-Of Revelations and Reality-

"Every death leaves a scar, and every time a child laughs it starts healing."
–Eli Wiesel

[Monday, October 14, 2019]

Earlier, Piper had been adamant that her children return to school after the vanquish, but she knew that now she did not possess the presence of mind to drive them anywhere. She could barely even think straight, and how would she drive with hands that trembled as hers did now? Instead, she walked numbly to her kitchen, past the countertop and the oven. She fell heavily into a chair at the table, barely aware of her surroundings. Her head spun with a tornado of various snippets that left too quickly for her to identify. Cooking often helped her relax, but that was the furthest thing from her mind. Right now, she knew anything she tried to prepare would likely burn to a crisp.

Already thirty minutes had passed without a sound from the attic. Wyatt had spent that time telling Prue different stories of his own botched attempts to vanquish demons. As he had hoped, the tactic calmed her significantly; she even laughed at the last one. The color had mostly returned to her cheeks; her eyes glittered again, reintroduced to their previous luster. But now Wyatt was getting worried. What was taking so long? If Mom and Chris were still fighting, why was the manor so deathly silent?

When he finished the next story, he took a deep breath and quietly sent out his whitelighter senses. Like snakes, the tendrils probed through the house. They crept under closed doors, where the soft smell of familiarity greeted them. The hallway upstairs was laced with pieces of everyone. It stunk of sweat, frustration, and boredom; a tangle of salt and an off-putting sweetness. The tendrils were quick to shrink back and seep beneath the closed door one flight up. The attic tasted of a battle long since determined. The air had grown stale with the bitter stench of death—but whose? They crept closer to the wrinkled atmosphere where a life had recently been extinguished. It smelled like a bouquet of decaying roses, of a bitter and unfamiliar aftertaste. There was the faint lingering of fear, but it tasted arrogant, too. Immediately, Wyatt knew: nobody he loved had died today. The tendrils curled in anger. Wyatt sat worrying about Mom and Chris, and here they had not even possessed the decency to announce their survival!

With renewed vigor, they resumed their search. They flew down the steps and burst violently into each room. The tangy scent of overripe oranges, extra sweet, nearly overpowered Wyatt's senses. Beneath that lay a hint of fresh basil, the new-page smell of a locked diary with wet ink—but Prue's bedroom was empty.

Beyond that, the conflicting combination of sweet and sour; the bitter taste of aftershave and lilacs not quite ready to wilt; sweat mingled with the fresh just-out-of-the-shower smell of a bar of clean soap; burnt toast and a spinach casserole cooked to perfection. The tendrils bypassed their parents' room, too. Nobody was there.

They sped from there to the next door, which stood partially ajar. A few smells wafted out from it, like—whoa! They backtracked away from the bathroom door, but the stench lingered still and would for some time. The next door, his own room, was devoid of all smell. And beyond that—beyond that, the odor of old socks met the tendrils at the threshold, tainted with the sweetness of a vague sensitivity. There was just a touch of pepper, as if someone had sprinkled it on top as an afterthought.

More importantly, though, was the smell of deflated determination; of blood that had barely dried, neglected and unwashed. Those smells, simultaneously familiar and unknown, were in such contradiction that it meant only one thing. Only humanity could pose paradox: Someone was in the room. That someone stunk of burnt pepper from long ago and of the smoke from a recent battle and of tremors, unending. Chris.

The tendrils diffused back to Wyatt, in the process locating the familiar oatmeal-raisin, coffee grinds, and lit explosives from the direction of the kitchen. Both Chris and Mom were healthy and alive, yet neither had possessed the decency to inform Wyatt. Instead, they allowed him to sit there and worry for half an hour. Well, they would certainly get an earful if he had anything to say about it.

This time, when he stood, Prue allowed him to with much protest. She did look up with concern, but he quickly allayed her fears with sincere assurances that all was well and the battle had been won. Accepting this, she watched him head toward the kitchen. His frown was set in determination, intent upon demanding an explanation from his mother. The moment he entered the room, however, all thought of words tumbled from his mind. He noticed first what was missing: the aromas of Piper poring over the stovetop, face red from rising steam. Whenever Piper was in the kitchen, the oven was on; there was the fresh smell of a mouth-watering promise to come. But now—nothing. Her back to him, Piper sat with her head resting against crossed arms on the table. Her shoulders shook in a way Wyatt had never seen from her.

In a strangled voice, he whispered, "Mom?"

He expected her to sound as she looked, though he could not fathom the cause. However, her voice was deceptively clear when she said, "Not now, Wyatt." Before he could protest, she added softly, almost begging, "Please."

Head bowed, the boy backed out of the room. He could not understand what had happened to shake such a rational, cool-headed woman; a part of him didn't want to find out.

The hours passed like minutes, and yet to Chris every minute slowed to an hour's length. He sat silently on his bed, legs crossed, eyes on the wall. Over and over the scene replayed itself in his mind. What had he done wrong? Why had Piper looked at him with such horror, with such utter disgust? What could he have done to make her turn away from him in a way she never had before? He felt like a child, rejected by his mother, refused her love—but why? What had he done to deserve such shunning?

Blank eyes replayed the scene on his wall: the confusion in the demon's eyes when the cornered teen stepped forward, the shock on its face, the realization that dawned once it was too late, the dullness of death seizing it. And all of that, all of it… I didn't do that, did I? he wondered through the haze. But he had, though the proof of his involvement was not on his hands and never had been.

His eyes gravitated towards his palms, open and accusing on his lap. He stared as hard as he could, fiercely enough that he started to see what he knew was there—the last warm blood of his enemy.

"But… it was self-defense…" His words rebounded within his empty bedroom, returning to him. Even to his own ears they lacked conviction. He curled his fingers over the imaginary blood to deny its existence, but it refused to allow its only witness such a mercy. Crimson dripped between his fingertips and onto the back of his hand. He closed his eyes so he wouldn't see the discoloration extend further. When he looked again, the scene had vanished, though the fear it had instilled very much remained.

Self-defense, it was only self-defense. He only did what had to be done, didn't he? After all, his mom's life had been at stake. He had no other choice. With the potion destroyed, he had to vanquish the threat in any way possible. His quick thinking had saved his mom's life!

But if that was truly the case, why had Piper looked at him with such distant disgust? Why could she not bear to make eye contact? Why could she not stand to see him, to have him touch her?

Hours passed in this state of ambivalence. Finally, Chris managed to tear his gaze from the blank wall, and looked over at his bedside table. His digital clock told him that five and a half hours had disappeared since Piper had picked up her children from school: four o' clock in the afternoon. What had happened to his time?

The boy released a heavy sigh and slid from his bed. His bare feet padded out of his room to the cold, wooden floor of the hallway. His feet tingled from disuse, sending up shards of pain that diminished a bit more with each next step. At the top of the steps, he paused, listening. He heard nothing, so he tiptoed down the stairs, skipping the fourth step, which he knew – from experience – creaked. He froze when his foot landed softly on the bottom step. He sucked in a breath and tried to strain his ears to hear the hushed voices of his parents in the kitchen. They were talking about something serious, something they clearly didn't want to be overheard.

Naturally, Chris crept closer.

"—saw it, Leo," Piper was emphasizing gravely. "I saw him."

Obviously Leo did not need to ask who "he" was, but Chris was dying to know. He had a gut feeling this "he" was somehow connected to Piper's reaction in the attic.

Gently, Leo reasoned, "We knew this was bound to happen eventually, Piper. After all, they are in essence the same person."

"No." Chris could imagine her giving a fervent shake of her head, effectively cutting the very thought from her mind. "This was different." Before Leo could argue, she added, "I don't know how, okay? He just was. It was like Chris was here." Chris froze at the sound of his name. So his instincts were correct, then; this did have to do with him. He leaned forward, desperate to hear more. Ignorant of the eavesdropping ear, Piper continued, "The other Chris, I mean."

Chris's heart pounded in his ears, but he forced himself to take a breath and process what he had heard. Just another by the same name? No, something told Chris it was more than that. The "other" Chris? His namesake maybe? But how could Piper get spooked about a likeness of her son to a man she had never met?

An icy cold doused his chest in anger; the feeling proceeded down to the pit of his stomach, warming and then beginning to burn in hot flames. His mother had left him feeling like a demon she despised, running to her husband while he got left behind, rejected. Why—why was this at all fair? Why did she get to be angry when he had done nothing wrong? For crying out loud, he had saved her life. Did that count for nothing?

Eyes hard, Chris revealed himself by stepping out into the kitchen. In a voice that wavered, he demanded, "Who's 'the other Chris'?"

A heavy silence descended upon the occupants of the room. Through wide eyes, Piper spun to stare at her son. Her face was pale and drawn; she looked physically ill. Leo looked better, but grave. His eyes were haunted, filled with a permanent longing for something he could never have. He was the most clear-headed in the room, though, and was, therefore, the first to react. He stepped forward to put a hand on Chris's shoulder, but the teen immediately shrugged off the attempt at comfort. He glared acidly at his father. Backing away, he repeated, "Who is he?"

The room was silent, frozen in time. Leo stood between his wife and his son as if to hold together the rift that had so quickly been torn down the middle. He glanced back and forth between the two, looking undecided. At length, he moved to stand beside the horrified form of his wife. He pulled her close in an attempt to pass his strength to her. He wrapped one arm around her shoulder, pressed his lips to her ear, and murmured softly, "He should know."

As if slapped, she jerked away from her husband. "Leo!" she declared in horror. Had he so easily forgotten the reason they had kept this from their children? Perhaps she had been foolish in letting him convince her not to bind the kids' powers, but she would not let him get the better of her again—not for an occurrence of this importance. "They can't know," she breathed out in a rush.

"Can't know what?" Chris interrupted impatiently. One way or the other, he would find out what his parents were hiding, especially if it had something to do with him, which he more than suspected. His hands clenched into fists at his sides, digging into his thighs in his rigid stance.

For the present, Piper ignored Chris, or perhaps didn't hear him at all past the blood thrumming in her ears. Almost in a panic, she insisted, "Leo, you know why we can't tell them. How can you even think about doing that to them? And what about Wyatt? If he knew, it would just kill him."

Wyatt was involved, too?

"Piper, they'll find out either way," Leo reasoned, His eyes glided to his son, crinkling in a half-smile. His expression had a faraway feeling, as if he were recalled a myriad of relevant memories. At length, he said quietly, "Our boys are resourceful like that." He returned his gaze to Piper, capturing her eyes in his, holding them, reassuring them, calming them. They made her a silent promise: No matter what happened this afternoon, they would get through it. Together, they would overcome this ordeal, just as they did all the others. "Wouldn't you rather if we told them and not that they find out some other way?" In his eyes she read what he left unsaid: They would hate us. That thought she could not bear; she did not think she could live with Chris hating her more than he already should.

It was with the greatest reluctance that Piper turned to address her son. Eyes glimmering with stubbornly unshed tears, she grasped Leo's arm for support. He pulled her closer, the meaning of the silent gesture clear: he was here for her. "Get your brother," Piper instructed hoarsely, "This concerns him, too."

Chris rushed to do as he was told. He flew up the stairs in mere seconds, forgetting, even, that he could orb. Impatiently, he pounded his fist against Wyatt's closed door. It seemed to take ages before Wyatt responded with an irritated, "What?"

In one breath Chris ordered, "Mom wants to talk to us, so get out of there!"

Through the door Chris heard the bedsprings creak and then footsteps thumping across the floor. Everything happened slowly, as if Wyatt were deliberately trying to annoy his little brother because he knew how much Chris wanted him to hurry. Chris had half a mind to just orb into the room, but Wyatt rarely tolerated such a blatant breach of privacy. Even in his eagerness, the younger Halliwell would not forget that. Finally, just as he began to contemplate disregarding self-preservation and barge into the room at the risk of his brother's wrath, the door opened. Wyatt poked his head out into the hall.

"What?" he asked in annoyance. "I have stuff to do."

"I told you already," Chris retorted with as similar exasperation. He folded his arms over his shirt and frowned disapprovingly. "Mom and Dad have something important to tell us. She says you have to be there."

From all the way down the hall, Prue's door flew open. Head poking out, she called to them, "What's going on?"

Wyatt, who was feeling rather generous with his sister after their afternoon together, explained, "Mom wants us." Simultaneously, in a significantly less charitable mood, Chris snapped, "Nothing's going on." He threw a sour look at his brother.

"Mom and Dad want me and Wyatt," he corrected meaningfully. "You have nothing to do with this."

A flash of hurt darted through Prue's eyes. Extinguishing it quickly, she cried, "Why can't I come?"

"Because," he snorted, and left it at that.

When he and Wyatt passed by her door, she jumped in front of Chris and glared hotly. He only rolled his eyes and made to shove her aside but she pushed back, bracing herself against the wall. "It's not fair. Stop being a bully, Chris. I want to know. It's not fair to keep secrets."

"Mom said only—" This is such a waste of time, he realized. It would take all evening to get Prue to leave him alone, and meanwhile Piper might change her mind. As it was, she didn't seem to keen on explaining herself. Could Chris risk that possibility coming to fruition? Heaving an exasperated sigh, he muttered, "Fine. You can listen if Mom and Dad say you can." Properly satisfied, she let her brothers pass, falling into step behind Wyatt.

They trooped down like soldiers in war. From the back Prue wondered, "Why wouldn't Mom and Dad let me know, too?" Chris ignored her.

When all three kids marched into the kitchen, Piper stared darkly at her youngest child. She started to tell Prue to leave—no sense it making it worse than it had to be—but Leo stopped her with a gently squeeze on her shoulder. The implications were clear: they all deserved to know. She closed her mouth reluctantly. It seemed, as much as she wished she could, it was impossible to lessen the blow. And she had to wonder—would any of them forgive her after this? She glanced at each face. Chris, eager but trying to hide it; Wyatt, confused but intrigued; Prue, inquisitive and curious. All wanted to know what their parents had to say. Piper tried to estimate how long it would take for those expressions to be wiped off their faces, for them to be replaced with anger and disgust.

Chris felt he had certainly waited more than long enough for his explanation, and made that perfectly clear by demanding, "So?"

Wringing her hands together, Piper suggested, "Maybe you three should sit down—"

Flatly, her middle child said, "Mom." No more delays. He didn't want coddling; he wanted answers.

"Okay," she sighed. "Okay." Her hands trembled as she stared at her boy. The lines between him and his other self blurred as they had in the attic. This time, she saw him in the stubborn chin, the colored cheeks, the resolution in the teen's eyes. She could see so vividly the way he had once looked at her when stripped of all that—of his security. She could recall his shy vulnerability on the day she had found out he was her baby; the way he had looked at her as if he wanted to smile or to reassure her, but was afraid of her reaction. She saw her son—both of him—and that made the talk that much more difficult. "About a year before you were born…"

Her heart throbbed painfully at the memory she long ago tried to bury. Speaking became nearly impossible while she stared right at her son's face, so she closed her eyes. Clear as day, an image of her son burst into her mind, a picture from when he was a healthy young man saving the world. He watched her from behind her eyelids, as if a fourth curious party to the conversation. But Piper could not do this. For all that fifteen years had passed, it was still her son's death. Her throat closed, barring words from laying plans to escape.

After a moment of silence, Leo gave her shoulder another encouraging squeeze and spoke up himself. "About a year before you were born, a man came to us—from the future."

Prue's eyes widened in delight while both her brothers merely raised eyebrows in query. By now they were so used to such outrageous phenomenon that a comment like that did not garner as much surprise as it probably should have. Their curiosity came not from the revelation itself but from the peculiar fact that their parents had never thought to mention this man before. Obviously, he had made his mark on the family.

"That man"—Leo's eyes bore into Chris—"was you."

This time Chris did react, blinking silently in astonishment. The heaviness that invaded the room settled over its inhabitants with satisfied finality. Chris stared from his father's determined stare to his mother's drawn face. At length, he repeated, "Me?" as if the very idea were impossible. "I traveled through time?"

"You did," Piper answered softly. "You came back because something had happened that needed fixing." Pride laced her tone as she murmured, "You came back to save our family, to save the entire world."

Well, if that did not sound like something out a fairytale, then Chris decided he must have actually gone insane this time around. Save the world? Second child, second rate in the power department, always over-thinking everything—that was who the world picked as its savior? It really must have been doomed, then, for it to choose so foolishly. "But what about Wyatt?" he protested. "Or you or one of the aunts? Why would I go?"

Piper bit her lip and glanced at Leo. She wondered how much they should reveal, how much because too much, how much before their children could not handle what they were presented. Understanding her hesitation, Leo answered for her: "They couldn't. Nobody could except for you, Chris."

Chris folded his arms, not even close to satisfied. "Why not?" he asked again. "Wyatt is twice-blessed. If anyone could do it, he could."

Wyatt squirmed in discomfort. On the one hand, he hated when Chris compared their powers. On the other hand, a part of him agreed. He was the oldest; it was his job to protect his younger siblings. Why would he not have gone?

"Because," Leo sighed, "Wyatt was the one who needed saving."

Wyatt's head spun. Something happened to him so far in the past, and yet it had taken a travel through time to stop it? Why had nobody back then been able to help him? What had happened to him to affect the future to make the entire world in need of saving?

Before the eldest could voice the question, Prue piped up for the first time, "What was wrong with him?"

Piper averted her gaze, lips pursed. Leo, however, looked directly at Wyatt, his eyes offering a silent apology, as he answered, "He turned evil."

The air deflated from the boy's lungs in a silent tremor. Somehow, with those three words, he felt himself go instantly numb. His heart thrummed loudly, a steady and forceful pounding in his head. His ears rang; he felt feint. Beside him, Chris instinctively reached out a hand to steady him. If his brother had not been there, Wyatt was sure he would have fallen.

At this moment, though, he could not stand for Chris to touch him. Chris had gone to the past to stop his brother from turning evil—to stop him, Wyatt, from turning evil. How evil had he been that Chris could not deal with it in his own time? What atrocities had Wyatt committed that had forced his brother to go to such great lengths in order to save him? And to save the world! What had he done? He had turned evil and brought the whole planet down with him in the process. How could Chris beside him and offer a hand after the bombshell their parents had just dropped on them?

In Piper's ears, the silence rang like an accusation. She could hear the voice of her long-gone child. An unmoving demand—What have you done to me, Piper? Worse, even, because Chris never would have aired out his frustrations. They would have gone unvoiced while he used his anger to fuel his demon hunts. Instead, he would have fixed her with a cool, distant stare, as if he had never seen her before in his life. A look that had always sent chills trembling up her spine. She could see it now so clearly. Finally, when she could no longer take the silence, she begged, "Chris…"

For a moment the teenager said nothing. He looked from his mom to his dad to his brother's averted gaze. He tried to bring everything to order in his mind. Pensively, he ran a heavy hand through his unkempt hair. "Wyatt was evil," he stated, wincing in sympathy as he saw his brother's shoulders stiffen. "I—or another me—went back to save him, to stop him from turning evil. Obviously it worked or else…" He did not finish his sentence, didn't have to. They all knew the "or else" of the statement.

"You did," Piper said to him. She seemed more easily able to speak about the man's heroism and did so with pride. "You saved him when he couldn't save himself. You—the other you—wanted Wyatt to grow up happy. That's why he did all this. That is why he gave up his life to come back to us. He wanted this." She looked to Wyatt, eyes pleading, but with his eyes on the floor he missed the imploring look she shot his way. One word kept ringing in his ears.

Dead. His brother had died.

To be honest, Chris was not surprised to hear his other self had lost his life in his endeavor. When he looked into his mother's eyes and beheld the anguish that clouded them, he almost could have guessed the outcome. He recognized the emotion as the one that had pained her upstairs in the attic, which served as a reminder of his original question.

"But why…" he began, "why were you so mad at me upstairs when I reminded you of him? Did you…" He swallowed hard, licking dry lips, but forced himself to finish, "hate me back then?"

Piper started, eyes wide in surprise. She shook her head vehemently, dismayed that she had let her child think that for even a moment. "No, sweetheart, never. We could never hate you." She pushed away the guilt of her past distrust, of her loathing, of her spiteful words to her whitelighter. She had not known. Back then, she had not known. How could she?

"Then why—"

"It's because he was different than you," Leo interjected. "In essence you two are the same person: You're one spirit but two souls—two minds, two sets of memories. Experiences are what make up a person, and since you have grown up in a different world you shouldn't logically have the same personality."

Softly, Prue recited, "Nature versus nurture."

Leo threw a glance at Prue, who had been left largely unnoticed for a time. "Exactly."

"But when you vanquished that demon," Piper went on bravely, "you looked and acted so much like him… I just…" Tears stung her eyes. She closed them and expelled a slow breath.

Barely audible, Chris realized, "You still miss him."

After a couple of seconds, Piper opened her eyes, more composed this time. "Not in your place," she insisted immediately. "Like your father said, you are two different people. I could never replace one of you with the other. It just… hurt to see him in you when we tried so hard to stop you from growing up into someone that needed to be him." Pausing, she asked, "Do you understand that?"

Chris thought for a moment. "He grew up in an awful world that needed him to become a certain type of person to survive. You don't want me to be like that because that means I had to live through something as horrible as he did."

For the first time since the bombshell landed, Wyatt's voice invaded the room. Softly, he corrected Chris, "Something as horrible as me." Chris whipped around to stare at his brother, whose eyes were dark and so weary, ridden with guilt.

Firmly, Piper countered, "No, Wyatt, not you. It was not you; what happened was not in any way your fault. We saved you; Chris saved you. You aren't that person anymore. You never were, not in this timeline." But Wyatt was clearly having none of it. He turned away, expression hard, almost angry.

With less warmth than their mother, Chris snorted, "Haven't you been listening?" Surprised at the sharpness in his brother's tone, Wyatt looked over at him. He had not wanted any pity, but getting none still through him off. He had half-expected to need to yell at the pitying stares, but Chris sounded far from sympathetic. "That Chris wasn't me because he lived in a different world," he explained. "Obviously the same goes for you. I know you think you're above the rules, Wyatt," he joked, "but the time-travel rules apply to everyone. If I don't get to take credit for all the good stuff my other self did, then why should you get to take the blame for all the bad stuff your other self did?"

Piper had tensed through the quasi-speech, wondering how badly it would hurt Wyatt. It came as a surprise to her when Wyatt's eyes softened slightly. He tried to offer a half smile. It came out more like a grimace, but at least it was something. Both parents let out their own relief in the form of a conjoined sigh. The tension of the moment ebbing, Piper demanded, "Why don't you listen when I say it?"

Wyatt was by no means all right and still shaken up, but his almost-smile remained, wavering but there. "Sorry, Mom," he said hollowly, "teenager's prerogative. Don't take it personally." Piper recognized it as a feeble attempt at a joke, however poor, and smiled at his forced resilience. "Still," he continued solemnly, returning his attention to his brother, "I feel like I should do something after all this…"

Chris, who was unwilling to let the discussion get serious again, cocked a smirk. "Well, I wouldn't say no to you doing my chores for the next few mo—" He ducked just in time for a wooden mixing spoon, swaddled in orbs, to go flying over his head. When he looked up, Wyatt was almost grinning. That was much better.

Forgetting to admonish her boys, Piper watched their antics with a smile. Through all these years, she had deluded herself into thinking the question would never come up, the truth would never be revealed. Only in those dark moments of the night where she had awoken, breathing heavily, to nightmares of secrets uncovered and doors unlocked, had she taken a moment to let her imagination run. Never in a million years, in all the times she had thought about it, had she ever expected the conversation to go as well as it had. The children would certainly still need time to adapt, but they were stronger than she gave them credit for. While Wyatt had been severely shaken by the news, he had accepted it more readily than Piper could have hoped. Eventually Wyatt would learn to cope with the facts, especially with Chris there to help him, as he was already.

When Leo's arm snaked around her, she snuggled into his embrace, smiling against his chest. "Leo," she murmured, arms folding across his back, "I love our children."

Relief made everything funnier than it was, which had Leo chuckling aloud. Against his chest, Piper felt the deep buzz of laughter trembling against her cheek. She let out a sigh, closed her eyes, and gratefully listened to her sons' banter echo in the room.

Replies to Anonymous Reviews:

Katawat – Thank you. Your penname sounds familiar. Did you read A Different Ending? (I should know that without asking, I know. Sorry!)

Blue Darkness – Okay, I'm cheating. I'm being lazy by responding to your review here, instead of replying properly as I do to non-anonymous reviews. (Ah, I'm pointing out a personality fault of mine there. wink) Your hypothesis may be correct; that you will find out as the story continues. I will, however, correct you in that whatever your hypothesis, you did not get it from the original draft of BLD. This aspect of the story was not in existence in the first draft.
You mentioned that the point of view seemed awkward at one point. I'll try to work on that, though I'm not exactly sure what you mean by "awkward." But I know the feeling of being unable to express what felt off, only that something did.
You would freeze, too?—So would I! It seemed so strange to me that the characters on the show so rarely froze up. I don't get it. Just because they have powers does not make them less terrified when there is a burning ball of fire literally flying at their faces. Or maybe I'm just more of a coward than I thought. wink
The trouble with writing that scene from only Chris's perspective would be that the reader would then see it only from that perspective. Which means the reader would believe it to be true, and have it in his head to settle for all that time it takes me to get the next chapter up to clarify. By the point, the reader will already actually believe that, which makes it all the more difficult to introduce the truth. The trouble with readers is that we tend to innately trust the author, so there would be no reason for anyone to doubt the truth in what I've written. Which would anger many people—"why would Piper act like that to her own son?!" "You've written her so horribly!" etc., etc., etc. Phew, that was quite a dissertation there. I should try to work on being a bit more concise. Anyway, I hope it brought to light a few things. :)

Sjsnugglebug – This isn't a response to a review. I just wanted to let you know that I'm still alive and have been meaning to email you with all the latest updates. It's just been pretty busy with the holidays and getting kidnapped and all (don't ask). I will try my best to get to your email as soon as is humanly possible. Right now, I had the option of responding or posting, and I figured you would rather the post anyway. (Also, I'm so excited to read your next chapter… and I haven't forgotten that I still owe you a review. I think I may just combine them. We'll see.)

Artsfan – Likewise, not a response. Just a quick note to let you know that I do plan to get to your email as well. I'm terribly sorry to both of you for falling off the map like this. You're both saved in my inbox, waiting for me to find the time to give you each the updates you deserve.