Thicker than Water...
The sound of tires crunching over unfinished road filtered through the open windows as the vehicle came to a halt. Twisting the key and pulling it from the ignition, the dark haired young man paused to consider what he was doing. Flicking his gaze over the steering wheel towards the looming mansion, he hesitated and asked himself why he was making this move in the first place. He owed this stranger nothing, and although they shared a father, the dark eyed mechanic felt no real connection beyond that of blood. Running a hand through his hair, he checked himself once again in the rearview mirror, hoping to see a more confident face staring back. Instead, there was reservation and doubt etched in his eyes of chrome. Going so far as to wear a buttoned up formal shirt and a pair of dark trousers, Alexander had made an effort to look his best for a brother he had never met. He had even styled his hair back with some moose and had finally shaven off the stubble which had been growing in for the past week.
Stepping out of the old Mustang, its dark paint shimmering in the mid-day sun, Alexander stopped to scrape off a stray mark on the hood with his fingers, smiling slightly as the caked dirt came off easily. His car was his pride and joy, and the young mechanic had worked months fixing, upgrading and paying for it. From a pile of junk, he had turned the classic into a marvel of his mechanical skills, and had gotten an eye-turner of a car for a steal. Stepping away from where he had parked it, the dark haired mutant found himself walking towards the mansion, his hands jammed into his pocket, and his fingers playing with the keys and spare change within. Nervous and struggling to keep his feet moving, Alexander found himself wondering about his half brother. What was he like? Was he a jerk like their father, or had he grown up different? It was hard to imagine someone he had never met, but a range of possibilities flew through his mind.
As much as he wanted the boy to look something familiar, there was little desire in the mechanic for the boy to have the same disposition as his father. Walking slowly, his dark boots kicking stay stones off the main driveway, Alexander wondered if he himself had inherited any personality traits from his father. Did he carry the same rage, the same emotional detachment as his father did, or was he more like his mother; a broken, silent figure just waiting to be scattered to the winds? Absently his eyes trailed down to his exposed forearm, the Latin script of his tattoo seeming unnaturally bright in the sunlight. Accipere quam facere praestat injuriam, it read, the block letters spelling out the story of his life. It is better to suffer an injustice than to inflict one, and all Alexander ever did was suffer injustices at the hands of his father. It was one reason he had gotten the tattoo, his sudden anger one night after abuse leading him to the tattoo parlour.
Rolling his sleeve over the words, Alexander buttoned the cuff to hide the art and continued his slow walk. The mansion was huge, and for a second Alexander felt another stab of doubt. What if this place was one of those high class boarding school types, where students wore uniforms and everyone seemed to have a British accent? Brushing away the doubt, Alexander finally pushed through the massive doors, his heart suddenly beating rapidly in his chest. This was the point of no return, he told himself. After signing in at the reception, there was little he could do to make his existence unknowable to Jess. But then again, his brother deserved to know that he did have more family out there, as dysfunctional and distant as it might seem. Maybe in time Alexander could even bring the younger mutant home, have him meet his father and mother. Almost instantly, he dismissed the latter relative from the equation. There was no way his father would be glad to see Jess. It would just anger him, and bring about another night of wrath and ranting about mutants.
Finally stepping forward and approaching the main desk, Alexander gave the man behind the counter a small smile. "Im here to see Jess-" Alexander paused. Somehow he doubted the mutant shared the same last name, and Alexander couldnt remember the name on the invitation offhand. Raising his index finger to the man behind the counter as if buying a few seconds, the chrome-eyed mutant reached into his pocket and pulled out the folded invitation. Unfolding it, Alexander read out the last name and apologized. "Jess Marino. He's my half brother…and we havent really met," He said as a way of explaining himself. The man at the reception simply nodded and buzzed through the intercom, calling for Jess to come meet his brother.
The droning voice of the history professor was enough to nearly lull him to sleep. The topic of discussion that day was the Kennedy family with its members' uncanny ability to meet an untimely end in the spotlight while political accomplishments were put on a backburner. To Jess, they had always seemed to be one of those families that court disaster and whose history is like watching a train wreck play out before your eyes. It's dark and it's unfortunate yet you just can't seem to wrench your eyes away, even as the passengers go up in flames.
Sometimes Jess thought of his family this way. His mother, Lara, a woman who hadn't been able to handle her own life let alone take care of a little one. She had long ago abandoned him to nights of Springer and microwave dinners or worse, wandering the streets of New York, while she 'made a connection' with a guy. Lara has obviously never heard the saying about learning from your mistakes. She had spent her whole life making the same mistake over again. The only mistake she had learned from was her pregnancy.
Then there was the father he couldn't remember. Tyler Mariano had claimed to be going out for a pack of smokes and Lara had never questioned why he needed a backpack for a cigarette run. He had never returned. Drunk after a new break-up she hadn't seen coming Jess' mother had muttered something about being a mutant and how HE hadn't liked it or liked that it was in the genes. Jess had been smart enough to figure out that this meant his father wouldn't be coming back for him and driving him off to a nice house in his expensive car. Those were dreams he had given up on and abandoned for stupid long ago.
Two screw-ups left only Jess himself to complete the family tree. Resentful of his parents and any authority figure who might be seen as parental. It had been pure luck that kept Jess and his New York friends out of jail for petty theft and public mischief. He was just some punk with no future. Yup his family were winners. All they needed was an interesting hook like frequent untimely death.
When the buzz of the intercom broke through Mr. Burns' voice Jess began to wonder if there was a God afterall. "Mr. Burns could you please send Jess Mariano to come meet his brother?" the faceless voice asked. Jess was pretty sure the teacher in question had sent a reply in the affirmative but the whole world had gone into slow-motion as he attempted to process what could only be some kind of horribly cruel joke at his expense. His brother? For once in his life Jess was without a comeback.
"Jess?" Mr. Burns' prodded him. Somehow that voice that could put Argus to sleep seemed gentler, as though the man had some respect or compassion for family, even Jess' family.
"I don't have a brother," he said aloud. His tone was defensive. The native New Yorker was convinced this was somesort of joke and he wasn't about to give the one in charge any ground. Burns just shrugged at him, the sort of shrug that said 'this isn't my problem' and glanced towards the door. Jess pulled himself to his feet but he felt as though his shoes were made of concrete and each step towards the door was heavy. He should have been thrilled, should have been ecstatic at having an actual excuse for getting out of class instead of having to invent his own. Instead he was all kinds of confused and there was a strange terror in Jess, the terror of hope that he so rarely felt.
When he was little Jess had asked Lara for a brother. He had been ignorant of the process behind a baby and decided he wanted an older brother. Lara had done her best to explain to the four-year-old that it wasn't that simple, that he could have a brother just because he wanted one. As stubborn in his beliefs then as he was now Jess had sulked. Only later had he understood that what he was asking had been impossible.
All hope of family had left him that night with his mom, when she had confessed that Tyler left because of the mutant gene she bore, a gene he had also unknowingly possessed. There was his screw-up of a mother and his abandonment father and then there was him. He didn't need anyone else anyway... right?
Now suddenly there was a strange sensation of possibility for a family member who wasn't as broken as those he knew. Mostly Jess Mariano thought this was some kind of joke. His mother hadn't had another kid but his father..? What if there was a brother? He had to be younger surely, Lara would have mentioned it if there was an older kid. Would they look alike? Would the kid be like his father? that man Jess had never known or would he take after a mother unrelated to Jess? He let his imagination run away with him, despite being very aware of how every thought and dream would come crashing down at the inevitable realisation that it was all a prank.
These were Jess' thoughts as he walked down the hall. He wasn't even sure how to walk anymore. The concrete in his running shoes was lessening but he wasn't sure whether to walk faster or run for the finish line. He just kept moving in the right direction. Finally the last hall and he was there, standing in the front hall of Xavier's.
There was another male there and Jess stopped directly across from him yet halfway across the room. His feet wouldn't move any further and the wary student wasn't sure he wanted to get that close to an illusion anyway. Having a brother appear was like an oasis in the middle of the desert yet he would disappear just like that and be proven to be a no one, this Jess would have bet money on. Then again unlike his guardian Jack Harmony, Jess was not a betting man.
There was silence as Jess seized the guy up. Older than him, by at least a few years. The guy was dressed up in the sort of fashion that Jess might have made fun of with a button down shirt and dark trousers. Even the guy's dark hair was slicked back and he was clean-shaven. Olive skin and dark hair were enough to give them a slight resemblance and Jess would have been lying if he said he didn't notice it. The most unusual part of the stranger's appearance lay in his eyes though. They were almost metallic, entrancing in an eerie sort of way. Jess met that metallic gaze with his green eyes for a minute before looking down at himself.
Dark hair had been carefully styled to appear careless and he too was clean-shaven. That was where the similarities ended for Jess wore a leather jacket over his wrinkled green tee and his dark jeans were hardly formal wear.
Possibility perhaps but the suspicious mutant was not about to believe just any stranger who waltzed in here and claimed to be his brother without concrete evidence of some kind. "I'm flattered, really. I had no idea I had the starpower to be punk'd" Jess said, his tone very obviously sarcastic.
A beat and then, "What do you want from me?" asked Jess. This was more guarded, the negative mutant not ready to believe even if it was what he wanted. Jess didn't have anything to offer anyone and he didn't think he had made enough of an impact for someone to play a practical joke on him so why was this stranger standing here thinking they had some sort of connection? Jess was almost afraid to find out.
Re: Thicker than Water...
Chrome eyes regarded the smaller man impassively. If he felt any resentment towards the sarcasm, he hid it, and instead handed the invitation over to Jess. "According to what it says, we share the same father." If Jess wanted concrete evidence then he'd just have to look elsewhere, for even Alexander had no other way of proving the fact. True, they shared alarmingly similar characteristics, such as the dark hair and the olive skin, but that could very well be because half the world had the exact same features. Bracing for whatever bout of sarcasm was to come next, Alexander took a moment to carefully study the younger man. Unsure of what to expect, the chrome eyed mutant had regulated himself to imagining portraits of different young men, and almost all of them had looked like a younger version of himself. Now that the real image was placed before him, Alexander didn't really know what to think.
The boy was someone Alexander would probably have dismissed as some rebellious high school kid, and that very fact unnerved him. If this young man insisted on seeing further proof, or wanted to delve into deep family history, Alexander knew he'd find himself in somewhat of a tricky situation. True, the boy could pass for his brother, but was that really all there was too it? From all he had gleaned from the first few seconds of introduction, Alexander saw a suspicious young man almost intent on calling some imaginary bluff. It made the mechanic uneasy, and Alexander felt the sudden urge to simply lie and bail.
But he didnt.
Something kept him standing, hands now in his pocket and eyes turned on his newly found brother. "Listen," he started before Jess could reply to the issue of the invitation. "I don’t know how that got to our house, or why I even made the effort to come here...but I did. This isn't some joke being played on you, nor am I part of some warped big brothers of America organization. All I know is that this letter did come, and that someone thinks we're somehow related. I'm just as curious as you." Alexander finished with a small smile and turned his eyes away from the Negative mutant. He had been told his eyes could be unnerving in their steely texture and utter lack of pupils, so he gave the boy some room to adjust to his words.
Thinking back to his father, who had become the crux of the entire issue, Alexander could remember how his father had left his mother and him alone and without support for a few years. His mother had told him his father had fallen for another girl and was now married to her. The old man had even changed his last name to obtain a marriage license. After a few of what had been the best years of Alexander's life, his father had returned, fresh from leaving his other wife and child in the lurch. Looking at the younger man suddenly, Alexander felt a strange sensation well in his gut. If he assumed correctly, this rebellious young man standing before him was the little kid his father had abandoned years ago. In a way, Alexander felt both sorry and happy for Jess. Sorry for what he assumed were the painful years which followed the loss of a father, and happy for the fact that Jess probably didn't have to put up with as much abuse as Alexander had at the hands of his father.
Either way, if Alexander himself was any indication of the mess Tyler Walker...or Tyler Marino...or whatever name he chose to use, left behind, then this dark haired young man standing before him had probably been dealt a crappy hand as well.
Turning his gaze back on to Jess, Alexander wondered how he could have ever imagined this meeting going smoothly. It wasn't as if he could just waltz into the mansion, find his brother, announce the revelation that they were related, and then have things go on as if they had never been apart. Things didn't work like that, and the awkwardness that was building between them only reinforced the fact. Even if he managed to somehow convince this young man that he really was some long lost half brother, what then? He simply couldn't invite Jess back to his house and then announce to his parents how he had found the child his father had abounded more than a decade ago. Heck, Alexander didn't even know what made brothers bond in the first place. Should he invite the smaller man to a ball game, or perhaps go out and shoot some pool, what? If anything, Alexander was even more confused than he had been when he first arrived.
And to think I thought this would be only moderately awkward…
Re: Thicker than Water...
Jess wasn't sure what he had expected but it wasn't that this stranger would seem so unphased at the less than friendly greeting. He took the invitation from the other's hand wordlessly but Jess' gaze was torn between the paper and this man who might be his brother. Green eyes flicked back and forth, devoid of the image of usual cool detachment Jess liked to project.
"According to what it says, we share the same father."
His father then, as he had known it would be. If it was all some cosmic prank then the culprit had done their research. What was strange about the whole situation - well, Jess amended, stranger - was that this man was older than him. In that moment Jess thought he wanted to hit the faceless father who sometimes appeared in his dreams. Jess had never held much respect for his mother. He was sure that some part of him loved her because however many mistakes she made she was still his mother and right now he wanted to protect her because his father had had someone else before her. He had abandoned her. Had he left because he already had a family? Jess' thoughts played across his face, manifesting mostly in a grim expression of unwanted knowledge. Fantasies about a father who came back for him had been realistically shattered years earlier but those dreams that hide away in the subconscious, the ones that you know are impossible yet you still yearn for to come true, those ones were harder to break.
Finally Jess glanced down at the paper in his hand, recognizing it as the generic one sent out by the institute to family members. Parents' Day Weekend was something Jess hadn't really thought about. He sure as Hell wasn't about to call Lara and there wasn't anyone else, or at least there hadn't been. Jess was still speechless when he started talking.
"Listen, I don’t know how that got to our house, or why I even made the effort to come here...but I did. This isn't some joke being played on you, nor am I part of some warped big brothers of America organization. All I know is that this letter did come, and that someone thinks we're somehow related. I'm just as curious as you."
Somewhere in the midst of his brother's speech Jess' able mind kicked in and he considered it logically. The invitations, dorky though they might be, were legitimate and it wasn't likely that this was part of a joke. Besides that who cared enough about him to try and play any form of a prank?
"So what happens now? We do Springer, find out if Tyler is the father and then you start dolling out brotherly advice?" Sarcasm was back in full force. Had Jess been in possession of any real friends they would have wondered how long it would take his brother to realise that sarcasm was the shield Jess hid behind.
There was a moment's pause, during which Jess stared unblinkingly at the floor. When he looked back up he wasn't apologetic but there was a quiet sigh, as if Jess was steeling himself against something. "Look," he began, finally meeting his brother's unnerving gaze. "It's not like I don't appreciate the get out of history free card, this is just.." He searched for the right word for a moment before deciding there wasn't one. "It's weird. I don't even know your name."
Re: Thicker than Water...
He grinned. "Alexander," he said, extending a hand, "And no, I don't do talk shows. Nor to I doll out brotherly advice- whatever that means." It was obvious Alexander didn't get Jess' biting sarcasm, but responded with a light joke all the same. Again, he felt pressed to simply leave, and warm tendrils of coercion coiled uneasily in his belly. He had never done anything like this before, and the very fact that he stood before his half-brother was a testament to some force of will then kept him fastened to where he stood. For all he knew, Jess was the product of Tyler's deviance, and the reason his father had ran off in the first place. As a child, Alexander wanted to hate Lara, and the spawn she had birthed. Jessďż˝ mother was all that was wrong in Alexander's perfect world, and was a indication of everything Tyler had done to hurt and damage Alexander's own mother.
And then he stood speechless again. What was he supposed to say now? What would be the right thing to say now? It wasn't as if Alexander had practised before driving over, and it wasn't as if he had been a similar situation before. It was all very alien to him, much as it was probably very alien to Jess. The awkward situation he had put himself in made him fidget with the buttons of his sleeves, and he wondered if he'd ever find a friend lurking behind Jess' hostile green eyes.
For all the genetic details they shared, they had grown up to be two different people. Being related didn't make reconciliation easier, in fact, it made it all the more difficult. Alexander knew that the man standing in front of him was a brother, was blood, and yet he had never met anyone who had seemed more alien, more distant. The fact that both of them were reserved and cautious didn't help either, and he wondered if there would ever be a way to simply chip away at the formidable wall standing between them. For instance, what if jess didn't like cars? Or what if he didn't enjoy pool or beer? If they were completely at odds interests-wise this reunion would be far more difficult.
Turning his silvery grey eyes to Jess, Alexander felt pressured to speak up, as if the ball was in his court. He was, after all, the older brother, and he was the one who had come to visit in the first place. If he hadn't, Jess would have stayed oblivious to a whole family related to him. A family that was his blood, and included the father who had abandoned him years before. Thoughts of Tyler again brought a strong bile to his throat, and he wondered how that issue could be resolved. There was little chance his father would want to see Jess, and even less chance that the boy might actually get an apology. If there was one thing Tyler didn't do, it was apologize for all the wrongs he had committed.
"It is weird," he agreed, after another awkward pause, "But I guess there's a reason we got that letter this year, right?" In his mind, the word kept repeating. Right? As if he were searching to justification, as if he were willing his half-brother to agree.
Topic Commands
Click to receive email notification of replies
Click to stop receiving email notification of replies
