A Mother's Love - Part Four

So now he was back and had waited until the house was silent for a very good reason – he had no desire at all to talk about this with anyone, not even Hannibal, not now, not ever, and he would feel so much better about coping with it all in the morning.
 
He crept into the living room, determined to camp out on the sofa for the night, forgoing his warm space next to the man who loved him for the opportunity to get himself together a bit more. He pulled the cushions into place and yanked the throw off the back of the sofa to use as a blanket and had just sat down, unfastened and slipped off his sneakers when a voice from the corner of the room scared the living shit out of him. “Hey, kid, glad you’re back.”
 
He grabbed his chest in shock and almost jumped out of his skin, realising at the same time that Hannibal had waited until he had taken his shoes off before announcing his presence, sneaky fucker, knew Face was unlikely to go tearing back out into the night in bare feet. Face just sighed and leant back in the cushions, letting his heart slowly steady its thumping, he had no desire to run anymore tonight anyway – just like he had no desire to talk.
 
“I’m back because I’m tired,” he said, his voice a flat monotone, “and I’d like to go to sleep now, if that’s alright with you.”
 
“Of course it’s all right,” Hannibal edged forward in his seat and Face could see him partially illuminated by the street lights outside. “Why don’t you come upstairs then? It will be so much more comfortable for you up there.”
 
“No thanks,” Face replied snippily, “I’d rather be alone tonight,” and he set about arranging the cushions and spreading the throw and finally slipped off his shorts and stretched out on the sofa, his feet sticking out of the throw and hanging over the end of the arm rest.
 
“Face...” Hannibal’s voice was soft in the darkness, but Face just turned on his side, back to his boss. “I’m sorry, kid,” it seemed that Face’s snit wasn’t dissuading the boss from his purpose, “I shouldn’t have kept that from you.”
 
Face remained silent.
 
“I know it’s hard to appreciate, but I really was trying to save you from being hurt. Really.” Hannibal sighed, as all he got in return was a continued silence and a stiff back. He moved closer but stopped as he saw Face tense up even more. “Please, kid, please don’t do this to me...”
 
Face had whirled around before he’d even realised he was moving and found Hannibal kneeling right in front of him on the carpet. “Don’t do what to you?” he snapped.
 
“I know this is difficult for you, Face, but please don’t shut me out.”
 
“Shut you out?” Face was shocked by the bitterness in his own voice, “What like you didn’t shut me out when you first found out who that woman was?”
 
Hannibal looked at him imploringly, “Face, I’ve told you I’m sorry about that, I was only trying to help.”
 
“I don't need your help,” Face spat.
 
Hannibal just tried again, reaching his hand out and resting it on Face’s knee. “We need to talk about this properly, decide what you want to do.”
 
Yanking his knee out of the way, Face crossed his legs and shuffled back into the corner of the sofa. “There’s nothing to talk about.”
 
“Tomorrow we should get the results of the DNA tests,” Hannibal perched on the edge of the cushion, keeping his distance from Face, “and then once we know if she is really your mother we can work out how you want to do this.”
 
“You are not listening to me; there is nothing to work out!” Face’s eyes were cold in the darkness and he pulled himself back even further into the cushions.
 
Hannibal sighed, “I don’t want you just jumping in there with both feet, kid, we need to take it carefully, I swear I won’t let her hurt you again.”
 
Face pulled back so far that his feet were now underneath him and he was crouched in the corner of the sofa, positively quivering with emotion. “Hannibal, you are not listening to me! There is nothing to discuss; I have no desire to see her at all!”
 
At last Hannibal stopped. “What?”
 
“You heard me.”
 
For almost a whole minute Hannibal just stared, lost for words. “But kid,” he eventually whispered, “Why?”
 
Face rolled his eyes, “Why the hell do you think Hannibal? She dumped me remember? Why would I want to see her now?”
 
Hannibal held his hands out, “To find out why? To let her explain?”
 
“No!” Face’s voice was beginning to rise again, “I can’t think for one single minute that there is anything going on here that she couldn’t have explained at any time in the last thirty five years! She’s waited this long? Too fucking little, too fucking late.”
 
“Maybe she’s only just been able to find you?”
 
Face laughed, a flat, empty sound that chilled Hannibal’s heart, “I was in the Catholic Care System until I was sixteen years old Hannibal, she knew exactly where I was, she could have contacted me any fucking time she wanted!”
 
“Maybe she had her reasons.”
 
Face’s eyes opened wide, “Maybe she did! But I don’t fucking care what they were, right?”
 
Sighing, Hannibal reached his hand out and rested it on the top of Face’s foot. “Don’t make this decision now, you are tired and you are upset. Come to bed with me and we will talk about it in the morning.”
 
But Face just exploded, “Will you start fucking listening to me?” he yelled, “There is nothing to talk about! There are no decisions to be made, I don’t care who she is and what she wants, I’m having nothing to do with her!”
 
Hannibal rubbed at the cold foot under his palm, “Look, kid, give her a chance. You haven’t seen her since you were four.”
 
“Yeah? Well the reason for that, in case you’ve fucking forgotten, was that she left me on the steps of the orphanage when I was- wait,” he suddenly stopped and looked back at Hannibal. “Four? I was four? Did she tell you that?”    
 
 “Yeah,” Hannibal muttered, frowning slightly.
 
The implications of that statement hit Face like a steam train. Suddenly everything he thought he knew about his life was wrong, skewed slightly, all the things he thought he could rely on, gone. He’d long ago resigned himself to not knowing who he was, what his real name was, but to find out now that he wasn’t even the age he thought he was just totally wiped him out.
 
So he was four when she left him, four. Not even old enough for school. That meant he’d gone through school a year above where he should have been, no wonder he’d found it hard, no wonder he’d had to study harder than anyone else just to make it all make sense. No wonder he’d been small, ‘weedy’ the other kids had called him, but not once he’d started running back and forth to school, not since he’d gone into the backyard after chores and started lifting those big stones, not since he’s bust the nose of the next kid who’d call him that. And the army, Face’s blood ran cold. He knew damn well he’d got in early, was so fed up of life the way it was he’d forged a birth certificate and letter from his ‘parents’ allowing him to join up at seventeen. But of course he wasn’t seventeen at all, he was sixteen, or so he thought, but now he knew better. Fifteen. He was fucking fifteen when he joined up, not quite seventeen when he saw his first war zone. Jesus Christ, he must have been the youngest Army Ranger in history.
 
And what else? Suddenly he was ten years old when he had his first spell in juvie, twelve when he lost his virginity, thirteen the first time he got pissed, seventeen when he first slept with Hannibal, the birthday party the boss had thrown for him when he was twenty one, the best party of his life, a total lie now... His whole life was one big falsehood.   
 
He shook his head, trying to make sense out of it all and suddenly Hannibal’s hands were on him, warm against his cheeks, turning his eyes to look at him, “Face?” the worry was clear in his expression.
 
Face closed his eyes, all his fight gone. “Hannibal, please,” he whispered. “Please just leave me alone. I can’t see her, I can’t do this. Please, I’m begging you.”
 
Hannibal didn’t understand what was happening, not one tiny bit, but he could read the look in the kid’s face before he closed his eyes, knew despair when he saw it and realised he’d pushed too far already. He pulled Face’s limp body towards him, his hand going up to rest in his hair at the back of his head. “Okay, kid, okay,” he soothed. “Look, come to bed with me and I swear, I absolutely swear, I won’t mention this again tonight, okay?” Face didn’t respond so Hannibal just started tugging him gently to his feet. “Come on, come on. You’re cold and tired, it’s been a tough night, come on, baby, come to bed.”
 
Face didn’t reply, didn’t even look up from the floor, but he let Hannibal pull him off the sofa and towards the stairs, and once they were upstairs he let him strip his clothes off and guide him into bed. He even let the boss pull him in and wrap his strong arms around him once the duvet was laid across then both and the bedside light was switched off. But he didn’t go to sleep, not until the first rays of light were creeping around the edges of the blind and the birds were singing loudly at his window.
 
 
__________________________
 
Hannibal was an early riser. Generally they all were, habits learned in the army difficult to break, but this morning Hannibal knew Face would be asleep for some time yet, he knew that the kid would have had a rough night, had felt him tossing and turning until it was light. He slid quietly from the bed, watching as Face stirred slightly, murmuring in his sleep before turning to the side and settling once more.
 
BA was already up, perusing the sports pages of the morning paper, the smell of the coffee he didn’t even like wafting around him as he sipped his juice. “Morning,” Hannibal greeted him, pouring a large amount of coffee into a mug. “Thanks for the coffee.”
 
BA nodded to himself, “Thought you might need it,” Hannibal slid into the seat opposite as BA’s dark eyes lifted up to his, “He came back then?”
 
Taking a sip of the hot coffee, Hannibal nodded, “Yeah, about two thirty.”
 
“Thought so, thought I heard him come in.”
 
That made sense. Hannibal knew that even though Murdock and BA had gone to bed, left him to deal with Face’s eventual return, they wouldn’t have settled into sleep until they knew he was back home safely.
 
“So,” the concern in BA’s eyes was obvious, “he alright then, man?”
 
Hannibal sipped at the hot coffee again, thinking. “I don’t know,” he eventually replied; he let out a long sigh, “Says he won’t see her.”
 
BA stared back in obvious stunned silence. “He won’t see her?” Hannibal shook his head, “Why the hell not?”
 
Thinking for a minute, going back over their conversation from the previous night, Hannibal paused. “It still hurts him, BA, the way she left him.”
 
BA sat back in his seat, “Yeah, well it would wouldn’t it? Havin’ your momma disappear like that, but she’s back now an’ she wants to make it right.”
 
“He says it’s too late.”
 
A disparaging humph came from BA’s side of the table, “Geez, Hannibal, this is his mom! It aint never too late to make it right.”
 
Looking at his corporal carefully, Hannibal answered quietly, “You need to remember though, BA, not everyone’s mother is like yours.”
 
Shaking his head frustratedly, BA frowned, “I know that, but what the hell does Face know about any of this?”
 
“What are you saying?” Now it was Hannibal’s turn to frown, “That because he’s never had a mother before she should be grateful for the first one that comes along, no matter what she’s like?”
 
BA’s glass of orange juice hit the table with an angry thump and he wiped the back of his hand over his mouth, “No, I’m aint sayin’ that at all. I’m sayin’ he won’t know what she’s like unless he gives her a chance!”
 
Hannibal refused to let BA’s anger get to him, “But she left him, he thinks she’s forfeit all her chances.”
 
“Nah, she’s his mom, she has rights!”
 
That was true, Hannibal supposed. “But with rights come responsibilities don’t forget. And has she lived up to hers?”
 
But BA wasn’t easily swayed, “I dunno – did she? Didn’t she? She said she had her reasons for leavin’, said he was better off without her, who’s to say he wasn’t?”
 
“You really believe that?”
 
BA rose from his seat and went over to put his empty glass in the dishwasher, “I dunno, colonel, no one knows what the reasons were, that’s why he needs to meet her, find out.” He turned back to Hannibal, leaning his back on the edge of the sink, his hands resting on the cool aluminium, but Hannibal didn’t answer, he was tracing patterns with his finger onto the table top, brow furrowed.
 
“Look,” BA tried again, “all I’m sayin’ is all these years he’s been actin’ all sad and left out that he never had a family behind him, and now he has that chance and he’s turnin’ it down!” He shook his head slowly, “Don’t make much sense to me, your family’s the most important thing in the world.”
 
Still Hannibal remained silent and eventually BA could stand it no longer.
 
“You think he shouldn’t see her?” he asked him, incredulous.
 
At last Hannibal answered, sighing heavily, “No, BA, I think you are right, I think he should at least talk with her the once. I’m just trying to see things from his point of view.”
 
BA walked to the door, his hand on the knob, “Yeah, well, he’s wrong, man, dead wrong. She’s a nice lady, gone to all this trouble to find him, come over from New York to see him, the least he could do is meet her. All these years without seeing him musta been hard for her,” he shook his head, “I’m goin’ for a shower.”
 
Hannibal listened as his footsteps retreated up the stairs. BA had made some good points but Hannibal didn’t agree with everything that the big guy had said, knew that Face would agree with even less. He rubbed his chin, deep in thought; all these years without seeing Face had been hard for Adele? Hannibal really didn't know about that, but they’d certainly been hard for Face.

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