Chapter 5.17: Long time no see

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From Cassy's diary

Life seems to proceed calmly in the Miller house, looking after Sirio and Halley is keeping everyone busy to the point of not letting us worry about anything else.

Halley's growing so quickly. The more time passes, the more she resembles her dad, don't you agree, my dear diary?

But the little one isn't the only one for whom time passes... A few days later, in fact, we were cooking a new birthday cake for Venus and me.

We don't feel that old yet, but the sporadic episodes of back pain seem to be of a completely different opinion...

It was a good party, especially for the kids who couldn't wait to have their slices of cake!

Venus: Halley, it's bedtime!

Halley: Nope!

Venus: C'mon, I can see from here you're sleepy already!

Halley, although she is so little she can barely put a whole sentence together, already has quite a temper.

At times we would describe her behaviour as naughty, as if she finds it amusing to do the opposite of what she is told to.

[*Halley, on the other hand, got the Silly trait, how lucky I am...* ]

Venus: Once upon a time...

Steve: (off-screen) Are you sure you're all right, Venus?

Venus: Of course I am!

Steve: But you look like you had tiger-like stripes on your skin!

Venus: Bah, it's nothing serious, c'mon!

Meanwhile, Sirio is growing a lot too, and he starts to understand his surroundings better and better. He has always been very smart, often he understands things well before they are explained out loud. 

However, the more time passes, the more his questions get complicated. For example, lately his favourite question is...

Sirio: But my dad? 

Cassy: ...

Question for which I haven't found a good answer yet. 

I think that it's normal for him to start wondering about it, especially now that he hears Halley say "mom" and "dad" all day long. Or now that the other kindergartners keep asking him who her dad is, and why he's never even met him.

However, I find it impossible to answer him, when I'm the first to have no idea what happened to Toq, or that it crossed his mind to make the decisions he made... So, all I can say to him in those cases, is:

Cassy: I'm sorry, Sirio... But I don't know where he's is, either.

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From Venus' diary

Today it was my and Steve's turn to go to the grocery store, so we left the house chatting about random things, as usual.

Venus: And, if I remember correctly, there should also be a discount on...

Steve: A discount on what? The pizza-flavoured fries from last week?

Venus: ...

Steve: (perplexed) Did you see anything?

Surely he was the last person I expected to meet by pure chance around the town. But he was also one of the very few people I could never let go like that, without even telling him off!

Venus: Wait here for me a moment.

Steve: Venus, wait! Don't you really want to...

Venus: (angrily) You stupid squid-head, where the heck have you been for all this time?

Toq: ...

Venus: And don't think you can get away with it, you really have a lot to explain to us, you know?

I'm sure he was about to run away again, but I still dragged him to the nearest table to force him to talk to us. That idiot Toq had been missing for years, leaving Cassy heartbroken and raising their son alone, I couldn't let him get away with it!

Toq: What do you want from me?

Venus: You really can't figure it out by yourself?

Toq: ...

Venus: Why the heck did you just disappear like that, without explaining anything to anyone?

Toq: ... I explained it already to Cassiopeia, I told her I needed time to understand.

Venus: But it's been years! And then do you even realize how bad it was for Cassy, because of you being such a selfish idiot?

Toq didn't seem to want to tell us anything else, but his expression became harder and harder to decipher as the discussion progressed.

He seemed to have a head full of a thousand thoughts, but so cryptic for us to make it impossible to even imagine what could actually be happening inside of that squid-head of his. 

Steve: (cautious) Maybe the one who should talk to him is Cassy, ​​not us.

Venus: What? I won't let him into the house, it would only make her feel worse!

Steve: But, I mean... at the moment she doesn't understand why he's gone, but I think deep down she would like to understand it.

Venus: But...

Steve: Can you think of any time when Cassy preferred to leave something unfinished?

I sighed, no longer knowing how to answer back. Sometimes Steve shows to know my sister and me all too well...

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From Cassy's diary

Cassy: Hey, Venus! If you forgot your shopping list here, I can send you a photo... What? Slow down, I don't get what you're saying...

The phone call I received from my sister Venus this afternoon may be one of the strangest and most unexpected that I have ever had.

Venus seemed beside herself too, she spoke so fast it was hard to keep up with her. But the message seemed all too clear.

Cassy: Oh. I see...

I had to think about it a lot before deciding what to answer. On the one hand, I was waiting for a new opportunity to clarify all those points that had remained pending. But, on the other hand, I was afraid that seeing Toq again would only make both me and Sirio feeling even worse than we are doing now.

I don't know if it was bravery or recklessness, but I think both Sirio and I deserve to know more. Thus, a little later...

Toq didn't seem to have changed much, he only seemed a few years older like the rest of us. Otherwise, the serious expression always seemed the same.

Sirio is usually afraid of strangers, so I wasn't surprised when I saw him cling tighter to me. Looking closely, though, more than scared he seemed intent on scrutinizing Toq with a curious face. He certainly is very different from anyone he's ever met before, that's for sure.

Toq: (uncertain) Cassiopeia, I...

Cassy: Wait. I think that Sirio would like to greet you, now.

I'm sure Sirio understood who Toq was from the first moment, he hadn't had any need to ask us. And he amazed me even more when I saw him take a few steps towards Toq, to ​​then say to him in a very cheerful tone:

Sirio: Hello!

Toq: ... hello, Sirio.

Toq had then given him a half smile. He seems to be smiling a little more than the last time I saw him, thinking about it. Seeing that Sirio wanted to talk to him, he had then crouched in front of him politely, waiting for his questions.

Sirio: Why is your head so weird?

Toq: ... many people say it, in fact there are not many who have a head like mine. But it is my head, that is all.

Sirio: Ah.

They talked quite a bit, Toq didn't even get upset when Sirio approached him to pull one of the tendrils on his head (although he has told me several times that it's very painful for him, and it also interferes with his telepathy).

Then, after a considerable yawn from Sirio, Toq had turned towards me to say:

Toq: He is tired, I think he wants to go to sleep.

Cassy: Yes, it's actually almost bedtime for him.

Sirio: But I'm not sleepy!

So I brought Sirio to his bed and, as usual, I read him a story for helping him fall asleep. 

When I was sure he was sleeping, I then turned back to Toq to say:

Cassy: (accusatory) I think you really have a lot to explain to me, you know?

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§HermioneSims§ corner:

Bwahahaha, I'm so evil at interrupting here the chapter! Jokes aside, the following to this scene is even longer than this whole chapter, so I had to split it in two. The extra suspense is just a nice extra.

I would also share the information that, gameplay-wise, the relationship level between Cassy and Toq in this phase in the story was this one:

As the description says... It's very complicated.