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chasseurdeloup · 1 year ago

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Family Matters || Andy and Kaden

TIMING: Current PARTIES: @declinlalune and @chasseurdeloup LOCATION: The cabin SUMMARY: Andy comes home to find Kaden tearing out the banister on the stairs. Their casual chat ends up being a lot deeper than either of them bargained for. CONTENT WARNINGS: parental death (mentions)

There was one thing Kaden could say about the cabin, he’d never be bored there. Every time he fixed something, he found three other things that could use some attention. Today it was the railing on the stairs up to the loft. The whole banister wobbled back and forth if you dared to try and use it. Thankfully, it wasn’t essential by any means, but it was a disaster waiting to happen, that was for sure. Part one was to see if tightening the screws on the end of the railing would be enough. And of course not. He sighed and got to taking the whole damn thing apart. It was going to be a whole damn afternoon project. Good thing he had the place to himself for the–

Kaden nearly jumped out of his skin when the door swung open. Putain, guess alone wasn’t happening. “Hey,” he called to Andy over his shoulder as he yanked one of the railings out of the base of the stairs.

–

Andy had finished work for the day, and early, too. It hadn’t been very busy, so she’d been cut loose, and she wasn’t complaining. She had a bit of a headache, so she was grateful to go home, take something, and eventually get started on whatever project had been evading her while busy with other things.

When she pulled up to the cabin, Kaden’s truck was in the driveway. Andy wasn’t entirely sure what his hours were at work, and she hadn’t bothered to ask. She didn’t want to make him feel like he was under some watchful eye, because neither did she. Andy rotated her jaw, pressing her fingers just beneath her ear as she shouldered the front door open. As he greeted her, she stopped in her tracks, brows raised at the railings that were on the ground. “What are you doing?” She dropped her bag by the door and kicked her shoes off before closing the door behind her. “Did you break something?” Probably not. He was probably fixing something, like he had been doing with just about everything in the cabin.

–-

The second railing was in there a lot better than the first. Kaden was going to have to use some actual strength instead of coasting on the advantage he had from being a hunter. He wrapped his hands around the bottom of the pole and leaned back to try and wedge the damn thing out. The whole thing was at the wrong angle, couldn’t just stay like that. “What does it look like?” he said between grunts. So fucking close. One more good pull and it should be–

Kaden stumbled backwards a few steps as the railing finally gave way from the base. He wiped his brow with the back of his palm, tossing the wooden pole to the ground next to the other. Before he went to the next, he turned to Andy. “Break something?” He rolled his eyes. “No, I’m fixing the damn railing. It was about to fall out of the damn stairs on its own.”

Andy winced as Kaden stumbled backwards, though she made no move to catch or break his fall (if he had). She stood by the door, watching as the railing split from the hinges, clattering to the ground. They barely used the loft, but it seemed a little late to explain that. It was mostly for storage; things that they had accumulated but didn’t need went up there, or winter gear.

“We don’t really use the stairs, so we didn’t bother to fix it.” Andy sighed and moved into the kitchen, grabbing herself a glass of water. “What else have you been fixing?” She knew he meant well, but she couldn’t keep up with the mini-projects he’d been doing, or if they were in line with what she wanted. Maybe he was earning his keep. The cabin was way nicer than anything else she and Alex had lived in in the past several years, but it was still… a work in progress, and probably seemed a lot worse to Kaden than it actually was.

–

“I figured,” Kaden said as he went back to work. The next few railings he pulled out were so loose they practically fell out on their own. “But it still wasn’t safe. And you both are usually carrying boxes or other shit up and down that are so big you can’t see where you’re going. So I figured I'd fix this before it becomes an actual problem.” The easy part was almost done. Taking the thing apart was going to take a lot less time than putting it back together correctly.

He paused and looked around the cabin. What else had he done? “Uh, the cabinet hinges. Table leg. Leaky faucet in the bathroom. Not all today. But yeah.” He knew there were more little things all over the place for him to take care of in his down time. Part of it was because it bothered him to have things in disrepair, sure, but he was also there crashing on their couch. It was the least he could do to help out. “If there’s something else you want me to look at just let me know.”

–

Andy grabbed the bottle of generic aspirin from the cabinet above the stove and took two, throwing them back with a swig of water. “Hey, I didn’t say I wasn’t grateful.” Because she was. She had to be, all things considered. Kaden being around was still a little weird, and she knew that Alex didn’t know what to think of him, but Andy hoped that they would get along. The topic of hunting, however, was still ever present.

“I was wondering why the table hadn’t tried to fall over the last time I put something onto it. Thanks.” Andy finished off her glass of water and put the cup into the sink before returning to where Kaden was at the loft stairs. “Nah, I think you’ve got all the most annoying shit handled.” There were a few other things, like cleaning the gutters, but she could do that herself. The last time she had done it, she’d found a squirrel’s tail. Not the squirrel, just the tail. Maybe she should have Kaden do it this time around. “Do you need any help?” Even though she had a headache, she could still be useful.

–

“Okay just checking,” Kaden said, relieved. He wanted to help but he didn’t want to overstep. It had been so long since they’d seen each other in person prior to the past few months, they hadn’t quite figured out the rhythm of it all. “Figured it was the least I could do.” There were plenty of times when his extra sensitive hearing was more of a burden than a gift, but came in handy enough times. Like when he caught the rattle of small, hard items in a bottle of some sort. It was either candy in a jar or pills. Kaden leaned over to check and surely enough, Andy was swallowing something, probably painkillers. “You alright?” he asked. He figured it wasn’t serious by any means but still worth asking.

He waved off her thanks with a small hand gesture. It was no big deal and he didn’t want to make it too much of a thing. He wiped his hands off on each other and was about to get started sanding, but he turned when she spoke to him. “Hmm? I mean I don’t need it, but I’ll take it if you’re offering.” He handed her one of the railing poles. The tops of them were ragged, unsurprising given the shitty construction. “Want to sand down the splinters?”

–

Even though she’d been younger then, Andy still held onto all of the memories concerning Lyon and before Lyon. She didn’t like to remember Tennessee for the sake of her own sanity, but France was easier to stomach. Kaden had been kinder to her than Keira had ever been. Claire was similar to her own parents, and maybe that should have comforted her some, but instead, it made her feel guilty and unworthy. Claire had made sure of that. At his question, she shrugged. “Small headache. Some lady came in wearing perfume that smelled awful and way too much of it.” It was probably that and the constant banging outside on the street from a group of high school students and their percussion instruments. Some end-of-year thing. “Plus the whole town reeks right now, so that’s not helping anything.” They were luckier, out where they lived, though.

She didn’t like watching other people do things. Andy would sooner fight past the headache as well as any other ailments and help somebody than sit idly by. She grabbed the sheet of sandpaper and the railing that Kaden handed over and got to work, not bothering with gloves. Her hands were calloused already from the amount of work she’d done to begin with, as well as having to deal with all of the hot and heavy trays at the bakery. “How was your day? You haven’t been doing just this all day, have you?”

–

Kaden nodded with understanding. “Yeah, I don’t understand why some people decide to bathe in perfume. Always makes me wonder what they’re covering up.” He was always glad that his nose wasn’t as sensitive as his ears were. Especially right now, with the town the way it was. “It’s not usually like this, right? You didn’t just invite me out to a stinky town, did you?” He was mostly joking, but he did have to wonder.

He huffed out a laugh as he leaned over the stairwell. The holes for the rails were in, well, interesting shape. He was going to have to fill some of those in with putty, no doubt there. “No, I had the early shift today. Definitely not doing this all day.” Good thing, too. He hated spending too much time inside. There was no way he’d have stayed in the cabin all day even if he’d had the day off. “Wasn’t bad. I had to chase down a loose dog. Then I had to get a raccoon out of someone’s house. Didn’t run into anything supernatural today so that was nice for a change.” It was rare that was the case in Wicked’s Rest. Most days he ran into at least one monster masquerading as a cat or dog.

–

“I’m sure the town stinks in some places, like Gatlin Fields, but…” Andy sighed, “not like this, no, not usually.” She wasn’t sure what was going on, but it all started with the fissures and the weird obsidian crabs, and then there was the ooze, too, that she still didn’t have an answer on. She wondered how Alex was fairing, if the smell was giving her headaches.

She was a little interested in what Kaden got up to at work, mostly because she couldn’t imagine him wrangling racoons from people’s basements. Andy continued sanding down the one side of the railing, looking up at her cousin as he reaffirmed what she had thought it was like. “It’s a little weird that these people might not know what they’re looking at, so they’d call a regular guy–” She paused. “Well, not you, but somebody else who might work for the department for something like a… I don’t know, a hellhound.” The thought was more terrifying than it was funny. “But I guess it’s a good thing, right?” She didn’t know if Kaden still hunted. Didn’t know if he tracked down defenseless people or creatures. To stay ignorant would provide to the problem, but she wasn’t sure she could stomach the truth.

–

“Well that’s good to know,” Kaden said as he continued to work. He peeked up to catch a glance at her as she wondered aloud. “If I had to guess, I’d say there’s a reason why the death rate for the position was abnormally high.” He felt bad about the poor saps who had tried to do the job before him. They had no fucking clue what they were getting into. They never stood a chance. “Gary’s the only other AC officer on staff and he avoids the field like the goddamn plague. Must have learned his lesson. Which is fine by me. It means he gets to do all my paperwork if he wants to be chained to a desk so damn bad.”

The gaps in question were filled, just had to wait for the putty to dry, so Kaden grabbed a rail and began sanding, too. “It works out pretty nice for me, though. Get paid for the shit I’d do anyway, which is a nice change of pace. Usually chasing after basilisks and bies is just a thankless job.” He could feel a twinge of tension in the air. They hadn’t really talked about hunting before then. In fact, they avoided the topic. All of them. “You, uh, don’t anymore? Do you?” Kaden dared to sneak a look over at his cousin. “I mean, uh, hunt. That is.”

–

Andy didn’t know who Gary was, but he sounded smart. While she couldn’t completely understand feigning ignorance about what happened in the town (especially with the casualty rate), she could understand being acutely aware of what you were equipped to deal with. Andy didn’t think that aside from the hunters' cache, Wicked’s Rest assisted much at all in keeping the town safe. After all, the emergency response units were a joke. “That makes sense.” Andy turned the railing over in her hand, examining it to make sure that she hadn’t missed any of the uneven wood. “Paperwork sounds like a bitch, so I guess you sort of lucked out there.” That, and Gary wouldn’t get in Kaden’s way. How far would Kaden go to eradicate something as simple as a snicker-snacker instead of just rehome it?

As he continued to explain what it was he liked about the job, Andy’s grip on the railing tightened. So he was still hunting, then– found fun in it, maybe? That seemed more in Keira’s wheelhouse. At his question, she looked up at him, brown eyes darkening slightly. How he could even think she would do that, or could after everything that happened. “None. Not at all.” She put the railing aside after she noticed the tension had made her sand down one side a little too far. She’d need to even it out. “How could I?” Andy’s expression wavered, but she fought for neutrality. “With Alex, it all changed. I never…” She took a deep breath. “Never really liked it anyway, so it was easy to give up.” The first time she’d been faced with a raiju, she’d let it get away on purpose, only for her dad to come up behind her and kill it in her place. She hated the way it sounded as it died, and she hated the way her father had looked disgusted in her, but proud in the fact that he’d rid the world of something existing within its own world, out in the woods where it wouldn’t hurt anyone else. “But I think you already knew that.”

–

Kaden did his best to keep any expression off his face, though he couldn’t quite keep his brow from rising a little at her answer. Not at all? He kept his eyes on the sandpaper and the railing in his hand, didn’t want to make this a big deal. Or make her think that he judged her or anything. He wasn’t in any fucking place to, not now. Not with his own worldview shattered into a million pieces lately. “Yeah,” he replied, “guess I did.” He’d noticed the lack of weapons in the cabin. Well, besides his.

“I don’t–” he started, looking away from his hands. Only he didn’t know what to say. Hell, he didn’t even know what he wanted to say. He let his gaze fall back down to the task at hand. “I mean I, uh, I guess you already know that I still do. Considering, you know. That.” He gave a small nod to the chest full of knives and guns and whatnot by the couch. “But, uh, I’m not….” How could he explain this to her when he couldn’t explain it to himself? “I don’t follow the code anymore.” Wait. That sounded bad. Didn’t it? “I mean, I do, it’s not like I don’t have any guideli– but it’s not my family’s. I don’t–” An exasperated exhale left his lips. Words still didn’t come to him, none that felt right. None that didn’t dredge up the events that brought him here. And he wasn’t ready to dive into that.

“Anyway, this banister’s going to be unrecognizable when we’re done. You won’t even believe it’s the same thing.” The smile he offered was half-hearted a best, but he hoped that she’d want to change the subject as much as he did.

–

Andy clenched her jaw tightly, just enough to grind her teeth. She watched him carefully, looking out for any telltale signs that there might be something else there. That there might be something he wasn’t telling her. No matter how hard she looked, she couldn’t find it. So instead, Andy dropped her gaze back down to the railing that she’d put to the side.

She stared at it for a long while as Kaden spoke, not sure she could stomach the idea of looking up at him. He fell over his words like she figured he would, but she was surprised to hear about his family’s code. Andy pressed her tongue up against the roof of her mouth as she stared down the shaved sides of the wood, and how the sawdust had fallen to a mess at her feet. She hadn’t even paid attention. “What are your guidelines?” She looked up to finally meet his eyes, but by then, he’d already looked away.

Now was as good of time as any to have the conversation she’d been skirting around. At first, she wasn’t sure she wanted to have it, but where her sister was concerned, Andy knew she needed a straight answer. Did she need to force him to look at Alex in shifted form so that he would remember the color of her coat so that in the chance she got loose from the shelter they’d built, he wouldn’t shoot? “I want to know. Because I can’t have you staying here if you’re a threat to Alex, or to people like Alex.” She emphasized the word, because that’s what they were. Not monsters. She’d met more monsters who wore skin like her own than those who shifted into something else. “I’m not trying to make you feel like shit, Kaden, and I’m not trying to misunderstand what you’re trying to say, but I need you to reassure me that you aren’t hunting people.”

–

Kaden froze. There it was. The question he was hoping she wouldn’t ask. Because he didn’t have an answer.

What are your guidelines?

He didn’t know. Not yet. That’s what he wanted to figure out. But he knew, he knew before she even said it, that his place here was contingent on them.

Before he could even begin to answer, the blood and the knife and the look on Damien’s face all flashed before his eyes.

The railing rattled and clanked as it fell out of his hands onto the ground. He didn’t remember leaning back to sit on the stairs, but he was. He didn’t know when it had become so fucking hard to breathe, but it had. He wasn’t sure what he had been looking at before, but now he was staring at the floor with his hands wrapped around the back of his head.

He concentrated on breathing. Inhaling and exhaling, trying to find the oxygen in the room. It was only after he could hear anything other than the sound of his heart pounding in his chest that he remembered that he wasn’t alone. Shit.

Kaden jolted up to look back at Andy. She had said a lot. More than just the first question. And she was waiting for an answer. Fuck, what was the question again?

Guidelines. His guidelines. And something about people.

“Sorry, I’m–” He cleared his throat, hoping to clear away the shakiness in his voice. “Felt a little lightheaded. But, uh, yeah I’m… figuring those out. I just know that, um…” The look in Keira’s eyes, the resentment and disgust, lingered in his mind. He bit into the side of his mouth, pain forcing him back into the present. “I know I don’t want to be–” Keira. He didn’t want to be her. But he couldn’t say it. Not that he was sure he could say the alternative out loud either. “I don’t want to be a murderer.” The last sentence was soft, subdued, something that would have been hard to hear if his cousin hadn’t been a hunter, too. And part of him wished she hadn’t heard him at all.

–

Kaden looked like he was going to fall apart at her feet. Andy felt a pang of remorse, but it didn’t last very long. She knew now that there was no way to avoid this conversation, not if she wanted to foster some kind of relationship with her cousin. Where Keira had been cruel and unjust, especially towards the two girls during their time in Lyon, Kaden had been kind. Andy wanted to be kind to him, but she needed to know that he deserved it first.

It was rich, Andy thought to herself, that she would try and dictate where her kindness started and ended, especially when she could hardly be kind to herself.

The only sounds to stir within the cabin were that of its worse-for-wear beams creaking with every gust of wind from outside and Kaden’s shallow breathing. Andy knew the look on his face, she’d seen it within herself every time she looked in the mirror after a particularly bad nightmare or close call with Alex.

Andy stayed silent, lips pressed firmly together. She should avert her gaze, look at something else– focus on the railing she’d sanded down too finely, maybe, but she couldn’t look away. The sound of Kaden’s heartbeat reached her ears, a rhythmic thump loud and clear– uneven, too. What the fuck had happened in Lyon? She knew that people like them, they were traumatized from an early age, but this was something else entirely.

As he began to speak, all Andy could do was listen. It was clear that something had happened to get him to this point. She wondered if it had anything to do with Keira.

I don’t want to be a murderer.

If Andy hadn’t been paying attention, she might have missed it. She maintained a neutral expression, all aside from the knot in her jaw. “Okay.” Maybe if she were raised right, or maybe if she hadn’t raised herself, she would have known how to comfort him. It was easier with Alex. She had practically raised her sister, even before their parents died.

Without saying another word, Andy got to her feet. She went into the kitchen and began to start the kettle. She’d spare him the horror of using the microwave to warm the water, but only this time. She decided to let him have a brief moment alone after the water had finished heating before returning with a cup of peppermint tea.

“This helps me.” She sat down next to Kaden on the stairs, holding out the mug to him. “Not always, but sometimes.” Though Andy wanted to ask what happened in Lyon, she bit her tongue. The answer she wanted had been given to her. He wouldn’t hurt Alex. Really, it seemed like he didn’t want to hurt anyone.

“I’m sorry.” It wasn’t often a hunter apologized– though, could she really consider herself to be one anymore? “For whatever it was that happened.” Sorrow clung to her like tar, sticky and unruly.

–

Kaden didn’t know where she went. Part of him was sure that she was walking away to pack his things for him and send him packing. How could she trust someone who didn’t know what they fuck they were doing? How could she let him stay there when he didn’t know what his fucking morals were anymore? Who would want him there after he failed his little sister and got his best friend killed?

He’d missed the part where she’d come back. How long had she been sitting there next to him? There was something in her hand. A mug. When he managed to process that it was for him, he took it with a small nod, only to stare down into the hot water, watching the steam rise from the cup.

I’m sorry. For whatever it was that happened.

“Nothing happened,” he said without hesitation, without thinking, only saying what he told himself far too often out loud to her in return. It was easier to lie to himself in his head. Speaking it was harder to pretend. I’m fine. Nothing happened. I just wanted a fresh start. I’m fine.

The silence hung in the air and the lies felt more and more hollow, their power to placate him fading away with every second that passed. Still, the last thing he wanted to do was relive it all. Again. And telling someone– if he told someone, that would make it real. It would start seeping in, and the wall he tried to build around himself would start to be washed away.

“Sorry,” he said, eyes still on the tea. “I mean, thanks. For saying that–” There weren’t words that felt right. “It’s…” He pressed his thumb against the ceramic wall of the mug, letting the heat prick at the pad of his finger to the point of pain. “There’s a reason I left. You’re right.” He just wasn’t brave enough to say it. “It’s–” What was there even to say? That he could say without falling apart? “Alex isn’t… she’s not the only werewolf I–” That he cared about. The words wouldn’t leave his lips. Hell, he wasn’t sure he could even find them. He hoped she could fill in the blanks.

–

He lied to her, just as she expected he would. She would have done the same. Andy sat in silence. Had it been Keira? His mother? No, he probably would have told her already if something had happened to either of them. Though she was not fond of her cousin or her aunt, she knew what it felt like to lose family.

As he spoke, Andy lifted her gaze to his hands. They were wrapped around the mug as if an anchor. Like if he didn’t hold onto it to the point where his knuckles turned white, he’d drift away with whatever memory was clearly plaguing him.

Andy steeled herself for whatever tragedy that had befallen him. Though he didn’t give her much to go off of in his initial admission, it was enough for her to understand. This was where normal people hugged, and where she should tell him that it was okay. But she knew it wasn’t. Because if anything were to happen to Alex, then that would be the end of it all. Judging by Kaden’s demeanor, Andy could take a few guesses as to what had happened with the werewolf he mentioned, but she couldn’t be sure, so she reeled in her assumptions.

“The world’s fucked up, isn’t it?” Fucked up in that you’re taught one thing and then that world crumbles around you and you’re left to flounder, and to question everything you’d ever been raised to believe. Andy guessed this was where she got lucky. She hadn’t believed in anything much at all even before her parents were mauled to death by the very things she’d been raised to hate. There weren’t many condolences passed onto hunters who’d lost loved ones. It was a part of the cycle. In part of breaking that, Andy rested a hand on his arm– a subtle enough gesture. “You don’t have to tell me the rest if you don’t want to.” There were things she wasn’t ready to talk to him about, but maybe she should. Just… not now.

“Just know that I… won’t judge you. For whatever it is.” Would that be true, if Kaden had been the one to pull the trigger? Or to shove the blade into the chest of the individual who he claimed to care about? Andy couldn’t be sure, but clearly whatever had happened had fucked him up enough that she didn’t think he’d be doing it again. Or maybe it was something else. Keira came to mind and her stomach twisted.

–

An unexpected laugh spilled out at her words. “Yeah,” he said, shaking his head, “that’s putting it lightly.” Kaden had to wonder how often normal people imagined what their life was like if they had been born into some other family, some other life. Everyone probably did every now and then, but he had a feeling that hunters let their minds wander in that direction more often than most. He knew he did. If he hadn’t been a hunter, would he have kept both his parents? Probably. Would he still have his sister? He didn’t imagine they’d necessarily be as close as some siblings, but he was sure they wouldn’t be where they were now. In some other version of themselves somewhere, maybe Keira got a chance to be normal. Her intense drive and determination could have been used for good. And not for–

Andy’s hand on his arm broke his thoughts. Probably for the best. It was strange, not the sort of gesture he was familiar with; not from family. Showing empathy or offering some sort of condolences, well, it just didn’t usually happen. Kaden was pretty used to it. What he wasn’t used to was the sense of comfort that spread over him. It was small, sure, but, as much as he didn’t want to admit it, it was the sort of shit he’d always longed for from his immediate family. It had been a long time since Keira had shown any sort of caring, been capable of any empathy. That had been stripped away from his sister a long time ago. She probably never even knew she’d lost it.

Kaden nodded at the offer to tell his story. It lingered there, dangling in front of him. The desire to let it all spill out on the floor and out of his mind was tempting, but it clashed with the fear of making the whole thing solid and real. The scent of peppermint wafted up to his nose as he inhaled deeply. It was clear, fresh, almost cleansing.

Putain. He’d have to tell someone eventually. There was no way he could hold onto this forever. Maybe if he just said a little, it would be enough to lift some of the weight. “I had a friend. He…” Fuck. His throat tightened already. This was going to be harder than he thought. “Damien. I, uh, knew him a while. Pretty close.” Understatement. He was pretty sure he spent more time at Damien’s apartment than his own whenever he was in town and not on a hunt, to the point where they joked that they were roommates. Not to mention that Kaden’s free time had pretty much belonged to Damien by the time he… “He got bit. Turned.” Kaden swallowed back whatever was threatening to spill out, not sure if it was emotions or bile. “Keira, she… She found out.” His thumb glided along the side of his mug while his teeth grit against each other. “I didn’t… So she–” Kaden clenched his jaw and did his best to focus on the tension, the pain. It was better than the alternative. It’s not like he dared to say anything more anyway.

–

Andy’s usual impatience fizzled as she sat next to Kaden. She felt as though any sudden movements might scare him away, or make him turn in on himself and decide that his trauma wasn’t worth bringing up. She held her own tucked beneath her tongue, not yet ready to face the onslaught of emotions that’d surely rise with their exposure.

As Kaden began to explain what had him falling apart at the seams, Andy stayed silent. She was good at it, sometimes. What Damien actually meant to her cousin, she could only guess. Her heart sank as he continued on, her own skin prickling at the mention of Keira. Before he even finished the sentence, she knew where Damien had ended up. It wasn’t entirely Keira’s fault that she had ended up that way. She’d been taught to believe one thing and she followed it blindly. Andy couldn’t begin to imagine doing something like that to Alex– to take a friend from her for the sake of what she was taught.

Despite the pain Kaden’s story made Andy feel, it reaffirmed that she’d done the right thing by leaving with Alex. She wasn’t always so sure. Somewhere in the back of her mind she wanted to believe that because they were blood, Claire would have helped with Alex. But she knew that wasn’t true. Alex would have died by one of their hands. Probably Keira’s, given this story. Andy still had the scars from when she and her cousin were forced to spar. She still remembered how Keira had laid her out, ridiculing her for not being able to beat her. Andy hadn’t wanted to hurt her cousin, that was all. Keira didn’t seem to care about that.

“I’m sorry.” The words felt weighted, but there were no marionette strings holding them up as an act. They were genuine, and they fell into the space between herself and Kaden. “I’m glad that you’re here.” Their earlier conversation had been heated– Andy’s accusations sharp like knives, but now she understood. Maybe not wholly, because at the very least, she still had Alex. She took a deep breath and stared across the way, testing the number of things she could say before deciding against the lot of them. “Whatever you think you did to cause it, or if you think you could have stopped it.. None of that is your fault.” She gave his arm another gentle squeeze. “I’ve… learned, over time. It gets easier. It’s fresh now, so…” Could she even tell him to give himself time to grieve when she couldn’t even give herself the chance to do so? Their situations were different, though. “It might not be okay, but you’ll… it’ll get better.” Andy cleared her throat.

–

Kaden had hoped that saying it, that speaking the words would be a relief, that the weight would lift, but he still felt it pressing down on his chest. His throat was tight and tense and he was going to start bleeding if he bit the inside of his mouth any harder. He knew why, what was threatening to let loose, but he didn’t want to. He didn’t want to fall apart any more than he already had sitting on the stupid steps holding a mug of tea while his cousin tried to comfort him. He didn’t want to cry. Some part of him worried that if he started, he’d never stop. The dam was cracking, though, bit by bit the fracture that had started out as just a hairline was growing bigger and bigger.

Andy’s words were another crack in the dam, even if the reason was the opposite of the rest. I’m glad you’re here. Putain, he didn’t realize how much he needed to hear that. All he could manage to do was lean into her ever slightly, feeling her shoulder up against his arm.

He didn’t know what he expected her to say next, but he hadn’t been ready for that. It tapped into thoughts and fears that he hadn’t even acknowledged yet, that this was his fault. Kaden found himself shaking his head, unable to accept her assessment of it all. Of course this was his fault. Of course it was. There were at least twenty different ways he’d already imagined how he could have prevented it. In his mind, there was nothing to debate. It was his fault, at least in some part, and he was going to have to live with that til the day he died. But he didn’t have it in him to argue. Or to say anything, really.

The stretches of silence were broken only by the small sniffles from Kaden. Since he refused to let any tears fall from his eyes, they threatened to find some other avenue. He held onto them, tried to stuff them away as they sat in the quiet of the cabin. “I’m not letting anything happen to Alex,” he said, sharply slashing the silence, turning to look at Andy finally meeting her eyes. “I know she’s not my–” Sister. Alex wasn’t his sister, no. He had failed his sister. “But I promise I’m going to look out for her. Or try to, at least.” He wasn’t convinced he was capable of protecting anyone at this point if he ever was in the first place.

His gaze drifted back down to the mug. The corners of his eyes started to sting and he continued to ignore it. “I don’t know what I’m doing yet. I just know… I just know that it’ll be different. That I can’t–” He inhaled and looked up at the ceiling, trying his best to hold off the stupid fucking emotions a little longer. “I can’t be that.” Not anymore. “All I want to do is try and keep people safe. Whatever the fuck that means.”

–

When Andy and Alex had arrived in Lyon, Andy had been pressed with questions. Why had their parents been intent on protecting their children instead of fighting? It was because the sisters were incompetent. At least, that’s what Claire had claimed. That their parents’ deaths were more so on Andy’s hands than Alex’s, but that they should have known what to do. That at the very least, they should have died with them. Andy had held onto that guilt for years. She’d seen the rage in Claire’s eyes, and in Keira’s, too. She’d felt it, with every punch that her cousin had thrown. While it took Andy a long time to realize it wasn’t her fault that they had died, she still felt guilt over the accusations thrown forth by her family members. If she couldn’t protect them, what made her feel like she could protect Alex if something similar happened?

The two sat in silence for a beat longer, leaving Andy to regret her choice of words. Had she gone too far? Just as she was about to say something– an apology, maybe, the sound of Kaden’s sniffling had her tighten her jaw. She wasn’t a crier, and she knew that he wasn’t either, so hearing him lean into his emotions rather than ward them off was a shock all on its own.

Andy tensed slightly at his words. She looked over at him, noticing the sincerity. “You and me both.” She had spent many years looking after Alex, raising her on her own– one state to the next from dirty and dusty hotel rooms to the backseats of broken down cars in junkyards. They were just kids, and while Andy hadn’t always made the best decisions, she had at least done right by her sister. Or, she hoped she had. Now that she had his confirmation that he wouldn’t hurt her, Andy felt all of her earlier worries melt away. Sure, there were the anxieties of Kaden running into the wrong people and it falling back onto them, but that couldn’t be helped. Even with herself and Alex, that was a possibility. “Me, too.”

“Thank you, by the way. For telling me. I know that it might have been a lot.” Andy removed her hand from his arm and rested it on her own knee, tapping her index finger against it. “I’m glad we had this talk. Honestly I wasn’t…” Her eyebrows furrowed. “It’s been a lot. Over the past few years. But um, I mean it when I say that I’m glad you’re here.” It would be easier with Kaden around, Andy decided. He would help her. They could be a family– a real one. Not one of those fucked up ideals of unity, guilt, and duty that her parents had always spouted. “She’ll come around to you, too. Eventually. Like I said, it’s… well, you can imagine. I won’t tell you her story, she can tell it to you herself when she’s ready, and you can tell her yours when you’re ready.” Andy smiled at Kaden, fighting back the exhaustion that’d begun to sink into her shoulders. The conversation had taken a lot out of her, and she was sure it’d taken a lot out of him, too.

–

It felt like his emotions were still trying to fucking drown him, but Kaden could feel the weight of the tension in the room lifting. It was easier to breathe, at least. Even if nothing much had really changed. Still, he couldn’t help but let out a small laugh when Andy mentioned she was glad they had this talk. “Yeah well, I sure didn’t plan on telling anyone. At least not anytime soon,” he said, watching his thumb as he used it to make circles on the side of the mug. “But, uh… probably good that I did. So thanks. For giving me the chance. For taking the risk, too.” Andy knew what she was potentially inviting into her house when she told Kaden he could come to Wicked’s Rest. She knew she was inviting a hunter to live with a werewolf. He was pretty sure he didn’t deserve that kind of grace or trust but there weren’t words for the gratitude he felt. Even if there were, he wasn’t sure he’d be able to say it properly anyway.

“I’m sure it’s just a matter of a few dozen more hours of being forced to listen to Taylor Swift,” he said, returning the smile. He knew it wasn’t going to be that simple by any means, but they had time. Kaden finally brought the mug to his lips and took a sip of the tea now that he didn’t have to brace as tightly against the wall containing his grief. She was right, it was nice just to have. Hell, it was nice to feel some sort of accepted. The cabin had felt more like a pit stop or a go-between for him since he first got to town and he’d figured that was how Andy saw it, too. It might be too early to say, sure, but he had a feeling that it might be more of a home than that, for him as much as for them. Kaden looked up and took a glance around the cabin, trying to see if it looked any different now.

Right. The railing. There was still sawdust all over the floor, the banister was in pieces, and it wasn’t even close to done. “Yeah, might have to finish that up tomorrow,” he said with a nod to the evidence of the unfinished project. “Sorry about that.” He sighed as he brushed some of the sawdust off of the stair with his boot. “So. Take out tonight? My treat?” It wasn’t a question so much as an offer that he was pretty sure wasn’t going to be turned down. It felt small, like his attempt at helping around the cabin, but it was the least he could do to try and extend even half the kindness his cousins– his family had shown him already.

#c: andy #declinlalune #writing #para #family matters #parental death tw

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