LONELY SUN | TVD

FOUR

FOUR : mothers and sons

Thomas' return home was anticlimactic. He half expected to find all his siblings gathered in a circle, a sort of mockery of an intervention. Maybe Elijah and Klaus in a tag team of good cop/bad cop. Rebekah and Kol listening in, nosy as they were, and later coming in separately with their own lectures. Finn had never been undaggered long enough to participate, but Thomas can imagine what the asshole would say anyway. Something about being vampires and abominations of nature.

They'd all forget about it the morning after, anyway. It was the Mikaelson way; ignore a problem and it'll eventually disappear. If not tomorrow, in a year, if not ten, if not a hundred. Holding grudges in of itself was exhausting when combined with the weight of being alive to feel them every second of every day for over a millennia. In the end, the Mikaelsons only had each other. It was hard to always stay mad at the only people you had left.

Thomas supposes he should've accounted for Esther. She wouldn't get it, of course, she was human. She'd never felt the weight of being eternal. She wanted to deal with everything the human way, uncaring that such a thing would never work on the oldest beings in existence.

It's Finn that greets him at the door, with a cigarette nevertheless. He ushers Thomas to the porch, pointedly rolling his eyes at the odd looks. "Don't look at me that way, little brother. I do still care, sometimes."

"Didn't care when you were trying to get us killed," Thomas utters, shutting himself up by sticking the cigarette in his own mouth. It's the one grudge he'll never let go of, and it'll forever make it impossible to be friendly with Finn.

The older rolls his eyes, exhaling smoke. "Mother and Elijah are inside. They've been debating what to do with you."

"Oh, goodie," Thomas says. "Has Klaus suggested they dagger me again, or is he waiting?"

"He's not part of the conversation," Finn says. "Mother won't allow it."

"And you?" Thomas asks. "Why aren't you part of it? I seem to remember you were permanently stuck to Esther's side, doing her bidding."

"I'm not your parent," Finn shrugs. "I've never felt the need to be, unlike my little brother." He lights a second cigarette. "When did Elijah's need to parent all of you begin, do you reckon?"

"When Klaus was born," Thomas deadpans. "And then again when Mikael decided he hated him. And when the rest of us came into the world." He waits a beat. "And finally, when it became apparent you weren't going to."

"I was never very parental," Finn dismisses. "And none of you brats respected me enough for it." He waits a beat. "Elijah does his best, as does mother. Remember that."

Thomas throws the cigarette bud against the floor and crushes it under his foot. "And have you ever, Finn? Or do you just let your little brother do all the heavy lifting?"

"I don't know, Tommen," Finn says, sarcastic. "Have you ever let me?"

There's many things Thomas could say. That it wasn't his job to make things easy for anyone; he was a child, he needed his brothers to protect him, it was that simple. It wasn't his job to make things easy if all Finn was going to do was attempt to make everyone as miserable as him. That all Finn ever did was make him feel guilty for existing, for living, for surviving. That if Finn redirected his self-hatred towards those who'd actually turned him into a vampire, against his will at that, then maybe they could be close as siblings. Thomas doesn't; he's long since learned this is a losing battle.