Something More

Who: Tad and his Grams
Where: Tad's house
When: Evening

The ride home from Kaysen's house the night before had been silent and once home Tad had gone straight to his room. Since then he hadn't really left besides to go to the bathroom or to grab something to eat out of the kitchen. By the time dinner rolled around, Tad had to go downstairs, especially once he smelled food cooking.

He expected she'd be there waiting for him when he came down but not like this. She wasn't standing in the doorway glaring at him, but just sitting at the table across from his plate holding a mug of coffee, waiting silently. Hesitating slightly before going in Tad eventually slid into place at the table across from her. "Are you not eating?" he asked, voice quiet and concerned.

She looked up from her mug slowly and the look on her face stopped the forkful of food in midair. He'd seen her upset with him, and he'd seen her frustrated, but this look? It was something completely different.

"We need to talk Tad."

Tad put down his fork without taking the bite and dropped his eyes from her face. "Okay," he conceded his voice hesitant and worried. "I'm sorry I was out too late." Maybe apologizing ahead of time would help ease the blow.

Grams stared at him for just a second before answering him. "That's not it, or well that's not all of it." She sighed a little and then moved onward. "I am curious who she is though."

Tad flushed a little and ducked his head lower, running a hand through his hair. "Her name is Kaysen, we go to school together. She's sorta best friend." When he finally did raise his eyes the look Grams was giving him was said she didn't believe him or that she saw through the "we're just friends" story. Luckily for Tad though she didn't comment, she just nodded and moved on.

"I want to talk about what happened. On your trip." There was a depth to her voice Tad had never heard before, a type of sadness that seemed laced with fear.

"Nothing happened," Tad said too quickly. "It was just a trip. We got snowed in." The explanation sounded as weak as it was.

"You know I don't believe you. You've always been a terrible liar," she told him. "Plus I saw the bruises. They look worse than usual."

Tad cringed at hearing exactly what Kaysen had said the night before, even more so because it was true. "How did you..." he started to ask, but he knew better. It was a small house, just big enough for the two of them. Plus, although he'd avoided her, they had spent some time together. And knowing him, he'd been looking at the bruises when she arrived to retrieve him. "It's not what you're thinking Grams. No one did this to me," he explained, hasty to avoid another visit to yet another shrink. Something did it to him.

"And yet, you've still got bruises on your side," she pointed out. Her voice still had that sadness, that fear, but her tone was even, calm. Tad watched her, confused. It was a side of the woman he'd never seen before. They'd dealt with his bruises for years, she'd patched him up so many times, she'd wiped away tears of pain and fear. She'd taken care of him his whole life, especially when his parents left him on her doorstep at such a young age. Grams had been there, for lows in the middle of the night, even when they sent him into violent rages that he couldn't control. She'd done all the doctors appointments, all the emergency trips to the hospital for spiked blood sugars. But the woman sitting across the table from him now, she wasn't that woman who'd raised him. She was someone else entirely.

"You wouldn't believe me," he told her truthfully, not sure he should even try and lie to this different woman. He looked away, back towards the door of the kitchen as if there was an escape and then back at the table.

"Try me, son."

Tad's eyes fell on hers again and he saw it, saw that he should tell her. That she might not write him off as crazy. "Demons," he said quietly. After talking to Hunt, he was sure that's what it had been. There wasn't any doubt in his mind now.

"That's not something to joke about Tad," she told him, but without the skepticism he expected to hear in her voice. No, she sounded like she honestly meant what she was saying.

"I wouldn't joke about that Grams," Tad said, something building behind his eyes. Perhaps is was the memory of the demon Kaysen set on fire, or the one in the hallway that Caleb almost blew into another world. Things had changed for Tad, only not in the way he wanted them to. As the fire burned in his eyes, he watched the sadness fill hers. She was seeing something in him, and although he wasn't sure what she saw, he could tell it was something she'd both dreaded and expected.

Grams nodded, and used her mug to motion towards the plate in front of him. "Eat your dinner Tad." She stood and came around the other side of the table, resting her hand briefly on his shoulder and then she left the kitchen. Tad looked over his shoulder, watching her go wondering what the hell just happened.