Difference between revisions of "Logs:Jealousy"

K'del was jealous.

He'd admitted as much to Milani when she'd told him the news, so it wasn't as though this was a surprise... but it still surprised him how jealous he was.

He sat out on the ledge, nestled between Cadejoth's forelimbs as the bronze attempted to keep still enough to be a comfortable backrest, and brooded.

It had never bothered him that Milani was sleeping with K'ndro. It still didn't. There were other people he slept with, too, albeit fewer of them these days, and he wasn't (much of) a hyopcrite; she could sleep with as many people as she wanted to, that would never matter.

But somehow it did matter that she'd be carrying the baby of someone else. That she'd get round and big and happy and excited, and it wouldn't be him getting excited alongside her. It had been sitting there at the back of his mind for a long time, now, this idea that one day, when the time was right, they'd have a family.

It had never occurred to him that he might not be the father of her children. Of her firstborn, at least. At least.

Cadejoth huffed warm breath down on him, and K'del shut his eyes. He was just going to have to work through this, that's all. Maybe once he was used to the idea, it wouldn't feel so awful; it was absolutely true that he was happy for her. For... them, all three of them. So he'd have to focus on that, and just let the rest of it go.

At the back of his mind, too, he worried. Phara's death was still so close and so painful. Milani was healthy, but Phara'd seemed healthy, too: perfectly healthy. What if something went wrong? The worry rose higher than the jealousy, rushing over him. He didn't know what he'd do, if it were Milani who died. Or Nakasha.

Poor Nakasha. Here he was, being mopey about not being the father to a baby, and there she was, wishing she wasn't going to be a mother. He quietly wished he could do more to make things easier for her - to protect her more from their parents, to take away this burden. She was so young.

(The irony in that was more or less lost on him. Young? She was older than he'd been when he made Weyrleader.)

Perhaps it was best, that he wasn't going to be a father just yet. It might distract his parents, but then again, they still didn't seem to approve much of what they could see of his lifestyle. Maybe it was better, for now, to leave that one alone.

But it would've been nice... his child and hers, so close in age, just like he and Kash had been. Both weyrbred, albeit in different weyrs.

Never mind.

Silently, his hand curled over Cadejoth's hide, he stared out towards the lake, over snow turned brilliantly white under the light of the moons. He'd slept with... dozens of women, probably, over the past couple of turns, plenty of whom now had babies with someone else. Did his just never take? Aside from Milani's last - he remembered the night she told him that with a lump in his throat - which was just as likely A'son's than his, there'd never been any scares with him.

Was he even capable of being a father? Was he going to spend the rest of his life watching the people he cared about, even loved, get big with other people's children, when he had none of his own?

No.

He shut his eyes, blinked away the thought. He was eighteen turns old, for shards sake; if he was childless at twenty-eight, or thirty-eight, maybe it'd be something to worry about.

Give it time, K'del. You've got enough else to worry about now without getting fanciful and morose about things that might not even be true. Let it all go.

Let it all go. He took a deep breath and nodded to himself. Let it all go. Milani was so happy about all of this; he'd be happy, too.

Happy for all of them.