1
Author: tarago
Rating: M
Status: WIP
Fiction Type: Present Day
Pairing: Paul/Tim
Warnings:
Disclaimers: I am doing this for fun and have no affiliation with DAAS.
Summary: Paul and Tim have fatherhood thrust upon them.
Paul
Mornings can only have been invented by Satan: the effort, the rush, the sheer grind of it all. Clearly something demonic is going on. Left to our own devices Tim and I don’t participate because the night is our time, we are work late/sleep late men. Still up and doing at two am, still asleep at ten.
Except that now five mornings a week the alarm goes off at six forty and I just can’t adjust to the change. I used to get showered and dressed leading by example but I ditched that routine because it was dreadful and as only Kristen is leaving the house what the hell does it matter if I’m dressed or not? So I usually choose not. Tim is excused early mornings and has trained himself to go to the bathroom take his first lot of pills and go back to bed without actually waking up which is bloody impressive.
Kristen’s radio howls into action at seven but it is rare that this provokes any signs of life. At seven fifteen I knock on her door and today’s exchange was typical.
Me: Time to be moving.
Her: Get stuffed, you wonk!
Me: Please start moving.
Her: I am! You don’t know, you can’t see through walls so just...
The rest is lost and muffled as she buries herself under the covers but I suspect that sentence ended in the words ‘fuck’ and ‘off’. I knock again at seven thirty and keep at it until I hear movement and the door of her bathroom slamming.
I make toast and think about my mum with renewed respect. How did she manage to get six of us and my dad who like all men back then did nothing domestically up, fed and out the door on time day after day without setting fire to us out of sheer frustration?
Breakfast is a nightmare because Kristen has my problem and can’t face eating first thing but I feel that it is my responsibility to get her to and it’s ridiculously hard. We’ve run through a thousand different foods and she doesn’t want any of it. I know exactly how she feels because whenever I try to force something down to make it seem like breakfast is a good idea I feel sick.
She dawdles; she hesitates and tries to run out the clock so she won’t have to eat. This morning we were joylessly taking tiny bites of toast when Kristen suddenly burst out laughing.
Me: What?
Her: You look so miserable.
Me: You do too.
Her: This is like the saddest toast in the world.
We both got the giggles and I agreed to end the breakfast farce forever and was rewarded with a hug as she headed off to school. I’ve probably done the wrong thing but if it makes mornings less of a slog I really don’t care.
I take my tea out onto the balcony and try to talk myself into getting on with the day but the bed sings out its siren song so I snuggle up with Timmy instead. Over the years we have developed contours he and I: knees, elbows, arses we fit together effortlessly and wonderfully. He is warm and his arm strong as he holds me close.
Him: Job done?
Me: Yep. I’ve banned breakfast.
Him: Banned it? What are you King of the Morning?’
Me: Yes.
And for today at least I am.
Kristen
Mornings are so stupid. I’m an adult, I know how to get up and go to school but Paul is just nag, nag, nag and all do I know what time it is and have I got my whatever for the thing? Why can’t he just shut up?
Actually, Uncle dear, you can talk all you want but I can’t hear you. That’s right you’re like white noise to me and there’s no words just a buzzing sound. All right so today I had gone back to sleep by accident and him knocking on the door was really useful but that doesn’t mean he has to be in my face every shitting bloody day.
He was nice about breakfast though. He is nice sometimes but why can’t he CALM DOWN and GET A LIFE instead of always interfering in mine?
Crap! I’ve left my iPod at home and I really need it. I feel sort of protected when I’ve got my big Skull Candy headphones on and all I can hear is my music. It’s the best way to be part of school when everyone's moving around at the same time.
I’m not going to school without it so I’m not going to school. I’ll go downtown and check the crowds. Mum loves people watching so even though I don’t think it’ll happen I think that if I scan enough crowds then one day I’ll see her doing the same thing. I don’t really think that because that’s such a little kid thing to believe but then I do a just a bit, yeah?
I mean she is somewhere and she’ll come back and then I’ll live with her and not Paul and Tim which will be so amazing.
Won’t it?
Edited by tarago, 23 April 2012 - 12:16 AM.
) for the next part.
