Wrong Address, Return to Sender

Recluse pulled and pulled and finally it felt like something moved, and the desperation grew. With her eyes closed, her posture stiff she desperately pulled and pulled in her mind, this feeling growing stronger and stronger as whatever was at the other end grew closer. She prayed it was her daughter. She reached the end of the thread, feeling whatever it was she was grasping mentally slip away from her grasp and Recluse sat still for a moment, holding her breath. At first, she could sense nothing, no scents, no sounds. Then a voice, and her whole heart dropped. The woman slowly opened cherry gaze, though it was narrowed as she swung it towards a very familiar figure. A flurry of emotions flowed through her, a terrible terrible sadness, the well of grief she'd been holding in her chest opened up into a wide chasm, there was a disappointment and a fear... What if Kali didn't want to see her? What if her daughter blamed her for her death? Then she defaulted to what she always did, cover all the pain, all the scary emotions with anger. Old reliable anger, it was what she'd used to mask herself when it wasn't safe to be open, and it hadn't been for much of her life, in no small thanks to the man standing before her.

The woman rose to her paws, letting that anger flow so he would not see her desperate pain, her lips pulling back and a growl rumbling in her throat. "Go back." She said, her voice was low and dangerous, no explosive rage, just low simmering anger. "Go back and send your brother, send Jigsaw." Give her someone she missed, someone she actually missed. Not this man, not this man who'd destroyed her, had left her to rot as a child, had gone off to fuck someone else while she nearly died from his abandonment, who'd returned only to make her a bastard and fail to understand all she wanted, all she'd ever wanted was an apology for what he'd done to her. When last they'd seen each other she'd still been a child desperate for the approval of the man whose lack of love had nearly killed her, she'd wanted nothing more than to hear she was good enough. Now she was more than that, she'd been a queen but she didn't define herself by that. No, she was a mother. A devoted caregiver, who's children had filled that desperate hole of approval, their love had filled her up. Had let her see herself as worthy for the first time in her life, had let her be vulnerable enough to find love, to find her husband, to know someone could love her for more than blood.

But her rage cracked. She'd learned to be vulnerable, it was healthier maybe but in this moment it was a flaw... "Go back, find my Kali... Send her to me, please, I just wanted to see her again. My baby, I just wanted to see my baby..." She broke, her voice rising from a low threat to desperate begging. "I only want my daughter..." Fuck, she crumpled upon herself, unable to stop the emotion flowing from her face, her words and her tears. She just wanted to hold her baby one more time...

speech think action