Disclaimer:The Thunderbirds do not belong to me. They are the property of Gerry Anderson and his affiliates. The original characters come from my imagination, and have appeared in some of my other works. I am pretty sure that my imagination belongs to me, unless it runs wild and becomes a law unto itself.
AN: This chapter is definitely not for those that like their Tracy boys squeaky clean, and therefore needs a warning: there are some brief references to substance abuse. I've tried to keep it as mild as possible, but it can be a painful subject for those who have been affected by it.
Chapter Four
Jefferson J. Tracy, former astronaut, entrepreneur and business tycoon, remained calm and composed as he entered neutral territory. It was not the hotel suite he, John, Virgil, Gordon and Alan were staying in, nor was it Scott's room in a different hotel. Instead, Jeff had found an empty office in the corporate building his conferences were held in, and he had commandeered it for the afternoon.
Scott and John had beaten him to their location. John perched on the edge of the windowsill, platinum blond hair glinting under the sunlight, appearing as a halo. Cornflower blue eyes hardened, though. A sign of his frustration at having to take sides, and he was most probably going to back Scott, like he and Virgil always did.
Scott, on the other hand, had no misgivings over displaying his displeasure at the situation. Frowning heavily, with his arms crossed firmly across his chest, Scott sat cross-legged on the desk.
"Scott," Jeff acknowledged with a nod of his head. "John, thank you for ensuring that he turned up."
"Like I had a choice," John muttered, almost inaudibly. Luckily for him, Jeff did not hear.
"Right, I'll cut straight to the chase. Scott, I meant what I said earlier today. I truly am sorry for my choice of words yesterday. For that, I apologise from the bottom of my heart."
Scott sat, defiant, jaw jutting out in a stubborn expression.
"However, that does not change my opinion of the way you comported yourself in the aftermath. When a member of family is in hospital, or any kind of trauma, you do not choose to go incommunicado. That is unacceptable, and it demonstrates irresponsibility on your part. I expect your phone to be open and you to be picking up all calls that come your way. What if I was calling you because Gordon needed a blood donor for a transfusion? You wouldn't have gotten the message, would you?"
"I'm pretty sure I would have answered if John called."
"That's not the issue at hand!" Jeff practically yelled. "You left when your family needed you! You were out of reach when you were relied on the most! Did you know that you were the first person Gordon wanted? Did you know that you completely rejected his call?"
"I didn't intend to reject his call," Scott defended himself, only to be cut off by Jeff.
"You don't intend to do a lot of things, Scott, like not watching your brothers when you were supposed to. Funny how it still occurred anyway."
John gulped at the venom Jeff had used. "Dad," he interjected quietly. "That is way below the belt. Scott's done more than enough watching of us over the past nine years. And how is Scott meant to watch them if they choose to move without telling him? Scott's human, not God; he only has two eyes. He does not see all."
Scott mouthed a quick thank you to John as the blond leaped to Scott's defence, immensely grateful for his little brother's presence.
"John's right, sir." Scott swung himself off the table and straightened his posture up to its full height. Even though there was only a distance of two inches between their height, Scott seemed to tower over Jeff.
"I'm not God. I don't see everything, and I certainly don't have complete and absolute control over any situation at any given time. What you perceived as ignorance, I considered preservation. However, you're entitled to your opinion, however wrong it is, and that's fine. I know you, and I know you'll believe what you want to believe."
"Dad, Scott has probably over owned responsibility, so your implication and accusations towards what you perceived to be irresponsible is unjust and unfair," John advocated, just as a means of trying to keep peace.
Jeff raised his eyebrows. "And what exactly do you mean by that, John?"
"What he means is that I've been the primary carer for them since I was ten," Scott ground out through cemented jaws. "Right after Mom died, and more often than not, you were seeking solace in the bottom of a whiskey bottle. When we needed, no, we relied on you to make things better, even if it was something simple like a hug, or a glass of warm milk and a bedtime story for the sleepless nights, and you were in no shape to do that. So they came to me, because I could give them what they needed. But I was never what they wanted."
"Scott," Jeff gasped, wounded that he would bring up the taboo topic of his mother. "Stop. I don't want to hear this!"
"No. No, I won't, because this is how it all began! You think the myriad of problems we have'll get solved if you sweep it under the carpet like you normally do? Because I'm telling you, that's like putting a Band-Aid on a cut that requires stitches. It will never stop bleeding! And you know what, Dad? We need to talk about her. All of us. Why? Because that's the beginning of the downhill slide that led us here today."
"This is becoming a dissertation," Jeff muttered, unhappy with the way the conversation was headed. Jeff had expected some skeletons to remain in the closet, but it appeared that Scott was insisting on a full spring clean. Instead of the Tracy patriarch remaining in control of the discussion, dictating what topics were on and off the table, the Tracy heir held all the reigns to the topics at hand.
"Sit down, then," John said dryly, moving to the desk. "I'd imagine that, this time, the tuition is not only enlightening, but free."
"Being the eldest, I can remember quite a bit about life before and after Mom. I remember what it was like to be a kid. I remember being able to wake you up at the crack of dawn on a Saturday morning so you could take me down to the airfield for an hour before heading home to watch cartoons with the others for the rest of the morning. You'd make us the best blueberry pancakes with bubble gum syrup, much to Mom's dismay. Do you remember that, Dad?"
From the mahogany table, both father and son nodded mutely.
"Well, I remember the cartoons and the food," John amended. "Not the airfield."
"Back then, we called you Daddy. Not Father, not Dad, and certainly not Sir. You weren't any of those classifications yet. You were Daddy because you always seemed to make time for us. It didn't matter how much work you had brought home with you in those initial days of establishing your company; if we wanted to play a game of hide and seek with you, or ask you for homework help, you'd always do it."
Jeff fidgeted, wondering if Scott was trying to make him feel guilty with recollections of the past, or if his trip down memory lane served any tangible purpose.
"Remember life straight after Mom died? I'll bet you do." Scott sighed, interlocked his fingers as he paced the length of the office. "Whatever you possessed to make you Daddy got cremated and scattered into the ocean, along with Mom's ashes. The same way my childhood disappeared that day. You never seemed to have time for us after that. If it was a question on sixth grade homework, or the request for a simple snack, you expected us to fend for ourselves. Christ alive, Dad, I was ten freaking years old, and you left me in charge of four younger siblings!"
Out of his peripheral vision, John could see the ashen tinge to his father's skin tone. Jeff's grey eyes had a glassed over look, not because he was bored, but because he refused to acknowledge memories he had worked so hard on forgetting.
"Scott." A warning, before Jeff came to his senses and struck, rendering their relationship broken beyond repair. "Thin ice."
Scott nodded, took a deep breath to steady himself and heeded John's advice.
"Do you know the one thing I remember most about that time?"
Jeff shook his head.
"Let me give you a hint. It involves Virgil. It's you, basically ignoring his existence because he looks identical to Mom. He couldn't help that; it's an accident of genetics. He asked me why you couldn't bear to hug him, bear to look at him anymore, one evening after you brushed him aside and headed straight to the liquor cabinet. Do you know how hard it was for him to ask me that? Do you know what was harder? Trying to find the answer that could reassure Virgil, and not paint you as an ogre."
Jeff scrutinised his mind, searching for the relevant memory. Amidst the haze of his mind in the months after Lucille's death, he couldn't locate it.
"Do you know what an average day for me was at that time?"
Knowing that there was only one answer Scott wanted to hear, Jeff shook his head, wisps of grey shaking loose from where he had combed it earlier that day.
"I'd wake up, often before five, brush my teeth, go for a shower. I'd spend the next hour or so finishing off last night's homework, because I'd been too busy to complete it the previous night. At six thirty, I'd wake John and Virgil up so they could brush their teeth and shower. You were running out of the front door by this time. By seven, I had placed five bowls of breakfast on the dining room table. I would then hound Alan and Gordon to get ready for school, which is more difficult than it sounds. Once I washed the breakfast dishes, I tossed five lunches together and we scrambled out the door to catch the bus that would deposit John and the others off at elementary school while I went to middle school."
Jeff opened his mouth to speak, but Scott held up a hand to stop him.
"Afterwards, I would wrangle the troops from the playground and we'd head home. If we were lucky, we'd be just in time to catch the bus home. More often than not, we'd miss it and we'd have to walk. Sometimes, we'd stop in the shops, pick things up on reduced price so I could make them dinner with the little money we had. We wouldn't get home until after four. Then I'd have to fix them something to tide them over until dinner time. John and Virgil would start on their homework, no prompting needed, but I had to contend with Alan and Gordon, just so that they would get it done. I could spend about fifteen minutes on my own work before I had to go referee a fight that had broken out between the youngest two. Inevitably, Virgil would come to me with a homework problem because John was busy with his own work, and couldn't help him. So, I'd not only have to sort out Gordon and Alan, I'd deal with Virgil as well.
"By seven thirty, I had them eating dinner and once they finished, I spent the next half hour cleaning up while John kept them occupied with a game. John would then put Alan and Gordon to bed and watch Virgil play the piano before telling him it was lights out and heading up to sleep himself. By about ten, everyone was asleep, letting me attempt to complete my work in peace. You'd normally be back home by this time, but for the most part, you spent most of it locked in your room, and nothing, short of nuclear warfare, could drag you out to us."
Silence reigned, as Jeff absorbed Scott's verbal tongue lashing.
"Funny thing, though. I remember each detail because I lived it, but I didn't mind in the slightest. I didn't want the responsibility, but I accepted it because it was the right thing to do. It was the only thing to do. I knew you were doing what you were doing to try and provide for us. I knew about our monetary problems; I was very much aware that we were on the verge of declaring bankruptcy. I didn't care that I had adopted the primary carer role, because I thought it would only be for a short time while you got back on your feet. I believed you had enough trust in me to ensure that the day-to-day running of the household went smoothly while you provided for us."
"Are you telling me you thought I was a bad father?" Jeff asked, rising on defensiveness. Heck, the man had basically called his son an abject failure the night before. Scott was bound to want to get a few comebacks in.
"Under the circumstances," Scott picked his words carefully, knowing that his outburst had cut Jeff more than he was willing to show. "No, you were not a bad father. But in your quest to ensure financial stability, you cost me something else. You cost me my childhood. To be quite frank, Dad, I would rather have had time with you as a child, than the money. And I know how easy it is for me to say that, because I've never been in your position, but that's what I would have preferred."
"And all of this… undue stress, shall we say, led you to…?"
"Dad," John issued another warning sharply. "I don't think –"
"No, son," Jeff replied adamantly. "Scott wants to air out dirty laundry, so it's better to air it all out." His direction diverted to Scott. "Is it?"
"The drug use? The shooting up of smack on a regular basis? The subsequent cocktail of hash, alcohol, smack and ecstasy swimming in my bloodstream leading to the overdose? It was.,.. quite a big player, yes. I'll give it that much. But it wasn't the only factor. I thought that maybe it might help you sit up and take notice of us a bit more, if something happened to me."
There was something that sparked in Jeff's eyes, John noted, a keen observer in this exchange. Whether it was incredulity or resentment, John couldn't tell.
"Was that the twisted logic you used to justify your actions?" It was hurt, John identified, averting his eyes, feeling that he was intruding on a moment that should have been between Scott and Jeff. "You're using me as a way of exonerating yourself from blame? You're shirking off your responsibility and judgement in your mistakes onto me."
"No, Dad! Far from it!" Scott scrubbed his hands vigorously over his face. "I was thirteen, old enough to make my own choices. Old enough to know the risks and stupid enough to take them anyway. It was stress, peer pressure, me trying to figure out who I was, not who I was forced to be. I just wanted to escape, become someone else for a while. Every time the weight you had beared on my shoulders became too much, I had to turn somewhere else to find a quick-fix, because you were off on your latest business trip, and you weren't there to help me."
If those words were meant to reassure Jeff, they did the complete opposite. Instead, it made him feel infinitely worse. Hindsight had shown him that he had allowed himself to drift so far away from his sons. At the same time, Jeff realised that it was the first incidence of Scott showing a complete and utter disregard for his duty and responsibility to his family. He should have seen the signs for what they were, not disregard it, as he had done.
"Well, if it makes a difference," Jeff muttered. "It worked."
"All I know is that after that, you packed me off to Grams," Scott continued, as though there had been no interruption. "I spent a year there, before you insisted that the others followed suit and joined Grams and myself."
The nineteen year old moved to the window, drained from the emotional toll this was having on him. Like ripping off a Band-Aid, this was one of the most painful things he had done to date.
"Dad, that was the best thing you have ever done for me. Not just because you let me get the help I so badly needed, but because it gave me the time to figure out who I was, who I could be and what potential I had within me. And while I wasn't completely back on track within the year, I was in a much better position to cope than I had been before. I felt that I could handle the responsibility of being the big brother and care giver better than before."
Jeff raised his eyebrows. "How so?"
Scott shrugged, as though the answer should have been obvious. "I had a better support system. I had Grams, who was always willing to demonstrate the benefits of her attitude adjustment clap when any of us refused to toe the line."
"Oh, yeah, I remember those," John winced, shifting his weight as he sat. "Knocked you right into the next side of Sunday."
"Thank you, John," Jeff interjected, mildly amused. He, too, had been on the receiving end of an attitude adjustment clap one too many times as he grew up.
"And it's been like that ever since."
Another pause. Jeff wondered, once again, what the trip down memory lane was meant to achieve. Aside from depicting the extent of accountability he had placed on his young son's shoulders, which Jeff had remained blissfully unaware of.
"Dad, I haven't said all of this because I resent it. I've mentioned all of this because I wanted you to know that I've never taken my duty towards my brothers lightly."
"Then what did you resent?" Jeff demanded, swinging himself off the table. "I know you, Scott, and I know you're restraining against revealing something."
"Do you really want to know?"
Jeff nodded. How bad could it be?
"I don't resent the fact that you have all these expectations of me," Scott chewed on his lip, ploughing on ahead nervously. "But when I don't meet up to these expectations, you have no hesitation in chewing me up, spitting me out and then hanging what's left of me out to dry. That's what I resent the most. Half the time, you're so caught up in pinning the blame on your scapegoat, which is me, by the way, you can't see the wood for trees, and realise that it was an accident."
Jeff felt the ire rise within him. "I get you to watch over your brothers so these accidents don't occur!"
"But, Dad," John interjected, knowing that this was exactly the wrong thing to say, as it would just incense Scott. "Scott is powerless to prevent quite a lot of things. Take the time we went ice-skating and Virgil broke his arm. That happened because the blades were ridiculously dull and couldn't grip the ice properly. Virgil just happened to fall in an awkward position when that occurred. There was nothing Scott could have done to prevent it, but when you arrived at the hospital to see Virgil, the first thing you did was berate Scott for not being careful enough with us. And he sucked it up, because he knew that's what you needed from him. What about the time I fell out of a tree because I wanted to see the planets align with my telescope? Scott told me not to, but I did it anyway. When you found out, Scott was the one you chose to vent at, not me. It should have been me, but he took it, as it's his bizarre way protecting us."
Jeff nodded, showed he had acknowledged, heard and understood what John was saying. "But that's not the issue at hand, here, John. The issue is that Scott was meant to be watching over Gordon and Alan to ensure that nothing would happen to them. He was the preventative measure I implemented."
"Dad, please, enlighten me," Scott snapped, reaching the end of his tether. "How exactly am I meant to observe two beings that have disappeared from sight? Oh, and by the way, preventative measures have the tendency to fail. That's why I exist."
"You were not meant to let them disappear!" Jeff retorted back, hands forming fists, leaping to his feet, consciously ignoring Scott's jibe.
"And you thought they'd listen to me?" Scott laughed sarcastically. "Dad, they stopped listening to everything and everyone when they hit their teens. Of course, had you been around more often, you would have picked up on that."
"And what does that mean?"
"It means exactly that! If you could spend more than a week at home at a time instead of travelling all over the country, you'd realise that taking charge of the Tracy boys is so much harder than you make it out to be."
As Jeff began to swell in indignation, John cut in. "Scott, I think you've said enough for now. Dad, sit down and take a few deep breaths before you implode."
The fierceness in John's voice made both men comply.
"Dad, one thing you've forgotten in all of this, and one thing Scott will never remind you about, is that this was initially meant to be his time away from us with his girlfriend." As Jeff was about to interject, John continued. "With only his girlfriend. No family, and no fraternal interference. They had been planning this since January. That's six months in the making."
Jeff was fully aware of that. In fact, he had given his approval to Scott in the initial stages of planning.
"You were the one that put the kibosh on that, when you announced that not only were you headed here for a business conference in the week Scott was coming here, but you had planned to turn it into a family vacation."
That much was true. But Jeff hadn't, and still could not see how that interfered with Scott's plans. As far as he was concerned, if he wanted to take his family out for a vacation, he was entitled to. It also served the purpose of allowing him to spend some time with his children, something he hadn't done in a long time. To Jeff, it seemed like the ideal plan, combining business with recreation. It was just one of life's unfortunate coincidences that the conference happened be situated at his eldest son's vacation spot, in the same week that the aforementioned son would be on vacation. At the time, Jeff recollected, it had seemed like a blessing in disguise. Not only could he spend time with his boys during the three days where he was not scheduled to work, he could enlist the help of his eldest in watching over his rambunctious bunch.
"Dad, Scott will never willingly tell you this, but he was pretty pi-" John broke off, biting back the words that were on the tip of his tongue. Remembering that he was addressing his father, he knew that language would not earn him, or Scott, any brownie points. "Scott was annoyed. Well, annoyed is putting it mildly."
At Scott's incredulous look, John laughed. "Please. I share a room with you. I heard you cursing up a storm, and then subsequently running down to raid the kitchen for a midnight snack or three.
"My point, Dad, is that Scott refused to complain about this because he knows how badly we wanted to spend time with you. He was putting everyone else's needs above his, as he always does."
That, Jeff realised, was the differentiating factor between his sons. The youngest had no problem with voicing his opinion, often not knowing when it was a good idea to keep his thoughts to himself. The eldest, on the other hand, would internalise his thoughts, letting them fester and stew for almost a decade before he decided to let the incident go in an act of good faith, or let it out in an avalanche of suppressed rage.
"Dad, this has to stop. You need to understand that John, Virgil, Gordon and Alan are all old enough to look out for themselves, to some extent. They have to be held culpable for their actions. I'm tired of having to play Dad-junior to them all the time. For the first time in nine years, I just want to be the big brother. That's it. No more, no less. I've pushed myself to the breaking point under the sheer amount of work they require, and frankly, I'm done with it. Especially with you reacting the way you do when things don't quite go to plan. You need to sit down, and have a serious think over your priorities, Dad, and this time, make sure that we are at the top of the list. Permanently."
Cobalt blue eyes glanced at the stainless steel watch slapped around his right wrist. Scott had been in here for nearly three hours, and his stomach was grumbling for some more food. Emotionally draining conversations tended to have that effect on him.
Opening the door, he leaned casually on the frame. "Dad, despite everything you've put me through, I still have the greatest respect for you. But, I'm telling you right now, one man to another, that something has got to change. Something has got to give, because if we keep going down this path, we will hit the point of irreconcilable ideological differences."
The door closed quietly with a click, leaving two stunned Tracys in the office. Jeff made to move after Scott, but John's arm barred him back.
"How do you think it went, Johnny?" Jeff asked, his heart plummeting to his feet like a stone. This was not how he envisioned the discussion.
"About the best you could hope for," John replied, slinging an arm over his father's shoulders. "Scott's right in saying that you've pinned a heap of responsibility onto him, and that you've been quick to blame him when accidents occur."
"I know," Jeff murmured quietly.
"But he's also left the ball in your court, Dad," John pointed out, ever the optimist. "Now it's up to you to decide if you'll volley it back, or let it bounce out of play."
It was no choice at all. How could Jeff not volley it back to his son? The Tracy patriarch wasn't fool enough to turn down a second chance when he saw one.
"Word of advice, Dad; if you are intending to volley back, do it gently."
And with that noted and read, Jeff took his second, third and fifth son out to feed them an early dinner.