“Can you please tell me why your tutor quit earlier this morning?” I say giving my sister a withering look. She just shrugs her shoulders not even attempting to hide her guilt. Heck, she’s smiling brighter than the sun.
“Why are you tutoring me? Elizabeth is a better teacher than you.” She insults me without batting an eye. Actually, she is correct. Elizabeth is most certainly smarter than me.
“Well she is currently sick in bed so you are stuck with me.” She pouts at that statement. Why does she like Elizabeth more so than me. What’s wrong with me? I speak two languages and am quite learned in many fields.
“But your boring, you just recite the books all day without deviating a single word. I’ll fall asleep even before we get through the first paragraph.” She complains. Why am I disrespected so much?
“Alright, why don’t we play a game of chess. If you can even beat me once I'll give you 10 gold coins.” She brightens up quickly and runs to the couch. I give a sigh. Kids are too obvious. I should make her study more. Then again spending time with family is important.
“So has anything interesting happened lately?” Vicky asks innocently. Wait, where is she going with this?
“Nothing, Nick has been complaining about the amount of paperwork he has been doing.” Not that I feel any sympathy for him. I still handle more than he does. “Oh, yeah Leo’s letter just came in.”
“What did it say?” She asks excitedly. Well it wasn’t much.
“It was to Elizabeth. He only gave me one line.” I say indignantly. Not only did he send a letter to my wife he has the audacity to tell her to report to him if I do anything crazy.
“I see.” She deadpans. Apparently, she doesn’t see the injustice in the situation.
Anyway, after playing chess for a couple hours, she of course didn’t win a single game.
“Checkmate!” She yells all of the sudden.
“Impossible.” I should have been paying more attention. I’ve been playing the game much too risky. Well a loss is a loss. As father said, I should not make excuses.
“Alright I'll give you your gold coins. Just as I get up. Vicky tugs on my sleeve. I look at her to see that she’s looking at the ground.
“I know you don’t like talking about Mom, but I really want to hear a story.” She says her voice becoming smaller the more she talks. It was quite hard to make out. I sit back down and begin stroking Vicky’s hair.
“Well, she was a very uptight woman. She’d always tell me to follow the rules. She also didn’t show much affection.” I begin.
“Was she mean?” Vicky asks. I probably should have explained this better. She has no clue what kind of person Mom is.
“No, she was just an extremely private person. She was still a very kind mother. She’d make time during the day to visit me. Also, before bed every night she’d visit me and make certain I went to bed.” Not that I stayed in bed all the time. “She was just an awkward person who didn’t always express her emotions the best. Still she always showed that she cared about me.”
“Do you think that she loved me?” Vicky asks looking straight into my eyes. There is only one answer to such a stupid question.
“Of course, she did, with all her heart.” I give her a final pat and get up from the couch. Just as I was about to leave the room I turned back and looked at Vicky.
“I also want a report on the rivalry between The Allonian Duchies and the Kingdom of Felworth tomorrow. It has to be good or I'll make you redo it.” With those final worlds I leave the room.
A/N: I should note that James equates love with spending time with family. Part of his problem with his father is that William never spent time with his family. So even though he is always busy he still tries to make time for those he cares. He is also a pushover to those he is friendly with. Alright for the fact of the day I shall be talking about Aveven. It is a medium size country but only has a small population. It is situated between Arria and Allonia. The biggest city in Aveven is Wargdon which is a holy city for Altons. Though the capital of Aveven is Cliftonton.
