Chapter XVIII: Happy Allusions of What Was
Being invited into the home of his own family- the people who he thought were his biological family members- Fang was overwhelmed with the feeling of being out of place, accompanied by the nervous jittering of a paranoid schizophrenic. And yet, on top of it all, he was excited, and filled with great happiness.
There were dishes of hard candy everywhere, and the sofa was covered in throw pillows. Pictures of a young girl with a thin frame and long, brown waves- presumably Alice- were everywhere, there was evidence that a cat lived there- stray hairs and chewed cat toys- crocheted quilts… the ideal grandparents' house.
April, who was still a flutter, and still calling for Al, brought them into a small sun room in the back, over looking their tiny, but neatly kept yard with a rather large above ground pool in the corner.
"Sit, sit, sit," she said, flapping her arms in the direction of the loveseat in the corner. Which the two boys gladly squeezed onto. April herself momentarily sat down, then jumped right back up and started calling for Al.
"Wha' is it, Ape?" an elderly man who looked slightly confused entered the room, rubbing his eyes sleepily. His glasses hung in a chain around his neck and swung back and forth whenever he moved, and he seemed to be doing that a lot, out of disorientation
"Al, this is Alex!" Her voice was excited, hopeful, but also somewhat tired of her husband's nonsense.
"Alex? April, I don't know anybody named Alex." His voice also mirrored the tiredness of his wife's, although Fang was willing to be that was more out of defense than genuine annoyance.
"Alexander Aaron, does that ring a bell?" The small woman put her hands on her hips pointedly.
"Alexander Aaron… you mean, like…?"
"Yes, Al, like Alice."
"Oh, well…" Al fell back into a nearby armchair- covered in a layer of several floral print quilts- looking nothing less than completely and utterly shell shocked.
The elderly man wiped his brow of sweat that wasn't there, and then looked suspiciously from Fang to his wife and back again. His eyes narrowed, and his words took an accusing tone, "Yer sure?"
"Yes, Al," April's voice edged on annoyance, "I'm positive."
He grave a gruff sort of humph sound and continued to glare at the brown haired boy, who self-consciously shifted in his seat, staring down into his lap and wondering if maybe he should just leave now.
But slowly, Al's face began to soften, and his eyes warmed and his mouth fell into an easy smile, "Well, he sure as hell looks like her."
Alice nodded in approval, "He sure as hell does."
Fang looked around the room unsurely. There were four walls, a set of bunk beds pressed up against the back wall, and a cot lined up against the opposite. Both were covered in warm looking comforters and large, fluffy pillows. A dresser and a nightstand stood in between them, and there was a small chest at the foot of both beds.
Everything in the room smelt of cedar, and looked like it to. Even the floors and ceilings were made of the same material as the walls, which were made of the same wood as the chest and the nightstand.
Light streaked across the floor and decorative rug from a large, open window on the western wall.
Fang suddenly felt a hand on his shoulder, a large one with a firm grip, "I'll get a lamp and book shelf in here as soon as I can, but for now we'll have to make due."
The voice was Jeb's, and Fang looked up into his warm green eyes with hope, and fear.
"A bit overwhelming, isn't it?"
Fang nodded, looking back at the room and swallowing deeply.
"I'll let you and Iggy get settled, and then I'll bring Gazzy in here and get you all tucked in, alright?" He didn't wait for an answer, but smile and nodded pleasantly before leaving the room.
Iggy, who had been clinging to the doorway, his head darting around in the direction of every incoming sound, bit his lip and called out to Fang unsurely, "F-Fang… can you…?"
Fang, nodded, then caught himself, "Y-yeah, of course."
He wasn't sure of what to do, but knew he had to do something. So, he stepped slightly behind Iggy, put his head hesitantly between his shoulder blades and gave him a gentle push into the room, "Okay, um, right here," he pointed Iggy into the direction of the window, "is a window, it's pretty big.
"Up ahead, are the bunk beds, I think those are ours." Iggy's delicate fingers reached out and grasped thin air. Gentle as always, Fang coaxed Iggy's hand towards the bedpost until his fingers were in contact with the cedar.
"Over here, is a dresser, and a nightstand." Again, he brought Iggy close enough to touch the object, and then moved on to the next.
"And then this is the cot, which I think the other boy will have."
"The other boy?" Iggy furrowed his brow confusedly, "You mean, the little one?"
"Yeah."
"Oh… okay."
"Um, that's about it."
Iggy coughed and sat down on the cot, "Thanks, Fang."
"For what?" Fang blinked confusedly.
"You know, showing me around and stuff."
And there was so much Fang wanted to say, to that one little phrase.
I'm sorry we're not friends. I'm sorry I'm stupid. I'm sorry you're blind. Why couldn't it have been me? What's gonna happen? Are you gonna be okay? Why? I wish things were different. I want to scream. I want to cry. I want to hug you. I want things to be normal. I want this to end. I want to go back. I'm scared to go back. What will happen to us?
And Fang felt his eyes prick with tears that threatened- and also refused- to spill at his command, I'm so scared.
And yet he couldn't. He could only nod his head and swallow his tangle of thoughts, "You're welcome."
Every few seconds, Max would look over at Nudge to make sure she was still there. Hard to believe, after they witnessed the splendor of her parents' house. There was marble, gold leaf, silver, priceless pieces of art which no one even dared to look at, for fear they'd break them.
Champagne was poured for them, although Max refused it, and made the three others do the same. Caviar was also offered, but no one really wanted that. Well, except Gazzy, who ate the stuff up like it was Wal-Mart brand potato chips.
Although if they'd asked for it, Max doubted they'd have given them the time of day. Half way through, Nudge's father left for a phone call, and then her mother was dragged away by an "urgent" instant message on her brand new Black Berry.
The winged group saw themselves out.
Nudge's parents made it very clear, though, they had no problem with any of them staying, or leaving, or taking anything, even. Nudge pinned for a pair of boots her mother offered her, but the two girls exchanged glances, and they knew it wasn't right. It wasn't theirs to take, even if the owner really didn't care.
They, did, however accept a debit card and a small scrap of paper with Nudge's fathers phone number on it. Should it run out, they were to text- and not call, most likely he'd hang up if he didn't know the caller- him and ask for more. Max doubted they would, because it also felt wrong… too dependent. But the money already on the card- which one of the house assistants had set up for them during the course of the meeting- could come in handy, so they accepted.
As her stomach grumbled, Max was beginning to think some of that caviar might have been a good idea, after all. Gazzy certainly wasn't complaining.
He and Angel- who had set herself in Nudge's lap- were squabbling over a coloring book, as usual. Nudge was looking dreamy eyed out the window, Max couldn't help but wonder what she was thinking about. What her life could have been like with those people? Or what it would be like without them?
The taxi purred along at a sad, slow pace in the rush of five o'clock traffic, only making Max's nerves worse. For their destination, was her own home.
Or what she thought it to be.
She had an address, she had names, but then she remembered Jeb.
"You killed your own brother!"
She wondered if Jeb was her father, and perhaps the name was that of her mother and step-father. She wondered if Jeb wasn't the father. She even went so far as to consider opening the door to see Jeb's face, but she immediately ruled the prospect out. Jeb was not her father. Jeb would not have followed them. Nobody could have followed them.
They were safe now, or they were going to be. They had friends, friends who would hide them and make sure the school would never hurt them again.
And a sickening thought gripped her stomach.
What if this was all just a trap?
What if they were really going back to the School?
She could see it, getting off the plane and being shuttled into a bus, where they were locked into cages and-
But the rest of the vision stopped there.
Paranoia, she realized, was what she was being gripped with. Not a real, true concern. But pure paranoia. There was always risk in every situation, obviously, but she had to trust these people. It was there only hope.
"I still can't believe it," Al said, drinking deeply from a cracked coffee mug which April had placed in front of him along with a tray of food containing chocolate cake and an omelet. Both looked to be leftovers, but no one complained.
Iggy and Fang received the same thing, although Fang couldn't help but notice April just took the coffee and continued to jump up and down looking for things to get them. Perhaps she should take some Xanax, or at least put down the coffee to soothe her nerves.
"Believe it, Al, he's your grandson," she sighed, placing paper towel napkins in front of them, which she had just jumped up to get rather excitedly.
"A'ight, a'ight, I do already." It was almost comical the way those two bickered, true husband and wife bickering.
April rolled her eyes before turning her attention to Fang, her voice soft and her eyes absolutely misty, "Oh you do look so much like her, you know? Exactly like I'd have imagined you."
Fang felt himself blush, "Thanks."
"But I bet you're wondering what happened to her right?" she frowned and furrowed her brow, "I mean, you came here to meet your mother and instead you ran into a couple of old birds you're vaguely related to."
Fang nodded mindlessly.
"Darling," she said slowly, "I'm willing to be that you've gathered your mother died?"
He nodded again.
"Good, you're a smart boy."
He didn't nod this time.
She took a deep breath in, "Alice is not, biologically, my child. She is the daughter of my sister, who died during Alice's birth. Al and I, her legal guardians, were given custody immediately. At the time, we were trying for children of our own, and we were reluctant to take on another responsibility…" Her tone edged on regret, and she fidgeted in her chair, much like he had done just before.
"But how can you turn away from family? We certainly couldn't. We took her in and raised her as our own, never did have a kid of our own, actually. So I guess it was good that we took her in. Turns out she had a brilliant mind, quite the little genius. Straight As, all her life. Never had any trouble at school, always a good little girl. Always."
Both April and Al showed great pride in this, sitting up a little straighter and smiling a little brighter. Fang had figured his mother was smart, seeing as there were a lot of certificates of achievements hanging around the place, and he couldn't help but feel proud too, that he'd come from such genes.
But the happy, drunken pride feeling was quickly diminished as the story took a low turn, and mouths turned to serious frowns as April continued her tale in a low, sad tone, "And then your mother turns sixteen and things start to change. She starts driving off at night, and this boy starts hanging around. Al and I thought it was good, she was making friends, Alice had always been a shy one, but then she starts stumbling in the doorway at six AM unable to stand up right or walk a goddamn straight line," bitterness hit her voice, "and dammit, we didn't do a thing about it. Too scared to.
"Of course, things turned bad. By the summer, we were lucky to see her face once a week. Sleeping all day, out all night with that boy. Should've put a stop to it, should've done a lot of things. But I didn't, and one day we got the news. Not from our own daughter, no, we weren't given that honor, but from the mother of the boy who'd done the deed. She'd found some pregnancy tests in their wastebasket and thought she knew what was going on.
"And we told her the truth, that it wasn't our fault her boy was sleeping around with anything that moved, and that there was no way our daughter would ever need to take a pregnancy test, let alone that it would be… positive. She was polite enough, thanked us for our time. Never called again. Of course, we were both shaken, so we asked Alice about it, if she knew why this boy had all these pregnancy tests, positive ones.
"She didn't answer for a long time, but when she did I think that was when we realized what'd been going on.
"We wanted an abortion, of course that was the only way to go, but abortions were expensive, and taboo. We did what we could. Pulled her out of public school, looked into adoption agencies, and in her fifth month we were approached by this 'agency'-"
At this time, Al, who had been silent, broken in, "Agency shmagency! They were nothing but a bunch of foolhardy, bastard, sons of bitches and I told you that from the very start."
"Yes, you did," she admitted, "Now can I please finish the goddamn story?
"Anyways, the 'agency'-" she shot Al a warning look- "wanted to test some kind of drugs or something on fetuses, for early brain development or something like that. They were always very vague about exactly what they were doing, but there were huge benefits. Or what we'd considered benefits at the time. They'd adopt the child out, deliver her at their own property, and pay her for her troubles, the only thing we had to do was come in for bi-monthly shots.
"The birth went flawlessly, and they even let her hold her baby before they took him away, but I think it broke her heart. To be giving her own flesh and blood away like that. For a while, it looked like things were getting better. All the homeschooling had paid off and she was going to graduate early. The boy we hadn't seen again, and we were looking into colleges when the nightmares started.
"She'd have these horrible dreams about failed abortions, orphanages, demon children, the like. She'd wake up screaming and thrashing in the middle of the night, and it was just horrible to see her go through it. We took her to a shrink, of course, that's what you do for these kind of things-"
Al broke in again, "He was a quack, an awful quack!" But no one really paid him any mind.
"-and he gave her some sleeping pills to sooth her dreams. That seemed to work fine, and we thought everything was going to be okay, but…" she let out a long, low breath and pressed the tips of her manicured fingers against her temple in the midst of an un-namable emotion she had been preparing herself for, but could obviously never sooth, "She overdosed. There was a note. Didn't say much. But I think she was sorry. About a lot of things."
Taken aback, Fang gaped at his grandmother, and then at a picture of his mother on the wall behind her. Standing in a garden of some sort, and you could see her freckled skin hidden beneath a plain white dress. Her brown eyes squinted into the sun and her mouth was broken into a genuine grin. She looked happy, innocent even. What would have happened, had he not been given away to the School? Would she still be here, what would happen to his father?
Iggy gripped his hand tightly, but Fang felt numb to his touch.
April looked at him intently, brown eyes staring deep beneath his skin and below to his thumping heart, "But you're back. Alice would be happy to know that."
But I'm a freak, with wings. Is that how my mother would have wanted me?
He cleared his throat, unsure of how much to tell them, how much they wanted to know, "What happened to my father?"
Al shook his head, "Motorcycle accident, years ago."
"So, I'm… an orphan?"
"Oh, no!" April sounded outraged, "I mean… you have us."
But that wasn't the same, was it? Most likely he'd never see these people again. They were going into hiding, weren't they? So, he really had no family. None at all. He was the last of the Adams… or whatever their last name was, with their all A naming scheme and the same brown eyes that everyone seemed to inherit. How could he be the only one left? How could he be so alone?
Somewhere a car alarm went off, and Al started complaining about automobiles, April replying in the same annoyed tone. The two were so absorbed in their own bickering, they didn't see Iggy tap Fang's hand and whisper in his ear, "You have me."
A/N: Rawr, fear the cuteness, and my tendency forget to update, and the fact that always breaks when I have updates ready... mmyeah. One chapter left.