Substitute [bxb] ✔

Home is where I am

"Please just have a laugh with me
'Cause you know I'm borrowing by now
These sounds, have already crowned
Come on, it's a silly dream
Dreaming of the imagery unfound
The view sits nice from that cloud."

- Homage [Mild High Club]

...

Somehow his feet had dragged him to the very place he had found his first love in, the place he had worked in for the better half of his life, where he had honed his skills and where he still had a purpose in his dull, unamusing life.

The Joubert Bakery.

Victor was too dry to be emotional but he still felt a strange sense of nostalgia hit him as he looked at the bricked walls of his once workplace. He wondered how much it had changed since he had abruptly left. Was it still flourishing? Did the customers miss him, did they ask for him? Had his presence ever really mattered?

"Victor!" A feminine voice gasped his name. "Is that really you?"

He turned around to find his mother standing there, covering her mouth as tears left her eyes freely. She looked weaker than before. She had always been a little frail and delicate-looking, but now it was obvious as to just who was going around doing the most work after he left.

He really was the worst son ever.

"Mum?" He asked, unsurely, his voice croaking with emotion suddenly.

His mother let out a broken sob as she flew into his arms, crying pathetically while he wrapped his arms around her thin form. He felt his own eyes getting wet and he patted her back, shushing her gently.

"Victor, I am sorry! Please forgive your mother, please!" She weeped into his chest. "I was wrong, I was so wrong! Please come back, please Victor." She pulled back a little, tears running down her face as she looked into his eyes. "You'll come back, won't you?"

"Mum..." 

"Victor!" She cried again. "Everything has fallen apart! The bakery is dying! I can't pull all the work around here, we're going to have to shut it down..."

"...Father?" He questioned cautiously. Surely his father would still not want his sinner son around, even at the expense of going bankrupt.

"Your father is sick, he's bedridden." His mother wiped her tears. She took the hem of her apron and wiped Victor's tears too. "You are the man of the house now."

"Mum..." He started, holding her hand in his own. "You are the rightful master of the house, not me. It's you who has been holding it together, after all."

"I haven't..." His mother shook her head. "It's all crumbling down... a woman can only do so much on her own."

Victor shook his head stubbornly. "Why do you sell yourself short so? You're a strong woman, mum."

"Will you..." She started hesitantly, desperation clear in her voice. "Will you come back? I know I've been unfair to you, I know it's the last thing you'd want to do but- Victor! You're my only son, I can't- It hurts to see you so far away from me! I wish I had- It's been tearing me up, how I-"

Shushing her gently, Victor took her hand and led her inside the bakery. He had no answer for her yet, he still could not fathom facing his father after the words that had been said to him. But he could at least relieve his old mother from some pain. He didn't owe her that, but he still wanted to. She needed him the most right now, and he wasn't cruel enough to turn away from the woman who had tried, in her own sense, to provide him everything she could, even though she fell short on the emotional aspects.

She hadn't been the best mother to him, but he could still be a good son.

"How are the finances? Any debts?" He asked, looking around at the state of the bakery. It felt barren, barely an essence of the place it once used to be. The shelves that had always been filled with delightful treats were sparse. It looked dusty too. His mother had probably been the only person running the business, and it twisted his heart to think so.