Post by Gryphon Matsuoka on Jul 17, 2014 17:06:33 GMT -5
Set in Fall 2019
TW - Mentions of death in relation to cancer and smoking.
TW - Mentions of death in relation to cancer and smoking.
Fiona would've killed Gryphon if she ever saw him doing this - he lit up the cigarette between his lips and filled his lungs with the cancerous air, before slowly blowing out the smoke and relaxing a little. The issue was that Fi would never see him doing this, at least not in person. Why was that an issue, you might ask? It was because she wasn't around to see it. She was diagnosed with bowel cancer in 2016, and even with the surgery and the chemotherapy performed, the cancer had been in its advanced stages by the time it was diagnosed anyway. It was too difficult for her to fight and she died last year, in hospital, in her sleep. The whole time, whilst she was struggling through it, she had tried to force Gryph not to come visit her. She wanted him to focus on his education and making sure he was setting himself up for a good life. The first time, he ignored her and went to see her anyway, but after that, it was too hard for him to travel from Pilot Ridge to Seattle on a semi-regular basis. And he couldn't just desert his studies, like she said, so he ended up doing as she asked.
In hindsight, he regretting doing that so much, even though he hadn't had much of a choice in the matter. When it was most important, he hadn't been able to see her. He didn't even get to say goodbye, and that tore him up. He never got to tell her how pivotal she had been when it came to his life and his happiness - he knew he wouldn't have become the person he was today without her. Maybe she had already known that, but she had deserved to hear it coming from Gryph's mouth, and he never said it.
The winged boy took another drag. Maybe, if there was a heaven up there, somewhere, Fiona was with his mom or something, even if that sounded childish. Maybe she was looking down on him right now and shaking her head - maybe they both were.
The Sun was hovering on the horizon, just starting to sink down out of sight. Since Fiona's death, Gryphon had become more complacent than before, and quieter. He was still kind, still friendly and helpful, but he held a heaviness that he hadn't shouldered before. He didn't go out of his way to see people anymore - he didn't even go out of his way to try and leave Pilot Ridge. He was comfortable, for the moment, so he didn't see the point. He wasn't perfectly content, but he was comfortable.
NB: Not sure if the content constituted for a trigger warning but better safe than sorry, eh?
