Freaks: Year One

Different Together

It was one late afternoon nearing the end of December. The snow kept falling, and the wind picked up speed making it all the colder at his open window. He watched as the flurries of snow came rushing down.

He would have loved to go out, and gather a bunch of snow together just to see what would have happened, but he knew he couldn't, so instead he watched as the snow fell, and occasionally reached out trying to catch the small flecks of snow.

His parents left for work that morning, meaning Alabaster was now taking care of Adelaide, and Atticus. At the moment, Atticus was having a nap upstairs, so Alabaster continued to watch as the snow fell from one of the windows.

"Alabaster." Adelaide said, snapping his attention to her, and away from the snow that was outside the window. "It's your move." She indicated to the board. They were playing a game of Wizard Chess.

He made his move, making one of her chess pieces get knocked down. He looked up at her, and she was staring at him warily. "What?" He asked.

Adelaide shook her head, and focused on the game. "Nothing."

Alabaster stared at her quizzically. She had been acting odd with him for the past week or so. She kept looking at him warily, like she was unsure about something. She even sometimes said things that made no sense to him, but whenever he asked about it or asked what she meant, she just said nothing was wrong, and went back to whatever she was doing.

Just then Alabaster heard Atticus crying, so he told Adelaide he would be right back, and went up the stairs, and to one of the bedrooms where Atticus would be sleeping. He opened the door, and saw Atticus was floating out of his crib, crying.

"Oh!" Alabaster yelped, and rushed over to the crib, where Atticus was hovering over. Alabaster picked him up from midair, and placed him back in the crib safely. Atticus was still crying.

"Uh...be quiet please." Alabaster said.

Atticus continued to cry.

Alabaster really didn't know what to do. He had taken care of his little brother before, but in the past when Atticus would cry, Alabaster observed that his mother would just leave him until he stopped if he wasn't hungry or needed to be changed. "Um...are you hungry?" He picked up a bottle on one of the tables, and handed it to Atticus. "Here you are."

Atticus threw the bottle of milk toward Alabaster's face. "Ow!" He exclaimed as it hit his face. Alabaster bent down, and picked up the bottle, and put it on the table. "Well what do you want?"

He continued to wail.

Alabaster picked Atticus up again, and did a quick check. Nope, he didn't need to be changed, but then what did he want? He knew his parents would just leave him at this point - they told Alabaster he was too young for the discipline curse so they would just leave him alone, but Alabaster had this weird feeling in his stomach about him leaving his baby brother to cry alone in his crib.

"Okay..." Alabaster said slowly realising that Atticus had his arms out like he wanted to be picked up, so Alabaster picked up Atticus, and hesitantly patted his back, slightly rocking him. Atticus started to calm down while Alabaster walked back, and forth across the room. He wasn't really sure how to comfort his brother, but this seemed to be working.

"There, there." Alabaster tried, as he continued to pace the room with his little brother in his arms. Maybe he had a nightmare? Alabaster thought. He really wished Atticus was old enough to tell him what had made him cry. It would make it easier to know what to say, but he still said, "There is no need to be scared." 

He held up Atticus in front of him so his brother could see his face. "It is silly to cry over things like that. When you get older you need to know that you won't be allowed to cry. It's not good, but I guess you don't understand that yet."