David looked at the man sitting across from him. He had a commanding face, and enough youth left in him to make him easy to relate to. He had already been many things in his life; Admiral, hero, friend, husband, neighbor, lover, widower. However, to David, he'd always simply been "father". Any other moment in his life, he would have found his father's presence a comfort. Today, it only made things worse. In every young man's life, there came a point when his father would learn of the son's first forays into the mired world of sexuality. That discovery was unerringly followed by a talk concerning the dangers and risks of sexual behaviors. These talks tended to end badly, and the most common way was when the father didn't approve of the son's choice of partner. Considering David's partner had been his sister, he could see no way his father could possible approve. He was, after all, only human.
Even being optimistic, David expected this conversation to be grim. After all, human literature is full of the word 'incest'. Even if he'd never encountered a formal definition, he would have known from the connotations it was given just how humans felt about a brother and sister being sexually intimate. Since David was rather literate and had encountered a formal definition, he understood the connotations that much more. No, there was no doubt as to how this conversation would go.
The one thing David had to give his father credit for was his discretion. His father hadn't tried to sit down and have this conversation with Glyse; he'd known it would have done him no good. Their mother had raised them both so strongly in the Sooni traditions that for Glyse, there was no breaking from the mindset of her race. To them, this 'incest' thing didn't exist; all biological repercussions had been genetically engineered out of them before their race was even born. No social reason for the word existed until they had discovered humans, and had needed to learn human language, and even then, most Sooni didn't know its meaning. None of them truly understood the concept.
“David, I see no reason to dance with you. I know about you and your sister. I know what happened, and chances are I understand it better then you give me credit for. What do you have to say?”
Should he tell him that it was good? Tell him that it was a moment in his life he'd treasure forever? Should he slam his father's silly sensibilities with an onslaught of his carefully prepared logic? No, he really only had three words to say. “I love her.”
“I'm aware of that. She's you're sister, after all.”
“No, father. I love her. The way you loved Mom.”
David's father took a deep breath and closed his eyes. Moments of silence passed between father and son. “You're wrong David. I still love your mother.”
Nothing more needed to be said. They both understood what the other wasn't saying. David wasn't accusing his father of not loving his mother; of forcing her away and causing her death. His father wasn't invalidating his feelings, and wasn't forcing an unrealistic ultimatum down David's throat. If David could live with the knowledge that the woman he loved was his half sister, then so could David's father.