Genes

The Wollstonecrafts, having successfully diluted their problematic pureblood tendencies with scads of marriages and procreation, still held their family reunions in the dark by candlelight. Every now and again, you'd see the old ways in someone new - the unshakeable devotion, the ridiculous talent dismissed as luck, the needlework. It was little Brynn Mary who was the center of attention at this year's gathering; so small and slight but radiant. All of six, she had refused to relinquish her love (or her hold) on a favorite stuffy that had met an untimely end with one of the dogs; she had saved what parts she could and sewn them expertly onto another accident she'd stored away for scrap. "This is his eye there," Brynn Mary pointed. "The best eye - the warmest and wonderfulest!" She was beaming. "What's his name?" someone asked (because one had to). "Please don't say 'Frank'; please don't say 'Frank'; please don't say ...," Brynn Mary's mother, carrier of the Wollstonecraft genes, begged her deity du jour silently of mind. "FRANK!" Brynn Mary called out, smiling and pulling the bear/cat/dog mangle to her heart. "Splendid," said Cyril Wollstonecraft carefully. "What a perfect name." The patriarch looked over at the girl's mother and gave her a nod. They would watch her in the decades to come and try to tame that genius without stifling it.