The Importance of Being Kept

Chapter 25. Grieving

"Mom?....Mom!" Bryan yelled out his mother's name when she refused to look up.

Kaitlyn finally raised her head to give her two sons hovering over her a blank stare. "What? How?" She stared at them in confusion.

Darren and Bryan had left their penthouse as soon as Kanna had told them the news and hightailed it to the mansion only to find a heartbreaking sight before them. They'd run all over the mansion looking for their mother and their beloved butler and they found them in a hallway on the second floor, their mother holding the fallen butler's head in her lap as she cried.

"Your father isn't here. He's away on business...how...how did you know?" Kaitlyn wiped away her tears.

"That doesn't matter right now, Mom. For god's sake how long have you been like this? Didn't anyone try to help you? The maids, where are they?" Bryan demanded.

"I made them leave. I couldn't.. I didn't want them to see him like this. I couldn't sleep and he'd left to fetch me some tea. He was taking a very long time returning so I came to check on him and found him on the floor. He was just laying here staring up at the ceiling. I tried to call for help. He didn't want me to. He told me it was too late and...that...he was glad we made him stay when he tried to leave. He told me that he'd always seen me as the daughter he was never able to have and was happy that I was by his side for his passing. And then he just....left. He left me! The only man I'd ever known as a father in my entire life, left me...he's gone, he's gone!"

"Mother," Darren said moving to help her up.

"NO!" Kaitlyn screamed at him hysterically! "Don't touch me! Don't touch him! You don't understand! He was the only person that I felt safe with in this world, I bonded with him, even before your father came to his senses, Richard has always been there for me more than anyone and now he's gone!"

"Mom, we loved him too," Bryan whispered trying to hold it together. "I've never seen her like this," he stared at Darren for help.

"Not as much as she did," Darren told her. "To her, he was her world next to our father. I'll call him and let him know."

Bryan couldn't do anything but kneel beside his mother and embrace her as she continued to cry over Richard's body. "I knew he didn't have long," he said to himself, "but still, I didn't want to believe he would ever leave us."

"She's refusing to leave him. I think she's been like this for a long time," he heard his brother talking to their father. Darren suddenly turned to her with his phone. "Mom, he wants to talk to you." He held the phone by her ear when she didn't take it. The twins watched her closely. After a while Darren pulled the phone away. "She's not responding," he told his father.

Bryan stared at him expectedly when he hung up the phone.

"Thank god, he's close by. He's in Seattle. He's taking his jet so he should be here in less than an hour. Stay with her. I'll get her a blanket to keep her warm," he ordered.

Darren walked away. He didn't accept this. Like Mama Ruth, another precious person in his life had just passed away. True it was because of old age, but it didn't stop the pain he felt. A pain he had no idea what to do with. The pain hurt like a knife tearing through him, made it hard for him to breathe. He leaned against the wall and took in deep breaths. He had to stay strong for his mother, for his brother who was so much like her when it came to these...problems.

He stared at a vase in the hallway. It had been a gift he'd given to Richard who had took the ultimate pride in taking care of it even to the point of displaying it in a well-lighted glass case for everyone to see. He'd never understood why the old man had made such a big deal over a vase he'd picked out for him when he was little. He did now... He stared at it angrily and in a rageful fit threw the entire thing across the room watching it hit the wall and shatter into pieces.