Genesis

I set the platter of pancakes down in front of James. He glanced at them, a quick look of disdain settling on his features before he looked back down at his homework. I intertwined my fingers and placed my cheek on them. My grin was wide as I lowered myself to his level on the island.

"What?" He stopped writing for a moment to glance at me.

"Your teacher called me today."

His eyes widened. "It was an accident," he said quickly.  "I mean, he deserved it but I didn't mean to hit him that hard."

"What?" My smile dropped.

"What?" He quickly repeated. His eyes flicked down to the pancakes before moving back to mine. "W-what are you talking about?"

"What are you talking about?"

"W-which teacher, were you referring to?" He asked me.

"Your science teacher..." I said slowly. "She called and told us you won the science fair and that your project would be displayed at the open house..."

"Oh." His mouth turned into the shape of an O as his eyes moved back to the pancakes. "So these were congratulatory..."

"Do they look like a punishment?"

"Umm. If I say no...can we consider me telling you what I told you a confession of truth before my art teacher called— which she will, in a few days by the way."

I narrowed my eyes at him for a few seconds before pushing the plate of pancakes towards him. "Deal."

"Wow!" He cheered flatly, setting aside his pencil to pick up a fork. "These look so good I can almost ignore the black on them."

"Don't push it, kid." I pushed away from the island. "Butter and syrup?"

"Please."

I headed toward the refrigerator to grab it for him when I heard the front door open. I knew Lucifer was going to meet Syn and I had been on pins and needles since he left. I just didn't expect him back so soon.

It either went really well...or extremely bad.

Judging by the way he slammed the door and stormed into the house...it was the second.

James cringed, poking at the pancakes. "I told you guys he shouldn't have gone," he muttered. "Should have sent me instead...Syn likes me more."

I winced and set the butter and syrup on the counter in front of him. Lucifer practically rushed passed us to his study without so much as a glance and instantly I heard glass being sent to the ground. Concern immediately filled me and I turned toward James.

He read the room before I was able to utter the words. "I'm going to eat in my room. My show is about to start." His mouth was full as he grabbed the plate and his things.

I kissed the top of his head as he walked away. "Thanks."

The moment he trotted up the stairs, I turned my attention back to the ruckus Lucifer was causing. I knew Syn was a touchy subject— he was for the both of us but the way he came in...it was unacceptable.

I walked to his study and stopped at the door when I saw the mess ahead of me. The glass shelf he had against the wall was shattered against the floor. The books and items he had on it were scattered across the floor and he was ripping at the wallpaper.

He looked like a madman. His hair was a mess and his shoulders shook as he clawed at the wall. He sniffled loudly and something in my chest tightened. He couldn't be crying. That was just something he didn't do.

"Lucy..." I walked in slowly, avoiding the glass on the floor. He ignored me, punching out a couple of the wooden panels in the wall. "Lucifer, what's going on?"

I reached out to touch him and he snatched his arm away from me as if I were a flame. What the hell?

I took the chance to look at his face as he continued pulling and throwing the wood from the wall. Tears streamed down his face incessantly and his lips were set in a tight line.

I had only seen him like this once in my life, and it was when Syn died.

After a few more seconds, he reached into the wall and pulled out a large brown trunk. He took it to his desk and set it down and I followed him, my eyes filled with concern.

He loosened his collar and ripped his necklace off and my curiosity was piqued even further. He began wearing it almost three decades ago. It was a black corded necklace, with a dark key dangling in the middle. He always wore it under his shirt and even around me, when it was exposed, he flipped it around to his back.

I asked him why he guarded it so religiously and what it opened, but he never told me. He simply said some secrets are okay to keep.

I watched as he pushed that same key into the thick golden lock. When it clicked open, he tossed it aside and undid the latches.

I stayed in my spot and crossed my arms to keep myself in my spot as he opened the trunk. If it truly was this significant to him, I didn't want to intrude.

The first thing he pulled out was a small teddy bear. Familiarity filled my eyes as I looked at the ragged item. It was Syn's. And perhaps one of the only things Lucifer contributed to his nursery in Jeradua.

Then it was a small folded blanket. A baby blue one with small colorful ships scattered across it. My hand reached out for it and I picked it up.

It was so tiny. He used to be so tiny.

My eyes began to water. If I tried to put this around Syn now it probably wouldn't even cover his shoulder.

One by one and with delicacy, Lucifer emptied the box. He was searching for something urgently yet set everything aside with so much care. The same care he clearly put into packing away and keeping all of this.

His baby clothes, tiny socks, pictures of Syn as a baby...some I'd seen before that I sent him and some I hadn't. I knew he snuck into the palace when Syn was an infant, but I always assumed it was to see me.

He always told me he wasn't equipped to be a father whenever I mentioned him seeing his son. He treated what we made together as truly a deal only I had wanted. But I guess he was more invested than he let on.

"W-why do you have all this?" My voice broke as I looked through the photos. My fingers stilled on one and tears streamed down my cheeks. It was Syn. He couldn't have been more than a year old.

Lucifer, stoic as always held him in his arm and looked straight ahead at the camera. But it was Syn in the photo that had me frozen. He was smiling. He was looking up at his father, his toothless mouth half open and his eyes shining with a brightness I had never seen before.

Lucifer plucked the photo from my hands and shoved it into his pocket before continuing his search.

"Why haven't I seen this before?" I asked him, my voice more accusatory than intended.

"You had him. I had photos. What does it matter?" His voice was cold as he pulled out a couple of large Manila envelopes and a big binder.

"You could've had him too, Lucifer."

"We both know that's not true." He undid the ties on the thick folder with a sniffle and emptied the contents of it on the desk. "You wanted Jeradua— to be the Queen they wanted. The life you envisioned for yourself and our son back then didn't have any room for me."

"I would've made room if I knew you wanted it."

He rifled through the countless documents before emptying the other. Birth certificates, report cards, awards...hospital records stared up at me.

He lifted a packet of papers and stood up straight, looking through them. His eyes scanned each page before he went on to the next and after doing it five or six times, he froze.

Whatever he was searching for, he had found it.

His hands trembled as he gripped the paper. And I waited with bated breath. "What is it?"

His eyes filled with tears and he opened his mouth to let out a laugh but a sob came out instead. He dropped to his chair behind him and read the paper with a hand over his mouth. His elbows were on his thighs, his fingers curling into the pages as his teardrops stained the pages.

"I-I didn't fucking read them," he said strained voice.

"What are you talking about?" I rounded the table and crouched down in front of him.

His breathing was shaky. "I was so busy with the war, my father..." I tilted my head to look up at him, desperate to understand. "...I only saw bruises when he arrived. I ordered them to take him to the hospital and he was there for two fucking days."

A tear slipped down his cheek and I wiped it away but he wasn't looking at me. His eyes were stuck on the paper and a part of me didn't allow myself to look down.

"I was so busy, Gen," he whispered. "They brought him home and left this on my desk assuming I'd read it. But I was so busy."

I nodded slowly.

"By the time I found the document it was under a load of other shit...I got the rundown from a servant. They treated Syn and that was all. I figured if there was something important, they would have told me so I did to this what I do to everything. Pack it up and put it away."

He was being vague but I had a feeling I knew what he was talking about. Julius. I was banished when the abuse began but when I found out, I found a way to come back. I almost died, but I needed to protect Syn. I owed him that at least.

Julius told me if I remarried him and left Lucifer he'd leave Syn alone....but it was a trap, again. I was locked away in a cell as far away from my son as possible and so isolated from the rest of the world that Lucifer thought I left him for good.

There were no fairies for me to wish on that time.

"Blame me for that," I said to him. "I was in the palace...I should've fought harder."

"He told someone," Lucifer continued. "The hospital had a therapist they send to children who show signs of abuse. They interviewed Syn and he told them everything." He paused as something caught in his throat. "They asked him if he'd be comfortable with them telling his father and do you know what he said?"

"What?"

"Yes, please." Lucifer looked at me, his dark eyes full of pain. "His words exactly." He held up the paper. "He wanted me to know. Wanted me to do something. To protect him. But I didn't read it.

"I came home and sent him countless nightmares to try to speak to him, feed him, bathe him." He cried and my heart tore in half. "I had the gall to be embarrassed by his behavior when it was mine that was appalling."

He ran a hand through his hair before wiping his eyes with his fists. When his eyes met mine, they were bloodshot. "You know what he told me tonight?"

I raised my brows in question.

"He said, he could've changed a long time ago if I had just asked him how he was feeling sometimes," he said. "He told me that my father didn't condemn him to being emotionally stunted for life. My father brought him into the world that way and then gave him me as a father.

"He knew I'd be so consumed with hatred— with the need for revenge so much so that I'd neglect everything else in my life," he said. "My punishment wasn't my fall from Heaven. It wasn't him abandoning me, it was this all along. My father knew there would come a day where I'd find out and it'd be too late. He wanted me to see that I am no different than Him."

"You're nothing like him."

He shook his head. "No, I'm worse. Because as cruel as he is, he knows everything. I know nothing."

He stood up from the chair and grabbed his coat, preparing to leave. "Where are you going now?" I stood up and grabbed his arm and he shut his eyes tight.

When he opened them, he laid a hand over mine and removed it. Hurt filled me as he took a step away from me and looked at me. There was a question in his eyes that I couldn't disregard, but, I didn't know the reason for it.

"I need to figure some things out for him right now so I'll be gone for a few hours," he said. "When I come back, I'd like to be able to look at you easily. I know it's not your fault but my mind right now...there are so many questions and I need to know for a fact that you never knew of this."

What? "Knew of what?"

He held out the hospital records. "Read them," he said and I took them. "If I find out you were aware in any capacity, you die. If you weren't...I won't have to intervene for you to wish you were dead."

I heard the threat loud and clear but it felt completely unwarranted. I tried not to let it hurt me as he gave me one last glance and left the room.

When I was alone, I sunk down on the chair and read through the pages. Some of it, I knew. It pained me to read just how badly he was hurt by Julius though. I knew it was bad but the injuries...I could've never imagined them being so extensive.

When I reached the last few pages, I remembered Lucifer mentioning an interview. Just as he said, it was around the time Syn left to live with him.

Initial Consultation Report- Pediatric Suspected Abuse Assessment
Patient Name: N/A
Date: 07/08/2002
DOB: 10/31/1983
Guardian(s): N/A

This initial consultation report documents the first meeting between [Dr. Jacob Spielhan] and [N/A], prompted by concerns raised regarding potential abuse. It is noteworthy that a previous therapist has observed signs suggestive of sexual—

"...abuse," I read the sentence and my gut plummeted. I scanned through the preliminary introduction before going into the actual interview portion and my breath caught.

I sobbed as I read through my son's printed words, his voice sounding through my ears. There were no names. All I saw was him referring to his abuser as a she. My mind ran rampant with who it could've been and who I may have left him with that could've done something so heinous but no one came to mind.

As I read more, anger passed through me. He described how she'd come to the dungeon he was kept in to "help him".

The dates lined up. And if it was during the time Julian had him in that cell, I had to be there. For at least part of it. I had seen him a handful of times— at least when Julius allowed me, but I never suspected anything. I never even wondered as the possibility was so far from my mind.

Did Julius know?

There were so many questions in my mind— the most burning being why Syn didn't tell me, but it was the most unfair of them all. He didn't trust me and I couldn't blame him. I was weak.

I wiped my eyes as I read on and when I reached the end, it felt like I'd taken a long ass walk off a short cliff. I plummeted down into a cold and icy river of realization. There was a reason this wasn't investigated further and it was printed in fucking Times New Roman across the end of the page.

Dr. Spielhan: Would you be comfortable with us speaking to your father about what you've told us? I heard he's the one who sent you here. He may be able to help.

[N/A]: Yes. Please.

Dr. Spielhan: You said you live with him now? How is he?

[N/A]: I don't know.

Dr. Spielhan: Why is that?

[N/A]:  I met him once right before coming here. I've only ever heard rumors about him.

Dr. Spielhan: Rumors? Is he a well-known man?

[N/A]: I guess.

Dr. Spielhan: Well, what's his name? I might know him.

[N/A]: Lucifer.

Dr. Spielhan: N/A (End of Meeting).

I knew revealing to the world that Lucifer was his father would open him up to an entirely new world of pain. But I thought...well, I hoped the world I underestimated would prove me wrong.

That was a mistake I'd never make again.

As the truth of everything was beginning to settle within me, my mind began to pick up on things I never thought twice about. One being how he hated it when I touched him or tried to hug him. Any contact that wasn't initiated by him was one he showed obvious discomfort with.

I always assumed it was just because of his nature. That he just wasn't used to affection.

I poked fun at him for it. I'd catch him by surprise here and there thinking he had just grown up and didn't need his mom hugging him anymore.

But it was never that.

Lucifer was right. Although I was going to escape his wrath for my ignorance of this...

He was right. I did want to die now.

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