Family Ties

It was safe to say that Freddie didn't know a lot about parents or parenting, although this wasn't exactly his fault; he couldn't be blamed for his mother and father being murdered when he was ten - a mere toddler in the monster world - or for the fact that the only other figure he had to look up to was his Uncle Al.

And Freddie did appreciate all the efforts his uncle had put in just to make sure he grew up in a loving environment, away from the tough adoption and fostering processes...but all the same, he wished he could have known his parents.

Even with Al's efforts, though, his childhood had been far from easy or peaceful: by the time Freddie was sixty he was already helping his uncle out by doing small jobs for whichever employer hired them at the time. It wasn't tough work, admittedly, nothing more than helping to serve beverages and food, but it was still work. Besides that, they found themselves on the run more often than not: sometimes it was because of rather unaccepting humans becoming a sudden threat, and other times because they needed to move to a different area for a job.

One particular memory stayed in Freddie's mind as he grew up, more so than others: shortly after his fiftieth birthday, when Al had been working nights in a local bar. Being young, he had refused to leave his nephew alone for the whole night and so had no choice but to take Freddie with him to work; he was unaware of the things that he might have seen.

Freddie had been left to sit at a chair near the bar so that Al could keep a close eye on him and given a book to entertain himself with; at a young age, he loved learning and hoped that maybe he'd be able to do something with the knowledge he gained so that he and his uncle could have a better life than they did presently. Freddie would always remember random details about that night, such as the subject of the book; it had been an Italian book of short stories - his parents had been of Italian origin, and so while English was his first language Al had insisted that he learn Italian too.

"...I can't, Joe. Look, I've got the boy over there - he's hardly in the way."

His ears pricked up at that: 'the boy over there' was a phrase commonly used to describe him.

"Do you not know how bad it is for business to have a kid sitting here?!" A harsh voice snarled. "Our customers are not going to want to see some snotty-nosed nit cluttering up the bar with his crap!"

That had been a Mister Joe Boyle, Freddie remembered: a tall and scary man who looked like death personified. God knows what species or type of monster he was, but there was no way that a vampire could look that terrible or terrifying - perhaps he was some kind of monster found in comic books.

"Get rid of him," Mister Boyle continued, voice dropping to a low threatening tone. "Or I'll do it - one way or another."

And suddenly there was a loud slap that sounded around the bar: Al had grabbed Boyle, enraged, and struck him straight across the face. Judging by his face afterwards, Freddie could only guess that he'd done it on impulse since he immediately looked guilty and begun to apologize.

"I'm sorry," Al seethed, obviously using all of his effort to sound polite. "It won't happen again...But I don't want you threatening the boy."

Suddenly, Al was being dragged out by his shirt, over the bar and to the floor, and Boyle was above him with his fist raised. "You think I'm letting you get away with this?! Stupid little fucking grease ball!"

It was a word that Freddie didn't understand at the time, but would later come to know as being a racist slur because he was Italian; still, at the time he had watched horrified as the scene in front of him unfolded.

"You work for me, you got that?!" He continued to yell, aiming another punch for Al's nose. "You should be on your knees begging me to accept your appreciation for the job; you won't find another bar owner around these parts so willing to hire an uneducated little dago!" After a few more hits he pushed himself up, looking down at Al with disgust on his face. "You will do whatever I say, you understand?!"

By this point Al was bleeding heavily and curled up on the floor - unable to do much else, he gave a simple nod as he gasped out in pain.

"Damn fucking right!" Boyle spat at him before turning to look at Freddie. "That goes for you too, you little Guinea; I don't care how white you are, you're still a greaser, just like the rest of them!" His eyes flickered to the book that the boy was reading and his mouth curled up in a cruel smirk. "No amount of reading will make you different: within the next hundred years, you'll be working a low-paying job just like your pathetic uncle!"

Those words stayed with Freddie for years and years after that; growing up, he wanted to help his uncle - to make sure that their lives were better one day, that they never had to worry about having too little for themselves. But no matter what he did, it always went wrong; unlike his uncle, he couldn't cook and therefore couldn't help out with the chef jobs that Al got. He had just about enough co-ordination to wait tables, luckily, but even then there were still accidents if he got too distracted or nervous.

Thankfully, life wasn't quite as bad as it had been during that time working at Boyle's bar - they weren't called racist slurs or fearful of physical violence - but it was still pretty bad for decades.

They had been living and working in Bulgaria when they heard about the announcement in the paper, the one that changed everything; in fact, they'd just lost their jobs as a chef and a waiter at a restaurant the night before when Freddie, flicking through the local monster news uselessly.

"Hey!" He cried out, alert and bright immediately. When his uncle looked up, he gestured for him to come over. "I think I found the answer, Uncle Al!"

Al gave a small sigh. "This better be good..."

"It is, it is," Freddie insisted excitedly, pointing to the ad in the paper. "Listen: Head Chef needed for hotel restaurant in Transylvania, Romania. Send reference of previous work. Uncle Al, it's perfect!"

His uncle gave his nephew a small pitying look. "Fred, we don't know how old this ad is...they've probably filled the position by now-"

"No, it's new!" The red-head exclaimed desperately. "If you look at the ad, it says that their chef retired this morning - it's midday now, and this paper only came out just before dusk, that's what the guy who gave it to me said! If we sent off our information now, they might consider us!"

Al, knowing he wouldn't give in, took the paper into his hands and studied it closer. "Christ, Freddie...I can't apply for this! Do you know which hotel it is?!" When his nephew just blinked, he shook his head. "Hotel Transylvania - one of the most prestigious in the world and run by the Count Dracula; our chances of working there are about as high as the chances of us being able to settle down."

"But if we got it then we'd be able to settle!" Freddie stated, looking up at the older vampire pleadingly. "Look, I know it's stupid - that I'm stupid for thinking we could get it - but we need to take the chance!"

Not expecting much, Al had agreed and allowed Freddie to mail the application out as soon as the night fell - and they'd be forever grateful that they did.

"Daddy?"

"Yeah, Mina?"

She tapped her foot impatiently. "Freddie just turned up at the door. He said he wanted to talk to you," Mina told him, looking rather put out over the fact that her friend wasn't looking for her at that moment. "I told him that you were busy sorting out plans for our summer trip to Hawaii but he insisted."

Johnny gave a shrug. "Alright, cool. He can come and talk if he wants."

So far, the planning of the trip to Hawaii wasn't going too badly: sure, it required a lot of precaution on his and Mavis' part to make sure that they weren't going to be travelling in daylight at any point that they weren't going to be on the plane (the shades on the windows took care of that problem), but so far they were all pretty excited to be going.

"Err...hi."

Johnny sent his son-in-law a small wave as he entered, looking away from his computer research. "Hey, dude! What's up?"

Freddie was fidgeting and more anxious than usual, he noticed, especially as he took a seat rather carefully across from Johnny and bit his lip. "I...well...I didn't want to...er...bother you or anything...but I dunno who else to ask really..."

No one ever asked his advice on anything, not even the kids, so Johnny was rather intrigued by this. "Oh yeah? What do you wanna talk about?"

"Well...me and Lucy, we're...you know..."

Ah. Johnny couldn't help the large grin that spread across his face. "Oh, I see: pregnant wife pains? Don't worry, man, been there and done that. It won't last forever, trust me, and it doesn't mean you're stupid: it's just the weird hormones, you know?"

"No, that's not what I mean," Freddie said quietly. "I'm just...worried about it. About being a...a father..."

Oh. The older red-head suddenly understood completely. "Oh, right! I know what you're talking about now!" He paused to close the lid on his laptop and straightened up in his seat. "Don't worry, every guy gets that; at one point or another, you sit there thinking if you're gonna suck real bad or if you're gonna screw this kid up. To be honest, I'm pretty sure that one of mine is gonna be screwed up one way or another since I spent most of the time goofing around..."

Freddie blinked, not quite sure what to make of this. "O-Okay. Right. Thanks, I guess?"

"You want advice?" Johnny checked, and his son-in-law gave a nod. "I'm not sure I'm the right guy to ask, you know; besides, shouldn't you be asking your..." He trailed off as he remembered that Freddie didn't have a father or mother - only an uncle, who had raised someone else's kid...though was that too different from raising your own? Johnny didn't know, so he said, "Never mind. Sure then, you can ask me anything, dude."

Freddie looked rather hesitant for a moment before he jumped right into it, clearly anxious and awkward about having this whole discussion. "Well, it's just that I'm scared that I won't do a good job, you know? I mean, I know you said that all dads feel that way but they know what to do 'cause the look at what their own dads are like...I can't do that."

"Well...what about your Uncle Al?" The older vampire asked. "I know it's not the same thing as a dad but couldn't you just use him as an example?"

"He worked most of the time," Freddie said quietly. "He looked after me and taught me how to read and write and stuff, and I love him. But he's always said that he's never acted like a dad to me - he just did what he could to help me survive."

Johnny, having grown up in a relatively large but loving family and then raising his own kids that same way, couldn't quite imagine that; he sometimes forgot that some people's main priority was to survive instead of being happy. "Man, that's rough...Okay, well...if you want me to give you a few tips then I will - but it probably won't be very good." And then it came to him, bright as day - corny, but still useful. "So, you wanna know something to make you a good dad, right?" His son-in-law gave an eager nod. "It's so simple, dude, that it's nearly stupid: if you love the kid then you can't go wrong."

Freddie gave a small frown of confusion. "I don't..."

"Every decision a guy makes as a dad is made 'cause they love their kid and choose what they think will be the best possible option for them in the long term," Johnny explained surely. "Like, if a kid acts badly then you send them to their room to teach them a lesson - in the long term it'll make them a better person. Okay, so sure they'll get pretty mad at you at first but that'll go away after a day."

Who knew he was so good at this kind of thing? Really, Johnny thought to himself, he could give Count Dracula a run for his money at the rate he was dishing advice out.