[s] disowned (moms)

[cibarium]

Eve had barely noticed the time pass at all as Leila went about her business in Other Ashdown, dealing with the Multitude and Conference both. She'd expected her wife to be home after she'd gone to bed, honestly, familiar with both the time-consuming nature of such meetings and the time-altering nature of Other Ashdown. So it surprised her to see Leila home before 10pm. She quietly crossed the main area of the house to put her familiar to bed, and barely responded at all to the welcome back, simply turning a bit to meet Eve's gaze for a second.

And she had a familiar look on her face, one Eve hadn't seen in years.

Something had happened. But more important things first: she was bleeding.  

[cibarium]

 

[cibarium]

Something had happened, and she couldn't even explain to her heartbreak to her own wife. Leila shrank away from direct touch for a couple of days. The event was still fresh in her mind, and she had discovered early on what Ezra meant when he said she'd regret trying to reveal anything that had happened: before the memory could cross over to Eve she would feel the searing pain in her left hand all over again. And it was all she could think about for hours at a time.

There was some comfort in being held while wrapped up in the huge lumpy brown blanket they'd owned for years. But not nearly enough.

The forced silence made things tense even though Eve reassured Leila throughout the day that as far as just the two of them were concerned, it didn't matter. Sometimes Leila gave willful looks in response, but it does matter, hoping Eve's intuition would kick in somehow and she'd be able to ask the right series of questions.  

[cibarium]

But when Eve caught her wife with her hand clapped over her mouth, weeping at the bowl of oranges on the dining table, she began to suspect something.

There wasn't much else she could think of to explain it.  

[cibarium]

Leila looked up at Eve a little later that day...

shibrogane

checking the wife for spookyvision

 

[shibrogane]

cibarium

Eve appears normal, rather like any other civilian Leila encountered in her day to day.  

[cibarium]

"I saw something," Leila said, her voice crackling wetly. "There were three of him..."  

[cibarium]

Three was a magically significant number.

"Of who, pet?" Eve gently asked. She reached across the table to take her wife's hand -- which, upon Aleksy's advice from some weeks ago, was now gloved. Leila had been resistant to the idea before. Now it had become a matter of safety. It made things tense to know there were things in her mind she had to hide.  

[cibarium]

"Ezra."

Leila squeezed her wife's hand meaningfully upon uttering the name, which took some effort. It was hard to say. She hoped, wanted to think she knew, that Eve would pick up on it.

She looked up again in a silent offer to show what she'd seen. A slow nod signaled acceptance, and Leila instructed Eve to close her eyes. She would see the two blurry images, one aflame as the Burning Man, the other recognizable as the burn-scarred Ezra they'd come to know, and how they walked away to leave behind the third one, unharmed and painfully real.  

[cibarium]

It was a strange, and shocking, and bittersweet image. Neither of them had many ideas what it could mean.

"When did you see this?" Eve asked.  

[cibarium]

Instead of answering, Leila shook her head.  

[cibarium]

Eve's suspicion began to grow, and along with it, some other feelings she didn't know what to do with. For the time being she set them aside. For the time being, she didn't respond directly to Leila's silence. Instead they sat together holding hands for a while, as Eve gently ran the fingers of her other hand through her wife's hair, and snatches of skin contact gave her glimpses of a deep pain too old to be so raw.