All in all you're just another brick in the wall

*Torin* · (This post was last modified: 09-05-2020, 11:36 PM by Torin.)

In truth, Torin didn't know what he expected as his father's reaction, but the slight softening he saw in his father's demeanor wasn't it. For a brief moment, his own defenses went down, and he looked at his father with all his vulnerability on clear display. But soon enough the walls would come slamming back up, closing off as he listened to his father. His lips curling and Torin squeezed his eyes shut.

Shut up! Just shut the fuck up! He thought to himself, only just managing to keep himself from yelling it directly in his father's face. He grit his teeth, the anger flooding through his whole body again, the shaking starting again. But it was only a mask, he was angry on behalf of his sister; furious that his father dared to insinuate that Jewell had done anything but give her whole being to raising those kids. But he was also hurt, deeply stung to his core as if his father had managed to strike at the real issue he himself had been trying to ignore this whole time.

"You don't think I haven't been telling myself that this whole damn time?" He spat, his voice raising to try and mask the quiver. "All day I've been telling myself that if I wasn't such a colossal fuck up that she'd probably still be alive. I've been asking if it had been Mom or Rory if there would have ever been an issue, they would have known when to tell them about their father, would have kept a better watch on them." There wasn't anger in his voice anymore, he wasn't speaking from anger anymore, but deep-seated fear. He didn't belong here, he was holding a position that was never meant for him and fate seemed determined to punish him at every turn for it. "I can't stop blaming myself, I can't stop thinking this wouldn't have happened if anyone but me had been involved."

He couldn't look at his father, he thought he knew what he'd see there. Resentment, disgust, all the things Torin himself had been nursing for years. He knew he had screwed everything up. But he had been the only one to step in when the pack had needed someone. Now he was certain it would have been better off without him.

Still Zell continued to speak and the anger returned, he grimaced through his tears. "I was still here. Breasal was still here." He snarled, lips curling. "Maybe we were grown but we were still your children. But you never tried to reach out to us. You only ever seemed to care about being around Kairi, so don't give me that bullshit!" Zell's final insinuation was too much though.

"And why the fuck should you have any right to the children of a woman you've done nothing but belittle and berate, for no reason I can see?" He roared, rising to his paws, now staring his father down with all his fury. "No one ever fucking told me what she did to make you hate her so much! I didn't know what I was dealing with that day you threatened her and her children. You think I wanted to be put on the spot like that? You think I was happy having to chose between you or her? You may not have accepted her as your daughter but Jewell is my sister." He was seething, his chest rising and falling rapidly with his anger. "I thought I was doing what anyone would have done, protected a vulnerable, scared wolf. But apparently, in your eyes I declared war on you and everyone you loved. I would have done the same for anyone, for Kairi. Once I would have thought you'd do the same. Apparently, I was wrong."

"Do you hate her because of Mom?" He was suddenly hit with the possibility. "Do you hate her because mom was the one that brought her in? Because she represents Mom? You're not the only goddamn wolf in this pack who was hurt by her leaving you know! I never even got to tell her about what I'd done before she was gone again... I've lived the last two years of my life certain that if she came back know she'd be met with nothing but disappointment. I worry that she left because we disappointed her..." He trailed off, unable to pursue that train of thought anymore, the fight leaving his body again as he collapsed back onto his haunches; huddling over himself and sobbing.

"That I disappointed her." He whispered to himself. He wasn't even sure anything he said was coherent anymore, he was simply a boat on the rough ocean of his emotions, unable to contain all his fears and doubts anymore now that the flood gates were open. Maybe he'd been off the mark about why his father hated Jewell, did it even really matter anymore? Whatever the reason this was the one division between them that it seemed neither would be willing to try and mend. Torin had only ever wanted to maintain peace in his family and he had failed... he'd made his bed and laid in it.

"Silent Treatment" & Deep thoughts

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