AN: Now Jack isn't my favorite character by any stretch of the imagination. He's amusing, yes, but his utter lack of personality in the show kind of made me overlook him. It recently occurred to me, though, that there has to be some depth to this man. He is married to Maddie, after all. She must see something in him. And surely Danny and Jazz didn't get everything from their mother. Thus this series of vignettes exploring Jack – his personality, his past, the thoughts that make the orange-jumpsuit wearing, fudge operated ghost hunter. These little snippets won't be connected, and may conflict from time to time. I'm just seeing if I can find a believable character under all that comic relief. Wish me luck.
The Fentons belong to Mr. Hartman. I own none of the characters that appear in this chapter, whether in the flesh, in mention, or on screen.
Thanks to pearl84 for, even inadvertently, inspiring this adventure.
Secrets
Jack Fenton looked around the room, a smile sliding across his face as he took in the empty house. Maddie was out on a mother-daughter trip with Jazz all weekend and Danny was at the fair with Sam and Tucker for the day. This left Jack alone, free to do what he wanted.
It wasn't that Jack hated being with his family – that couldn't be farther from the truth. He loved nothing more than exploring the world of ghosts with his wife, or hanging out with his kids, whenever he could catch them. It was just that sometimes Jack needed time to himself. Time to do all the things he couldn't, or wouldn't, do with his family around.
Humming the Ghostbusters' theme, Jack trotted up to his room and changed out of his trademark orange jumpsuit, opting for the more comfortable jeans and t-shirt of his youth. Granted, the t-shirt was still orange – it was his favorite color after all – but it was a nice change from the form-fitting one-piece he usually wore.
Looking twice around the room, just to be safe, Jack opened the door to his half of the joint closet and leaned his massive bulk into it. Digging carefully though piles of clothes long fallen from their racks, a discarded pile of torn jumpsuits, some winter clothes, and a couple of pairs of old boots, he found what he was looking for.
Nestled in the far corner of his closet, between some old steel-toed work boots and last year's jumpsuit, was a little white shoe-box, it's lid resting loosely on top.
Carefully freeing the box from its well-hidden corner, Jack looked around the room once more and set it on the bed. With a quick shove, he pushed everything that had spilled free back into the closet and shut the door.
Grabbing the box Jack descended again into his blessedly empty living room. He went first to lock the front door, peeking not-so-subtly through the front window, and pulling the curtains as he saw no one coming. Then turned for the kitchen.
He locked the back door as well and pulled the curtains over the windows.
Hungry smile on his face, Jack pulled open the fridge door and extracted the small plate of fudge Maddie had left him, along with a half-gallon of milk. Setting his prize on the counter, Jack noticed the note nestled between two pieces of heaven on a plate.
Love you. Enjoy your day off.
Jack smiled still further at the message, his heart warming. It was the little things. They reminded him – as if he could ever forget – just how much he loved her. How he would do anything to protect his Maddie.
Still staring at the note, he reached up and freed a glass from the cupboard above him. Pouring himself some milk, he managed to wedge the milk back between left-over take-out, a jug of orange juice, and various condiments.
Carrying everything to the living room, Jack cast one last look around for imposters. Still no sign of intrusion.
Carefully, reverently, Jack pulled the lid off the little white shoe-box. Inside glistened a small collection of seeming junk, things one would find on the quarter table at their local lawnsale.
A well-loved dog toy in what may have once been the shape of a squirrel rested between a ratty old catching glove and an old journal. The spine long since worked past the point of fixing graced a copy of My Friend Jasper Jones, a small brown picture book just small enough to fit inside the box. An old pillowcase, a little tiny picture album, several crayon drawings, a couple of homemade Fathers' Day cards, a scrap of white cloth embroidered in silver beads, a small ghost blaster – his very first, the treasures were many, nearly too many to safely close the lid over.
But it wasn't these that Jack was after. Carefully lifting the other memories and setting them aside, he freed a DVD case from the very bottom. It had once been a VHS, but the family's very last VCR had eaten the tape, leaving Jack heartbroken. He had been forced to buy a replacement DVD, and do quite the James Bond in order to keep his family from seeing it. One look and he knew they would be disappointed in him.
He could imagine the look in their eyes. The hurt, the anger, the sadness...it went against everything his wife had taught him. Everything they had worked for in their years together.
Still, the story was part of his childhood. No matter how he tried to convince himself of its falseness, trying to pass it off as a simple romantic fantasy, or a delusion or a childhood amusement, the fudge-lover could not bring himself to stop watching it. At least once a year he dug it from the depths of his closet where no one else dared venture and indulged that nagging need. All the time struggling to doubt its content, while at the same time swept up in the possibility of it all. In all the potential it would open up, were the film true. Were the film's plot even plausible.
So it was that Jack popped the DVD free and slid it into the player, turning the TV on and hunting the control from between the couch cushions.
Pulling his favorite chair over and settling it down in his prime viewing position, feet propped on the coffee table, fudge and milk in hand, Jack grabbed the control and started the DVD player.
The DVD spun to life, its menu cycling through footage of a young girl and her father, travelling to a new home for the hundredth time. The girl reminded him of Maddie every time – of the stories she told of her younger days. This was back before her father passed on, when her family had moved a lot, following him across the country as he was posted at this base and that base.
The girl was also strong willed and brave, and pretty as well. She wasn't nearly as pretty as Maddie, of course, but Jack still remembered crushing on her as a young boy.
He hit play, watching with a smile as two boys dared and teased and bickered and finally entered the haunted mansion. He could, and did, recite their lines along with them. He smiled as the main character hesitatingly approached the boys, calling out to them but not wanting to approach them. They'd run away, he insisted. They'd be afraid.
When finally the main character finally appeared the boys screamed, fleeing the mansion. Only their flashlights remained, clattering onto the floor behind them to highlight a developing photo they had taken. He smiled in the picture, even as the boys beside him screamed.
Casper's lonely sigh echoed across screen, and Jack felt it tug softly at his heart.
Wouldn't it be wonderful if somewhere, anywhere, there was a friendly ghost just like him?
~*~*~