August 5th, 1892 - Kirke Home
Tybalt Kirke

Fridays were always a bit of a relief for Elsie, the end of her workweek meant she got to spend time with Bentley and Tyb during their down time and she cherished those days when they got to spend it together. Bentley was so close to crawling that she feared their peace of mind would go right out the window once he was mobile. He could sit up and was starting to scoot around that way already, it was only a matter of time before their house was no longer safe. Especially if he was anything like his father.

Mrs. Robinson, against her better judgement, had let Elsie take over dinner for the evening. Their housekeeper was a lovely woman, very prompt and dedicated and they treated her well because not everybody would work for a family like theirs, shrouded in some scandal. Elsie was by no means trying to take the housekeeper's job, but she did want to know enough to cover making meals if for whatever reason Mrs. Robinson was unwell or was unavailable. Mostly, Elsie just liked feeling useful. Mrs. Robinson had moved on to finishing up the laundry from this morning instead without complaining, but she had that look anyway.

Bentley was quite content making a mess of his own dinner in his high chair, at the state where he enjoyed feeding himself more than being fed, so Elsie just let it happen. He could be easily tossed into the bathtub before bed. Plus he was happy and occupied while she finished up making the asparagus and getting everything set for when Tyb came home. Speaking of— she heard the front door open. Tyb would know where to find them, it was pretty much the same at this point each week, but she called out anyway. "Just finishing up dinner!" She called, leaving it up to him if he wanted to unpack and decompress or come find them.

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MJ always makes her so pretty

He barely remembered leaving the Ministry, but here he was in the hallway at home. Already? Part of him had wanted to put this off for as long as possible, go somewhere and stay there and wait until the worst was over, let someone else do it – but of course he couldn’t. He had to tell her.

He had to tell her now. His hands were trembling a little as he shut the front door after him; he clamped one in his other to forcibly steady them as Elsie called out something about dinner. She hadn’t heard, then. It had still been an ordinary day for her.

The last few hours of his workday hadn’t been. It had been a murmured comment in the Atrium, first, that Tybalt had greeted with a furrowed brow. Then standing in an office in Law Enforcement, too fidgety to sit, as someone told him nothing in too many words and someone else told him the real news, as much as they knew, and someone else asked questions he couldn’t answer and then, eventually, let him go home.

He felt dazed and numb on his feet, and went into the sitting room rather than face her in the kitchen, because he knew she’d see something in his expression the instant she looked. “Elsie, will you leave it for a minute?” Stumbling back into the hall, he called for Mrs. Robinson to watch Bentley, to get her to take everything off the stove – and then, swallowing hard, returned to wait for Elsie in the sitting room. “I need to talk to you.”

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She didn't hear him for a minute, so assumed he'd gone off to take a few minutes, but then a moment later heard him ask her to leave it and she found Mrs. Robinson was ousting her from the kitchen to finish dinner herself. That in and of itself was strange, but then she heard him call again from the sitting room, saying that he needed to talk to her and a feeling of unease settled into the pit of her stomach.

Obviously perplexed, she left Bentley in his high chair with the housekeeper. Wiping her hands on her apron, Elsie then took it off to hang it up as she made her way out of the kitchen and down the hall. It was hard not to be automatically suspicious. She was naturally an anxious person, though it was better these days, but that fact that her typically-happy-bordering-on-exuberant husband was using that tone of voice set her on edge.

Forcing herself to keep her own voice in check, Elsie knew something was wrong the moment she looked at him. Physically he looked alright, which was a relief, but it was fleeting. "Tyb what's wrong?" She asked hesitantly, in barely more than a whisper. "Are you alright?" Els crossed the room to him, unable to hover by the door

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MJ always makes her so pretty

It was caught in his throat already, lodged there, he didn’t know how he was going to get it out. And of course she was worried already – worried about him – but this was so much worse than she’d expect and he didn’t know how to say it and...

Elsie was coming over, and he put his hands on her arms to hold her there by him, his thumb brushing gently just below her shoulder in some premature attempt at comfort. He was probably the one who was finding any comfort in this, though, because all she would be feeling right now was dread. But that was it: telling her wasn’t any release from that. Fear of the unknown was less, much less, than the total sum of grief.

He had seen that kind of grief on her once before, years ago – had seen it at its heartbreaking start in the Gryffindor Common Room that morning. Bentley. Elsie had been sobbing; they’d hugged; he’d walked with her through the corridors and felt next to useless then.

She’d lost one brother already. How was it fair that it had happened again? “I’m –” he stammered, shaking his head to say fine, it’s not about me. “It’s –” His throat closed up again, and came back in a whisper. “Maybe you should sit.”

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Something was wrong and she could feel her heartbeat quicken as she ran through any number of possibilities of what could have happened. Clearly her immediate worries were soothed; Bentley was fine and in the hands of their capable housekeeper, Tyb was obviously physically fine, standing here with her hands on her arms, but outside of that, her mind was racing with possibilities. Had something happened at work? Did he lose his job? Had he heard something from his family, from hers?

"Please just tell me." Sitting wouldn't help, she knew he was struggling and likely she would be soon too, but there was nothing to be done about whatever this was. Gently she reached out to hold onto him, knowing she needed that much already. "We'll handle it, whatever it is." She managed to add, though she wanted to sound more sure than she was, because she honestly didn't know what to expect.

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MJ always makes her so pretty

She didn’t listen to him; she thought this was something they could handle. She was wrong about that. Tybalt grimaced and shook his head helplessly, but he had to get it out, had to tell her now however much he hated to, however much Elsie would hate him for it –

“It’s Owen,” he heard himself say – distantly, like the world was underwater. “It’s Owen, Elsie. He’s dead, he... died today.” Owen, her little brother; her bold, boisterous little brother; who’d gone ice-skating with them years ago; who’d had a whole quidditch career ahead of him; a whole life ahead of him; a family who loved him.

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The anticipation was filling her up, drowning her in whatever it was he was going to say. When he finally came out with it, Elsie heard him, it was hard not to, but the reality of it didn't immediately hit her. It registered, what Tyb had said, Owen had died today. He was gone, but as she looked up at her husband, eyes welling with tears she wasn't aware of, she couldn't process what that meant.

Losing Bentley felt like a lifetime ago, she still wasn't over it, not really, but she was able to cope. To be told that Owen, her vibrant, funny, outgoing baby brother was also gone, it broke something inside her she wasn't sure she would ever be able to fix. It would be written all over her face and she tried to smooth the creases she knew had formed on her brow, Elsie wasn't sure she could hold out for very long. At least this time she wouldn't feel guilty about crying all over Tyb. "What—" Elsie started, stopped, sniffling, unsure of what it was she could say right now. What happened? Where? Had her mother been told? How had Tyb found out?

Her fingers curled tighter into Tyb's robes and she looked up at him helplessly. Her knees were weak and she was shaking, betraying the flood that would no doubt erupt soon. "What happened?" She managed finally, tears streaming down her cheeks. Nearly a decade of life experiences saw her holding it together better this time, but it wouldn't last long.

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MJ always makes her so pretty

Her world would split in two, here: there would never be the same before again. There would only be days without Owen from here on out, Owen who had been too young to go. Tragedies happened every day, but they were easy to ignore until you were in the midst of it – and now he felt a surge of anger at the world like Owen had been his own brother, because this wasn’t fair.

And Elsie was already crying, but he couldn’t lie to her, didn’t know how to soften the blow – he hadn’t seen it, he didn’t know, but he had heard enough to be sure that it hadn’t been peaceful. His voice shook a little; he was clutching at her too. “I don’t – they found him on the High Street. Said he’d choked, or suffocated, like it... like someone did it to him,” Tyb got out. Owen. How could anyone have done that to Owen? “I’m so sorry, Elsie,” he said, voice rising in desperation.

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Elsie heard the words, but didn't exactly process them. She was looking right at Tyb when he said them, but as her eyes searched his, there was nothing else that could be said. This had been intentional, her baby brother murdered in broad daylight. It was impossible to wrap her head around. The grief was unlike anything she'd ever felt. This was different than losing Bentley; this was senseless and unimaginable. Her poor mother was going to be impossibly wrecked. Poor Charlotte! Telling her was going to absolutely destroy her.

Just thinking of how the rest of her family was going to take the news saw Elsie collapsing into Tyb. She was overwhelmed and heartbroken. All she could do was sob into his shoulder, still clinging to him as if he were the only thing keeping her upright. How could someone do this? Her thoughts came in a jumbled mess, bouncing around her head and completely paralyzing her from doing anything else but cry it out.

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MJ always makes her so pretty

“I’m so sorry,” Tybalt said again; he might have been saying it over and over without realising. His mind seemed disconnected from his body; any motions he made were nothing more than muscle memory. Elsie’s whole weight was swayed into his shoulder, so he wrapped his arms around her more tightly and squeezed.

He couldn’t see her face, which might have helped his composure if he couldn’t feel the full force of her sobs wracked against him. He put a hand to the back of her hair, grateful that at least she couldn’t see his eyes welling up as well. But Tyb shouldn’t cry because she was crying: someone ought to be the strong one. He let out a shaky breath over her shoulder, fighting that frantic feeling again. “Tell me – please tell me what I can do,” Tyb entreated, no more composed than Elsie was; as if he didn’t know there was no way to fix this, and nothing in the world he could do that would have the slightest effect on her pain.

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There was nothing anyone could do. Had her parents been notified? Had Harvey? Adella? She had no idea how to tell them, how this always seemed to fall on her. Tyb had the worst of it though, having to hear about it firsthand at work. It certainly couldn't have been easy to carry that news home to her.

She shook her head against his shoulder. Nothing could be done now. "W-was someone sent to t-tell my parents?" She mumbled, tears still streaming. She had to collect herself enough to go home and tell everyone else if that wasn't the case. Going to her parents' house was what she had to do anyway, to be there for them in any way that she could. There was going to be so much to do in the next few days. They hadn't even had Bentley to bury, that had been done in Boston where he'd been staying, though they had a headstone for him here too. This was wildly different and very much the same all at once.

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MJ always makes her so pretty

“They’ll be sending someone,” Tybalt said, sure of that &ndash not least because the Beauregards would all need to be interviewed as part of the case, lest there was some important detail about why Owen had been targeted. Still –

“But you should go and be there with them,” he added, regardless – it felt awful to make her go through all that again, and have to support her siblings and her parents when she was grieving too – but it was better if she wasn’t alone. And Tyb – he felt it too, of course he did; little Gryffindor Owen had always been his favourite Beauregard after Elsie, like a younger brother of his own – but he still felt something like an interloper, an outsider to their grief. “I’ll come, if you want me,” he offered, not sure if he would only be a nuisance to them, but wanting to help in some way, even if it was just to be there to tell law enforcement to leave them alone when they inevitably came knocking. He squeezed her shoulder a little too tightly. “I’ll do anything.”

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   Elsie Kirke

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Relieved that she would not have to be the one to break the news this time, Elsie took a few deep breaths, but couldn't unwind her arms from around her husband. He was the only thing keeping her upright and if she let go she would certainly collapse.

She kept her face pressed into his shoulder, nodding as he spoke. "Please, I can't do this by myself." She hadn't last time either. He'd hovered around her in the weeks after Bentley's death, always there in her periphery, ready when she needed him without even having to ask. This time she was going to lean on him more heavily, because this was heavier and harder and it felt far more surreal.

"We should bring Bentley with us," She decided, mumbled into his shirt. The baby was a good distraction from the sadness and who knew how long they would be, it would be unfair to ask Miss Halliwell to stay late. Plus he was too little to know what was going on. "I'll get his things together while you change." Baby steps, simple, quick milestones they could manage until things got easier. Reluctantly she finally let go and wiped her eyes, wholly unprepared for this, but moving to do it anyway.

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MJ always makes her so pretty