Mondstadt Tales• Kaeya X

Chapter II

It's been 6 years.

Father still hasn't come.
And I have come to terms with the fact that he probably never will.

I spent way too many nights crying myself to sleep, wondering what I did wrong... why he abandoned me...

The last years haven't been easy...
Diluc is my brother. Maybe not by blood, but he is the closest thing I have to family. I owe him so much...

He has a pyro vision. And he has already joined the knights. He is great at everything he does. And Crepus, our dad is very proud of him.

But most of all... he has been my safespace. Still insists on offering me this goddamn awful grape juice... it has become an inside joke at this point.

But honestly... I don't know what I would've done without him. He saved me, in one sense. All these nights when I'd wake him up from my sobs as kids, he never once complained. He comforted me everytime, agreeing to me sleeping in his bed because I was scared.

I fact, this happened so often that he often snuck in my bed either way.
The idiot would go under the blankets and pull my legs or tickle me...

Now that we are far too tall to do that kid of shit, we still share a room, but a bed has been added.

And the last time I cried about my father was years ago.
I got into an accident. My arm was ran over. Almost cut off. I really thought I would die, or stay paralyzed. Crepus was the one who came and picked me up, called a healer and took care of me as I recovered. Crepus did. Not my father.

And after that moment, I never cried again.
Because I realized, I had found a father again.

Diluc has taught me German. I am fluent after all these years. He trains with me and he is helping me to also find a place in the knights...

Sometimes I still wake up in the middle of the night. But these nightmares are different. I still haven't found the courage to tell anyone the whole truth... not even Diluc. After all these years, I am ashamed to admit I'm still having a faint hope that one day my father will return... and if that happens, I dread to tell him that I revealed his secrets.

So I'm lying. Everyday. About who I am.
_________________________________________

Diluc returnt home early from work that day. As usual, he ran up to his room, finding his brother laying on his bed, a stray cat resting on his stomach.
He rolled his eyes but chuckled.

-You can't go a day without doing something stupid huh?

Kaeya smiled, petting the cat.

-He snuck in from the window. What could I do? He is cute.

Diluc couldn't argue with that. He changed clothes and fell on his bed, tired from the work at the knights.

-Jean was there again...

He hugged his pillow and stared at the ceiling, his bright eyes never having changed ever since he was little. But now they were shining for a more specific reason.

Kaeya laughed wholeheartedly.

-Just talk to her already.
Bet she likes you back too... mister handsome. I certainly know few girls who do...

Diluc pressed the pillow against his face. Kaeya loved to tease him like that. Diluc was utterly smitten with Jean, another member of the knights.
Jean, however, was the shy type. And Diluc wasn't the bold type either...
So their interactions were limited at work matters, though Diluc had managed to fill an entire drawer of dandelions that he picked up everytime he thought of her...
Even though most of them were dried out by now, he knew they were her favorite flower. And so he kept collecting them. Even though he doubted he would ever get the courage to give them to her.

Kaeya also teased him about that too.
Both he and his brother were popular among the girls, Diluc's beauty and talent as well as Kaeya's charm and style had much appeal among the girls their age.

But Diluc had his eyes set, while Kaeya was simply uninterested.
The truth is, he had let himself think a lot about a certain someone...
A boy.
His name was Albedo. He had come here the same way he had. One night, without explanation.
Alice, one of Crepus's friends, took him in like Crepus had taken in Kaeya.

Alice was a wonderful woman. She treated Kaeya and Diluc like her own children, and they all hang out with her daughter, Klee.

Alice left on a trip she still hasn't returned from, and Albedo is taking care of Klee now.
He is the more... introverted type too...

Kaeya never liked anyone before. It was a strange feeling. He was ashamed to admit it to anyone, with the exception of his brother.

Diluc was a bit worried, as Albedo never really opened up, and they didn't know a lot about him. He always stuck around when Kaeya went to hang with him, feeling like something was amiss about him. Or this could simply be an overprotective older brother.

Either way, the brothers spent the rest of the day playing with the cat and training together.

Kaeya fell asleep faster than usual that day. And instead of nightmares, he was driven with dreams of light blue eyes, pale skin on his own...