Disclaimer: none of this franchise is owned by me.
Summary:
Coach replies, "And yet you, of all people, should remember that where someone began does not decide where someone will end up."
Aladdin winces.
Or; When Coach Had Opinions on Family Day.
Author's Notes:
My imagination said, "What if…?"
AU revision of a scene from the film. Does not interfere with remainder of film content, besides an obvious character reimagining (Coach himself, given a probably different, slightly altered, context).
Standalone OR in the same AU verse as my multi-chapter story.
Title of piece from "With or Without You" by U2.
:: ::
sleight of hand (twist of fate)
::
"You—!"
He lunges to slam his fist into Chad's sneering face—despite the delicate hand of his practically-a-sister, who was betrayed by this smug peer, all the more reason to throw the punch—ignoring murmurs from a growing audience that are blotted haze in his rage, shoving aside even Mal's sharp command—
The air itself compresses around him like a glove. All forward momentum halts just as another voice cuts through anger-static. A deeper voice. One that he has already been trained to hear over adrenaline pumping in his veins.
"Jay! Chad!"
His arm trembles. Chad's sneer trembles into a defiant, sulking glare. The blonde's eyes flicker to the side.
Jay doesn't look away from the threat. Evie's hand is clenched in his shirt, he can feel the stretch of the fabric in his side, so at least he's still blocking her.
"Both of you, back off," Coach says, effectively silencing the courtyard.
He doesn't move forward, but neither does he move to the side. The threats are glaring at them, are hysterically tearful, are distraught by their mere presence. His stomach twists.
Evie's hand tugs his shirt, just enough for him to step back into formation. Without looking, he knows where the others are by more than innate awareness of personal space. Carlos would be sheltered beside Evie and shielded by Mal, and angled so no one sneaks up from behind. Mal has not taken point because she's the threat trigger. That puts him in the front, and they've boxed themselves into a tight-knitted cluster to defend. He knows this even without feeling the displaced air from their movements.
Practice makes perfect.
The air pressure fades the longer Jay stands stone-faced with fists clenched. Coach has placed himself in the middle ground to the side, forcing a triangle. Dividing the battlefield.
Quietly, looking at Jay, Coach says, "Nobody's going to attack." The three at Jay's back remain firm, ready—until Coach turns to Chad, adding, "And nobody will need to defend."
"Coach—"
"You dare imply—"
"Why, I never—"
Coach raises one hand in a gesture that somehow halts Auradonian protests. "I imply nothing, just state the facts as I see and hear. Mediating is not about laying down blame. Now, I know no one here wants this nice day to turn uglier. No one wants to unpack a few decade's worth of hurt today. So, I suggest we each back up, boys, and you go back to your own gathering. Highnesses."
He'd probably have defused more of the tension without a slight pause before the title. The grandmother-queen's face flushes. "My gathering is right here, and was going well until we were provoked."
Coach says, "Now, what did I say about casting blame? If you want to go there, keep in mind, mediating is also all about truth." She looks at him defiantly only as long as she can stand the silence he holds. Then she backs down, flustered, fussing with her granddaughter's sleeve. Coach's calm, wise eyes fall back on Jay and he says softly, "Jay, you need to cool it. No one's going to throw a punch here."
For a long minute, all Jay can hear is his own breath and all he can feel is the cramping pressure of his clenched fists. Disbelief equates to white noise in his ears. How damn stupid do they think he is?
He tunes back into pointed mutters in the audience when Evie shifts to break rank. He automatically catches her waist with his hand. She pats it once and proceeds, only one step to put her in full view. He doesn't insult her significant abilities by leaving his arm outstretched or trying to push her back again.
Pretending to be calm, Evie tosses her hair. "Let them have their precious gathering. We know when there are better places for us to be."
We're not wanted, so we don't want to be here.
Coach crosses his arms. "There's no reason everyone can't go back to having a pleasant time. Leave the ugliness where it belongs, in the past, instead of dragging it back into the present."
"We weren't the only ones to bring memories of the past here, old friend," some stranger breaks in, one whom Jay takes a minute to find. And when he does, he sees thick black hair and draping robes with gold embroidery, and a face from a history book he snuck a look at in the library just-because, just-to-know.
Once upon a time, a street-rat-thief turned into emir. And now, sultan, Aladdin looks at Jay with a blank expression.
Does he actually have a kid here?
Mal's arm is tight around his sleeve.
Wait. Old friend…?
Coach replies, "And yet you, of all people, should remember that where someone began does not decide where someone will end up."
Aladdin winces.
Damn, Coach. Just when I don't want to like you much, you come out with a wickedly low blow.
Jay gives Carlos the signal behind his back. The smaller boy pipes up, "Just let us go."
From him, it sounds marginally less fierce and more puppyish, but that is, after all, the point. Coach frowns, refocusing on them, on what Jay intended him to see—that his unfounded reassurances did not lead to Jay backing down. His body turns slightly, and his voices gentles. "If you want to stay, you can. This is a celebration for everyone to enjoy."
Old wounds. Jay grimaces.
Sure enough, Mal snaps, "Since when do you care what we want?" And with that, tugging on his arm, she leads their casually-swift escape. He backs up, turned only to ensure that Evie's ahead of him and that Carlos is tucked safely between them, while Mal charges out of the minefield. Ben reaches for her, hesitates, then stops himself.
Smart guy. She won't hear it right now. He's better off staying here.
"Running away?" Chad calls. Someone near him hisses, someone else further away snorts. A whisper, something being deemed shameful, and other unheard comments. Jay wants to respond but he's watching their backs. Until—
"Jay." That's a demand to wait and, with that air-pressure he felt stopping him, he knows that someone—that Coach—could stop him if he wanted.
Mal glances back, fierce, and he shakes his head. Evie worries at her lip as she seamlessly slips behind Carlos to bring up the rear while he waits, stuck in enemy territory, on-edge now that they are negotiating a loose crowd without him at their heels.
Coach has stepped closer when Jay transfers his general glare into a focused one. He doesn't let himself look anywhere else but at the Coach who, apparently, is much more than one of the only quietly, genuinely welcoming adults he's met here.
He's not certain, but has just seen more than enough to guess that Coach might have his own lamp. And, yup, that's enough to stop me from still liking the guy.
Coach sighs. "Son—" He cuts himself off when Jay looks him in the eye, feeling his loathing at the word fill his whole body. "Jay," Coach corrects. "You and your friends are welcome here, as much as—"
"As if we had any family?" He laughs without feeling it. The sensation is strange, which in itself is jarring. "Let me ask you something, Coach. You've been watching the VK daily sideshow display." Curious: he winced. "So, tell me, honestly, the way you all like to do here. Do you actually think we belong in Auradon?"
He almost doesn't mind the blatant eavesdropping.
Coach's face looks like it did that time Jay got too excited before being presented his jersey and talked too casually about his past. "Coming to Auradon was a chance for you all, and I've seen you take every opportunity offered. And I apologize for the fact that some here aren't all that willing to see you as your own person instead of as an echo of their own past." A faint undignified rustle permeates the grass.
"You didn't answer the question," he points out.
"Yes. You belong here."
If only.
No way he's responding directly. Not with the eyes and the whispers and the expectant ears all around. The best he can muster up is a flash of insight, a final parting shot to maybe salvage some of their pride.
"Nice of you to offer free range on Family Day, thanks for making it. Just doesn't work for us," he finally says, taking a step back.
Coach barely blinks. "What did we get wrong?"
Jay half-smiles. Look at that, he's learning. "Family, on the Isle, means something different," he replies.
"What does it mean, there?"
No way. There's no explaining what haunts the others—a mother's fur coats, an old queen's mirror-voice, the denial of a complete name. Nothing about broken lamps and tarnished baubles mattering more than sons. Not while royalty is hovering and, behind his Coach's shoulder, listening so intently he can practically hear the fountains, and a face from a past that came before him hovers sullenly. Or at least, the darkness of that particular sultan's hair makes him appear to be a shadow.
Instead, Jay says, "I already told you. Back when I joined the team." Coach is still frowning, not understanding, and it frustrates him. You knew him better than most others here, except one, and you still don't see what he would have been to me. He's frustrated enough to repeat plainly, "You wouldn't want to be at any dinner in Jafar's house."
He almost winces at his error—casually naming his father, in this crowd, with Aladdin himself present—but it's too late, so he finally shakes his head, turns away, and weaves his path across the lawn.
No one calls him back this time.
:: :: ::
The whole encounter is concerning, but most particularly is his newest students' distancing language. No one calls their own parent by name accidentally. And they don't make a habit of it—so much that it sounds natural to them. This will need to be addressed.
But not by his old friend, whose shoulder he grasps before the sultan can follow after his old enemy's son. "You'll make it worse," he says.
Aladdin, stubborn as ever, snaps, "We can't leave it at that." Thankfully, only this man seems to be thinking to follow: none of the other family clusters appear to share that desire. I should feel relief alone.
"Not only can we, but we must," he replies. Turning them both, Coach looks Aladdin square in the eye and refuses to hold back any of the disappointment he feels. "And whatever must be done, it certainly cannot be done by you. Not now."
The hurt is unmistakable. But it's been nearly a month, during which time Coach had been reaching out to anyone in Auradon who might be able to serve as adult support systems to the four so-very-fragile youth.
(Oh, he will never let them hear the word fragile in reference to themselves, but truth is truth.
And the truth is that as an educator and functioning-minded adult, he was quick to see signs of past troubles and turmoil in Jay. Athleticism is one talent that any can have, but Jay's aggression was not one normal to any youth. Neither were the fear and hyper-vigilance in Carlos. He didn't work with the two girls, to see their reactions, but he'd willingly turn back into a lamp-enslaved being if he was wrong about them also displaying warning signs of their own.)
And in that month of reaching out, only Anita and Roger Radcliffe expressed willingness to travel from the far side of the country to the capitol to meet the children—Carlos in particular. They hoped to arrive just after the coronation. The man Aladdin had become was uncertain, afraid. The Sultana Jasmine was tired of it, too.
("He either thinks the boy will be like his father, or he'll see too much of himself. He's afraid of the guilt he feels for unintentionally leaving a child to grow up like he did, never thinking about the Isle—so many of us never did. How could we not have considered there might be children?")
Like many of the royals, distraught at the thought of never having considered whether children existed until a young prince brought it up.
Like many of the royals, disgusted that they never looked past the first page of the yearly reports filed by Yen Sid.
Like many of the royals, outraged enough to request resignations and accountability.
Like many of the royals, guilty enough that the young prince became newly-crowned high king in light of this error.
No, not error. Not oversight. Ignorance, and arrogance. The audacity to think all outcomes had been foreseen. The former high king had been made to look very foolish indeed. And he paid for it when the vote came for a new high king to ascend—and their nominated young prince, who had discovered the issue, was tested at length, and passed brilliantly. The choice seemed obvious.
Of course, it was the height of arrogance for these same royals to then become even more distraught at the newly-crowned high king's method of addressing the issue. To bring the Isle children over? But…they were raised by evil! They were evil!
(That hadn't seemed to be on their minds while raging about accountability and government oversight. But…he was just a tourney coach and athletics instructor.)
All that could be said, but in the end, Coach merely guides Aladdin back towards his family with a very firm, "This is neither the time nor the place to finally decide. More importantly, you have not actually decided."
"Of course, I—"
"No. You're feeling guilty and want to make yourself feel better. Don't. That is not what Jay or any of them need."
Aladdin finally stops fighting the firm nudging. "All right. Just so we are clear, though—yes, Genie. I have decided." Their eyes briefly meet. "The moment I saw him, I knew I couldn't walk away."
Sometimes it took him a while, but the man usually ended up doing what was right. Coach Genie smiles, and it's only a little bit dimmer than he'd like. "Then after the coronation." Sultana Jasmine is close enough now to hear, to nod approvingly, and to take her husband's hand. "I'll introduce you in a much less threatening setting."
If there is any such thing to these four. Somehow, he thinks that answering that question is the key.