It wasn’t like she didn’t know.
She knew, deep in her bones, that Teen wasn’t Nicky. He couldn’t be. Despite what everyone else thought of her, Agatha did have a heart. Shattered, probably. Fragile, and hidden so deep under sarcasm, arrogance and selfishness that no one would have ever found it again. But a heart, nevertheless. And her heart would recognize her own son in an instant, despite all the decades that had flowed since the last time she had seen him.
That boy isn’t yours.
When Rio had appeared on the Road, like a bad joke of fate, her first instinct had been to wrap her hands around her throat and choke her to death. If one could actually kill Death. She wouldn’t know, she had never tried. Not really.
In the sound booth, there had been manipulation on her part: a futile attempt at swaying her determination in killing her with the alluring promise of some familiar comfort. Agatha knew manipulation, and she knew that the best way to lie was to tell half-truths. So yes, there was a part of her that still longed for Rio, that still ached and screamed and cried when the gap between them closed so much that it hurt to stay apart, and Agatha had used those feelings to trick the woman before her.
But all of that had been before.
She saw Teen collapsing on the floor, and caution went out of the window. She didn’t care that the others would see, she didn’t care that Rio would see, she didn’t care about anything else other than him.
It was like piling two sheets of paper on one another, and then splashing them with water, so it became impossible to determine where the first sheet ended and the second began. The boy’s face had turned into Nicky’s, the blood on his shirt and hands was her son’s, the day she had lost him.
She wouldn’t lose him too. She couldn’t. But there was so much blood, and Rio was slowly inching closer and then Lilia said those words, those words that Agatha knew meant something along the lines of there’s nothing we can do but pray he’ll survive. But there was no God or Goddess to pray to, not down there, not for Agatha. So she had snapped her head towards the woman and snarled don’t.
Don’t say that. There must be something, anything we can do.
Her eyes met Rio’s for one split second, and all the anger in her voice vanished, replaced by desperation.
“Don’t”. Please. A prayer. Please, don’t take him away again.
The wound had healed without a scar, but Agatha had stayed by the boy’s side for what felt like hours, silence heavying on her shoulders like concrete and the walls around her heart crumbling.
“Agatha”.
He sounded… He sounded like Nicky.
Could he be? Could he really be her lost son? Did Rio bring him back to her? Would they be able to finally have back all that they had lost?
“What really happened to your son?”.
She snapped out of it in an instant, eyes hardening and chest tightening, as if to shield her once again from weaknesses.
Her son was dead. She had seen life trickling away from him like sand in an hourglass, she had held his limp body in her arms, she had cried over him for hours, as if her tears would somehow wake him up. They didn’t.
And yet…
And yet Rio just had to basically tell everyone else how she didn’t want to do that, how she didn’t want to hurt her the way she did, even though it was her job. Her fucking fate-assigned job to reap souls from witches like a debt-collector, just like she had done with Nicky.
Agatha knew that she didn’t want to, she had seen the tears in Rio’s eyes when her knife had pried Nicky’s lips open, an ancient ritual which had freed his soul from the physical body. Once, she had found it beautiful. In that moment, it had been the most horrific thing Agatha had ever witnessed.
She’s my scar.
The truth was that all Agatha wanted was to forgive her. But how could she? How could she do this to Nick? How could she forget sleepless nights and empty rooms and silent days, when all she could do was lay in bed and wait hopelessly for her child to come quietly into her room, at first light, just like he did whenever he had a nightmare? She couldn’t.
But Rio had come looking for her, had played with her hair the way she used to do when they were younger and Agatha would zoom out, her mind somewhere very far away, when Rio’s gentle and cold hands would be the only thing able to bring her back.
She had made the mistake to turn around, and when she saw her, eyes wary but worried at the same time, she allowed herself to be vulnerable.
For just a moment, it was all okay.
Nick was fine, Rio was with her again, and Agatha had a Coven that could barely be called such but showed more warmth in a couple of hours than her own had ever done in all the years she had been a part of it.
She leaned in.
“Agatha. That boy isn’t yours”.
She drew back.
Of course. Of course she would say something like that. Rio had been many things in all the years they had been together, but dishonest? That seemed like an impossible thing for her to be. Of course she would shatter her perfect fantasy, because if Agatha had kissed her, she would end up believing something impossible.
And Rio, her honest and fucking beautiful Rio, couldn’t let it happen, even if it meant never getting her back.
Agatha smiled. A bitter smile, one of resignation. She walked away.
She wanted to scream, curse all the Gods she knew.
But they wouldn’t answer. They never did.