3am

In which the Onceler remembers a father figure whose still within reach.


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Ted had once mentioned that Audrey was his 3am. There wasn't much more to the conversation then that which Oncie could remember, but as he watched the minutes tick by first quickly, then slower, and slower, until finally it seemed that they'd stopped, he wondered if he too had someone as his 3am. The early October wind shifted the tufts in the Trufulla trees back in forth creating eerie shadows and sounds in the dim moonlight.

Oncie couldn't remember the last time he stayed up so late. Or felt the need so desperately for another breathing body beside him. Memories of lying awake in his old bedroom, coughing and sobbing until his throat ran raw, and his mother was knocking against the door screaming for him to hush up and go to sleep. The nights after his father left were the worst. Spent with his face buried beneath pillow after pillow, forcing himself to quiet down before she heard him. Was that what had awoken him tonight? The sounds- or would it be memories, as those sounds had long since ceased existence- of his father?

Oncie racked his brain, digging back to earlier when he'd first awoken with a sandpaper tongue and salted cheeks. The specifics were gone, huddled back down deep in his subconscious. But there were the sounds. Or what he remembered of them. The hollow noise of his father's suitcase hitting the wood floor beneath his feet. The whimper of newborn brothers, forgetting to be fed. His mother's curses then pleas as the front door was pushed open. The own wretched sobs that worked through his small body, as he'd watched a figure in his life begin to disappear.

And something else. The feel of hands, worn and calloused from planting, sawing. Harvesting, and riding. The hands of a farm man, touching his face softly. Something he hadn't done in months. His breath still stale with the pungent scent of alcohol. He hadn't been all there, words slurred, eyes glazed over already looking to the land ahead of him. The other life he'd been creating behind the scenes.

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Oncie turned over in his makeshift bed, fingers prodding the end of the old fashioned telephone. Nimble fingers found their way into the small wheel, turning it the correct seven ways. At this point, and Oncie was sure, as he watched the smaller hand and the bigger hand chime the new hour, he didn't need conversation. Not even a simple hello.

He expected the dial tone, the sound of the chime as the phone called out to an empty home. Once, twice, and then three. He revealed in the sound, even if there was no answer. At least they still had a connection, a single ring, that connected one line here, to another somewhere else, somewhere Oncie couldn't even begin to think about.

And then, a groggy sound. Familiar, yet, different, tainted by something new, and very far.

"H-Hello?"