Disclaimer: Eoin Colfer doesn't own the song. Good Charlotte doesn't own the characters. If I owned anything, I wouldn't be here, would I?
The Story of My Old Man
I was young when he left. (Has it really been a year already?) We rarely talked when he was still here, anyway. He always had a business transaction to manage or a misdeed to plot. He always took his meals in his study.
And even when he did speak to me, his words made no sense to me. Gold is power; never wait for money to come to you – you must go to it; and, you'll understand money when you're older. I did understand money, though: greed, terrible greed.
But then his greed led him on a journey to Russia. A journey from which he has not returned. He has abandoned us.
I don't know too much about, too much of my old man
I know he walked right out the door and we never saw him again
Last I heard he was at the bar doing himself in
I know I got that same disease, I guess I got that from him
My greatest fear is that I'll let my greed take me over, like it did him. He was weak, but I shall have power over myself. I will never be like my father or my Fowl ancestors. I will never do terrible things to further my own goals. I hate them.
This is the story of my old man
Just like his father before him
I'm telling you do anything you can
So you don't end up just like them
Like them
They did anything they could to get money, even if it left innocents broke. I know this because my father and many other relatives bragged about some of these crimes. Bragged. One would hope they'd have the decency – nay, intelligence – to at least keep the less legal ones to themselves, but the entire Fowl family is bound into secrecy: Tattling on a fellow Fowl often resulted in a smaller family, on your side.
It was sickening, really. I'll never do anything that'll earn me a Fowl secret.
Monday he woke up and hated life
Drank until Wednesday and left his wife
Thursday through Saturday lost everything
Woke up on Sunday miserable again
I remember asking him why he was so sad today, that cloudless Monday. I remember him saying that our fortune was dwindling; he was not sad, he said, but thinking of ways to boost our income.
"Why?" It was my favorite question nowadays.
"We need money."
I repeated my query.
"Money is the only way to get anything done, my dear boy. Without money, one has no control over one's own destiny." Or others' destinies. The unspoken words were more evident than their audible counterparts; and more chilling.
Within the day, he had had an idea. He spent a night and a day shut up in his study making arrangements to ship soda to Russia. He left the house with barely a goodbye on Wednesday.
The news about the sinking of the Fowl Star reached us on Saturday. My first thought was relief; there was now one less Fowl to rob the world. My second thought came on Sunday with reports that Father's body had not yet been found. He was still alive, he had to be! Or so thought Mother. She had been devastated when the Fowl Star had sunk, but now she had hope. My second thought was disappointment.
I remember baseball games and working on the car
He told me that he loved me and that I would go far
Showed me how to work hard and stick up for myself
I wish he wasn't too hard to listen to himself
When I was little, we would do math together. It was quite fun, at first.
"You're a genius, Arty. Four years old and already doing multiple-digit multiplication!" He ruffled my hair affectionately. "You can do anything you want with that brain of yours." He was always encouraging me not to let anyone else think for me, because what a waste of genius that would be.
Later, he gave me a new set of math problems: money-related problems, such as calculating simple interest and complex interest or converting between two different currencies. He wanted to replace my love of knowledge with a love of wealth, or possibly just intertwine the two so closely that they would eventually be one and the same. I refused to do these problems.
This is the story of my old man
Just like his father before him
I'm telling you do anything you can
So you don't end up just like them
Like them
I find it strange that he told me to think for myself while he let his avarice think for him. I find it ironic that he, in his hypocrisy, proved to me why his beliefs about thought ought indeed to be heeded.
Monday he woke up and hated life
Drank until Wednesday and left his wife
Thursday through Saturday lost everything
Woke up on Sunday miserable again
Mother's hope of his return had endured, but whether this hope was logical to hold onto or not is a different story. She was going mad, I could tell. She needed him, and because I needed for Mother to be happy, I needed him, too.
So I hoped, as well. Against all rationality, I hoped.
Unlike, Mother, I did more than hope. I used his own precious money to fund search parties. That his greed might rescue him was just another irony.
Money ran low. We had no source of income without Father. I took a gander at those math problems from so long ago – I had no trouble with them, of course.
I had to provide for the family, now. I sold patents, I wrote and sold essays and short stories under various pseudonyms, but it wasn't enough. I did unlawful things, but only to unlawful people. I realized I would probably brag about them at a Fowl family reunion; I was, dare I say, proud of these things. It was the right thing to do. Mother and I needed food; those crooks whose gold had been… relocated had more money than they needed.
Someday he'll wish that he made things right
Long for his family and miss his wife
Remember the days he had everything
Now he's alone and miserable again
When Father is found, I'll be glad only because Mother will then recover. When Father is found, it will be a revival of a criminality presumed vanquished. And all my good work will have been for naught.
A/N: Songfics: can't live with 'em, can't listen to music without plotbunnies eating face off. Bleh.
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This is Labour Three: Artemis-Timmy relationship. I hope.
Inspiration: Was listening to Good Charlotte. Wrote this fic.