"Um, Sir?," She asked because it must have been at least a minute and Cailen was just standing there, staring at her.
He just couldn't find his voice. It was her. She was standing right in front of him, asking how she could help him and he couldn't speak.
He didn't know how he knew it was her, maybe it was her nose, maybe it was her eyes or her hair and that she actually did look like him, but he just knew.
He had so many questions, so many things to say to her, yet he couldn't make any words form.
This was a bad idea.
Hell, the whole night had been a bad idea.
How did he go from being at a party, to being with the boy he loved, to losing his family, to ending up staring at his biological mother like a fish in a fishbowl?
Why did he come here? He shouldn't have come here.
Why did he think he could do this? He couldn't do this.
Cailen's feet were way ahead of his brain, one of them stepping back, blindly searching for the step and only finding it when he stumbled back, nearly falling on his ass.
The woman, Arabella, blinked at him, a confused expression crossing her face as her hands found the little girl's shoulder and held her close, probably protecting her from the crazy man who knocked on their door.
Cailen assumed she was going to pull the little girl inside and slam the door shut. He would if he were in her position, but she didn't.
Instead, she bent down beside the little girl, whispering something in her ear and then she was running off into the house.
Arabella straightened up, her arms crossing over her chest as she regarded Cailen, who was still backing up down the walkway, unable to look away.
It wasn't until she opened her mouth to speak that he turned around, ducking his head and shoving his hands in his pockets.
He was hoping he'd somehow become invisible, that she would just let him leave and forget the strange man that came up to her door and stared at her without a word for a couple minutes.
Unfortunately, he had no such luck.
"Excuse me?" Came her voice from right behind him, she was following him. "Are you okay? Can I help you with anything?" She asked, putting a hand on his arm and pulling slightly to turn him around.
For some reason, he let her- not having much fight in him at the moment. Her face softened when he was fully turned, probably just noticing the tears that were beginning to fill his eyes.
She rested her hand on his shoulder, squeezing lightly.
"What's the matter?," She asked but Cailen remained silent, quietly looking her over.
She was a little shorter than him, with long brown hair, the same color as his, her eyes were the same cerulean as his that were regarding him with sympathy, even though she had no idea who he was.
Maybe the resemblance wasn't as evident as Cailen thought, maybe he only noticed because he was looking for it but either way, he could still see they had the same nose and bone structure.
She was quite small, kind of like he's always been, for a boy at least. Now, he knows where he got his short stature, and she was definitely pregnant judging by the round belly on an otherwise small person.
"What's your name, love?" She asked softly, giving him a reassuring smile.
Cailen wondered why she was being so nice to a random stranger. She probably saw what a mess he was and was worried he'd go walk out in front of traffic or something.
He could imagine what he looked like at the moment after crying all night and sleeping on a bus. Cailen met her eyes for a long moment, willing his voice to come to him.
When it did, he winced at the scratchiness, certain she didn't hear him.
"Cai." He said so quietly, his voice low and scratchy and barely audible.
Arabella still smiled, nodding her head.
"Cai," She repeated. "Cai, what's the- "
"Cailen." He interrupted her.
And like that, her smile vanished, her eyes going wide and wild, looking Cailen over in a hurry as her hand retracted from his shoulder in shock.
He was positive this was the part where she will tell him to leave, where she will tell him that he should have never come here- that she never wanted him to come here.
But she didn't.
Cailen was shocked to say the least when she reached out again and pulled him into her arms, holding him close to her.
He was a little taller than she was so his head hung easily over her shoulder, her round belly making it a bit awkward.
Cailen didn't hug her back, and not because he didn't want to, because he really didn't know if he wanted to or not, but because he was just too shocked- too emotionally confused at the moment to do much of anything.
The hug didn't last long, maybe five or ten seconds, but Cailen let her hug him because this was obviously hard for her as well, if the sniffling in his ear was anything to go by.
She pulled away with wet cheeks, wiping at them with her hand and sniffling her nose. She took an obvious step back, taking deep breaths to calm herself.
"I'm sorry, I- I shouldn't have done that. I'm sorry." She apologized, still trying to keep her eyes dry. "I- I just- I-" She seemed about as speechless as he felt and eventually just gave up, resorting to just staring right back at him, not bothering to wipe her face anymore.
Cailen couldn't tell what he felt in that moment.
There were too many emotions swirling inside of him. Too many emotions that just didn't make sense to him. He felt relieved but at the same time tense and unsure, like yeah, she was obviously happy to see him but what would happen now?
He felt happy that he found her and she hadn't pushed him away, yet, but he still felt the crippling sadness that was growing inside of him all night. He felt angry with her for what she did to him but he couldn't find it in him to show her.
He was so confused on how to feel right now.
"Did you want to come in?" She asked after a long moment of silence.
Did he want to go in? He supposed it would be rather silly of him to come all this way, say his name and just leave.
Cailen looked at his feet, nodding his head slightly as he scuffed his shoe against the concrete, sniffling his nose.
Arabella lead him inside the house, closing the door behind him and waiting for him to take off his shoes.
The inside of the house looked bigger than the outside, a long hallway that stretched back into what looked like a kitchen, different openings along the way. To the right was a wooden staircase that lead upstairs, pictures lining the wall on the way up.
He couldn't see specific details but there were four portraits of different girls, a photo of Arabella and another man and one of all of them together.
Obviously this was her family and they looked happy.
Cailen had to bite down the bit of jealousy he felt stir inside him. He really did not need to add that to the list of emotions he felt at the moment.
"Did you want some tea?" She asked as she led him down the hall, taking a left into what looked like a living room with a couple couches placed in an 'L' shape around a coffee table with a television in the corner.
She seemed to have calmed down somewhat, her voice steady, her tears dried up but he wondered if she was really as much of a wreck as he was on the inside.
Cailen still didn't have much of a voice so he only nodded and then nodded again when she looked back at him and could actually see his response.
"You can have a seat. I'll be right back." She smiled and gestured to the couch and left him to go fetch the tea she offered.
Cailen took a careful seat on the couch, not wanting to disrupt the blanket thrown over the back of it.
His hands were still stuffed in his pockets, pulling his jumper tight around him because he felt as though that was the only thing holding him together right now. He was looking around, spotting more pictures set up on the coffee table and on a shelf by the television.
The house resembled his, not in size because Eden and Dean's might as well be a mansion and compared to that, this might as well be a shack. No, it resembled it in the way where everything about it screamed 'home'.
There were photos hung up proudly everywhere, knitted blankets thrown over the backs of the couches and folded up at the end, there were toys in the corners and schoolbooks placed carelessly on bookshelves.
It looked lived in, like a family lived here and they were happy together. It just had that feel to it.
Cailen had never really felt that about the homes he went in and out of before. It became this thing that he dreamt about until he finally found it at Eden and Dean's.
He would miss that feeling.