wipeawaythedebt | Have Yourself a Merry Little Day or Trhee After Christmas

He spends the first few days back in a bottle, wracked with guilt and pain unlike anything he's ever felt. But it doesn't help. The memories, fresh as if they had happened last week instead of twenty years ago, won't leave him alone and here in Darrow there just isn't anywhere left to run. There aren't any wars to go off and fight, and while the temptation to hit the tables or see if he can't pick a fight in a bar somewhere is strong, he resists it. She wouldn't want him to.

Elizabeth.

Anna.

Two sides of the same coin and he's the one that had set them spinning. It was his doing, all of it. He sold his daughter to a man who promised her a better life than the one Booker could give and the man had been a monster. Comstock locked his little girl in a tower, treated her like an experiment and tried to make her his... sacrificial lamb or whatever the hell Comstock had planned. Booker still hasn't figured that out. There's nothing he can do to ever fix that.

But he has to start somewhere. For whatever it's worth, he is her father. And he had been planning on getting her something for the holiday before everything had gone so crazy. So today, even though it's after Christmas, he's standing at her door, freshly showered and shaved with a small package in his hands. Only he can't bring himself to knock. She'd made it perfectly clear when she moved out that she was done with him and after that whole mess back in New York she might hate him even more now. He doesn't blame her. He hates himself quite a bit these days. So in the end, he leans over and sets the wrapped gift near the doorframe and turns to leave.

Best if he's not here when she finds it.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Elizabeth knew he was probably lying. She'd gotten decent at reading him, but perhaps she was assuming on her part, too, knowing how she'd been feeling lately herself.

"Thank you," she replied, staring down at Oliver, who had come over to her now. She idly pet behind his ears, letting it steady her. "I - I'm glad you came around, you know. I - I think we probably should...talk."

He doesn't really like not having the dog to distract himself with, makes him feel even more exposed but there's nowhere for him to go. So he has to stay and face this, as much as he's been trying to avoid it. She's got a right to answers if she's got questions.

"What do you want to know?"

Elizabeth nearly admitted she didn't know where to start. She had seen the events unfold in front of her. She had seen the decision he had made and the one he eventually came to make. She wanted to be angry at him, but his one awful decision hadn't forced the man she thought was her father to lock her away.

She was tired of living in the past. She was tired of being angry and upset.

"What now?" she settled on asking, looking at him. There was no malice in her voice, no anger in her expression. She just didn't want to even begin to contemplate any future between them until she knew what he wanted. She'd be hurt too much before, and it made her almost guarded. "I don't - I don't expect anything from you because of this, if you're worried I might be."

"Ain't worried about that." And he's not. Her expecting anything out of him is the last thing he's worried about. He blaming him for everything, that's what's been keeping him up because she's got every right to. But does he say that out loud or does he not put that kind of pressure on her?

He's quiet a lot longer than he probably should be, but wrestling with oneself isn't an easy task. But in the end, she's taken him to task for lying to her before, so she shouldn't start now. "I know I don't have a right, not after everything, but someday, if you could maybe, just someday... Anna- Elizabeth. Elizabeth, I'm so sorry. Failed you in just about every way a man can."

The use of her - her real name - gave her an unexpected swell of emotion. Delsin had asked her, when she first found out, what she wanted to be called. She hadn't even considered using her birth name, that - that wasn't her, not really. Anna died the day she was given up, no matter how much she found herself wondering, lately, how her life would have been if it all hadn't happened.

But it hadn't, and she was still Elizabeth, as much as the name would always be attached to so much pain. She idly scratched behind Oliver's ears, the motion keeping her grounded as she tried to think of what she wanted to say. How she wanted to say it.

"What you did to me - I don't know how anyone could do that to their own daughter," she started, wanting to make it clear it didn't hurt her deeply. To know all her pain had started because her father abandoned her - it wasn't something she simply could forget overnight. After exhaling a slow breath, she continued, "But you came back for me. Even - even if you didn't know why. I don't - I don't know what's in the future for us, but -"

She looked away as she said the next part, unable to quite hold his gaze.

"I've lost so much. Too much. I don't - I don't know how to be your daughter, but I'd like to see you more than every few months," she explained. She didn't regret leaving, not one moment, but the fight had gone on long enough. "...If you really want things to change between us, I'm willing to try to start fresh."

He doesn't even know what to say to any of that. Doesn't know if he should be happy or terrified she's given him the opportunity to disappoint her again. He'll just have to keep his shit together this time. Remember what, who, is important to him and why. No more forgetting, no more pushing the memories down and thankfully without Columbia's tears and the Luteces' manipulations he should be able to keep everything where it is. As hard as it is to remember, it's probably better this way, for both of them.

As for the future, "I don't expect you to forget, Elizabeth, kinda surprised you even opened the door for me, but I'll be damned if I'm gonna have it slammed in my face again. Your Ma'd probably come back an haunt me if I did that." It's another thought that tears at him, that his precious Annabelle would never see the strong, stubborn girl she'd left behind.

Surprisingly, he finds himself wiping a tear from his eye at the thought. "She'd be so damn proud of you, Elizabeth and you're so much like her..." He can't quite finish the thought.

Have Yourself a Merry Little Day or Trhee After Christmas

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject