the parent trap
CHAPTER FIFTEEN: all of my change spend on you
Remus has a particularly fun run-in. Well. Fun for him.
⁂
Remus laughs along to the chorus of chuckles that erupted after some joke that Grandfather’s made that he doesn’t entirely understand.
Something about Prince Charles? Some kind of current event? Whatever, Remus is glad to laugh at the monarchy regardless.
Uncle Logan reenters the room, a bottle of wine in hand. Remus squints at the bottle and tries his very best to quash the excitement that Papa surely would have had at the sight of such an excellent vintage.
A 1981! Oh, Remus needs to see the label—if that’s an Alsace or a Sauternes vineyard, that’s bound to be a stunning merlot, truly…
“May I have a sip?” Remus blurts out.
The adults all exchange looks with many a raised eyebrow; Grandfather and Uncle Logan look to Dad.
“Well, all right,” Dad says, amused, proferring the glass. “I don’t think you’re going to like it…”
Well, that’s where he’s definitely wrong. Remus takes it, holding it by the stem, and he swills the glass under his nose, taking a healthy sniff.
“Ooh, blackberry, redcurrant…” He takes a sip, smacking his lips in appreciation. “What a bouquet! A bit robust for my tastes, but then I’m partial to the softer California grape. An excellent vintage from the year, the rains really—”
And then Remus remembers Roman knows jack squat about wine and shuts himself up.
Dad and Grandfather exchange an incredulous look, laughing together.
“Did the summer camp have a wine tasting?” Grandfather chortles.
“Oh, Dad, really,” Dad says. “I bet you’re quoting some movie, aren’t you, Roman, they aren’t going to be giving eleven-year-olds wine.”
“Uh, yeah,” Remus says shiftily. “A movie, something like that…”
“Speaking of movies—here, right next to the showings—”
“Oh, Father, you and your papers,” Dad sighs, but he leans in to examine the piece regardless.
“Look at that—they’re reporting that the Concorde can fly you anywhere in half the time…!”
Remus tunes out of this conversation just in time for Uncle Logan to seem to remember something.
“Ah, Roman—this was waiting,” Logan says, handing over a piece of paper.
“A fax? For me?” Remus says.
“From your friend Augustus.”
Remus tries not to panic too obviously as he unfolds the paper.
It’s a sketch of Sammy, barking out a cartoon speech bubble that says 911!!!! as he sprints toward an archway.
An archway with a man with a hand to his chest, the other down on one knee.
Remus falls out of his chair.
“Roman!” All of the adults exclaim in alarm.
“I’m fine!” Remus says, popping back up again. “Um—I guess movies don’t prepare you for wine, I’m feeling a bit light-headed… Dad, would you mind if I stepped out? Got some fresh air?”
“Are you all right?” Dad says. “Would you like me to go with you?”
“No, no, I’ll be all right, just a little woozy, it’s all totally fine—excuse me!”
He sees Dad, Uncle Logan, and Grandfather all exchange a look before he absolutely books it.
⁂
Remus runs as fast as he humanly can, down the street, to the park, and—
“Oi, James!”
Remus almost ignores it entirely and keeps running until he remembers that he’s James.
He slows to a stop, turning to examine the shouter in question: a boy his age, if a bit shorter, sauntering forward with his hands in his pockets and smirking a mile wide.
Remus thinks something very unkind about the stereotypes about British teeth coming from somewhere, but does not say it.
Yet.
“Oi, James, I’m talking to you,” the boy snaps, and the clues click in Remus’s head. Awful teeth—terrible British prep outfit—sneering facial expression... the clues all lead to one thing.
This must be the dreaded Richard Davies.
Oh, yes. It’s obvious the longer Remus looks at him. He’s dressed in a little coat and tie, as if he’s still wearing some sort of uniform; he looks generally unpleasant, even if one were to imagine him pulling any other face than that pathetic way he’s curling his lip. Add in the general air of malaise he’s bringing to cloud over the entirety of the park, empty of people for Davies to swagger past and knock over, there’s no doubting it.
“Come on, crybaby, what are you gonna do?” Davies sneers. “Cry?!”
The proper, British, Roman-esque response would probably be a sharp comment and to walk away. Stiff lip and all that nonsense.
However, Remus is an American and also an asshole.
And also, this jerk is picking on his twin brother.
So he hauls back, forming a fist just like Virgil taught him, and punches Davies in the nose.
Davies goes down like a sack of potatoes, sprawling across the pavement like someone shoving a little kid off the playground.
“You hit me!” Davies wails in shock, clutching his bleeding nose with both hands.
“Damn right!”
Davies does not seem to compute this. It’s like Brits don’t know that classic American adage of talk shit get hit.
“I’m gonna tell!” He sputters.
“Tell!” Remus cackles. “Tell who? It’s an empty park, jackass! Are you gonna go run home crying to your mummy, you coward?!”
He kicks him in the ribs for good measure. Not as painful as he’d like it to be if he’d been wearing proper boots, but he imagines a pointed loafer can’t feel great either from the way Davies curls up, writhing on the ground like the awful little worm that he is.
Remus grabs him by the collar, hauling him upright and shaking him hard.
“You listen to me, Dick Davies,” Remus snarls in his face. “Shit’s gonna go different from now on. If you ever fix your mouth to me like that ever again, you’ll wish for the days I just gave you a bloody nose. You’ll think back on this day with fondness and longing for this compared to what I’ll do to you if you keep talking like that. Get the picture?”
“You—you just wait till school starts again! You’ll regret this!” Davies cries out, and Remus just rolls his eyes.
“You can try to claw whatever status back that you had, but I saw you almost piss yourself when I tapped you,” Remus says. “I’m not worried about school at all, 'cause I’ll bounce you up and down the fucking court like Spalding.”
Remus does a little fake-out lunge toward him, and Davies cringes back with a squeal.
“That’s your cue to run crying home before I start round two, Dickhead Davies,” Remus says helpfully, and Davies at last grasps some semblance of common sense and sprints away.
Remus watches this with a deep sense of satisfaction.
Wait. What was he doing out here again?
Right! The fax!
Remus resumes his sprint for the nearest payphone, flexing out his punching hand as he goes.
⁂
He hastily feeds in as many of the funny-shaped coins into the phonebox it requires and dials with his non-punching hand, as the punching one is starting to ache a bit.
“Hi,” he says, barrelling over the voice of the operator, “I’d like to make a collect call to America, please—”
Remus waits impatiently through the whole process as he has to direct the operator to the phone number of one Parker Knoll in Napa, California, until at last—
“Hello?!” Remus says, then, remembering himself, “Uh, an Augustus Plotka for Remus Parker—”
“Remus?” A voice repeats through the phone.
Virgil! Remus has to clap a hand over his mouth from exclaiming it.
And then, Virgil continues, “Augustus Plotka, huh? That’s the codename you two picked? Remus, I know that’s you, and I know it’s Roman here.”
Remus considers playing dumb for a split second, but—
“Virgil!” Remus cries out, jumping up and down. “Oh my God Virgil it’s you it’s my favorite not-Dad I miss you so much it’s Virgil it’s Virgil—!”
“Remus, slow down,” Virgil says on the edge of a laugh. “Hey there, holy terror, I’ve missed you.”
“I miss you too!” Remus shouts down the phone line. “Did he clue you in? Oh, I’m so happy he clued you in, ‘cause he sent me a fax and it had a distress call in there, what the hell’s going on?!” Then, “Oh my God, I can say hell! They’re way more strict about cussing here, Virgil, I’ve been—”
“Your brother’s a bit busy at the minute,” Virgil says, gently cutting him off, “but I can definitely tell you what’s going on here.”
“Tell tell tell!” Remus says. “Tell me everything! Roman barely knows how to gossip, I think I have to teach him how to break through all that British propriety, but I know Pa’s got a boyfriend now, what’s that all about?!”
There’s a shuffling and the sound of a shut door, which means Virgil’s almost certainly barricaded himself in the pantry.
“His name’s Maddox, and—”
“And you hate him?!” Remus blurts out. “Roman got that far.”
“That’s a bit of a strong,” Virgil begins, then wavers on the whole proper parental advice thing and whispers, “okay, fine, yes, I hate him, I gave Roman carte blanche to be full nuts before I realized he wasn’t you because I thought you’d break them up, which I know is awful of me to put on you—”
“No, are you kidding?! That would be so fun!”
“Yeah, I thought you might say something like that,” Virgil says.
And then he hesitates.
He hesitates a lot. Enough that Remus has to feed another coin into the machine.
“Virgil?” Remus prompts. “Virgil, what’s happened?”
“Remus,” Virgil says, his voice very gentle. “Your Pa’s getting married.”
Remus laughs. Because there’s just—there’s no way that that’s what Virgil just said. There’s no way!
“What do you mean?” He says. “Getting married. What do you mean?!”
“Black ties, white suits, right in the vineyard,” Virgil says grimly. “Maddox wants them to tie the knot in three weeks.”
“Three weeks?!” Remus yelps. “Aren’t weddings supposed to take forever to plan?!”
“Yeah, well. Maddox is eager to jump the gun.”
Remus growls.
“So I’d imagine that’s part of the distress call Roman sent,” Virgil continues.
“Of course it is,” Remus says, “this puts a major wrench in the whole getting—”
Remus stops himself. Probably too late.
“Hm,” Virgil says, then, taking mercy on him, “Yeah, I bet a wedding would probably put a wrench in you guys getting your time in with your other fathers, wouldn’t it.”
Remus sighs in relief. Either Virgil knows that part of the plan is getting their parents back together, or he just decided to not look into it too much.
Wait, this is Virgil speaking; of course he knows. Virgil overthinks about everything.
“I can’t believe it,” Remus says. “Pa, getting married. Has he absolutely lost his mind?”
“It feels like it, some days,” Virgil says grimly. “It’s like Maddox has put some kind of spell on him.”
“Or a curse, more like.”
Virgil huffs out a laugh. “Or a curse. Patton’s so close to snapping out of it sometimes, so close, you should have seen the look on his face today when—oh, you are not gonna believe this—”
“What?” Remus says, clutching the phone tightly with both hands.
“Maddox,” Virgil says snidely, “has decided that the house is simply too big, and in order to call me to and fro to fulfill his every whim, I am now being called over via bell.”
Remus’s jaw drops. “You’re kidding.”
“I’m not,” Virgil says.
“God, a bell,” Remus says. “Like you’re an animal that needs to be trained.”
“Yeah, like I’m Pavlov’s dog or something, except instead of getting ready for food, I’ll be associating that damn bell with Debbie Jellinsky’s evil twin.”
“Hey, don’t talk down on us evil twins,” Remus says mildly, “I need good representation in media too.”
Virgil laughs, which was the goal.
“So he’s treating you like some kind of servant?”
“I do technically work for your Pa, kid.”
“Yeah, okay, whatever,” Remus says, “but you’re part of the family, too. And even if you did just have a working relationship and nothing else with my Pa, that’s no reason to treat service workers like crap! Seriously, a bell! And Pa didn’t break up with him right then and there?!”
“He looked real embarrassed, I’ll tell you that much,” Virgil says. “Went all red in the face. We’ll Have Words about it later.”
Ohh, We’ll Have Words. That’s Pa-and-Virgil code for let’s not disagree in front of Remus, not that they argue a lot anyway.
“So there’s some hope for him seeing that Maddox, like. Sucks.”
“Yeah, I’d say that for sure.”
“Hm,” Remus murmurs. “Very interesting…”
“I thought you’d think that.”
They’re quiet for a little longer, trying to listen to the other one breathe cross-continentally.
Then, “I just can’t believe he wants to get married that quickly.”
“Oh, Remus,” Virgil sighs.
“I mean—married,” Remus repeats. “You’d think he’d learn after the first whirlwind wedding that that’s maybe not the best move for him.”
“Remus Parker!”
“What? It’s true!”
Remus listens, a warm glow in his chest, as Virgil splutters, trying to walk the line of a response between you’re absolutely correct and you can’t SAY things like that.
“Look—I don’t have any money left, I’m on a payphone,” Remus says, digging through his pockets. “Will you tell Roman that I’ll fax him with a plan? Or I’ll call him later tonight?”
“Yeah, kid, ‘course.”
“And don’t let Pa near the fax machine.”
“Obviously.”
“Good,” Remus says, “good” and they both wait.
Virgil takes a deep breath. “I really miss you, punk,” which is ridden over by a progressive series of beeps. Time’s up.
“Ireallymissyoutoo okay BYE,” Remus hollers over the beeping and hangs up the phone before they can get cut off.
Remus starts to charge out of the phonebox—
Only to run smack into someone waiting for the phone, holding up a newspaper.
“Oh—’scuse me,” Remus says, and then he gets a look at the waiting man’s face.
Grandfather stares down at him with an arched eyebrow. Remus’s stomach plummets down to his feet.
“Uh-oh,” Remus whispers.
“Yes, quite an uh-oh indeed,” Grandfather says mildly, folding up his newspaper into a neat rectangle and sticking it into an inside pocket of his coat. “One does not raise Janus James without knowing how to catch onto an excuse. Light-headed from one sip of wine, phah! What do you say you and I take a little stroll about the park, eh, young man?”
“Okay,” Remus says gloomily, accepting his fate. Grandfather places a hand on his shoulder, turning to walk them down the path.
“What’s this all about, then?
“It’s a pretty long story…” Remus says cautiously.
“Well, it’s a very big park, and we’ve got plenty of time, you know,” Grandfather says.
“Um,” Remus says. “First of all, you should know. I’m Remus. Not Roman.”
“Goodness!” Grandfather says, in what to Remus is an underreaction but to the British must seem very dramatic indeed. “You have been acting very odd, dear boy…”
“Well,” Remus says. “There ya go. That’s why.”
“Very odd things. Very odd indeed,” Grandfather continues. “Not knowing to cut down Ribena, for starters. And your room’s quite the mess.”
“Roman complained about that a lot at camp.”
“Ah! That’s where the swap’s taken place. And, speaking of odd things…”
Remus braces himself.
“On my way after you, I passed by that dreadful Davies boy that’s been giving Roman such trouble in school, and it seems like he’s gotten his what-for… that bloody nose had nothing to do with you, then?”
“I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Remus says as innocently as possible.
“Good lad,” Grandfather says, and slips him a twenty-pound note.
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