Kintsukuroi_Chapter-19

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Chapter-19

Ben didn’t remember his biological father all that well, having only been five when he’d passed. He had faint recollections of his Mama with tears streaming down her face guiding his hand as he set fire to something shrouded in white, but the memories were faint. He guessed Jayna had been heartbroken at the time to be widowed so young, but then the omega had had to stow her grief in favour of devising an escape for them from the pack and raising a child by herself and the heartache had been drowned under the avalanche of responsibility.

Jayna had never re-married.

Ben suspected that it had not been because there had been no offers (because he was not blind and even he could see that his Mama was gorgeous), but because of Janardan. The alpha had been tasked with their protection and while Jayna had been initially wary of the fearsome warrior, the man had gradually won her over. He knew about the clause his grandfather had insisted upon, that Jayna would lose custody over him if she remarried... but he suspected that was only half the story. Because Jayna had never even tried dating again.

Even now, at nearly twenty-one years of age, Ben wasn’t sure what the equation between Janardan and his mom actually was... the duo had never mated and he didn’t think they were involved either (and he was so not interested in figuring out his mother’s love-life!)... But - but they seemed to share a deep bond.

And despite having lived here for the past two and a half years, but it was not yet ‘home’ the way their last address had been... Even worse, ever since they had moved here, Jayna had grown withdrawn. Part of it was giving up her home of the past three decades, but it seemed to go deeper than that. Ben wasn’t sure if it was a conscious decision on Jayna’s part or not, but the omega had stopped wearing vibrant colours and even among the pastels she now wore, any and all shades of red had somehow gone missing. Jayna was avoiding meat as well; nothing overt, but whenever there was steak or pork or turkey on the menu, Jayna found some excuse to not eat it. He had not caught on initially, but once he had, Ben had been alarmed by the development and worried about protein deficiency. He had only been able to coax a few pieces of chicken into her on one occasion, but had found Jayna throwing up a few hours later and stopped trying after that. He incorporated more dairy and cereals into their diet to make up for the protein deficit. Outwardly, there was nothing wrong, Jayna still went out and taught at the local university - did all the things she always had; no one had actually questioned them about Ben’s other parent, obviously assuming that he and Jayna had separated- as was common these days but nonetheless, Ben found himself questioning if Jayna would answer ‘separated’ or ‘widowed’ if asked. His Om’s once frequent smiles had grown rarer and Ben wasn’t sure about the last time his Mama had genuinely been happy. It worried him and he hated to admit it, but Jayna was behaving more like the quintessential ‘traditional’ widower after leaving Janardan than she had after his father’s death.

It had been a little more than two years now and Ben hated how dull his Mama’s eyes looked. She was always unfailingly polite, but smiled so seldom these days that Ben found himself missing his mother’s dimples. Anyone unfamiliar with Jayna would not even notice- just assume that Jayna was naturally very serious, but he remembered his mother prancing on the couch and competing at air guitar with him back when Janardan lived with them and the changes were glaringly obvious to him. He recalled how competitive the woman could get at Monopoly and how she made the best fries to go with that spicy green dip that was Janardan’s speciality and how the two would work in tandem every time it rained to make a huge platter of spicy potatoes and coriander dip and they would spend hours on the porch with Janardan strumming Adam’s old guitar and Jayna occasionally humming along, feeding herself and Janardan as they watched the rain moisten the earth. As he had grown older, he had stopped joining them, partly because he had ‘better things to do’ and partly because he had genuinely grown busier, but he missed those times...It felt like missed opportunities now that he could no longer have that time with the two people who had raised him. When it rained now, Jayna refused to venture out. Ben had once caught her watching their yard from the window with suspiciously wet eyes, but didn’t know how to make it better. Besides, he missed the gentle warrior himself, and while he had never accepted the title, Janardan had been as much a parent to him as Jayna and it hurt to know that he would never see the man again.

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Chapter-20 [Epilogue]

MasterPost

Earlier Parts: Prologue- Chapter 1 - Chapter 2 - Chapter-3- Chapter 4- Chapter 5 - Chapter 6-

Chapter 7- Chapter 8- Chapter 9 - Chapter-10 - Chapter-11- Chapter-12- Chapter-13- Chapter-14 - Chapter-15 - Chapter- 16- Chapter-17 - Chapter-18