DISCLAIMER: F4 and all its characters belong to Marvel. No money is made from this. This is done all for the greater glory of Reedness!
12 November, 2008
Perfectly Normal
Chapter Four: In which things falls apart
By Ina-chan
"Never underestimate the insight of children. In most times, the simple manner of how they see things is the purest of truths."
Daddy used to say that all the time. When Joe and I were little, he always held our opinion with high regard. It drove my Mother crazy how Daddy used to dote on us. She claimed that he only did it to turn us against her. When I met Teddy many years later at a children's benefit, he echoed the same sentiments. It seemed ironic that Teddy of all people would share the same perspective as my father. Then again, Teddy remained childlike in many ways. Perhaps that was the reason why we became fast friends.
To tell you the truth, I didn't really appreciate that sentiment until I had Reed. And I didn't really understand what it truly meant until Reed started talking. When Reed started talking, it was as if floodgates rusted shut opened all at once. It was as if he was trying to make up for the years he didn't speak. If you didn't set limits, he would indulge in a continuous running tangential commentary of every single thought that entered his head.
An ordinary person would find my son's new quirk an annoyance. But I was so grateful to be finally allowed to have a better glimpse of what goes on in my baby's mind that I didn't care. Though, I found myself once again, dumbfounded with amazement with his new milestone. We quickly discovered that we needed to watch what we say in front of him too.
Like with music and chess pieces positions, Reed remembered what he heard other people say with remarkable accuracy. Sometimes, he would quote them at the most inopportune moments. Reed's memory was like a tape recorder. He remembered every word of every conversation or every radio and television show he had actively listened to. He was able to recall and recite everything verbatim with proper prompting. Of course whether he understood half of what he heard or said was another story.
All too often, he would fall into these rambling lapses. Like how a comment involving something like let's say… monkeys, would be quickly followed by something that was almost like a compulsion for Reed to say everything he knew and read about monkeys, from monkeys in nursery rhymes to the different kinds of monkeys and to where monkeys were found. It was very easy to see how this could be problematic in social situations.
But as I mentioned before, at that point, I didn't care. It may have been selfish of me to think that way, but for a mother waiting six years to hear her baby's voice… this was heaven.
Of course, Nate being Nate, had his own ideas about the whole thing…
"Cans clang the noisiest when they're empty."
Yes, the ever so practical and philosophical Nate. I knew that he was as thrilled as I was to see our son reach every milestone despite the mountainous hurdles that he had to overcome. But Nate was always the scientist and the businessman. Yes, they were admirable and valuable traits that brought Nate to where he is now.
But sometimes, I wish…
Nate always valued substance over size and ends over the means. How he managed to keep a happy medium between these contradicting traits of his without losing his sanity, astonished, baffled, and frustrated me all at the same time. I gave up trying to figure out exactly what goes on in that brain of his a long time ago. It'll probably be easier to learn how to speak and read ancient Greek.
Like why he chose me, for example. I knew from experience that it was very easy for any woman with a heart to fall in love with Nate. But why he would fall for someone like me had always been a mystery.
I'm not being ungrateful or paranoid. When I first met him, Nathaniel Richards could have easily chosen any girl he wanted. And knowing Nate, he gets what he wants… most of the time, anyway. He was a handsome, wealthy, very eligible bachelor from a very well respected family. He was a son of a war hero, who bravely jumped from an airplane more than 20,000 feet off the ground straight into the gunfire of enemy lines in one of the bloodiest historic days in World War 2 France. And on to of that, Nathaniel Richards, even as a young man, was already a respected and certified scientific genius.
I, in the other hand, was an old hag on her way to spinsterhood, close to a decade his senior. I was the daughter of an unknown, mediocre University Dean who hated his job as equally as he was hated by his students, and married then divorced an alcoholic who made social climbing an art form. I had no accomplishments or pedigreed background to be proud of other than the stubborn ambition of clinging to impossible delusions of grandeur despite the reality of living as a poor unrecognized professional musician for the rest of her natural life, who by pure chance became fast friends with the funniest, wittiest, and most caring scatterbrain dreamer in the world.
After that embarrassing first impression, when I mistook Nate to be Teddy's father… I never thought I'd see Nathaniel Richards again. In fact, it was the last thing I wanted. But being friends with his older brother pretty much any means of avoiding him a complete impossibility. There was also the fact that Nate's unflagging persistence on pursuing even the hopelessly impossible. If his charm didn't win you over, his perseverance eventually wore you down. When I asked him what it was that he saw in me, he simply smiled and said something about empty noisy cans.
Of course, I saw Nate's point in Reed's case. Our boy clearly possessed exceptional gifts. His mind had the ability to absorb knowledge like a sponge. But with the way Reed was now, with his incessant compulsive tangential ramblings, it only showed how disorganized his thoughts were and his inability to coherently process what he learned. So to help stop Reed from simply parroting what he heard, I started the pattern of encouraging him to ask questions instead of just repeating what we said. It didn't take that long for my clever boy to get the hang of our new game.
Now Nate… I know Nate was trying his best amongst the circumstances happening around us. I do appreciate the fact that he started to make more of an effort to be present in Reed's life (even though Dad had to take him aside to have a long talk with him about it first). But Nate's idea of "father-son quality time"…
My husband's life mainly revolves around two places, the office and our home. In our home, where normal husbands would have a little carpentry workshop in the basement or the garage, my husband set up an entire wing of the mansion into what he called a "home office"… which really looked more like a mad scientist's laboratory.
And Nate's idea of spending quality time with his son was to take Reed with him to his personal lab, plop our son in a corner while he focused on his latest project.
It drove me crazy! I've been in Nate's home office and I personally didn't care that this was the birthplace of his genius' many wonderful creations. The place was full of things that were simply accidents waiting to happen. It was simply not a place for a little boy to be in. I resisted the idea of letting Reed wander in there unsupervised until Dad finally convinced me that my baby was no longer a restless toddler (not that Reed was a fidgety child in the first place) and that it was only fair to let Reed spend time in Nate's environment since I did have Reed all to myself pretty much his entire life.
Maybe Dad was right. It was just a matter of the mother hen in me, unwilling to let my baby chick out of my sight.
But those few moments when Reed wasn't around me made me realize a lot of things. Like the realization that I was probably more dependent on Reed than he was with me. And also the sick feeling coming from the pit of my stomach at the realization that after all these years…
I didn't really know Nate that much any more.
"All the king's horses and all the kings men…"
It all started with Teddy.
It was inevitable. It was probably the wrong decision to bank on the hope that the government would turn a blind eye on Teddy based on Nate's connections to the White House and the good relationship Richards Technologies had with the military. But there's no stopping Teddy from being himself. If he saw an injustice, he was the first to speak out, no matter the consequences.
So when HUAC summoned Teddy to appear in a hearing, he arrived in full battle gear and defiance. It was inevitable, Teddy was then sentenced for six months of prison for contempt.
Event though there were no clear charges accusing Teddy to communism… the fact that this happened was more than enough to cause the damage. Nate was forced to cut off all ties with his brother to pacify Richards Technologies' stakeholders and save the company. I'm sure it was a decision that Nate didn't want to make… but it wasn't that much of difficult decision either.
Nate and Teddy were already at odds for a good number of things as most siblings were throughout the years… not just regarding Teddy's political point of view…
…other things…
"Do you know why they can't put Humpty Dumpty back together again?"
It was natural for couples to start loosing that spark once they get comfortable with each other. I was witness and a living testament of that through my parents. Instead of trying to bring the spice back into their marriage, my mother turned to drinking. In return, my father turned to concentrating more with his work. In response to that, my mother started turning to other men.
That was one of my biggest fears. Seeing what happened to my parents happen to us. After almost ten years of marriage, Nate looked as handsome and dashing as the day we met. In comparison, the years have not been as kind to me. Considering that I've lived an eccentric recluse's life since Reed was born, compared to my peers who maintained their profile in high society, I'd be easily mistaken as the hired help to take care of Reed rather than Nathaniel Richards' wife. It didn't bother me before since Nate had always made it clear that he didn't care too much with appearances.
Or so I thought he didn't.
…at least until Jennifer Klukatch came in the picture.
This young bimbo who was a senior executive's daughter working her way through law school. She somehow managed to worm her way up to become Nate's "executive assistant".
Nate accused me of being completely paranoid. Maybe I was… but who could blame me? He was the one who was spending all his time at work and preferring to spend whatever free time he had locked up in that stupid lab of his instead of spending time with his family. There was also the fact that if his "beloved wife" was kept completely out of the dark from this arrangement and only found out about it when the so-called bimbo just happened to pick up his personal phone line.
His PERSONAL phone line!
But that was just the beginning. As the saying goes… when it rains, it pours. Sometimes it poured to the point that it felt as if the world stopped spinning.
"Ice melts in glass but it doesn't unmelt…"
It started with a phone call.
The voice on the other line tried to sound sympathetic. But I imagined that this being just one of the hundreds of phone calls delivering bad news an over-worked civil servant does per day… the bottom line was, they were more interested on getting the answer to their question.
But… I haven't seen my brother, Joey, since he was sixteen. I suppose… that was one of the reasons why I became instantly attached to Teddy after hearing his story. Like Teddy, my brother was not able to tolerate life with our father. Then again, what Joey thought of Daddy was one of the things I always blamed on Mother. She tried very hard to turn us against him… and Joey was too young to know better. Joey had always been Mommy's little boy.
Joey started running away from home when he was twelve. Someone (most of the time the police) usually brought him back. As a teenager, he got involved with the wrong crowd. So after his twentieth arrest and possibly his hundredth attempt to leave home when Joey was sixteen, Daddy threw his hands up in the air and allowed Mother to take full custody, against our better judgement.
And we all know what a great parent figure Mother was.
Joey got involved in a robbery in a convenience gone wrong and innocent bystanders got hurt. A four-year-old little girl died. It was an accident, he said. He wasn't the one who had the gun, but he was the one who got caught. I never doubted him. Joey lied about a lot of things, but I know my brother. He'll never lie about things like that.
But a little girl was dead, he had a rap sheet as long as football field, and somebody needed to pay. People were angry and nobody cared that he was a little kid himself. Joey was tried as an adult, sentenced like an adult, and imprisoned like an adult. His hatred towards my Dad extended to me, as he saw me as traitor. I tried to visit him once, and wrote to him once in a while. He didn't want to see me and he never wrote back.
As much as I hated it, we drifted apart and I never heard from him again.
Until years later… a few weeks ago… when a tired Civil servant managed to track down my brother's next of kin to inform me that my baby brother died peacefully in NYU Downtown hospital after a massive stroke. My little Joey, who at one time clung tightly to my arm because he was afraid to be left alone in the dark, died alone... and unknown.
And for the first time for the longest time, I had the strongest longing to go home.
Even though there was no one to go home to any more.
Since my marriage, Nate has protected me in his little comfortable and safe bubble that to my shame, I forgot about everyone else outside of it. While Joey was far from the most perfect role model for my little boy, it still wasn't fair that he died without knowing he was an uncle. And that he died without Reed knowing about him. Reed… all his life, he was protected in that bubble as well. Being the way he is, I knew that Reed would always find himself living within a bubble even if… no… when he manages to break through his disabilities.
It was time.
I needed to break free.
Reed needed to start seeing that the world was bigger than the mansion we lived in sunny Central City.
I needed to come home.
"Are you coming back?"
Dad's question sounded ominous. He probably knew. Well… he probably sensed it. He sensed what I really felt in my heart. If it weren't for Reed, I knew my answer right then and there. Somewhere along the way, Nate and I started to drift apart. If it weren't for Reed, Nate probably wouldn't have cared if I came back or not.
No… I wouldn't do that to my boy. My brother and I knew first hand what its like to grow up with a parent absent. I may have turned out okay in the outside, but I'm just as screwed up as my brother… and we both blame respective parents absent in our lives for letting us turn out this way. I couldn't do that to Reed.
Though at least for a short time, I could forget about Nate's infidelity, Teddy's legal problems and Joey… I just wanted to be happy and have a good time introducing the greatest city in the world to my son and finally introducing New York to the most fantastic little boy in the universe.
I admit, I was a little afraid at first. I didn't know how Reed would respond to this new environment… New York City's noises and action may be a little bit too much for a little boy like Reed. It took a little bit of prodding for Reed to come out of his shell… but my fears were baseless as Reed was quickly absorbed into the environment around him when he did. From beating a couple of vets to a quick round of chess during our afternoon walks at Central Park to attending as many concerts I could get a hold of tickets of and even to listening to Noah, one of my father's young protégés who became a family friend and was more than happy to play host to us in the evenings, ramble about his inventions and theories over the dinner table.
In many ways, this was the first time I've been truly happy for the longest time. I don't really know what spurred me to do what I did. It was an impulsive irresistible thought that prompted an action just as impulsive and just as irresistible. And though it was just a matter to picking up the phone and calling someone… anyone… to let them know what I've done… I didn't. I don't know why.
My little boy made his way to my bed a while ago… curled up and fell sleep in my arms. Something from the back of my mind whispered that I should get up and do something yet at the same time, the selfish feeling of doing that would destroy this perfect moment. No Nate, no Teddy, no Joey, no autism, no problems…
Just lying comfortably in bed, staring at the ceiling, listening to the familiar sounds of the city I love from the window of the Four seasons and my little boy's soft rhythmic breathing, watching the random snippets of my life flash before my eyes and feeling for the very first time in my life, numb with peace, content and feeling…
…perfectly normal…
The End
Author's squawk:
Wow. This chapter took forever to finish. I personally thought that this had way too much stuff crammed in compared to the other chapters… and waaaay too disjointed. It was a struggle editing what to keep and whatnot. But looking at it now, I realized, this entire fic is after all in the POV of Evelyn Richards as she… well, you probably figured out what was really happening based on how this ended, and if you read a companion chapter to this fic from "Invisible Red Thread".
Anwayz, it feels sad to finally say goodbye to Evelyn. I'm not really sure if I liked the character she ended up being in this fic. She's definitely not the same character that Reed idolized as a child. Ah well… here's to crossing fingers that Millar would actually touch her… (now that he has dipped his toes dealing with the whole Alyssa Moy thing.)
Ja!
Ina-chan