This is a long story. If you would like to read it in a more broken-up format, you can find in on ArchiveofourOwn under the name 'Mommy Grew Up Different' by WanderlustandFreedom.
Ben never really had any reservations about making Mal his wife, and when the time came for them to have children, he didn't have any worries about that either. The moment little Prince Zach had been put in Mal's arms, she'd transformed into the best mother Ben had ever seen.
Mal was determined to give her kids the best childhood she could. She wasn't perfect - there were a few bumps along the way - but there was no one Ben would have ever trusted more to be his partner in crime and his kids' mom.
Mommy Grew Up Different
"Alright Zach, what's three times two?" Ben asks his three-year-old son, kneeling down beside his bed and smiling as the child counts on his pudgy toddler fingers.
"Six," Zach replies and looks at Ben expectantly. Ben's smile stretches even wider.
"That's right!" He applauds, holding a hand up for a high-five. "What's six times three?"
That was a harder one, but they'd gradually been moving into bigger numbers the last few weeks. Zach furrows his brow. He counts on his fingers, folds his arms across his chest, and then analyzes his covers in deep thought. Ben hears a noise from the hallway and briefly looks over to see Mal leaning against the doorway, furrowing her brow the same Zach is as she listens. She must have already finished putting their other son, Tyler, to bed. That means he's running behind.
"Eighteen," Zach replies, brightening up as he remembers the answer.
Ben laughs. "That's right!" He exclaims and then pushes up off the floor to sit beside the small child on the bed. Zach scoots over against the wall and pats his blue striped sheets, indicating Ben can move forward. Ben chuckles and reaches across the bed to pick up the book his son had picked out. "Alright, champ, are we reading about Rapunzel and Eugene tonight, or are we - what's this?" Ben raises an eyebrow as Zach reaches out for the thick book in excitement.
"It's my word book," Zach explains, snuggling into his pillow and opening it up. "Aunt Jane said all the kids in the high schools get one, and she gave me this one to keep. See? My name is on it." He holds the book close to his nose, flips through the pages, and takes a deep inhale. "It smells like a good book," he mumbles as he curls into Ben's side. "She said it'd help me learn new words."
"It's called a dictionary," Ben raises an eyebrow, fighting a little smile as he looks up to see Mal still looking at them confusedly in the doorway. "Dad used to read through this when he was younger too. Not as young as you, though. You can look through it to find words you don't know or go through and see which ones you do know."
Zach nods, opens to the first page, and skims down the entries. He skips over the letter 'A's and goes straight for the first long word he sees. "Aardvark," he announces, nuzzling his sandy blonde hair into Ben's side as Ben leans back against the headboard and starts combing his fingers through Zach's hair. "An animal with a long snout and a long sticky tongue that feeds mostly on termites and is active at night." He looks up at Ben with his finger on that last description. "That means they're nocturnal like cats, right?"
Ben chuckles. He can't believe how much his son knows. He's well aware it isn't normal for a kid to be this knowledgeable, but he isn't going to we complain too much. It's nice to have someone to talk to like this. "That's right," He agrees. "Like cats and snakes and lizards and things."
"It must live in a hot climate," Zach reasons. "And it moves at night when it's not so hot."
Ben hears Mal shift in the doorway and he glances up to see she's dropped her hands in something like surprise. He smiles up at her, and though he can't see her expression, he figures it must be something like pride. She hasn't been able to come in to help him put Zach to sleep the last few months as Tyler tends to turn his furniture into animals when he's anxious for bedtime and she usually has to round up and return a herd or two to its original form. Zach, however, doesn't have magic and prefers reading aloud to his parents as part of his bedtime routine, so that's pretty easy for Ben to cover as Mal tried to calm Tyler down. However, he was exhausted tonight, so Mal gets to listen in on what he and Tyler usually work on in the evenings.
"Abacus," Zach reads. "An instrument for doing arithmetic by sliding counters along rods or in grooves."
Ben puts his finger down on the word 'arithmetic'. "What's that mean, champ?" He asks.
"Math," Zach shrugs. "It's like what we've been working on. Multiplications. Like two times two and six times six."
"Which is?" Ben prompts, and Zach puts the book down to tap his index fingers together.
"Four and thirty-six," Zach announces. "Which together are forty."
"Good job," Ben smiles over at Mal. She is standing very still in the doorway, and he can't tell if she's breathing or not. Zach keeps reading, mumbling by his side, and Mal slowly creeps into the room to hover by the foot of the bed. Zach finishes reading about 'abolitionist' and then reaches for a pencil on his headboard to circle the word, indicating he's interested in learning more about it. Ben isn't surprised - it's the same kind of concept he lives for. He leans forward to take Mal's hand and it's then that he realizes her face is drawn and taut and she's staring down at the book in Zach's lap like it's an evil thing she doesn't want around her son. Ben frowns. "What's wrong?" He asked.
Zach looks up immediately and sets the pencil and book aside. "Mommy..." He whines, leaning on his knees with his arms outstretched. "Are you feeling sad?"
"No, baby," Mal smiles a little tight, scared smile. He knows the look, but he hasn't seen it for a while. Not since Zach was born. There's the occasional exception - when their toddlers go near stairs or when they first started standing or when Ben tosses them into the air, but for the most part, he doesn't see the 'I don't like this at all' face. She takes Zach into her arms and hugs him tightly, and Ben tilts his head at her while Zach's head is turned away. She ignores him, which raises Ben's concern even more.
Ben puts a hand on Zach's back. "Bud, it's time for bed," he announces. "I'll read more of your new dictionary with you tomorrow, but Mom and Dad had a long day today. You can stay up a little longer and read, or you can go to bed now."
"I'll go to bed," Zach yawns. He climbs back into his covers and then pushes the dictionary away. "You can answer my questions later." Ben snorts, pulls the covers up around the little three-year-old, and then kisses his hair as Zach closes his eyes. He and Mal walk to the door, glancing back every so often as parents are wont to do. Ben lets her into the hall before him, shuts the door softly, and then turns with an open mouth to reask Mal what happened. He doesn't get a syllable out before she's practically exploded into rushed whispers.
"You're doing multiplication with him?" She demands, clutching her hair. "And he's reading a dictionary? He's four! He's not even four - he'll be four in three months! How long has this been going on?"
Ben blinks. "Is it a problem?" He asks. "You already knew he liked reading."
"Well, I mean, I'm glad that he's smart and everything, but..." Mal chews on her lip with wide eyes darting back and forth without landing on him. "Don't you think he's too young?"
"He's gifted," Ben shrugs. "I have no idea where he gets it from, but he catches on so quickly. We've been doing multiplication together now for almost two weeks. I'm trying to get him to learn his fours and sixes."
"I thought you were doing additions?" Mal questions, biting her lip and turning from one side to the other as if she can't decide which direction she wants to go. "I thought you were going to be starting subtractions once he got the hang of it."
"We did," Ben shrugged. "He caught on really fast. He can do two-digit addition and subtractions in his head and everything else on paper. So I moved to multiplication." He catches her hand as she spins around in a frantic circle. "Hey - what's the issue here? He's smart, so what?"
Mal rips her hand free only to wave it in front of her like she burned it and she's trying to shake off the pain. "I don't know that stuff, Ben!" She snaps in a whisper. "What's a noc- a n- an animal at night! and multiplication is like... second grade here, right?"
"Third," Ben corrects quietly.
"That's not better!" Mal snaps. "Why is he growing up so fast? Why is he learning so much? I mean, I'm happy - I am! He's such a brilliant, perfect boy, but he's going to grow up thinking I'm a dunce because I can't answer any of those questions!"
"You can't answer what six times six is?" Ben drawls slowly, though he understands her panic now. Auradon schooling system is intimidating enough to Mal, whose Dragon Hall classes barely taught them to read and write. If not for Yen Sid, the vast majority of Island Children would have had to retake elementary courses in High school, and some of them still can't read or write.
"Of course I can!" Mal snaps. "But... but... he's going this fast and he's just going to keep going! I just had my baby Ben - I don't want him to be big yet!"
"You're not going to lose him," Ben tells her, taking her hands and squeezing them tightly. "Mal, he adores you. Did you see how sad he got when he thought you were sad in there? You're his whole world. He and Tyler both think you're the literal sun." He drags her into his arms and lets her claw around at his collarbone for a hold before wrapping her hands around his back and letting out a little breath.
She's a good mom. She lifts Zach up to pick books off of higher shelves and retrieves toys that Tyler likes to hurl across the room and she lets all three of them - Ben included - curl into her when they watch movies together and she's the stabilizing rock that holds his little family together. But he gets how this scares her. After all, Zach won't be little forever, and his questions are only going to get more complex and hard to answer.
Tyler gets a little older to where he's now three and Zach is four and Tyler is no longer attempting to create a zoo in his bedroom before bedtime. Ben and Mal start rotating again, and Mal learns very quickly that Zach's bedtime routine is now very far out of her depth. A stack of various encyclopedias - some children's and some not - sit beside his bed with his dog-eared and marked-up dictionary in a prized position on his headboard. She manages to help her baby get through brushing teeth and pajamas without fumbling too much, but then Zach is curling up into his pillow and pulling the blue comforter he got at Christmastime around his shoulders as Mal skins the spines of the encyclopedias for something she recognizes. "The Plant World", one reads. "How Government Works - for children", says another. "You can speak French!" a third announces.
"Can we read my dictionary?" Zach asks after patiently waiting about thirty seconds as Mal examines each of the unfamiliar titles beside his bed. Mal nods with a swallow and Zach retrieves his blue and white dictionary and opens it up in the middle. She takes a deep breath to calm herself and then panics again when the first word Zach reads is unfamiliar.
"Minuend," He mumbles as he lays his head down on her shirt and leans the book open on her legs. "A number from which another number is to be subtracted."
Mal's skin crawls. Now that she's thinking about it, the word sounds vaguely familiar in the back of her head. Maybe it was included in a lesson years ago or something. But the fact she didn't know it is the problem. If he asks any questions, what will she say?
Luckily, most of the words are pretty straightforward and there isn't a lot that she misses. There are mislead and mission and mistake, all of which are pretty okay, and then the occasional word like mirth or a mite.
"Mite - o - chon - drian," Zach sounds out and then pauses to yawn. "One of the parts found in the cytoplasm of a cell outside the nucleus that provides the cell with energy released from the breakdown of nutrients."
"Baby, do you know what that means?" Mal blurts out. Her head is spinning. It's somehow easier to remember what the various terms mean from her high school classes when Zach is sounding out the big words so carefully, but she still only has a vague recollection of what it means.
Zach nods. "We're made up of cells," he explains, running a hand up his arm. "And cells have DNA that tells them how we need to be built. And this is part of a cell that makes energy." He curls up closer to her arm. "Dad told me about it a while ago."
Of course Dad told him. Dad is smart and was taught these things as a child. Mom was not.
"Mitosis," Zach begins, yawns widely, and then looks at the page through half-lidded eyes to finish. "Process of cell division by which two new nuclei are formed, each containing the original number of chromosomes." He finally sets the book down, rubs his eyes, and then rolls over onto his pillow. Mal reaches over to tuck him in. "Mom?" He calls, eyes closed as he mumbles against his pillow. "How does a cell get the same number of DNA when it becomes two new ones?"
Mal's mind blanks out and she stammers a little as she slides off his bed onto her knees. "I, uh, I think they double, baby. They double up and then divide."
Zach squeezes his pillow, opens his eyes, and looks up. "But... they're already doubled?" He ponders aloud. "They're in a twisty spiral."
That Mal remembers. Her teacher had a giant stretchable model that Evie and Doug once rented out and examined in their dorm room. "Maybe they double the twisted DNA?" She suggests, relaxing a little as she runs a hand up and down Zach's back.
Zach shrugs and buries his face into his pillow. "I'll ask dad tomorrow," He yawns. "Goodnight mom."
Mal sits down hard on her tailbone with every bone in her body vibrating. Her son's words go through her like a bullet. 'I'll ask Dad'. She slowly forces herself to get up and walk to the door. She pulls it shut before she collapses beside the frame and presses her fingertips to her head.
Why is he asking questions like this already? Why doesn't she know the answers? Has he already caught on to the fact she's not nearly as smart as he and Ben are? How much longer does she have before he realizes she's a complete idiot who has no chance of ever learning half of the things he practically downloads into his brain?
Ben finds her there, on the floor outside her son's room mumbling 'questions' and 'cells' underneath her breath. And at three a.m the following morning, when he's awakened by the light of her phone as she reads a seventh-grade lesson on cells and biology, he doesn't say a word.
"You know, just because you don't know about lightning and thunder doesn't mean you're not smart," Ben sighs from the doorway as Mal clicks through the twenty tabs she has open on her computer. "You just know other things. Who cares if Zach knows what the plant is called - you know whether or not it's edible."
"Great," Mal snaps irritably. "You and he can talk about electricity and... reactions in the atmosphere and I'll tell him where best to stab a man so he dies." She snaps the lid of her laptop shut with her eyes closed and lets out a ragged, ashamed breath. "I can't tell him things like that," she moans. "He already knows you're smarter than I am and I'm scarier than you. If I tell him things like that, he'll think I'm a monster."
"He's not going to think you're a monster," Ben sighs, pinching his fingertips to the bridge of his nose. He already knows he doesn't have much chance of convincing her, though. They've been having this discussion for almost two years now.
"Why is he growing up?" Mal groans, burying her face in her hands. "I can't deal with him getting bigger and all these things... Tyler still can't read by himself and he's almost four now!"
"Zach's a special case," Ben sighs. He's not sure how to console her - is there any consolation for a mom who feels like her baby is growing up too fast? And all she says is true - Zach amazes everyone who meets him. He's somewhere in between a third and a fifth-grade level as far as his knowledge goes, but his rationing is beyond even some adults Ben knows in the courts. Most of what he knows is from reading or Ben and Mal talking with him. They called in a tutor a while ago, and Zach was nice enough to her, but he simply learned too fast for her to be able to develop lessons for him. The local school kind of shook their heads and said that it would be a waste of his potential to have him sit in with even the sixth graders, who need things to be taught more than once whereas he remembers everything, and the only premiere school for kids his age is five hours away, so the only schooling he's done has been online and at-home activities. Now that Tyler is almost to kindergarten age and he's being grouped in with the rest of his age group, he and Mal are starting to understand exactly where a child of Zach's age should be. And it's not sitting upside down in the armchair in the library reading Einstein's theory of special relativity for fun. (He couldn't understand it, but he keeps track of words and phrases and that's how he figures things out)
"Is this good for him?" Mal sighs, tugging on her hair a little. "He's not around any other kids except for his brother and his cousins. and he's moving so fast... what happens when he levels out?"
Ben shrugs. It's going to be a long time before Zach levels out. And he's not too concerned with Zach's friends. Sure, the crown prince doesn't get out much, but he's kind and amicable and gets along well with everyone. He's not a very temperamental child, even when pestered by Zach or Jay's kids.
"We need something he can focus on learning that he won't master the moment it's out of someone's mouth," Mal sighs. "Preferably something with other children." She glances over at Ben with a soft, pleading sigh. "For my sanity and his sake."
"I don't think there's a problem," Ben sighs, sitting down beside her. "But it might be good for him to know what it's like to not learn something right off the bat."
"I was thinking of putting Tyler in dance," Mal sighs. "The other moms at the school have some of his friends in a class together. It's like a tumbling, gymnastics program. After school... let out some of his energy."
"Well, it's not like he can go battle pirates for fun like you used to," Ben snorts, nudging her side even as Mal frowns. "That sounds good. Are you going to put Zach in one?"
"Well, then I'd have to drive out there and back and then there again to drop him off and pick him up. Tyler can walk with his friends. One of the moms works in the building," Mal sighs, brushing her hair out of her eyes. "It would be better to have something I can take him to when I drop Tyler off at school."
Ben puts his hands on her shoulders and rubs his fingertips into her shoulders. "Maybe... music?" He suggests, and then a new plane of understanding opens to his eyes. "Actually... that's a great idea. Learning an instrument helps make connections in kid's brains. He'll have to practice to get good at it and train the muscles in his fingers to-"
"Oh my gosh, you're just like him!" Mal groans. "Why did I marry someone smart? This was a horrible idea!"
Ben laughs. He can't help it. He kisses her cheek and mumbles an apology against her skin. "I'll talk to him and ask what sounds cool," He tells her. "And then I'll get back to you, okay?"
Thus, Zach begins taking guitar at age five. They pick a studio two buildings away from the public library, so for an hour and fifteen minutes Zach does guitar, then he goes to the library for weekly crafts lessons that other homeschooled kids participate in, and then waits the last hour or so before Mal or Ben picks Tyler up from school. He doesn't mind the wait since he gets to read, but he does mind the lessons themselves. Guitar, it turns out, is hard for him. He gets annoyed, but never angry. Sometimes he asks Mal if he can not go, but he doesn't argue when she disagrees. Once he kicks the empty guitar case, but their oldest child isn't very explosive or hot-headed. Ben's proud of him. After all, it isn't easy to struggle with something, and after learning everything else so easily, it's hard to have to practice something as simple as plucking strings in the right order.
For the first time, he progresses at the same rate as the other kids taking it with him, and Ben sees all of Mal's nerves relax one by one. It's still hard for her to see him move so fast in other subjects, but so long as she can listen to him complain about disliking guitar and how much the strings hurt his fingers, she's convinced that he'll still come to her for advice and comfort and she can keep trying to be a good mom.
For several months, Ben listens to his eldest mutter in the family room as he plucks and presses and then strums on his instrument. Sometimes he has to close his eyes when an out-of-tone note vibrates in his ear or when he hears Zach growl in the little way that reminds Ben a.) his son is struggling and b.) the Beast curse definitely still lives on in their family. Then, one day, he walks through the room and listens to Zach play 'Twinkle Twinkle Little Star' without any pauses and on all the right keys. And then Zach sets down the guitar with a proud smile and looks up for approval. And at the moment, man, wow. He's been proud of Mal before, but never like this.
The idea that the kids would one day have questions about Mal's childhood had occurred to him, but he'd always brushed it aside because they hadn't started asking questions yet. He assumes Mal has been thinking the same way. "It's not a problem yet, so let's not talk about it." But the inevitable fault in that plan is that they're both completely thrown off when they finally do ask.
"Dad," Zach asks in the car from the backseat as he balances a book strategically so Tyler can't romp his action figure over it. "The evil fairy in Sleeping Beauty is Grandma, right?"
Mal chokes on her coffee and Ben whips his head around before she seizes the wheel to ensure they don't veer into a new lane. The car next to them honks unpleasantly as their morning commute is interrupted.
Tyler falls out of his seat and onto the floor, where he whines a little before getting back up and sitting down. He sulks in disappointment - he told them he was buckled up and now his cover has been blown. Ben pulls to the side of the road and since he's the better composed of the two adults, he turns around to buckle Tyler up with a firm expression and put a hand on Zach's leg. Zach's face is white.
"Sorry guys," Ben breathes, still holding a hand on Zach's leg. "We, uh, weren't expecting you to ask about Grandma." He exhales and turns to Mal, who is as white-faced as Zach is as she stares stone-faced out the windshield. "Yes, Grandma was the Evil Fairy. Kinda like how Grandpa Adam was the Beast a long time ago."
"So she's dead?" Zach asks quietly. Mal recoils next to Ben like someone threatened to hit her. Ben's a bit wary too. Zach is seven, so it's not exactly strange that he knows the Beauty and the Beast stories and Sleeping Beauty. It's not strange either that he's asking about death and can understand that concept. Poor Mal looks like she'll be sick though. How many deaths had she witnessed(or participated in) by the time she was his age?
"No," Ben replies simply. He hopes Zach won't ask any more questions. He's not sure Mal can handle him explaining how she's alive and on the Isle in human form with her powers bound and how Mal hasn't gone to see her since before she got pregnant. He doesn't even want to explain why his dad thought it would be a good idea to bring back all the villains who had died to punish them further. It's easier to let Zach believe she never died in the first place, like it's easier to let him believe in Santa Claus rather than risk him explaining it to one of his friends.
"Is it a bad thing to talk about?" Zach asks, biting his lip the way Mal does when she's nervous. Ben hides a small, anxious laugh.
"No," he assures his son. "No, you can ask about Grandma. We just weren't expecting you to and you surprised us." He pats Zach's leg to reassure him and then turns with a shaky breath to Mal to see if she has anything to add or clarify. Slowly, she turns back to try and face Zach.
"Mommy doesn't really talk to Grandma anymore," She whispers. "Grandma wasn't a very good mom to me. That's why she doesn't come and see us like Grandma Belle and your Grandpas do."
"You have a mom?" Zach shouts, kicking his legs out and falling back into his chair like he's gone boneless from the shock.
Mal cracks a smile as Zach shifts a few inches away from his loud little brother and rolls his eyes. "Yes, Beastie. Daddy has a mom, why wouldn't Mommy?"
"Because Mommy's tough," Tyler yells, taking his dragon action figure and flying it in circles in front of him. "And Daddy's a big softie!"
Mal bursts into laughter as Ben glares a little from his seat. Zach tilts his book into a shield as Tyler's dragon soars into his airspace and whispers: "I think Dad's tough too." Ben looks up through the rearview mirror to check for cars coming up behind them and also to glance at Zach as he leans against the window with his book mostly hiding his face. The title, which he can read even in the mirror, is 'Auradon History - Updated version with King Benjamin and Queen Maleficent.' He exhales slowly.
They make it to the school without another almost-crash and Mal unbuckles her seat belt to climb out and come around to help Tyler jump out. Zach lowers his book to glance out the window in interest at the other children who are bustling around the elementary school, but then ultimately returns to his stories. When Mal opens the door, Tyler pounces out and jumps into her chest in a way that makes her laugh but almost knocks her over. She squeezes him tightly and kisses his head before he's trying to struggle to the ground. She juggles him down as she also tries to reach in to grab his backpack, and when she turns around, he's already dashed away to his friends. Mal sighs and shuts the door as Ben chuckles softly. As soon as she's gone, Ben turns around to Zach.
"Hey, bud?" He calls, and Zach looks up from his book. Ben nods to it. "Who are you reading about?"
"Grandma and Grandpa," Zach replies, glancing back down to his place. "This is talking about them getting married."
"Okay," Ben nods and then glances out to make sure Mal isn't returning yet. She's not. She and Tyler are easily recognizable from twenty feet away, where the two purplettes exchange a hug before the bell rings inside and Mal waves goodbye to him. Other parents and teachers stand around, glancing cautiously at the queen as her vibrant-haired son romps inside with his friends. "Listen, bud, if you have any questions about Grandma Maleficent or Grandpa Hades, it might be better to ask Dad first alone and I can answer it or tell you if Mom would be better to answer it."
Zach looks a little caught-in-the-headlights as he stares at Ben sheepishly. Ben smiles to comfort him as he sees Mal start to make her way back to the car. "You're okay to ask questions. We're not going to hide things from you. But it can be a bit hard for mom to remember, okay?"
"Okay," Zach nods.
Mal opens the door and gets in with a little exhale. She buckles her seatbelt and then smiles at the two of them, completely unaware. Zach looks back down at his book as Ben leans over and squeezes her hand. "Ready for guitar?" Mal asks Zach.
"Yeah," Zach responds carelessly, then looks over the top of his book at her. "Mom?" He calls, and Ben glances in the rearview mirror at him automatically to make sure that he's not about to ask another Maleficent question. Mal turns to show Zach that she heard and the book goes down a little more to reveal more of Zach's face, which Ben thinks looks more like Mal's and less like his every day. "I love you," he tells her.
A smile blooms across Mal's face. It's the same sort of thing that she used to do when he'd make her blush as teens. "I love you too, baby," she whispers.
Zach furrows his brow. "How come I get to be called baby and Tyler gets to be called Beastie?" He asks.
Mal laughs. "Well, when I first learned I was going to have a baby, I didn't know if you'd be a boy or a girl or what your name would be, so I just called you 'Baby'. And then you became Baby when you were born. But then Tyler came along and I had to come up with another nickname for him. I couldn't give him yours."
"I think you should come up with a new one, mom," Zach recommends. "I could be dragon. Or something else that's cool."
"Hmm," Mal makes a face as if she's considering it, but Ben knows she'll never change his nickname. Zach changed her life and he's always going to stay small enough to fit in her hands in her head. Even when he's fifty, he's always going to be her baby. "We'll see."
She turns to watch the road with him and he tangles their fingers together around the shift of the car as he drives. The radio plays softly and he can hear Zach turning pages, about one every twenty-eight seconds, in the back. Mal finally closes her eyes and leans her head back into the seat in this way that makes her seem young and careless and makes his heart start thudding in his chest. They're just turning into Zach's Guitar studio when they hear him unbuckle and lean up into the front with his index finger on a term he has a question on. "Mom, dad?" He calls.
"Hmm?" Mal asks, turning her head to listen to him.
"What's the Isle of the Lost?"
There's a beat of silence where Mal opens her eyes and stares at the page, uncomprehending. Ben barely has time to park the car before she's withdrawing into herself, clapping a hand over her mouth and leaning back into the seat with tears filling her eyes. Ben unclicks his seat belt, leans across Zach, and pulls her head against his chest before she can start crying. Ben gives Zach a shaky smile as Mal starts to gasp and shake into his shoulder. "I'll tell you later, bud. Have a nice time at guitar."
Later that same night, Ben and Mal go to sit on Zach's bed. He glances between them with a little fear in his eyes as they sit on either side of him. They already decided how this conversation should go, and exactly how they should filter things for their seven-year-old.
"You've been asking some very grown-up questions lately," Mal begins, leaning into the wall and inviting Zach to lean against her side. Ben stretches out, leaning on his elbows and running a comforting hand up and down Zach's spine. "Dad and I had to think about how we should answer you. I'm sorry I scared you today."
Zach doesn't respond. He just wraps his tiny arms around her midsection and cuddles into her further. Ben shifts his weight a little more towards the small child. "It's good to ask questions," He whispers. "We want you to feel like you can talk to us. We might not have the answers right away and sometimes things are harder for us to talk about, but we'll always try and help explain things."
Mal pulls Zach onto her lap and starts combing her fingertips through his hair, which matches Ben's straight down to the texture and style. She kisses his forehead and lets him hug her a little longer before she asks: "Why were you reading about Grandma and Grandpa?"
"Because," Zach starts in a little whisper. "I'm gonna be king one day and kings have to know a lot about where they live."
Mal pouts. "Baby, you're not gonna be king for a long, long time," she frowns. "Don't throw your childhood away. You can worry about the crown later."
"But that was very thoughtful of you," Ben butts in, raising an eyebrow at Mal. "You know that you could have asked us, right? We would have told you."
"But I like books," Zach reminds him, and Ben snorts.
"Okay, champ. Well, what questions do you have about your book?"
Zach leans towards his headboard, where sits the Auradon history book. He cracks it open and points to scribbles in the margins of the book. "Why was Grandma Maleficent in charge of the evil guys?" he asks.
Mal's lower lip wobbles. "Because she was the evilest of them all," She replies. "And she had magic, so she was very powerful."
"I think Judge Frollo was eviler," Zach mutters as he writes the answer in underneath the question. "He burned people inside houses."
Ben silently disagrees. The longer he's married to Mal, the more deserving he thinks her mother is of the title 'Mistress of all Evil'.
"Why were Grandma and Grandpa in charge of the good guys?" Zach asks, turning the page to show a photo of a mural of Belle in her yellow dress, dancing with the Beast.
"Because Grandma was very smart and knew how to get people to listen to her," Ben explains. "She wasn't as smart as you, though."
Zach mostly ignores the compliment as he flips a few pages forward to show them a map. "What's the Isle of the Lost?" He repeats, pointing to the dark scatters of shadowy cliffs and rocky beaches that make up the jagged place Mal used to call home.
Mal lets out a long, slow breath, and Ben realizes that she needs to do a lot more of this conversation than he originally anticipated. "The Isle of the Lost is where Grandpa lives. You've been there, remember? There's a big, long, white bridge? Dad and I put it up." She puts her finger down on the label on Zach's map. "But before Dad and Mom knew each other and before Grandpa Hades was allowed to come over here, it was a big jail for bad people. And I was born there, so I was trapped in with all the bad people."
"With Grandma?" Zach asks.
Mal nods. "Yes, I had to live with my mom just like you have to live with me. But my mom wasn't very nice to me."
"Were you abused?" Zach asks, innocently enough.
Ben's mouth drops open. "Where'd you learn about that?" He asks.
Zach points to his favorite book - his dictionary - and recites "Abuse; harmful treatment of a person or an animal."
Mal draws Zach's attention back to her using two fingers under his chin. "That's a hard question for Mom," she tells him. "Grandma wasn't very nice to me, but neither were a lot of people. Let's think of it like this, Zach. Let's say we have a friend who likes to hurt people. And they don't care if they get in trouble. So you send them away so they don't hurt anyone. Like a jail, right?" Zach nods along to her words. "Well, the Isle was where we sent everyone who wanted to hurt other people. But just because there wasn't anyone nice to hurt doesn't mean they stopped being mean. They just all hurt each other. My mom hurt my dad and my mom's friends hurt her and it was dangerous because it was like a game to some people. A game where they try to hurt you. And that's where Mom, Evie, Jay, and Carlos were born."
"So everyone wanted to hurt you?" Zach deadpans, looking extremely disappointed in the figurative friend Mal described. "Why didn't you leave?"
Mal hesitates. "Well... it was a prison for bad people. And Grandma and Grandpa thought that because our parents were bad, so were we. So we were trapped too."
Zach draws a fingertip down the spine of his book. "So you were trapped with lots of people who wanted to hurt you until Dad became King and said that you should come to see Auradon," he puzzled out.
"You've been reading ahead," Ben mumbled, staring at the book and spotting a bookmark near the end.
Zach nods and slumps into Mal's side. He rests a hand on her ribcage as he thinks about everything. "Mom?" He asks softly. "Were you evil?"
Mal looks like she's fighting back tears as she swallows and says: "A little, baby. Mom was a little evil."
"She wasn't evil," Ben disagrees. "She just didn't know what good was."
"Did you do bad things?" Zach asks.
It takes a long, long time for Mal to formulate an answer. Finally, she chooses the simple and truthful, "Yes."
"Why?" Zach frowns, sticking out his lip in a perfect pout that he inherited from her.
"Well, at first it was because people wanted to hurt me. Then it was all I knew how to do. And then it was because I wanted to show off and be mean. I wanted to be like everyone else." Mal does her best to explain, but she trips and fumbles up her words as she goes.
"What sort of bad things did you do?" Zach asks. Ben looks up to make sure she's holding herself together well enough to answer.
She kisses his head and combs his hair to the side. "I'll tell you that when you're a little older," She whispers. "And not before bed. I don't want to give you nightmares."
"Dad gets nightmares when she tells him things," Ben confides to his son. "And he's been listening for a long, long time."
"Does Mom get nightmares?" Zach asks. He looks up at Mal for an answer. Ben wishes there was an easy one. Not something that is like: "Every night, but sometimes more than others. Most of the time she can forget her own nightmares. Then other nights she wakes me up because she's holding onto me. And other nights she wakes herself up screaming and begging invisible monsters not to hurt her or me or you..."
"Sometimes," Mal whispers in the dark. "But I'm a big girl. I can deal with them."
Zach nods, gives her one last squeeze, and lies down. "I'm glad I live in a castle," he yawns, "And not in a prison."
Mal chuckles as she pulls the covers up around him and tucks him in. "Me too, baby," she whispers. "Goodnight."
Tyler turns six at the beginning of December and they celebrate by organizing a skating party with his friends from school along with a bunch of his cousins. Tyler blends right in with Evie's vibrant haired twins, and his spontaneity is only combated by Jay's two sons. Zach skates and then talks with the other parents and some of the older children for about two hours and then dozes off into his dad's side with a book.
On the way home with two little boys chattering in the backseat wildly, Ben takes a high overpass and they stop by a fast food joint for ice cream. The royal family crowds into a booth near a window and Mal barely manages to get Tyler's shoes off before he's off to play on the giant indoor jungle gym they have here. She sighs irritably, kicking his shoes under his chair, and puts her head down on the table. Ben laughs and rubs her back while Zach calmly removes his shoes and stows his book safety behind the salt and pepper in case ice cream happens to get on the table while they play. "Did you know that the first jungle gym was patented by Sebastian Hinton before Auradon was even formed?" He asks. "And that government regulation requires at least a foot of cushioning material underneath them?"
"I knew that," Ben nods. "Do you know why?"
"Because a fall from more than six feet can be lethal, especially if you're not landing on your feet," Zach replies.
"You can jump from higher if you don't lock up your joints and roll with the fall," Mal yawns noncommittally. "I once jumped from three stories up, had my fall broken by cardboard about halfway down, and rolled when I hit the ground. Didn't even bruise my ankle."
"That's dangerous, Mom," Zach deadpans. "Even a fall from ten feet can crush your spine. Gravity makes you accelerate to the ground at a rate of nine-point-eight-meters-per-second-squared. and you can't level out your acceleration at that point either, so you can't reach free fall."
Mal groans. "Well, I could tell you about the speed up thing you were talking about, but I don't know all the numbers."
"That's high school curriculum," Ben furrows his brow at Zach. "What have you been reading?"
Zach shrugs. "I found some big books in the back of the library. I don't like the one on chemistry, but the biology and physics ones are interesting. I also found some math books. Right now I'm reading about how they discovered the number for pi."
Ben drums his fingers on the table in thought and hums. "We need to go get you tested," He hums. "See what level you're at."
"According to the national standardizing system, I'm at an eleventh-grade reading level, a ninth-grade math level, a tenth-grade science, and a fourth-grade writing level. Also, I have lots of random knowledge," Zach informs them.
"I'd believe it," Mal sighs.
Ben snorts and nods towards the playground. "Go play, Zach. Keep your brother from beating anyone up for us, please?"
Zach nods and bounds off towards the structure. As he disappears into the towering plastic tubes, Mal says a little prayer of thanks that her son, despite how advanced he is, still finds joy in jungle gyms and recycled plastic forts. "Whose bright idea was it to have a son who's smarter than both of us?" She sighs.
"It's not that bad," Ben sighs, wrapping his arms around her and kissing her hair. "It's going to be interesting to see what he does."
He squeezes her body closer to him and Mal closes her eyes and groans again. "Now," she sighs, "If only Tyler could lose a little energy. Goodness, gracious."
Zach and Tyler come tumbling out of the slide together, laughing their heads off, and then take off towards the swings which hang under the fort and which you can swing back and forth on. Mal finds Ben's hand around her waist and squeezes it. "I like this," She whispers. "This is nice."
"It is," Ben agrees.
They stay for an hour or so. Long after the ice cream is finished and when Mal is half asleep, Ben finally calls them to get their shoes on. With flushed red faces and sweaty bodies, they clamber back out to their table where Ben and Mal start helping them get ready to go.
"It's really fun when we do things like this together, huh?" Ben asks as he helps Tyler slide his shoes onto his feet. "I like it when you guys play nice together."
"I like it when we fight," Tyler yawns, stretching his arms above his head.
Ben hides a smile as he finishes double-knotting Tyler's laces on one shoe and then glances at Zach. "Zach's been a really good older brother to you," he reminds Tyler. "Do you think you'd be a good older brother too?"
"No," Tyler frowns. He crosses his arms, daring Ben to refute his statement.
Zach pauses where he's been pulling on his coat and squints at Ben. Mal laughs - they look like twins when he does that. "Are you and mom having a baby?" He asks.
Zach's mouth falls open and his eyes grow wide in comic shock. Ben nods, trying to hold back a smirk, and pulls Zach towards him so he and Tyler stand side-by-side. "We're going to have another baby in our family in May," he announces slowly. "We don't know what it'll be yet, but we do know that Mom's going to be very tired until them, okay? So she might not be around as much."
"That's okay," Tyler straightens up. "So long as it's a boy and he doesn't get any of my toys. Also, if mom has to go to bed early, that's fine, but I think I should be allowed to stay up later while you tuck Zach in."
Ben hummed, sending a glance at his oldest as Zach rolls his eyes. The truth is that Zach is getting older now. Bedtime routines are shorter. He doesn't want them around when he's reading and he doesn't need lots of hugs or kisses before he goes to bed. Some nights he doesn't even wait for them in his room. He comes and waits in the living room, talks with them a little before bed, and then with a hug and kiss each walks himself off. His bedtime has, without Tyler's knowledge, been moved back. So long as he gets up on time, it'll stay that way.
Ben scoops up his youngest, soon-to-be middle child, into his arms and pokes his side where he's ticklish while Tyler writhes. Zach scoops up his book into his arms and then goes to Mal and holds out a hand to help her up. She chuckles a little at the help and then picks him up too. Zach, however, frowns and pushes her away a little. "Mom!" He whines. "I'm too big to be held! I wanna walk."
Tyler, upon hearing his older brother's words, starts beating his fists against Ben's shoulders. "Me too!" He exclaims. "I'm a big kid, dad! I can walk to the car by myself!"
"Race you there," Zach challenges, a competitive glint in his eyes that usually isn't there. Ben sets Tyler down and the purple-haired kid narrowly avoids running into the table in his haste to race his older brother. Both boys run out into the snow and begin fighting over the handles on the car.
Mal looks heartbroken. Her hands are miming the action of holding something, trying to understand when Zach became too big for her to carry. Sure, he's been getting heavier for the last few years, but now that he's told her, it's breaking her heart. Ben stares for a few seconds as he unlocks the car and the kids clamor in. Then he walks over and hugs her as she hides her face in his shoulder and calms back down. Before she can pull away to follow the children outside, he catches her face and whispers in her ear "Are you too big to be held?"
Mal gives him an odd look, and then he sweeps her off her feet. She yelps as he hooks an arm under her knees as she locks her hands around his neck. He carries her out past the other patrons, who are laughing, and into the car where the two kids are whining, begging for them to start the car. She laughs as the snow falls on their faces and when he sets her down on the hood, with the boys still complaining in the car, to kiss her, she responds with equal, almost childish vigor. Ben can't hear Zach and Tyler groaning and complaining in the car, but he sees them turn away, covering their eyes and pretending to barf, and can't stop the bubbling laugh that rises inside of him.
On December twenty-third, Ben gets off work long past the boy's bedtime and finds his and Mal's rooms empty. He checks both of the boy's rooms since Mal is sometimes prone to go cuddle with one of them before bed. Both love physical affection, something they inherited from both of them. Zach and Tyler are both still up and reading and playing quietly in their rooms, which isn't a problem, but he still asks them to go to bed soon.
He's just texting Mal to ask where she's vanished off to when the door to their room flies open and she stumbles in, dropping plastic shopping bags to the ground and clutching her hair. She kicks the door closed and turns to fling her gloves and scarf to the ground with a feral scream.
He stays still and blinks several times before he dares to ask "What happened?"
Mal starts wiping frustrated tears out of her eyes as she collapses down onto the bed and tugs herself into his side, seeking immediate comfort. "I took the boys to Evie's today and they were so impressed with the way she decorated her kid's presents. She has pretty paper and fancy folds and the bows are all pretty and they said her house looks like a Christmas card. So I thought I should try and go the extra mile and make things look nice here too. And I was going to make a 3D paper dragon and a 3D paper beast like I used to do in High School to put on each of their presents."
She pauses here, wiping streams of tears away and takes a deep breath. "But I didn't have the right kind of paper, so I had to put the boys to bed early and Tyler fought me, and then I had to go out but my car is low on gas so I took yours and traffic was horrible and three stores didn't have the type of paper I needed so I went all the way out to Cinderellasburg-" She flings her hand outwards, presumably to indicate Cinderellasburg even though she's more closely gesturing to Arendelle on the opposite side. "And they didn't have the right size cut so I waited extra while they cut it and I was trying to get home so I pulled out too fast-"
"You were in a crash?" Ben panics, staring at her in shock.
"Just a small one," Mal frowns miserably. "But - you won't believe this - there was a Christmas Tree festival right next door and cameras out and when they heard the brakes screeching everyone turned around and-"
"You were caught on Live Television sliding into someone," Ben realizes, chuckling a little at her misfortune. "I'm sorry, Mal."
Mal sniffles. "And then traffic was horrible and I got here and realized I got the wrong shade of green," She finishes. "This green looks like a lime was sunburned and cried itself to sleep."
Ben hesitates. There're a couple of different ways he could go about comforting her, and he starts by giving her a long hug as she starts to calm down. "You know you don't have to make them dragons and beasts," he mumbles. "They're kids. They're just going to rip the paper off anyway."
"But I want them to look nice," Mal whines. "I want them to have nice presents and nice wrappings like Evie's kids do."
"They do look nice," Ben sighs. "You spent an entire night last week wrapping them." All of Zach's have the royal crest on them and are blue and gold and all of Tyler's are purple and green with stripes. "They're not going to love you any less for not doing origami on top of them, I swear."
"But I have to at least try!" Mal snaps, sitting up and pulling at her hair. "If they don't turn out okay and if I ruin them and if evil really can be inherited and if anything my mother said about me is true then the very least I can say when one of them tries to destroy Auradon is that I tried to be a good mom and I tried to teach them what they needed and I tried to wrap their presents nicely at Christmastime."
"You're not going to ruin them," Ben groans. They've had this conversation over and over throughout the years. She never can believe him. "And a Christmas present decoration isn't going to tip that scale."
Mal shakes her head still and refuses to look at him. Finally, Ben sighs. "I'm sure they'll love it," he says. "But will you have time to finish? Christmas is in two days and you still need to sleep."
"It shouldn't take me too long," Mal sighed. She puts her feet underneath her and wanders over to where she dropped her shopping bags. Ben follows her and helps her pick everything up and put it on their bed. As he leans over, he sees a bit of purple hair in the living room, just behind the couch. He whips his head around and it's gone, but Ben's been with Mal and her friends for too long to write it off as imagination. He drops everything on the bed and marches back into the living room while Mal starts opening things and muttering instructions to herself under her breath.
No one is in the living room, so Ben opens the door to the hall and finds both boys sitting against the wall, whispering. They both stop and look up sheepishly when he crosses his arms in disappointment. Tyler looks madder to be caught. Zach just looks embarrassed.
"Do I want the explanation?" Ben asks slowly. Tyler looks at him in confusion at the bigger word. Zach just looks at the ground.
"We wanted to see our presents," Zach admits, blowing his bangs out of his face. He needs a haircut. "We're sorry."
"Sorry that you found us," Tyler mutters. Ben snaps. He reaches down and seizes Tyler's hair and uses that to haul him to his feet. Then, he gets down on his knees and glares at him.
"Well, I'm sorry you're sneaking around and breaking rules and making it so Mom and Dad can't trust you," He snaps. Tyler flinches away with wide eyes. They don't generally get yelled at, these two. Tyler's a little wild, but Mal usually keeps a close enough eye on him that there isn't a lot of wrongdoing he can do. He's obviously taking advantage of her bad day and recent exhaustion. Zach has never really needed the supervision. It makes Ben wonder how his oldest got weaseled into this scheme.
Ben swats Tyler's butt and pushes him in the direction of his room. "Go to bed," He calls, using the scary authoritative tone that makes meeting rooms still and which is guaranteed to make the two kids quake. Tyler's face goes red and tears start running down his face as he balls up his fists and stomps away. He slams his door when he reaches it. It's a great sacrifice of pride for Ben not to pull him back and really lay into him for that attitude. Zach, the moment he hears Ben start to yell, jumps up and sprints in the direction of his room. Ben hears the door closing a little too hard but knows Zach isn't trying to throw a tantrum - he's just trying to escape.
Ben pokes his head back into the room. Mal is standing in the doorway of their room, looking regretful. She's probably heard him yell maybe three times before, and only once at her when she tried to use her spellbook on him after he'd caught her lying. He waves her concerns off and then shuts the door into the hall as he heads down towards the boy's room. In Tyler's room, he's flinging toys at the ground in anger with hot-headed tears running off his cheeks. Ben picks him up, puts him in his bed, and goes around picking up some of Tyler's favorite toys and action figures to take away for a little while. Tyler just buries his face in his pillow and screams. He's tried throwing temper tantrums before, but Mal will use magic if he starts screaming aloud. He's still very good at making it clear he's angry, but at least his mother has trained him well enough. Ben locks the door from the outside as he leaves. He'll have to remember to unlock it before he goes to bed so Tyler can still go down the hall to the restroom if he needs it.
In Zach's room, the lights are out and it is dark and Ben doesn't see his son sitting in the corner of the room until he hears the hiccups and sees the hall lights reflecting off crocodile tears. He sets Tyler's confiscated toys by the door and goes to sit against the wall beside Zach, who recoils. Ben holds out an arm and after a few long seconds of hesitation, Zach hesitantly rolls into his dad's side and takes hold of his shirt as he cries. "I'm sorry," he cries. "I'm sorry. Please don't be mad at me."
"I am mad," Ben frowns. "You were sneaking around and you were eavesdropping on Mom and I. I trusted you to be better than that."
Zach begins sobbing. Ben's heart aches a little. He tugs Zach's chin up - he has a lot of Mal's features in his face -
and wipes his tears away. "Deep breaths," he whispers and Zach hiccups as he tries to calm down. "Now, Mom is working very hard on this Christmas for you two. I know it's hard to wait, but I need you to act maturely. You've got a big brain and you're very smart, so use it. Do you understand me?"
Zach nods furiously and then Ben pulls him in for another hug until Zach's breathing returns to normal against his chest. His son is about a third as tall as he is, he realizes. Maybe he's half of Mal's height too.
"Dad?" Zach whispers as he wipes the last of the tears away with the back of his sleeve, "What did Grandma tell Mom?"
The question catches him off guard. "What do you mean, champ?"
"Mom said 'if everything my mother said about me is true'," Zach quotes. "What did Grandma say to her?"
Ben sighs and rubs a hand up and down Zach's back. This is Mal's personal stuff he's digging into, and he doesn't want to go too deep. "Your Grandma," he sighs, tightening his grip around Zach's body, "Is as evil as they come. I don't like her at all. When Mom and I got married, her mom used to tell her that it wouldn't work out and that I was going to get bored with her. She said that I only wanted to marry someone from the Isle to look good and I picked her because she was very powerful on the Isle. And she said that if she and I had any kids together, then they'd be just as evil as she was because evil runs in her blood."
"Evil can't run in blood," Zach hiccups. "There isn't any genetic material for evil. All that's in blood are antigens and blood cells and plasma and nutrients."
"Well, you know that, and I know that, but she thinks otherwise," Ben sighs. "That's why Mom stopped talking to Grandma when she learned she was gonna be your mom. She didn't want to hear Grandma talk about you."
"Does Grandma know I'm here?" Zach asks, sitting up and then sliding to lean against the wall beside Ben.
Ben chuckles. "Well, I assume so, but we don't talk to her. You were kinda announced to the whole kingdom and there was a big coronation, remember?"
Zach nods even though logically there's no way he remembers that day. He has no clue about Mal's panic attacks and how she used to refuse to allow herself to be around Zach, sure that some evil that still resided on her would taint him. No idea how hard far she stretched herself to protect him from prying eyes, judging whispers, and a past that still follows in her shadow wherever she goes.
"Dad?" Zach asks, rubbing his eyes a little. He's gotten older and he now rubs his eyes the way Ben does - with his fingertips instead of his fists. "Is Grandma the reason Mom's so scared we'll grow up bad?"
Ben's hands still. His son is seven, still. How is he supposed to explain this to a seven-year-old? But, he figures, if Zach is able to ask the question, he's probably old enough to receive most of the answer. "Well, bud, that's a tough one," he sighs. "Give me a moment to think about how to respond."
Zach still sniffles every once in a while, but aside from that, everything is silent. Finally, Ben clears his throat. "Grandma... She wasn't a great mom. So, mom doesn't feel like she can be that great because she doesn't have a good example. She kinda just follows me and tries to not do what Grandma would do."
"What would Grandma do?" Zach mumbles.
Ben exhales. "Grandma... yelled a lot. She used to hit mom. Mom couldn't come home because she'd lock her out and sometimes she'd throw mom's stuff out in the street and she'd take money from other people who wanted to hurt mom."
"So she'd sell mom?" Zach asks softly. Ben can only nod.
"Yeah. She would." He pauses to think of other, specific things. "She used to tell mom that she wasn't good enough to be her daughter and that if she didn't do well enough then Grandma would just replace her with someone better."
"That's not how it works," Zach protests, sitting up. "What would have happened to mom? You can't just get rid of her."
Ben swallows. "Well, Zach, Grandma was talking about how she would kill mom. And she tried a couple of times."
Zach takes this ragged, hurt breath and Ben squeezes his small body. Partly to give him comfort, partly to comfort himself. "It's okay, though. Mom's tough. She took care of herself and now we don't talk to Grandma anymore."
"The Isle of the Lost sounds horrible," Zach hiccups and then slowly pushes away and sits up on his knees. "I'm sorry for sneaking. I thought mom had already wrapped the important things and so it wouldn't matter as bad."
"Well, you picked a bad day," Ben sighs, rubbing his eyebrows. "But it's okay. Just don't do it again."
Zach nods and gets to his feet before crouching down for one last hug. Ben watches his son go sit down on his bed and slowly gets to his feet himself. Zach pulls the covers up himself but doesn't protest when Ben fixes them even tighter around him and then kisses his hair before he leaves.
"Tyler," Ben calls, shaking his son's shoulder on Christmas morning. "Tyler, it's time to get up."
"No, it's not!" Tyler moans, pulling up his pillow and burying his purple hair underneath it. "It's never time to wake up. It's always time to sleep."
'Mood,' Ben agrees silently. "Alright," he sighs, standing back up. "I guess I'll have to tell Zach and Mom that they can split your presents because you don't want them." Immediately, Tyler flings the pillow, which is steaming a little, against the wall and jumps out of bed. He runs straight into Ben and then pushes his way through his legs to get to the door. Ben sighs in frustration but laughs at his antics nonetheless. He can hear Tyler hollering "It's Christmas!" Down the hall as he goes.
He follows his son to the Living Room and finds both anxious boys waiting beside the door he purposefully locked. He snorts as they bounce from one foot to the other and makes a big show of searching his pockets for the key. "I don't have it," He chuckles finally, and they both groan. Tyler jumps at him and shoves his tiny hand into Ben's pocket.
"Yes, you do!" He shouts. "You big, fat dragon-liar!"
"No, I don't," Ben laughs, backing up a little. "But, I bet that if you knock really, really softly, a fairy will hear you and open the door."
Immediately, both boys jump to the door. Tyler pounds on the door with hammering fists that rattle the hinges and Zach shoves his shoulder.
"No, Tyler!" Zach hisses. "Dad said softly!" He raises a tentative fist to the door and taps very, very softly against it. Immediately, the knob lights up green and clicks. Tyler twists it so hard Ben hears a pop that makes him wince, and then both boys poke their heads in and gasp in shock. Ben smiles.
Behind the door lies a paper winter wonderland. Hundreds of snowflakes that their family made yesterday spin on the ceiling, and presents are spread out among sparkly paper on the couches. Everything is separated into five sections. Zach's things cover one of the loveseats in shades of bright blue and with origami Beast's acting as an additional identifier. Tyler's are pushed a little bit more away from everyone else's and cover the floor behind the tree. Several long, purple and green dragons protect his horde. Ben and Mal's share the couch with modest white wrapping and beautiful, colorful bows on top. Then, in the center, there are some family gifts, most of which will be for the baby that will be here this time next year. The entire room smells like a pine forest and guitar music is playing in the background.
"Christmas!" Tyler shouts at the top of his lungs as Mal appears from behind the door, filming their reactions with her phone camera. He beats his chest with his fists and spins in a circle before thwacking against the couch and falling into a pile of sparkly white paper that Mal set out to resemble snow. Zach stares, openmouthed, at everything before he turns to Mal with an astonished look.
"You did all of this?" He gasps.
Mal looks surprised at his reaction. She nods, wiping the last remnants of her stress out of her eyes. "Yes, baby, Dad and I did this."
"Well, mostly mom," Ben argues. "I helped with her one-thousand snowflakes." He bats at one with an annoyed look. "And she wouldn't even use magic," He finishes with a sour look directed at his wife's camera.
"Thank you!" Zach exclaims, tripping over another wayward pile of paper snow as he rushes to hug her. He buries his face in her midsection when he reaches her and Mal almost drops her phone as she tries to return his hug. She looks absolutely relieved.
Tyler dashes into his pile of presents and lets out a dramatic shout. "We have dragons!" He yells, tugging one of the origami dragon present decorations off of his gifts and putting it on his head. He starts to run around the room, very narrowly avoiding running into Ben, with the dragon's long body flicking up and down with the wind as he goes.
"Dragons?" Zach asks, letting go of Mal and then running to lean over the back of the couch with his presents. He shouts in triumph. "Ha! You have dragons. I have Beasts!" He carefully pulls two up, makes them face each other, and then lets out a vicious roar that makes all of Ben's hairs stand on end. Mal stares in shock until Zach starts giggling and pulling off all of the other origami action figures.
"Dragons have better growls!" Tyler declares, rushing by Zach with his dragon flapping behind him. "Roooaar!" He bellows and jumps onto the empty armchair. However, his growl is more tame, not like Zach's animalistic one. It does have the hints of something demonic behind it, which he probably inherited from Hades and his godly roots but is overall a childish impression that makes Ben laugh as he goes to Mal's side and wraps his arm around her.
"I told you they'd love it," He whispers.
"Shh," Mal whispers with a smile as she leans into his frame, holding both hands to her belly. "I'm allowed to worry."
Tyler pulls off another origami dragon, rumpling the tail a little as he does, and then attaches both to his arms with the tape before stretching out his arms, airplane-style, and continuing his dash around the room. Meanwhile, Zach lines up his Beasts from largest to smallest in pride and then glances over his shoulder to where Ben and Mal are standing, waiting.
"Be right back," Ben whispers and then slips back into the hall. Mal goes to sit in the armchair and watches Zach leave to go pull his and her stockings off the wall. He puts his with his things and then hers with hers, and then he brings back Ben's and the baby's, which is lighter than everyone else's. The baby's he puts at Mal's feet before sitting cross-legged in front of the stuffed loveseat and reaching into his stocking to glance over his new things. A collection of chocolates and candies fall into his lap along with a new toothbrush and toothpaste, socks, and then a breakfast of bananas and tiny oranges. He happily pulls on a new pair of thick socks with the Beast Crest knit into them and then begins to carefully peel his oranges and eat them slice by slice while Tyler dashes around the room. He doesn't bring Tyler's stocking over - probably to punish him for all the extra noise he's making.
Tyler finally collapses with a sigh over Mal's lap, and she chuckles as she runs her fingers through his sweaty hair. He pokes at the stocking by her feet. "Is this mine?" He asks loudly.
"No, Beastie," Mal replies. "That's for Fae. We needed some things to start with her room."
"Fae?" Zach's shoulders slump as he stares up at her. "He's Beastie, they're Fae, and I get baby?"
Mal sighs. "I like your nickname," she tells Zach, leaning over to ruffle his hair as he wrinkles his nose at the contact. "And you know what, no matter where you go and how old you get, you're always going to be my first baby. That's not gonna change."
Zach sinks into the loveseat with a little groan before the door opens again. Tyler is filtering around in the baby's stocking, looking for candies. "There's nothing good in here!" He complains. "It's all binkies and funny rags and socks."
"You have socks and candies and breakfast in your stocking," Mal explains as Ben comes into view behind the loveseat. "I bet that if you ask Zach or Dad really nicely, they'll help you lift it down."
"My hands are full," Ben hums as he puts a mug of hot chocolate down beside Tyler and then another on the table for Tyler. "Zach, can you help Tyler get his stocking down?"
Zach sighs, walks to the wall, and pulls Tyler's black and red stocking down. "Here, Tyler," He says, putting it beside the table. Tyler clambers off of Mal's legs and takes a seat criss-cross-applesauce with his back to the table. He upends his stocking in between his legs and then begins sorting things to find his favorite chocolate bars.
"Thanks, Zach," He mumbles as he unwraps a chocolate cookie bar, dips it in his hot chocolate, and then begins to chew.
Mal sighs. "Beastie, don't forget to eat your breakfast," She reprimands. Ben puts a hand on her shoulder and presses a mug of steaming hot chocolate into her hands, taking care to squeeze her fingers before withdrawing to sit on the arm of the loveseat. Mal smiles at him before closing her eyes and sipping her drink.
Ben claps his hands together. "Well, I don't know about you guys, but there's nowhere to sit in here. We need to start going through these presents so we don't have to sit on the floor!"
"Or Mom could move," Tyler hums. "But let's do presents instead. Presents are better than breakfast anyway."
"Finish your banana," Mal commands, raising an eyebrow. "Zach is already almost done with his breakfast." She nods towards Zach, who doesn't look up as he pulls a segment of orange apart and squints at the tiny segments inside.
Tyler picks at the top of his banana and then slowly figures out a way to break into it. As mushy banana bits find their way to stick to his chin, he yanks the plastic bit out of his new socks and puts them on his feet before sticking them in the air to show Mal wordlessly.
Ben stands up and brings over his and Mal's stockings so that they can both locate their own breakfasts. Ben has muffins wrapped in crinkly plastic, and Mal has an abundance of strawberries and grapes. Tyler whines when he sees her strawberries. "Can I have some?" He begs, pulling on her pajama leg.
"You can after your breakfast is done," Mal bribes him. "And after we clean your face off."
They slowly make their way towards unwrapping things. Mal struggles to wipe off Tyler's face as he squirms while Zach waits patiently, tapping his fingers on the first present, which is heavy and has the lines that a hardcover book makes in the side of the paper. When Mal finally releases, Tyler, he practically explodes into his pile while Zach finally slides a golden letter opener under the line of paper.
"Clothes!" Tyler explodes, collapsing against the couch in disappointment. "My first present is clothes?"
Mal only rolls her eyes as Zach carefully puts his wrapping paper behind the couch and holds up his book to show them both with a small smile. "I got the book I wanted!" He exclaims softly.
Mal raises her eyes at the unfamiliar cover and then glances up at Ben. "Is that one from dad?" She asks softly.
"Yeah," Ben affirms. "Now, that book's a really high level, Zach. So if you need any help with it, let us know."
The cover of the book reads "Thompsen's Microbiology and Scientific Metaphysics - fourth edition".
"A textbook?" Mal whispers in confusion.
Ben nods. "He read the first few pages of it when a college student left it at a table," He whispers as Zach puts his book safely underneath the couch, where no hot chocolate spills can reach it, and then begins to look through his other gifts.
Mal can't help but feel like she missed a beat when she compares the things she got for Zach versus the things Ben got for Zach. There's a variety of other books on subjects she can't even begin to understand, among them "ASAP AP Biology", "Cryptological Mathematics", "Big Ideas Math", "Unsolvable Mysteries of the Universe", "Introduction to Biochemistry," "Understanding Psychology", and "Social Problems in Auradon - second edition." He's also got a planner, which she has a vague idea of how to use, two section-divided notebooks and fancy pens, and stickers with things like "Additional Information" or "Sources" on them. Meanwhile, she's given him a variety of clothes, a weighted blanket, a beanbag chair, and then a bookcase. There isn't much difference in how much Zach likes his presents between them, but she can feel the directional differences between her and Ben's methods palpably.
Tyler rips the paper off of his things so quickly that Mal barely has time to get photos in between, and then he gathers everything up on his own beanbag chair and munches on his chocolate while beginning a large Lego Block Kit on his stomach on the floor. The boys are both quiet then, as Zach collapses into his new chair and starts examining his microbiology textbook. Ben reaches over to the couch and hands things to Mal for her to unwrap. "I'm not sure he'll be able to read all those," he whispers in her ear in concern as they watch Zach flip a page and circle something inside the book. "They might be too hard for him."
Mal swallows and draws the tape back on her gift. She tries to ignore the fear twisting in her stomach. Part of her agrees with Ben. Metaphysics isn't exactly a third-grade subject, and Zach is turning eight next summer. He'd only be in the second grade if he was enrolled. There's no way he should be able to read anything in there. But the other, devilish part of her whispers: "What if he can read them? What if he is that advanced? What then?"
When the paper is all cleared away and everything wrapped has been uncovered and discovered, then Ben clears his throat and both boys look up. "Zach, we have one more thing that Mom and I have decided to give you." He puts his hand over Mal's as she takes a little breath. "But this comes with a lot of responsibility and there's going to be lots of rules attached."
Zach closes his book. "Yeah?" He asks, perking up a little in anticipation. Ben lifts the pillow on the couch and reveals a small box, about the size of Ben's palm, hidden there. Zach stands up, takes the gift, and then with one glance towards his parents, slowly unwraps it. Tyler leans forward in excitement, making wild guesses.
"Is it chocolate?" He demands as Zach rips a corner back. "Or is it a game? Or another book?"
But Zach pulls the paper back to reveal a slick white case, and his mouth drops open in comic shock. His eyes are wide and his cheeks flushed as he turns around a box with a photo of a phone on it. Tyler howls when he recognizes it. "No fair!" He says. "I want one!"
"When you're older," Ben shakes his head. Mal pulls the sulking child into her arms as Zach looks back down at the box in shock.
"Now, this is a tool," Ben explains, leaning forward as Zach slowly lifts the top and pulls out a blue-backed smartphone. "Mom and I know that you like to hang out in the library and wait for us, and we also know that you're reading a lot of advanced stuff and you won't always understand it. This is to help you find more information and also get in contact with Mom and Dad. We're going to put filters on what you can search though, and you have to leave it in our room at night, and we're going to search it, but this is yours."
"You can order your phone case," Mal mumbles. "Find a design you like and if you need help, let us know."
"This is so cool!" Zach exclaims, reveling in the thrill. He throws himself forward into Ben, and then into Mal. Tyler whines as he's squished in between his mom and older brother. Zach ignores him long enough to kiss Mal on the cheek.
"Go grab my laptop from my office," Ben suggests, "And I'll help you set up your phone and put music and games on it. Okay?"
Zach scrambles off, accidentally slamming the door to the hall in his excitement, and vanishes. Tyler groans from where he drapes himself over Mal's lap. "How come he gets a phone?" He moans. "He's not that much older. Can I have one next year?"
'Absolutely not,' Mal thinks. She already feels guilty giving one seven-year-old a cell phone despite his maturity and intelligence. "When you're ready for it, we'll give you one," she promises Tyler, kissing his forehead. "Zach is a lot older mentally. He's responsible enough for it. When you can remember to brush your teeth by yourself and you don't throw fits and you can clean up after yourself, we'll consider it."
Tyler whines and rolls off of her lap, thudding to the floor. Ben rolls his eyes as his youngest whines into the carpet. "You're really convincing us," He sighs, and then picks Mal up off the armchair to pull onto his lap. Mal curls into him for a second then opens her eyes and reaches for Zach's textbook. She opens it to the page he left it one and sees three six-syllable words circled with question marks beside them. Everything else, it seems, is clear.
Ben hums. "He must be a little further ahead than we thought," he mutters.
Mal feels like she might be sick. She's always known her baby was smart, but she skims the page and feels a headache coming on, she realizes just how far ahead. Her baby boy is officially smarter than her, and she wonders just how much time she has left before he realizes she's a complete idiot.