Chapter Text
[From the Undying Poems of Tommyinnit: a Father’s Day Gift]
Father, what can I hold against you?
Other than the obvious? The oblivious?
Father, what have you done wrong to me other than bleed?
This grudge of blood I cannot hold against you.
This sin spread in semen I cannot claim to be your design, nor your fault
(Although you cringed in that metaphor, which is why I used it. (You read all my poems, so I have to make you laugh. I have to make the reading worth it))
You named me twice. You held me a thousand times. You will hold me a million more.
I’m your bitter bitch son. Raised on formula and heart blood
I’m bleeding. You’re bleeding. I’m born.
Hello, father. Welcome.
I’m welcome. You’re bleeding. I’m borne
—
When Sam was a kid, they screened him twice for autism because it felt archaic to call him a changeling. His parents tried but alas, they failed. Nothing stuck other than odd rumors of fae blood.
Sam’s teeth where too sharp. His eyes too keen and pupils too unnervingly square. Sam didn’t need friends. He had the ants, the moss, the silver pocketknife in his hands.
(Mom always was afraid of his metal allergy. Iron made his skin green. She chalked it up to sensory issues.)
Their small town didn’t stand a chance.
When he reached middle school they tried to bully it out of him. The joke wasn’t funny anymore, the bit was over. All the bullies managed to do was take him on the anvil face of relentless teasing and straighten him out.
They just refined him. Made him sharper. He learned how to hold iron then.
By high school, Sam was a ladies’ man. A playboy. A heart of gold who never could tell a convincing lie, but stole cars from people’s backyards. Cruising through the back roads leaving a trail of rust in his wake.
“They’re junk anyway,” he said once, to the women who became Hannah’s mother a week before, “No one is going to miss something with no side doors,”
They smiled then. They stopped smiling soon.
Baby number one, Hannah, survived all three attempted abortions. Came out completely silent too, which was the worst part. The poor teenage mother took what was left of her reputation and skipped town. Was head cheerleader at the next school over, far from the kid she never wanted to talk about.
Little Hannah forced Sam to take in the fact that when he throws a rock in the river, the water moves. His actions have tangible effects on the world around him. Nothing like that ever happened before.
He held her in a baby carrier during his treks through the forests. She became just as wild as he was. Bare foot and bare babe.
Then, some bookworm girl got it in her head that she was going to fix Sam and tame Hannah before she got too out of hand. Baby Clementine was born just before Hannah turned two.
(Fun fact: Tommy bit a doctor on his way out. He did scream, though. Where his sister did not.)
Clementine was the turning point for Sam. Realizing that, holy shit, he’s seventeen and a father of two. His parents stopped giving a shit years ago. Both the moms are out of the picture.
Two tiny souls swaddled in blankets donated by their neighbors are counting on him. He refused to let them down.
So he started paying attention at school. And, well, actually attending. Welding class became his only A. Something about Mr. Bad’s promise that if he took welding seriously he could make good money was too good to ignore.
This was his ticket to securing a middle class life for him and his babies. He was taking it.
That metal allergy and/or sensory issue with iron ever really went away. He just wore gloves and thus no one could see it. Under that helm he became something worth trying to teach. Worth trying to even just talk to.
For quite a bit of time, Mr. Bad was Sam’s only friend.
He proved such by being the first person to get Sam and his kids christmas gifts one year. Sam got a new pair of shoes, the little brats a crate full of toys. Additionally, advice on how to teach a kid how to talk was handed down, one father to another.
Eventually Sam wasn’t seventeen anymore. He became twenty five.
When Clementine turned eight he asked Sam to rename him something better. Something more fitting. A name that made since for a little boy, not a little girl.
Together they picked out Tommy, because that’s what they call British soldiers, and clementines are flowers that can go on a soldiers grave. Real morbid naming system, yeah, but it fit well enough.
In a sign of the changing times, whatever society deemed wrong with his kids actually showed up on the DSM.
Hannah got her anxiety diagnosis at eleven when a teacher gave her a panic attack so severe Sam challenged, and beat, him in an afterhours bar fight. Tommy got his adhd diagnosis almost directly after they cut his hair, because what else happens to hyperactive white boys who can’t sit down in class?
They still never pinned Sam down with anything other than being a bit of a bastard. They only called him one because they knew they could never get away with calling either of the kids that.
Mr. Bad was correct in his statement that welding was more than just a stable career option. The three moved away from the prying eyes of that small town into to their white picket fence house in no time, a massive upgrade from the living room of his parent's house.
It was good. It’s been good for a while now. Sam’s doing something he never thought he’d be able to do before, fit in.
Yeah, their yard always has an unseasonable amount of dandelions. What of it? Obviously Tommy has some built in ability to pick up sidewalk pidgins. They are esteemed household guests! Hannah might be followed around by butterflies whenever she walks to the gas station to get candy, but what little girl isn’t? Maybe your kid just isn’t special enough.
Sam fought tooth and nail to make sure that his wild kids would never get caught in the barb wire fence of civilization. That they’d never learn to grip the iron that makes their skin pink and red, respectively.
They’d play in flowers, climb in trees for afternoon naps, and hang out with the possums that trust them with their babies. No one will ever have the chance to call them all the things Sam got called. To grow up alienated and alone like he did. Hannah and Tommy actually have friends! Real ones! What a major upgrade from what their father had.
Sam’s parents may of eventually stopped giving a shit, but he is never going to stop caring. With a weight that clogs his chest, he’ll care long after he’s dead.
Now, Sam is a thirty three year old man with two teenage kids. Hannah is eighteen, about to graduate high school with a full scholarship to her preferred collage. Biochemical engineering isn’t going to know what hit it. Tommy is sixteen and already putting every other kid in the school’s art department to shame. Been working on that poetry book for years.
Sam is so proud of them.
He’ll will always be infinitely proud of them. Already ten times further along to greatest then Sam ever was. Already ripping things apart and smiling with a learned arrogance, not an ignorant one.
Secretly, he’s proud of himself too. It took so much hard work and turmoil to get them to where they are now. They’re a strange family, sure, but they’re ok.
Sam sacrificed everything to make sure they were ok. He’s content with that.
There is still an ache felt in never being allowed to grow up at a pace that was enjoyable. Sam was punched through the keyhole and had to recollect his bones once he got to the other side.
However there’s no fixing it. No use trying. No real use crying. He puts his kids through therapy and that’s enough.
Sam looks through the kitchen doorway to spot Hannah and Tommy bickering over the switch, elbowing viciously. Someone is obviously losing smash bros.
He takes a swig of tea, grown from the garden with pride, and thinks everything’s going to be ok.