In Which Rennie Wonders How

January 1, 1189

Rennie neither knew nor cared what Lyssa would think of her commandeering her bedroom. It shouldn't have been much of an issue. Lyssa was still dancing the night away, and Rennie didn't think she'd need more than a half hour's peace. If Lyssa minded someone else just resting on her bed, minding their own business and not snooping anywhere private, while she wasn't even around... well, that was her problem.

Though, Lyssa never minded that sort of thing. Rennie only considered it because she herself might have.

In the past, at least. Her personal neuroses lay half-abandoned in the wake of everything else going on.

The final letter from Rome had arrived. The church had threatened her grandfather with excommunication for his insistence, but it had proven an empty threat when they'd learned just how little he cared. The scandal of it, no doubt. It had been less embarrassing than letting her parents divorce.

She guessed she was glad of it, or ought to have been. Her mother, at least, would be better off. Her father would too, in time. Lord knew she and her siblings were doing as well as they could.

She'd liked having a family, though--as fucked up as that family might have been.

"Rennie?"

She rolled her eyes as he knocked. Her cousin Sev, probably wondering why he hadn't gotten a kiss out of her this year. He'd pestered her enough about it in the past couple months. She didn't have time for this. "Get lost."

"Relax, Ren. I'm not here to pester you." Sev shuffled in, fingers in his hair. He did have nice hair, she'd grant him. "I just wanted to see if you were all right."

She didn't want to lie to him. So, she said nothing.

"Your parents?"

"That obvious?" She slid off of Lyssa's bed. The wooden floor might as well have been jagged rocks.

"It's not as if it was a secret. And even if it was, your father is my uncle; I would have found out eventually."

"I suppose." She sighed. He probably didn't know what to say beyond that, and she guessed she appreciated his not trying. He didn't know what she was going through. He didn't know it would get better. But he knew that he didn't know. "How are your parents still happy, after all these years?"

"I don't know. I guess they have their own lives and they have their life together and they support each other no matter what." That sounded... well, like more than her parents had. Her father had his own life. Her mother had had her life with him.

The support had been woefully one-sided.

"That's a nice idea."

Sev shrugged. "I like to think so. It's a pity not every couple can be like them."

Indeed. There had only ever been one person who could make her father happy. Rennie had her suspicions as to who it had been, but suffice to say, her mother was out of the running. For all she'd tried. "I hope you'll have something like your parents have one day."

"Thank you." He stepped up and engulfed her in one of his warm, firm hugs.

"I hope you'll have something like my parents do too."

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