Friday Writing Response for July 31, 2009

This week's writing went a bit easier than most, because I wasn't trying to fit it in with everything else I had going on. Instead I just sat outside on my day off, on my front porch, propped my feet up and wrote. The sun was shining, the bugs were leaving me alone (for the most part) and I got a scene done.

For the Imperial Story, as most of my writing has been lately, and using the prompt from the Fray: I'm losing you and it's effortless. Told from Anitra's point of view, set after her and Briyant rescue the Lambazzias.


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[Rosaria] paused for a moment. "There's still room for you to travel with us, you know. Wakka will never ask for it, but he could use Briyant's help. Your help."

Concentrating on the bedsheets, I found it hard to meet my mother's eyes. "Our place is here, in the Underground. You know that."

She took the top blanket from me, spreading it on top. Her bed always looked crisp and sharp, from the years she had spent working in our village's hospital. "It wouldn't be permanent. Just one mission, like we used to."

I wasn't the only one trying to hang onto the past. As much as I wanted my family to come back together, the way we were before the Great Raid, it was a fool's dream. The kids we were then were only shadows of the adults we'd become. "Briyant and Wakka will never work together again," I reminded her softly, tugging the pillowcase onto the pillow. "Both are too stubborn, wanting to lead."

"I'm sure they can find a way to work something out."

"Not for Briyant." I gave Rosaria a small, sad smile. In her heart I knew she'd done what she thought was best, caring for the lost little boy she'd found. It wasn't her fault, what Wakka had raised him to become. "He's handling this better than I thought he would - at first, he only agreed to the rescue because I wanted to do it. He's accepted it, now."

"He's still that angry with us?" With the bed made, there was nothing left to do with her hands, and Rosaria sank into a sitting position on the edge of the bed. "I only tried to do what I thought was right. To give him a home."

Sitting next to her, I took Rosaria's hands in both of my own. It killed me to see her like this, the woman who had always been our beacon of hope and light when the world seemed like it was coming to an end. "He doesn't blame you, just Dad, mostly. Because you never told him the truth about who he was, and how we discovered what happened. In one night, he learned his entire life had been a lie. That's not something you just get over."

Her eyes glanced up to mine. "And what about you? You were angry enough with us to leave too?"

"It wasn't like that." Not for the first time, the guilt welled in my stomach, but I forced it down. "He wouldn't stay. And I couldn't be without him again." I didn't regret my choice, but that didn't make it any easier to live with.