In the Lion's Den

Last Revelations

TW: allusion to rape/pedophilia

Poppy had the audacity to laugh in his face.

It was a hollow laughter, void of real amusement.

"Don't be ridiculous Simon, we were children, we had our minds on very different things. Did you really believe there could have been any truth to the rumours?"

Heat rose up in his head.

"I... I... Damn it, there's so much I don't remember from that time."

She grew serious and considered him carefully.

Then she said, in a much milder voice: "Nothing happened, Simon. Not between us."

Then she turned towards her sewing and threaded some dark yarn into a needle, indicating that for her the conversation had ended.

He should have been relieved.

And he was - a little.

He took some deep breaths to prove it to himself.

Then, calmer, he went over to the dressing table, trying to concentrate on the things his grandfather had chosen to complete the wedding attire.

The ascot was coloured in dark burgundy and would most probably be reflected somewhere in Marianne's bouquet.

There were very light leather gloves in beige and a white pocket square.

And then there was the pocket watch.

The golden double hunter casing was plain, but carefully polished.

When Simon picked it up, it felt strangely familiar in his hands.

He turned it around and saw the delicate engraving of two very simple letters who brought back a world of memories.

Simon played with this thing Papa said could tell the time.

Very carefully of course.

Or so he thought.

Mostly he would look at it with a very stern frown, then invent some numbers and say: "It's a hundred o'clock, we have to hurry to be on time."

That usually made Mama smile and Papa would laugh with those deep rumbling sounds that told him he was truly pleased with his son.

Then he found the letters.

He was very interested in letters.

He could already sing the alphabet with Lillian, and because he insisted she had started to show him how to identify some of them.

"Papa, I know this letter is called A, and what does this one mean?"

"It's a B, for Brandon."

"That's your name, isn't it?"

"It's yours as well."

"No, Papa, my name is Simon."

His father chuckled and said: "Your full name is Marcus Simon Brandon. So if you would engrave your watch, you would write on it an M..." he took a pen laying by and wrote big letters while he spelled them out... "an S... and a B, just like this one on the watch. Now, my name is Andrew Brandon... A and B."

The voice of his father and the image of their drawing room in South Africa faded away, as another voice intruded his memories.

"What are you smiling at, Mr. Brandon?"

And so he was back in reality, too few hours before the entirely wrong woman would become Mrs Brandon.

"A memory."