Philip Hamilton straightened his collar and flattened out his jacket, standing outside the door to his father's office. He was waiting for him to exist, knowing better than to interrupt him while working. While waiting, he contemplated the day's happenings, turning over in his head the major questions he was about to ask his father. There were so many choices to be made, he wasn't used to this. He was merely a young poet with young words and a young heart. George Eacker was 27, he knew so much more of the world than Philip.
He heard his father's footsteps approach the door, then stall and backtrack. Philip sighed. How he loved his father, but his work had stolen so much time that could've been spent teaching Philip how to be a child. Now he was almost an adult and he needed his help to survive. The world around Philip had changed so much from the days were he cried in his mother's arms, missing his father and unable to phantom why he'd left them again. He knew better now, he understood his father's work. Now he was as determined as he was to preserve the good name of Alexander Hamilton, and Eacker had disgraced that. In doing so, he had thrown his safety to the wind. All he wanted was to protect his father but in doing so he'd (literally) placed himself into a line of fire.
A number of hours passed before the door creaked open and Hamilton finally existed his study. He almost didn't see his son, as the door opened out in front of Philip and he was heading in the opposite direction, but Philip called him back, almost having to run after him to keep up the pace. "Father! Sir..."
Hamilton spun on his heel, a smile gracing his features. Philip could make out the growing wrinkles, the lines and dips of his face that were starting to show more and more of the stress he went through daily to fight off his opposers. It always softened into resemblance of the younger self Philip could hardly remember, when he looked at his son.
"Philip." He put an arm on his shoulder, the smile never fading from his lips. "I hope you weren't waiting long..you need to learn you can knock, son, I'm here for you whenever you need."
Philip nodded, but in the knowledge that he would do he exact same thing the next time he needed his father's help. He held his Dad's work and drive above all else. It was as important to him as anything.
Philip inhaled, so worried that Hamilton would snap at him, call him foolish or rash for his behaviour, scold him as he so often did when he was a child. "Today a man by the name of George Eacker..was speaking so much shit about you, I could just let it slide you wouldn't have either! ...He was downtown on Broadway and I confronted him during the show he was watching, right in the middle of it...I caused a scene but the pamphlets, the essays he's written! That 4th of July speech. Pops, I'm sure you've seen them, but I couldn't just let it go. I had to stand up for your name, he was taking it and raking it through the mud.." Philip swallowed, his mouth felt dry, his breathing coming out sharp and panicked. He was so nervous to disappoint this man who'd given him so much, his name, all of the knowledge that streamed from his brain to pages upon pages. He was following in his footsteps through and through, set to be one of the greats, just like Alexander was going to be, and already was. His father used to say all the time when he was younger that one day Philip would 'Blow us all away.' He'd been too young at the time to understand, but now thinking back on how many times his father had announced this with a heart full of honest hope and colossal pride, it gave him so much more ambition and motivation to go above and beyond. To do the Hamilton name as best as he could. Some days he didn't feel half-deserving of donning his father's name. He would not let Eacker shit on it. No longer.
"I challenged him to a duel. It's tomorrow morning.. I don't know what to do we never learned how to shoot at Columbia..." He allowed himself to laugh nervously, but avoided his father's eyes. "What should I do...I needed to stand up for you, for your name, I had to, I'm sorry..."
"Philip..." Hamilton shook his head. His smile was now tinged with such sadness, Philip had to advert his gaze again when he tried to reconnect their line of sight. He couldn't take it. Not the disappointed and regretful words his father was going to spew and not the look in his eye, so full of deeply buried pride, he knew was probably pushed even further below the surface now. To his surprise, his father's voice was warm when he continued, "I was in your position once. Well, you know what, on numerous occasions. You did the right thing to stand up for what you believe in, I just regret that it was over something that I could've resolved if I'd seen or addressed it sooner. Now...did he attempt to peacefully negotiate? What did you say, how did he respond to the accusations?"
"He refuses to apologise, we had to let the peace talks cease..."
His father sighed, nodding. "Very well. Where is this happening?"
"Across the river in Jersey."
"And tomorrow?" Philip merely nodded his head once, stiffly, in response. His father wasn't going to save him from facing this challenge he'd set himself. He'd gotten himself into this mess. Alexander knew far better than to pluck him out of it just because he had authority, Philip knew this. He also knew this was a great way to feel as though he was doing good in the world, and becoming a man while doing just that. A good man, of virtue. Like his father was, despite everything he'd gone through in previous years. "Okay. Philip. I'm going to give you my two muskets, but I need you to do as I say, yes?" Philip gave the same stiff nod again, and Hamilton proceeded in showing him how to properly load the gun, how to cock the trigger, and demonstrated how he would fire. "When the time comes, fire your weapon in the air. I know it may sound absurd, but Philip, your mother's been through a lot. She doesn't need you to go and get yourself killed over something that would seem to her as being a petty squabble which I happen to be at the heart of. She's wary enough of me as it is at the moment..."
"I'll protect your name, Dad. And I'll protect you from any reciprocations from her... but what if he decides to shoot then I'm a goner..."
"If he is truly a man of honour as he claims that he is, he will follow suit. No one will get hurt and the courage and bravery you showed to stand there on that duelling ground will be enough. Make me proud, son." Hamilton smiled, closed the gap between them which was just a stride, and planted a kiss on the top on his sons' head. "Now go, practise shooting those things, out of sight of your mother though, you hear me? I've work to do. Come to me tomorrow once you've settled it, I've some writing I would like to share with you." He gave him the same warm smile that the conversation had started with, as he walked away, and Philip felt like a major weight had been lifted from his shoulders. That had gone much better than he'd expected it to, but he was still apprehensive about shooting towards the sky. It seemed foolish and somehow cowardly, something that Philip would later reconsider as, in actuality, a major act of bravery. But his young heart didn't want to forfeit the duel in such a manner as his father had suggested. He would do him proud, and shoot skyward for him only, not out of his own principles.
The day was clear and dry for late November, but the cold bit into Philip's face and stung at the tip of his nose as he crossed the Hudson. He carried his father's two guns underneath his overcoat, hugging them to the chest as if they were living creatures that he was trying so desperately to keep the cold away from. Once he touched down on the banks of the New Jersey green in which they would duel, he took them out, and started to inspect them as Hamilton had shown him, as he walked forward, towards the battle. George Eacker's second loudly debated with his own as he did settled into place a few meters from where Eacker already stood. The grass was still a lush green and growing, seemingly unaware of the harsh bite of winter that was already setting in. Philip always seemed to notice the most useless of details, but he used that to his advance when it came to his poetry. He could string even the mundane together and transform it into something that shimmered with elegance and beauty.
"George! How was the rest of that show you were watching... what was it-"
"Philip, come on. I know you're young and scrappy but I'd rather skip the pleasantries, let's go."
Eacker's second's voice brought the truth, the striking and humbling reality biting down hard on his thoughts, his ability to move as gracefully as normal. His steps forward, toward Eacker, were full of faltering strides and his gate was as uncertain as that of a fresh colt. Once they reached the spot, standing one foot apart with their guns at their sides, Eacker's second began to count and they turned, matching every new number with another step away from the man that was going to shoot in the opposite direction. One would fall, or both, the possibilities played out like rapid fire through Philips head as he debated, in those seconds, what was to be done.
"Five...Six.." Philip turned and defiantly raised one of his father's guns above his head. He would do him proud. He was a Hamilton with pride, after all, he would wear the name like a badge of honour and do what was right. He stood there, and watched Eacker turn on "Seven...", then instead of raising his gun to the sky, as he so clearly saw Philip doing, he pointed it straight towards his chest, and pulled the trigger.
The world didn't stand still. There was no moment in which he could contemplate the meaning of his existence or what would come after. All of that had been dwelled upon for the hours from the challenge of the duel to when he stood on that wide field and pointed his gun up towards the heavens. No. The only thing that took longer than the instance it really belonged to, was that of him falling to the ground. He felt the bullet enter, just under his rib cage on his right side, and exit, then enter again, this time through his right forearm, then lodge in there, his arm felt as though lightening had struck it, there was no pain at first. But he lost control of his limbs and somehow, as he fell he felt his finger slip the trigger and fire. I hope it hits him, he thought, feeling his body cower. He landed on his knees first, tilting forward with slight momentum, then back. Always poised, dignified. He let himself surrender to the grass and it was there, for the first time since he was a child, that he cursed his father. All he felt was warmth, everywhere, and the corse, almost dead grass beneath his cheek. It was clinging on to life, he noticed with some grief, just as he was. The warmth quickly subsided into pain, though Philip had lost all consciousness of time or light or noise or even the feeling of the grass beneath him, at that point.
And then everything was pain. People pulling at him, grabbing his clothes, pulling his arm back together and to his side. In all of it, all through it, there was pain. It seemed to be all he had ever known, just the unbearableness of it all, of how it seeped in and became his entire consciousness. That was, until he passed out on the boat back to Manhattan, back towards his father.