall, towards his office, was an innocent one. With what happened three, nearly four days ago, he wanted to ensure that she was where she was suppose to be and doing what she was suppose to be doing—which was being in their bedroom and being asleep. After seeing that she was in bed, and was sound asleep, he gave his head a nod then moved on; while this now-former act of his had been a relatively easy one to do he knew that he was to experience a sort of difficulty with the one that was coming up.
Though he wanted to do it—go up to the third level, then check on the children before coming back down—he forced himself to stay on the level that he was on; for the last three days, he had been struggling to do the most simplest of tasks and, for nearly all of that day, he had been prevented from doing the one task that he both needed and wanted to do.
"Mistress? Mistress, wait... wait! Mistress!"
"What's going on? Lass? Lass, hold up a second!"
"Angel? Angel... slow down and calm down, please!"
For the last three nights, he had been tormented by hearing Losal's, his grandfather's, and his sister-in-law's voices either questioning or pleading for his wife to slow down in her progress to the house's second level; the late evening of January 1 looked to be no different than the ones that preceded it. He heard the voices, and he heard his wife's sobbing, and he saw himself rushing down the hallway and then intercepting her before she had a chance to close and then lock the door to the room that she had run to... he, on that late, December 29 morning, had been able to see that she had come home scared, and with an animal to boot, and he had also been able to hear her say that "nothing happened" during her visit with Trobrencus before finding himself as being "kicked out" from the room that she ran and then locked herself up in.
"She sped through the gate, sir." Losal said in this near-four day old memory of his. "After speeding through the gate, then to the portion of the driveway that's close to the porch, she threw the door to her car open, then grabbed something that was on the front passenger seat, then tore inside. I no more had the door open for her before finding her as flashing by me and then charging up one of the foyer's staircases."
"She on something, Lad? Came close to trampling all over me after getting to this level." his grandfather had said after Losal's words were expelled.
"Wouldn't say anything... but she was sure crying something fierce." his sister-in-law had said. "Was it her purse that she was clutching so tightly? Did she go somewhere or something?"
She went somewhere alright. To a place that he had only been to twice and to a location that he had thought was safe. While it was a little too late now he realized that he should of never let her go to that location, or see the man that owned that location. Something had happened to her during her visit with Trobrencus and he had yet to learn what it was—did Trob hurt her, or scare her bad enough to do as she did, or had something else happened that was irrelevant to her time spent with Trobrencus? All he really knew was that, when she left, it was heading on 9:15 a.m.; at the time that Trobrencus's call, which specified that she had been admitted to his place, was received, it was 9:59 a.m... what the hell had happened between them two times? Nearly forty-five minutes had happened between her leaving and Trobrencus's call being received—so much could of happened to her in that time...
He went down the hall, trying to forget the voices, and trying to get his mind set on the thing that he now needed to do; when he reached the door that went to his office, he wasted no time in throwing it open or in turning around to close it. Surprisingly, the task of crossing his office was easy. He found himself as believing that he'd be able to do as he both needed and wanted to do all while making the trek to his desk, and then pulling the chair out from underneath it, and then sitting in it. Once his butt was in the chair, he found himself as being plagued by his old nemesis—he seemed slow in reaching down to unlock the drawer that the unsent invites were in, and he had to do more than kick his ass to open the drawer and then remove the invites that were in it. When it came time to arrange the invites on his desk, he found himself as being very uninterested in them.
"The ones that go to my sisters, and their spouses, go in one pile while the ones that go to their offspring, and their families, go in the next..." he thought while forcing himself to put the invites in two, neatly organized piles.
Though it took a degree of effort, he did, finally, arrange them in the two piles that he was intending to create on his desk. After the invites were on his desk, and were arranged in the way that he wanted them to be in, he set to looking at them. While he had managed to get farther in doing this task on this try he wasn't but so surprised to find himself as being unable to go further in doing it or in making an attempt to finish it. It took him nearly five minutes of mindless staring before he finally decided to push himself from his desk. After removing himself from his chair, then rounding the item that he needed to sit before, he paced his office—this was ridiculous! The issue of looking at the addresses that were on the envelopes, and checking the number of invites per envelope, and seeing if the names that were written on the invites were correct was an important one but he was just not able to do it—the events that occurred nearly four days ago were preventing him from doing what he should be doing.
"Said for her to drive up to the gate and then wait for Trobrencus to press the button that'd open it for her... nothing from me was said on her following a man who had intentions to hurt her, or who'd allow for what happened between them to happen." he thought while pacing his office.
If the event that occurred on the morning of December 29 was going to prevent him from doing what he needed to do then, maybe, having a session of thinking it out would put some of his conscience at rest—the Gods surely knew how much he had been trying to either forget it or push it to the far recesses of his mind.
His wife, after running to and then locking herself in a room, had stayed in that room for around three hours before coming out; along with being noted as checking the hallway both ways, and then leaving the room very hesitantly, she had gone to their bedroom for a shower and then some fresh clothes. Homsi, he recalled, had been asked to bring her a bottle of wine and a glass right after she was dressed—instead of taking her what he had been requested to take to her, he had been stopped and then questioned on why he had them two items on him. He, who had had a most nerve-wracking three hours, had taken over in taking them two items to her after getting an answer to the two questions that he had asked the Goblin. All while letting her sit on their bed, and consume two glassfuls of the beverage, he had asked her questions on what was wrong and why her arrival home went in the way it did.
Except for saying that Trobrencus was the source of where the puppy came from she had said nothing on what happened between he and her; with all that happened in the three hours that occurred between her homecoming and her being noted as being out of the room that she had locked herself in, he had forgotten all about the puppy being in the house. Angel, after retrieving the animal from the room that she had spent three hours in, had shown him it before saying that she was one of the pups born on Trobrencus's property during his and his family's absence.
"He, after hearing all of what's going on here, told me to follow him. He took me straight to his kennel, then he gave me her. He left the kennel right after she was in my arms." she had said after showing him the puppy.
He had given that animal a long, quiet look before blinking his eyes and then giving his head a shake; while he was okay with dogs, he wasn't all that grand a dog person—they left their stools in the house; they chewed the carpets, and the furniture; they scratched the walls and floors; and they required a lot of vet care and attention. While he was sure that the boys, and Eshal, would teach the dog right from wrong, and while he was sure that he and his wife would have to join them on some of the instances where the animal would need to be taught what was and wasn't appropriate to do in the house, he wasn't all that favoring towards the animal being in the house.
The idea of his telling her to go back to Gamma Vile and then return the animal to the one that it had come from had run itself through his head numerous times; despite being a strong idea, and despite having a good meaning and point behind it, he hadn't been able to voice it. With Angel being so upset, and with everyone in the house being either very concerned or upset over her, and with the children's eyes growing very bright after it was shown to them, he had just not had the heart to tell her to return the animal to the one who had given it to her.
Angel claimed that all she had done after locking herself in the room that she had taken up for them three, long hours was sit and stare at the wall; the animal that she had brought back had either lay, all curled up, on her lap or had walked around, giving everything that was in the room a good sniffing. Nothing amiss had been found in that room after he went in to see if she had done something while his wife was in her state so he figured that the claim was a truthful one.
"And, once the door to the room that she took up for them three hours was shut, and then locked, I decided to take a trip down to where her car was parked."
No one had touched it, or had gone to move it from where it had been parked to the garage; with all that was going on in the house, no one had been thinking clearly—and he had a feeling that his staff knew that he'd be interested in looking at the car too. In a way, it had taken just one look for him to know that something amiss was going on with it—there had been a feeling around it that he had just not been able to miss. After saying the spell that'd cause anything that was masked on the vehicle to appear, he had gasped; apparently, the Damage Disappearing spell had been done on the car sometime during his wife's absence—the fender had been found as being smashed, the windshield was shattered, the hood was buckled in more than two places, and the headlights were broken. There had been all sorts of burn areas present on the vehicle's left side, which had also been scraped of its paint in several areas, and the side view mirror had also been noted as hanging from the car's body too. What the hell had happened for his wife's car to be so badly damaged? According to Ulok Gzujus, who was rather smart with mechanical and car-related things, the damage done to the car could only be done by another car.
After being told that the interior of the vehicle's driver's side had burn marks on it, he went into the house then grabbed and dragged his grandfather out; his grandfather, after seeing the extensive damage to the vehicle, had grown very concerned—the same occurred after everyone else "ventured" out to see why he was so "excited" about the car that his wife had driven that morning.
"Me, my father, grandfather, sister-in-law, and mother, around thirty to forty minutes after she was noted as moving about the house, took turns in sitting her down and then trying to get her to speak of what happened." he came close to saying after stopping before the office's one statue.
Of course, Angel wouldn't speak a thing of what happened. She continued to insist that her visit with Trobrencus was a nice and pleasant one, and that everything was cool between them. With the car being as badly damaged as it was, and with her coming home being so scared, and with a puppy to boot, he, and they, called bull on that. Except for him and his mother, everyone had grown frustrated with her lack of cooperation—while his grandfather had given her a sad shake of the head before getting up to let the next participant take his place his father and sister-in-law had given her an earful on what she should and shouldn't be keeping from people; thanks to them two, she had grown upset, which had caused both he and his mother's interrogation to be put to a temporary halt until she calmed down.
"Trob said that he and his family will be over for their visit in four days." she had said around ten minutes after his session with her started.
Let them come, he had thought after hearing this, and then nodding his head, and then getting up from the chair that he had been sitting in; when they did show their faces for their visit, he'd be searching out and then having a good talk with Trobrencus. No one scared his wife like they had a few days ago! He wanted answers and he wanted them as swiftly as he could get them—if he couldn't get them from his wife then he could well get them from Trobrencus!
His wife, about an hour after being interrogated, had taken the puppy up and then gone to find where the kids were; the task of tracking them down, and then showing them their new "pet" had been done afterwards—he, in a way, wished that she hadn't done that. With her homecoming being the way it was, and with his finding her car as having a spell on it that masked the damage that had been put on it, he had come very close to saying that the puppy couldn't be kept. In his eyes, he viewed Trobrencus's "gift" as something akin to a hush-hush card—one of them I'll give you this and you say nothing on what happened between us things.
So far, the animal hadn't done anything in the house; the carpeted and non-carpeted floors, the walls, and the furniture was all intact, and no messes had been found, and they hadn't been kept up at all hours of the night because of the animal either not wanting to go to sleep or wanting to play during the hours where they were suppose to be sleeping. Angel and the boys, and Eshal, were tending the creature well.
"And I am glad for that—while I already knew that Angel could take care of an animal I didn't know if one of the children would be able to do so. They're showing responsibility, which is a good thing to see them doing."
He paced and paced and paced for the longest of time before, finally, forcing himself to return to his chair and then doing the task that he needed to do; though it was a grand struggle, he did manage to read through the first stack of invites that were on his desk.
WhoslaVile and Zebyr Verobari
12 Crisimaja Street, 278451-09685
Planet Malndor, M-51 Galaxy
BeklaVile and Keibo Sebatu
45865 Remegsne Drive, 120985-74590
Planet Zaikeo, M-51 Galaxy
VaibaVile and Majeer Doshluna
676 Hosai Court, 435641-75346
Planet Gamma Vile, M-51 Galaxy
AraimeeVile Surfeit
4532 Oleggen Drive, 239856-75761
Planet Gamma Vile, M-51 Galaxy
AzvraVile Surfeit
4543 Oleggen Drive, 239856-75761
Planet Gamma Vile, M-51 Galaxy
TakkeVile and Kokan Hyunduzia
549 Quaf Street, 234312-32461
Planet Haaglurn, M-51 Galaxy
BellatanVile Surfeit and Canere Klaie
745 Belldaire Court, Apt. 12, 254314-34120
Planet Gamma Vile, M-51 Galaxy
DaispaVile Surfeit and Chokota Zentuie
751 Belldaire Court, Apt. 21, 254314-34120
Planet Gamma Vile, M-51 Galaxy
ZajraVile Surfeit and Poa Pendusklia
954 Reldaa Drive, 075621-00985
Planet Mooshang, M-51 Galaxy
KashiraVile and Bushon Bedali
85 Hoftur Court, 000985-00021
Planet Gamma Vile, M-51 Galaxy
TulaVile and Rubacon Iovides
099 Plevak Drive, Apt. 5, 111090-12091
Planet Mooshang, M-51 Galaxy
That was a lot of envelopes to send out; eleven total, and a majority had more than one invite in them. Araime and Azvra were single while the others were married and had children. As far as he knew, there were no new arrivals—no new nieces or nephews—to his family.
After looking through the contents that were in the first stack, then returning them to the drawer that they had come from, he looked at the second stack's contents. Regardless of what happened three days ago, he was still under a lot of pressure to mail out everyone else's invite—after what happened to his wife, and with two of his sons acting funny, he was half-willing to put all of the rest of the invites away and then saying no on sending them out when they were brought up again.
"Dammit!" he cursed after feeling himself as being, once again, hindered from finishing the task at hand. This time, it wasn't his concern for his wife, or the wondering of what happened during her trip to see Trobrencus, that caused him to be unable to go on in looking through the invites; the act of thinking about how changed his two sons were was the cause of this new hiccup. He, after five minutes of fighting himself, sighed then sat back in his chair; maybe some time to think over the issue that he had just thought of would do him, and his conscience, some good—like with the prior one, he had been trying to push it to the back recesses of his mind these last few days.
Lhaklar and Lazeer, while making decent strides in becoming settle in the house earlier that week, had changed almost overnight; up to the night of December 29, they had been moving about the house on their own, and partaking in activities in the gym or library without a problem, and had been talking to others. They were no longer doing that now. Lhaklar and Lazeer were now being very overly clingy with their mother—she couldn't go anywhere without having the two of them as tagging along either behind or beside her—and Lhaklar was barely speaking with anyone in the house. Lazeer, quite concernedly, was refusing to come out from his room unless someone—Angel or Bile, meaning—came up to retrieve him. Despite the two looking to be loving the new "pet", he was able to see that there were some issues going on with them—besides the over-clinginess to their mother, and their either not speaking to anyone or wanting to leave their chambers without having someone as coming up to retrieve them, the look, that was present in their eyes, wasn't right.
Could they be stressed out? They were being bullied on a near-daily basis, and his father, and his wife, were almost constantly on their backs about what they were doing during the day hours... were the ones who were staying for their lengthy stay doing something to make his sons be in the way that they were or was something else at work? Bile and Hazaar were still going around, acting like themselves, so he wasn't worrying about them; Eshal was also acting like her old, natural self, so he wasn't worried about her either.
"The puppy seems to be the only thing that will bring them out from their weird state—they play with the creature; they feed it, and give it water; and they laugh themselves silly whenever its around them... but, when the animal's somewhere else in the house, or is with Eshal, the two return to being as they were." he thought just before giving himself a good foot up the ass in finishing what he needed to do.
NishonaVile Sebatu
29 Chokinti Drive, 090761-09489
Planet Gamma Vile, M-51 Galaxy
WebalaVile Sebatu
32 Chokinti Drive, 090761-09489
Planet Gamma Vile, M-51 Galaxy
BralaVile Verobari
12 Karplo Drive, Apt. 43, 987451-09001
Planet Keaipa, M-51 Galaxy
VrawieVile Verobari
26 Karplo Drive, Apt. 59, 987451-09001
Planet Keaipa, M-51 Galaxy
ShenieVile Verobari
57 Jegrah Drive, Apt. 12F, 910401-00001
Planet Keaipa, M-51 Galaxy
NekkeVile Doshluna
1231 Qeenan Boulevard, Apt. 43, 095641-03451
Planet Gamma Vile, M-51 Galaxy
AesaVile Doshluna
320 Uvintu Boulevard, Apt. 65, 012001-98500
Planet Gooho, M-51 Galaxy
KulabaiVile Surfeit and Salbira Sleab
0971 Merintha Drive, Apt. 12, 211092-87900
Planet Gamma Vile, M-51 Galaxy
Vile Vile
606 Terracota Drive, 110110-90012
Planet Gamma Vile, M-51 Galaxy
Rita Repsula Vile and Lord Zedd
1 Moon 12, 012431-08671
Planetary Moon, Milky Way Galaxy
Rito Revolto Vile
1 Moon 12, 012431-08671
Planetary Moon, Milky Way Galaxy
Now he felt proud of himself; the task that he had been trying to do all day, but that he had been prevented from doing, was all done. All he had to do was put the second stack of invites in with the rest and then lock the drawer that they were all in—the event of a series of invites being sent out accidentally wasn't about to have a repeat! After doing this final item, which wasn't all that hard to do, and which he had no issue in doing, he found himself as feeling free—or, at least until another area of concern came to his mind.
While getting up from his chair, then going down to the bar, which was on the house's first level, he thought about what was going on between his wife and his niece. Dara Dara, as of the last couple of days, had been getting on his wife's nerves—she had been telling her to stop doing this in her daily routine, and to stop Bile from doing that in his daily routine, and she had also been discovered as telling Lhaklar, Hazaar, and Lazeer to keep their time around Bile "low". The latter area, which had only just been made present, had caused his wife to about explode—along with giving the woman a good piece of her mind, she had also told her to not track down or tell her sons that they needed to regulate their time around one another. The true cause to Dara Dara's constant phone call placements, which occurred at near-noon and supper hour, had been discovered earlier that afternoon; after eavesdropping on one of her made calls, he had found her as both talking to Vile and making a report on what was going on in his house—she, he presumed, had been doing this from Day 1 of her being here.
He had told her to stop doing both and she, despite saying that she understood what she was doing, and saying that she'd stop doing what she was doing, had continued doing as she was—Vile's number was back to being blocked, and she had been threatened of being thrown from his house if he continued to hear and see of her doing as she was. The act of his threatening to throw her from the house had caused him to "land" in a bit of hot water with her mother but he had managed to stand firm and get both to quiet up and then go off to another part of the house.
What Dara Dara was doing was the last thing that he both needed and wanted right now; his wife, and their sons, needed things to be calm in the house—things were just not that right now. They were under a lot of stress, and two of them were becoming very unsettle, and he was gravely worried about them.
"The second stack of envelopes consisted of fourteen invites; the grand total in unsent invites is thirty-seven, which means that a further thirty-seven people will be in the house after they're all sent out." he tried to regain the free-feeling that he had felt after finishing the task that he had been meaning to do all day but that he hadn't been able to do. "With Trobrencus having a family of fifteen, and with their arrival being somewhere around a couple to several hours away, the official tally is fifty-two—or, unless one or more of the people coming over have kids that I'm not aware of, then the number might be over that."
While his home was big enough to accommodate the people that were expected to come over he wasn't very sure on how his wife and sons were going to react after everyone was here. He hoped, for his and his family's sake, that everything would be fine and that everyone would mellow down and get in the groove of doing what they were there to do, which was to see and get to know the boys and get reacquainted with Angel.
After reaching the house's bar, then downing two drinks, he yawned; with it heading on 12 a.m., he really did need to go to bed—with his wife, who had spent the last two nights upstairs, on the third level, sleeping in the same bed as he that night, he had something to really look forward to, which was sleep with her. He was glad that she was back to sleeping in their chamber again and he was also glad to see that this formerly done routine of theirs was slowly making a return; he hoped that it'd continue because he really missed her during the night hours.
"So quit dawdling and get up there! Don your PJ's, or down everything except your underwear, then get in bed." a small smile pulled at the side of his mouth as he went to do as his mind told him to do.