I hopped off the bus, making sure to thank the bus driver as I left. If there was one thing I could be thankful for, it was that the scenery in Vancouver really was beautiful. I understood why someone like Claire would want to live here, even if she had the choice to live anywhere in the world. My face scrunched up against my will when the thought of my aunt popped into my mind. I just couldn’t believe she would force me to take public transit alone. Even if nobody knew who I was, it always felt like they were staring holes in my back. Like they were disappointed. If they knew I was Edgewing’s son, those stares would only feel worse.

“Oh my god!” A teenage girl’s squeal at the bus stop snapped me back to reality. “This makeup look is so pretty!” Sparks flew from her fingertips as she swiped through her phone. 

Her friend leaned over her shoulder to look at the post. Her jaw hung open as she grabbed her own phone and opened an app, presumably to save the post for herself. 

“Claire Obsidian is literally so gorgeous, girl. How does she look like that while going out for a trip to the mall?” 

My curiosity got the better of me as I discreetly walked behind the stop to peer through the Plexiglass. The girls giggled between themselves, talking about the post as they jokingly pushed each other, fangirling over my aunt. 

“Wait, there’s another post!” the first girl exclaimed, shoving her phone into her friend’s face. 

“She has a kid!?” the second girl screamed. 

I caught a glimpse of her phone. On the screen, was a photo of me with my arms crossed and a scowl on my face as I watched Claire fill her cart with nothing but frozen food. The post was captioned, “Claire Obsidian and an Unknown Boy on Shopping Trip?” 

“You’ve gotta be kidding me!” I exclaimed, hitting the plastic screen. The two girls screamed in surprise, before a look of recognition flashed across their faces. They quickly sprinted over to me, bombarding me with questions about my relationship with Claire. 

“Ah, uh. That’s not me?” I tried nervously. 

“Nice try, kid. You might be adorable, but you’re a really, really, bad liar.” The girl with the spark gift said as she pinched my cheeks. “Are you her kid? Does she have a secret boyfriend?” 

“Hm,” the other girl mused. “He doesn’t really look White though. He low-key looks Wasian.”

“OMG, what if she had a kid with a K-Pop idol?” the first girl wondered. 

My heart raced as I wondered how to escape this situation. It wasn’t that I was uncomfortable with them asking questions, but I just didn’t want the dreaded question everyone loved to ask to come up. 

“I—” 

“Hey! Atlas! My boy! Your aunt was worried sick that you hadn’t come home yet. She sent me to find you!” a husky voice rang out. 

“Colonel Sanders?” one of the girls exclaimed.

I turned towards the voice. Approaching from the beach was my grandfather, Lance Obsidian. For being a man well into his sixties, he was far from what people would expect him to look like. The wind-whipped through his salt-and-pepper hair as he flipped it around dramatically. 

Damn. It just wasn’t fair how genetically blessed the Obsidians were. Even if I wasn’t blood related to them, I thought it was unfair how I was the ugly duckling of the whole family. Father was apparently offered brand deals even when he was a student, Claire was one of the biggest celebrities alive, and Grandfather was able to make a living as a movie star even after his retirement from his hero duties. I hadn’t ever met them, but supposedly the Sakurayama family was also incredibly attractive. Compared to them, I was just, well, average.

“How rude of you to call me Colonel Sanders!” Grandfather protested jokingly. “I sure hope it's not because of my gift.”

“Wait, Lance Obsidian? No WAY!” the girls squealed in excitement. “Can we please get a photo?” 

“Sure, bring it in, girls,” he said, draping his arms over their shoulders. “Atlas, if you don’t mind?”

I took one of the girls’ phones, thankful the attention was off me for even a moment. I made sure to capture the sea in the photo, admiring the beauty of the sunlight refracting off the surface of the water. Grandfather chuckled, throwing up peace signs for the second photo. It was only when he laughed that I realized the girls were right. With glasses on, he really did look like Colonel Sanders. 

As I handed the phone back to the girls, they asked Grandfather what our relationship was. With a wink and a finger to his lips, he told them that I was Edgewing’s son, and that it was a secret they couldn’t tell anyone. 

“Are you two students?” he asked. When the two of them nodded, he flipped open his wallet and handed them each one hundred dollars. “Get yourselves something nice. Y’all remind me of Claire when she was your age.”

I watched him grin as the two girls excitedly skipped off, waving at him the entire way. With my hands on my hips, I asked him, “So, did you just give Claire a hundred dollars on the regular?”

“Of course not,” he said, ruffling my hair with a smile. “I gave her a thousand each time!” 

I scoffed in disbelief. There was no way that this was the man my father would tell me horror stories about. 

“Listen to me, Atlas.” Father would say when I was young. “Your grandfather is a terrifying man. No matter what, you can’t break any rules in front of him. You understand me?”

“How are your wings, Grandfather?” I asked, snapping out of my memories.

“There you go again with the ‘Grandfather.’ I swear, can’t you just call me Grandpa? You’re starting to sound like—” 

“Like who?”

“Never mind. My wings are doing fine, as you can see.”

He unfurled his two white wings, flexing them experimentally before wincing. According to my dad, he originally had six wings before losing four of them on duty. The two remaining ones were apparently non-functional as far as flight was concerned, but the feathers they were composed of still worked fine. 

He walked me to his car, offering me a ride home. Claire apparently called him and was worried sick about why I hadn’t gotten home yet, thinking I was lost. In reality, I had fallen asleep on the bus and waited until it did another full loop around instead of calling her. On the drive home, we chatted about various things, until the topic of Claire’s job came up.

“Yeah, she’s been complaining to me and our agent that the diet she has to go on for her next modeling gig is too harsh,” he said with a laugh. “How are you holding up, Atlas? Did she let you buy food for yourself at the mall?”

“Huh? Seemed to me like she was eating fine.” 

If Claire was going to force me to walk home, then I was sure as hell going to snitch on her. There was no way I was going to put up with living with her without getting a few licks in here and there. 

“What do you mean?” 

“Oh, just that she bought nothing but microwaveable frozen food, she had nothing in her fridge apart from soda and beer, and that I saw a whole bunch of takeout containers at the dinner table.” I gleefully listed the things on my fingers as I snitched. 

“Claire!” Grandfather thundered as he threw open the door to her house. “We agreed that you were going on a diet for your next gig! There’s only so much leeway I can give you before the agency gets on my ass about it!”

“D-d-dad?” Claire stammered from the top of the staircase, her legs shaking. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Atlas told me everything! Putting your job aside, how could you only buy microwaveable foods for him?”

Claire’s eyes landed on me behind Grandfather. Her expression morphed into one of pure betrayal, like I had just kicked her puppy. Tears began to well up in her eyes as she wailed.

“It’s not my fault! I can’t cook and I want to eat yummy food! I’m sorry-y!” Claire sobbed. 

Grandfather’s expression became panicked as he rushed up the stairs to comfort his daughter. As I walked past them into my room, I heard him say that it was okay and that he would figure something out with the agency. I sighed, witnessing first-hand the princess treatment that led to Claire turning out the way she did. 

On the bright side, my room was completely set up. My futon was laid out nicely, and Grandfather set up a large dresser for me to put my clothes. The room itself was beautiful, complete with its own bathroom and lots of natural lighting from the windows. 

That night, as I tried to sleep, I tossed and turned in my futon, riddled with unnecessary thoughts. Did I truly deserve the love Grandfather and Claire showed me? After all, they weren’t related to me by blood. It wasn’t as if I had the potential that my father had, or any potential for that matter. I shook my head, hoping I could physically shake the thoughts away. They had been haunting me since I was young. I thought I’d be over them by now. If the girls at the bus stop knew I was giftless, would they still treat me the same?