Cry, Cry till the Sun Shines (Lancelot)

[Deleted]

After her realization in the middle of the night that perhaps all hope was not actually lost for her family, Barbara was feeling slightly more positive about the days ahead. She had some idea of what she could do to ease her life and those of her two children onto some semblance of an even keel. It was a starting block, and although she was tired from too little sleep, Barbara still managed to get herself up out of bed to go down to the pub to get herself breakfast.

She wasn't sure if she had much of an appetite of which to speak, but getting showered and dressed had felt temporarily rejuvenating. Any amount of caffeine that she could get sounded like an excellent idea, as well, if for no other reason than to keep her eyes open. Barbara had left the room that she had shared with Georgiana in hopes that her daughter would take the opportunity to sleep in while she could. If she needed her for anything—or, God forbid, if she had a vision of anything—she would be, for the first time in a long time, mere steps away from her.

As she went to go ask whomever happened to be working that morning if they could brew her up a pot of coffee, Barbara saw that her son had already come downstairs from his room, and he had found himself a table. “Hi, honey,” she greeted him, though there wasn't much use in trying to sound upbeat. “Did you sleep at all?” She hoped that Lance had had a more restful night than she and Georgie, but she wasn't counting on it.

lancelot ray linley

[Deleted]

@barbara

If anyone had asked Lance the day before if he thought he’d be able to get a good night’s rest after everything that had happened, he probably would have slapped them silly. If he had the energy to even do that in the first place. The mind numbing news of his father’s death had finally escaped his thoughts for a fleeting moment at some point in the night. That was just long enough for his exhausted body and mind to give in to the temptations of sleep. Passed out cold would have been one way to put it.

Unfortunately, in his state of absentmindedness Lance had thought it would be a good idea to set an alarm for the next morning. So there he was at eight o’clock sharp, scrambling over the tangled up sheets of his bed trying to shut the stupid clock up. It had never occurred to him that a simple muffle spell would have sufficed. Instead he slammed his hand down on it multiple times before it eventually stopped ringing, only to toss it at the wall. Of course it shattered to pieces and then he had to fix it back up again. The entire process was enough to incur the wrath of a hungry stomach, something that was going to be nigh impossible to fall back asleep with.

Cleaning himself up rather quickly, so as to not waste another minute of potentially starving to death, Lance popped the door to his room open and made his way down the hallway. He paused for a moment at his mom’s room, contemplating whether or not to knock. He didn’t really want to wake her or Georgie up, especially if they hadn’t been able to sleep as well as he had. The mere thought that he was able to rest so soundly under these circumstances was sickening. Turning away from the door, he continued on his way down to the pub level of the Leaky Cauldron.

There weren’t too many other patrons around. That seemed like it should be rather surprising for a Saturday morning. Then again, what would he know about the business practices of a British pub? He was just a fatherless, American wizard who only months before had been an orphan for the past six years. If the harshness of life had already hit its cataclysmic moment that fateful night all those years ago, then this was the sequel; it’s sweet revenge for giving him and Georgie the opportunity to possibly be happy and part of a family again.

Lance spotted a small, empty table off to the side of the room almost immediately upon walking into the pub and made a beeline for it. He didn’t realize that one of the staff was trying to catch his attention. The only thing he was concerned about was sitting down and getting food as fast possible. It wasn’t long before one of the staff was at the table and talking to him. It took a few seconds for it to click that it was his mom standing there, asking him if he had slept at all. Well, technically he wasn’t wrong about her being an employee. “Morning,” he stifled a yawn. “Passed out cold. Not sure when I fell asleep though.”

[Deleted]

Relieved to know that he had slept, although he had looked prepared to yawn, Barbara took a seat at the table across from her son. She had almost forgotten about the ring in his lip, though it wasn't as much of a shock now. Asking him about it was on her list of things to do at some point; she wanted to get to know Lance again, just as she had with Georgie.

She felt ashamed that she didn't know much about her son's interests these days, but interrogating him in that regard would feel something like mother-son speed dating. “I'm glad you slept well,” Barbara responded to what he had previously said. At least one of the three of them had managed to sleep through the night, since she certainly couldn't say the same.

Lance must have missed Art, she thought; it wasn't apathy that had allowed him to get his rest. Still, Barbara had learned from her first encounter with Georgiana that her choice of words was important. She didn't want to end up with anything else spilled on her. Once of that had been enough. “Have you had anything to eat yet?” There weren't any dishes in front of him, so she assumed that he hadn't had breakfast.

lancelot ray linley

[Deleted]

@barbara

She sat across from him. Lance had expected as much. They really hadn’t talked too much the night before, so he assumed this was going to be catch up time, or something of that sort. Outside of his parents showing back up out of the blue, he really hadn’t conversed with either of them. Actually, his father wasn’t even in the picture until he was dead. Lance felt a small pang of guilt for even thinking that. He would have liked to have seen him at least once. Art had been dead, in a sense, for six years already. Now he really was gone. “Me too I guess.” Lance responded with another yawn. He could do with another hour or two of sleep though. Once the alarm woke him up, there was no going back, unfortunately. Those extra hours would be restless ones; the reality of the last few days finally sinking in.

This small conversation wasn’t as bad as he had anticipated though. Probably had something to do with both of them wanting to avoid the questions and thoughts that had plagued them the night before. The last thing Lance wanted to do right now was reopen those wounds first thing in the morning. It was far too early to be doing that. “Not yet.” He answered, somewhat raising a hand to get the attention of one of the waitresses. He figured they would be over to the table quickly, with his mother there and all. “I need to though…it was kind of hard to put anything down yesterday…” That had slipped out. Lance looked down at the table as he waited for the waitress to come over.

[Deleted]

“Not yet.” As Lance said that, he flagged one of the waitstaff over to him. “I need to, though…” he acknowledged. “It was kind of hard to put anything down yesterday…”

Barbara frowned but wasn't upset with him. The only reason why she was capable of functioning well enough to get herself through the day—as minimally as that might have been—was because of him and Georgiana, Barbara thought to herself. It was difficult to eat without an appetite. “Try to eat something,” she advised, hoping that her son would take that cue to eat something that possessed some nutritional value. As far as she knew, her children were in control of what they ate while at school, but that didn't mean that they made healthy choices when it came to their food.

She looked over to the waitress whom Lance had flagged. The good thing about working at the Leaky Cauldron and having a good relationship with her coworkers was that they would be willing to make Lance something that wasn't on the menu. “Do you want something in particular?”

lancelot ray linley

[Deleted]

@barbara

What was the frown for? Because he hadn’t eaten yet? Or because he said that he couldn’t eat yesterday? It had been too long since there had been any kind of scolding to that degree, so he wasn’t sure if he had said something wrong. It was kind of unnerving. Going from having caretakers and professors to suddenly having parents again. Parent. Only one. He had to keep reminding himself about that. Lance was sure it would be a while longer before that fully sank in. There were parents, then not. Then they were back, and now was gone again. Muggle authors couldn’t write a better novel than this. Usually they got off pretty well with killing off both parents and sending the children to hated aunts or uncles or something. That seemed to be all the rage in England, anyways.

“I will.” Lance finally responded about eating something. He was rather hungry now. The events of the day before, as he had just briefly let out, had kept him from feeling any of that. The only thing that had existed was a constant drain on his energy from the weight of comprehending everything that had transpired. But now that was all in the past, his stomach yearned for something substantial. It would more than likely stay down too, which was saying something. Lance looked to see the waitress heading in their direction. As his mom mentioned having something in particular, Lance could tell that what he wanted wasn’t going to be on the menu. “Steak and eggs…” He stated quietly. “But they probably won’t have that so anything is fine I guess.”

[Deleted]

Lance's request was for steak and eggs, though he added that they probably wouldn't have that, so he guessed that anything was “fine”. Barbara smiled softly at him but gave no verbal response to him for a moment. He seemed to be forgetting that she worked at the Leaky Cauldron.

Addressing the waitress, Barbara made her tone evident that she wasn't trying to sound ludicrous. Steak and eggs might not have been a regular breakfast offering, but some things could be bent, considering that they wouldn't be going out of their way to look for any ingredients. “He'll have an order of steak and eggs,” she said, ordering for Lance, “and… I'll just have a cup of coffee for now.”

Once the waitress had gone, Barbara looked back across at Lance, clearly having lost her train of thought. “I… should've asked if you wanted anything to drink…” she apologized to him, realizing that he hadn't said anything about it before. “I'm… sorry, honey.”

lancelot ray linley

[Deleted]

@barbara

The waitress was over in a matter of seconds after he explained what he wanted, and his mother ordered for him. Clearly the workers there understood what was going on. He hadn’t thought about that, so they would probably bend over backwards to help as much as they could. The fact remained that the steak and eggs he remembered from back home probably wasn’t going to be anything remotely the same as what was produced in London. This wasn’t a muggle diner to start, it was a pub. Food was food though, and the effort alone to make his request would be enough to satiate his hunger. Anything whole and fulfilling was going to do him good right now. Lance gave the waitress a half-smile as the order was complete and she left. Just because he was on the verge of an awful mood didn’t mean he had to spread it to others. That had seemed to happen a lot lately at school with Georgie. He’d have to tread carefully now.

“No big deal.” Lance shook his head as he also realized he hadn’t gotten anything to drink. “I’ll just ask when she comes back.” Or he could waltz up to the bar and ask for something. His chair was really comfortable though, and the prospect of having food soon was enough to keep him planted there. “How’s Georgie doing?” She hadn’t made an appearance yet that morning. Hopefully sleeping as much as possible, which was the answer that he wanted to hear. Knowing her though, the strong front that had been up all day had dropped the second the door closed and he was in his own room. It wasn’t easy being so guarded.

[Deleted]

Shrugging off her oversight as “no big deal”, Lance asked how his sister was.

They all could have been doing better, but, from a relative standpoint, Georgie was alright. “She's… doing okay,” Barbara answered him. She paused then and grew quickly hesitant. “I don't know if she told you,” she considered, “but she had a vision a while back…”

Being activated by water, Georgie's visions happened daily, so to say that she had had a vision—in and of itself—wasn't unusual. It was what she had seen in that vision that was enough to continue to haunt Barbara, especially after the conversation that she had had with Georgiana in the middle of the night. “She said—She said she saw me and your Papa, and we were…” She swallowed. “We were leaving,” she said, her voice hushed.

“And I think,” Barbara sighed, “she's scared that'll happen again…” Even though Art was dead. She wanted to avert her eye contact from Lance, to look down at her lap to keep him from seeing her so worn down, but she just couldn't. It hurt Barbara all the more that she knew that her children knew that her having a job and ties to this foreign country in which they were now living wasn't enough—at least in their minds—to deter her. They had had good, stable jobs and plenty of connections in South Carolina, too. “I'm—I'm not leaving, Lance.” Her voice cracked. “I can't…”

lancelot ray linley

[Deleted]

@barbara

Hearing that Georgie was doing okay was somewhat of a relief. She hadn’t really shown any signs of anything. He had figured that was mostly for his sake, seeing as he maybe uttered a dozen words the entire day. Georgie had seemed…calm for the situation they were in, not that it meant she wasn’t feeling anything. That had to be impossible. The mention of his sister having another vision didn’t mean too much, except for the fact that it was about their parents leaving again. Lance took a deep breath as his mother continued talking, how Georgie is probably scared that she would leave again. He could feel a mixture of sadness and anger bubbling inside him, knowing that if he opened his mouth, things that didn’t need to be said would be. Taking another deep breath, the waitress returned with his food. “Thanks.” He stated blandly, looking up at her. “Think I could get an orange juice too?”

He couldn’t look up at his mother, and apparently she couldn’t do the same to him either. Taking a few bites of his food in silence, the waitress quickly returned with the requested drink before disappearing again. Another couple of seconds in silence and Lance placed his fork down on the plate. Holding in what he wanted to say wasn’t going to work anymore. It was self-destructive and needed to be released somehow. “What if it does happen again?” His whole body stiffened up, knowing that he was saying things that weren’t appropriate for this moment. “It seemed pretty easy for the two of you to do it the first time. Of course we’d be scared that you’d just up and leave like we don’t even exist. Like we don’t matter.” He tried picking his fork back up to take another bite but couldn’t because his hand was shaking too much. If Georgie was seeing visions of what may happen, then he had every right to voice his opinions on it, even if this wasn’t the time or place.

[Deleted]

“What if it does happen again?”

“Lancelot Ray!” She should have known that he would become defensive of what his sister had seen. For years, Barbara was reminded, they had been all that the other had had—just as she had been with their father.

“It seemed pretty easy for the two of you to do it the first time,” he fired back at her. She couldn't bear to meet his expression, but she knew that it must have been hostile. “Of course we’d be scared that you’d just up and leave like we don’t even exist. Like we don’t matter.”

Slowly, Barbara lifted her head, and she grabbed a napkin from the table to use in lieu of a tissue. “Lance… Of course you matter!” she cried. It pained her that he would suggest it. He and Georgiana had never stopped mattering. If they hadn't cared, they wouldn't have saved everything that they'd had in order to cross an ocean for them.

Barbara coughed and took a sip of her coffee, which had been brought over to her a few minutes before. She repeated her thoughts aloud as they ran through her head, tearfully hanging onto another napkin. “We had to wait until we knew it was safe. We couldn't put y'all through that…” At least, putting the children through that at a time when they had been certain that they would continue to grow up in the same place that they had always known—and attend school at Ilvermorny like she and Art before them—had seemed unthinkable.

After Art's funeral, she thought, her children would be able to return to a good school where they received three square meals a day and had the same opportunities for success as any of their peers. They still had every chance in the world to do what they wanted with their lives. “You're safe. It could've been worse. It could have been so much worse…”

lancelot ray linley

[Deleted]

@barbara

Lance thought he would regret saying what he did, but he didn’t. He welcomed it. Finally he was able to get all of this out after months. It probably wouldn’t be the end of it but at least the hostility, or the majority of it, would be gone. Then he could sit back and think about everything he was about it say. Her reaction was exactly how he had expected it to be, considering how awful it was. Of course it was all true though. When she said he mattered he found himself shaking his head slightly. “If we, your own children, mattered then we wouldn’t be here right now. All you ever say is that something horrible would have happened if you and dad didn’t run off into the night leaving us behind. Ever think that whatever it was that was after you might just casually show up and pick Georgie and I off since you weren’t there to protect us?” He swallowed hard, only stopping because the waitress had returned with his drink. Taking a sip, he stared into the glass, watching the orange juice spin around a little. “But you did put us through it. Shipped off across the ocean to a place we’d never been to be with people we didn’t know. No rhyme or reason why the two of you just up and left.”

He laughed slightly as she said it could have been worse. No it couldn’t have been. There’s no way either of them could have known how he and Georgie felt. It was impossible. Lance continued to shake his head. “Sure, we’re safe now, but that was the worst day of my life. Want to know why we barely reacted to dad’s death? Because we’ve already had to do that once. Doesn’t really have the same effect the second time.” That was a lie. It hurt more this time because he was actually dead. It hurt way more than he really wanted to admit.

[OOC: yikes O.O my bad that he's being mean xD]

[Deleted]

It wasn't long before Lance started in on her again, telling her that, if he and Georgiana had mattered to her and Art, “[they] wouldn’t be here right now.” He continued, “All you ever say is that something horrible would have happened if you and dad didn’t run off into the night leaving us behind. Ever think that whatever it was that was after you might just casually show up and pick Georgie and I off since you weren’t there to protect us?”

Lance was right in that they hadn't thought about every last detail. At the time they had left, her and Art's concern had been in throwing off their blackmailer, protecting their children without putting them at risk had been a fine line, tricky for them to navigate. It was why they had assumed that someone else would be there for them.

There was a welcome pause for Barbara as Lance sipped at the orange juice that had been brought to him. Barbara had to wonder if the waitress had been eavesdropping on their conversation or if her timing was just a coincidence. Once Lance had taken a sip of juice, though, he was right back at it. “But you did put us through it. Shipped off across the ocean to a place we’d never been to be with people we didn’t know. No rhyme or reason why the two of you just up and left.”

Somehow, Barbara thought, he had forgotten that that part hadn't been their fault. They hadn't lived in isolation in South Carolina; there had been a whole community there that could have helped to raise them, yet none of them had done it and had made it the problem of strangers at an orphanage on a completely different continent. She wasn't angry at Freddie Cache, to whom she was even more grateful for his generosity towards two kids from America who had no place in his country. She couldn't be truly angry at either of her children, either—frustrated with them, at times, for not trusting her—but never angry to the point of rage.

The entire situation and the memories that had accompanied that terrible past came crashing back down on Barbara, who had been reduced to tears as her son continued his tirade. It didn't help that she was exhausted and mourning, and so she sat there and took whatever else he had to get off of his chest.

“Sure, we’re safe now, but that was the worst day of my life.”

You and me both, Barbara thought. The day when she had left them had been the worst day of her life, too. Art's death was tied with it, though at least she had her children to help her through it.

“Want to know why we barely reacted to Dad’s death? Because we’ve already had to do that once. Doesn’t really have the same effect the second time.”

Barbara understood what Lance meant, though she couldn't make herself walk in his shoes there. Leaving him and Georgie behind once had been hard enough, and she was still feeling the gaping hole of Art's passing now.

She had been silent for long enough that she didn't think that she was going to cry again if she tried to speak. “We didn't think it would even be a year.” Barbara sniffed. “The next thing we knew, y'all were nowhere to be found…” When their children hadn't been on the register at Ilvermorny, they could have been anywhere… alive or dead. Hoping to inject something other than negative emotions into the conversation, she considered, “…Kinda like us for you, huh?”

Once she had spoken, Barbara realized that what she had said only sounded selfish. They probably thought that so much of what she and Art had done was. She looked back over at Lance, determined not to cry all over again despite the lump in her throat that was hinting otherwise. “Thank you for being here,” she told him. If everything that he had said was true, then he could have been at school instead—and maybe even preferred the idea—but had come because he knew that she needed him just as much as she needed Georgie. “I love you.”

lancelot ray linley
OOC: Maybe one more post each for this one?

[Deleted]

@barbara

There wasn’t much of a reaction from his mother until he finished talking. That was all Lance had asked for. He had needed to get all of this out for months now. It wasn’t necessarily pent up rage, he thought he was better than holding that emotion inside, but more disappointment in his parents and not understanding why thing were unfolding the way they were. He knew why she was making the excuses she was using though; they hadn’t actually thought anything through all those years ago. That was the only way any of this made sense to him. Was the government over there not accommodating of their employees and the issues they had? The one over here would practically bend over to help those that needed it, granted things were different, as he had learned at school over the last few years.

Lance shook his head at her comment about knowing it would be this long, and that when they had tried to find him and Georgie, they were gone. Then there was some equation to how that situation was the same as how they had woken up without any parents there. No. That was nowhere close to being the same. “But we were alive when you left us. We didn’t even have the opportunity to know that.” Lance took another bite of his food. He had cleared a lot of it away already, despite being so vocal during this conversation. Being angry like this, if anger was the correct word for it, kind of killed his appetite. “I wish I - we didn’t have to be here for this for these reasons, but we are.” That was slightly more reasonable of him, considering everything else he had said so far. Standing up, Lance took one last bite of his food. He wanted to lay back down now and get more sleep if possible. “Same.” Standing still for a second, he looked at his mother before leaving to head back up to his room.

[OOC: or that could end it? that's my last post though so if you want another one, that's cool xD]

[Deleted]

“But we were alive when you left us. We didn’t even have the opportunity to know that.”

Barbara could only wish that they had had some way to let their children know that they weren't dead. In the same way that families prepared for any other emergency, they should have done something. Both Georgie and Lance had been old enough to recognize some sort of sign—a symbol known only by the four of them—that could have told them what they needed to know. Maybe the other adults in their lives wouldn't have believed them if they had insisted that she and Art were actually alive and well, but they would have known. There could have been some hope to which they could have clung…

“I wish I—we didn’t have to be here for this for these reasons, but we are.”

“I wish we didn't, either, baby…” she answered back, looking up at her son with a sad smile as he stood from the table.

Lance hadn't explicitly said that he loved her back, but what he had given her was close enough.

lancelot ray linley
(Fin.)