The Talk

"Danny, we need to talk to you."

Danny froze on his way to the stairs. It was amazing how quickly the dread filled him. Because there was no reason for his parents to be sitting on the living room couch at four o'clock in the afternoon, doing absolutely nothing. Where were the half-finished weapons and wacky gadgets? The ghost-themed needlepoint and Fenton Family Action Figures?

Oh. Right. We need to talk to you. They weren't doing nothing - they were waiting for him.

A thousand implications flashed through his mind, each one stabbing into him with a unique flavor of panic. His parents were getting divorced. They were going to move. They were finally sending him to military school because of his bad grades. Vlad-freaking-Masters was coming to live with them. Maybe someone had died.

"Why don't you take a seat, sweetie?" said his mom, gesturing to the armchair.

Staring at them, Danny crossed the room, lowered his backpack onto the floor next to the coffee table, and sat. Stiff with dread, he waited for them to break the news.

His parents glanced at one another. They looked just as uncomfortable as he felt. His dad, squirming a bit, was the one who finally spoke.

"So, erm, Danno. Well… how do I put this… have you noticed your body feeling a bit… different lately?"

Danny's face fell slack, and then it filled with heat. His eyes darted frantically to his mom. "Why are we talking about this right now? Why is Mom here? Oh my god." He smashed his palms over his burning face and wished he could get away with disappearing in front of his parents.

"I think your mother needs to be here, kiddo."

Danny shook his head. "Nope. Nopenopenope."

"Danny-" his mom began.

He interrupted her - face still buried in his hands. "Look, if it makes any difference, I already know everything you think you need to tell me." He stood and fumbled for his backpack. "So why don't I just go to my room, and you guys stay here, and we can pretend we had the conversation, and everyone's happy?"

"You already know?" asked his mother, sounding dumbfounded.

"Yup. That's the internet for you." And realizing how much could be read into that careless comment, Danny blushed a shade darker. Shoulders hunched to his ears, Danny tried to make his escape.

He made it as far as the bottom step.

"Danny, wait!" cried his mom. "We still need to talk about this."

A high-pitched whine rose out of his throat. "We have to?"

"Please sit back down."

He was sorely tempted to run upstairs anyway, but something in his mom's voice convinced him to stay. She hadn't ordered him to come back. Instead, she seemed almost desperate. Danny couldn't remember ever hearing his mother sound like that, and it broke his resolve.

So he sat back down and stared into his knees, steeping in embarrassment. There was a hole ripped through his right pant leg; he began to tug on a loose thread.

"Tell us what you've already figured out, sweetie."

Danny's head shot up. He gaped at her. "Are you serious?"

His mom reached out a hand towards him but stopped halfway, curled her fingers, and replaced the hand in her lap. Danny's father wrapped it in his own and gave it a comforting squeeze.

"We want to help you, son," he said, "but first we gotta make sure you understand the situation. What all of this means."

"Um. I'm fifteen. I think I'm old enough to know what it all means."

That didn't appease his mom or dad one bit. Danny watched distress creep into his mother's face. "But you're acting like nothing has changed."

"Am - am I supposed to be acting differently?" Just what did they expect from him?

"Most people do," said his mom. His dad smiled and nodded at her encouragingly. "It's… healthier that way. For them, and everyone around them."

This sounded suspiciously like the work of his older sister; no one loved talking about really private issues more than she did. "Did Jazz put you up to this?" No wonder they looked so uncomfortable.

They were taken aback. "Does Jazz know?" said his mom.

"Uh… why wouldn't she?"

For a moment, they continued to look surprised, but then his mother's expression of shock sank into one of resignation. "No, of course you would tell Jazz. You two were always very close."

His dad considered this, and eventually he, too, nodded his acceptance.

So Jazz hadn't put them up to this. It was their own special breed of awkward parent-initiated talks. He decided to try a compromise.

"Uh, so, like… do you want me to tell you, if I, I don't know… kiss someone, or…?" Please, don't make him go on. That was painful enough.

"Kiss someone?" echoed his dad. "Why would you want to do that?"

Danny and his parents stared at each other for several long moments of incomprehension.

Finally, it dawned on him. "I think we're talking about two different things here."

"What did you think we were talking about?" asked his mom.

"I thought we were having - you know!" Danny waved his arms. "The Talk! The birds and the bees and putting a condom on a banana and… geez, what the heck are we talking about, then?"

"Danny… we've been trying to tell you that you're dead."

"Oh."

On second thought - talking about sex with his parents suddenly didn't seem all that bad.

A/N: Oh my goodness. I don't know what I thought this was going to be when I started, but it definitely wasn't this.

Prompt: "After realizing that their son apparently doesn't realize that he is a ghost, Maddie and Jack have to gently break the news to him that he is dead."

Thank you, dragonsdomain, for the prompt!

T.F.C~