but oh what a year

[patrols]

Comments

[persistingly]

I offered once to cash in a dear friend's chip to bless Russell, here.

( But, as expected, he declined, and it's not like they knew if it was really doable. Magically, not vampirically.

"You... not a," Jay Michael almost says. )

No, not a vampire. A witch. A lady friend I became acquainted with in Scotland. I seem to collect friends from there.

[an_honestword]

I've already lived four hundred years too long - I'm not looking to extend it by becoming a vampire.

[Immortality is not for everyone, and while Rusty doesn't have a death wish, he does think he's lived long enough.]

Not that I have any issues with them, clearly. Just not the right life choice for me.

[persistingly]

You wouldn't have been a vampire, just a man with the enhanced senses of a vampire.

( He'd been drinking, there was no fine print involved. For all he knows, he was selling his son to be turned. He was, rightfully, turned down.

"Maybe the immortality without the perks and the bloodlust," Jay Michael starts. "It suits you." )

[an_honestword]

[Rusty wrinkles his nose before shaking his head.]

It really doesn't.

[Part of it may have been the fact that he could never live a full life and was constantly getting murdered and having to start over, but Rusty never saw the appeal of immortality. He's never wanted to live forever.]

Immortality isn't for everyone. I'm quite comfortable with the idea that my life will one day end.

[pumping]

Sorry.

( He feels like he's saying all the wrong things and doesn't know what to do here. And suddenly doesn't know what to do with his hands.

Rhett pipes up. )

Rusty's immortality was cursed upon him and used for sport. He is saying, that finally, that curse has been lifted. And this is his last life.

( He speaks into the side of his wine glass and not to his son's boyfriend, or his wife. It is as much a somber occasion as it is a celebratory one. But he and Scarlett and Melanie have loved and lost. )

[an_honestword]

[That's not exactly it either. He makes a face before taking pity on Jay Michael and trying to explain.]

It wasn't even real immortality. If I could survive to a natural death, to die of old age and natural causes, I would have been free of it long ago. But a group of witches that I formerly considered friends - the ones who cursed me - would hunt me down and murder me before I could get that far, and then I would be reborn and start over again. It hasn't been my favorite experience.

[persistingly]

( Well, that quiets Jay Michael down, who can only sip from his wine, because it wouldn't be. )

And now, those former friends are former people.

[an_honestword]

That they are. And now their descendants are in charge and ... hopefully they'll do better than the ones who came before them.

[Even if he senses that maybe he isn't as completely done with them as he may want to be.]

We'll see what happens.

[persistingly]

We will indeed.

( He settles back into the meal, enjoying his time with the entire family while they have it. There are other things to discuss, but he'd rather not think about his other son living to an old age. He takes his wife's hand in his on the table.

This is their little family and it's special. )