Okay, wow, where should I start? You've probably figured out by now my last name is Williams. Alfred F. Williams doesn't really have the same ring to it as Alfred F. Jones, don'tcha think? Sounds like some old stuffy guy, Jones is like Indiana Jones! A professor but still totally badass. But the Jones thing didn't start until—

Wait, I should probably do this in order. Okay. So. Alfred F. Williams and Matthew Williams. Mattie's a year older than me, but everyone thought we were twins. We ended up in the Orphanage when we were 5 and 6 years old, about? Our mom was...that's not important. I'm not gonna downplay this: I was the cutest 5-year old ever. And Mattie, well, yeah he was adorable, too, but he was kinda shy. And older. I dunno what it is about some foster parents, but—uh, I mean, I get it, a lot of people want younger kids for their family, they wanna help, but a lot of times the older kids are the ones who need it more? Anyway, um, I've mentioned the Orphanage before, right? It's not really an orphanage—those aren't really a thing in America anymore what with our lovely foster care system. We called it the Orphanage, though, like with a capital O. It was a group home. There was me and Mattie, three younger kids who came a bit after us (oh cool you met Peter? What a dork right? And he's been adopted, that's awesome!), and a couple older kids who'd been there for a while. We hung out with the younger kids at first, 'cause they were less, uh...scary. They were really tall, okay? And we were short kids. (Haha, grew into my height, right?)

But then, maybe a little less than a year later, the Joneses came. They were nice, the first time they came to visit. They talked to me some, asking things like my favorite food (burgers!), favorite color (it was blue back then, but it's yellow now if you're interested), and if I liked playing outside (I dominated at kickball; I was like a 5-year old kickball prodigy), other stuff. I didn't really get the significance of it at first? I answered their questions, talked to them—I mean, I was excited adults were paying attention to me! Then Mattie told me they were probably thinking about fostering or even adopting me. That was pretty exciting, too, up until the point where they were telling me to get ready to leave, but they didn't tell my brother to get ready because they "only wanted one child, to get used to the experience before they thought about bringing home a second one" and fuck no. I threw the unholiest fit of all unholy fits, even strapped into a car seat, and they actually tried to tell me I'd get over my "separation anxiety" soon? Like hell. Their sweet all-American blond angel turned out to be a terror around the house. I broke sooo much stuff. There was a lot of screaming. Maybe some crying. Also that underwear thing Mattie told you about. But they were stubborn as hell, I'll give them that. They kept trying but I just couldn't take them lying to my face about how it would get better so I ran away...Nah, I was almost six by this point. It's not that young! And they lived in the same town, anyway, it's not like I had to trek across the state or anything.

And they didn't come to take me back, so that was the end of that. That's the Joneses.

Um...

Right, so the older kids. I got some brownie points from them for running away, and me n' Mattie both starting hanging out with one of them. We were best friends. And after the Joneses, me and my brother knew better and we'd avoid any visitors. And we got old enough that we didn't really have to worry about it anymore—we thought, anyway, but that's for later.

I know, sounds weird, right? We were happy about not getting a "real" home. But we had each other and we had Ivan and we didn't really trust anyone outside of our little trio. Ivan...he'd been there for a while, too. So had his two older siblings. They were all kinda, off-putting? Maybe? Is the word I'd use? So they'd never been anywhere else. They were tough, and me n' Mattie really looked up to them—once we got over how scary they were, I mean. And Ivan was—sorry, this part is harder to put into words. He was the first friend I had besides my brother. And not just that, but we were both younger siblings, and the most awful thing imaginable to both of us was being separated from our family. Sometimes just the two of us would hang out and we'd have the coolest adventures but we also talked—a lot for kids, I guess. We went to the same school and we lived in the same place, like we were basically together all the time. And we both wanted—okay, this is gonna sound dumb but we both wanted to be astronauts when we grew up. We'd build spaceships out of old cardboard and start space wars against evil aliens with our awesome phaser technology and—uh. You know. Stuff like that. Kid stuff. Friend stuff.

Aaaand then me and Mattie got adopted. Mattie was, uh, 14 and I was 13. And we moved out of town, came here, and Mattie started high school (even more terrifying, right?) and I tried writing, I tried calling, and Ivan never answered me and I got so mad about it and I just. Stopped trying. (Fuck. Why did I stop trying?) The people who adopted us? Well, you know Arthur and Francis—they're not that bad, c'mon!

It was nice. Having a bigger family, I mean. And I was in high school then, and Mattie got accepted into college (I mean one of his dads is the dean, but he's a smart dude!) and I had friends and parents and my brother.

Except then my friend Toris made an offhand comment about gang activity (I know, what?, bear with me here). But yeah, gangs in some nearby cities, and one of his cousins had been mugged by a group led by a tall guy with scary eyes and a Russian accent, and I knew it was Ivan.

So then I—oh man, Lovi, you're gonna think I'm so stupid.

I had just turned 17, so I dropped out of school. I told my parents—I mean, I told Arthur and Francis I'd get my GED instead, that I didn't want to live with them anymore, that I wanted to go home. I had a huge fight with Arthur about it. He took it really personally, I guess. They were both really confused, and hurt, and everything was chaotic for a while. I didn't even tell Mattie what was going on. Couldn't. He was really supportive anyway. He's cool like that.

And uh, then I ran away again.

(Yeah, yeah, I know. It seemed like a good idea at the time? And I had to! Ivan needed my help.)

I told my—Arthur and Francis and Mattie that I had a place to live, and a job. (Ow! I know! I know!) But I went and found Ivan. And he wasn't, I mean, I dunno. Something was wrong. Like he was frozen or something. He could fake a smile, sound nice, but there wasn't anything genuine left except anger. He didn't even react to seeing me again, or anything I said. It was...really scary, to be honest. And I was hanging around with him, talking at him, basically 24/7. He let me sleep on his couch. And I mean "let me" because it's not like he invited me, he just didn't say anything when I followed him back to his shitty apartment. I had some money for food, so I just, stuck around I guess? And like, you can't really follow someone who's in a gang around all the time without getting noticed, so to stay near him I had to...do some stuff. Not drugs, don't look at me like that! But uh, well, I told you I broke a shit ton of stuff as a kid, right? Well, I had this baseball bat—nevermind, probably shouldn't get into that.

So we were together again. Going on adventures again, I guess you could say. (Or not. Sorry.) This is when I started going by Jones. It's hard to explain why without bringing in some kinda psycho-analyzing crap but, uh. I just didn't want Alfred F. Williams to be...the guy with the baseball bat. Anyway, it got to the point where that was just how my life worked, and I wasn't following him around constantly. This was after a couple of months, I guess? We were coexisting. I asked around and found out his older sisters had gotten old enough to leave the Orphanage themselves. So they had. Without him.

(Fuck, and I had given up on trying to contact him. Why did I—?)

And he'd left, too, and been by himself ever since.

Until I came back.

I swear I was trying to get him to leave the whole time. The things we had to do, they were getting worse but he didn't seem to realize the danger, or even care what he was doing. And then, being the idiot I am, I told him—I was desperate, Lovi, and I said the worst thing I could think of—I said that we both needed to quit or I was going to leave without him.

(I know. I know.)

He blew up at me. It was the most emotion I'd seen from him in—well, since we were kids. We both ended up with a lot of bruises, and uh, he kicked me out.

And I've been...homeless since then.

I came back here. Told Mattie I was rooming with a friend, had a job, was working on the GED still. Francis and Arthur, well I mean they're both super nosy so of course they found out. But I wasn't about to move back in with them. A high school dropout with gang connections and a complete failure at helping his first friend? They didn't deserve—I wasn't gonna drop all that on them. I've been working some odd jobs, but nothing permanent. Not qualified without even a high school diploma.

And then Ivan moved to the next town. And he was so close, I thought, maybe it means something! I have to keep trying. But Ivan was still too involved, and he didn't want anything to do with me. He's kinda in a "kick Alfred's ass on sight" mindframe more than a "let's make up and be non-gang member friends again" one, I guess.

So when I wasn't working I'd go bother him, get beat up (but I got some punches in, too! I have, well, honestly I have a lot of experience fighting), and then come back here. Then this one time, he punched me so hard I thought I'd lost my tooth. He told me to leave and I did. Went to the library.

And I met you.

Short chapter, and a pov shift! We will return to your regularly scheduled third person (and longer) chapters next time. Only one or two chapters to go, actually...

I am a liar. Never listen to me when I say I'm gonna update within a certain timeframe. This fic will get finished though! Man, over four years old now...Hopefully this answered a bunch of the longstanding (four years) questions you've had! If you're still confused about anything or I've gotten something completely wrong/misspelled/contradicting previous chapters, let me know and I will try to fix it! You're all awesome and I'm very glad you put up with me. Also, if anyone knows of a job opening for someone graduating with a biology degree, hit me up.

HOW OLD ARE ALL THESE PEOPLE? This fic has established so far that Lovino is a sophomore, so he's 19 turning 20 in March, Alfred is supposed to be three years younger according to Lovi but it's more like two years and a few months, plus his birthday is in July so he's 17. He should be in his senior year of high school and technically he'd have to be 18 before he could drop out but we're gonna say it's 17 for the sake of the story. Kiku was in the same grade but graduated early and is now a freshman in college, along with Toris who was a year above them. Matthew is a year older than his brother so he is 18, and a freshman. Okay. Probably no one cares that much but I managed to confuse myself a lot trying to figure it out so I typed it out.

-AoNoShi, 4/4/15