He was late, so late, and his father was going to kill him.
Matt bounded up the front path, shivering a little in the wind that nipped at his exposed skin and sent leaves whispering across the stone. He took the steps two at a time, barely noticing that the house was completely dark despite night falling outside.
He was late, dinner had probably been on the table hours ago, but football practice had run over, his dad couldn't blame him for that, could he?
Matt's breath started coming faster and faster as he frantically patted at his pockets, feeling around for his keys. He swore when he couldn't find them and dug around in his backpack instead, sick feeling in his stomach growing as he fingers slid over textbooks, spare papers, the crumpled paper bag that had contained his lunch, but no keys. Matt slowly shifted his backpack back onto his shoulder, wondering if it might be safer just to turn around and hightail it to his mother's new apartment. His father was already going to be furious at how late getting home he was, but if he had to knock and interrupt the football game he was no doubt watching on the television it would surely be worse.
On a whim he stuck his hand out and twisted the doorknob, surprised when it gave way under his grip and permitted him entry into the dark house.
Matt crept inside, cautiously reaching out to flick the hall light on as he did. He almost dumped his backpack right there in the hall so he could go searching for his father, but then he remembered the last time he'd done that. His father had tripped over it and subsequently worked himself into a rage so intense that his face had gone red and he'd bellowed that he'd throw the backpack and everything in it in the bin if Matt ever did it again.
Heeding the warning in mind, Matt clutched the strap tighter and slowly walked forward past the open doorway to the living room. He'd half expected a voice to speak out from the darkness, to turn and find his father sitting there, waiting to bust him. He already had excuses on the tip of his tongue as he turned more fully to the doorway, but from the dim light of the hall he could see the living room was empty, television dark and quiet, armchairs abandoned. Matt shivered, wondering why the sight was so unsettling.
He walked further into the house, finding the kitchen as empty as the living room, pausing to hang his backpack on the hook on the wall. What was even more strange was that he could see no evidence that his father had cooked dinner, the place just as Matt had left it after cleaning up his breakfast things. Sure, since his parent's separation meals at the family house had become rather simplistic - his father was entirely too used to his mother preparing three meals for everyone in the home - but usually his father found it in him to at least slap a steak on the grill and prepare a basic salad. Matt opened the fridge just to double check but couldn't find any indication that his father had even been in the kitchen since the morning.
Matt slowly closed the fridge door, any appetite he'd worked up from the rigorous training session, abandoning him. He'd almost have rathered his father to be waiting downstairs to yell at him the second he'd gotten home, at least it would have been over with by now rather than this awful feeling of anticipation. But maybe that was part of his father's plan, his cruel way of dragging out the punishment.
Sighing and trying not to think about the world of pain he'd be in the next morning, Matt slowly made his way up the stairs weighed down by a combination of the hits he'd taken during football practice and apprehension for the next morning. He'd already resolved to leave his homework for the night and just go straight to bed by the time he'd reached his bedroom door and was preparing to push the door open.
But then he caught sight of his father's bedroom out of the corner of his eye, the door sitting just ajar.
That fact wasn't unusual in of itself, but the dark, quiet room beyond it, was. There was no blue light or sound of the television blaring as there would be if his father were still awake, but the lack of raucous snoring suggested he wasn't asleep either.
Something twisted low in Matt's stomach and even though every instinct in him was screaming at him to just go into his room and shut the door, instead Matt took a single, hesitant step towards the master bedroom. The next step was harder, and the next one even more so after that, but Matt forced himself onwards, inching along the hallway until he was hovering just outside the doorway, breathing heavy and harsh in his ears.
He didn't want to go in there, he didn't want to go in there, he didn't want to go in there. He didn't want to see what was in there.
Hoping that his father was just dozing, and would yell at him for bothering him, Matt nudged the door open and slipped inside, waiting for his eyes to adjust to the darkness. As they did, he could immediately tell something was wrong. His father was on the bed, but not with his head on the pillows. Instead he was strewn sideways across the mattress, feet pointed towards the open doors of the closet as though he had been facing it when he'd fallen backwards.
Inexplicably, Matt thought of the rifle that his father always kept, unsecured on the top shelf.
Matt lurched forwards with a cry and in doing so, lurched completely upright as he tore himself out of that horrible dream and back into the present. He was not fifteen years old anymore, he was not in that house anymore, and that absolutely was not blood, wet and sticky, covering his hands.
Matt tore out of the bed, barely making it to the adjoining bathroom before he'd fallen to his knees and vomited into the toilet.
His fingers spasmed against the porcelain.
They were not covered in blood, sliding over his father's cold, hard skin. They were not covered in blood, slipping on the phone and making it hard to dial 911. They were not covered in blood, leaving marks on the carpet as he hunched over and vomited all over the floor.
Matt vomited over and over again into the toilet, stomach clenching and unclenching, until there was nothing left but bile. He wasn't sure when Sylvie arrived, but all of a sudden she was there, hand warm and comforting on his back. She didn't say much, just knelt beside him and stroked his back, until he was done gagging and retching. He slumped against the cold, tiled wall of the bathroom and Sylvie disappeared long enough to retrieve a glass of water for him. Matt's hand was shaking as he went to take the glass, so she kept hers wrapped around his, helping him to bring the cup to the lips so he could take a long drink.
"Better?" Sylvie asked softly and he nodded his thanks. "Do you think it was something you ate? I thought the salmon last night tasted alright."
"It wasn't dinner," Matt said hoarsely.
He squeezed his eyes shut against the memories the nightmare had stirred up. Sylvie didn't say anything, waiting patiently for when or if he'd be ready to talk about it. He'd never talked about his childhood much with her, their relationship had always been such a safe place, a happy place, that he hadn't been able to bear letting the bad memories invade it. She knew the broadest details of course, that his father had died when he was fifteen, that his mother had been responsible, and that he hadn't been close with his father before or his mother afterwards. And part of him never wanted to tell her any more than that, didn't want to subject her to the finer details, to see the look on her face when she heard the whole story.
But then he looked at her, her face turned to him, expression so patient, so open, and wondered if maybe he would feel better if finally allowed himself to acknowledge the memory.
"I was dreaming about the night my father died," he began, watching her face carefully. But other than a slight inhale and subtle shift as she made herself more comfortable on the tiled floor, there was no reaction. At his pause, she nodded encouragingly. "You know, that my mother… that she shot him," he continued awkwardly.
"I do," Sylvie said gently.
"What I never told you…" Matt trailed off and sighed deeply, turning his eyes to the wall opposite. He wasn't sure he could look at her as he said this next part. "I never told you that I was the one who found him."
"Oh, Matt," she whispered brokenly, and he felt her gently take his hand, squeezing it. He knew she wanted him to look at her, to know that he wasn't alone, but he couldn't.
"It's fine," he said automatically. "I'm over it."
"No, it isn't and no, you aren't."
No, it wasn't. And no, he wasn't.
"We weren't close," he continued. He didn't know where he was going with this, why he was telling her all of this, but Sylvie was listening attentively and that was enough. "He wasn't-" Even years later it was hard for him to say this, to speak ill of him in this way, no matter how many times he forced himself to say it. "He wasn't a good father. He was-"
Abusive. The one word he'd never allowed himself to say out loud. His father hadn't abused him, had never hit him. Grabbed him on the shoulder maybe, shoved him around a little, but he'd never hit him. And deep down Matt knew it wasn't as simple as that, that words could be just as abusive as fists. That his father's words had been- but he still could never say it.
"We weren't close," he simply said again. "But I never wanted… that."
"Of course, you didn't," Sylvie said.
"But part of me," Matt forced himself to say, and he felt like he might be sick again, even as he turned to face Sylvie again. "Part of me was relieved. Not that he was gone, but that I would never have to watch him hurt my mother ever again." The next part was barely a whisper, "And I don't know what that says about me."
But Sylvie didn't miss a beat as she scooted closer and held his face tightly between her palms. "It means that you went through something awful, something traumatic, something that understandably caused a lot of complicated emotions, emotions that you were never allowed to properly process. And that does not make you a bad person, Matthew Casey," she said fiercely. "It makes you normal. And someone who I love very much."
Matt didn't realise how much he needed to hear those words until she said them. How much he needed to be able to share this part of himself, the deepest and darkest part, and hear that she still loved him despite it. He didn't know how important it was until she said it and he felt the tears spill down his cheeks. Until he broke apart while she held him together.
I am so fascinated by Matt's backstory and always wish we'd gotten more of it and how it affected him in canon. Alas we didn't and so voila, this fic was born. It's part of the Febuwhump challenge so it was written on the fly so forgive me if it's not perfect. As always thanks for reading and would love to hear your thoughts and opinions x