First Capo: Athelo Brown

Chapter Eleven

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AUBREON
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The atmosphere around my dining is uncomfortable. It's sickening and it just makes you want to finish your food quickly and leave for an evening run to wipe off the suffocating feeling of being under such a heavy aura. No matter how homely they set the dinner with, it still won't make this family homely and warm. We're never a warm family, to begin with. I did try my best to be a great husband and a father but it's all useless if the people I'm doing it for won't reciprocate my effort.

Even Athelo, whom I put so much love on when he was young, turned out to be exactly like his mother. I love him as my son and never once did I think he was a burden or a mistake made by two hopeless young adults. We were inseparable back then. A father and a son who adored one another.

Everything changed when he turned twelve and had a taste of the truth about me and his mother. He couldn't accept the fact that his parents weren't in love. We're beyond the perfect family Athelo once thought. Starting there, he drastically changed, he was distant both to me and his mother. I understand him because I experienced that very much. More specifically I came from a very troubled family, they love one another too much to the point of killing themselves when one of them dies, which one did. My father just couldn't accept the death of my mother and he decided to kill himself leaving me and my newborn baby sister. 

My mother died of childbirth and my sister wasn't old enough to survive with a five-year-old brother, such as me. What can I do to a baby? I wasn't even educated enough to learn how to raise a baby. So all I ever did was go to a nearby foster home and left my sister there. After that the rest is history.

I couldn't do anything for Athelo after that, I never explained how things are to him since his mother did it all by herself. Who knows what wickedness she spews to our son? It wasn't that I don't want to explain, I wasn't given a chance to explain. He seems to know it all and didn't want to hear my excuses.

I glance towards my marble plate, the half-eaten meat seems to glance back at me and initiates me to speak. The silence of the dinner was as expected. We talk after we finish our food since that's Angelica's table manners. She hates everything out of order and today is the day I'm going to ruin her hard worked organization.

"So..." Both of them glance at me. "What have you been up to these days son?"

"Just traveling and drinking, nothing much" His tone wasn't the usual 'half-hearted' manner that he usually has during our scheduled dinner. Normally he would be uninterested and reply with little to no words, waiting for the moment to leave the table. Today, he seems different. "Things have been going my way these days"

"Oh. I'm glad to hear that...do tell me more" I became interested in the fact that we were having a very father and son conversation. All we ever do is argue and shout at each other's faces.

"There's nothing much to it, I'm just starting to think my life is interesting and began to discover things that I never imagined would exist" He glance at me expectantly, a glance full of amusement and caution. His discovery must be something great because finally, he seems to be interested in my existence. 

"Your discovery must be amazing then because I never saw you this interested before" I smiled and Athelo huffed, shrugging both of his shoulders, a very amusing action. Does the universe finally realize that it's been putting way too much depression in our family? 

"Did you finally realize the value of being an heir?" Angelica finally spoke and it immediately ruined Athelo's mood. 

He rolled his eyes and instantly drop his interest. "yeah mother..." was his half-hearted reply.