I….would giggle, actually, if I were to think about the first time I met my Big-Big Brother—that is, if it weren’t so heartbreaking of a meeting. I don’t actually remember any of these things; my brothers told me the story, as well as Father. They told me so that I would know how I came to be in this world, that I would know the beauty of my Mother—and how awful, awful, awful her passing was, the lost chance of our meeting.

They tell me I had stumbled around, tiny and helpless as anything; I had touched Reginald first, quavered my way toward him, knocking against him, his greyness, the stone-like lines of his body in search for something that would soothe the stinging ache of hunger that gnawed my belly. Of course I know better now, that one should not look for woman’s milk anywhere near the person of a man—but I was a babe, barely even swaddled, and he was the first warm body that I touched, that would touch me. I probably didn’t cease my bleating, even with a touch that would become so comforting to me later, later.

I don’t suppose he knew what to do with me. Poor Brother, but I know how Reginald can be when it comes to little children—clueless and short-tempered, I’m sorry to say. I cannot guess how patient he was with me, a tiny little ball of fur searching him for a full teat. Oh my—but how ridiculous that thought is! He was saved his dignity, luckily, by an even larger shadow, a monolith of onyx and ivory with eyes of molten gold, rumbling something gruff and smoky that rumbled in ways that I couldn’t fathom.

Father.

He named me, then. He took me into his embrace, whispering things into my ear, nonsense that I wouldn’t be able to sift through in my own memories. But he named me, then. Macaria. In those moments, nestled as I was against my father’s bulk—I would suppose I felt his heart beating, beating, beating in his chest, the world rumbling into ruins with the strength of his misery. I didn’t know Father was in misery, then—I only knew I was hungry. I confess I must’ve knocked into him as well a little bit, searching for some treasure that instinct told me I must retrieve. But I had wobbled so much, my legs weak with the effort and the crying of fear; I toppled at my father’s feet (they tell me I did it with a squeak) and I lay there for some time, most definitely confused by my falling, disoriented by my persistent hunger-pains.

But there was the third thing I was learning in my lifetime: the shade of Father, strong and resolute above me, balm to the terror that reigned supreme in my blood. They didn’t tell me this part—there was no way they could ever, ever know this part. I know it deep in my soul that it was this moment that I learned the safety of my Father; the warmth of him, the strength I could pull from him, that he offered me. The assurance that I would never, ever be alone.

talk talk talk