Carry You

Weiss looked up when she heard somebody approach. Of course, it was Blake. She wanted to ask why she was being bothered, but she knew why. Part of her really didn’t want to be pulled away from her books, but she did need to head out with her. The meeting was at three thirty but Kali said that they should leave a bit early. This was going to be hard. Meeting and interacting with new people wasn’t Weiss’ strong suit. She had somehow managed to not drive Blake off, but with the dutchesses Varela, it proved how inept she was. She tried but she managed to fail pretty badly. “Okay, Weiss; we should head out.” Blake’s voice was soft. Weiss sighed. This was probably going to end in complete disaster. These changelings had grown up in Koiria. She had grown up on Remnant. There was as big of a cultural divide between her and them as there was between her and Blke. She had no idea to approach any of this. These people wouldn’t know how to interact with her either. It felt like it was going to be an exercise in futility. This all felt like a very bad idea. She would prefer to stay here and read. “Okay.” She left the book open where she’d been reading. Hopefully she could come back and pick back up where she’d left off. She wanted to keep reading. Information couldn’t hurt people. It was her best friend. Cold, hard facts couldn’t hurt her. Well, at least not in the same way that people and emotions did. She hated all of this. People were way too unpredictable and she felt like she was incredibly likely to get hurt by the changelings due to the differences. They headed out and went to the teleport room where they made their way to a part of the city that Weiss hadn’t seen before. This part was a large central park with lots of stores surrounding it. The weather was lovely so people were out and about, enjoying the nice day. It was so strange to Weiss to see a large park like this. The most she’d seen were the small courtyards in Schnee manor. Yes, she’d seen the forests surrounding Blake’s manor, but this felt different. This was carefully manicured to have people enjoy it. It was absolutely bizarre to her… “Let’s get something to eat.” Before Weiss could even say something, Blake grabbed her hand and dragged her to a stall. A few people stood in front of them, but it wasn’t too bad. They got to the front of the line in about five minutes. “What do you want?” Blake pointed to the menu posted on the side of the shop. Crepes… She’d never heard of such a thing before. Some were sweet, some were savor. They had said three thirty was snack time, so she didn’t need to get something that was a full meal. “Um.” Sweet things were supposed to be desserts in her mind. But it seemed like it wasn’t a huge deal to have something sweet for a snack. But the strawberry banana one topped with a sprinkling of chocolate syrup sounded really good to her. It was mostly fruit with only a little bit of sweet syrup, so it couldn’t be too bad, right? She shyly placed her order then she moved off to the side with Blake. This entire restaurant thing was still so bizarre to her. Having options to choose from things were so strange. She only had that sort of freedom with her clothes. They got their orders and Blake had them sit at a small table. Weiss did catch sight of something unusual though: a woman with green eyes. She made an order at the crepe stand and waited. “Oh, that must be one of the changelings.” Weiss nodded. Already, she had grown used to being surrounded by people with mostly amber eyes, so it stood out quite a bit. The woman took her order to another corner of the part and Blake nodded. Weiss took in a deep breath and followed Blake over to the woman. “Pardon my rudeness, but are you changeling? My family recently adopted one and we thought we’d check the group out.” Yeah, asking something like that did seem rude, but it was the only way to find out in this case. Hopefully, the woman wouldn’t be horribly offended by the question. The woman looked a bit off put but she nodded. “I actually help organise the group. Though…” She looked at Blake. “Who are you? Your eyes tell an interesting story.” Blake’s ears flattened against her head and she looked away a bit. “I’m Marja Kovalenko.” “Oh, the Kovalenko family… I’m Blake Belladonna and this is Weiss Schnee.” Blake motioned to Weiss who stiffened a little bit. She offered a curtsy out of habit, only to realise too late that the woman probably didn’t know what it was. This was only her fourth day here. Dealing with completely foreign manners wasn’t built into her system. She hoped Blake and the others would understand. She’d try to get it in due time, but a few days wouldn’t be enough to get that ingrained in her system. People were not her strong suit. At all. She would rather be reading. “Oh, right; the Belladonnas. I hadn’t know you’d taken in a changeling. But you said it was recent? She shouldn’t be that old…” Marja’s eyes widened, something obviously occurring to her. “You didn’t bring an older girl here, did you?” Weiss looked away. She was nothing but a shame no matter where she went. Granted, none of this had been her choice. She was trying to not reflect too poorly on the Belladonnas but she didn’t get to make the choice in any of this. “I know I broke a lot of laws doing it, but I don’t regret it. If you want to look down on anyone, look at me. I didn’t really give her a choice.” Blake placed herself between Weiss and Marja and held her head high. Well, none of that was any sort of lie. Weiss hadn’t had any choice. Blake hadn’t even consulted her parents. It was an entirely snap decision. She had no say in it and neither had Blake’s parents. “That…is very strange, but you two are welcome to stay if you want. I’m not sure how much you’ll get out of it though… She grew up on Serlia, right? The cultural divide is probably pretty wide…” “It is.” Weiss’ voice was tiny as she looked down at her crepe (which she hadn’t even taken a bite of yet). “You have no idea how wide it is. I thought this was a bad idea but Kali and Blake insisted.” She was connecting to Valerie on a superficial level, but that was because their interests intersected at falconry. She couldn’t connect to any of the fae outside of Valerie because she simply didn’t know how to approach them. Fae culture was the complete opposite of everything she’d been raised with. Openness wasn’t exactly something Atlas was known for historically… “There is a reason changelings are taken as babies except for freak cases. I’ve never known anything but the Lider court. I’m guessing all of this had been hard on you?” Weiss nodded. There was no real way around it. This transition was extremely hard on her. She missed Winter but that was a constant fact of life for her. She always missed her big sister. She hoped she would be able to talk to her more often now that Winter didn’t have to worry about President Jacques finding out. “It’s been incredibly hard. I’d never left home before this. I’d barely left my family’s manor.” In that regard, being around the Belladonnas wasn’t so different. She couldn’t really go anywhere that wasn’t on the family’s grounds. At the very least, though, she could see Neige and ride him whenever she wanted. That and the library were the only positives she could see. She would start up with lessons soon enough, so she’d be back to something resembling normalcy hopefully in a few days. Sitting around like this was…unnerving. “I can only imagine.” Marja rested her cheek in her hand. “I’d probably go through something similar if I visited Koiria. Where are you from? I’m a bit of a scholar on human cultures.” Weiss frowned. “Atlas.” She knew the sort of reaction that would probably illicit. Atlas clearly wasn’t a good place based on the general reactions the fae had due to her mindsets. She was trying to unlearn things but could somebody expect her to unlearn an entire lifetime of programming in only a couple of days? She didn’t even know what she neededto unlearn. Her entire mind had been shaped by Atlas and its policies. Marja flinched at that. “I’m so sorry. That can’t have been an easy life.” She paused for a second. “And did Blake say Schnee—as in the Schnee Dust Company?” Weiss sighed internally. Apparently she couldn’t escape that even here. “Yes, I’m the heiress to the SDC… Or former heiress, I guess.” She wasn’t able to apply that to herself anymore. Auria had taken her place. She really had no idea what was going on in Atlas any longer. She had gotten her planner back but that was as far as her knowledge went. She really wished she could know, though. She had a feeling Auria was wreaking absolute havoc. She wanted to know what was going on in Atlas but she would probably never learn. “How did you handle the fae changeling, then? Somebody like you can’t simply disappear without repercussions.” That was very true. She could learn fae often simply took babies and didn’t replace them. That was disturbing, but it also explained why a lot of fae didn’t end up being brought back to Koiria and didn’t end up like Weiss. How much harder it would it be for a fae to integrate into society and be expected to live there for over ten thousand years? Weiss had struggle enough as was for the eighty or so year she would be there if she didn’t take on advanced magic. However, Blake spoke up before Weiss could. “Auria Digeneres was willing to take Weiss’ spot. She’s from the Misum court which is good, considering Weiss’ eye color. No doubt she can do glamors at her age, but natural is best.” Ah, right, glamors. With the fixed eye colors of fae, it was hard to match the variety of humans. But there were long-lasting glamors that could be applied to babies and would stay there for life. It was a curious quirk of magic… “I’m surprised a Misum—” Marja stopped herself for some reason Weiss didn’t catch. “A-Anyway, the others should be arriving soon. How old are you, Weiss? We tend to separate by age demographics. I’ll probably be a bit older than you.” That was odd, but she supposed it made some level of sense. People within the same demographic could relate to each other better. Her fiance had been far outside of her demographic, nine years her senior. But that wasn’t uncommon in Atlassian arranged marriages. “Sixteen.” She was pretty far from seventeen. She had a January birthday and it was July. It probably wouldn’t be too long until she lost track of that, though. She had no idea how to translate the fae calendar onto the Remnant one. It was all so horribly confusing and she hated it. She really did. Her life felt so out of sorts since she couldn’t rely on even the calendar to keep her straight and oriented. “Okay. You’ll be in the fifteen to eighteen demographic, then. For our group, we have five other people in that group. There are about fifteen told for our little meetup. Keep in mind changelings are rare in this day and age, so it’s impressive we even havefifteen people in total. They’ll probably all get there in the next twenty or so minutes.” Marja smiled and Weiss nodded. “Can I eat now?” She’d gotten her snack a little while ago and wanted to eat it. Marja nodded and Weiss sat down, then began to eat. It was a little on the sweet side, but it was good. She definitely preferred the bananas over the strawberries, though. Something about the flavor wasn’t her favorite. It wasn’t terrible, but she simply didn’t like it took much. But it was still nice. She watched as people started to file over to the little corner of the park. Many greeted each other with hugs and were incredibly familiar with each other. She already started to feel isolated and alone. She had Blake with her but that was hardly a comfort. These people all knew each other and likely grown up together. She saw some fae bringing a couple of toddler with them. The kids laughed and giggled while their caretakers took a out toys for them to play with. She was a stranger and alien. How could she possibly hope to fit in with them? She spotted a group of three teenagers gathering at the edge of the park. “Come on, Weiss; let’s go.” Blake offered her a hand to Weiss who took it and they approached. The group laughed uproariously at some joke told by a…person with short brown hair. It was hard to tell gender at a glance, at least within her traditional understanding of the concept. She still had yet to truly wrap her mind around the concept of nonbinary. The group stopped talking and looked at each other. “Who’re you two?” The one that had told the joke spoke up. They squinted their eyes. “What’s a half breed and a chaos-maker doing here?” One of the others snickered by Weiss didn’t catch who it was. She felt the tension in Blake’s hand and her ears flattened. If she didn’t know better, she’d swear Blake was about to growl. Marja slipped over to the group. “Nigina, this is Blake and Weiss. Weiss is a human changeling like you, though she was only taken in recently. Please treat her and Blake well.” The brown-haired person looked away but nodded. Marja looked at Weiss and Blake then went back to her own group. This was tense and Weiss wasn’t sure how to handle it. “Um, I’m Weiss Schnee. I’m from Remnant, though I suppose you know it as Serlia.” She wasn’t sure how to handle any of this. Chaos-maker? That sounded like a loaded term, but without the cultural context, it meant nothing to her. And she was glad. She didn’t want to get off on the wrong foot with them. She didn’t want to make friends, but she didn’t have much choice. These kids could potentially not like her. SHe hoped that wasn’t the case, though. “Wow, you actually grew up on Serlia? That’s incredible! What was it like?” A girl with black hair and bright orange eyes looked at her hopefully.Weiss was only going to disappoint her. She really had nothing good tosay about Atlas. It was like a prison with how she’d been raised and nothing could really change that. “I always wondered what growing up there would be like!” “Um, nothing like what you would expect here. Atlas…isn’t very kind to women.” She hadn’t been formally educated until thirteen. She hated that all she knew was needlework and music for the first thirteen years of her life. She loved learning so much that it was the only love she’d likely ever experience. She would be alone and isolated from the fae, so she severely doubted she’d find somebody to love. The girl looked disappointed. “Oh… My parents told me I would’ve been from there had I stayed. Do you think that might’ve been why they took me? I was supposedly from the nobility.” Yeah, that would very well explain it. If the fae knew anything about Atlas upper class, taking a baby from it would be good. A girl would almost never be educated due to how she was. Simply being a woman she had no reason to be educated. “Yes, most likely. I wasn’t properly educated until I was thirteen.” The girl looked horrified. Yes, that was about the reaction she’d come to expect to the realities of Atlas. She really didn’t understand how horrifying these facts were until seeing fae reactions. “Women—especially upper-class ones—are really just meant to be breeding stock to continue the family lineage.” There was no way around that. She knew what her place should’ve been. She really should’ve only had children and been kept at home. That was the bare truth of the matter. “I-I’m glad my parents rescued me from that then. I always thought it was unfair but…” No, it wasn’t. Growing up here did seem better than growing up in Atlas. This girl had been spared a horrible face. Weiss would’ve likely known her name and face, but that would be about it. They would’ve been catty with each other. There were no friends in the Atlassian upper class—only allies that would stab you in the back if given the chance. Nobody truly cared about each other. That was a weakness that could lead to political or business death years down the road is maneuvering wasn’t careful enough. “It wasn’t. Atlas’ upper class is…not a good place to grow up. Especially as a woman.” The girl was already horrified and she didn’t want to make things worse. Atlas was absolutely wretched. How Winter had survived in the military, Weiss wasn’t sure. It was hard to know. Winter wasn’t super forthcoming like a lot of Atlassians. But it was probably to protect Weiss from reality. It made sense now. Winter was always trying to keep her safe… “I’ll really have to apologise to them… I’ve always been angry at them for taking me away. But they never explained why. Can you really blame me?” Weiss wasn’t sure how to answer that. She really didn’t feel robbed of anything save her education. Her world was…small, as she was seeing now. How could she feel robbed of anything when she didn’t know what she was missing in her life? The girl then blinked. “Oh, right. My name is Petronia. It’s nice to meet you.” She offered a slow bow and Weiss returned it. “I’m Nigina.” The initial person spoke and Weiss looked helplessly at Blake. What was she supposed to do? She had no way to tell who this person was. She had no idea how to refer to them. She didn’t want to offend somebody needlessly and repeat what happened with the dutchesses Varela. THen again, could Blake read what she was confused about? She had her shielding ring on so nobody could get to her soul. She at least did notice the others had similar rings on, so it wasn’t like she was alone. Blake squeezed Weiss hand and let out a breath. “I’m Blake Belladonna and this is Weiss Schnee as I said earlier. Nigina, how should we refer to you?” Weiss looked at Blake again. That wasn’t rude? If not, she could’ve asked that. She was trying so hard to not offend anybody that she was paralysed by interaction. “I don’t care really. Masculine, feminine, neutral. Whatever.” Nigina flapped their hand dismissively. Well, that made things harder, not easier in Weiss’ mind. She simply didn’t understand how people couldn’t care about gender identity or otherwise. Gender defined a person’s place in Atlassian society. “And who’re you?” Blake looked at the last person who appeared fairly masculine. ‘Grigori.” He bowed his head to them, far less than any of the others had done. Nigina hadn’t even bothered with bowing. They did seem rather rude. How could somebody in fae society be so rude? Weren’t manners important? Then again, the librarian had been quite rude to her despite the apparent worry about manners in society. “We normally have two more with our group, but they’re both busy. Today will be a short meeting, so it won’t last too long.” Blake nodded. “That’s fine by us. Right, Weiss?” She looked at her and Weiss gave a hesitant nod. “That’s fine.” She felt so out of sorts with all of this. It was overwhelming to meet so many people at once. She had a really hard time keeping up with multiple people. This was so incredibly frustrating. Nigina and Grigori broke off and started talking to each other about things Weiss couldn’t follow, leaving her alone with Patronia and Blake. Weiss wasn’t sure what to say. “So, um, what hobbies do you have?” Patronia’s voice was as awkward as Weiss felt. She still really didn’t want to talk about herself but she did have the option to simply abstain from answering if she wanted to. “I read a lot. And I train in combat.” She paused. “I’m also learning about falconry.” She hadn’t really had her first lesson on that yet, but she would be actively learning soon enough. It was going to be hard, though.The lager birds intimidated her but Lilyana didn’t want to start her on the micros. Life was hard. Transitions were tough. She had no idea how to handle any of this. Patronia smiled a bit. “I like to read too, mostly books from Serlia. It’s interesting to see what they think is possible and what isn’t. I read their comics too and it’s all magic stuff in different forms. It’s kind of silly when I live in a world of magic, but it’s interesting to see.” “Comics?” She had never really heard the word before. She could vaguely recall multiple times hearing somebody complain about political comics, but that was where her knowledge stopped. She had no idea what they were. What could somebody read that wasn’t a book? Patronia blinked. “You don’t know what comics are? You’ll have to come over sometime and I’ll show you.” She explained what comics were, but Weiss had a hard time picturing it. Who would want to have pictures showing them what to imagine? Wasn’t a good chunk of the supposed fun of fiction picturing things how one wanted? Why take that away from somebody? She didn’t understand. “I guess.” This was really hard for her. She didn’t know how to interact with people. She simply had no desire to make friends. It always felt like she was going to be stabbed in the back and taken advantage of. She’d already been open with Patronia enough it felt like she could be taken advantage of. Though the other girl had already accepted her claims out of Atlas at face value. “Actually, why don’t we go do our own thing? We can do some shopping.” Patronia smiled but glanced over Grigori and Nigina. “We don’t haveto stay here. I call them all the time.” Weiss nodded. “Okay.” That sounded better than sticking around here. She could feel Nigina did notlike her for some reason even though they’d barely spoken. “Where do you want to go?” She didn’t know anything about the fae city except that it was broken up into different areas. They required teleportation to get to and from. That was all she knew. Patronia led them to where she wanted to go which was the first area Blake had brought Weiss to. She made a beeline for a shop and Weiss smiled when she saw it was books. It also had the smell of old books which pleased her. She mostly only got new books, so handling an old one was always a treat for her. “This is my favorite store. It’s for old and new books alike. I can show you comics here.” Patronia pulled them over to a section that had thin magazines on the shelves. There were two main sections: Koiria and Serlia. The latter section was much smaller than the former. The girl pulled a few of them off the shelf and showed them to Weiss. “These are comics.” They were exactly what Patronia had described: images interspersed with dialogue bubbles. What was the point…? “I see.” Well, she could see what they were about, but she couldn’t understand the appeal. Patronia took over, though, and started talking about all sorts of different things. She pulled off the comics from the shelves and launched into long diatribes Weiss couldn’t follow. All she really picked up was the fact that native Koirian comics tended to be something called speculative fiction. She didn’t understand anything about genres… Eventually, though, Patronia did take the hint and flushed. “Sorry. I really love comics. I find them really fun whether they’re Koirian or not. Though timelines, retcons, and such can make them hard to follow at times.” Weiss still had no idea what any of that meant. So all she could do was nod, a little and pretend she understood. “So what do you like to read?” Weiss frowned. “I mostly read dust journals, though that apparently isn’t applicable here. You don’t even havedust.” It was hard that her only real source of enjoyment had been taken away from her. Dust was the only thing she could wring any sort of enjoyment out of that. Well, that and bouncing around on her Semblance.S he really didn’t need to worry about that anymore either. She wasn’t going to Beacon, so she really didn’t need to practice any sort of combat anymore. This world seemed extraordinarily calm and peaceful especially without the threat of the Grimm… “Is that really all you read? It feels like reading reference books all the time would get boring. Have you really never read fiction? Or comics?” Weiss sighed. “Fiction holds no appeal to me.” She paused. “And I’d really not rather answer why.” She wasn’t sure if changelings held the same ability to detect half truths as fae did. She didn’t want to be caught lying, lest somebody call her out. She simply had no desire to spend her time in fictional worlds. She didn’t understand the appeal of escapism. If one was unable to cope with the harsh realities of life, then they had no place in the world. People like Willow were so incredibly weak. Plus, fiction would’ve taken time away from her learning. How could she compromise her education? Patronia frowned. “Oh. Well, do you think you could try?” She took them to another section entitled ‘mystery.’ Again, they were broken up by world and kingdom on the Remnant side. “If you like logical stuff, mystery might be a good place to start. Maybe we could read the same book and see if we can solve the mystery before the book ends?” Weiss tapped her chin. That might not be a bad idea to do. More fantastical stuff didn’t appeal to her. But she was incredibly detail-oriented so if it involved different details, it might not be horrible. “All right.” She frowned as something hit her. “But I don’t know enough about Lider society to pick up on anything…” The Atlassian section was…small. Maybe fifty books. She doubted that products of Atlassian society really appeared to fae or changelings. It was built on the oppression gender and other things she probably didn’t realise. She doubted any fae really wanted to read about that. She would have some idea of what to expect, but Patronia wouldn’t outside of the short explanations Weiss had given. “Hm, that is a good point. Fae tend to prefer Valian media if they consume anything from Serlia. But it’ll be an interesting learning experience for me. Why don’t we get one of each. It’ll teach us about the other’s home culture.” Well… That was likewise another good point. She supposed learning be done through fiction. She could also ask Blake about points she didn’t understand. She really had so much to learn and a detail-oriented fiction genre might prove a valuable learning tool for her. Weiss looked at the Atlassian books while Patronia chose some fae books. Surprisingly, Weiss found some books with a female detective. It was a military mystery too. Oddly, the summary mentioned the main character had white hair and blue eyes. No, there was no way. She shoved the thoughts to the back of her mind. She handed the book to Patronia. “It’s also a military mystery, so that’ll give you some insight into how Atlas’ military integrated into society.” It was based in modern-day Atlas, so it wouldn’t be too far for Weiss to go. The publication date was only a few years out, so it wasn’t like the culture had shifted significantly or anything. “Wow, neither court no longer holds down a militar, so that’ll be interesting.” Patronia handed Weiss the book she’d picked out. “This one is a few years old, but I like this author. Her style is excellent and her mysteries and clues are subtle. You’ll probably have some trouble with it but…” Honestly, Weiss wasn’t noe to back down from a mental challenge. This would put her to the test and she didn’t mind that. It would help keep her sharp in a way she didn’t mind. “I’ll relish the challenge.” She didn’t mind trying it out. This would really push her in a way that would be safe. Pus, she’d learn. She really would.S he was trying her best to adapt, though the culture shock was very real. “How do we want to do this: read one book at a time or both?” Weiss tapped her chin again. Good question. She wasn’t sure. She would be better at the Atlassian one, no doubt, but learning about society was important too. Decisions, decisions… “Maybe we read both at the same time? We can keep notebooks to help us make sure we don’t confuse the two books for each other. Then we can compare notes.” Quite literally in this case. Though she had never really done that before. It would be strange to do that. She and Whitley were far enough in age that they weren’t learning the same things. Plus, she was basically a certifiable genius. She could pick up almost anything in a short amount of time. “Okay! Maybe…two chapters per book per week? It’ll give us time to really mull over the details of each. And if we need to reread, we’ll have time to do that. Sound good?” Four chapters per week? She could do that. She could pick up small details in her dust journals on first reading, but yes, she may want to reread and double check details at some point. These books were decently long… It’d take them awhile to get through the books at two chapters per week. “That sounds fine.” Weiss managed a small smile That wasn’t the worst thing ever. Though something unrelated was bothering her. “What is Nigina’s problem with me?” SHe already had a feeling she knew Nigina’s problem with Blake. Blake had said her own grandparents had disowned her. So she had a feeling they really didn’t like Misum… Patronia shifted uncomfortably. “Oh… That… I shouldn’t tell you.” Weiss nodded a bit. There were plenty of things she shouldn’t tell the others. She had seen how even learning a little bit about Atlas tended to really upset people. It was awful. She really needed to keep her worst punishments and such at her father’s hands. It was for the best. “Anyway. Why don’t we head back to our homes and get started on these books?” Patronia was definitely hiding something, but she wouldn’t push. They checked out and Blake took Weiss back to the Belladonna manor. Once they were there, her ears fell and she sighed. “What’s… Oh.” That was a dumb question. Weiss realised too late how dumb it was to ask that. Blake had blatantly explained how a lot of people didn’t like her simply based on her mixed-race heritage. “Sorry. But could you explain something to me?” Blake blinked but nodded. “What does ‘chaos-bringer’ mean?” Blake’s ears flattened at that. Weiss could tell it was a loaded term, but she really had no idea of the cultural context. She would really struggle with the fae mystery book at this rate. “It’s…a really racist term for Misum. Misum tend to be more mischievous and fun loving than Lider. But Lider interpret that as chaos and as a generally negative thing… There’s a lot of racism between the two courts…” Blake wrapped her arms around herself. Weiss stood there awkwardly. She wasn’t sure what to do or say now. She had never really comforted to anybody before. She really didn’t like any of this. She didn’t like Atlas, but it was what she knew. It was predictable unlike the fae. “Anyway, I’m going to go find my mother. Go ahead and return to the library if you want.” Blake existed the room, leaving Weiss alone. She had Sayaka and waited for the bird to show back to the library. With that done, she sat the two mystery books on the table then went back to her previous studies. She had no idea how to handle emotions… Blake was best handled by her mother or somebody else…