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Barry never forgave Lucretia.
He wasn’t as vocal with it as Taako, though in even in their motley crew hardly anyone was ever as vocal about their feelings as the twins. Taako had kept a lot of things close to the vest for a long, long time, but he’d never been subtle about his anger.
Lup forgave Lucretia almost immediately and with complete sincerity. She wasn’t over it-- none of them were, and there were long talks to have and tears to be shed, and when she finally got her body back she and Barry spent hours just holding each other-- but her forgiveness was genuine. Her and Magnus, and Barry didn’t know how they did it.
Merle he understood. Merle, as unconventional as he was for a holy man, had always been quick to forgive and move on and put on a smile. Merle he understood.
Hell, Magnus he understood. He’d lost a lot-- suffered a lot-- but in the end he’d met the love of his life and found a new meaning and spent ten years untouched by the memories of the lives they’d led before it all. That wasn’t to say Magnus wasn’t harmed in the end, but he wasn’t the worse off at the end of it. That, and Magnus had always bounced back fast. Fifty-so years in each other’s pockets and one particularly emotional drunken evening had cracked Magnus open about his childhood, about things he neglected to mention when he talked about his past, stories that were harder to tell than the dog fight and everything that came afterwards.
Magnus bounced back fast, had learned from a young age how to, and between that and his giant heart, it was really no surprise.
Lup, though. For all that Barry loved Lup with all his heart, for all that he knew his wife inside and out, for all that their relationship was the deepest he’d ever formed with another being, he didn’t understand the depth of her forgiveness. He couldn’t wrap his mind around it.
And Taako wasn’t offering any answers. The two of them were sitting on Barry’s kitchen floor. It was nearing three in the morning, and they’d drunk their way through two and a half bottles of wine. Barry’s head was swimming, his skin was buzzing and warm, and his mouth was running without his complete control.
He knew it might not have been wise. He considered himself a smart man. Taako was more himself now than he had been for so long, but nobody could blame him for being a little emotionally volatile. He might not have been the best person to go airing out shared insecurities with early in the morning, but who else was Barry supposed to go to? Cap’n’port? He couldn’t bring himself to do that.
Taako was listening, head heavy where he’d dropped it on Barry’s shoulder, ears flicking every so often in interest, and he hummed quietly in the appropriate places.
“This isn’t something I can forgive,” Barry confessed for the fifth time, and Taako hummed and took another swig from the bottle. They’d abandoned glasses an hour ago. “I spent those ten years in agony trying to keep myself together. When… when I had my wits about me, I was beside myself trying to find Lup, and, and, when I wasn’t… I wasted so much time, I forgot her so many times, forgot everything… ”
Another hum. Another swig. Taako pressed the bottle clumsily into Barry’s hands, and Barry took a sip on reflex. Nearly empty. Damn.
“I couldn’t help but thinking that I should have let her take me. Swipe my… my damn mind just so I didn’t have to remember. I hated myself for thinking it, but….”
“I hated myself for forgetting,” Taako responded, voice rough and tired. Barry fumbled around and caught Taako’s hand in his, intertwined their fingers, and squeezed. It wasn’t something that needed to be thought about, not between them. The twins had a thing for hand holding.
Merle was partial to initiating contact, to comforting hands on shoulders (or upper arms, or hips, whatever he could reach when he needed to), to pats and caring remarks concealed behind sarcasm. He’d always been good at looking after them, when he hadn’t been gone for parlay. Magnus was the most tactile of the crew, taking every opportunity to hug and lean on and pick up and wrestle, to poke at and lay heads on laps and shoulders. Share a bed with the guy, and you’d wake up wrapped up almost entirely.
The twins had been a bit harder, Taako especially. Lup had been carefully hesitant, but after the start of the second cycle, once they’d rematerialized once again and she’d realized they were pretty well stuck together, she’d been quick to jump on the Magnus train of physical affection. Taako hadn’t been so into it.
They teased him near constantly, when it was all shiny and new, that though Taako hadn’t let anyone hold him until cycle twenty-seven, he was hanging off Kravitz in a few short months. Lucretia had been almost as frugal with touch, reserved and hesitant, but unlike Taako she didn’t flinch away. They’d never gotten a full childhood story out of the twins (or, he’d heard it from Lup, but never from her other half), which was almost understandable-- elf childhoods being a century long and all, there was a lot more to tell than Magnus had in a decade and a half.
The only one more hesitant than Taako had been Davenport, but even he’d cracked after enough time together, carefully maintained professionalism giving way to show a real person full of fear and bravery, someone they could be family with.
Every cycle, though, the twins rematerialized clutching each other’s hands, and now on the kitchen floor Taako was more than comfortable listening to Barry cry while lounging entirely against him.
“You okay, bubeleh?” Taako asked, voice still harsh and exhausted. Barry found himself shaking and wondered why. He nodded.
“Fine,” he croaked, and then, “She was all alone in there, Taako. How does she not hate her ?”
Taako’s sigh carried the weight of the near two hundred thirty years he’d been alive. He said, “It’s baby Lucretia,” as if that explained anything. “You might as well ask her to hate Magnus, you know how damn loyal she is.”
Barry sighed and nodded. His cheeks were wet. Taako’s hair stuck to the one he’d been resting against the elf’s head.
“Real damn annoying…” Taako added, and Barry couldn’t help but chuckle.
He asked, “Do you think you’ll ever forgive her?” and expected Taako to laugh, something cold and mean and telling, something to make Barry feel better. Instead, Taako stayed silent, ears flicking against Barry’s shoulder. He felt his stomach settle heavy and dreadful.
“Unpredictability is part of the Taako Brand,” he answered instead, and what Barry heard was yes . “Can’t try predicting perfection, can we?”
Taako was saying yes, and Barry hated himself even more. Almost as much as he hated Lucretia-- or, as much as he wanted to hate Lucretia, as much as he hated himself for not quite managing it.
Barry had never been very vocal about anything. He was a simple man with simple needs, and until getting launched into space he’d been happy to keep it that way. He kept his head down and worked hard, he let his work speak for itself, let the science lead him. He’d never been as loud with his feelings as the twins, but in this moment he wanted to scream. Wanted to scream and cry and let it tear out his throat, feel the electrifying instability of a lich barely keeping control. He felt caged in. He felt drunk. He felt miserable .
“Cha’boy is not sleeping on the floor,” Taako announced seemingly out of nowhere, though he may have been speaking when Barry wasn’t paying attention. He untucked his head from Barry’s shoulder, and Barry was almost sober enough to recognize the damp patch on the fabric of his t-shirt. He sat up and stretched, arching his spine, popping his neck, rubbing gingerly at the leg that bugged him after Wonderland. He stumbled to his feet, nearly toppling back over and bracing himself on the counter. Then he reached down, took Barry’s hand, and hauled him up as well.
They leaned on each other as they tripped up the stairs and down the dark hallway, wine bottles left abandoned on the kitchen floor to become tomorrow’s responsibility. Lup was asleep in bed when they reached the bedroom-- the guest room was a mere ten feet down the hallway, but it was an old habit to collapse in bed together. Impossible work and exhausting hours had caught all of them sharing warmth at night at the Starblaster, unconcerned after about cycle twenty-five about waking up with any of the others snoring into the pillow next to them.
Lup stirred when they both collapsed nearly on top of her, chuckling sleepily and dragging Barry close under the covers. She reached over him to pat at her brother, tugging affectionately at his ear in a way that made Taako grumble and pull a pillow over his head.
Barry settled down with Lup pressed to his back, tucked entirely against him and holding him tight, and his and Taako’s fingers still intertwined. His arm would be numb in the morning, but that was fine. For the time being, Barry almost felt okay.
He didn’t know if he’d ever forgive Lucretia, if not for himself than for the rest of his family, for all the damage done and for the anger that roared in his chest that shouldn’t have been there.
It’s baby Lucretia, Taako’s voice reminded him, and Barry hated that it was enough to make Barry want to forgive her. Hated that it wasn’t enough to let him.