theunderdog | (no subject)

Entry tags:

(no subject)

When Tess had asked him what he was going to do, he'd said he was going to fight Tommy. In a way, it felt like they'd been fighting for years, across countries and oceans and without a word, all culminating here. It wasn't like Brendan hadn't known his brother was angry. Hell, he was angry, too, though he'd come to terms with a lot of it. He still hadn't expected anything like this, raw fury that made him want to step away. He couldn't, though, he had to keep going, no matter how much it hurt to see Tommy still coming at him with one arm cradled to his chest, limp from the shoulder he'd dislocated himself. For Tess and the girls, for the life he'd chosen when he had decided to stay in Pittsburgh so, so long ago, he couldn't just give up. In that way, he thought, the fights were one and the same.

It was over now anyway — and he was saying so, too, only distantly aware of it through a haze of pain and adrenaline and emotion. This fight, Sparta, that was done, that was his and he knew it, so close he could practically taste it, the answers to all their problems, but that wasn't really what he meant. The fight between them, the silent battle lasting half a lifetime, that was done, too, or it could be. Nothing good came from being bitter. This was his little brother he had pinned, the one he'd lost so long ago, and it didn't have to be like this. Maybe it was for the best that it had come down to the two of them. Though they'd argued out on the beach, it was, or it seemed to be, the only way they could communicate at all, through punches and kicks and blows dodged, and there was still plenty left unsaid.

"I love you," he said, hoarse, voice breaking on the words. "I love you, Tommy." He should have said so a long time ago, before Tommy and their mom had left; he couldn't remember when he had before. But it was true, as true as all the rest of it, and more important now than ever, when they finally had a chance to put an end to all of this. Even with his arm around his brother's neck, desperate for what victory would bring, Brendan wasn't sure what he was doing more of, embracing him or holding him down. It didn't matter. Tommy's fingers tapped his shoulder and it was done, over, all of it, the crowd erupting in cheers that he could only half-hear with his arms around Tommy, one hand held up to keep everyone else at a distance, sheltering his little brother the way he should have been able to since a long damn time ago. None of the rest of it could hold his attention now, not the officials or the reporters and their questions or the people reaching out to try to touch them as they walked past. It wasn't going to stay like this, there would be plenty else to deal with, but for now, it was just them.

Until he wasn't. The noise from the crowd, which had started to dim, cut off suddenly, and where Tommy had been at his side, he wasn't anymore. Brendan blinked — once, twice — and drew in a breath, hand lifting to his head. It was possible — probable, really — that he could have had a concussion, but the last he'd checked, that wouldn't have caused full-blown hallucinations like this. Nothing changed, anyway. He was standing, barely, with movement under his feet, alone, or what seemed that way for an excruciating few seconds, until an all too familiar voice drew his focus to his side. "Daddy, what happened?" asked Emily, a question he'd given his girls plenty of reason to ask lately. "Where are we?"

It was a question he didn't have an answer to. For a moment, he was just relieved to see them, Rosie seated beside her, and he thought, for a moment, that it meant Tess might have been here, too. He couldn't see her, though, and she'd have made her presence known by now, he was sure of it. Trying not to think too hard about what that meant when he had so much else to try to make sense of anyway, he shook his head. "I don't know, sweetheart," he said. "And I don't know where Mommy is, either. How 'bout we go find out, huh? It'll be an adventure."

That, at least, seemed to satisfy them for now, which was a relief. Probably that wouldn't last long, but he wasn't sure how he could comfort his daughters when he couldn't even figure out where to start with what had apparently happened, which ought to have been impossible. With the train they were on pulling into the station, though, there was only one thing to do. He took one of each of their hands, and started off onto the platform slowly, watching for any signs of what this might have been.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

There was a diner on Parliament Street that he frequented. If you could call it that, after only a few weeks in this god-forsaken city. It was hole in the wall sorta joint, greasy tables and plastic menus, an open kitchen and an ancient waitress, and it was exactly the type of place he felt comfortable in, hunched in a back booth with a cup of coffee and a tuna melt.

So, he wasn't hanging around the station, that day. It was coincidence that took him past it, but maybe something drew him to look in that moment as a man stepped off the train with two little girls in tow.

He stood frozen for a long time on the sidewalk, hands curled to fists at his side, and he thought about how easy it could been, just to turn and walk away. Let somebody else deal with this shit. This was not his problem.

Only, in the end, it kinda was.

Hunched inside his hoodie, hands in his pockets, he jerked a nod in the other man's direction... Brendan Conlon, his big brother... and said, "Whatchu doin' here, man?"

He hadn't looked at either of the little girls directly, just yet. It was like he couldn't quite bring himself to.

It probably shouldn't have been enough to stop him in his tracks, seeing Tommy there, hearing his voice, but it was. If not for the other night out on the beach, it probably wouldn't have even been that familiar. Now, though, Brendan was certain he'd have known it anywhere. Ignoring, for the moment, the way Emily and Rosie tugged on his hands, a question of who's that, Daddy? echoing in his head, he stared. How Tommy had gotten here before him when just moments ago they'd been walking together, he didn't know, but this was getting stranger by the second.

"Kinda hoping you could tell me," he said, though that wouldn't have occurred to him if not for the question. Something was wrong, though. That had been apparent from the start, but now he really knew it. Tommy was dressed differently, the fresh bruise by his eye faded. Whatever had happened, this wasn't the Tommy who'd just been propped up against his side, only he didn't even know what that meant. "Where's here?"

It should've still been easy to hate the bastard. Would've made the whole goddamn experience easier to swallow. But it wasn't just the presence of those little girls that toned down the fire. That fight in the ring wasn't the last bit of catharsis they'd ever need, but it had been a start, and walking out of the arena, they'd both known it.

Now with time and distance between them, Tommy didn't have a clue what the hell that meant. All he was sure of is that he didn't feel the same burning need to punch Brendan Conlon square in the face without another word shared between them.

"It's called Darrow or something. 'Least, that's what they keep tellin' me," Tommy said, his big shoulders lifting in a shrug, "I been here like a month, man, and you probably know as much as I do."

"A month," Brendan echoed, an obvious question in his voice. That didn't make any sense. He'd just seen Tommy, just had his arms around him, and now he was talking about a city he was pretty sure he'd never heard of before with some ridiculous amount of time lapsed between them. He didn't want to believe it at all — things like this just shouldn't have been possible — but however angry Tommy was and might still have been, Brendan couldn't see why he'd lie, and anyway, the facts spoke for themselves. First he'd been somewhere else, and then he'd shown up here, girls in tow when they should have been miles away, and Tommy wasn't wearing any signs of their recent fight.

That still didn't make him any less confused. "You wanna fill me in on how that's supposed to work when I just saw you?"

"You want an explanation? I don't got one. I just know how long I been here," he shrugged, thinking on the last time they'd seen each other and ignoring that telltale ache in his chest. He could shrug the whole damn thing off all he wanted, but the two of them had unfinished business.

Finally, he looked down at the two little girls holding their father's hands, and immediately regretted the mistake. It was hard to deny their existence when they were looking up at him, their eyes wide and maybe just a little fearful.

"Don't remember you having these two with you during the fight."

"That's because I didn't," Brendan said simply, hoping this didn't mean he was going to have to answer a whole lot of questions later about who he'd been fighting and why. He and Tess had decided a while ago, when he'd started getting back into it, not to tell the girls what he was getting up to, and he meant to try to uphold that while he could. From the looks of things, there was going to be enough else to worry about already, the both of them a whole lot more visibly uneasy than he was, which only served to make him feel worse. He should have been able to offer them some kind of reassurance, but even if he could say that everything was going to be alright, he was as in the dark as they were; it wouldn't have accomplished much.

She tugged on his hand and, despite still being worn out from the fight, certainly running on pure adrenaline, he hoisted Rosie up onto his hip, pressing a kiss to her curly hair, his other hand still holding Emily's. "They were just on the train with me," he explained. "Girls, this is..." Your Uncle Tommy, he wanted to say, but he couldn't bring himself to, remembering too well what Tommy had said out on the beach, how they weren't his family. They were, and things had changed, but there was enough up in the air as it was that he didn't want to risk starting an argument in front of his daughters. "This is Tommy."

"My name's Emily," said Emily, braver than her sister, if clearly still frightened by this turn of events. Brendan smiled just a little to hear it, adding, "And this little one's Rosie."

It wasn't remembering, not in any clear sort of way, but in the back of his mind, somewhere, was a memory of a little girl with blonde hair and a wild laugh, like her mother's. He couldn't remember a name, or even the details of her face, but looking down at the two of them, he was hit with a surge of deja vu that had nothing to do with the damn photographs of them that he'd pretended not to look at.

"Yeah, nice to meet you," he said, glancing away and shifting his weight awkwardly, "Look, man, they got stuff for you at the information desk. 's the same for everybody. Keys to an apartment and stuff. You want, I can show you."

"An apartment," Brendan echoed, half a question. How any of this was supposed to have worked, he didn't know, but he didn't much like the sound of that, maybe because it was simpler to hone in on a comparatively unimportant detail than how fucked up this whole thing seemed. He didn't want keys or anything of the sort. He wanted to be home, with Tess, in the house they'd be able to pay off with the prize money from Sparta. Somehow, though, winning seemed incredibly distant, like something that had happened a lifetime ago or in another world; he wasn't sure that last part was inaccurate. "What do I need an apartment for? What are we even doing here?"

"I don't know what to tell you, man. I been here weeks and nobody's found a way outta this damn city. You come in on the train, but you can't leave that way. You can get in a car, but you can only drive so far before... somethin' stops you. Trust me, man, I know how crazy it sounds," he said, his eyes sliding over the little girls again. He could tell they were getting scared and he wondered if maybe they shouldn't talk about this stuff with them around. What the hell the alternative would be, he didn't know.

Trust me.

Well, wasn't that a fucking laugh.

It did sound crazy, and a whole lot of other things besides, but in spite of all that, Brendan wasn't sure he had any choice but to believe him. Difficult as this may have been to understand, most of these facts stood for themselves, and it wasn't like Tommy would have had any reason to lie about the rest of it. No matter how fucked up things between them may have still been, that wouldn't have made any sense, and he couldn't imagine his brother doing so purely out of spite. They hadn't, as far as he could tell, gone that far.

"Alright," he said, for his daughters' sake more than anything else. They were clearly as confused as he was, and more frightened; if this was the sort of thing Tommy had to tell him, he wasn't sure he wanted to hear the rest of it in front of them. "Let's see this apartment, then." A little softer, he added, "Everything's gonna be alright, girls, I promise."

"Hang on," he muttered, turning his back on the whole damn scene, on his brother and those little girls. A family he hadn't been a part of in a long time. And maybe a lot of that had been his own choosing, but not all of it. At fourteen, he hadn't really known what a choice like that would really mean, and afterward, there'd been too much pain and that infamous Conlon stubbornness getting in the damn way.

He walked up to the Information Desk, asking the woman there for the envelop for Conlon. She looked skeptical for a moment, then looking past him to Brendan and those little girls, she handed over the manilla envelop with a nod.

The whole damn thing gave him the creeps.

Returning to the three of them, he muttered, "Let's go," and headed toward the street.

As soon as Tommy was gone, the girls' apparent shyness waned, both of them with more questions than Brendan could even process at once as he watched his brother's retreating back. He'd been told a few things, sure, but he still couldn't get a handle on any of this, and the things he really wanted to know, he doubted anyone would have an answer for. This was entirely new territory, though, and not just because the city was one he had never seen before. He'd spent half his life with Tess, made a choice years ago to give up a promise and stay with her. Even knowing that he would do anything for his two daughters, he wasn't sure how he was supposed to do this without her there.

He'd just finished offering yet another reassurance when Tommy returned, and he stared just a moment before following along, Rosie still on his hip. This was just one more uncertainty, but at least things seemed to be settled enough for the time being that he wasn't left to make sense of this on his own.

"Where are we going?" asked Emily before he could get a word out, when he'd meant to ask what all was in that envelope. "Is it far?"

"Dunno, yet," Tommy answered, cutting the girl a sideways look as he tore open the envelop. Pulling out the little card, he read the address on it with a snort of laughter. Chelsea Cloisters. Of fucking course.

"Come on, we'll take a cab," he said, stepping toward the edge of the street and hailing one of them heading their way.

"At least there are cabs," Brendan said under his breath, tone wry. There was, admittedly, a nice sense of normalcy in it, something much needed, but it was a small comfort when he still had two frightened girls, a wife who didn't seem to be anywhere in sight, and a brother it was difficult to determine where he stood with. It was just a few minutes ago that they'd been holding each other, something put right even if not everything had been yet, at least in his mind. The same clearly wasn't true of Tommy, though, if he'd been here that long. Brendan couldn't even be sure if he knew about it at all. That would just fucking figure, if he didn't. "So you know where this is, then? The place we're going?"

"Same building as me," Tommy muttered, opening the door to the cab and letting Brendan and his girls climb in first.

"You're a couple floors up."

At least they hadn't been put right next door. Shit was awkward enough already.

Edited 2012-07-13 21:37 (UTC)

All of this would be a lot easier, Brendan thought, if Tommy weren't so damn difficult to read. Already there was enough he couldn't make sense of, but he didn't know where they stood, either, or just how bad a thing it was that they were apparently going to be living in the same building. It didn't have to mean much either way — he'd lived in apartments before, and being close to other tenants was hardly a requirement — but he wanted things to be okay, wanted his girls to have an uncle, especially without their mother here. He just didn't know, even now, if that was possible, if the two of them would ever really be okay again.

"And you don't know how any of this happens," he said as he got into the cab, Emily on one side of him, Rosie on the other, the words half a question despite the obvious answer. "The IDs, the apartment assignments, it's all just… out of thin air?" It seemed a little too perfect for that, but maybe that was the point.

The little one, Rosie, was staring at him, all big eyes and blonde ringlets, and he slouched as close to the damn door as he could get. He wasn't afraid of her so much as every little damn thing she represented. Everything he'd lost. Everything he didn't even remember having in the damn first place.

"I've asked around. Nobody's got more explanation than that. You and that envelop turn up outta thin air. You're either one of the clueless bastards like us that don't got a clue, or you're the rest of the damn people in this city, who all act like nothin' weird's going on."

That in itself was even weirder, but Brendan didn't think he needed to say that much. If Tommy had been here for a while, as was apparently the case, then he'd probably figured all of that out for himself. He decided, too, that it was probably useless to tell Tommy to watch his mouth around the kids. There were worse things he could have said, and chances were, if they hadn't heard them already, they would soon.

Smoothing a hand over Rosie's hair, he sighed, exhausted and unable to hide it, as much from the fight as anything else. He'd taken it pretty good out there, and that, he nearly did say, except there was one thing left that he didn't know, that he was sure Tommy would be able to answer. "So if this all works..." He gestured vaguely in front of himself. "Like you say it does, with people showing up outta nowhere and spending months here when they've just seen each other, do you remember everything?"

"Depends on whatchu mean by everything," Tommy said, turning to look out the window, but he could still see Brendan's reflection, that goddamn expression on his face like he was waiting for answers. Waiting for shit to make sense.

Nothing would make sense. Nothing about this damn city, nothing about their goddamn family. None of it.

"Sparta," he answered, figuring he'd leave it as simple as that for now. Tommy could make of that what he would, and either way, there were bound to be answers in it, whether he knew about their fight or not, and how it had ended. Right now, Brendan was having trouble even caring that he'd won, news that hadn't fully sunk in yet. The important part was between them. The important part was that things were supposed to have been okay from here on out.

"Yeah, I remember," Tommy muttered, three words weighted with a hell of a lot more than the sum of their parts. He remembered, down to the details. The damn ache in his shoulder wouldn't let him forget.

"Any bills for my shoulder ever turn up, I'll be sure to send 'em your way."

It was utterly ridiculous, the urge Brendan had to apologize upon hearing that. Popping Tommy's shoulder had been a pretty low blow and he knew it, but that was the risk they took every time they got in the ring. He'd done what he had to. It wasn't at all what he'd meant in bringing the fight up now.

"Right, because that's what there was to take away from all that," he said, trying not to sound too bitter. Christ, it was like they were teenage boys again, except things had never been this tense between them when they were young. "You do that."

"I remember, man. This really something you wanna talk about it now?" Tommy said, cutting a look at the little girl sitting between them.

"I mean, whatchu wanna hear from me right now?"

"Nothing," Brendan said, raising his hands in a show of surrender. Maybe there was a lot they probably ought to talk about, but this was far from the time, and he knew that. Just the answer was all he'd really been looking for. "It was just kind of hard to tell."

"Yeah, well... whatever," Tommy muttered, producing a toothpick from his pocket and clinched it between his teeth.

They were still a couple blocks away and suddenly all he wanted was to get out of that damn cab.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only