“We’ve raised a three year old. And incredibly bright three year old who gets into far too much trouble and is going to drive his daddy and papa insane.” Q smiled. He thought the sun rose and set on Teddy, so really, how was he to tell if the child he had raised was “good”. He was the best. And then the smile fell once again “That’s the thing Vix. She could be here. She could be here and she chose not to be. Because I wasn’t enough of a husband to her. I lost Teddy his mother because I couldn’t be what she needed. So, she left… to see the world, and have adventures that I couldn’t take her on because my life is here. It’s the mosaic, and Teddy and Eliot, and our little garden, and the quiet magic i never knew I wanted…” he sighed “And she maybe someday she’ll come roaring in like a hurricane and want to sweep him up with her… that’s what scares me most. That Not only was I not enough for her, but someday… who knows when… I’m not going to be enough for him either. For any of them” he shook his head “Sorry… I shouldn’t… You came all this way, and I am just bogging you down in my own mess. This is why we broke up, right?” he teased though there was a little sharpness there too.Â
He felt bad for letting the darkness that so easily swallowed him up, spill all over Alice. It was something he had been working on over the years, and something that Arielle’s leaving had made the worst of. Still he did his best to put on a brave face for her and not show how much of a mess he was. HE had Alice in his arms… something he hated to think he had given up, but that he very much had… and he wasn’t going to let this moment pass like so many others had.Â
He lost himself in now… something Eliot had encouraged him to do over the years, and something that was becoming easier with practice. And, when Teddy re-approached with his little horse and his eyes wide, he was there in the moment… not in the dark in his bed. Another thing he would need to thank Alice for later.Â
“I want you to stay for lunch” Teddy explained, drawing close to Alice and looking up at her with giant brown eyes, curls falling into his face where they weren’t quiet long enough to tuck behind his ears. Quentin wasn’t ready for his first hair cut…Â
“I think we both do” Quentin added softly. “I left Teddy snacks earlier, but I think this calls for a special lunch, don’t you?” He asked Teddy letting go of Alice only to scoop his son up into his arms and give him a spin.Â
Teddy squealed with laughter and urged his father to do it again, to which Quentin happily obliged.Â
No one, particularly not Quentin, would have expected this afternoon, from the start of the day.Â
Alice lifted up her hand to cup his cheek as he talked about what Arielle did, she knew that sometimes people needed time to figure out who they were. Still, she had decided to have a child and get married, it was not Quentin’s fault that she left. “She’s a fool for leaving the three of you, you can’t blame yourself for her decision, she did not have to leave completely but she did.”
Alice bit her lip when he mentioned them having broken up, so much had happened between the Quentin he would become and herself. How she thought he was going to sacrifice himself, and then her trying to destroy magic forever, then finally after a lot of complications them actually getting together again. She wished she could tell him that they had been together again but she knew she shouldn’t. “No, we both were complicated and made mistakes.”
This moment was the best she had in a long time, with no idea what was happening or where there future would leave. But what did it matter? She always thought that some sort of predictability would be good and that’s what they built here. They built a structure for their son where they could live happily.
“Lunch sounds lovely,” she said as she tentatively reached out to push the curls back from his eyes. Alice took a step back to allow Q to pick Teddy up and let out several laughs of her own as she watched the two of them. “So a special lunch? Has your daddy figured out how not to burn bacon or is that still his special skill?” She asked teasingly. “I can cook as well, but I might have to learn how to cook here first, if you two fine young men can teach me. You see, I’m not very used to Fillory and how all of it works.” She looked to Quentin then, hoping that he would help her settle in here, learn the quirks and the differences. She could work a stove on earth but everything was always different here.