#spichka

Let's put a pin on that age gap nonsense and now look at how they're both grieving for the loss of Isidor Burakh and how Artemy cannot properly process that grief—for multitude of reasons, and all very fair reasons—and how he's also emotionally repressed, let's be honest. To deal with this and having a young boy, who is dealing with the same grief, looking at the closest adult for comfort—Artemy in this case—and not receiving it..... well.... I don't think it would be that farfetched to speculate that a bit of resentment might grow from Spichka's pov because, think about it, Artemy's avoidance to talk about Isidor's death, would make sticky think that maybe Artemy lost what affection he had left for his father from how long he's been away. The boy might incorrectly think that Artemy isn't hurting as much as Sticky is hurting and "he damn well should be!" Sticky might think, or something like that.

But what Sticky doesn't know is that Artemy is experiencing very mixed feelings about Isidor and what he left after his death for Artemy and the reason why Isidor wanted him to return. But sticky doesn't know this because Artemy isn't telling him!!!!!!

I personally believe that Artemy does want to be this person Sticky depends on like a father but my man doesn't know how to go about it because he literally wasn't given the choice to be!!!! (Not to mention, also something his father left him to do without considering his feelings about it oof but that's a whole other can of worms) he had no say in the matter and you bet your ass it's gonna show with how he would apprentice Sticky even though he doesn't mean it to.

The train arrives, bringing gifts from the Capital...