AN: Thank you to Fluehatraya, who left some of the nicest, well-written reviews for each chapter that I've ever seen. I appreciate the vote of confidence even if I can't pronounce your username, but then again the same thing can probably be said of my username. Also, no I did not realize until afterwards that I used black for the African-American characters. Sorry. And yes, I consider Tucker minor enough for this, if only because he never gets any real focus in the series.
It may have been a fluke of genetics. It might have been, according to Alton, an act of Allah that was done to show him the value of love. Tucker would never get used to those words coming out of his brother (half brother, possibly half-brother) and coming out of that face, with those pointed features, plump nose, eyes almond shaped. His eyes took everything in with a warmth and lack of judgment that had closed the age gap between them. It didn't mean anything that Alton was ten years older than he was. They were best friends, even now that life had shoved everything it could inbetween the brothers. (Half- no, it didn't matter, but it did-)
Alton had black eyes. Not merely brown, pitch black, radiant and devourers of light, drawing eyes to his and people to him. His gaze was like an embrace. His hair lacked the fluffy texture of his parents (mother – stop!) and instead was soft and used to hang down to his chin. That was back when he lived at home.
Back then, Alton had called the house in Amity Park home. Now it was 'the house' at best.
There had always been an undercurrent of tension between Alton and his father, which bled over to his mother. (Their father, Tucker meant.) Although as an oblivious little kid Tucker had never quite understood what the split was over, as he got older he knew exactly what it was about. With his caramel colored skin and pitch black eyes, he could have been anyone's son – but he wasn't likely to be the son of two teal eyed bistre skinned people with textured hair. Since they had videos of both of their births, there was no doubt Tucker and Alton were brothers and had the same mother. What was in question for a while was the other half.
Arguments had erupted when Alton was eighteen and hadn't stopped. He could take his father's awkward looks, the way he wouldn't lay a hand on his shoulder or hug him very often, he could endure being referred to as 'my wife's son', and yet one thing set him off in a way Tucker had never seen him set off. They had crept upstairs at the sound of yelling, hearing their father's voice rising more than it ever had, and then their mother had begun to cry. The yelling hadn't stopped. In a motion of fury, the older Foley sibling yanked the door open and stormed in, putting himself inbetween his parents physically, as if he could shield his mother from their father's words with his body, black eyes blazing.
"You have no right to talk to her like that! You hate me, you go to me!" Alton had snapped, stepping up to his father with intimidating, quiet tones in his voice, a serious solemn volume that denoted a storm inside. "Leave her out of it. If you need to make a woman cry to feel big, you're not fit to be anyone's father."
Tucker's father had sworn at him and told him to get out, but Alton wouldn't leave without ushering his mother out. Once the subject had been broached, it couldn't be hidden again. Arguments between the two men became as regular as the sun, Alton calm and collected if via gritted teeth, his father a wreck, their mother always crying and always comforted by her children. She sobbed again and again that she hadn't had an affair, and they were both her precious baby boys, and they believed her. They loved her. Alton protected her as if it were his calling, he babysat his brother, he dutifully pushed through college, and he helped Tucker with his homework. He would not be banished from his own family life. He was part of this household, no matter how unwanted he was by his father.
That was when Alton had converted to Islam and found his real calling. He hadn't been particularly ashamed or blatant about it, simply studying the Quran in the privacy of his room, abstaining from the usual beer he and his father had, and… calming down. Although he'd never been loud when arguing, he grew more and more at peace with the world around him. Alton Foley developed a calm that could weather storms big and small, often shutting his eyes, raising his hands and saying, "La hawla wala quwata illa billah." He would exit the room without further words, leaving his father fumbling. And he began to ask questions his father couldn't answer.
"Is this worth what you're showing your son?" he'd ask, with a nod of the head towards Tucker. "When he acts like this with his wife, is that going to be okay with you? When you die, is this how you want to be remembered?"
Eventually, when Tucker was ten and his brother was twenty, his brother stood up at dinner and announced he was going to leave to run a mosque in Canada. The reaction was explosive. Tucker's ears rang with his father's shouts, but Alton stood there, watching him, taking him in with those eyes that couldn't hold anger, refused to, and simply stepped around to the table to stand beside the other man. A tense silence fell over the room before the black eyed boy wrapped his arms around his father and pulled him in for a tight embrace, holding onto him and burying his face in the other man's shoulder. Tucker's father (their- oh, who cared) stared, unable to wrap his arms around his child in return as his eldest son thanked him for teaching him the values of patience and love, and told him he hoped Allah would soothe the pain in his heart.
"I love you, Dad," he said, his voice cracking, and Tucker's father had shoved him off. Alton's eyes were shiny, with tears or possibly emotion, it was never clear. "I love you. Rahimakallah."
Tucker's father turned to leave the room, but Alton grabbed him by the wrist.
"I had samples sent to a lab. Before I leave, you'll have your answer."
Their father left with a brief, "Thanks."
Nowadays Alton called back to talk to his mother and brother, but his father refused to take the phone. He refused to let Alton come back for visits with a mixture of fear and confusion for this strange imam of a mosque in another country who bore his name and little else. He tolerated the constant emailing back and forth Tucker and Alton did, accepted gifts for Muslim holidays, managed to grit his teeth and bare it when Alton married a woman named Zilal from Saudi Arabia, he just couldn't stand to be in the same room as the other man. They hadn't seen each other in person since Alton left for the airport years ago to become an imam, hugging his mother about six dozen times and telling Tucker to hold tight to his dreams of designing and inventing technology. They departed in silence, ultimately, the kind that comes with knowing.
Although Tucker had never seen it, the lines on the paternity test were dappled black – positive. And their (yes, their) father had to live with that, every day.