SD241812.09 | JL | Com Ivanova, Javaan Irelle | "Missixr þú hanxyn"

Posted on Sun Feb 19th, 2023 @ 12:18am by Admiral Rochelle Ivanova

1,138 words; about a 6 minute read

Mission: Lacuna
Timeline: BACKLOG

"Ég sakna hanxyn..."

The Trill words, spoken so soft, took a moment to register within Rochelle's mind. She was hopeless with that language, barely catching bits and pieces and putting just enough together to be somewhat passable during her time with Landon - but she knew, somehow, what her son had sighed against the frozen window pane... And it stung. It wasn't that it stung because it hurt her as a person, nor was it a slight against her company, but that it widened the hardly healed wound that was life post divorce. Her tongue worried her lower lip and she shifted positions in her chair, trying not to let on that she'd heard, and understood, Javaan. Her reading was suddenly so much less interesting, and her eyes continuously flit from the last word she'd read to Javaan and back - Several times, in fact - before she finally gave up reading and just closed her eyes to listen.

The divorce had been hardest on the boy. He loved his father, engaged in a form hero worship only practiced by sons - and she couldn't blame him. The Landon Javaan knew, and remembered, was indeed a hero. He was an attentive, loving, wonderful father who played hard and loved even harder. He was larger than life, a brilliant, dazzling, vibrant light that so many people admired and children spread rumors about concerning his flight and fighting skills. The Captain that had returned to the Vindicator from the dead - the one who branded Tr'Bak, the nastiest Romulan of all. Lying to him, telling him that his father was sick and away for awhile, was the worst thing that she'd ever had to do - especially when it was so brutally obvious that the child knew there was more to the tale.

So much more.

She stifled a sigh, setting the PADD quietly on her lap, and her reading glasses were carefully tugged off only to hang from her fingers as she pinched the bridge of her nose.

How the hell could she even begin to tell him that she'd left his father because of drug use? Only -- belay that... It was drug use because of having to process shit caused by their never ending fight with Tr'Bak... Belay that too... She'd divorced Landon because of Tr'bak, because he was slowly killing himself because of Tr'Bak by way of narcotics and she knew, or at least had thought, that she'd never be enough to fix him so long as the threat remained.

That would suffice...

Only Landon had chosen to rescind their divorce on a technicality because he was desperate to hold on to something that should never have been on the chopping block in the first place? How could she tell him that she'd started a new relationship that now was more complicated than ever before because she was still married? How could she tell him that she'd taken a bogus diplomatic mission to put space, literally space, between her and his father? Answer? She couldn't. It wasn't something a parent could discuss with a nearly three year old boy and expect him to understand, let alone be able to process.

It wasn't fair, that's what it was... Not... Fucking... Fair.

Know what else wasn't fair? That in spite of it all she knew that loving Landon was something she couldn't stop. They'd become such an integral part of one another, forever orbiting around each other one way or another.

Laying all of that on the shoulders of a small child wasn't exactly fortuitous and so... It was buried - albeit just beneath the surface - and meant to be ignored... Except she shouldn't. Not with Javaan sitting at frosted windows, watching the snow fall, and lamenting how much he missed his father.

As if sensing his mother's discomfort, Javaan slowly pulled his eyes away from the wintry scene outside the window and turned to watch his mother. Even to him she seemed small, maybe even fragile, as she fought the demons rising within her own soul. She looked tired, really, sitting there with one arm propped up on its elbow, glasses dangling from her fingers and the other draped unceremoniously across the coordinating arm of the chair she sat in.

"Momma?" He asked, tilting his head. A soft cascade of short chocolate hair followed the directional change, framing his face.

Realizing she'd been caught down in her own doldrums, Rochelle re-opened her eyes and flashed the boy a smile, "I'm sorry, Vaan, I must have fallen asleep. Did you need something?" It was as good a cover as any - the only one that came quickly to mind - but tasted so sour as she spoke it.

"Missixr þú hanxyn?" The boy never shifted his inquisitive gaze from her, reading the changes to his mother's face and expressions, pouring the Trill words into the air. "Ég saknay pabba, Momma, ekki þú?"

And they hit her chest like a sack of bricks.

"Yes," She answered with the smallest of nods, "I do. I miss him too."

"He'll get better, Momma. Don't worry. He wasn't coughing or stuffy when we colored. I'd know. I don't like snot. He didn't have any, so... He's getting better!" With that the boy left his perch to trundle over to where his mother sat. One of his chubby little hands reached up to pat the back of hers and he smiled that same, sure, comforting smile that she'd seen his father give so many times. "Maybe Santa will take him here and we can do the sticker tree and cookies and sing happy birthday to you!"

Another nod would have to suffice for the time it took for her to swallow that damned knot and she reached to cup her son's cheek, smoothing her finger across his satin soft skin. She'd give anything to protect such innocence, to preserve it from all that sought to destroy and corrupt it, but knew that such a task was a losing battle. Time would ravage it and taint the fairytale that children existed in - and there standing in front of her, a sniff over three feet tall already, was the evidence by way of a little boy who'd left his window - and imagination no doubt - to behave as an adult and console his mother. The PADD was damned, her glasses set on the side table next to the chair, and she found herself tugging her son into her lap and wrapping her arms around him, pressing her lips to the top of his head. "Maybe, baby, maybe."

The only thing certain was that something was going to have to change... And fast. Tr'Bak would pay for the damage he'd inflicted.

---

Commodore Rochelle Ivanova
Commanding Officer
USS VINDICATOR, NX-78213-F

Javaan Irelle
Golden Child

 

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