fic: Haunted
Jan. 16th, 2020 08:05 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bonnefoisTitle: Haunted.
Series: TF2
Character/pairing: Spy/Scout's mother, Scout
Rating: PG-13
Word count:
Author's note: Part of a story called "Further Regrets of a Ghost" which I have toyed with the idea of calling "Loving Ghosts."
Follows Playing House and Did You Have to Let It Linger? Precedes Last Call, Trace and The Ghost Family.
For Sarah.
1952.
"Ma, there's a French ghost in the kitchen again!"
Colleen looked up from the pot of leftovers she was stirring. A bit of flirting with the butcher had gotten them some scraps to fill the soup with a bit of taste.
"A French one? How can you tell the ghost is French, sweetie?"
"He said weird frog stuff," Liam said. he shoved an entire piece of buttered toast in his mouth. Sticky crumbs smeared across his cheeks. She'd meant those to be for dinner, but Liam always got pushed aside by his many bigger brothers. He was her little runt, her last baby. She had to sneak scraps to make sure he grew up strong.
"Don't talk and chew at the same time," she said.
Liam's cheeks puffed out like a hamster's as he ate.
"Then what did he do?" she said.
"Didn't do anythin'. Just hung around the kitchen. He thought I wouldn't leave. Do we gotta call the priest out here to get rid of him?"
"No, that won't be necessary. You see, you're in luck. French ghosts won't hurt you."
"Because they're cowards?" Liam said.
"Where'd you get that, honey? The French got a lot goin' for them. Art and poetry, philosophy, even fashion," she said.
Liam scrunched his face up in a grimace. "But can they punch someone in the face?" Liam said.
"Don't need to. They're too busy stabbin' each other in the back," she said.
"So they're stealthy, like James Bond?"
"Some of them are," she said.
"You think the ghost is like James Bond, too?" Liam said.
She looked to the soup, and shook her head. "There's definitely similarities. More than I ever liked to admit, but I always was bad at love."
Liam balled his fists, and spat out crumbs as he spoke. "You ain't bad, Ma. You ain't bad at anythin'. You're the best Ma around, and I'll punch anybody who says otherwise!"
"You're sweet, but everybody's bad at some things, pumpkin." She reached out and ruffled his dark blond hair. He looked a bit like a kitten, scrunched up face, unsure of affection. She just might get a sharp retort.
He was growing uncomfortable with baby names, but for now, he was allowing her this. She would take every last moment of childhood he would allow. This one was wild, a little spitfire who would make her cry just as much as his father.
Already she'd seen the signs.
"I'm not. I'm the best around at everythin'!"
She kept stirring. "Your last report card says otherwise," she said.
"Nobody cares about that crap, Ma! Like who cares if I ain't good with numbers. Everybody knows nobody from Southie gets to go to some fancy beacon hill place. Ain't none of us goin' to Harvard."
"Oh, Liam."
She wanted him to dream, but the confines of their world were so small. Even a step into Roxbury was too far.
"Ma, don't look like that. I'm okay. I wouldn't wanna go to no rich fuck school anyways."
She turned on him, and gave Liam a cold glare. "Liam Dempsey, language!"
"Oh, c-crap!"
His mouth was always getting him in trouble. Truly, he didn't resemble his father at all. Except the eyes, those stormy gray eyes. But there was hope, instead of mystery behind his eyes.
Then again, she hardly knew her beloved ghost. But she loved him, still. She loved him always.
"I'll let it slide this time. But next time, I'll be washin' your mouth out with soap, you hear?"
She'd threatened that so many times and never done it. She worried at times that she had too soft a parenting style. If she didn't teach them right, then it'd be the
"Okay, ma," Liam said dejectedly.
She bent down to his level, and brushed the crumbs from his cheeks.
"Listen to me. I want you to always keep dreamin'. Never give up, even if it seems hard."
He lifted his chin, and reached out for a hug. "I'm gonna be big, ma," he said in her ear. "I know it, even if nobody believes it and calls me a pipsqueak. I know it. I'm gonna be a star and everybody is gonna love me."
"I know it too, sweetheart."
"Aight, ma! I'm gonna go ask the ghost if he'll help me with my math homework again!"
"Well, if he's gonna haunt us, he might as well help from time to time," Colleen said.
She put a pinch of precious spice in the soup as Liam rushed down the rickety stairs.
"Careful!" she called back. Even though she knew he wouldn't be, and never was. So impetuous, that one. Always the first to rush into trouble.
Of course, she couldn't say much on that. Maybe he got it from her.
*
Liam cupped his hands over his mouth and belted out "Mr. Ghost! Hey, Mr. Ghost! You out here!"
Oh, the lungs his son had. He was surprised the windows didn't crack with such a shout. He wore a little striped shirt, stained with grass and blood and dirt over the years into a certain kind of camouflage. His baseball cap was ever so offset from the way he had rushed down those stairs.
Spy stayed in the shadows, silent as ever.
Liam folded his arms about his chest. "C'mon! You can't fool me. I know you're around here, so come out already. Or I'll--go ask the priest how to get ghosts to come talk."
He cleared his throat. "You have good perception if you could see me," he said.
"Damn straight I have good eyes," Liam said. "I'm the best there ever was and ever will be."
"Tsk. Language. What would your mother say?"
"Probably want to wash my mouth out with soap again...Wait, you'd tell her? You're a dirty tattle-tale! I didn't know you friggin' French ghosts were squealers!"
"Technically, secrets are my line of work," he said.
"Ghosts have jobs now?" Liam said.
"Do you think tasks are just for humans? We have to make a living somehow," Spy said.
"But, you're not livin'," Scout said.
"True. But when I come here, you could say I almost am," he said.
"So you're a ghost who is alive sometimes? Sounds like somethin' in one of those comics, like Creature from the Black Lagoon. You know anythin' about times tables, Mr. Ghost?"
"Mon lapin, that's far too advanced for you," he said.
The nickname had been easy, considering how his son ran about, just like a rabbit.
"That's what Michael said! I told him I'd kick his ass. I gotta beat 'em, or he's goin' to call me stupidhead for years," Liam said.
This time, he didn't remark on the language. He could already tell that it was a losing battle.
"I suppose you never could refuse a challenge," he murmured.
"Put out your hand."
He pulled a pen that could kill a man from his cigarette case, and began to write on the back of Liam's hand. X's and O's, like he was losing at tic tac toe.
"We'll start with something simple. Anything multiplied by zero is zero...anything multiplied by one is the number multiplied..."
"Even million billion gazillions?" Liam said.
"Yes, though gazillions is not a word," he said.
"But one plus one equals two. Why can't one times one equal two? Why they gotta make it like that?"
"If you practice things, it will grow easier."
Liam let out a groan. "Ma says if I wanna grow big and strong, I gotta drink my milk. I like chocolate milk, though."
"Yes, that too."
"So, Mr. Ghost, you're real smart?"
"I wouldn't survive in my job if not," Spy said.
"Golly! I didn't know ghostin' was that hard a job."
"So, if you're so smart, you know where my dad is?"
"On the same plane as I," he said.
Liam gave him a confused look. "My dad's a pilot? Like flyin' around some big fancy plane? That might explain why he ain't ever around."
"Your father is a ghost," he said.
"Yeah, that's what ma said. I wish I could've met him. Hey, Mr. Ghost, if you see my dad, could you tell him hi for me?"
"...Of course," Spy said.
He kept writing out equations instead of feelings of the family he could never quite have.
1955
For years, Liam would go out and talk to ghosts. A fistful of baseball cards, a comic from a nickle he'd found on the street, or a new bruise from a fight he swore was
Liam stood out in the back, on that cold spring night calling the name of ghosts for hours. She thought for sure his throat would go hoarse. But, she should've known, Liam wouldn't give up that easily.
Finally, by the time each call out for a father he never knew, known only as "Mr. Ghost" only brought about curses and yells from his neighbors and barking dogs, she brought him in.
Liam gave her the most heartbroken look. "Ma! The ghost ain't comin'. I really hoped he'd come back, this test is awful. I keep tryin' to think French things, but he isn't here."
She looked far off, and closed her eyes. "He does that."
"I called and called and everythin'. I really wanted to talk to him. O'Shea said I was a tattle tale rat when I wasn't, and clocked me one. You think Mr. Ghost knows a way to teach him one?"
"Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord," she said.
"But ain't goin' to church and all bein' Godlike, so you should be like god and friggin' smite people right in the face?"
She had to hold back her laughter. Parenthood never prepared her for a mind like Liam's. Full of energy and his own sort of logic, always marching to the beat of his own drum.
"You gotta talk to Father McKay at that one, sweetheart."
Liam's shoulders slumped. "I did. I thought, bein' pals with God, he might know a way to get Mr. Ghost back. But he said somethin' about blessin' the house because we're bein' oppressed by Satan himself? I tried to tell him, Mr. Ghost is nice and helps me with my homework, but he wouldn't hear it."
"Mr. Ghost is supposed to be a secret, sweetheart."
Of course, Liam was the epitome of the term "Irish Whispers." He never could keep a secret for longer than a minute.
"But...Did I imagine him? Like some imaginary friend? He helped me do times tables. He even played ball with me once," Liam said. He touched to the baseball mitt there, that had simply appeared on his birthday, like many other gifts that sprung from the ether. Dollar bills laid out, presents in his locker. Liam swore he was the luckiest boy around, to find all that money.
"He comes and goes. You never know when he'll be back. But he always comes back."
"I wished so hard he'd come to school with me. They went and called me a damned project rat. Said I had the face of a weasel," Liam said.
"You listen here. Those little brats don't know anythin'. They're just bein' mean. You are a handsome boy, and you'll go on to leave a mark on this world."
"Of course they're wrong! I'm totally handsome and I'll beat them all up."
"Now, that's better. Don't you let them get you down," she said.
Liam reached out for a hug, and she gladly brought him close. There were only so many more years she could have before he reached adolescence and pushed her away with the teenage years.
"I wish the ghost was back. This homework is hard. I even threw a penny in the fountain and everythin'."
"Me too," she said. She leaned in to kiss his forehead. "I'll try and help you with that, okay? I'll pray tonight that he'll come back for you. Now, go wash up and say your prayers."
"All right, ma," Liam said.
He rushed off down the hall to the bathroom they shared with the other families on the floor. He was always rushing headlong somewhere. She only hoped that it wasn't headlong into a heartbreak, loving a father who was always just out of touch.
1956
The ghost was eventually left to imaginary friends and daydreams, teased to oblivion by his brothers and friends when Liam couldn't keep that secret. Liam could believe in superheroes and even himself, but this ghost, the closest thing he had to a father, was difficult for him to cling to hope.
She waited out nights with the window open, never knowing if he was alive or dead. But the scent of cigarette smoke reached her.
"You returned," she said to the nothingness. "Or, perhaps I am dreaming again."
Her very own Eros came close, until she tasted tobacco and the trace of alcohol on his lips.
"A job overseas," he said.
"Explain that to your son. He missed you," she said, a trace of winter's chill in her voice.
"My apologies, ma chérie. This is how it is, loving a ghost."
She let out a sigh. "You're right. That's how it is."
And then she said no more, for the night was fleeting, and so was their time together.
Series: TF2
Character/pairing: Spy/Scout's mother, Scout
Rating: PG-13
Word count:
Author's note: Part of a story called "Further Regrets of a Ghost" which I have toyed with the idea of calling "Loving Ghosts."
Follows Playing House and Did You Have to Let It Linger? Precedes Last Call, Trace and The Ghost Family.
For Sarah.
1952.
"Ma, there's a French ghost in the kitchen again!"
Colleen looked up from the pot of leftovers she was stirring. A bit of flirting with the butcher had gotten them some scraps to fill the soup with a bit of taste.
"A French one? How can you tell the ghost is French, sweetie?"
"He said weird frog stuff," Liam said. he shoved an entire piece of buttered toast in his mouth. Sticky crumbs smeared across his cheeks. She'd meant those to be for dinner, but Liam always got pushed aside by his many bigger brothers. He was her little runt, her last baby. She had to sneak scraps to make sure he grew up strong.
"Don't talk and chew at the same time," she said.
Liam's cheeks puffed out like a hamster's as he ate.
"Then what did he do?" she said.
"Didn't do anythin'. Just hung around the kitchen. He thought I wouldn't leave. Do we gotta call the priest out here to get rid of him?"
"No, that won't be necessary. You see, you're in luck. French ghosts won't hurt you."
"Because they're cowards?" Liam said.
"Where'd you get that, honey? The French got a lot goin' for them. Art and poetry, philosophy, even fashion," she said.
Liam scrunched his face up in a grimace. "But can they punch someone in the face?" Liam said.
"Don't need to. They're too busy stabbin' each other in the back," she said.
"So they're stealthy, like James Bond?"
"Some of them are," she said.
"You think the ghost is like James Bond, too?" Liam said.
She looked to the soup, and shook her head. "There's definitely similarities. More than I ever liked to admit, but I always was bad at love."
Liam balled his fists, and spat out crumbs as he spoke. "You ain't bad, Ma. You ain't bad at anythin'. You're the best Ma around, and I'll punch anybody who says otherwise!"
"You're sweet, but everybody's bad at some things, pumpkin." She reached out and ruffled his dark blond hair. He looked a bit like a kitten, scrunched up face, unsure of affection. She just might get a sharp retort.
He was growing uncomfortable with baby names, but for now, he was allowing her this. She would take every last moment of childhood he would allow. This one was wild, a little spitfire who would make her cry just as much as his father.
Already she'd seen the signs.
"I'm not. I'm the best around at everythin'!"
She kept stirring. "Your last report card says otherwise," she said.
"Nobody cares about that crap, Ma! Like who cares if I ain't good with numbers. Everybody knows nobody from Southie gets to go to some fancy beacon hill place. Ain't none of us goin' to Harvard."
"Oh, Liam."
She wanted him to dream, but the confines of their world were so small. Even a step into Roxbury was too far.
"Ma, don't look like that. I'm okay. I wouldn't wanna go to no rich fuck school anyways."
She turned on him, and gave Liam a cold glare. "Liam Dempsey, language!"
"Oh, c-crap!"
His mouth was always getting him in trouble. Truly, he didn't resemble his father at all. Except the eyes, those stormy gray eyes. But there was hope, instead of mystery behind his eyes.
Then again, she hardly knew her beloved ghost. But she loved him, still. She loved him always.
"I'll let it slide this time. But next time, I'll be washin' your mouth out with soap, you hear?"
She'd threatened that so many times and never done it. She worried at times that she had too soft a parenting style. If she didn't teach them right, then it'd be the
"Okay, ma," Liam said dejectedly.
She bent down to his level, and brushed the crumbs from his cheeks.
"Listen to me. I want you to always keep dreamin'. Never give up, even if it seems hard."
He lifted his chin, and reached out for a hug. "I'm gonna be big, ma," he said in her ear. "I know it, even if nobody believes it and calls me a pipsqueak. I know it. I'm gonna be a star and everybody is gonna love me."
"I know it too, sweetheart."
"Aight, ma! I'm gonna go ask the ghost if he'll help me with my math homework again!"
"Well, if he's gonna haunt us, he might as well help from time to time," Colleen said.
She put a pinch of precious spice in the soup as Liam rushed down the rickety stairs.
"Careful!" she called back. Even though she knew he wouldn't be, and never was. So impetuous, that one. Always the first to rush into trouble.
Of course, she couldn't say much on that. Maybe he got it from her.
*
Liam cupped his hands over his mouth and belted out "Mr. Ghost! Hey, Mr. Ghost! You out here!"
Oh, the lungs his son had. He was surprised the windows didn't crack with such a shout. He wore a little striped shirt, stained with grass and blood and dirt over the years into a certain kind of camouflage. His baseball cap was ever so offset from the way he had rushed down those stairs.
Spy stayed in the shadows, silent as ever.
Liam folded his arms about his chest. "C'mon! You can't fool me. I know you're around here, so come out already. Or I'll--go ask the priest how to get ghosts to come talk."
He cleared his throat. "You have good perception if you could see me," he said.
"Damn straight I have good eyes," Liam said. "I'm the best there ever was and ever will be."
"Tsk. Language. What would your mother say?"
"Probably want to wash my mouth out with soap again...Wait, you'd tell her? You're a dirty tattle-tale! I didn't know you friggin' French ghosts were squealers!"
"Technically, secrets are my line of work," he said.
"Ghosts have jobs now?" Liam said.
"Do you think tasks are just for humans? We have to make a living somehow," Spy said.
"But, you're not livin'," Scout said.
"True. But when I come here, you could say I almost am," he said.
"So you're a ghost who is alive sometimes? Sounds like somethin' in one of those comics, like Creature from the Black Lagoon. You know anythin' about times tables, Mr. Ghost?"
"Mon lapin, that's far too advanced for you," he said.
The nickname had been easy, considering how his son ran about, just like a rabbit.
"That's what Michael said! I told him I'd kick his ass. I gotta beat 'em, or he's goin' to call me stupidhead for years," Liam said.
This time, he didn't remark on the language. He could already tell that it was a losing battle.
"I suppose you never could refuse a challenge," he murmured.
"Put out your hand."
He pulled a pen that could kill a man from his cigarette case, and began to write on the back of Liam's hand. X's and O's, like he was losing at tic tac toe.
"We'll start with something simple. Anything multiplied by zero is zero...anything multiplied by one is the number multiplied..."
"Even million billion gazillions?" Liam said.
"Yes, though gazillions is not a word," he said.
"But one plus one equals two. Why can't one times one equal two? Why they gotta make it like that?"
"If you practice things, it will grow easier."
Liam let out a groan. "Ma says if I wanna grow big and strong, I gotta drink my milk. I like chocolate milk, though."
"Yes, that too."
"So, Mr. Ghost, you're real smart?"
"I wouldn't survive in my job if not," Spy said.
"Golly! I didn't know ghostin' was that hard a job."
"So, if you're so smart, you know where my dad is?"
"On the same plane as I," he said.
Liam gave him a confused look. "My dad's a pilot? Like flyin' around some big fancy plane? That might explain why he ain't ever around."
"Your father is a ghost," he said.
"Yeah, that's what ma said. I wish I could've met him. Hey, Mr. Ghost, if you see my dad, could you tell him hi for me?"
"...Of course," Spy said.
He kept writing out equations instead of feelings of the family he could never quite have.
1955
For years, Liam would go out and talk to ghosts. A fistful of baseball cards, a comic from a nickle he'd found on the street, or a new bruise from a fight he swore was
Liam stood out in the back, on that cold spring night calling the name of ghosts for hours. She thought for sure his throat would go hoarse. But, she should've known, Liam wouldn't give up that easily.
Finally, by the time each call out for a father he never knew, known only as "Mr. Ghost" only brought about curses and yells from his neighbors and barking dogs, she brought him in.
Liam gave her the most heartbroken look. "Ma! The ghost ain't comin'. I really hoped he'd come back, this test is awful. I keep tryin' to think French things, but he isn't here."
She looked far off, and closed her eyes. "He does that."
"I called and called and everythin'. I really wanted to talk to him. O'Shea said I was a tattle tale rat when I wasn't, and clocked me one. You think Mr. Ghost knows a way to teach him one?"
"Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord," she said.
"But ain't goin' to church and all bein' Godlike, so you should be like god and friggin' smite people right in the face?"
She had to hold back her laughter. Parenthood never prepared her for a mind like Liam's. Full of energy and his own sort of logic, always marching to the beat of his own drum.
"You gotta talk to Father McKay at that one, sweetheart."
Liam's shoulders slumped. "I did. I thought, bein' pals with God, he might know a way to get Mr. Ghost back. But he said somethin' about blessin' the house because we're bein' oppressed by Satan himself? I tried to tell him, Mr. Ghost is nice and helps me with my homework, but he wouldn't hear it."
"Mr. Ghost is supposed to be a secret, sweetheart."
Of course, Liam was the epitome of the term "Irish Whispers." He never could keep a secret for longer than a minute.
"But...Did I imagine him? Like some imaginary friend? He helped me do times tables. He even played ball with me once," Liam said. He touched to the baseball mitt there, that had simply appeared on his birthday, like many other gifts that sprung from the ether. Dollar bills laid out, presents in his locker. Liam swore he was the luckiest boy around, to find all that money.
"He comes and goes. You never know when he'll be back. But he always comes back."
"I wished so hard he'd come to school with me. They went and called me a damned project rat. Said I had the face of a weasel," Liam said.
"You listen here. Those little brats don't know anythin'. They're just bein' mean. You are a handsome boy, and you'll go on to leave a mark on this world."
"Of course they're wrong! I'm totally handsome and I'll beat them all up."
"Now, that's better. Don't you let them get you down," she said.
Liam reached out for a hug, and she gladly brought him close. There were only so many more years she could have before he reached adolescence and pushed her away with the teenage years.
"I wish the ghost was back. This homework is hard. I even threw a penny in the fountain and everythin'."
"Me too," she said. She leaned in to kiss his forehead. "I'll try and help you with that, okay? I'll pray tonight that he'll come back for you. Now, go wash up and say your prayers."
"All right, ma," Liam said.
He rushed off down the hall to the bathroom they shared with the other families on the floor. He was always rushing headlong somewhere. She only hoped that it wasn't headlong into a heartbreak, loving a father who was always just out of touch.
1956
The ghost was eventually left to imaginary friends and daydreams, teased to oblivion by his brothers and friends when Liam couldn't keep that secret. Liam could believe in superheroes and even himself, but this ghost, the closest thing he had to a father, was difficult for him to cling to hope.
She waited out nights with the window open, never knowing if he was alive or dead. But the scent of cigarette smoke reached her.
"You returned," she said to the nothingness. "Or, perhaps I am dreaming again."
Her very own Eros came close, until she tasted tobacco and the trace of alcohol on his lips.
"A job overseas," he said.
"Explain that to your son. He missed you," she said, a trace of winter's chill in her voice.
"My apologies, ma chérie. This is how it is, loving a ghost."
She let out a sigh. "You're right. That's how it is."
And then she said no more, for the night was fleeting, and so was their time together.
