Fandom: Five Nights at Freddy's & Bendy and the Dark Revival
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Most people who were friends with Cordelia didn't know she even had a brother. Her best friend hadn't even known Cordelia had a sibling until she'd been invited to the Schmidt household and had seen the family portraits. She wasn't surprised, honestly. She'd led most of her life separate from Mike. She was six years older, after all, always too old to be a proper playmate for him. She'd had expectations to meet, responsibilities to perform.
By the time he'd run away from home, she'd been up to her ears in work at the law firm. Still, she remembered the day her mother had called her with cold clarity. She'd gotten home from work to find the phone ringing off the hook. She'd answered, expecting it to be a colleague from the firm who had been pursuing her relentlessly. She'd been ready to yell until she heard her mother crying on the other end. Her mother was speaking too fast, her voice clouded with tears.
"Ma, slow down," She said. "I can't understand what you're saying."
"It's...It's Mike." Her mother sobbed. "He's gone."
"Gone...? What do you mean gone?"
"He ran away!"
Her heart sank. Looking back, she felt like she should have seen it coming. Her parents had been worried about him, telling her about how angry he'd been getting, how he'd been drawing away from them. Looking back, she felt like she should have done something. She hadn't been able to go back home to comfort her parents, so she tried to assuage their fears on the phone.
Her heart was heavy when she hung up. She knew Mike's mind had been set on art, but their parents had been worried he wouldn't be able to live comfortably like that. He had evidently taken this to mean that they didn't believe in him. He was always doing things like this. Always acting impulsively without any regard for the consequences. But she couldn't force herself to be angry with him. She was terrified. She didn't know where he'd go or what was going to happen. And that was petrifying.
She didn't see her brother again for almost 20 years. By that point, he'd made quite a name for himself in the animation world. Michael Afton Studios. When the studio had opened, Cordelia had almost cried from relief. Her brother was safe and alive. And best of all, he was making cartoons like he'd wanted. She allowed herself to believe, for a time, that he was happy. But this only lasted for so long.
When the rumors of bankruptcy began to circle, she paid a visit to the studio. She told no one at the office where she was going, nor did she tell Blayke. But her husband knew. He always seemed to know. No one at the studio recognized her, not that she expected them to, especially since she introduced herself as Cordelia Schmidt. The employees looked nervous when she said she was a lawyer, but also resigned. She was led down to Mike's office by a thin man with crooked glasses and dark bags under his eyes who told her he was the accountant, Grant Cohen. He assumed she was there because of the bankruptcy, and she did nothing to tell him otherwise.
"Mr. Schmidt, there's someone here to see you," Grant said when he opened the door.
"Tell them to wait." Mike snapped. He looked to be buried under a mountain of paperwork.
"I'm not waiting." Cordelia's voice made him freeze. He looked up very slowly. Grant took one look at Mike's face and got out, leaving the siblings alone.
"What are you doing here?" His expression was closed and guarded. There was no trace of the bright-eyed boy who had tugged on her sleeves to show her his drawings.
"I came to see you." She replied. God, he looked so much older. She could see the beginnings of grey at his temples, mixed in with his dark brown hair. There were lines around his mouth, his eyes. He'd filled out a bit since she'd last seen him, stocky like their father. He'd grown a mustache too. It looked good. He looked like an adult. He was an adult. So why did she still think of him as that gangly kid?
