Two Different Worlds

CHAPTER 30: Catching up

Our day came and went quickly, soon it was back to work. Frederick accompanied me to a few meetings while Princeton spent some time with Mari given that he wouldn't have been much help anyway. Winston worked on a few other things for other future meetings as well as having a bit more of a life for himself then just being completely dedicated to work like in the past. I supposed Mila does him well in that.

I sat with Frederick going through the papers spoken about in one of the meetings as I stopped and looked up to him. He seemed to be very concentrated and that's good but because of that he's given little to no opportunity to talk about him. Princeton already explained his family situation as complicated as it is but he still talked to us. I would assume Frederick would be okay with talking about him as well. Winston came in with a schedule glancing over at Fredrick's paper's, "Oh, Winston do you know where this article is?" He asked as Winston nodded. "Yeah, it's in the archives second shelf on the right. It should be in a folder" Winston answered. "Okay, thank you. I'll be right back" he said, getting up and stepping out.

"Frederick confides in you more right?" I asked, looking over at Winston as he glanced over at me. "Why?" He asked as I looked over at the door. "Has he told you what happened to his kids? Wife? Anything?" I asked as he shook his head taking a seat across. "He has not but I will say I find it strange he had kids at all," He said as I stared at him blankly. "Why? Wait so you do know something I don't" I said standing up and closing the door as Winston glanced over. "Um, you should know this too. He said he would tell you so I don't understand why you're acting so oblivious," He answered shrugging. "Tell me what? He didn't tell me he had been training with Ingrid since ten. So what else was he supposed to tell me," I asked as Winston looked down before clearing his throat and getting up. "I think that's something for you to talk to him about. I should tell you this unless he's okay with it" Winston said, bowing and leaving the room.

As soon as Frederick came back in and before he could talk anything about work I closed the door. "I want to know about your family, what happened exactly?" I asked as he froze. "Mother... look, it's a lot for different reasons. That question and the answers to it are not that simple for me" He said as I took a deep breath. "Then start with what you told Winston that I don't know apparently. Why is he surprised that you had kids?" I asked. Frederick set the folder on the table and sat down. "Because I don't like women... not in a romantic manner anyway." He said, glancing up at me. "... Frederick, but why- why wouldn't you be okay with telling me? Why didn't you say anything to Nellie?" I asked as he looked away.

"You were always busy and when I had the courage to tell you... the incident happened. As for auntie Nellie, you know how conservative she was. She also said she wouldn't give Lucius his shares if I didn't marry the girl of her choosing" he answered. "Then what happened to her? To your wife, I mean," I asked, he took a deep breath as he adjusted his posture on his seat. " Her name was Priscilla, she was... good, I suppose. She cared about my health and was really an attentive wife but as a partner we didn't really fit. I wanted to focus more on helping out Psy and Lucius and she wanted to be my priority. As I said before we did have three kids. She took them when the youngest Pamela was a few months old," he said as he began to fidget a bit.

"Took them?" I asked. "I wasn't the best husband. I wasn't there for her. I missed all their births and our anniversaries were not any better. Most of the time I tried to avoid her purposely. So she got sick of it. Pamela and Nereus are bitter about it and Hadleigh, who did look for me, died in a house fire leaving Libbie to me." He said looking up at me with a pained expression. "And Libbie is Stephen's mother who also passed..." I asked. "Yes, Nereus has a daughter named Romina but I've never met her. The one that keeps up with them is my sister" he said as his eyes widened as if he said a bit too much. "Si-sister? You have a sister? From where?!" I asked, completely shocked. "Um, so you know the other commander aside from Ingrid," he asked.