Post by Casey Winslow on Apr 17, 2009 1:35:36 GMT -8
Friday, October 15, 2010
Despite all its beauty, the world was an ugly place. Casey had been reluctant for years to accept what he now viewed as a truth. Evie had been missing from his life for a few weeks now, and he had no real knowledge of where she was. Certainly, the papers had reported an accident of some sort, but the fact that he could not be there for her was slowly driving him mad. And the truth was he didn't necessarily believe a word of it, and thoughts of what could have actually happened to her plagued his mind. Had she told Trevor that evening what he had said? Had the bloody bastard panicked? Did Evie even remember him at all? Yet, if he had panicked, why was he still alive here? or was Trevor simply playing mind games with him, waiting for the opportune moment to strike?
"Are you ever going to leave the window?"
His son's voice made Casey jump, the bottle of firewhisky falling from his hand, what was left of its contents spilling out on the hardwood floor. "Be a little sneakier next time, eh? Give me a bleeding heart attack next time, will you?!"
"Certainly, dad. Right up there on my list of fun things to do."
Scary part was that Casey actually didn't doubt it was. He sighed, leaning against the window sill and resting his forehead against his hand. "Sorry, Jules. It's only--I'm stressed."
"Don't worry about it, dad," Julian replied. A little wary of how calmly he'd said it, the boy's father looked over at him.
"I know I haven't been the best fa--"
"Don't worry about it, dad." There was an edge to his voice this time.
"I'm sorry, son."
"Really, don't worry about it."
"I'm your father. I'm going to worry, especially when I cost you your mum and your sis--"
"Shut up."
"I've shut up too long already."
"Exactly. You haven't been much of a father for years."
"I did my best, Jules..."
Julian stared at him a moment before laughing derisively. "Oh my god, you actually believe that, don't you?"
"It's true."
"All of my life, dad, you've been this come-and-go figure. You know, I never really liked Quidditch, dad." He paused, watching almost stoically as his father opened his mouth to speak, but he cut him off. "I only pretended because I wanted so desperately to be close to you. I wanted to be something special to you. I wanted you to love me."
"I did love you," Casey protested quietly.
"No, you didn't. And I was never good enough for you. Never!"
"Yes, you were." But Julian didn't seem to hear him as he spoke over him.
"You know when I was in class with you, you showed more interest in everyone else. You graded me harsher than everyone else. When I took my first test in potions, I came to class early just to show you my marks. I wanted to see so badly that look on your face. I wanted to hear out of your mouth those words, dad. 'I'm proud of you, son.' But no, not even so much as a, 'Good job, Jules.' No, it was, 'Can we please talk later? I'm not feeling well.' I believe those were your exact words. Weren't they, dad? Weren't they?" Casey swallowed, blinking back tears and trying to find words, but none would come. "Don't you even have anything to say for yourself?" Tears formed in the boy's own eyes as his father failed to speak. "I hate you," he said in a harsh whisper as he narrowed his eyes before turning.
"Julian, wait!"
"I'm tired of waiting."
Casey sighed, taking in a deep breath and releasing it slowly as he stared at his son. He had to remember he was too young to understand fully what he had been through, and he had to remind himself he'd just lost his mother and sister. He couldn't bite his head out for speaking to him like that. More importantly, he couldn't invalidate what Julian had said or he'd lose his attention. He shook his head. "Jules, I know I haven't been the best father in the world, but I've tried. That has to count for something. I'm at least here. I could have chosen to leave, but I didn't." He sighed again, pausing a moment and looking up a little to try not to let himself tear up as he remembered being in his office that day when Evie had interrupted him.
"I know you probably can't remember all the good times we had when you were little anymore. All you can remember is me when I was so depressed, lost. And I'm sorry for that. I want to make it up to you. But you haven't exactly made it easy for me to even try. Every single time I come near you anymore you yell at me or turn your music up or tell me how much you'd rather be with Sam and Lucy rather than me. And I try to give you space. I didn't want to force myself on you. I wanted you to come to me about your mum, about your sister. I wanted us to work through this together, but then I made my mistake, and then when I finally managed to spend time with her again, you insisted she wasn't mum over and over again. I couldn't stand hearing that. I didn't want to believe that.
"And I should have pressed you to talk a little more than what I did, but I was so afraid of pushing you away farther than I already had, but I see I managed that royally anyway. I suppose hindsight truly is twenty-twenty." He gave a dry chuckle. "You have to believe me when I tell you I tried my best, but I'm only human. I'm no one special, son. I'm just a father who's lost his daughter and is trying to figure out how to take care of his son and a husband who has lost his wife and is trying to get her back."
Julian was quiet for a while--too quiet. Casey wanted to come closer, but he didn't want to scare him off. "I wanted to be just like you," he said at long last, his voice quiet and eyes not quite on his father. "I wanted to be strong like you, to be confident like you. I wanted to know what to say and when to say it like you always seemed to. You were my hero. I used to hear all those stories about how you saved mum, how much you loved her, and I used to hear everyone say how you were the wonder couple. I always would imagine it, and as I got older, I wondered what I would do in the same situation. But then you lost it, and I'm sorry, dad, but I just can't view you the same anymore. I feel like I don't know you anymore. You're not that brave person anymore. You're just like everyone else."
"Only worse?" Casey interjected hesitantly.
"Yes," Julian admitted. "You hurt mum, being the way you were towards her my first year. And then I'd see you sometimes going to that woman, and the way you looked at her sometimes was the way you used to look at mum..."
Casey shook his head slowly. "If you think that Kara and I did anything, Jules, we didn't. It was platonic, completely platonic. And I know I hurt your mum. I know it, and I hate myself for it. I have to live with the fact that I treated her that way, that even though things started getting a little better after the attack on Hogwarts, she still likely felt some sort of resentment towards me. I have to live with the fact that I failed her the night Trevor took her. I have to live with the what ifs of if I had listened to her and just let her go to him when he sent that letter. I have to live with the fact that when I get her back, she'll probably hate me for letting Lydia die, and that even if she keeps it to herself, she'll probably always feel that way to some degree.
"But the fact of the matter is, Julian, that you hurt her, too." Casey left it at that, walking towards his son and resting his hand on his shoulder and lightly giving it a squeeze. "I love you, but I'm going out. We'll talk later, ok?"
"Ok," Julian replied.
~*~*~
It was only a few minutes later that Casey had taken the polyjuice, redressed, and had headed to the Abby. Ever since meeting Kara here that one time, he had frequented it, figuring that even though it wasn't his favorite place, it held less of a chance of running into someone he worked with and having to deal with that when he was already stressed. Maybe, if he was lucky, Kara would be here. If not, then someone would be there that he could talk to most likely. As it was, he sat down at the bar, greeting Liam and asking for his usual before going off to a corner to sit down. He didn't much feel like talking to the Irish man.