Author's Note: I didn't know that I had this (as in I completely forgot until I started reading it) and I just randomly clicked on it because I couldn't figure out what the title meant. And look! Something workable with minimal need to edit. Anyway, does anyone want to feel sad? Because I have a sad. It almost made me cry to read. AnD I WrOte It!

WARNINGS FOR: child abuse/neglect, brief suicidal ideation, and family dysfunction

C R Y

He's thirty seconds old - two months and some change prematurely born in the void of space. He has no idea what's going on around him but he's cold and something is very, very wrong. He is bumped and jostled while everyone is speeding through space to a hopeful safety.

He's swaddled, gripped close with love, his mother's voice trembles against his tiny body but his father's voice is distant. That voice he heard so many times through walls of protective flesh - a warm, rich rumble - is now warped by distance and space and panic.

A sad curse of the universe, fear and profound sorrow scar the day of his birth.

He's a handful of minutes old and the most noble gift his parents have given him is a chance- not just life, but an opportunity to live longer than his precious few minutes breathing recycled air. And just before death, his father's last (parting) gift is a name.

James Tiberius Kirk's weak lungs push whimpers and cries from his tiny body.

Stardate twenty-two thirty-three point oh four.

Jimmy's first birthday has no cake or pictures or candles. No adoring grandparents or milestones. He barely sees his mother and even though he has no concept of time or the significance it or of mental illnesses, he knows something is not right . She wakes with him and his brother Sammy as the sun rises. She drinks coffee and smiles and makes a stack of not-quite-right pancakes for him and Sammy to eat - Jimmy in his high-chair and Sam in his booster seat at the table. His mommy doesn't eat any, just sips her coffee and smiles indulgently at Sammy's antics and babbling. It twitches more towards a frown when she turns to him.

Jimmy doesn't know what this means, but he squishes slightly-too-brown pancake covered in whipped cream in one small fist and burbles nonsense into Sammy's stories with a big grin. He has teeth now and everyone in town can't help but smile back at him. They call him adorable, coo at him, give his mommy sad looks, crouch down to speak with Sammy. Jimmy doesn't know what most of this means.

Breakfast is finished off with fruit slices and a wipedown. Then he and Sammy are placed in the living room to watch cartoons and play games. Hours pass this way, until Jimmy is hungry and he starts throwing things when nobody pays attention to him. He cries and when Sammy tries to make him feel better, he hits him. His chubby little hand smacks his brother right in the eye. Then Sammy is angry and he is pushing Jimmy away.

Jimmy cries harder.

He cries the one word he knows. "Mama."

He shrieks it and screams it and huffs until he's puce and Sammy is covering his ears and crying too. He doesn't stop until he's lying on the floor, face in the carpet, exhausted and achy and hungry and whimpering. He falls asleep like this and when he wakes up, Sammy is rolling him over. He rubs his eyes and yawns and sits up, gearing up to cry again at his stomach's emptiness.

Then Sammy, three years old, lifts him up onto his feet and drags him into the kitchen. There on the floor, on two plates in the middle of a mess, are two of mommy's muffins. There's whipped cream and sprinkles, a chair pushed up against the counter to reach them. And Sammy sits Jimmy down in his lap and he says, "It's your berfday, Jimmy. And since I couldn' fine a cake and mommy is sleepin, we'll celerbrate together instead."

Sammy hugs him close and sings to him, tongue not quite used to the words, forgetting how long it's supposed to go, and barely carrying the tune.

Then Sammy tells him how to make a wish and has him pretend to blow out a candle. Jimmy has only one wish and that's for his mama. But he'll take his big brother Sammy.

The muffins taste mealy and not-sweet-enough, but Sammy drenches them in whipped cream and peanut butter and jelly and syrup and then they're good. For dinner they eat bologna sandwiches and after they strip down and take a bath together, splashing way too much and not using enough soap to wash. The water isn't warm enough either, but Jimmy doesn't care. Then Sammy pulls on his undies and puts a new diaper on Jim - backwards, but neither of them would know.

It's snowing outside again as Sammy tucks them both into his big boy bed. In the morning, mommy will yell furiously about the mess and pop them both on the butt before putting them in timeout, but as they fall asleep, Jimmy has forgotten about needing his mommy and Sammy is warm next to him.

Jimmy's second birthday is forgotten in the completion of a memorial to his father and the subsequent parties and ceremonies and galas that he's dragged across the country to attend with his family. On the day of, Sammy sings to him again over a slightly squished cupcake he smuggled away from the charity event they were at earlier. It's dark out and somehow there's two candles in the top of the cupcake. Sammy lights them with a match from a stolen matchbook.

Jimmy wishes he were home, with his mommy and Sammy.

They don't make it back until two weeks later.

His mommy doesn't seem to remember his birthday.

His third birthday is an Event. His mommy invites half of the town kids out to their farmhouse and strings of lights decorate the few trees in their backyard. There's balloons and streamers and presents wrapped in colorful, shiny paper.

Jimmy doesn't know anyone, barely recognizes the children he sees from the few occasions he's been at the preschool. Sammy is five years old now and in school. (He'll be six soon.) He knows more of the kids. They play outside in the light snow, since it's a warmer day, a stasis dome erected over their yard where the party is going on in full swing. It's warmer under the dome.

There's a man his mom keeps speaking with - about their father, about Starfleet, about Jimmy and Sammy. She calls him Chris and he tries to talk to Jimmy at one point but he hides behind Sammy to avoid him.

Jimmy and Sammy run off behind the old shed at one point, to get a break from all the people squishing them and talking about their dad. Jimmy has never really had any feelings about his father. He knows he had one, he knows he died, and people talk about him. He's a hero , they say. But after today, with everyone frowning and some crying, pitying him and reminding him over and over that they don't have one when they should have… Jimmy might just hate the guy a little.

"Why is mommy doing this?" Jimmy asks Sammy and Sammy kicks his toe into the ground. He looks up to the cloudy sky.

"Guilt," Sammy says, as though that explains everything. And maybe it does. Still, Jim persists.

"For what?" He asks, and glances around the corner of the shed to the party with the screaming kids and laughter and glowing everything. A little piece of vibrancy in an otherwise cold, grey world. Jimmy shivers.

Toddlers don't use words like that Jimmy, Sammy's voice says in his head even though he's standing right there with Jimmy.

On the outside, Sammy shrugs. "For surviving maybe? Dad didn't make it and then she forgot your birthday last year. She's just trying to do better, I guess."

Eventually, by some kind of quiet understanding that this moment was for introspection and maybe a little understanding for their father, they sneak back into the party just as their mother brings out a cake.

This time, a bunch of people sing to him.

Jimmy wishes his father was there, if only so he could meet him.

The next day, after the remains of the party are cleaned up, Jimmy and Sammy are taken out to lunch and they meet Frank.

Jimmy is four years old and school starts in the fall. It's barely summer but his preschool teacher had encouraged his mom that he be tested. Confused, his mother insisted that it couldn't be possible. He was too quiet, too allergic, too young, too shy, too fragile. He'd never shown any signs. Jimmy had eavesdropped with Sammy outside the room in the little hallway where Jimmy's coat and bag were hanging.

"I told you to stop using big words," Sammy mutters to him, sullen almost. Jimmy ducks his head.

"Sorry," he mumbles back, but Sammy ruffles his hair and slings an arm over his shoulder.

"Don't be," he says smiling. "You're a genius, Jimmy. People were bound to notice at some point. Just remember to keep your head down and work hard so the other kids don't have a reason to pick on you."

"You don't hate me, right?" Jimmy whispers and Sammy jerks him close, hugs him with both arms.

"No, Jimmy. Why would I hate you?" Sammy questions, sounding appalled. Jimmy can only sniff and shrug.

Because I'm too smart, because I know too much, because Dad isn't here and I am, because Frank is only around because I'm not enough for mom…. He thinks these things sometimes - even when he doesn't have the words, he knows the feeling. He's not enough and too much. His mom stares at the sky too often and he knows she's looking for their father, wishing on the stars like so many candles.

He ends up being tested and even though he averages out at about a third-grade level, his mom only lets him into the first grade. She says he's already too far ahead and if he moves up too quickly, he won't be able to make friends.

She must not care too much about it though, because soon after school starts, she takes a mission in space. Six months. She calls it a "trial run" to "see if she's ready." Jimmy knows what it really means.

She wants to know if she can go back out there and search for their dad without feeling guilty about leaving them behind.

For Jimmy's fifth birthday, Frank uses the money Jimmy's mom gave them for his birthday on alcohol and a box of grocery store, pre-made cupcakes. Sammy and Jimmy eat the whole box in Sammy's room, drinking a quart of milk with it. Sammy flicks a lighter to flame, sings him happy birthday, and Jimmy blows it out. They play cards and try to keep quiet. Neither of them have seen Frank drink this much.

Jimmy wishes that his father never died.

Jimmy's fifth, sixth, and seventh birthday pass much in the same ways his past ones have. And for that they're unremarkable. It's the summer after his seventh birthday that and for the moment, their tiny little farmhouse in Iowa is quiet. Frank had left some time earlier, peeling out and down the hot road in the cherry red convertible that his mom claimed had been his dad's at some point. One day, it was to be his or Sam's, passed from father to son.

Sam's gone out too, somewhere with friends in town. He's hardly home anymore. And his friends are all older. Twelve and thirteen year olds that treat Jimmy like shit whenever they're around. They call him smart-mouthed and whiny bitch, tell him to fuck off. Sam never tells them to stop. It hurts more than Jimmy thinks it should. After his step-dad Frank, who drinks and smokes and pokes him in the ribs and near his spine when he's too precocious, Jimmy thinks that Sammy's silence shouldn't hurt at all. But it does. A lot. Makes him swallow back tears and trudge away toward the bus stop. But maybe he kind of gets it, after having to grow up in the shadow of his genius little brother. Jimmy knows how Sammy protects him, knows how Frank forces Sam to tell their teachers at school that he fell down the stairs so they can continue seeing their mom when she's planetside.

They don't even have stairs, unless you count the step of the back porch.

So gets it. He hates it, too. But even if he kind of understands why Sam is hardly at home, he can't really understand why Sam is just leaving him behind there at home too. He thought they were in it together, that out of everyone, Jimmy had Sammy and Sammy had him back.

And Jimmy really doesn't understand why their mom is never home.

Jimmy, with his towheaded mop, peeks around the doorway of his mom's bedroom in his grandfather's house. He was too young to remember the man when they visited him in the old-folks home. All he knew about the geezer was that he shared a name with the guy. He had died four years ago and they had permanently moved into the slightly leaning farmhouse with Frank. His step-dad Frank.

Jimmy kind of hates the guy. Sometimes.

Jimmy kind of understands the guy. Sometimes.

In the dying afternoon rays of sunlight that stream through the gaps in old, lacy curtains, his mom sleeps deeply. Her body isn't quite adjusted to being planteside, on a different clock than the ship she traveled. Her eyelids flicker and she puffs out short, soft sighs. Her fingertips twitch towards her palms and Jimmy creeps forward, wanting to slip his tiny hand into hers. He avoids the spot on the floor near the footboard that creaks with any slight bit of pressure.

He wonders how long she'll be around this time. Long enough for the purple spots on his ribs to heal? Long enough for Sam to quit hanging out with those asshole kids? Long enough for Frank to not hurt them after she leaves? Maybe if he is good. Maybe if Sam's stealing doesn't push her away crying. Maybe if Frank quits drinking while she's around.

Maybe, if he's really good - wishes really hard - she'll pull him in tight to her chest where he can hear her breath, her heart beating against his cheek again, and she won't be repulsed by him. Maybe she'll be able to look him in the eyes and hers won't get red and glassy.

Because he doesn't understand why she's always gone, always preferring to spend her time in the lonely black between too many points of light, too many unfulfilled wishes, over being down here on Earth with them, with him. He doesn't understand, but when he looks in the mirror he's beginning to.

He carefully reaches out and touches her silky, golden hair on the pillow before leaning down and breathing it in. She smells like the recycled tang of a shuttlecraft, the warm heat of sunlight, raindrops on may-flowers, and home. Unthinkingly, he places his tiny – too short, too clumsy – finger on the back of the hand closest to him, feeling the ridges of her knuckles under smooth skin.

It's not his birthday but he makes a wish.

Wouldn't it be nice if she told him she was going to stay this time?

She inhales sharply and he jumps back, watching her cautiously.

She'd never hurt him like Frank.

(No, her hurts are deeper, permanent, built into his foundation.)

But if she opens her hazel-brown eyes she would see him in the corner by the dresser. And before she had time to school her features, he would see the sadness and disappointment there. He never knew what she was searching for when her gaze landed on him, but if he happened to look back before she could smile that too-sappy, too-soft, too-much-teeth smile, he would see that whatever she saw left her wanting.

Something about him hurts her, his very existence seems to cause her pain and sorrow. No matter how hard he tries to impress her, or spend time with her, or show her just how much he loves her, he still feels that rejection.

He just isn't enough.

And he knows if she were to wake up now, he would see that staring back at him.

Not today. He couldn't handle that today. Not so soon.

Jimmy mentally traces the lines of his sleeping mother's face, glowing and content and bathing in the pure rays of sunlight coming through their dilapidated windows.

He has no idea when he might be able to do it again.

Jimmy's eleventh birthday comes and goes. Sammy sings to him over a stolen cupcake from a convenience store. He doesn't make a wish.

Jimmy's mom hardly even calls him anymore, barely acknowledges his birthday. Always days late, always in a typed out message. The only time he sees her face is when she makes a visual call to all of them. He hears her voice speaking directly to him maybe twice a year.

He's giving up on keeping her home, keeping her close, being enough for her.

Sam is only home every third or fourth day. His grades are dropping and he's doing community service for two MIPs already. He's only thirteen and now he's barely around, barely able to look at Jimmy. First his mom, now his brother. He doesn't look that much like their dad. Besides, Sammy was too young to know their dad from memory.

Sometimes Jimmy just wants to scream with how lonely he feels, how inadequate and unable, useless.

Frank just makes everything worse. Frank always makes everything worse. He pushed their mom away, enabled her running. Without him around, their mom would have had to stay. But instead he's here and she's there. And Frank hits them, calls them names, tells them nobody gives a shit about the sad, poor kids of a barely remembered hero. Their mom can't even stand them, has to run off the planet to be away from them. Frank was the one who let her go. But he never sees it that way.

And on Jimmy's twelfth birthday, his blood runs cold and then boils hot.

Sammy tells him he's thinking of leaving, that he can't stand anymore of this shit, he hates Frank, hates mom, hates dad.

Jimmy is afraid to ask if Sammy hates him too.

But he thinks he knows the answer anyway. It's in the way Sam can't look at him, can't meet his eyes, never hugs him or ruffles his hair anymore.

Frank pushed him away too, and Jimmy isn't going to be enough to make him stay.

There's no cupcake this time, but Jimmy makes a wish anyway.

He wishes he had died before he even had a chance to breathe.

In August of Jimmy's twelfth year, Sammy fills a backpack and after a fight, he takes off down the road. Jimmy hopes he will come back, that it's temporary, but the sick, heavy feeling in his gut tells him otherwise. Frank's an ass about the whole thing but he always is. Jimmy can almost ignore it like he usually does.

But then, while being such a good boy, a perfect child, doing as he's told and washing the car - his dad's car, Sam's car, Jimmy's car - he finds the keys to it. He remembers Frank drunkenly slurring about selling it to piss off his mother, trying to get her to come back to earth. He remembers his wish on his birthday this year, feeling that urge more than anything overtake him.

Why not? he thinks.

If Frank wants to piss off his mother…

If Sammy's leaving…

If his mom can't even consider his existence anymore...

If Jimmy doesn't care anymore…

If none of it matters anymore, why not ?

That's how he ends up creeping the car down the drive to the highway, peeling out onto the deserted blacktop, flying past Sam some ways down the road.

Fuck him anyway.

He blares a classical song and he screams to it, flooring it, shifting and pushing the car past the speed limit. He has no intention of turning off on the road to the old quarry, but when the cop shows up and he sees the road, he makes a split second decision, his second that day.

The turn is sharper than he's ever taken before and he almost loses control of the car. But he doesn't and after hitting the gate, he's got a plan.

Nothing matters anymore. Not the bruises, not the loneliness, not the disappointment, not his mom, not Sam, not school. Nothing.

It's not his intention to play chicken with the cliff. He shifts rapidly through the gears, pushing the antique, beloved car as fast as he can. The edge is coming quick. His heartbeat pounds in his ear, his throat, but it feels slower, not faster. This is it.

It hits him, then.

And he slams the brake, turns the wheel, drifts toward the precipice…

Jimmy jumps at the last second.

With his newfound sense of self, and bravado he doesn't quite feel, he faces off with the cop.

He's done living his life to make other people happy. From now on, he's doing shit for himself.

Everyone else can go fuck themselves.

Frank picks him up from the police station that night.

His mother calls, furious about the car, repeating herself and demanding to speak with Sam as well, threatening to come back.

She won't.

Frank gets drunk and blames him.

Jimmy, for once in his life, hits back.

Jimmy has just tested out of his ninth grade courses in April when everything goes to shit. Sam's been gone for a year, Jimmy's thirteen, and Sam is back in town. Only, it's not for a reunion. Jimmy finds Sam in deep shit and—

Jimmy tells him to go and he wasn't sure if he wanted Sam to actually do it or if he wanted Sam to look at him and choose to stay, to face what's coming with Jimmy. He's pretty sure either option would have hurt more in the moment.

Sam runs again. Jimmy takes the fall.

He can't go back.

When they declare him whole and healthy again, and a date's been set for his discharge, he hacks the medisystem to find out who they've contacted to pick him up. His mom had been in to see him, right afterward and again around the halfway mark in his recovery, but she'd gone back into the black, faded away again, disappeared once more.

Frank. Fucking Frank.

He can't go back to that shithole. Won't go back. After everything he's lived through, after finally fucking choosing life over death, he can't go back to Iowa. He'd die there. There were only two options waiting for him in Iowa. A slow, painful death from being trapped or a quick and painful death at Frank's own hands. There is no way.

So, he figures, if he's already proven he could take care of himself (and 30+ others), if he's already shown he would do anything with nothing to lose, if his only other option was the system…

He'd just opt out.

The night before his discharge, he hacks the security and ghosts himself. Temporarily because the system would figure it out and debug itself, or alert someone to do it. Then his files would be replaced and footage scanned, and it would reveal exactly what he'd done. But by then he'd be long gone, offworld, hopefully. Out of country at least.

Didn't fucking matter.

All that matters is that he's fucking fourteen almost fucking fifteen and sick of everyone else's shit.

He was going to live, goddammit.

Live.

Jim is completely alone when he turns fifteen.

AN: I'm sorry I kind of hurt you like this except I'm not at all sorry. At least it ended kind of Hopeful?

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