How have we ended up here?

[Sharpie]

There was the ghost of a smile, quickly gone, as she promised she wouldn't bring Tertius. His father had never bothered to visit him here, and he rather hoped that he never would, he needed his own place away from the confusion and awkwardness that sometimes seemed to wrap around Tertius like his toga.

This was going to be a thing for as long as he had any sort of friendship with Charis, for as long as he had any connection to his father's household at all.

"I..." He took a breath. "He will have my father's friends, and their sons, people he will be friends with. I don't think it would be fair, to him, to bring him around someone he will know doesn't like him." And there, he'd said it. "I am... not someone he will ever look up to, I don't think."

He was not Rome's foremost expert on children but he knew that they could be extremely perceptive - Antonia certainly could, and he had no reason to think Charis' son would not be equally so, once he was old enough to think and to ask questions.

Although maybe he should try; he would be the boy's legal guardian if Tertius died before he was of age. Just another example of that awkwardness and complexity. Why did things have to be like that? He was pretty sure that nobody else in the entire insula had such complexities in their family lives.

His mother would no doubt manage to talk him into spending time with Peregrinus, of course. His mother could charm the birds from the trees, probably.

"Bring him, if you like. I daresay Proserpina can look after him while we eat."

 

@Sara

[Sara]

Charis knew he was going to say it, or had a feeling he would, but it still hurt to be so clearly told he did not like her son. She understood, rationally, why he didn't of course she did but it didn't make it any less painful to think about. She shook her head all the same, there was likely no convincing him but she had to try; "I don't want him to grow up with those people, only those people." Before she could blink Peregrinus would be grown and if she was not cautious about it he would be off conquering lands, enslaving people just like her, looking down his nose at men like Teutus and siring his own bastards. She could not allow that to happen. "I want him to know his family, and I want him to know normal people." She wouldn't beg that he could come here, but she was a persistent woman and Teutus hadn't explicitly said no.

He seemed to be on the same wavelength as her, moving between outright denial and acceptance as he relented. It wasn't a particularly warm offer but it was better than none and she'd take that. "I will." She smiled softly. "Thank you." She sighed and stretched out again on the couch, feeling like a weight was beginning to lift where it had lain merciless and heavy on her chest since this morning. "Is there anything else you think I should know?" She asked, turning the topic of conversation back onto softer, warmer topics. "As the wife of a fancy man?" 

 

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[Sharpie]

"I am hardly normal people," he managed, and shrugged. "I'm just as Roman as any of them, what makes you think I'd be any better for your son than they'll be?"

He set his cup down. Even without being present, Tertius' actions (or their results) managed to hurt the people close to him; he had seen the expression Charis' face as he admitted out loud that he didn't like her son. It wasn't the baby's fault, it couldn't possibly be, because what had he done other than to be born and declared free? Nothing.

He wondered if Charis' presence in Tertius' life had hurt Varinia - maybe not, his mother had had years to get used to not being around Tertius, after all.

"Don't thank me yet," he said and got up to cross the room for the jug of mulsum to top their cups up with. He needed it, she probably didn't, but she was a guest and it would be churlish for him not to give her more when he was having more. Mulsum was not the best for getting drunk on, but that could wait.

"I don't know. I don't know many wives of senators, not really. And you're hardly one to be ostentatious in the things you like to wear - I can't see you being comfortable dripping in jewellery, after all. Though I think people will take you more seriously if you do have some expensive things. Like earrings, or a necklace, that obviously cost money."

Charis, like Varinia, was a woman of tasteful elegance rather than tawdry ostentation. He would keep some things for her to look at and have first refusal of, if he found anything she might like before she came to call the next time. He had absolutely no compunction about taking his father's money in such a cause.

 

@Sara

[Sara]

"I will always thank you," She affirmed with a soft smile, "You kept me sane." even with their awful argument driving a wedge between them for those few months, Teutus had been a stabilising figure in her life when she needed it most. She owed him more than she could say. 

She let him top the cup up and fought the urge to do it for him. She'd only been a slave for three years but it was difficult  to imagine a life not in service of others  now. Rome really was excellent at beating old habits out and forcing new ones into people. She sighed and nodded. "You're right, but that's a good idea. Perhaps your mother and I could go shopping for something like that." Her lips twitched, "Two ex-slaves trying to navigate this new world together." Of course, her life was different again given she was now all but married to a Senator. A Praetor at that. "And I suppose I had better start...reading some histories. So I know who people like Ci-cero," She mispronounced it, "Are next time people mention them. Any recommendations?" 

 

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[Sharpie]

"I don't know how," he confessed. "Everything around me has been so utterly insane for the last two years. More." He set the jug down. "You can't count. Three. Three ex-slaves trying to make sense of something that just won't make sense. And I will see what I come across - let you have first refusal of whatever jewellery or - whatever, that I find that you might like."

He swirled the dark red wine around in his cup. "Cicero," he said, correcting her pronunciation. "And if you want to read history, start with Livy. He's pretty readable, and will give you a very good idea of the sort of stories Romans like about the city's past." And something occurred to him. "Something else - not to do with reading, but for you. Get yourself a girl, slave or free, doesn't matter. Someone you can trust, to be your maid. Someone from outside the household."

She needed her own ally within the house, now more than ever, and Tertius would not begrudge her a maid of her own choosing unless he wanted everyone around him to start muttering about his eccentricity.

 

@Sara

[Sara]

She smiled at his offer, and his words. Three. They were all in it together, even if two of the tree had their own home and their own life, no longer quite so thoroughly entangled in Tertius'. 

Livy. She made a mental note, nodding at him. She opened her mouth to ask if he had any hand for her to borrow, but then he spoke and suggested she get herself a girl. She blinked. The thought sat uncomfortably on her shoulders and she frowned, shaking her head. "I don't want to force another person to serve me." She knew Teutus had slaves, and wasn't quite sure how he squared that away with his previous life. Then again, he was Roman through and through and probably had a different view of a well kept slave than she did. "I wouldn't even know where to start to look..." She admitted. Besides, she'd only been freed for a day. It could wait, couldn't it?

 

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[Sharpie]

"If you won't buy, then hire someone - you said he gives you an allowance, so use it. And then you'll know it's her choice and you won't be forcing anyone. You'll find someone."

Gods knew she needed someone - he could only imagine what sort of contract his father must have forced on her, in order to keep her bound to him despite granting her her freedom. Tertius wouldn't have freed her if he didn't think he could somehow bind her to him in a different way, even more than through their child.

He would never understand how his father couldn't see what he did to people around him and why they might resent him for it all.

"Ask my father's clients, especially some of the older ones. They'll find you someone, I'm sure." She might prefer someone not Roman, but she would have to go to the slave markets for that and he really couldn't see her doing that, not from choice anyway.

 

@Sara

[Sara]

"That's a good idea." she nodded, warily. She really had  no need of a girl. She could do her own hair - although granted not in the styles that the fancy Roman women seemed to wear, she could dress and wash herself, clean her clothes, prepare a meal, garden, look after Peregrinus...what need did she have for a slave or a maid? But everybody seemed to have slaves and Teutus was right, she needed somebody of her own, somebody she paid for that she could trust with her life. 

"You don't know anybody, do you?" She asked with a wince. "Your father's clients...I don't even know how I'd approach them. 'Hello, I'm Charis, his concubine. Can you hire me a girl?' sounds a bit..." she laughed, "Ridiculous." 

 

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[Sharpie]

"I don't," he confessed. "Though I do happen to know my father's clients, I'll have to have a think." Even if they didn't have a daughter looking for employment (one or two of them might), they'd probably know somebody who did.

"It seems my lucky stone was better for you than for me," he added, half wishing he could ask for it back, though he really had no need of it now - he had his mother and really didn't need the thing she'd given him to remember her by, not now.

 

@Sara