House, Friday
Medusa's PoV
Maye I pushed him to hard, but it's an important event.
He has to see his father, just once a year. He complains that it's killing him, keeping it from his friends, lying.
I know. He doesn't understand that I know.
Suddenly, the heavy stone front door closed, pushing me out of my thoughts.
"Mom?!" I heard Deuce call from the lounge room.
I swallowed a sob of regret and walked into the lounge room.
Cleo was there, holding his hand, comforting him, and it didn't surprise me. It was a tad strange she was out this late but what was coming was good. It had to be. Or I might just loose it entirely.
Deuce gulped. "I'll go if I can bring Cleo and Clawd." He declared.
Inwardly tears of joy and thankfulness were flooding everything but I kept a calm composure.
I stalked around the lounge, showing no emotion on my face. I sat down on the stone lounge that everyone found surprisingly comfortable, looked up and said, "thank you, Cleo. Whatever you did, thank you."
Her (forced) mask of disapproval cracked as a single, liquid tear slid down my face.
She came over and hugged me. "Deuce loves you. He just needed a nudge." She whispered.
Standing up she said, "I have to go before Nefera finds out that I have snuck out." She hugged Deuce and kissed him quickly, before opening our door and heading down the steps and rushing home.
Deuce's PoV
The door closed and I stared, stunned, at my mother.
"You cried."
"I cried." She said nonchalantly
She cried.
She was crying.
She hasn't cried in centuries. Di immortals.
Monday
Clawd's PoV
Deuce has been acting weird, being all grumpy and not Deuce-y. Now, he was, more or less, back to normal.
Lunch was happening, Deuce was next to Cleo, I was next to Ula-D, Lagoona and Gil and Frankie was next to my sisters.
"So..." Frankie ventured carefully. "What...was wrong last week?"
Deuce's smile from my joke we were recovering from cracked slightly.
Cleo squeezed his hand and said, "you have to tell them sometime."
He sighed through his nose. "My dad called my mo-"
Toralei must have heard him start talking about his dad. She slid over to our table holding a cup of water. "What about your father?"
"Toralei!" Clawdeen growled.
"Deen." Deuce reined her with one word. Her nickname, too.
If I could see his eyes, I am 100% sure that he had an evil glint in them.
He flicked his pointer finger and Toralei's water dissapeared from the cup and reappeared on her.
"rawrrr!" She complained, as she stalked away to dry herself.
Cleo beamed and almost crash takled Deuce out of his chair. "I didn't think you would actually do it!" She exclaimed.
"So mate, who's the boomer?" Asked our resident Aussie, Lagoona.
"You probably won't believe me-"
Not this time. "Yes, we would. You're a terrible liar."
Everyone laughed.
"What can I say? The sea doesn't like to be restrained." He shrugged.
"What do you mean by that?" Gil asked.
"Guess."