Chapter Text
“Dead?”
“Yes, dead Claudius. How many times do I have to tell you before you get it into that thick skull of yours?” his mother snapped.
“But…” his words died out in his throat. What could he even say? His sister, sister-in-law, and brother-in-law had all perished. He’d never been able to see them again. Granted, they weren’t particularly kind to him. Not many people were. Then why did his tongue feel so heavy, as if he wouldn’t be able to speak ever again? Why did he feel a sense that he’d irreversibly lost something? After all, there had been no loving relationships to mourn. So what was it that had suddenly been stolen away from him?
Perhaps, then, he was mourning the family he could have had if he was born like everyone else.
Ever since infancy, he had always been different from the other children. He limped and trembled and stammered. His father had never lived to see these symptoms manifest, so he’d never know what he would have thought if he saw his son’s disabilities. Maybe he would have still loved him and treated him with gentle kindness. Maybe it was just wishful thinking.
But his mother never forgave him for it. In her eyes, her youngest child was an abomination. While she doted on Germanicus, (because everyone just had to dote on Germanicus…but he could, however, never bring himself to resent him for it like Livilla did) she practically used his name as a synonym for ‘stupid’. He’d seen Romans who treated Germans better than how she’d treated him. His sister was less harsh (it was difficult to surpass his mother’s resentment, to be fair), but she’d naturally internalised the idea that he really was nothing if not a fool. No matter how hard he tried to prove them wrong and show that he deserved a place in this family, he could never escape the label of an ‘outsider’, one who wasn’t like anyone else. He would be at best ignored and at worst treated like he was a monster until the day he died.
Was there any way to save himself from this fate?
“You need to get out of here.” echoed the voice of his deceased sister. A memory from long past.
“What?”
“You aren’t that stupid. You can live by yourself, you know that?”
“I-I’m not…”
She raised her hand to silence him.
“Even though you trip over your words, you aren’t that stupid. If you continue living with Mother, however, you’ll be trapped by the stigma of being ‘stupid’. You have to free yourself.
“But…but..”
The shadow of the tree above loomed over them. It was a grand old being that had been growing there for generations. The branches had spent years twisting and turning amongst each other. The tree was too great to be felled, and so as the snakes of wood proliferated, its shadow grew larger and darker over those that stood under it.
“You have an opportunity that I will never have. Not unless…” her eyes darkened, as if considering a horrible possibility. “No. You have to use this opportunity!”
Her eyes usually gave off the impression that she didn’t care for anything in this world. Not her mother (who returned the favour) or her siblings or her husband. He’d always seen her dull gaze survey her surroundings impassively, as if nothing was of any value or interest. He could barely remember a time where she’d looked at anything with the desperation that shone through in that moment.
He never understood why she was so passionate that day.
And now he could never ask her.
It was a beautiful sunny day outside (despite the presence of a few clouds that just obscured a full view of that radiant being. As Claudius stepped out into the light, the clouds cleared, revealing the full extent of the sun’s rays. As they scattered across his face, he didn’t avert his eyes but instead looked into the clear blue sky. A lone bird soared above.
Was it a dove? He couldn’t tell.
The bird wasn’t with a flock, as members of that species normally were. Yet it still spread its wings and flew amongst the rays of sunlight, guided by the gentle wind.
He’d never understood his sister. His mother, at least, was open about her hatred for him. Yet his sister, despite professing a similar disregard for him, confided in him regardless, and he did likewise. His brother was kind if distant, and his sister seemed to be the exact opposite.
“Why…w-why do you t-tell me…all th-this?” he asked her one day, after another one of her series of complaints against their mother. “You d-don’t even like me.”
She glared at him. For a second, he could have sworn that her expression looked startled, as if someone had hit her. But if it was there, it disappeared in an instant.
“What are you going to do? Tell someone?” she scoffed. “Nobody talks to you anyway.”
She didn’t deny not liking him.
He thought that reasoning was questionable as a child, and it became even more so as he grew into an adult. Claudius had always known that Livilla was the only person that was willing to even talk to him, but surely the reverse wasn’t true? She wasn’t considered abnormal like he was.
Her words still nagged at his head. She had urged him to leave. That was the last conversation he had with her before she died.
His sister was never kind, but she gave him company that he had been ever so starved of. She understood him, even if he could never understand her. Never would he see her again.
His sister was a bundle of contradictions that he couldn’t ever work his way around.
At that moment, something clicked in him. Between the bird that was gliding alone and the sun that was freed from its cloudy prison and the watery shine in his sister’s eyes as she spoke, he had an epiphany.
She was right. He had to move out. All this time, he had existed in this world only in its shadows. If he wanted freedom, he couldn’t wait and expect it to magically be granted to him. His relatives would never change unless he did. He needed to craft his own wings and take the initiative to soar in the sunlight as that bird did.
He was going to buy his own house and live on his own. He was going to get away.