(AiA!AU) THE LONELY NIGHT
Merry Christmas (see under read more) for information/lore
After Mark was born, his mother, Jane Heathcliff (previously Jane Verona-Lee) became a stay-at-home mom to care for him. His father, Matthew Heathcliff, was often away overseas on business as a consultant. Although he came home semi-frequently, it left a significant gap for a male figure in Mark’s life. For her part, Jane took her transition to stay at home mother uncomfortably, with her independent streak making her dislike relying on others. Her younger brother, Dave, meet his nephew at a rather young age (10 years versus Jane’s 20). Despite being young, he instantly becomes quite attached to him.
While Jane typically asked a neighbor to watch Mark when she needed to leave the house, since Mark is generally docile and quiet, she began to start leaving him home alone for no more than a few hours at a time around age 4. This became a problem when, one night in November 1978, Jane was held up by traffic and takes longer than expected to come home. Frightened and alone, feeling like there was someone in the home, Mark left the house to search for his missing mother. On the dark road, he got lost, and was accidentally struck by a car, only suffering a minor injury. That neighbor, Aurélia Torres, called CPS to make a report fearing he’d been abandoned, and kept Mark with her in the Torres house until his mom returned home. Although he doesn’t remember it, that was the first time Mark met Cesar. The next day, a CPS worker named Stanley Godwin visited the Heathcliff home to open a file on the home. Mark remembers that visit and him as “The Stranger”.
Between 1978 and 1980, Stanley visited the home semi-regularly until the household was deemed safe for Mark. As Matthew’s returns home became more sporadic, he and Jane discuss having another child, and Jane decides to seek out work once she deems Mark to be “old enough to look after himself.” Dave, after turning 18 in 1982, begins to form a friendship with the new pastor at St. Gabriel Church: Gabriel O’Brien. During this time, Dave decides to try to “filling in” as an older male figure for Mark and began to spend more time with him, convincing Jane to let him take Mark to church on Sundays. Jane noticed Mark’s increasing interesting in spending more time with “Uncle Dave and Uncle Gabe.” It discomforted her, due frequent…”rumors” about the nature of Dave’s relationship with Gabriel.
In 1984, Jane (age 30) got a job as a caretaker in a nursing home in Bythorne, and Matthew worked almost exclusively overseas. Mark (age 10) was being left home alone more regularly for several days to a week. She asked Dave (age 20) to stop taking Mark to church since she’d “rather he stay home.” It initially puzzled Dave, but after getting suspicious of her attitude, he looked into the Heathcliff household…only to be told about the initial CPS incident by a mysterious hooded individual.
On the comic itself: on December 24th, 1984, a ten-year-old Mark was left home alone as Jane had to fill in for another caretaker who had abruptly taken holiday leave. Dave, 20 years old, discovers this when he went to drop off a gift for Mark, and it greatly upset him to the point of calling CPS for the second time. When Jane arrived home, he confronted her, and an argument began where he criticized her choice to leave Mark home alone on such an important holiday, adding that she should have let him take care of Mark when she's away. The criticism rattled Jane, and she snapped, insulting him by implying he wouldn't know how to raise a child due to being unmarried and having “no experience with a family”, finally revealing her bias by making pointed comments about him and Gabriel.
The resulting fallout ended with Jane telling Dave to never speak to her or her family again. While leaving, Dave spoke to Mark, who was in the room during the argument, promising they’d meet again someday. It was the last time Mark saw or spoke to his uncle for a long time. It was also the last year Dave attended public mass, though he secretly still visited the confessional, but resisted Gabriel’s attempts to persuade him to return to mass. Also as a result of the fallout, Dave takes the “Verona” part of his name out in a fit of rage to distance himself from his family.
This second call to CPS had Stanley returning to the home. He eventually decides it’s still a safe enough home for Mark (age 11) to live in, but warns Jane (age 31) and Matthew that a third incident will result in Mark being removed from the home. Stanley privately tells Mark to call him “Six”, and promises he’ll be safe “from now on”. In secret, he places a Claim on Mark, only removed when (years later) Mark reunited with a friend from a long time ago: Cesar Torres.
