Chapter Text
Izzy settles on the couch with a groan and props his feet up on the coffee table. It’s his first night off in… he doesn’t even know how long. And of course he put up a fight when Ed insisted, made sure to get Roach in for the evening rush at least, but now he finds himself immensely glad for it.
He’s got everything set out, not wanting to move his heavy limbs off the sofa any more than strictly necessary. There’s a glass of that fancy gin Stede got him for his birthday. A little bowl of cashews and dried cranberries courtesy of his Mum. And the DVD player is locked and loaded with Alien - one of Izzy’s favorites, but far too slow-paced if he wants Ed to stay awake for any reasonable portion of movie night. He takes a sip of his drink, presses play, and relaxes into the burn of juniper and the creeping horror of outer space.
Not ten minutes in, the chime of the doorbell interrupts his hard-earned bliss. Izzy gets up, grumbling and fully ready to tear somebody a new one about it - Ed for forgetting his meds, or Jack for just being Jack, or…
Out in their hallway stands Mary, pale-faced and rumpled, a sniffling Louis clinging to her skirt.
“What the f-” Izzy catches himself. No swearing in front of the kids and all that bullshit. “What’s wrong?”
“I’m sorry, I would have called ahead but it’s all been a bit chaotic. Doug must have taken my phone and Stede’s stuck on a yacht in Haiti and…” Mary sounds rattled, like she has to organize her thoughts while already talking. She takes a breath and tries again. “Doug’s mother had a bad fall, broke her hip. She’s in surgery, so Doug and Alma went ahead to the hospital but-”
At the word hospital, Louis’ quiet whining pitches into a full-on wail, echoing off the bare walls in the corridor. Izzy ushers them inside - he doesn’t have the patience to deal with neighbors complaining about the noise tonight. Mary exhales as they pass the threshold.
“Seems his big sister has been telling him scary stories ever since she got her tonsils out last year. So I was wondering if… Is Ed home?” Mary’s eyes trail around their meager foyer, one hand still automatically stroking her son’s hair.
“Afraid it’s just me. But you can leave him here, if that helps?” Izzy curses himself the moment he says it. Of course Mary wants Ed to watch her kid, he’s brilliant at that sort of thing. Izzy likes Stede’s children, he really does, but something about them just makes him feel… exposed and awkward and fully out of his fucking depth. Unexpectedly, Mary’s face relaxes into a grateful smile as she directs her soft voice downwards.
“That would be fun, hmm? Wanna stay here with Uncle Izzy?”
“That’s Mister Teach or Sir as far as you’re concerned,” Louis mumbles wetly into Mary’s clothes and Izzy can’t bite back a wry smirk.
“Listen, little shrimp. If you let your mother go without making a fuss, you can call me whatever you want.”
Louis lifts his tear-streaked face to properly look at Izzy, eyes going wide as he wraps his head around the endless possibilities now open to him, likely unprecedented in all the six years of his life.
“Even Stinky McPoopface?”
“Sure,” Izzy snorts as Mary mouths a “sorry” around her own grin. He walked right into that one and they both know it.
“Alright, be good, pick you up in the morning. Thank you, Izzy. You’re lifesaver!” Mary is out the door in a flash and just like that, Izzy is left alone in his own apartment with a snot-nosed little boy and no fucking clue what to do about it.
“Have you had dinner?” It’s the first thing that comes to mind. Children need to eat, after all.
“Grilled cheese,” Louis nods, then proceeds to stare down at his own shoelaces and chew his bottom lip.
The silence stretches, painfully so, only punctuated by the intermittent squelching noises from the kid’s nose. Izzy briefly considers calling Edward to ask him how the fuck to entertain the child, but one of the shelter residents is having their birthday party at the café and Ed is probably up to his ears in overly caffeinated teenagers right now. He’ll have to figure this one out on his own.
“C’mon.” Jaw set, Izzy walks to the kitchen, trusting Louis to follow so he can at least give him a tissue or something. The kid still seems upset, understandably so, and Izzy tries not to get swept up in his own unease, in his desperate need to fix it , if only he knew how, which he fucking doesn’t. Ed would already have them dressed up in silly clothes, sword fighting with cooking utensils, but that’s Ed and all Izzy’s ever been good at is just…
“You allergic to anything?” He turns around, almost tripping over Louis who is in fact right behind him.
“What’s a lergic?” The boy wipes his nose on his sleeve and Izzy winces. He tries again.
“Like, stuff you can’t eat?”
“Mom says I can’t eat cat food.” Louis seems indignant about it and Izzy takes that as a no.
He might not be fun or cool or anything like that, but he was also an anxious little boy once - half a fucking century ago - and his Mum had her ways of getting him to settle down. He opens the fridge and gives silent thanks to Ed’s guts of steel - there is actually a carton of whole milk in there. Izzy’s stomach grumbles just looking at the thing. He pours some into a small pot and sets it on the stove, stirring so it doesn’t stick to the bottom. Louis watches him raptly.
“Are you making coffee?”
“I can make other things besides coffee,” Izzy replies, perhaps a bit too defensive. He’s only now realizing that the kid has never seen him outside of work, and isn’t that a slightly pathetic thought?
It takes a while for the milk to heat and Louis starts fidgeting, keeps poking a finger into his mouth.
“So, how’s school?” Izzy lamely attempts to distract the tiny human by making fucking small talk. He really is absolutely horrible at this.
“I don’t go to school yet, silly! Alma goes to school.” - Right, right, fuck, Stede said something about the boy starting first grade in September. Louis blinks up at him then, brow furrowed, and the abrupt shift in mood would put Ed’s own to shame. He looks… pensive, more worried than any child should ever have to be, like he’s only just remembered why he’s here.
“Will Gramma be ok?”
“Sure she will,” Izzy responds on reflex. He has no fucking way of knowing, but his Mum had her hip replaced a while back and it all went fine, so it’s not a complete lie.
“Will she have a scar?” There’s a fascinated glint in the kid’s eyes now and if Izzy knows anything about little boys it’s their insatiable morbid curiosity.
“Probably. Around here.” Izzy draws a vertical line along his upper thigh, where he knows his mother’s incision sits.
“Do you have any scars?” Louis scrunches his brows together, like that will help him see through Izzy’s sweatpants and shirt. He’s the spitting image of his father that way.
“Got this one.” Izzy manages to toe off his left sock while continuing to stir the milk. It’s faded over the years but the long, shiny strip of skin on the outside of his foot is still evident. The boy’s mouth falls open and for a second Izzy worries that he overstepped, that he gave the kid a fright, that he’ll have to explain…
“I got a loose tooth!” Louis grins. He pushes the tip of his tongue against his top left incisor and it swings forward dramatically, only hanging on by a fragile thread of gum tissue. Izzy shudders.
“Uh… congrats?”
“It’s my third one.” Izzy supposes that must be significant, maybe, but thankfully the milk is warm and he can occupy himself by pouring it into a mug and stirring in a big spoonful of honey.
“Here,” he unceremoniously hands Louis the cup. It looks gigantic between his little palms and his face lights up when he takes a sip. Izzy peeks at his watch - almost 10pm. “Isn’t it past your bedtime?”
“I don’t have a bedtime.” The kid is messing with him, that much Izzy knows, but he decides not to argue. Not after the rough day the boy’s had. Instead, he follows Louis as he ambles through the apartment, cup in hand, seemingly drawn in by their large flat screen TV like a moth to a flame.
“What are you watching?”
Luckily, the movie is paused on an interior shot of the spaceship, no possibly traumatic chest-bursting creatures for a child to see.
“You wouldn’t like it. But we can watch something else. What sorts of movies do you like?”
Louis plops down on the couch, milk sloshing over the sides of his mug.
“I like sea monsters! And pirates! And dogs and dragons and dinosaurs and the one with the lions but that made me cry and also robots and knights and princesses and do you know what Minions are?” He has to take a breath. Apparently, Izzy just inadvertently opened some kind of children’s media pressure valve.
“Alright, alright, wait here a minute.” Izzy gives the boy a hesitant pat on the head before leaving to get his laptop. Their movie collection is distinctly unsuitable for kids but thankfully, Stede has an account with every streaming service known to man and isn’t stingy about sharing. Izzy scrolls through the options, settling on either The Little Mermaid or Peter Pan and leaving both open so Louis can pick.
When he returns to the living room, the kid is curled up on the sofa, fast asleep, one tiny dislodged tooth lying on the coffee table next to his empty cup. Izzy drapes a blanket over him. He has to breathe around the way his chest is clenching, flooded with memories of Lily falling asleep just like that while waiting for their mother to get home from a late shift. Izzy washes the too-intense sentiment down with a swig of gin, settles by the boy’s side and plugs in his earphones so he can empathise with Sebastian the crab on his own like a fucking adult.
“Hey. Hey, Iz.” Ed’s voice is hushed but close enough to rip Izzy from his slumber. “Why is there a Bonnet kid on our couch?”
“Long story,” Izzy whispers back, stretching his aching neck because he’s dozed off in some atrociously contorted position, laptop still on his knees. The light coming in from the window is tinged pink, Ed must have had a long night. Izzy gets up, careful not to jostle Louis, and wraps his arms around his husband’s waist.
“How was work?” he mumbles into Ed’s shirt. He smells like sweat and coffee and a hint of beer.
“Busy. And um… I may have stabbed a hole into the fridge when I was defrosting it-” Izzy stiffens against Ed, a million curses ready on his tongue. “Yeah, I know you told me not to use the ice pick. But it’s all good, ok? Jack happened to have a brand new fridge that uh… fell off a truck or something. Came by to help me install it and then we had to have a drink…”
“‘course you did,” Izzy chides but it’s half-hearted, he’s far too tired to put any heat behind his words. They look out the window, still wrapped up in each other, and Louis whines quietly in his sleep.
“I’m so fucking bad at this. Kid hates me…” Izzy deflates against his husband’s chest. Ed hugs him tighter.
“Nah. He’s alive, he’s asleep, kitchen smells like you made him your Mum’s honey milk. Can’t have fucked up that bad.”
“Mmh,” Izzy hums in acknowledgement, if not assent. He still feels painfully inadequate but maybe Ed is right - apart from the tooth, the kid is still in one piece at least.
“Stede told me Louis drew a picture of us the other day. You with a cup of coffee in one hand, bloody sword in the other. Apparently I had an eye patch for some reason? Kids are so fuckin’ weird, man.” Ed chuckles softly.
“Told me he likes pirates, so…” Izzy shrugs. It probably makes perfect sense, in some convoluted six-year-old brain sort of way.
“See? You did good, Iz. You really did.” Ed rests his chin on Izzy’s head, his body warm and steady against his back. Outside, the first birds start chirping and the sunrise coats them all in a rosy golden light.