The morning room had been locked the whole time she'd lived at The Gallows, and talk about Kid's mom had been locked up, too. Now Patty could satisfy her curiosity on both counts. One teensy little look couldn't hurt, she reasoned. She was pretty sure nobody was around. Miss Marie had taken baby Alicia home, and Liz was napping. Lord Death was in Kid's study, and Patty scooted on out of there when he arrived. She was afraid they would fight again, and she hated it when they fought. It was funny when Kid argued with Liz, but not funny at all when he argued with his dad. If they were going to shout and smash things again, Patty didn't want to see it.
What she did want to see was Kid's mom. People kept promising that Sophie wouldn't hurt her, so why not? Once upon a time, Patty had been a very good burglar, and she could still get into a room without making a sound. She almost said, "Oooo!" when she saw the glass cases full of intriguing things, but she bit her tongue in time. She would look at all those pretty things someday, but right now, she had other business.
The business was sleeping peacefully in the corner, and she looked like Sleeping Beauty in Kid's old book of fairy tales, except even more beautiful. Patty's mother had been beautiful, but the kind of beauty that disappeared when you got close, and it had hard, mean edges. Sophie stayed pretty, even when Patty slipped into the chair beside the bed for a better look. Patty's mom had smelled like cigarettes, Miss Marie mostly smelled like baby puke, and Nygus smelled like the school gym, but Kid's mother smelled like the lilac bushes out in the garden. The other mothers Patty knew didn't wear such soft-looking sweaters, either. It had some blood on it, but a little blood never bothered Patty. She really wanted to touch that sweater. She brushed the sleeve with the tip of her finger, and Sleeping Beauty woke up.
They stared at each other for a moment before mutually deciding they were not okay. Sophie's scream pierced the air and Patty screamed right back. Her knees were so wobbly with fright that she could barely run.
"I'm sorry!" Patty shouted over her shoulder as she stumbled away. She didn't think Sophie heard, but she sure wasn't going back to find out. She flattened herself against the wall in the corridor, trying to catch her breath, which was hard when her entire body was shaking with adrenaline. She was still shivering when Lord Death arrived on the scene.
"Are you okay?" he asked, rapidly searching her for injuries. He looked as scared as Patty felt, and she flung herself against him. "I'm sorry. I didn't think she'd wake up. I didn't mean anything; I just wanted to see. I'm really, really sorry!" she babbled. Lord Death hugged her tightly.
"It's okay, Patty. You're okay." He soothed her for a moment before going to check on his wife. Sophie was wild-eyed but still immobilized.
"I saw a little girl!" she shrieked. "I saw a little girl! I swear she was real as you! She poked me. I felt it…I know I did."
Death righted the chair Patty had knocked over and sat beside his wife. "It's okay, Soph," he said, running his thumb over her soft cheek. She's real. You're not imagining her."
She seemed unconvinced, "Why would there be a girl here? Who IS she, then, and why is shetouchingme?"
"She lives here." Death figured simple and direct was the right approach — not that anything about the situation was right. Sophie frowned, and her lip trembled. "In Paris? In my house?"
"You're not in Paris. You…chased...uh…came through the mirror in my office when Kami did. You're at home, Cherie."
Sophie looked away from him for the first time and took in the familiar walls and furniture. She hadn't seen them in—it seemed like a very long time. Was it? But she remembered putting her mementos in the display cases and working at the desk by the windows. And she remembered putting her little boy down for naps in the bed she was sitting in.
"She lives in our house? Is she…is she yours? Did you replace me?" she asked in a very small voice. Death recklessly dissolved the Reaper magic binding his wife and gathered her into her arms.
"No. Nobody could ever, ever replace you. No matter what happens, you will always be my wife, and I will love you forever. Patty and her sister –"
"Sister? There are two of them?" Was her husband collecting little girls now? Because that didn't seem appropriate.
"Yes," he continued, reveling at how right she felt in his arms, "They're Kid's weapons –"
She interrupted again, indignant this time, "Kid doesn't need to make weapons! He's a strong Reaper, and he doesn't need help from anybody!"
"I know, honey, I know. But he wants to. Patty and Liz have lived here since Kid was twelve. They were damn near feral when he found them in Brooklyn. They had a rough start in life, but they're fine now. And they're…family. I adopted them. And they made all the difference for Kid after you…left."
Sophie buried her face deep against his neck, "After I did the terrible thing. That horrible, horrible thing. My poor baby. My poor little baby." She started to rock slowly in her husband's embrace, sobbing over the madness that had destroyed her, "I almost killed my baby. I thought I killed him. I knew I killed him. You told me I did, and so did Kami. And I almost killed Kami, too. I don't remember much. Just…a burning in my brain. And…a voice. It hissed in my ear and told me she deserved to pay for lying and making me think I'd murdered my little boy." Sophie moaned, "My little boy. He'll never want to see me again. Never, never…never."
"Not if you keep acting like that, he won't!"
Sophie jerked and peered over Death's arm at Patty, who'd worked up enough courage to stick her head back through the doorway. The girl was older than she'd initially thought. A teenager with the wonder-look of a child. Something wasn't quite…right about her. She filed the thought away, proud that she could do so, and gathered her tattered mind back to the present. The girl was talking to her.
"You can't keep calling Kid a poor little boy. He's not little! I mean, he was when we came to live here; he was a total shrimp! But he's tall now. And he'll hate being treated like a baby. I'd stop it if I was you. But maybe you can't help it; you seem pretty crazy." Patty looked from Sophie to Lord Death, "Maybe we could help her be less crazy so she won't upset Kid?"
She was on a mission now and not afraid to return to the room, "'Kid's upset enough. 'Cause you came back, and because you broke Maka's finger, and then she broke up with him."
Sophie clutched her husband's arm. "Maka? Kami's Maka? Did I hurt her? I wouldn't hurt her! Would I? Why was she here?" she asked him. Panic started to bloom inside her again. Why didn't she remember seeing Kami's daughter?
Patty didn't give Death a chance to answer. "That's the right Maka," she affirmed, "I mean, how many Makas do you know? She was here because she was going on a date with Kid. But that didn't happen becauseyoudid." She plopped down crisscross applesauce on the floor near the bed—near but not too close. Liz wouldn't like it if she got too close. And Patty knew how crazy-fast a Reaper could move.
"You sure messed up a lot of stuff," she said companionably.
"Maka? A date?! She's a child. They're children," hysteria crawled back into Sophie's voice. They were only ten years old…weren't they? She was sure Kid was ten when the awful thing happened.
"You lose time, love. You know that, right?" Death said carefully, and his wife nodded, "And I think you forgot how long you've been gone. Kid is… he's seventeen now. Do you remember?"
"No." Her voice was utterly flat, her body rigid. "He can't be. Can he?" She searched her husband's face, praying it was a joke. If it was, he was a better actor than he used to be. "He's almost grown up, then," she whispered. Have his lines of Sanzu connected?"
"They sure did!" Patty told her cheerfully, "It was wild as shit!"
Sophie buckled like she'd been shot. "I missed it. I missed it all!" she wailed into the crook of her husband's elbow.
Patty rolled her eyes at Lord Death, "Here we go again. You didn't miss much of it," she explained with exaggerated patience, "It only happened 'bout a year ago. He'd probably show you if you ask, and you aren't all screamy about it. She caught movement in the corner of her eye and turned to see Kid hovering in the hall with Liz freaking out behind him. "Right, Kid? You'd show her how you do your Super Reaper stuff, wouldn't you?"
Kid ignored her. "What's happening, Father?" he asked warily. He'd awakened Liz and forced himself to come and make sure Patty was okay but didn't trust himself to cross the threshold. He wasn't sure he could even trust himself to look at his parents, sitting in each other's arms like old times—like they hadn't ruined everything, like they hadn't both betrayed him.
Lord Death held Kid's gaze evenly and tried to channel calm to his son, "Patty came in to see your mom and woke her up." he explained.
"She almost scared me to death!" Patty supplied. Kid continued to ignore her. In fact, everybody was ignoring her. They were giving each other weird looks, and Patty didn't know if they were happy to see each other or if Kid would start breaking stuff again.
Sophie finally broke the silence, "You're so grown up." she whispered, "Not my little boy anymore."
"No," Kid's voice was cold, "I'm not."
Liz jostled past him to run to her sister's side, asking if she'd been hurt.
Sophie forgot she had been sad a moment before, "Look!" she exclaimed delightedly, pointing at Liz, "It's the other one!"
If looks could kill, and if Sophie could die, Liz's expression would have ended her instantly. "The other one? Other onewhat?" she asked, eyes narrowing dangerously.
Sophie didn't process the animosity directed at her, "I'm sorry, I don't know your name," she said brightly, "So I don't know what to call you!"
Lord Death hurriedly made introductions, "This is Elizabeth Thompson, Soph. Liz, this is Sophie, Lady Death. And this young lady who came to see you is Liz' little sister, Patty."
"Patty or Patricia?" Sophie asked as if they were having a completely normal social interaction. Patty thought about it for a moment. Nobody ever asked her what she'd like to be called - she was just Patty.
"Patricia," she decided. Sophie nodded, "Patricia, it is!"
Kid had had enough. "Now that the formal presentations have been made, you can both leave," he informed his sisters, "Patty, it's not safe for you to come in here. Don't do it again." He was stiff and grim, and Patty felt bad for him. Maybe she could fix whatever the matter was between Kid and his mother.
"But your mom misses you, and she's sad because she had to leave you. She promised not to be so crazy, didn't you" she directed the last toward Sophie, who nodded eagerly, "So why don't you come in and say hi? It's okay, we won't let anything bad happen to you."
Patty didn't know about the bad things that had already happened, but Liz did. "I don't think that's a good idea, Patty. Unless you want to, Kid," she added gently.
The only thing Kid wanted was to go hide in his room with Maka's arms around him. He wanted to tell her everything whirling around in his mind so she could help him make sense of his complicated feelings. He wanted to hear her say she loved him and would always be with him no matter what else was going to hell. But he couldn't have that, and it was all because of the two so-called adults in the room: one who had nearly killed him and one who had lied to him and kept him in the dark about something as important as his mother's life. He wasn't sure which hurt worse, but he didn't have time to think about it at the moment. Fury, his new constant companion, was building inside him again, and he wasn't going to give either of them the satisfaction of knowing that they bothered him. That they affected him in the least.
"No, thank you," he replied and, with a small, formal bow, saw himself out of the room. Sophie reached after him, begging him to come back, but he didn't even spare her a backward glance.
"That went pretty good," Patty said.
Sophie burst into tears again, "How can you say so?" she choked.
The girl shrugged at her, "Nothing's smashed and nobody's dead,"
Liz sighed and pulled her sister up from the floor. "Believe me," she told Sophie, "around here, that's the best you can possibly hope for some days."