Chapter Text
“If you need us, call us and we’ll be on the next flight. Promise,” Daphne said, fighting back tears as she held her middle child’s face in her hands.
Lilian gave a half-smile and assured her mother, “I know, Mom.”
“Your uncle can be here even quicker, if he needs to,” tears began leaking out of Daphne’s eyes.
Her daughter nodded, “I know, Mom.”
“And she has Frederick’s address and phone number if there’s a real emergency,” Niles assured his wife, placing his hands on her shoulders.
“I’ll be fine, Mom. Don’t worry about me,” Lillian assured her.
At her child’s words, Daphne broke down into tears and all but collapsed into her daughter’s arms. Lilian wrapped her arms around her mother, holding her tightly and assuring her that she would be fine. As she did, she may have let a few tears of her own escape.
Niles placed his hand on the small of his wife’s back and said quietly, “Darling, if we don’t leave soon, we’ll miss our flight.”
Daphne relinquished her grip on her child and nodded, tears still flowing. She reached to squeeze Lilian’s hand and sobbed, “I love you.”
Lilian wiped tears from her eyes with her free hand and smiled, “Love you, too, Mom.”
Daphne blinked back tears, nodded, and began walking out of her daughter’s dormitory, leaving Niles and Lilian in the room alone.
“You’re going to love it here,” he told her, eyes ringed with red and voice a little strained.
Lilian smiled at her father, “I know I will.”
“We’ll miss you at home, though.”
“I’ll miss being home… even Izzy.”
Niles smirked and gave a small laugh, thinking about all of his daughters’ squabbles over the years, “I know how that feels.”
Silence hung heavy between them for a moment as neither of them knew what to say.
Finally, Lilian broke the silence, launching herself into her father’s arms and sobbing, “I love you, Dad.”
Niles squeezed his daughter as tightly as possible, letting his own tears fall, “I love you, too, Lily-bug.”
The return from Connecticut to Seattle took roughly nine and a half hours-- almost 8 of those hours were spent actually on a plane-- arriving back in the Northwest at almost 2 in the morning.
By the time Niles and Daphne arrived home, the house was dark and silent. They were too tired to even bother turning on lights, instead stumbling through the darkness to their bedroom before collapsing into the bed.
Unfortunately, even as tired as they were, neither of them seemed to be able to sleep.
“It’s strange, isn’t it?” Daphne voiced into the darkness.
“Hm?” Niles asked, staring at the ceiling.
“Not having all of them here.”
“Oh.”
Thick silence hung in the room like a blanket.
“Maybe it would have been easier if David had gone to college,” Daphne postulated.
Niles shifted to look at her profile, “You think so?”
She cut her eyes to meet his, “No.”
He shook his head in agreement.
“She’ll be fine, you know,” Niles offered, reaching out to squeeze his wife’s hand, “I made it and she’s a lot stronger than I was.”
Daphne smiled sadly.
“And we still have David and Isabel here,” he offered.
A sob escaped her, “For now.”
“Oh, Daph,” he said, moving to take her in his arms. His hand moved up and down her back, hoping to soothe her, but knowing deep down that there wasn’t really anything he could do to alleviate her pain.
“You did a great job, you know,” Niles said.
She raised her head to look at him.
“Raising our children,” he clarified, “You’re such a fantastic mother.”
Daphne smiled sadly, laying her head on her husband’s chest. “You’re a wonderful father,” she mumbled, sleepily.
He smiled back at her, continuing to rub her back until he felt her breathing deepen and knew that she had fallen asleep.
“It’s going to be a lot more quiet around here,” he said to no one, yawning, and soon following his wife into a deep slumber.
The silence didn’t last.
It was barely 7 am before Niles and Daphne were awoken by the sound of David moving around the house. Groggily, Niles made his way to the kitchen, where his son was hard at work on something.
David jumped when he finally turned and noticed his disheveled father standing in the kitchen doorway. “I didn’t wake you up, did I?” he asked, sheepishly.
Niles just fixed him with a stare that somehow still intimidated David, despite the fact that he was now 21 and stood at least two inches taller than his father.
“Sorry,” he apologized, rubbing his hand over his mussed hair, “I was trying to make breakfast for you guys.”
Niles smiled a lazy half-smile and shook his head, sighing, before allowing himself to collapse into a chair at the kitchen table.
“How was Lily?” David asked.
His father yawned, “She’ll be fine. I think she’ll really like it there.”
David nodded as he continued cooking, “How about Mom?”
Niles chuckled dryly, “That’s… a different matter.”
“Did she cry?” David asked, sliding an omelet onto a plate.
Niles rubbed a hand over his cheek, feeling the stubble rough on his jaw, “It was… difficult. Not just for your mother.”
David nodded, “It’s going to take some time to get used to not having her around.”
His father nodded as the door opened and his mother entered the room.
“Just in time,” David said with a smile, carrying plates to the table.
After breakfast, Niles and Daphne drove to Nervosa to meet Roz and pick up Isabel.
“Hey guys, how’re you doing?” Roz asked, spotting her friends and waving them over to the table occupied by herself and the 16-year-old.
Niles simply groaned, which Daphne translated, “We got home at almost 3 am and David woke us up at 7 with breakfast.”
Roz chuckled a little, “Never thought I’d hear someone complain about their live-in chef cooking them breakfast.”
Niles and Daphne both smiled slightly, in spite of themselves.
“I still don’t understand why I couldn’t have stayed home with David,” Isabel grumbled.
“Because your brother is barely home,” Niles explained, “And you have proven that you cannot be trusted unsupervised in the kitchen. Need I remind you of the ravioli incident?”
Isabel rolled her eyes and groaned, but dropped her argument.
“Oh, by the way, Mom, you’ll never guess who dropped by for a visit,” Isabel began and this time it was Roz who rolled her eyes.
Looking between her daughter and her friend, Daphne asked, “Who?”
“Well well well, look ‘o we ‘ave ‘ere,” came a voice from the doorway of the cafe, “if it isn’t my dear little sister and ‘er husband. What a coincidence.”
“Speak of the devil,” Roz groaned, as Daphne’s head whipped around to see Simon entering the room.
“Simon!” she gasped, “What are you doing here?”
He pulled a chair up to their table and lazily draped himself over the seat, “Well, like the good son that I am, I decided that it had been far too long since I had given a visit to our dear old mum, so I hopped a flight. Then, while I was visiting, I found out about the future pride of the Moon family.”
Daphne narrowed her eyes, “What are you talking about.”
Simon slung an arm around Isabel, “You never told me we had a footballer in the family, Stilts!”
Isabel rolled her eyes and shrugged out of her uncle’s side-hug.
“You know, United’s got a womens’ side now,” he said, pointing toward his niece, “you keep this up and you’ll be a Red Devil yet.”
“If I do are you gonna get kicked out of their stadium, too?” Isabel asked pointedly.
Daphne’s head whipped around to her brother, “ Simon ! What happened?!”
Isabel smirked, “Uncle Simon got banned from the soccer complex.”
“Banned ?” Niles asked, incredulously.
Simon held up a hand in a lazy defense, “If pyrotechnics were prohibited, they should have had a sign saying so.”
“Fireworks are illegal in Seattle, you idiot,” Roz admonished him.
He shrugged.
She continued, “You’re lucky the police let you off with a warning.”
“On an unrelated note, do any of you know anyone interested in buying 5 cartons of road flares?”
“Hey, Mom. Hey, Dad.”
“Hey, Lily,” Niles said, leaning over Daphne’s shoulder to see his daughter’s face on the screen of her tablet.
“How was your first week, sweetheart?” Daphne asked.
Lilian smiled, “It was great.”
As their daughter told them all about her first week of classes, Niles and Daphne shared a look and a small smile.
Yeah, things were going to be different, but everything was going to be okay.