A bit of warning: yes, this chapter will deal with Siegfried again. Now, I know what you're thinking. "Ugh. All right, already, we get it. He thinks the kid's traumatized. Can we move on, please?"
I do apologize. This one takes a different turn, though, and sets out to start something that I've been trying to do for a number of years. So I beg patience, and hopefully things will work out for everybody.
Please?
"Excuse me, sir. We have a situation."
Seto took a long moment to realize that someone had spoken. Usually, when a company-wide email stated that someone was working from home, the implication was that that someone wasn't working as hard as they would have been, had they bothered to come in. This was certainly not the case with the CEO of the Kaiba Corporation, who often took the excuse of his private sanctuary to entrench himself even deeper than usual into his innumerable tasks.
He continued typing for a long while before finally turning to face the speaker, a relatively new hire by the name of Jared St. John. He had short-cropped blond hair and a young, though severe face, not unlike his employer's. When Seto looked at him, Jared said, "You've a visitor. The little mister" (this was what he called Mokuba) "has evidently given orders to the senior staff that she is not to be permitted onto the grounds. He's said that he doesn't want you to bother with her. Do you want to…?" He trailed off.
"Name?" Seto asked, though he had already guessed and was rising to his feet.
"Gardner," Jared replied.
Seto checked the time. 1:30 PM. Mokuba would not be home from school for another hour. He nodded. "Invite her in. Ensure that she is comfortable, and tell her that I will see her in a moment."
Jared nodded curtly. "Yes, sir."
When Seto entered the front parlor a minute or so later, he found Téa Gardner sitting at the edge of the couch, still wearing her jacket and looking as nervous as a mouse envoy sent to negotiate with a cat. He pointedly ignored the wave of irritation that welled up inside of him; he reminded himself that he had neither time nor tolerance for the petty grievances of his teenage years.
Seto sat, and regarded his old nemesis. "I believe it safe to assume that you are here for a specific reason," he said slowly, with none of the enmity Téa clearly expected. "I would ask whether you are comfortable, but it is clear that you are not. Perhaps it would be to your liking if we skip straight to the point."
She nodded. "I…wanted to…talk to you about…Siegfried von Schroeder."
Seto could not, much as he tried, hide the violent flinch and revulsion that shuddered through him at the sound of that name. "I figured as much," he said, straining not to clench his teeth. He would not succumb to weakness. "From what I understand, Mokuba has already made it quite clear how he feels about that subject."
Now it was Téa's turn to flinch. "He…he did. Yes. That's why I'm here. I wanted to…" She was about to apologize; Seto was sure of that. But she seemed to think better of it, and said instead, "I…wanted you to know that…I regret how I acted. I shouldn't have been so quick to think of you as a murderer." She'd clearly practiced this particular speech. Her voice was halted and mechanical. "I shouldn't have thought of you as a murderer at all," she added, and this did not sound scripted. "I…had no right to."
"You have every right to believe whatever you will," Seto said, and this surprised her again. "Mokuba might think you are unjust, that your opinion of me is mean-spirited and offensive. I do not."
"You…you don't?"
"We have little if anything in common, Téa Gardner. I have just as little tolerance for your beliefs as you do mine." His voice was curt, and neutral, with just the faintest undercurrent of the smoldering indignation lurking in his subconscious. "I have no more intention of worrying about your opinion of me than I do of hammering you with mine. For a long time, I strained to convince people to listen to me, to understand the way I think. It hasn't once made a difference."
Téa stared at her lap, clearly chagrined. Again, she did not apologize. She said, "I don't think it matters, how you look at my opinion." Seto's opinion of her rose a notch. "I've never seen Mokuba angry before. But the way he looked at me…the way he shouted at me…"
"I must apologize," Seto said, more sharply than he'd intended. "I did not raise my brother to treat his friends like that."
"No. I deserved it." Her face turned hard. "He didn't."
Seto blinked in slight surprise. "Excuse me?"
"What I did…what I thought of you…it hurt him. And why shouldn't it? You're his guardian. You're his protector. After what he went through—never mind. You know much better than I do what he went through. There's no justification for how I acted. Maybe you don't care what I think of you, but…Mokuba does." Now she looked Seto directly in the eye for the first time. "I didn't come here to apologize. That wouldn't do any good. I just wanted you to know that…that…" She cleared her throat and tried again: "That kind of anger…it hurts the person feeling it, just as much as the person receiving it. Mokuba's been through so much already, and I…I had no right, adding to it. Especially not for the reasons I did. I wanted you to know that I don't ever intend to do that again."
Seto stood up, and Téa stood with him.
"Understood," Seto said, offering the faintest of pleasant expressions. He held out his hand. "I'll hold you to that."
Téa smiled nervously and took the offered hand. "Thank you for your time," she said.
"Not at all," Seto said, and showed her to the door.
Téa left, and both felt as though they understood each other, for better or worse, just a little bit more.
