Chapter Text
Epilogues
Phil snagged two boxes of pasta off the shelf and tossed them into his cart, crossing the item off his list, and then continued down the aisle to get some sauce. He was debating the merits of buying a more expensive brand than his usual fare when from behind him he heard, “Mr. Coulson?”
The only people who ever called him “Mr. Coulson” in public were former students, so when he heard the man’s voice, he wondered if he would be able to recognize the student now that he was grown. It was always hit or miss. Some kids had faces that never really changed, while there were others who were virtually unrecognizable once they were grown.
Phil turned and looked behind him...and then looked up. It was always a surprise when his former students were so much taller than him. The man’s head was tipped to the side, a cautious half-smile pulling up one side of his mouth. He had short blond hair, blue eyes, and classically handsome features, but he was completely unfamiliar to Phil. “Yes?” he replied. “You’ll have to forgive me, but I can’t place your face...?”
“Steve,” the man replied, and before Phil had time to think that he’d had a lot of Steves throughout in his career, he went on to add, “Steve Rogers.”
Phil sucked in a sharp breath. Steve Rogers? Good God. There were some kids one never forgot, not ever, and that boy had been one of them. Phil took another quick look at the man in front of him, tall, well-developed, clearly muscled and strong. This was Steve Rogers? The small, thin boy prone to asthma attacks?
“Steve? Wow, you look....”
“Different?” Steve finished, his grin widening. “Yeah, I know.”
“I didn’t mean anything by that.”
“No, no, it’s fine.” Steve laughed away the start of Phil’s apology. “I get that a lot. Believe me, I know how different I look from when I was a kid.”
“I have to say you’re looking well. What have you been up to?”
“I’m in school, actually, for art.”
“Art school?” Phil grinned, recalling his former student’s passion for drawing. “Why am I not surprised?”
Steve ducked his head, blushing a bit. “Yeah, I know. I’ve only been enrolled for about six months or so. The government’s paying for it.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah. Bucky and I joined the Marines right out of high school.”
“The Marines? Wow, I’m impressed. Congratulations. I do recall you saying you wanted to be a soldier.”
Steve nodded, his smile dimming a bit. “Yeah, I did.” He paused, frowning thoughtfully. “It was good for me, you know? I’m glad I did it. It helped...put some ghosts to rest, as it were.” Then he shrugged. “But it’s not for me, at least not for a lifetime. Bucky’s still there and it’s the perfect fit for him, but after fours years I was ready to go on to something I really loved.”
“I’m really glad to hear that.” And Phil was. It was always a pleasure to hear about his kids and see the successes they’d made of themselves. He wasn’t foolish enough to think it was because of him, but he liked to think he might have had some small, lasting influence on them. “Whatever you do, you’re going to be great at it.”
“Thanks. I was thinking of maybe going into education one day.” Steve’s smile returned, sunny and open, so different than the smiles Phil had seen when he was a child. “Anyway, I probably shouldn’t keep you. I just recognized you and wanted to say hello.”
“No problem. It was good to run into you again.”
“You, too, Mr. Coulson.”
“Please, call me Phil.”
Steve laughed. “I don’t know that I could. Kinda weird, you know?” But he stuck out his hand and gave Phil’s a firm shake. “Bye, Mr. C.”
“Bye, Steve. Take care.”
“I will. You, too.”
Steve turned away, hefting his shopping basket in one hand, but he stopped after a step and turned back. “Phil?”
“Yes?”
“I...wanted to thank you.”
“For what?”
There was a long pause before Steve answered, and he studied the jars of sauce to his left as if they held the answer to Phil’s question. “When I was kid...it was hard, you know? Hell, of course you knew. Everyone knew.”
“Steve —”
“No, it’s okay. It’s fine. I’m glad that people knew because it meant they kept an eye out for me. What I’m trying to say is that I didn’t have the easiest childhood. Between my dad and my health problems, it was rough when I was a kid. I was scared shitless about starting school; I had more than a few panic attacks about it. But...but you helped. You were there when I needed you, when there were very few people who were.”
“I didn’t do all that much, Steve,” Phil protested.
“You let me be myself. You gave me the time and skills to work through things when I had problems. You let me draw .” Steve laughed ruefully. “God, I loved you for that. I think I spent that whole year wishing you were my dad.” He grinned at Phil’s obvious shock. “I know what you did you would have done for any kid, and that it probably doesn’t seem like a lot, but it meant everything to me at the time. So thank you.”
Phil just stared, stunned. Then throwing caution to the wind, he stepped forward and pulled Steve into a hug, ignoring the strangeness of hugging a grown man he didn’t really know in the middle of a grocery store. “You’re welcome.” Steve returned the hug, not for long, but tightly, the way he had as kid when he’d occasionally wound his arms around Phil’s waist.
“If I ever do become a teacher, I’m gonna try to be like you.”
“That, Steve, would be an honor.”
Steve blushed again, just a bit. “Oh, and Mr. C?”
“Yes?”
“I still have that mural.”
~*~
Phil jotted down the finals notes he had for the last child’s evaluation and then set the completed form off to the side. He would have to enter the results into the computer program later. Technology might have advanced since he first started teaching, but the tests for seeing if kids were ready to enter kindergarten hadn’t changed much, and he still preferred filling the forms out by hand first. It felt a little impersonal to sit pecking away at a keyboard while a four- or five-year old looked on. Besides, at his age, even with how good screens were, it still made his eyes ache to stare at them too long.
Reaching over, he grabbed his coffee cup and took a sip, grimacing slightly at the cool liquid. He should’ve had Ashlynn get him a fresh one when she made a run earlier, but at the time he’d still had plenty and too much coffee at any time during the day either kept him up too late or made him crash early.
“One more,” he muttered to himself, tossing the cup in the bin and stretching as he got up, feeling and hearing the joint in his left shoulder pop. He opened the door to the testing room and stuck his head out. “Ashlynn, I’m ready for the next one.”
“Sure thing, Phil. His dad just took him to the bathroom. I’ll send them in when they get back.”
“Thanks.”
A good five minutes passed before the door opened, a small, blond-haired, blue-eyed boy walking in as his father held the door open from him. Something jogged Phil’s memory at the sight of the child’s face, and all the pieces fell into place as his father —an absolute bear of man —turned around.
“Thor?” he asked in disbelief.
Thor’s face split in a wide grin. “Mr. C!” he cried, and even though he was now much taller and wider and bigger in every way that Phil, and he sported a full beard, the inflection and enthusiasm were exactly the same as Phil remembered when the man had been five years old himself. “Oh my God,” Thor continued, not even pausing before giving Phil a bone-crushing hug. “I can’t believe that you’re still teaching, that you’re still here . I’d have thought you’d be long retired by now.”
“I wasn’t that old when you had me,” Phil commented wryly. “And I could retire, but I enjoy my job.”
Thor reached down and ruffled his son’s hair. “Hey, if you’re lucky, you might get to have Dad’s teacher.”
“You taught my dad?” the boy asked.
“That’s right, when he was your age. My name’s Mr. Coulson. And you are...?”
“Magni,” the boy said, grinning. “Was Dad a lot of trouble when he was my age? Mom says he was a pain in the butt.”
Phil couldn’t help but laugh. “I wouldn’t go that far. Your dad was a pretty good kid for me. But, for right now, we should get started, so why don’t you guys say goodbye and we can begin?”
“Bye, Dad!” Magni chirped brightly, almost pushing Thor from the room.
“A little too eager there, sport,” Thor muttered, but went. “I’ll be right outside.”
“We’ll be fine,” Phil reassured him. When the door was closed, he pulled the form over and got started with the series of small tests that would determine whether or not Magni was ready to kindergarten, but from what Phil had seen so far, he didn’t think there were going to be any problems.
As expected, Magni “passed” with flying colors, even going to far as to ask if he could keep standing on one foot while they completed other sections. Phil capped his pen after marking the last box and stood. “Good job, Magni. Let’s go get your dad.”
Thor was sitting in one of the chairs in the hallway, his frame making the perfectly reasonably-sized chair look ridiculously tiny. “Everything all set?” he asked.
“We’re done,” Phil said. “I can’t tell you the results, but you’ll get them in the mail after we go over them, along with his assigned teacher.”
“I don’t suppose I could request you, could I?”
“Sadly, no. Besides, I’m not sure I have it in me to go through another year with a mini you.”
Thor laughed easily, without any rancor. “Yeah, I was a handful, I admit it. Magni takes after me in some ways, but he’s got more than a little bit of his mother in him. You remember Sif?”
Phil did remember Sif, and he remembered her being just as stubborn and active as Thor. He cocked a brow. “I’m not sure that’s encouraging.”
Thor laughed again. “She wasn’t as bad as me and you know it. Magni’s a good kid, you’ll see.” He bent down where his son was tugging on his pants and swung him up easily onto his shoulders. “Say goodbye, Magni.”
“Bye, Mr. C!”
Phil and Thor shook hands and Thor turned to go, before pausing and swinging back around. “And, Mr. C.? Know what you said about retirement? Just so you know, Loki’s son is starting preschool. Might want to get out while the getting’s good, because Vali is his old man’s son.”