In a bad mood

Zerden stood looking over the men under his command. They were training, and they looked tired. Zerden knew he had been pushing them harder for the last month. His bad mood had made him irritable, and every mistake was now punished with a gruelling training session.

He knew he needed to back off a bit. His men were well trained and the minor mistakes that they made didn’t warrant this punishment. Zerden needed to get his temper back in check. Which was easier said than done.

It would be easier if he just had known why he was in such a bad mood. If he was honest with himself, he knew. He just wasn’t up for admitting it just yet. So instead, his bad mood continued and everyone around him endured and stayed out of his way as much as they could.

“Don’t forget to put everything back before you head to get dinner,” he shouted. He didn’t wait around to make sure they did what he told them. No one wanted to disobey him at the moment.

He walked inside and headed to his room in the castle. Zerden had just sat down at his desk when there was a knock on the door. He sighed and went to open it. Outside, a page stood, holding a note.

Zerden took the note and closed the door without saying a word. He then opened the door again, to the surprise of the page that was about to leave.

“Thanks,” Zerden said and closed the door again.

Zerden knew who the note was from even before he looked at it. Only one person used pages to send him notes. If that wasn’t enough, he could smell her perfume coming from the note.

He went to his desk and sat down again. His bad temper had affected his relationship with Sarah as well. The last month he had noticed that things that he used to think was cute or sweet, now irritated him. Like the way she always pointed out other’s flaws. Then she would go on and on about them.

Zerden sighed. The last time Sarah had come over to his mother for tea. Sarah had said something about Mary, something negative.

It had escalated, and now his mother refused to see Sarah again. Not even when Zerden had promised that Sarah would apologise, had his mother changed her mind. That was kind of lucky, as Zerden didn’t think he could make Sarah apologise.

His father, had as usual, sided with Zerden’s mother. With personal relationships, Zerden’s father insisted that his mother was the person to trust.

Zerden sighed again and looked at the note that he still hadn’t opened. He just wanted his fiancée and mother to get along. Was that too much to ask? He loved his mother, and he cared for Sarah deeply.

The last thought made him sit up in his chair. When had he stopped thinking that he loved Sarah? Or was it just a slip of the mind? Probably, he decided.

He opened the note and found that Sarah wanted to meet him in an hour. Zerden groaned and rubbed his face with his hands. He didn’t have time to meet her in an hour. He had reports to write and exercises to plan and a hunting trip to arrange.

But he knew that if he didn’t show up or if he sent a note saying he couldn’t, he would have to listen to her whine about it the next time they would meet. And then he had to coax her into a better mood and then he would be in a bad mood himself.

Why were things so complicated with Sarah? Mary had never objected to him needing to do his work, he thought. The thought of Mary made him sigh, yet again. That was another problem. Since her latest letter, Mary had been on his mind more than usual.

He was interrupted by another knock on his door. Zerden contemplated to just shout for them to go away, but thought better of it and went to open it. Outside stood a soldier that told him that his mother had requested the Zerden came as soon as possible.

Zerden knew what that meant, a new letter from Mary. He asked the soldier to stay put, scribbled a quick note to Sarah that he was busy with work, and sent the soldier to deliver it as he headed for his parents’ apartment.

“Hi mom” he shouted as soon as he got inside the door.

“Zerden, how many times have I told you not to shout? You’re a grown man” his mother smiled at him as he entered the kitchen.

“Sorry mom. I got here as fast as I could,” he said.

“That you did. I just sent word to you. Excited to read Mary’s new letter?” she said.

“I just didn’t want to keep you waiting”

“That’s sweet of you. Now sit down by the table. I have it there for you,” she said and sat opposite from him.

It was a short letter this time, Zerden thought as he opened it. He started eyeing through it and he froze. He just stared at the sentence ‘But this will be my last letter’.

“What is it Zerden? Has something bad happened?” his mother asked, worried.

He looked at his mother and then down at the letter again. He didn’t know how to read this to her. But he cleared his throat and started reading. As he came to the part where she was saying goodbye, his mother started crying and Zerden didn’t know what to do. He continued reading until the part addressed to his mother was done.

They sat in silence, Zerden’s mother crying, Zerden looking at the letter.

“She is right,” his mother said. “It’s hard to let go of her, but she deserves to live her new life to the fullest.”

“But why must she cut us off?” he asked.

“Because you wouldn’t let her grow Zerden,” his mother said, glaring at him.

“What?”

“I’m not stupid Zerden. I can read between the lines, even if Mary is too nice to tell me. You wrote all those things to her I told you not to. You made her feel you can’t accept the person she is becoming. I once told Mary that I hoped you wouldn’t come to regret your choices. But now, I hope you will look back at this and regret it and learn from it” Zerden’s mother spoke the words fast and with a hard voice.

Zerden didn’t know what to say. He hadn’t liked the way Mary had sounded in her letters. She was changing, becoming something that wasn’t his Mary. He didn’t see how his mother was okay with that.

As he sat there, trying to think of what to say, his father walked in and stopped as he saw his wife’s tears.

“What has happened?” he asked, walking up to her and kneeling by her side.

“Mary has said goodbye. She needs to let go of us all to move forward. She sends her love,” Zerden’s mother told his father. His father nodded and hugged her.

“I think I’ll leave,” Zerden said, putting the letter in his pocket. He hadn’t read his part yet, and he dreaded it.

“Zerden, I think it’s best you keep away for a while. I’ll invite you over for dinner next week,” his mother said. Zerden looked at her. She had never told him he couldn’t come by before. Zerden’s father looked just as shocked as Zerden felt.

“Sure mom. I’ll see you in a while. Bye dad” he said as he got up and left.

The knot in his stomach didn’t go away. It grew as he walked through the hallways. He needed to get to his room to read the last part of the letter. Maybe it said something more, something to give him hope that this wasn’t the last thing he heard from Mary.

He sat down at his desk and opened the letter and read the last part. It was short and heart wrenching. Zerden could hear Mary’s voice in his head as she told him she was disappointed in him. He heard it again and again.

Was it true? Was he less than the man he could be? He thought about his mood the last month, the way he had treated his men. That wasn’t the captain he wanted to be. That wasn’t the way his father had taught him to treat other soldiers.

A week later and Zerden hadn’t slept much. His mind kept going back to think about how he could be a better man. He kept wondering if his words had had the same effect on Mary. Had she been unable to sleep, trying to figure out what she could do better?

He really wanted to talk to his mother, but she hadn’t invited him over for dinner yet and he didn’t know if she would accept him if he just walked over. But after eight days, he couldn’t take it anymore. He found himself outside his parent’s apartment. Knocking on the door to be let in, for the first time in his life.

His mother opened the door and looked at him. She nodded and walked inside, leaving the door opened for him to follow.

“I’m sorry, mom,” he said.

“I know Zerden. But I’m not the one that you need to apologise to. That one is someone that you no longer can apologise to. We need to honour her decision,” his mother said as she placed tea in front of him. He nodded. He knew that.

“She wrote me a separate letter,” he told his mother. He couldn’t look her in the eyes, so he looked into the tea.

“She said that she was disappointed with me and that I could be a better man than I am,” he confessed. When his mother didn’t speak, he looked up and saw a small smile on her lips.

“She is right, my son. You have the potential to be a great man, a great leader. But you aren’t living up to that potential at the moment. But it’s never too late,” she smiled at him.

“It’s not?”

“No Zerden. You may have lost Mary, and you have to live with that. But you can still grow and change, just like she is doing. I have faith in you,” she patted him on his hand.