A/N:The final chapter! But don't be sad, "Might as Well" is shaping up to be lovely, and the sequel to THAT is in the works. Have I been too vague and rant-y? Well, okay, here: This is the list of Mighty Ducks fics (mostly Bash-centric) that I am/have been/hope to be writing.
(The) Unforgiven-- Might as Well-- [working title] Combat Boots and Clover-- Old Friends, New Troubles
Sorry that this chapter is like, terribly long. There's lots of dialogue, and I needed to cover a whole shitload of stuff. And sorry if I don't get the scene at the end exactly right, it's been a few weeks since I saw D1.
---------------------Feedback------------------------
Solis
::shrieks:: Cookie! ::jumps Soli:: Hey, you thought I'd use the short chains? How're you treating my Fulton-clone? Better be good! Don't worry about not reading this one until now, I'm a review-whore, so every single nice one makes me very happy.
Wolfie
Terminal velocity? NEVER! Bwahahahaha...you doubt the limits of Schizzie-power? ::looks ominous:: I'm trying to keep updating, but my family keeps making me be social...
****
"The Unforgiven V"
Haley had said to him many times, 'I'm dying,' but she said it once more as he walked with her to her apartment that spring. She said, in a low voice that already sounded dead, "I'm dying, you know."
Fulton nodded. Everyone knew.
Haley sighed heavily, hugging herself with her thin arms and clutching, birdlike hands. And after a moment of silence continued, "I wish I wasn't, just because Momma's always crying...and Daddy don' even look at me no more. Like, if he did, he'd cry too, an' he don't wanna cry."
"People think you're weak if you cry." Fulton informed her solemnly. Haley nodded, looking even more birdlike with the movement.
"Is it weak, though?"
"Dad always said..." Fulton trailed off, realizing what he had been about to say and not wanting to say it. Haley, however, turned her huge blue eyes upon him and asked in her hoarse, low voice,
"You never talk about your real daddy. What'd he say, Fulton?"
Fulton avoided her gaze--it held death in its depths--and mumbled, "Nothin' important. Just..." Swallowing hard, Fulton asked, "Promise you won't...laugh?"
Haley shook her head. "I won't. Is it...his fault that you're in foster care?"
"Yeah...him an' my mom. Anyway, he always said, 'Don't you cry, boy, don't you ever let me see you crying!' And if I did, he'd beat me even worse." Fulton took a deep, steadying breath. "'Men don't cry, boys don't cry. You ever see me cry, boy?' And I didn't. It was only my mom, when she got hit."
Haley sat down on the curb, tugging at Fulton's jacket for him to do the same. Fulton sat, trembling, and Haley hugged him weakly. Something in him broke with that gentle, comforting gesture, and the words went pouring from him, laced with hate and pain and it was like Mitch was saying them to him all over again in his head.
"'It's all your fault she's like this, boy, all your fault. If you hadn't come along and /ruined/ my life...' He said that when my mom overdosed once. And then...he'd say that he hated me and I should just die...I was so stupid I was a waste of space...shit like that. But I, you know, started to believe it, a little I guess, because you can only hear the same lies so many times before it starts to sound true." Fulton bit the inside of his mouth, hard, to keep the tears down. "I saw my mom shooting up drugs a lot. She'd have a belt around her arm and a syringe in her hand...always the same fucking needle, I swear. Probably shared it."
"Do you ever hear from them?"
"They're allowed to send me letters. They never do."
*-*-*-*
Fulton muttered, turning away from the light out in the hall. "G'way..." Fulton grunted, hiding his head under his pillow.
Phoebe looked annoyed. Shoving at the boy's shoulder, she snapped, "Get up, you lazy bastard."
With a snort, Fulton put his head up and, blinking painfully, hissed, "What? Feebs?"
"C'mon. Shawn's here." The teen shook the short canister she held; it rattled in a familiar way. "Get up an' help us paint the town red."
Fulton sat up. "What'd you say?"
In the dark, he couldn't see Phoebe's face, but he could tell by her tone that she was grinning. "That new building downtown needs a new paintjob."
"I'm in," Fulton declared, swinging his legs off the bed. Phoebe laughed,
"See you out back, kid."
*-*-*-*
Two hours later, Fulton cornered his foster sister in the front yard. "You fucking bitch!" He snarled, giving her a hard shove.
Phoebe stumbled back, regaining her footing and taking a swing at the boy's head. "What the hell is your problem, kid?" The blow didn't land, and she pulled the leather strap off her neck, holding it like a short whip.
"You ditched me!" Fulton raged, "You saw the heat coming and you ditched me, you bitch!"
"Idiot!" Phoebe retorted. She swatted him on the head with her collar. "If I got caught again, I'd be off to prison 'cause I'm a repeat offender. Prison, not juvenile hall. You, the worst you'd get is juvie, man."
Fulton stepped back, folding his arms over his chest and simply staring at the girl before him. Yesterday, he would have loved to be just like her. She was cool, collected, unaffected, and completely psychotic. She didn't give a damn about what anyone thought. She was his sister, a person that he thought cared about him.
At first glance, there was no way that anyone would think of them as siblings. Fulton Reed was a heavy-set, pale boy with long, greasy black hair and brooding black eyes. Phoebe de los Fuegos was tall, slim, and only slightly plump; her cold hazel eyes were set slanted in gold-tinged brown skin, and her black hair--crinkly when not slathered with gel or paste--had natural pale brown highlights in it. Half Hispanic, a quarter Korean, an eighth black, and an eighth caucasian, Phoebe was a mutt and it showed.
Phoebe saw the hurt in Fulton's eyes as he stood in the harsh glow of the streetlamp. Her expression softened. "Look, kid, I was just looking out for myself. I forgot that I need to look out for you sometimes, too...I ain't never had a little brother that I /liked/ before, yanno?"
"I guess," Fulton said grudgingly. Phoebe laughed and slung an arm around Fulton's shoulders.
"You're the best, Fulton, you really are."
"Am I the best enough for you to consider shelling out five bucks to help me get a lip ring?"
"You're not that much the best, kid."
"Will you quit with that 'kid' bullshit?" Fulton demanded. Phoebe only laughed and didn't answer.
*-*-*-*
The year passed uneventfully. Fulton began the fifth grade as just the big quiet kid in the back of the room, menacing somehow in his simple presence. Rumors started to fly that he was a football player, that he'd been scouted by private high schools and universities. He ignored them and immersed himself in books by Brian Jacques. He had already read "Redwall," "Mossflower," "Mattimeo," and "Mariel of Redwall." Phoebe had given him five dollars, not for a lip ring, but to help him buy a hardback edition of the new Jacques book "Salamandastron." He never brought the books to school, and kept them hidden in a box on his closet shelf, so that Alan and Chad wouldn't find them.
Jason never came back, although he did send Haley a postcard from some little town in Ottowa, Canada. Some rich widow got an attack of conscience and, upon seeing Haley walking home from school one day, offered to help. Haley was sent away to the hospital, where they told her family that she was suffering from cancer stemming from a hepatitis C infection.
*-*-*-*
Fulton shifts his weight uncomfortably, waiting to be noticed by the head nurse. When she finally beckons him over, he asks, "Could you tell me where Haley Shale's room is?"
Snapping her gum, the nurse consults her list of patients. "Room 814," she answers, her breath scented with bubble gum. Fulton nods in acknowledgement and walks in quiet contemplation down the antiseptic hallway to Room 814.
"Fulton!" Haley exclaims as he stops in the doorway, suddenly uncertain. "Come in, come in..."
Haley no longer looks like herself. Her hair is blond, wispy and almost white, falling out because of the intense chemotherapy the doctors inflict upon her. Her skin is becoming transparent; blue veins branch palely at her thin wrists, throbbing with the tremendous effort of keeping her alive. Tubes and wires chain her to numerous machines monitoring her condition, and an IV line drips colorless liquid into her colorless flesh.
A blond woman wearing a shapeless peach-colored dress and shabby brown slippers sits beside the bed, dabbing ceaselessly at her weeping blue eyes. Fulton looks at her, thinking for a moment that this might be an older Haley. Mrs. Shale realizes that he is looking, and she smiles tremulously in welcome.
"Momma? Why don't you go down to the cafeteria?" Haley looks worried. "You haven't eaten breakfast yet. Fulton can keep me company."
Mrs. Shale nods and rises to leave. "So nice of you to visit," she whispers as she passes Fulton, her head down and eyes averted.
"I'm dying," Haley says matter-of-factly.
Fulton suddenly thinks of his father, poisoning himself with liquid bliss poured from a bottle. Of his mother, shooting heroin and speed in the bathroom and throwing up all over herself later. Of his 'sister' Phoebe, throwing herself at every boy who showed the vaguest interest in her. Of Jason, pursued by useless guilt into the missing persons file. Of himself, bleeding on the linoleum after one of his father's rages.
"We all are," he responds, "somehow."
Haley nods. "Yes."
"Does it hurt?" Fulton inquires intently, taking a seat in the chair beside Haley's bed. "Does dying hurt?"
Haley retorts, "Does living hurt?" They are both silent, and then Haley sighs. "Not anymore. They keep me so drugged that I can't feel anything."
"I feel like that sometimes." Fulton states. At Haley's curious, encouraging expression, he elaborates, "Like I can't feel anything. Like nothing matters. I see little kids get beat up in the schoolyard and I can't care."
"You should. Care, I mean. You can protect them."
"I couldn't protect my mother. I can't protect anyone." Fulton mumbles to his hands, unable to meet Haley's pale, knowing gaze.
"Listen," Haley says. "If you can, after I die...would you keep visiting me?"
"Of course."
Haley looks desperate. "Promise. Swear that you'll visit."
"I will, I swear." Fulton answers.
Haley takes a deep breath. "Momma won't, Daddy won't. It'll make them too sad. And they'll start over with some other kid, have a baby and forget about me." Suddenly, she smiles deviously. "Promise me something else."
"What?" Fulton asks apprehensively. Haley reaches out and pats his hand.
"You don't have to. But I was hearing about how some people have roses planted on their graves. Now, I don't care too much for roses, or any other kind of flowery plant."
"God, you're gonna make me plant pot on your grave, aren't you?" Fulton demands.
"Got it in one. But only if you can. If it's not too much hassle."
Fulton grudgingly promised that he would try. Mrs. Shale came back with a tray that only had three plates of different-flavored Jello on it. The two children talked for a little while longer, and then Fulton left.
*-*-*-*
Fulton headed over to the pond one day after it had frozen over that winter, drawn there by some inexplicable urge to observe something other than a printed page. The only people there were a bunch of shrimpy fourth and fifth graders, falling all over each other, and some old man shrieking abuse at them. The District Five peewee hockey team.
He sat on a bench and stared at them, following each one in turn until they tumbled to the ice. Then he would select a new person and trace their movements with his dark gaze. Once, one of the black boys caught him looking, and he smiled tenatively, only to be scolded by his older brother, who shot Fulton a look of scorn. Terry and Jesse Hall, Fulton remembered, as he watched them skate off side by side.
Every so often after that, he'd wander by the pond, just to see if the team was practicing that day. He began to think of them as /his/ team, even though he wasn't really a part of them, even though he never would be because he couldn't skate and couldn't learn how. He chased off bullies tormenting Averman and beat up a sixth grader who took Peter Mark's lunch money. After defending them, he broadened his scope to threatening anyone who would bully the smaller, more defenseless kids.
During this time, Haley died, quietly. She passed away in her sleep and buried on a Thursday. Fulton attended the funeral and did not cry, laid a few plastic daisies--the only bouquet that he could afford on such short notice, not that Haley would have cared--on the coffin, and was driven home by Phoebe.
He was there when the old coach had a heart attack; he ran to a pay phone and called 911 while the others panicked, but no one ever found out. The man survived but swore never to coach again, leaving District Five to its own devices.
*-*-*-*
"Fulton, man, you're too tall to be using this little kid hockey stick anymore." Phoebe said, turning over said piece of sports equipment in her hands. Fulton made a noise to indicate that he'd heard her, but his face remained hidden by "Salamandastron" and he did not answer.
Phoebe sighed. The house had been much quieter since the Terrible Twins had been relocated--to a foster couple with no other children--two weeks prior. Fulton had moved out of the big room he and Phoebe had shared, taking over the twin's room for himself. He'd already painted the walls black with an old can of paint he found in Kyle Green's toolshed in the backyard. (Lorraine had come home and actually praised him for being creative...but then, the children had always suspected that she had been a flower-child liberal.)
"I got some money. I can get you a new hockey stick if you want," Phoebe suggested.
"Okay," Fulton replied softly. "Thank you."
"Consider it your early Christmas present. The book was like your birthday present, anyway."
*-*-*-*
Fulton walked into the sports shop, answering Hans's "Good afternoon" with a nod. He had often come into the shop to buy more hockey pucks, since despite his best efforts, he often lost a few. Hands in his pockets, he wandered the aisles idly, not yet heading over to the display of hockey sticks. He liked coming here. There was something about it...
'It feels friendly,' Fulton realized. 'Safe.'
Fulton found himself at the display shelf for the ice skates. It was silly, really. Phoebe giving him money was the only reason he had enough to even buy himself a new hockey stick. There was no way that he could ever save up enough to buy skates, and he had no one to teach him how to use the things. But he still admired the soft sheen of the leather, the smell of polish, and the diamond-like gleam of the blades.
Somehow, the shop had filled up without his noticing. He looked up and recognized the D5 team--his team. And their new coach, some short guy with brown hair and an uptight attitude. There was a huge clattering, and Fulton's attention was pulled to his eventual destination, the aisle with hockey sticks. Charlie Conway was standing beside the jumbled mess of sticks that had been in neat order only a minute before, attempting to look innocent. Fulton headed over.
"Looking for something?" He asked. Charlie jumped. When he saw Fulton standing behind him, he smiled nervously.
"Um, yeah. Coach Bombay is buying us new equipment." Charlie headed over to another display, and Fulton trailed him. The smaller boy pointed to a hockey stick in it. "Think that's the right size for me?"
Fulton looked at it. "Sure." He pulled the thing loose and handed it to Charlie.
"Thanks, Fulton."
*-*-*-*
Fulton was back in his alley, setting up the steamer trunk again, because the new hockey stick /needed/ to be broken in, didn't it? The first attempt had the puck flying out of the alley.
There was the familiar sound of shattered glass. 'Oh, /fuck/.' Fulton thought, staring in shock at the damage he'd caused to the front side window of a van. 'This damn thing is unlucky.'
"Hey!" Someone had jumped out of the passenger side of the van. Fulton recognized the new coach, Bombay, and decided to make a run for it. The guy yelled again, but Fulton was at the back of the alley, trying to climb up the pile of garbage there over the fence. He felt a strong tug pulling him back.
"Look, it was an accident!" He blurted out. Bombay looked at him with a slight smile.
"Never mind about the window, where'd you learn to shoot like that?"
"Nobody taught me, I just do it." Every instinct was screaming at him to get out of there, so Fulton started to walk back to the front of the alley.
"Do it again." Bombay requested. Fulton sighed and lined up another shot. This one smashed in a back window. Bombay looked faintly amused. "Do you ever get it in the goal?"
"One in five." Fulton replied guardedly.
"Fulton, is it true what they say?" Bombay asked, "About the football scholarships and how they won't let you play hockey?"
Fulton shrugged, resting his hands on the top of his stick, and replied. "People talk. Don't mean nothing."
"Why don't you play with us?" The coach demanded. Fulton avoided his eyes.
"I can't."
"Why not?" Bombay persisted, "Are you afraid?"
Anger flared up in Fulton's eyes. What right did this guy, who didn't even know the slightest thing about him but his name, have to judge whether Fulton was afraid or not? "No, you moron, I really can't! I don't know how to skate!" That anger flowed through into his shot, the one that finally connected and sailed into the steamer trunk, this time with such force that the battered piece of luggage was knocked backwards.
"Is that all that's holding you back?"
*-*-*-*
There was more than that holding Fulton back. But he remembered what Haley had said. 'You should. Care, I mean.' And he realized that he really did care about these people. Once he did that, there was no turning away.
Someone needed him. /People/ needed him. He couldn't let them down, too. He'd spent too much of his life helpless and afraid, and he didn't want to do it anymore. Fulton Reed was redeemed.
~~End~~
(The) Unforgiven-- Might as Well-- [working title] Combat Boots and Clover-- Old Friends, New Troubles
Sorry that this chapter is like, terribly long. There's lots of dialogue, and I needed to cover a whole shitload of stuff. And sorry if I don't get the scene at the end exactly right, it's been a few weeks since I saw D1.
---------------------Feedback------------------------
Solis
::shrieks:: Cookie! ::jumps Soli:: Hey, you thought I'd use the short chains? How're you treating my Fulton-clone? Better be good! Don't worry about not reading this one until now, I'm a review-whore, so every single nice one makes me very happy.
Wolfie
Terminal velocity? NEVER! Bwahahahaha...you doubt the limits of Schizzie-power? ::looks ominous:: I'm trying to keep updating, but my family keeps making me be social...
****
"The Unforgiven V"
Haley had said to him many times, 'I'm dying,' but she said it once more as he walked with her to her apartment that spring. She said, in a low voice that already sounded dead, "I'm dying, you know."
Fulton nodded. Everyone knew.
Haley sighed heavily, hugging herself with her thin arms and clutching, birdlike hands. And after a moment of silence continued, "I wish I wasn't, just because Momma's always crying...and Daddy don' even look at me no more. Like, if he did, he'd cry too, an' he don't wanna cry."
"People think you're weak if you cry." Fulton informed her solemnly. Haley nodded, looking even more birdlike with the movement.
"Is it weak, though?"
"Dad always said..." Fulton trailed off, realizing what he had been about to say and not wanting to say it. Haley, however, turned her huge blue eyes upon him and asked in her hoarse, low voice,
"You never talk about your real daddy. What'd he say, Fulton?"
Fulton avoided her gaze--it held death in its depths--and mumbled, "Nothin' important. Just..." Swallowing hard, Fulton asked, "Promise you won't...laugh?"
Haley shook her head. "I won't. Is it...his fault that you're in foster care?"
"Yeah...him an' my mom. Anyway, he always said, 'Don't you cry, boy, don't you ever let me see you crying!' And if I did, he'd beat me even worse." Fulton took a deep, steadying breath. "'Men don't cry, boys don't cry. You ever see me cry, boy?' And I didn't. It was only my mom, when she got hit."
Haley sat down on the curb, tugging at Fulton's jacket for him to do the same. Fulton sat, trembling, and Haley hugged him weakly. Something in him broke with that gentle, comforting gesture, and the words went pouring from him, laced with hate and pain and it was like Mitch was saying them to him all over again in his head.
"'It's all your fault she's like this, boy, all your fault. If you hadn't come along and /ruined/ my life...' He said that when my mom overdosed once. And then...he'd say that he hated me and I should just die...I was so stupid I was a waste of space...shit like that. But I, you know, started to believe it, a little I guess, because you can only hear the same lies so many times before it starts to sound true." Fulton bit the inside of his mouth, hard, to keep the tears down. "I saw my mom shooting up drugs a lot. She'd have a belt around her arm and a syringe in her hand...always the same fucking needle, I swear. Probably shared it."
"Do you ever hear from them?"
"They're allowed to send me letters. They never do."
*-*-*-*
Fulton muttered, turning away from the light out in the hall. "G'way..." Fulton grunted, hiding his head under his pillow.
Phoebe looked annoyed. Shoving at the boy's shoulder, she snapped, "Get up, you lazy bastard."
With a snort, Fulton put his head up and, blinking painfully, hissed, "What? Feebs?"
"C'mon. Shawn's here." The teen shook the short canister she held; it rattled in a familiar way. "Get up an' help us paint the town red."
Fulton sat up. "What'd you say?"
In the dark, he couldn't see Phoebe's face, but he could tell by her tone that she was grinning. "That new building downtown needs a new paintjob."
"I'm in," Fulton declared, swinging his legs off the bed. Phoebe laughed,
"See you out back, kid."
*-*-*-*
Two hours later, Fulton cornered his foster sister in the front yard. "You fucking bitch!" He snarled, giving her a hard shove.
Phoebe stumbled back, regaining her footing and taking a swing at the boy's head. "What the hell is your problem, kid?" The blow didn't land, and she pulled the leather strap off her neck, holding it like a short whip.
"You ditched me!" Fulton raged, "You saw the heat coming and you ditched me, you bitch!"
"Idiot!" Phoebe retorted. She swatted him on the head with her collar. "If I got caught again, I'd be off to prison 'cause I'm a repeat offender. Prison, not juvenile hall. You, the worst you'd get is juvie, man."
Fulton stepped back, folding his arms over his chest and simply staring at the girl before him. Yesterday, he would have loved to be just like her. She was cool, collected, unaffected, and completely psychotic. She didn't give a damn about what anyone thought. She was his sister, a person that he thought cared about him.
At first glance, there was no way that anyone would think of them as siblings. Fulton Reed was a heavy-set, pale boy with long, greasy black hair and brooding black eyes. Phoebe de los Fuegos was tall, slim, and only slightly plump; her cold hazel eyes were set slanted in gold-tinged brown skin, and her black hair--crinkly when not slathered with gel or paste--had natural pale brown highlights in it. Half Hispanic, a quarter Korean, an eighth black, and an eighth caucasian, Phoebe was a mutt and it showed.
Phoebe saw the hurt in Fulton's eyes as he stood in the harsh glow of the streetlamp. Her expression softened. "Look, kid, I was just looking out for myself. I forgot that I need to look out for you sometimes, too...I ain't never had a little brother that I /liked/ before, yanno?"
"I guess," Fulton said grudgingly. Phoebe laughed and slung an arm around Fulton's shoulders.
"You're the best, Fulton, you really are."
"Am I the best enough for you to consider shelling out five bucks to help me get a lip ring?"
"You're not that much the best, kid."
"Will you quit with that 'kid' bullshit?" Fulton demanded. Phoebe only laughed and didn't answer.
*-*-*-*
The year passed uneventfully. Fulton began the fifth grade as just the big quiet kid in the back of the room, menacing somehow in his simple presence. Rumors started to fly that he was a football player, that he'd been scouted by private high schools and universities. He ignored them and immersed himself in books by Brian Jacques. He had already read "Redwall," "Mossflower," "Mattimeo," and "Mariel of Redwall." Phoebe had given him five dollars, not for a lip ring, but to help him buy a hardback edition of the new Jacques book "Salamandastron." He never brought the books to school, and kept them hidden in a box on his closet shelf, so that Alan and Chad wouldn't find them.
Jason never came back, although he did send Haley a postcard from some little town in Ottowa, Canada. Some rich widow got an attack of conscience and, upon seeing Haley walking home from school one day, offered to help. Haley was sent away to the hospital, where they told her family that she was suffering from cancer stemming from a hepatitis C infection.
*-*-*-*
Fulton shifts his weight uncomfortably, waiting to be noticed by the head nurse. When she finally beckons him over, he asks, "Could you tell me where Haley Shale's room is?"
Snapping her gum, the nurse consults her list of patients. "Room 814," she answers, her breath scented with bubble gum. Fulton nods in acknowledgement and walks in quiet contemplation down the antiseptic hallway to Room 814.
"Fulton!" Haley exclaims as he stops in the doorway, suddenly uncertain. "Come in, come in..."
Haley no longer looks like herself. Her hair is blond, wispy and almost white, falling out because of the intense chemotherapy the doctors inflict upon her. Her skin is becoming transparent; blue veins branch palely at her thin wrists, throbbing with the tremendous effort of keeping her alive. Tubes and wires chain her to numerous machines monitoring her condition, and an IV line drips colorless liquid into her colorless flesh.
A blond woman wearing a shapeless peach-colored dress and shabby brown slippers sits beside the bed, dabbing ceaselessly at her weeping blue eyes. Fulton looks at her, thinking for a moment that this might be an older Haley. Mrs. Shale realizes that he is looking, and she smiles tremulously in welcome.
"Momma? Why don't you go down to the cafeteria?" Haley looks worried. "You haven't eaten breakfast yet. Fulton can keep me company."
Mrs. Shale nods and rises to leave. "So nice of you to visit," she whispers as she passes Fulton, her head down and eyes averted.
"I'm dying," Haley says matter-of-factly.
Fulton suddenly thinks of his father, poisoning himself with liquid bliss poured from a bottle. Of his mother, shooting heroin and speed in the bathroom and throwing up all over herself later. Of his 'sister' Phoebe, throwing herself at every boy who showed the vaguest interest in her. Of Jason, pursued by useless guilt into the missing persons file. Of himself, bleeding on the linoleum after one of his father's rages.
"We all are," he responds, "somehow."
Haley nods. "Yes."
"Does it hurt?" Fulton inquires intently, taking a seat in the chair beside Haley's bed. "Does dying hurt?"
Haley retorts, "Does living hurt?" They are both silent, and then Haley sighs. "Not anymore. They keep me so drugged that I can't feel anything."
"I feel like that sometimes." Fulton states. At Haley's curious, encouraging expression, he elaborates, "Like I can't feel anything. Like nothing matters. I see little kids get beat up in the schoolyard and I can't care."
"You should. Care, I mean. You can protect them."
"I couldn't protect my mother. I can't protect anyone." Fulton mumbles to his hands, unable to meet Haley's pale, knowing gaze.
"Listen," Haley says. "If you can, after I die...would you keep visiting me?"
"Of course."
Haley looks desperate. "Promise. Swear that you'll visit."
"I will, I swear." Fulton answers.
Haley takes a deep breath. "Momma won't, Daddy won't. It'll make them too sad. And they'll start over with some other kid, have a baby and forget about me." Suddenly, she smiles deviously. "Promise me something else."
"What?" Fulton asks apprehensively. Haley reaches out and pats his hand.
"You don't have to. But I was hearing about how some people have roses planted on their graves. Now, I don't care too much for roses, or any other kind of flowery plant."
"God, you're gonna make me plant pot on your grave, aren't you?" Fulton demands.
"Got it in one. But only if you can. If it's not too much hassle."
Fulton grudgingly promised that he would try. Mrs. Shale came back with a tray that only had three plates of different-flavored Jello on it. The two children talked for a little while longer, and then Fulton left.
*-*-*-*
Fulton headed over to the pond one day after it had frozen over that winter, drawn there by some inexplicable urge to observe something other than a printed page. The only people there were a bunch of shrimpy fourth and fifth graders, falling all over each other, and some old man shrieking abuse at them. The District Five peewee hockey team.
He sat on a bench and stared at them, following each one in turn until they tumbled to the ice. Then he would select a new person and trace their movements with his dark gaze. Once, one of the black boys caught him looking, and he smiled tenatively, only to be scolded by his older brother, who shot Fulton a look of scorn. Terry and Jesse Hall, Fulton remembered, as he watched them skate off side by side.
Every so often after that, he'd wander by the pond, just to see if the team was practicing that day. He began to think of them as /his/ team, even though he wasn't really a part of them, even though he never would be because he couldn't skate and couldn't learn how. He chased off bullies tormenting Averman and beat up a sixth grader who took Peter Mark's lunch money. After defending them, he broadened his scope to threatening anyone who would bully the smaller, more defenseless kids.
During this time, Haley died, quietly. She passed away in her sleep and buried on a Thursday. Fulton attended the funeral and did not cry, laid a few plastic daisies--the only bouquet that he could afford on such short notice, not that Haley would have cared--on the coffin, and was driven home by Phoebe.
He was there when the old coach had a heart attack; he ran to a pay phone and called 911 while the others panicked, but no one ever found out. The man survived but swore never to coach again, leaving District Five to its own devices.
*-*-*-*
"Fulton, man, you're too tall to be using this little kid hockey stick anymore." Phoebe said, turning over said piece of sports equipment in her hands. Fulton made a noise to indicate that he'd heard her, but his face remained hidden by "Salamandastron" and he did not answer.
Phoebe sighed. The house had been much quieter since the Terrible Twins had been relocated--to a foster couple with no other children--two weeks prior. Fulton had moved out of the big room he and Phoebe had shared, taking over the twin's room for himself. He'd already painted the walls black with an old can of paint he found in Kyle Green's toolshed in the backyard. (Lorraine had come home and actually praised him for being creative...but then, the children had always suspected that she had been a flower-child liberal.)
"I got some money. I can get you a new hockey stick if you want," Phoebe suggested.
"Okay," Fulton replied softly. "Thank you."
"Consider it your early Christmas present. The book was like your birthday present, anyway."
*-*-*-*
Fulton walked into the sports shop, answering Hans's "Good afternoon" with a nod. He had often come into the shop to buy more hockey pucks, since despite his best efforts, he often lost a few. Hands in his pockets, he wandered the aisles idly, not yet heading over to the display of hockey sticks. He liked coming here. There was something about it...
'It feels friendly,' Fulton realized. 'Safe.'
Fulton found himself at the display shelf for the ice skates. It was silly, really. Phoebe giving him money was the only reason he had enough to even buy himself a new hockey stick. There was no way that he could ever save up enough to buy skates, and he had no one to teach him how to use the things. But he still admired the soft sheen of the leather, the smell of polish, and the diamond-like gleam of the blades.
Somehow, the shop had filled up without his noticing. He looked up and recognized the D5 team--his team. And their new coach, some short guy with brown hair and an uptight attitude. There was a huge clattering, and Fulton's attention was pulled to his eventual destination, the aisle with hockey sticks. Charlie Conway was standing beside the jumbled mess of sticks that had been in neat order only a minute before, attempting to look innocent. Fulton headed over.
"Looking for something?" He asked. Charlie jumped. When he saw Fulton standing behind him, he smiled nervously.
"Um, yeah. Coach Bombay is buying us new equipment." Charlie headed over to another display, and Fulton trailed him. The smaller boy pointed to a hockey stick in it. "Think that's the right size for me?"
Fulton looked at it. "Sure." He pulled the thing loose and handed it to Charlie.
"Thanks, Fulton."
*-*-*-*
Fulton was back in his alley, setting up the steamer trunk again, because the new hockey stick /needed/ to be broken in, didn't it? The first attempt had the puck flying out of the alley.
There was the familiar sound of shattered glass. 'Oh, /fuck/.' Fulton thought, staring in shock at the damage he'd caused to the front side window of a van. 'This damn thing is unlucky.'
"Hey!" Someone had jumped out of the passenger side of the van. Fulton recognized the new coach, Bombay, and decided to make a run for it. The guy yelled again, but Fulton was at the back of the alley, trying to climb up the pile of garbage there over the fence. He felt a strong tug pulling him back.
"Look, it was an accident!" He blurted out. Bombay looked at him with a slight smile.
"Never mind about the window, where'd you learn to shoot like that?"
"Nobody taught me, I just do it." Every instinct was screaming at him to get out of there, so Fulton started to walk back to the front of the alley.
"Do it again." Bombay requested. Fulton sighed and lined up another shot. This one smashed in a back window. Bombay looked faintly amused. "Do you ever get it in the goal?"
"One in five." Fulton replied guardedly.
"Fulton, is it true what they say?" Bombay asked, "About the football scholarships and how they won't let you play hockey?"
Fulton shrugged, resting his hands on the top of his stick, and replied. "People talk. Don't mean nothing."
"Why don't you play with us?" The coach demanded. Fulton avoided his eyes.
"I can't."
"Why not?" Bombay persisted, "Are you afraid?"
Anger flared up in Fulton's eyes. What right did this guy, who didn't even know the slightest thing about him but his name, have to judge whether Fulton was afraid or not? "No, you moron, I really can't! I don't know how to skate!" That anger flowed through into his shot, the one that finally connected and sailed into the steamer trunk, this time with such force that the battered piece of luggage was knocked backwards.
"Is that all that's holding you back?"
*-*-*-*
There was more than that holding Fulton back. But he remembered what Haley had said. 'You should. Care, I mean.' And he realized that he really did care about these people. Once he did that, there was no turning away.
Someone needed him. /People/ needed him. He couldn't let them down, too. He'd spent too much of his life helpless and afraid, and he didn't want to do it anymore. Fulton Reed was redeemed.
~~End~~
