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Post by Adrien Baillon on Jul 1, 2010 0:21:54 GMT -5
"I didn't know," she whispered tearfully. "Then one day, I came home and Adrien's dear face was all bruised, and he said that he was being bullied at school, and it had been why he was quietly slipping... and then Adrien said he'd done it."
She fidgeted, unseeing and nervous, like she was on the stand. "I pretended to believe him but I rushed to Adrien when he was out and he told me everything," she said, biting her lip. "When he came back I wouldn't let him, but he pushed me down and - "
Her face twisted.
" - And he never came back," she spat out, almost venemously, but more with relief and closure. There was a decided lack of a cruel edge to Lucie, no matter what life seemed to have dished.
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Post by Adrian Veidt on Jul 1, 2010 0:31:21 GMT -5
There was a long silence again, confronting Adrian with his lack of human understanding. He reached toward her, then lowered his hand again, unsure of what to do.
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Post by Adrien Baillon on Jul 1, 2010 0:36:47 GMT -5
She looked down again and shuffled through her pictures. She had so few. She laid out what was left - school pictures of Adrien during the last years of his life at home. Even at fourteen it was uncomfortably obvious why Père André would take notice of him; he was complete jailbait, sitting in dishevelled school-clothes and lying about in a way he had even know, moony and supine and pretty.
Lucie carefully tucked this up, about to put them away, but pausing and sitting back.
"Père Wozniak," she said uneasily. "He... didn't he."
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Post by Adrian Veidt on Jul 1, 2010 0:38:07 GMT -5
"Yes."
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Post by Adrien Baillon on Jul 1, 2010 0:39:12 GMT -5
Her lip trembled but she set her mouth almost defiantly.
"He took after me," she said sadly.
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Post by Adrian Veidt on Jul 1, 2010 0:47:15 GMT -5
"He turned out a fine man," Adrian assured her, raising his hand for her to clasp again.
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Post by Adrien Baillon on Jul 1, 2010 0:55:55 GMT -5
She took it almost clingily.
"After that, we didn't hear from him," said Lucie calmly, although not in the manner her son had - of repressing everything and bouncing back. She seemed genuinely resigned, a more resilient person than her son. "I suspected, and I confronted Wozniak - invited him over, you know. I offered him tea," she said, taking a sip of hers. "I didn't ask him - I just fretted, in a mother's way. He suffered a decade in hell, listening to me grieve; you could see it in his face. After that he quit teaching and burrowed deep into the church. I hope he never forgives himself. Aucoin - well, he didn't go by that when we met - was fifteen, and that is somewhat understandable; Wozniak was older than I am. Only by a small number of years - but this is hardly acceptable in his position."
She sipped a bit more and leaned back, steeling herself; there was something dainty in her movements that neither Divine nor Adrien had, though both of them mimicked it a bit in their own ways. She was so small and so quick about everything; more than anything else she resembled a hummingbird. "I think he loved him. He wasn't very old, emotionally; it was like a schoolboy crush on another schoolboy, but he was a man about it. Still, it was all very wrong."
She sighed, and looked down. "I wish he had told me..."
But she cut herself off, and steadied herself with another swallow of tea.
"I think I was expected to be shocked, and perhaps even horrified - I still belong to the church, Mr. Veidt - when I heard about him in the papers, recently; but I was elated. I had envisioned horrible things - I don't doubt I am right about them - but he was well, and safe, and happy; he hadn't died, for one, I know boys can do rash things, and vulnerable people can be the victims of them..." She stroked her own narrow throat almost nervously, but in a thoughtful way; it seemed to be a tick of hers. She was clearing her mind, making sure nothing was left out.
"...Paul wasn't pleased, though."
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Post by Adrian Veidt on Jul 1, 2010 1:03:16 GMT -5
"Not many people were," Adrian replied as delicately as possible.
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Post by Adrien Baillon on Jul 1, 2010 1:04:17 GMT -5
"Well, Paul is just going to have to live," said Lucie diplomatically. "Because there is something he doesn't know about Adrien."
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Post by Adrian Veidt on Jul 1, 2010 1:08:44 GMT -5
Adrian glanced at her. He was wondering if this was something he knew about Adrien.
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Post by Adrien Baillon on Jul 1, 2010 1:10:30 GMT -5
"...Which is that he would never have to need someone like you to compensate for me if I hadn't failed."
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Post by Adrian Veidt on Jul 1, 2010 1:18:30 GMT -5
That was worse. He sighed and probably looked inappropriately sulkish.
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Post by Adrien Baillon on Jul 1, 2010 1:23:59 GMT -5
"You're wealthy and influential, and tall and strong and well-spoken, and educated; you can protect him, you have power, you're practically undefeatable. Everything you touch turns to gold. And, well, you're a saint besides," she added with a little, nearly-embarrassed smile; "he likes that. But don't you see, Mr. Veidt? You're the exact opposite of what I have been for him as a mother - "
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Post by Adrian Veidt on Jul 1, 2010 1:32:33 GMT -5
"I doubt it's that."
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Post by Adrien Baillon on Jul 1, 2010 1:40:11 GMT -5
She shook her head and finished her tea, with a little bit of a shrug.
"Mr. Veidt... do you want any of the photographs of Adrien when he was a baby?" she asked a little timidly.
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