03-05-2022, 04:03 PM
While Malachi offered no explanation as to why he wanted other clothes, he was glad to hear his niece agree so wholeheartedly. She was right, too, in that it could provide a good excuse for her to practice the skills she had acquired. As they walked, his eyes wandered the passing shops, never lingering too long on any in particular. The most shopping he'd had to do for the last... fifteen years, or so, had been for whatever was needed of the church.
He kept his focus off of Nettie as she spoke, sensing perhaps the sheepishness that accompanied her first admission. There was nothing wrong with worrying for someone else -- he worried for her, too, but kept his anxieties in check with the knowledge that she could care for herself and had a full life of her own. She was not a child in need of constant supervision, no matter how often his thoughts defaulted to the idea when he let himself think of her.
What incident, specifically, she referred to when she said 'things have happened in the past' was not immediately clear to him; many things had happened, but which did she fear he might repeat? The question was not voiced, for the lack of privacy on the street.
But Nettie continued. Confessed, shamefully, to the fact that she had once wished for him to adopt her, and Malachi was taken aback. For all the reasons that he couldn't have done such a thing, her parents were probably the least of them, but he knew well that wishes were not bound by realities of fact. The young woman beside him had wanted him to be her father, not in the religious sense that he was, and he nearly felt his breath catch for the sorrows of a child's trampled wish. The answer would have been to tell her that it didn't matter, that she could think of him however she pleased, that he was a father to the faithful and faithless alike before he was anything else.
What came out instead was, "I would have."
Malachi glanced at her then, for but a glimpse of her face before he looked away. A redness pricked at his eyes that he neither acknowledged nor allowed to bloom into anything else. There was no use in thinking about what could have been, had his brother given her up, and had he not become a priest. Those decisions had been made for them both.
"If I had been able to. I would have."
It would have been impossible, of course, for reasons beyond those they could help.
"That is not an awful thing to have wished for. I wish that your parents had been more present, and that you wouldn't have even needed me," Malachi's smile was light; indecipherable. "But I am glad, too, that their absence meant that I could care for you. If anything is awful, it is that."
He kept his focus off of Nettie as she spoke, sensing perhaps the sheepishness that accompanied her first admission. There was nothing wrong with worrying for someone else -- he worried for her, too, but kept his anxieties in check with the knowledge that she could care for herself and had a full life of her own. She was not a child in need of constant supervision, no matter how often his thoughts defaulted to the idea when he let himself think of her.
What incident, specifically, she referred to when she said 'things have happened in the past' was not immediately clear to him; many things had happened, but which did she fear he might repeat? The question was not voiced, for the lack of privacy on the street.
But Nettie continued. Confessed, shamefully, to the fact that she had once wished for him to adopt her, and Malachi was taken aback. For all the reasons that he couldn't have done such a thing, her parents were probably the least of them, but he knew well that wishes were not bound by realities of fact. The young woman beside him had wanted him to be her father, not in the religious sense that he was, and he nearly felt his breath catch for the sorrows of a child's trampled wish. The answer would have been to tell her that it didn't matter, that she could think of him however she pleased, that he was a father to the faithful and faithless alike before he was anything else.
What came out instead was, "I would have."
Malachi glanced at her then, for but a glimpse of her face before he looked away. A redness pricked at his eyes that he neither acknowledged nor allowed to bloom into anything else. There was no use in thinking about what could have been, had his brother given her up, and had he not become a priest. Those decisions had been made for them both.
"If I had been able to. I would have."
It would have been impossible, of course, for reasons beyond those they could help.
"That is not an awful thing to have wished for. I wish that your parents had been more present, and that you wouldn't have even needed me," Malachi's smile was light; indecipherable. "But I am glad, too, that their absence meant that I could care for you. If anything is awful, it is that."
