Chapter Text
II was picking toys up off the floor when he heard the first knock at the door; the flat wasn't going to be perfect by the time the rest of the band barged in, and he'd long since made his peace with that. They'd seen him at far worse. Still, he kicked a stuffed bunny under the sofa and straightened a cushion out of something like habit.
The knock came again, more impatient this time.
He sighed, ran a hand through his hair, and went to answer it.
"Yo, we brought beer for the footie!" III announced, already giggling as he pushed past into the hallway, heading straight for the kitchen with the confidence of someone who'd memorised the floorplan.
Vessel stepped in after him, unhurried. He gave a small shrug in the direction III had disappeared. "Told him not to."
Then he pulled II into a hug, brief but genuine, and II returned it. More of a habit, of how they did things, than anything else.
IV was last through the door. He'd got a new leather jacket since II had seen him; black, as always, but with a band logo stitched across the back that II didn't recognise. He leaned in, squinting at it.
"Who's that, then?"
"Mates of mine. Metal lot from up north." IV's mouth did the thing that, on anyone else, might have been a proud smile. On IV it looked more like a very slight relaxation of his usual expression: a resting face so unreadable that new people sometimes thought he was furious with them right up until he laughed.
II smiled anyway. "Good for them."
IV responded by hugging him unexpectedly, hard enough to knock the air clean out of him, swinging them from side to side.
"Cheers," II wheezed.
They got to work in the living room, instruments tucked around the furniture, lyric sheets spread across the coffee table. Three songs still needed to be written before the album was done, and they needed them quickly. Vessel had rough lyrics already sketched out — they always needed adjusting once melody and rhythm entered the picture fully, but that was normal. That was the part II usually loved.
They'd been at it barely fifteen minutes; Vessel reading something aloud, III humming an experimental counter-melody, IV with his eyes half-closed and one foot tapping, when they heard it. The soft click of a door. A yawn, long and unselfconscious. The gentle slap-slap-slap of small bare feet on the hallway floor.
"Uncles!"
V came skidding into the room, sleep-warm and wild-haired, and made a beeline not for his father but directly for IV, grabbing onto his arm with both hands and swinging off it like a little primate until IV, expression unchanged, reached down and hoisted him up onto his lap, sitting down.
"There he is," IV said. "What's this little bean doing out of bed? Isn't it nap time?"
"Were we too loud?" Vessel asked, looking briefly up from his papers with something between apology and concern.
"Nah, he's been sleeping less in the afternoons lately," II said. "Don't worry about it."
"Yeah! Because I'm a big boy. I'm almost five now!" V counted his fingers and then twisted on IV's lap to look at III, eyes wide and very serious. "Uncle III, I'm big. I'm going to be tall like you!"
III beamed and leaned over to grab him, lifting him clean off IV's lap and spinning him in a wide arc while V shrieked with delight.
"D'you know what, I think you're absolutely right," III said, setting him back down on his feet. "Little giant in the making. Not like your gremlin of a father."
"Oi," said II, without looking up.
V had already moved on. He padded over to Vessel, slower now, and stood a couple of feet away. "Hi, Uncle Vessy," he said quietly, lifting one small hand in a wave before tucking his face, going pink, into III's side.
Vessel gave a small, measured smile. "Hello, V."
"I genuinely don't understand why he's still shy around you," IV said, watching the exchange with the particular fond exasperation he reserved for things he found secretly endearing.
"He saw me once just before a show," Vessel said, returning to his papers. "Old mask. All the paint. Was doing voice warm-up. He was terrified."
"That was over a year ago. He can't still remember that."
"Maybe Vessel's just extremely handsome and little man's a bit smitten," III offered cheerfully, settling back against the sofa. He glanced at Vessel sideways as he said it, something quick and amused in his expression that he didn't entirely suppress.
Vessel didn't look up, but the very faint shift in his posture suggested he'd heard perfectly well.
"Nah-ah," V said, with the absolute, unclouded certainty only a four-year-old can muster. "Uncle IV is the handsomnest."
A beat of silence.
"I—" II turned to stare at his son. "IV? Not Daddy?"
V looked between them, apparently unmoved by the gravity of the question.
"Uncle," he said.
"My own son," II said, pressing a hand to his chest. "My own flesh and blood."
V had already wandered back to his room.
They tried to return to work, and mostly succeeded. The flat settled into a comfortable rhythm; someone would suggest a line, someone else would pull it apart, IV would sit very still for a long time and then say one precise thing that fixed it. It was how they always worked.
V, however, had other plans.
He reappeared in the doorway with a stuffed dinosaur tucked under one arm: enormous, cartoonish, a very green T-Rex almost as tall as he was. He went straight to IV.
"Uncle IV. Did you see? Dino." He held it up with both arms, face shining. "It's my favourite and he always sleeps with me. Keeps the monsters away!"
IV looked at it with appropriate gravity. "Nice one, mate. He's very scary indeed. I'm sure he keeps you safe, aye?"
V squeaked with satisfaction and disappeared again.
Two minutes later he was back, this time lugging a boxed Lego set for III. He heaved it up onto III's knee.
"Uncle III. Look. Lego! Farm animals. Piggy. Ducky. Horsey." V pointed at different animals. "I'm going to build it with Daddy." He patted the box twice for emphasis, his tongue a little out.
"That's a big set, bud. Very impressive."
Another squeak. Another disappearance.
The third time, he came back more slowly. He was carrying a small pair of drumsticks — child-sized, 7A, painted red, worn and chipped since they got used regularly. He stopped in front of Vessel and looked somewhere in the region of Vessel's left knee.
"Drumsticks," he said quietly. "Daddy gave them to me. So I can be a good drummer."
He risked a very brief upward glance, then looked at the floor again.
"Show me, then," Vessel said. His voice wasn't unkind, but it was — as it always was — completely levelled. No softening, no baby talk. Just a genuine invitation.
V looked at his dad.
II nodded, slow and encouraging.
V took a breath. He went and fetched his practice pad, set it carefully on the floor, and sat in front of it with a seriousness that made III bite down on a smile.
He took another breath. He started to play.
It was a simple beat, straightforward, clean. Then he began to build it, shifting the rhythm, picking up speed, wrists loose, arms relaxed in a way that took adult drummers years to learn. He didn't tense. He didn't rush. It wasn't perfect; he lost some notes, rushed here and there, but it was still impressive for a four-year-old. When he finished, he looked around the room with uncertain eyes.
There was a moment of complete silence.
II was grinning so wide it looked like it might hurt.
III was the first to move. He got to his feet and started clapping, slow and emphatic. "Absolutely incredible, bud. You're already a proper drummer. Better than your dad, honestly."
"Don't push it," II said, still beaming.
IV leaned forward with a fist bump, then opened his hand for a high five. V did both, going pink right to the tips of his ears.
"You did really well, V," Vessel said. There was something attentive in his expression now, genuinely interested. "That was impressive. You will be an astonishing musician one day."
He extended his hand. V stared at it for a moment, then shook it very formally, immediately buried his face against II's leg, and did not come out again for some time.
"Right," II said, patting the lump of son attached to his knee. "That's enough showing off for one afternoon, yeah? Go play. Daddy's got to work."
In his room, V went through many toys before settling on a collection of plastic boxes and lids — the toys once inside tossed onto a pile now — and began drumming on them. With so many elements it sounded like an absolute mess. All of the adults stuck their heads through the door and watched as V happily drummed away.
"Whatchya doing there, V?" III asked, amused.
"Drum show! Like Daddy!" he answered, beaming, and kept drumming.
ᛑᛗᛛ
An hour and a half later, V appeared in the doorway again. This time he was quieter about it.
"Daddy?"
II looked up from the lyric sheet. "Yeah, bud?"
"Hungry," V said, very small.
II glanced at the clock and pulled a face. "Oh, bloody hell. Sorry, mate, I completely lost track. Come on." He stood, then noticed IV already unfolding himself from the sofa. "You don't have to—"
"I'm starving too," IV said simply, which was not the full truth but was true enough.
The kitchen was small but they all fit easily; V installed on the counter by IV, II already opening cupboards. The brief choreography of it was comfortable in the way of people who'd been in each other's spaces for years.
"Cheesy strings?" IV offered, holding one up in V's direction.
V recoiled as if personally offended. He frowned.
"No! No, no, no! They are yucky!"
II laughed. "Let me guess." He turned to his son. "Banana. Peanut butter on every slice. Fruit cocktail."
V nodded with great enthusiasm, already swinging his feet.
II set about it, slicing the banana, adding a small scoop of peanut butter to each piece, getting the yogurt and frozen strawberries down from the freezer. IV watched, leaning back against the opposite counter with his cheese strings, with an expression on his face that he was not aware of wearing.
"Uncle IV," V said suddenly, very solemn. "It's going to be loud." He pressed his own hands over his ears in demonstration.
IV pushed off the counter and stood in front of the kid, shielding him from the awful blender, covering his ears properly. V relaxed into it, smiling.
When the blender stopped, IV dropped his hands. V reached up and patted one of them in thanks, already turning his attention to the food appearing in front of him.
"Eat the banana first while the cocktail's still cold," II said, pouring it into a cup. "Don't want you getting poorly."
V nodded, very serious, and began eating with tremendous focus — a happy little shimmy working its way through his whole body with every bite, entirely involuntary, entirely unconscious.
IV found he was smiling like an idiot. He made his face stop.
"Nana?" V held up a banana slice in IV's direction.
IV leaned down and took it straight from the offered hand, making an exaggerated noise of appreciation. "Lovely nana."
V dissolved into giggles.
"Nana?" He held the next one up for II.
"Mmm." II took it, ruffled his hair. "Thanks for sharing, mate."
Another shimmy. Another bite. IV found his expression doing the thing again and was considerably less successful at stopping it this time.
"Careful," II murmured, not looking up. "People will think you're going soft."
IV's face fell into its most neutral setting with impressive speed. He showed II his middle finger while V's attention was elsewhere, and left to the sound of II's quiet laugh.
V, fed and washed and sticky-fingered no longer, found his way onto the sofa between III and IV and stayed there like something that had always been there, a small barnacle happily attached to whatever uncle was warmest.
III had discovered that V found his exaggerated facial expressions completely hysterical, and was exploiting this relentlessly. Vessel watched this with the expression of a man silently enduring a minor irritation; though the irritation, if you looked closely enough, was not entirely convincing.
"Alright," Vessel said eventually. "Let's get something done. II, do you want to run through the opening?"
II settled behind the electric kit, and the moment the first beat landed, V sat bolt upright. "Daddy drum show," he announced, in the particular tone of a child who has decided something is officially an event. He gripped his cup with both hands and watched with an expression of tremendous, solemn concentration, feet bouncing in time.
"He's so fuc—" IV started, quiet, more to himself than anyone.
"Bad word!" V's head snapped around.
IV blinked. "I didn't—"
"You were going to," V said, completely offended that someone like Uncle IV could use a naughty word.
A pause. IV looked, for just a moment, genuinely caught out.
"…Fair enough," he said.
ᛑᛗᛛ
Eventually they stopped working. III found the football match and turned it on; IV stretched out with the first beer; Vessel, in what was either a concession or simply a decision that arguing was more effort than it was worth, folded his arms and watched the screen with the patient expression of someone tolerating something for reasons of his own.
II had disappeared to begin the process of getting V to bed, which everyone in the room knew was not a fast process.
It was going well enough until V realised what was happening.
"I don't want to sleep," he said, gripping IV's arm with both hands, his voice going wobbly in a way that meant the tears were close and mobilising. "I want to watch the footie with the uncles."
"Mate, you've got nursery in the morning." II crouched down, tired but patient. "And Daddy's got meetings. We talked about this."
"I'm big," V said. "Big boys watch footie."
He turned to IV with an expression of complete, unguarded desperation.
IV knew exactly what was happening. He was not unaware that he was being deployed as emotional leverage by a four-year-old. He caved anyway.
"Five minutes won't kill anyone," he said carefully, looking at II apologetically.
II straightened up. Something flickered across his face. Not quite anger, sharper than tiredness, over almost before it landed.
"You know what," he said, quieter than usual, "he can stay up as long as he likes. You can put him down, for all I care. Or just let him doze off from tiredness. Drop him off at nursery before 8am." He picked up a beer from the side table and sat back in the armchair with the deliberate stillness of someone removing themselves from a situation before they said something they'd regret.
IV watched him.
He understood. The anniversary was coming up — he'd been quietly aware of it for the past week, watching II with a low, steady worry he couldn't do anything about.
He didn't push. He just settled V between himself and III and let the boy have his fifteen minutes, watching a match he wasn't particularly invested in while V provided breathless commentary on the players' shoes and confidently stated he could run faster.
When he finally carried V off to bed, IV was mildly at a loss.
"So," he said, standing in the middle of V's bedroom, which smelled of baby shampoo and had approximately forty thousand stuffed animals in it, "what do we do?"
V looked at him with patient exasperation, as if this was obvious and Uncle IV was being a silly adult.
"Bath day," V said simply, and climbed down from IV's arms and retrieved his own pyjamas and underwear and towel; a small person who took their independence very seriously. He took IV's hand and led him to the bathroom, as if he was the one guiding IV through the process, and not the reverse.
IV sat on the edge of the bath and watched him; only helping when asked, passing the soap, checking the water wasn't too hot. And he thought, not for the first time, that V was going to be an interesting person when he grew up.
Afterwards he sat him on the counter and supervised the tooth-brushing while combing the knots out of his damp hair as gently as he could manage, and V submitted to this with stoic dignity.
They made their way back through the flat. V stopped at the living room threshold and conducted his goodnights with great ceremony.
"Night, Uncle III." A kiss on the cheek, delivered with confidence, knowing III would never pull away.
III caught him and squeezed him, kissing the top of the toddler's head. "Night, trouble."
"Night, Uncle Vessy." A wave, shy around the edges.
"Goodnight, V," Vessel said, and his voice was softer than it was in daylight, when the work was happening.
"Night, Daddy." V held his arms out.
II was across the room in three steps. He held V for longer than strictly necessary, face tucked against the top of his head, and V didn't complain about it.
"I'll take him," II said, when he finally let go. He looked at IV and the embarrassment was written all over him, easy to read if you knew him. "Thanks for the bath."
"I've got him," IV said. "Go sit down, it's fine." He said it gently, and pushed II — one hand, brief, between his shoulder blades — back in the direction of the chair.
After another wave of goodnights and love you's they went to the bedroom.
"What's the book?" IV asked, surveying the small shelf beside V's bed.
V pulled one out from under his pillow; it had already been selected some time ago, and handed it over. Old folk tales. The cover was soft with use.
IV sat on the edge of the bed.
"Uncle." V pointed. "I can't see the pictures from there."
"Right." IV rearranged himself against the headboard, and V crawled in against his side, duvet pulled up to his chin, and looked at the first page expectantly. "Sorry. I don't do this much."
"It's okay," V said, quite kindly, and yawned. "I'll teach you. Read."
He made it to the fifth page.
IV sat with him a while after; longer than was strictly necessary, if he was being honest with himself. V's breathing had gone slow and even, his face slack in the way only sleeping children managed, completely surrendered to it. A small hand had found IV's sleeve at some point and was still loosely fisted around it.
IV looked at him for a moment. Then he carefully freed his sleeve, pulled the duvet up to V's chin, clicked the night-light on, and eased the door shut behind him with both hands so the latch didn't catch.
The flat felt different now, quieter in a way that had nothing to do with volume. The telly was still on in the other room, the low murmur of the match commentary drifting through, and IV stood in the dark hallway for a moment just breathing it in. The smell of the place. Something that was genuinely a home.
He found II in the kitchen.
Not getting a beer, as it turned out. Just standing at the counter with both hands braced on the edge of it, looking at nothing in particular. He'd turned the overhead light off and hadn't bothered with the lamp, so the only light came from the little one above the hob. It turned everything amber and soft.
He looked up when IV came in.
"Asleep?" he asked.
"Page five." IV leaned against the doorframe. "Didn't stand a chance."
II made a sound that was almost a laugh. He turned back to the counter. The line of his shoulders said more than his face did, which was also saying quite a lot, if you knew how to read it — and IV did, by now, after enough years of watching him from the corner of a room.
IV crossed to the fridge, got two beers, and set one down beside II's hand without comment.
II looked at it. Then at IV.
"Ta," he said quietly.
They stood there for a bit. It wasn't uncomfortable, which was the thing about them; the silences had always been easy, even when everything in the silence wasn't.
"He's good," IV said eventually, because it was true and because II needed to hear it said plainly. "V. He's a really good kid."
"Yeah." Something in II's voice, fond and tired in equal parts. "He is."
"That's thanks to you, that is."
II made a dismissive noise and looked away. IV let him have that, knew better than to push it into words he'd only deflect. He just let it sit there between them, fact enough on its own.
"The anniversary's next week," II said, after a while.
IV didn't say I know, though he did. He'd been watching the calendar the same way he'd been watching II, sideways and quietly, trying not to make it a thing when it already was one. "Yeah," he said instead.
II peeled the label off his beer bottle in one slow strip. A habit. IV had seen him do it a hundred times, usually when he had something to say and wasn't sure whether to.
"He's been asking questions again," II said. "About his mum. Where she is. Why she isn't here." He was quiet for a moment. "I don't know what to tell him. I've been— I've been trying to figure out the words for a year and I still don't know what the right ones are."
He said it simply, without self-pity, which somehow made it worse.
IV turned his bottle in his hands.
"There aren't right ones," he said finally. "Not for something like that. I think you just say the true ones and hope that's enough. And it will be, for him. Because you'll be there to answer the next question too, and the one after that."
II didn't say anything for a moment.
"I'm so tired," he said, and it came out very quiet. Not a complaint. Just the truth of it.
"I know," IV said.
"Not of him," II added quickly. "Never of him. Just of— everything else that comes with it. Doing it all." He stopped himself. Restarted. "It's fine. It is fine, I just—"
"II." IV said it gently, enough to stop him. "You don't have to explain it to me."
II looked at him then, properly, the way he rarely did, straight on, without the half-turn and the deflection. There was something in his face that IV didn't have a name for, or perhaps had a name for and wasn't ready to use.
"Call me," IV said. "Whenever. If you just want someone to sit here and do nothing in particular, or if you need to drop him off for a few hours and sleep, or if you want to talk, or if you don't want to talk. Just call me." He said it plainly, without making it into a grand gesture, because he knew that was the only way II would actually accept it. "I mean it. I haven't got that much on."
II held his gaze for a beat too long, then looked down at his bottle.
"I know you do," he said. A small exhale left him. "But thanks."
IV's hand found II's shoulder, brief and solid. He meant to leave it at a second or two. He wasn't entirely sure why it stayed a moment longer before he pulled back.
II didn't move away.
He also didn't say anything else. And IV didn't push him to.
They took their beers back to the living room. By then III had gone horizontal on the sofa, one arm hanging off the edge, quietly asleep; someone who'd had a comfortable evening and seen no reason for it to end. Vessel was still upright at his end of the sofa with a book open in his lap, which was either extremely characteristic or extremely pointed, depending on how well you knew him.
Vess didn't say a word about III.
He did, at some point in the next half hour, reach over and pull the spare blanket off the back of the sofa and lay it over him — movements practised enough to suggest this was not the first time. His hand rested briefly on III's shoulder when he straightened up. Just for a moment. Then he opened his book again and said nothing, to no one, in the comfortable amber dark.