#I imagine Thad would be texture-sensitive

[brown-little-robin]

7: Things Of His Own

part one | previous | next | ao3

A fantastic illustration by the extraordinary @eyefocusing! I am holding it in my heart always. Little Thad. HELEN.

An envelope slides under his door in late afternoon.

Thad is written on the back with a little flourish under it. Thad traces the curly line a few times, then works his finger under the flap and tears it open.

Thad,

Here is what the family agreed on yesterday.

For now, our promise about your powers stands, but we will work on a solution possibly involving giving you an artificial lightning rod. If we find you a trustworthy adult and limit your powers appropriately, we will let you live with that adult instead of with us.

If you don’t want to do it, we will not force you to go through the procedure, but it might take a while for us to build up trust with each other to the point where you can live on your own or with a non-speedster.

We will get you properly documented. You can go to an online college or be homeschooled if we can’t find you a host this year.

Love,

Max

Thad stares at the letter until the words stop making sense. They’re really doing this? Letting him escape their legacy with no punishment for what he’s done?

He slides the letter back into the envelope and puts it in the pocket of Bart’s old vest. He has to remember to keep it close to him. He will not let this out of his possession until the Allens keep their promises.

That idea lasts until 7:23, when he lies down and accidentally crinkles the envelope. If the jacket was washed with the letter inside, it would be destroyed. And right now, Thad’s not confident enough in his mind to assume he’ll remember to transfer the letter every time.

Hm. He’s never had to manage an important item before, other than the Inertia suit. Normally he’d entrust the physical items to CRAYDL, but CRAYDL’s gone and with it most of Thad’s capacity to function. CRAYDL was the one who made sure he was healthy and protected their lair. CRAYDL would have taken care of the letter.

His chest aches.

No. Stop. He can’t think about CRAYDL right now. He has a letter to hide.

He can’t keep the letter in the room; that’s too obvious. Where’s available to Thad, if not the bedroom? Aha!

He goes to the kitchen and searches the cupboards until he finds a sandwich bag. He sticks the envelope in a bag and seals it. Now it’s waterproof. He goes outside and buries the envelope in the planter by the side of the house. Thad figures it’s all right; Max probably is “watching” him, so if he had an objection he’d have objected by now.

Thad goes to bed jittery. He dreads tomorrow, with its looming “discussion”. But he has a hysterical kind of exultation, too. He can’t believe he argued with the Allen family and won.

He wishes CRAYDL could have seen it.

The kitchen is empty and dark when he ventures out for breakfast. It’s cloudy outside, and no lights are on except for the oven light. For once, Thad has gotten up before breakfast is ready.

Thad goes to sit in his usual chair, but hesitates. The chair has its back to the hallway door, and he really doesn't feel like being startled today. But sitting in Max or Helen’s place is out of the question. He hates this open kitchen design. There’s nowhere to sit with your back to a wall. Unless… Max or Helen removed some of the cupboards since he lived here last, so…

Possessed by a mischievous impulse, Thad climbs onto the counter and sits cross-legged next to the microwave.

Max comes in, adjusting his vest, and turns the light on. Then he notices Thad and just… pauses.

Thad stares back solemnly.

“Good morning,” Max says blandly. “Are chairs too ‘retro’ for you today?”

“No, there are chairs in the future. I mean, I never actually used a real chair in the future, but no.”

“Six centuries and you never used a chair?”

“A real chair. I was almost always in virtual reality in the nutrient womb,” Thad explains seriously.

“Of course. I should have thought of that,” Max says, a shade too dryly.

He gets it! He understands! Thad grins at him. The corners of Max’s mouth quirk.

Max opens the oven. Warmth comes out, a rush of sweet-smelling warm air. Thad clambers off the counter and edges around Max to get closer to the heat. Max gets the oven mitts out and pulls out one of three pans of cinnamon rolls, not the store-bought kind that Helen got once for Thad-as-Bart but fat brown homemade ones.

“Can you put potholders on the table, please?”

Thad speeds over and opens the drawer for the potholders. There’s silverware in it.

“Corner cupboard.”

Thad locates the potholders, chooses one with a design of blueberries and two plain blue ones, puts them on the table, and returns to stand by the oven. Max sets the pans on the potholders and leaves the oven door open a crack.

“Here, warm your hands,” he says. “Like this.”

He puts his big creased-knuckled hands out above the oven door, palms down. Thad mimics him. Ohhh, it’s warm, and the oven has a nice glow to it. It’s mesmerising.

“This is the best part of baking,” Max’s deep voice rumbles from beside him.

Thad keeps staring into the oven.

“Yeah… it’s nice… I wouldn’t have guessed you thought that, though. You keep the house so cold.”

“Ah. I’ll turn the thermostat up. It’s no problem.”

Thad shrugs.

“So. Discussion. Get it over with. I want to enjoy the cinnamon rolls.”

“I don’t have anything specific in mind,” Max says.

Seriously? Thad scoffs.

“Maybe you still get away with being all vague with Bart, but I’m not taking it. Don’t lie to me. What were you going to say last night?”

“Well… I was going to tell you that… it doesn't change my love for you, that you have no lightning rod. I love you just the same.”

Oh. Max seems sincere, but Thad doesn't understand. How? Why?

But he’s tired of arguing.

“Okay.”

“Thad, listen. I love you. Unconditionally. Understand?”

Thad closes his eyes, feels the dissipating heat of the oven on his eyelids. Max stays silent, waiting. Max is patient as a rock, and the cinnamon rolls smell so good. He wants to just say yes and eat breakfast, but he has to know if Max is lying.

He says, “Would you kill me, if you had to?”

“Thad…” Max sighs, disturbing the air, and a puff of heat billows up into Thad’s face. “If I absolutely had to put you down to save lives, I probably would, the same way I’d do that for Jay or Wally. But no matter what you did, I would still love you. Always. That’s what unconditional means.”

“Good,” Thad says.

Max nods.

“Let’s have breakfast.”

As they move to the table, Max says, “You’re a good kid.”

He’s not. But maybe someday. Maybe he’ll be more like one, at least.

“…thanks.”

They eat quietly. The cinnamon rolls are incredible, and they get better when Helen comes in for her lunch hour and laughs at them for forgetting the frosting, then makes enough to share. As they’re cleaning up, Helen says, “Thad?”

He closes the dishwasher. “Yes?”

“If you’re feeling up to going out today, the thrift store is having a sale.”

That could be good. Thad would certainly like to get out of Bart’s old clothes. Absent-mindedly, Thad watches Helen finish sweeping the floor and come over to the dishwasher to hang up the broom.

And Helen leans down and kisses his forehead.

Then she says something, like it was nothing, the kiss. Her lips were on his forehead, dry and warm. She kissed him. She kissed him between his eyebrows like he was a cat.

Thad wants to be a cat and have kisses on his forehead forever.

Helen says, “Thad?”

He blinks.

“Uh, sorry. What?”

Helen smiles. “I could drop you and Max off at the thrift store and pick you up in about three hours when I come home. Would you like to do that, or are you too tired today?”

“I’m fine.”

Thad feels a vicious kind of joy at putting on Bart’s leather jacket to go out. This is the last time he’ll ever put it on. He hunches his shoulders happily against the wind as they go to the car. Never again will Bart’s jacket protect him from the wind. Never again will Bart’s jacket squeak against the leather of Helen’s car’s seats. He should have agreed to go thrift shopping days ago. He steps out of the car with a grin that feels manic even to him and makes Helen chuckle.

Being inside the thrift store, a big rectangular building called Stuff and Nonsense, is decidedly less thrilling. Apparently it’s much busier than normal because of the sale; Thad sticks close to Max and listens carefully to his explanation of thrift shopping.

There’s racks of pants all in rows, and racks of shirts and sweater-type things, arranged by size and then by color, light to dark, a logical arrangement. The orange tags are half off, but he can try anything he likes. If he sees something in his size that he likes, take it and hold it or give it to Max. Once their arms get full, they’ll make their way to the dressing rooms and Thad will try on the clothes, keeping the ones that fit.

Max leads Thad to the pants first, “the boring part,” Max says. Thad is surprised to find literally half of the pants section dedicated to jeans; Bart’s wardrobe had fewer jeans, proportionately. Maybe Bart’s genetics played some part in that, because it only takes a few touches for Thad to decide that these jeans are out of the question. They’re scratchy and stiff and make his whole body feel shivery and wrong.

Thad tries to explain, and Max seems to understand. “Ah,” he says. “You’re sensitive to texture. That explains why you wore such a limited selection of clothing when you were with us before. I wondered about that.”

Another way that Thad is unlike Bart, then. Good.

Thad picks out some formal pants, then some soft shorts. His and Max’s arms fill up quickly; they make a trip to the dressing rooms, small enclosed rooms which remind Thad of his lair. There’s a mirror. Thad changes back into Bart’s pants reluctantly and follows Max to “the fun part”, shirts and sweaters.

The shirts start with the light warm colors, white and yellow and bright pinks and oranges and reds. Max and Thad exchange looks and move on to the cool and dark colors immediately.

Thad hesitates over the greens. He likes the camouflage pattern one all right, but the texture is like blue jeans. The t-shirts could be good. They’re very soft. But t-shirts are so… childish. How is Thad supposed to pass as a college student in a t-shirt? The plaid and the button-downs are better, style-wise, but the first one he touches is fuzzy and scratchy and the next is all stiff. Oh—but here’s a good one, a yellow-green plaid shirt that’s stretchy and soft without being fuzzy. There’s another good button-down further on, a sea-green one with pockets, and a plain grey with a little white seagull logo, and then a gorgeous deep purple button-down with black buttons. Thad laughs in delight and holds it up to Max, who smiles with such fondness that Thad loses whatever he was going to say and turns hastily back to the shirts.

He finds two more plaid shirts, then a t-shirt he makes an exception for because it’s plain black and therefore respectable. Then he picks up a black button-down and disturbs a hitherto hidden sweater. It’s a blue so light he thought it was white for a moment, tucked among a field of black as it is. He picks it up, frowning. Something about it is familiar.

Max says, “That’s odd.”

“Yes…” Thad murmurs.

He takes a closer look. The seams are sewn in white thread, not blue. Oh!

Thad stands on his tiptoes to whisper, “It’s your color, Max! It’s your lightning!”

Max’s eyebrows lift in recognition. Thad tucks the lightning sweater securely into the crook of his elbow and keeps searching.