Regan left swiftly, meandering back through the hall until she found the wash basin. She splashed some water on her face, even as she kept an ear out for the conversation in the other oom. She could only make out a few words here or there. She did hear Ögge’s footsteps. Maybe Regan was imagining it, but they seemed more forceful against the boards than before. Fuck. She sighed.

Once she was sure Ögge had arrived where it was she was off to, Regan dried her face and returned to the kitchen. “I’m sorry about…that,” Regan mumbled, looking sheepish, “I was just surprised is all.”

Regan sighed, running a hand through her hair as she often did when situations called for understanding beyond her limited emotional bandwidth. But there was one thought that dominated above all else. It came from a hurt so deeply buried that Regan had almost forgotten it was there.

“I just can’t imagine how you could leave your kid. As a mother.” Regan wasn’t looking at Othello when she said it. She was staring at the ground, distant, apologetic. She understood the woman’s reasoning, she just…couldn’t let that part go.

Regan didn’t agree. She wanted to argue but discovered she had no foundation to argue from. Regan didn’t have any mother to forgive or forget. It was as if she’d been spat out into the universe with no parentage at all. Just a babe without a name or cradle to call its own. She supposed the boy had more than that. He had Othello.

She opened her mouth and closed it again, gulping like a fish before nodding. It was their family, after all. Their decision. Who was she to intervene?

“No—” Regan offered quickly, returning the smile, “No, I’ll stay. I want to stay.” Because she did. Despite the inherent awkwardness, she still felt drawn to the little house. To the normality of family life, one that she had never before seen. The kind she might have had if things had turned out differently.

“Besides, these potatoes aren’t going to mash themselves,” she joked. Regan went to the kitchen and picked up where his wife had left off.