𝐒𝐎𝐋𝐀𝐄𝐔𝐋𝐌 - 𝐇𝐢𝐥𝐚𝐫𝐢𝐮𝐬 𝐇𝐞𝐚𝐯𝐞𝐧𝐬𝐛𝐞𝐞

𝟬𝟬𝟲 - 𝗰𝗼𝗻𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘀𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗺𝗲𝗲𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴𝘀

"Then tell me," she responded, trying to hide her uneasiness by fumbling with objects nearby.

When the opportunity for attention was provided to him, Haakon's eyes shone with delight, and he spoke up right away. "At first, I thought it was going to be boring," he said with a grimace, which made Eyana smile. "Since the teacher put me next to a boy who seemed to be too quiet," he whispered quietly but excitedly, turning on the bed and dangling his feet.

The girl laughed a little at that, the anxiety slowly disappearing, the situation was funny in fact, she couldn't imagine Haakon being friends with someone so quiet and calm, so for him to be so enthusiastic, something else had to be there, behind that. "Oh really?" She asked with a giggle, the situation with Dr. Gaul slowly leaving her head. "And then what happened?" She asked.

"Well," he added, and even though Eyana's back was turned, she could see her younger brother's excited smile. "At recess he approached me to play, he must have noticed my upset face or something." He appeared serious and abruptly raised his head, as if he had realized something essential. "Oh, his name is Max by the way!" He hummed cheerfully, again, too busy to notice Eyana's expression when she twitched in response to a photo on top of the shelf.

A photo of Arpina and Damian in an unknown location, less luxurious than the streets of the Capitol, but they both seemed to be extremely happy as they looked at each other. The woman's belly seemed to have a protrusion indicating pregnancy.

Strange. She had never seen that.

"Nyna, I'm talking to you!" Haakon lamented as he stretched his arms, which were previously on the bed, upwards. She quickly hid that photo between the books and scratched her throat in an attempt to hide the situation. "Oh yes, yes, sorry, what did you and your friend Max do?" She questioned him, and through the mirror, she could see his face turning red, which indicated that he had done another blunder.

On the positive side, he now had a friend to do this with him, which made her happy since the little boy had always been alone.

"We didn't do anything!" He responded quickly, which made her furrow her eyebrows and turn to him, not realizing the mistake she had made. "What did you ---?" She began but was unable to finish when she saw the younger boy's worried expression, looking at her tear-dried cheeks.

Shit.

He sat on the bed with his legs crossed, inspecting every detail of his sister, who seemed static under his gaze. She didn't want to talk about Arpina with the boy, not when he already felt bad about not having met her, not at all. However, she couldn't escape the questions he would ask; in the end, he could read her easily.

"What has happened?" Haakon asked agitatedly as he patted the bed for Eyana to sit down, and even though she was reluctant, she took the place, thinking of an excuse to cover up the situation.

Eyana could feel her brother's look on her face as she thought about what to say, and it made her agitated; she didn't know what to do; talking about Arpina didn't seem like an option, not with him, not when he never had the right to speak to her.

Sometimes she felt selfish due to the fact that she was so reserved towards her mother, especially towards Haakon, who, despite being an exact replic of the woman, could never talk to her since she disappeared when he was only a year and a half. But despite this, she was unable to share the memories she had with the woman; the selfishness within her told her that the memories were hers alone, and she wanted to be able to control something.

Obviously, she didn't leave him in the dark about their mother; many of the books the woman wrote for her she decided to give to her brother, perhaps as a chance to remind him that their mother loved them, or perhaps she didn't want to feel so selfish; she really didn't know. What she did know was that Haakon only had one book that was written directly for him—that it was given to him on the day of his birth but lost during the war.