A/N: Child/Teen John... just a little bit about John's situation in growing up. If you're reading these it would be nice to know whether you think I'm wasting my time, or if they're decent enough to keep going. Enjoy!
Parental Divorces.
"You're not taking them!" The scream reverberated around the whole of the house and the sound of a plate or another piece of crockery being launched across the room and hitting the wall. "Clear off, get out of here! You're not taking John and Harriet! Over my dead fucking body will you ever take them away from me! Fuck off!" Five year old Harriet wrapped her arm around her stuffed elephant, burying her face deep into her cuddly toy and cowering back into her older brother's arms.
"It's for the best Carolyn! The courts will agree with me, but I'd hoped we wouldn't have to take it that far!" John could hear his father's voice, raised but steady.
"Agree with you? Agree with you!? Now you're fucking deluded! I won't have some madman looking after my kids!" There was another sound of something else smashing and Harriet twitched again, startled by the noise.
"We'll see about that." There was the sound of footsteps moving quickly towards the staircase then proceeded up it. John's dad entered the room where both Harriet and John were huddled together' he was a tall, broad man with a firm military step like the soldier that John knew he had been. He bent down in front of his kids, a gentle smile present on his pleasant face and he put his hand tenderly on Harriet's knee.
"Alright Harri?" He spoke very quietly.
"I don't like it when you and mummy fight." She whispered, clutching her elephant even tighter to her chest than she had been doing before.
"I know Harri; it won't be for much longer, I promise. You know mummy and I love you very much" He answered, giving her a small hug. "You too Johnny." He ruffled John's hair affectionately. "Be a good boy for mummy. I'll see you both very soon." He got up to leave, an effigy of sadness painted across his face, and the children heard his feet receding down the stairs and then the front door slammed.
"And stay out!" Their mother's voice screeched.
They had been arguing for a long time now; it felt like for as long as John could remember they had been at each other's throats, and despite insistence from both of them that it wouldn't last much longer, it didn't look like it was going to end any time soon.
Just as John and Harriet started back at school it seemed that their parents had reached the last straw and their dad left. He had moved into a house on the other side of town and since that point he and John's mother had been arguing about visitation rights. John's mother insisted that when he walked out on her he had also walked out on his kids, which meant he had no right to see them, but he thought very differently... Carolyn hadn't coped very well with the break up, and it wasn't difficult for the nine year old John to notice that she had been drinking every night since his dad left.
It was a Tuesday two weeks after that argument when John and Harriet got out of school that they were met at the school gates by their dad. This was a surprise for them both – one that they were delighted about after not seeing him for a while.
"Hiya Harri, alright Johnny?" He greeted them both with a hug each. "You're coming home with me tonight, you're going to be living with me from now on." He took hold of Harriet's hand.
"But what about mummy?" She asked as he led them away from the school gates.
"You'll be staying with mummy at weekends." He told them. "Don't worry, you'll still get to see her."
The next six months were the best in John's memory of his childhood... The courts had granted his dad, James Watson, full custody of both of his children – with their mother to see them every weekend. James was a retired soldier who had gone into accounting when he had come out of the army; he was firm with discipline, but he doted upon his children. John and Harriet's relationship with their mother improved in this time also... when she was only getting to see John and Harriet from a Friday night to a Sunday night she seemed to have decided that all time should be quality time with them – where as before she had spent most evenings drinking and ignoring their existence. But then it all went wrong.
John and Harriet were both called out of class to find their mum, very pale and shaky looking, waiting for them at the school reception. She bundled them out of the school and explained, in a broken voice, that their dad had been taken ill and was in hospital. She tried to tell them, with the emotion strangling her voice, that he was very poorly and might look a bit strange – but she wanted them to see him just in case something happened. They arrived at the hospital to find out they were too late...
After those happy months with his father it ended in the most horrific day that John could remember. His dad had had a second heart attack in the hospital, and despite the best efforts of the doctors and nurses, he had gone.
They moved back in with their mum, but their dad's death had hit her hard even though the two of them hadn't been a couple at the time. Gone was the mum that they had grown accustomed to over the past few months, and back was the drinker who spent every night with her face buried in a bottle.
As John grew up he knew that he couldn't blame anyone for his parents separation, or for his father's death. That didn't stop him feeling like if his parents hadn't fought so much then maybe his father wouldn't have been under so much stress and his heart might not have given out... And maybe his mum wouldn't have drowned herself in alcohol for the rest of her life after. But there was no knowing if things would have turned out any different. They were done, and John had to live with that.
A/N: The next installment will be called: Heart.