Zelda wanted to cry. She could not, because he wasn't dying and this didn't really change anything, but she wanted to.

So she didn't. She curled her shoulders further forward; she was now really shrunk in the chair. She wanted to disappear, to be somewhere else. Really she wanted to be someone else, someone who either didn't care about her family or who had a father who was less demanding. But she couldn't lose Alfred, couldn't lose them - and so he was right. They were stuck.

"It can't be," Zelda said, "That can't just - it can't just be like that."

She couldn't stand it. Quitting was the right thing to do but she couldn't do it; it wasn't fair. If the last year had not fixed her feelings for him then she was not convinced that anything would.

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