The Dwyer Disruption (pt. 3)

Need to know(s):

Theme song: Enemy Fire ~ Bea Miller

Characters: Loki, Mr. Tyler

Rating: T (language)

Genre: Family, Angst

Summary: Doubting himself, Loki seeks advice and assurance concerning his position in Brynn's life. In the process, he learns far more than he thought he knew.

Loki was essentially running on autopilot after he left Ms. Dwyer's office, his much too preoccupied with the worry that the woman had managed to conjure up. At the back of his mind, he could hear Brynn calling to him, asking what was wrong, but he didn't answer her. He knew she was feeling his distress and was worried, but, as much as he didn't want her to worry, he just couldn't bring himself to answer her. How could he answer her? He had no idea what to say. He felt like he had no idea about anything right now! The storm of questions swirling around his mind was proof of that:

What if Brynn wasn't as happy as she could or should be? What if, deep down, she really wasn't happy at all? What if she didn't feel safe? Why would she feel safe? The events of the last several months proved that she wasn't anywhere close to being safe because of his presence in her life! Loki knew that Brynn deserved better than him for a guardian, but what if it was more than that? What if Ms. Dwyer was right and Brynn needed better than him?

The god felt the ache that came from that possibility deep in his heart and deeper still in his gut. The idea of giving Brynn up—even if it didn't necessarily mean he wouldn't remain a part of her life—was enough to make him physically sick. This was Brynn—his little sister—his Princess! She was the absolute light of his life! What would his life be like without her as the center of it?

It's not about what you want or need, Loki found himself harshly scolding himself. It's about what Brynn needs. You don't matter.

Before Loki knew it, he found himself back in the SUV and pulling out of the parking lot of the school. And then he was driving the streets. He didn't know where to, he was just driving, somehow picking out a path and finding his way to whatever destination it took him to.

It took him to Mr. Tyler's.

Loki parked at the curb in front of the house and looked up at the home. Strange that he'd come here. He'd only ever met Mr. Tyler a few times since coming into Brynn's life, and he'd never truly been alone with the man for any of those occasions. Suffice it to say, he hardly knew Mr. Tyler at all; so why he'd made his way here, Loki hadn't much of a clue. Except that maybe it was because he knew Brynn trusted Mr. Tyler and valued his advice; and due to that, maybe Loki felt as though he could do the same. At any rate, the man had never been unkind to him, so there was that anyway.

The Asgardian was only halfway up the sidewalk when the front door of the house opened and the short, stocky form of Mr. Tyler stepped out. The older man (or older looking anyway) smiled in that warm, inviting way Loki remembered. It was no wonder Brynn and her friends and every other child in Brynn's school liked Mr. Tyler and had been sad to see him retire; the man exuded friendliness and trust. In a way, he somewhat reminded Loki of Baggi—an old stable hand back on Asgard that had always been friendly to Loki and had taken special care of Loki's favorite horses. So there, that was probably another reason why Loki had come here.

"Loki," Mr. Tyler greeted him, sounding a little perplexed but nevertheless congenial, "what a surprise to see you. Is everything all right? Is Brynn all right?"

The questions finally seemed to snap Loki out of his stupor. "Ah, yes, she's fine," he answered with a slight smile and nod. "Brynn is fine." He fell silent again, not sure what else to say but feeling as though he had a million things to say. Why exactly had he come here? He still wasn't sure.

Apparently sensing his uncertainty, Mr. Tyler smiled knowingly. "So Brynn's all right," he said, "but everything else isn't. Am I right?"

Loki stood there in silence, looking at the short, little man. He began to open his mouth as if to reply, but nothing came to his mind to say, so he simply shut it again, his gaze slipping away from Mr. Tyler's.

"Hmm, well considering you don't seem to have much to say on the matter when you always seem to have a lot to say on any matter, whatever it is must be pretty serious." With that, the little man turned and waved a hand towards his house. "Come on," he invited, "we'd better take this inside. I just finished making some fresh lemonade if you're interested." He grinned in an almost conspiratorial way at Loki as he added, "I'll even add a little something special to take the edge off if you want."

Loki stared down at the tall glass of ice-cold lemonade, sweating in his hands. Well, it wasn't just lemonade; Loki had taken Mr. Tyler up on his offer to add a little something extra to it. This decision truly spoke to the Asgardian being unsettled because he never held with Midgardian alcohol, but the temptation of maybe "taking the edge off" as Mr. Tyler had said was just a little too tempting to pass up. Loki did not normally feel this way when it came to Brynn, and he wanted to stop feeling this way as soon as possible.

Sitting in a chair across the kitchen table from the god, Mr. Tyler took a long, pleasurable slurp of his own lemonade. "Ahh," he smacked his lips after a moment. "That hits the spot. Now," he turned his sole attention back to the Asgardian, "I'd say it's safe to say you've got something on your mind, Loki, and that you came here for help with it."

Loki looked up at the man, but remained silent, still not sure what to say or how to say what he felt like he wanted to say. Such a situation was very frustrating and nerve-wracking; especially for Loki, who usually had trouble not saying anything. This was very much against his natural order of things.

"Hmm," Mr. Tyler hummed thoughtfully giving the raven-haired man an appraising look. "You know, it'd be easier for me to help you if you told me what you wanted help with, Son." He looked at his glass of lemonade again as he lifted it to take another gulp.

Perhaps it was the way Mr. Tyler diverted his attention so it wasn't solely on Loki; perhaps Loki had finally decided how to say what needed to be said, or perhaps everything had finally just boiled to a head inside Loki and could no longer be contained; whatever the reason, Loki finally found his voice: "Am I a good guardian for Brynn?" There was a tinge of desperation in his tone that made the chaos god cringe, but the question was out there now so there was no point in walking it back or trying to play it off as anything else.

Mr. Tyler paused his glass at his lips. His eyes shifted to Loki again, and he actually looked rather surprised by the question. "Mind telling me why you feel the need to ask that?" he gently prodded.

Loki felt the slightest bit of heat rise in his cheeks. Ever the professional, Mr. Tyler had been careful to keep from saying anything that would make Loki feel embarrassed, but the god was making himself feel unbelievably stupid and foolish all on his own. He shifted his gaze away from the therapist's and back down to his lemonade. "Ms. Dwyer—the school's new therapist; she called in several children to meet with her yesterday—children with unconventional home lives."

"So Brynn was one of them," Mr. Tyler surmised.

Loki nodded. "It wasn't a very productive meeting," he stated. "According to Brynn, Ms. Dwyer implied that I may be abusing her or have questionable motives in regards to being her guardian."

Mr. Tyler made a low whistle. "Yeah," he agreed quietly. "I'd call that an unproductive meeting, all right."

"So unproductive Brynn stormed out before it was finished." Loki sighed heavily as he shifted his glass around. "Which brings us to today."

"And your question."

"Ms. Dwyer wanted to meet with me," Loki continued. "I don't know if she'd already planned to or if it was due to the meeting she and Brynn had, but she wanted to see me this morning, so we met."

Mr. Tyler didn't say anything, just let Loki keep unpacking.

"After meeting, she admitted that she was wrong about suspecting me of perversion, but she kept going on about abuse and neglect. She said sometimes these things can happen to a child without you meaning to do them or not. She implied that because I haven't known Brynn for very long—which is true-"

"Loki-"

"She asked me if Brynn was happy, Mr. Tyler." The Asgardian finally looked up at the Midgardian again, the worry he was feeling shining bright in his green eyes. "She asked me if I could be certain that Brynn was happy. I… I couldn't answer that. The one question I should be able to answer as her guardian is "Is my little sister happy?" and I couldn't."

"She got under your skin," Mr. Tyler stated, trying to comfort the god. "Ms. Dwyer is a young, fresh-off-the-grill therapist with a self-appointed mission to save either a life or the whole damn world, and you got caught in her sights. She's trained to read people, to look for and identify triggers and weaknesses and the whole lot so she can try to understand and help people; and she found your weakness in Brynn and the fact that you're still learning to be a parent and went after it. She didn't see anything that you can't, Loki—she just got under your skin."

"But she wasn't wrong, Mr. Tyler," Loki insisted. "At least, she wasn't wrong in everything she implied." The man looked rather distraught now as opposed to merely worried. "Brynn's life is hardly as carefree as that of an average child: It's hardly as carefree as that of children that also have unconventional home lives when it comes to that. She is forced to put up with much more than she has any right to be asked to, and all because of choices I made in the past. She wakes up every morning wondering if today will be the day that we're visited by a government agency. She anticipates every telephone call to be a summons for a mission from S.H.I.E.L.D, maybe one I won't return from. And when we go to Asgard or meet with S.H.I.E.L.D, she is forced to enduring judgement and ridicule for the sheer fact that she's with me and wants to be with me. Brynn pays for my mistakes just as much as I do, if not more so, Mr. Tyler. How could I possibly expect her to be happy living like that? How could she be happy?"

"Well, you already said it for one thing," Mr. Tyler replied. He smiled hearteningly at the Asgardian. "Brynn wants to be with you, Loki; she wants you in her life, even with everything that comes along with it."

"People often want things that aren't best for them, Mr. Tyler," Loki pointed out despondently. "Children in particular. It's my job as Brynn's guardian to make sure she has what's best for her—what she needs, not simply what she wants. And what if Ms. Dwyer is right? What if what's best for Brynn—what if what she needs—isn't me?" At this point, Loki shifted his untouched glass of lemonade out of the way and leaned across the tabletop, looking intensely, beseechingly at the psychiatrist. "You helped Daniel with his last will and testament," Loki stated. "You stood surety for his cognizance, which means you knew of his decision to grant custody to me; which also means you must have agreed to the decision as I'm sure you would have spoken against it if you'd felt it was wrong. So I ask again, Mr. Tyler: Am I a good guardian for Brynn?"

Mr. Tyler was silent for a long moment, matching and holding Loki's penetrating gaze. There was no uncertainty in his eyes, no flicker of doubt, just pure conviction and certainty. "Far as I'm concerned," he said with confidence, "you're not just a good guardian for Brynn—you're the absolute best guardian for her. More than that, I'm convinced you're just about the best goddamn thing that's ever happened to that girl—if not that whole family—for a long time."

Loki blinked in stunned silence. That wasn't exactly what he'd been expecting to hear.

Mr, Tyler looked down at his drink again as he shook his head. "Daniel was always worried about Brynn," he muttered sadly. "Here's this little girl, abandoned by her mother only to lose her daddy not too long after, then her grandmother, and then her big brother. Now it was just him and Brynn, and he wasn't getting any younger—never mind the heart issues. And here's Brynn, blaming herself for Lane's death, still not healed from losing her grandma not long before, and… well, you remember what she was like when you first got here."

Loki snorted and offered a wry smirk. Oh, yes, he definitely remembered. And he hoped and prayed every day that he never had to deal with that Brynn ever again. Although, dealing with that Brynn had led him to his Brynn, so ultimately it had been worth it. Silver-linings and all that.

"And then you come along," Mr. Tyler continued, meeting Loki's gaze again as he pointed at the god with an amused smirk. "You come along and suddenly there's someone can give Brynn a run for her money. You can get inside her head, understand her, read her, connect with her; and you can do it as naturally and easy as breathing. And you don't let her push you out either—when she shoves, you shove right back and put her in line again. You force Brynn to finally start putting herself back together and come back into the land of the living. Now Daniel doesn't have to worry about Brynn anymore, because you're there now, and he knows you can take care of her if it comes to it. Speaking as a father and grandfather myself, I can't tell you how much that means to a man, Loki—to know your kid'll be all right when you're gone. It was like Dan had suddenly shaved ten years off. Shame his heart was too far gone by then for it to help."

Loki stared at the man for a moment before letting his gaze slip down to the tabletop as he processed everything Mr. Tyler had just told him. He'd always expected Daniel to have reasoning behind their agreement for Loki to look out for Brynn that went beyond the old man's claim of, "I'm gettin' too old to keep up with her"; but Loki had no idea that that reasoning was Daniel looking for a guardian for his granddaughter. He thought that Daniel had just made that decision after his heart attack when Loki and Brynn were actually starting to become close and then spent the weeks after until his death making it official. But now—hearing this—it was clear the old man had been planning that from the start and that was why he'd been so insistent and pushing the two of them together. It was like he knew, Loki mused to himself. Like he knew he didn't have much time left.

Oh, but how could Daniel possibly have known such a thing? Yes, humans faced the fact that death always laid around the corner for them, but hardly any of them ever acted like it and planned for it. And not a single one of them knew. Still, Daniel had set everything up like he had, in fact, known his time was almost over. And it certainly made things a lot more clear if he had known. Loki supposed he would never know for sure what had been going on in Daniel's head and why.

"So," Mr. Tyler sighed, "there ya have it. It's not just me thinking you're a good guardian for Brynn—Daniel thought you would be too. Otherwise, why would he've chosen you?"

Loki met the man's gaze again. "I suppose you're right, Mr. Tyler," he admitted quietly.

Mr. Tyler snorted. "Suppose nothin'," he said, "I am right. But if you still doubt it, there's nothin' I can ever say that'll convince you otherwise." With a grunt, the man stood and moved around the table towards the refrigerator to pull out the lemonade and pour himself another glass of lemonade. "And if that's the case," he grunted, "I'm not the one you need to be talking to about this." He stopped beside Loki and clasped the young god's shoulder, meeting his gaze once again. He looked empathetic but serious. "You really want to know if you're a good guardian for Brynn? Wanna know for sure that she's happy? You need to be talking to her, Loki."