Chapter Text
"You need to stop leaving dead bodies in the Kitchen."
"Er... Uh yeah, sorry about that Max, just I was sorta tired when I came in last night, I took care of it first thing this morning." David sat down at the table next to his adopted son, pouring himself a bowl of cereal and joining him for breakfast.
"I don't care how "Tired" you are," Max took a long drink of his orange juice and slammed the glass back onto the table, "The landlady just has to walk in One time and we're screwed."
"Yeah I Know Max, I took care of it.” David hushed him with a tone of finality.
The two sat in silence for a few moments, only sound of their spoons clinking against their bowls as they both sat, too distracted by their own thoughts to do anything other than fidget with their utensils.
"Something on your mind Max?, You're normally more argumentative in the morning." David said,
Max said nothing, turning slightly in his chair to face away from David,
"I mean if something's wrong you can tell me Max, you know that..." Max sulked further, pulling his legs into the chair and tucking his arms into the pockets of his hoodie. "Okay, father's intuition, something's got you feeling blue, Let me make you a cup of coffee and we can talk about." He got up and set about filling the coffee pot, barely hearing max mumble behind him that he wasn't his father.
A few minutes passed as the two just sat silently, David waiting for Max to open up, Max waiting for David to let it go, both goals equally absurd and unrealistic, yet each of them held some hope the other would see it their way. While it was only around 5 minutes that the two sat there in silence it felt like an entire season, like the trees and flowers outside had bloomed, flourished, and died, in the span of one strained silence. The sound of nothingness only broken by the clinking of silverware as David poured a cup of black coffee and set it in front of Max. Holding onto the back of his son's chair he moved around the small kitchen and sat in the next to Max. "So, once you get a little coffee in you, do you wanna talk about it...?" Max looked down into the cup, his face as unreadable as ever, only the slightest hints of ire in his countenance, which finally broke into worry as he took his first few sips of coffee.
"I saw my parents on TV, my Birth Parents..." Max's face never betrayed an emotion, but the way his voice broke, the fear and confusion in his voice were unmissable.
David's eyes widened in shock, his fingers tapping at the table a bit quicker, a nervous quirk of his.
Max's voice filled the kitchen again, this time more wavy, like he was on the brink of an infinity pool and the glass was cracking, Water and emotions pouring over the edge. "Campbell was supposed to take care of them, they're supposed to be dead, but there they are on TV this morning talking about some new celebrity client they picked up! If they're still alive then- then it's only a matter of time David!" Max was visibly breaking down now, his arms shaking, his lip curling and eyes watering. "I mean it's not like they want me back, but if they say they never signed those papers, and CPS looks into your fake custody papers-"
"max"
"I don't want to go back into the system"
"Max"
"Fuck I’d rather live at Camp Campbell with the Quartermaster than go back into the foster system."
"Max!" David snapped loudly, this was the 3rd time he had said the boy's name, but only the first he was heard over Max's histarics.
Max stopped talking and turned to David, his teary blue eyes meeting David's Determined Green ones.
"Nobody is going to take you from me, Nobody is going to put back into the system." David leaned over in his chair to pull the boy into a hug, Max sniffling and sobbing into David's pajama shirt. "I don't know what happened with Mr. Campbell, but I'll call Gwen today and ask her to take care of it.
"Gwen? How is Gwen gonna help in this situation?" Max snapped, "Give them shitty fashion tips?"
"Hey young man, show your aunt some respect, she's just as much a part of this business as me and Jasper. Besides, Gwen is good at making it look natural, and we can't afford for it to be messy right now." David adjusted in his seat, the frazzled and overbearing father who couldn't understand his son replaced with a cold and calculating killer, ready to pass on his knowledge to his protégé. "Mr. Campbell should have taken care of it cleanly, but he didn't... for some reason..., Jasper is way too messy, he's better at getting information, and if i brought them out of the house there would be a trail to follow. No it has to be Gwen, Young adult dark skinned female, Your parents probably won't even notice that she isn't a part of the staff, it would still be best if she disguised her features a bit. Did your parents have any drug habits that you know of?"
"uh," Max was taken aback, still not used to the shift in character he saw in David anytime the conversation turned to murder. "I don't know, I mean I never saw anything other than drinking, but the only time I saw them was when they were drunk and angry. There might have been something I guess, dad was a bigshot lawyer and mom was an over botoxed trophy wife, so there was probably something..."
"Hm, Good point." David sat forward, holding his hands together under his chin. “Even if they don’t have any drug habits nobody would really question it if a bigshot lawyer and his trophy wife overdosed, Well maybe if they did it at the same time on the same drug, would two different drugs be better? different times is out of the question since this has to be a short term job, Gwen can't risk staying there too long. different drugs would leave more to track, so that might be more suspicious... Same time, same drug and people might think they were trying something new and it was to strong for them, yeah that's it, they needed something stronger and it was too much for them, happens all the time in Hollywood. I'll have to contact Dirty Kevin and see what kind of stuff rich jerks would try out to be adventurous and how much is a guaranteed lethal dose, Has to be a lethal dose, a hotshot would lead to too much investigation into the seller, accidents usually get a cursory glance and an autopsy and they move on.." David continued rambling on different scenarios and ideas
Max sat and stared at the man, a shiver running down his back as he mentally compared the David he first met at Camp Campbell, Childcare David, a happy-go-lucky fool who sings shitty campfire songs and tried to solve problems with hugs, to the David that sat at the table now, Hitman David, a cold calculating man who was willing to kill anyone who even dared cross him or his son. Max didn't know if he should feel honored, or terrified. He was sure David wouldn't hurt him, but in the few months since the end of camp that he had lived with David he had seen the depths of the man's depravity. The most chilling thing about it was how he always kept that same chipper tone of voice, and can-do smile, whether he was doing arts and crafts with campers, or rearranging somebody's internal organs. At times Max wondered if Daniel had actually poisoned himself on accident when they were all hypnotized, or if David had forced the liquid down his throat and then played innocent.
"We'll work out the details tonight, I have to get ready for work" David said, snapping Max out of his thoughts as he got up from the table, "You got everything ready for another educational day at school Max?" he asked, popping right back into the chipper persona Max had first met at Camp Campbell so many years ago.
Max took a moment to adjust back to Childcare David, “Yeah I'm ready for another day in Lock-up." Max stood up, grabbing his bookbag off of the unused kitchen chair and slinging it over his shoulder.
"That's Fantastic!" David said, giving Max a big thumbs up, causing Max to groan.
The rest of the early morning went as usual, Max grabbing his phone and David grabbing his messenger bag, David driving to school at a safe reasonable speed and obeying all traffic laws and using his turn signals, and max playing an episode of the podcast they had been binging together off his phone's aux. The conversation of this morning left behind, yet still lingering in the back of their heads.
David pulled into the staff parking lot and backed in to his designated parking spot. "Now remember Max, the kindergarteners only have a half day today, so I'll be leaving at noon to go meet Gwen so we can talk about... that other stuff... then I'll be back here at 3 to pick you up, and if you're good today in school the three of us can go get ice cream this afternoon, Won't that be terrific?!"
"Oh, it will certainly be something." said Max, stepping out of the car and slamming the door, David following behind.
The two walked into the side door of the school, splitting at the end of the hallway, with David reminding Max once more to be good and have a good day as he made his way to his kindergarten classroom to set up for the day's activity, and Max dismissing the reminder as he made his way to the 5th grade study hall to meet up with Neil and Nikki for a few minutes before homeroom.
Both of them putting up a façade of normalcy as they went about their day, Max barely paying attention in class but getting every question right (Much to Neil's constant annoyance), and David giving his all into teaching his students the colors of the rainbow (Including a song he wrote just for this lesson). They both felt that something life shattering sat just over the horizon, but neither one would ever let it show, both putting on their bravest face and acting like nothing at all had happened, and nothing at all was happening, pretending that life was exactly the same as it was yesterday and hoping nobody would suspect a thing. They both knew that their happy little life was build on lies and death, and that any slip could send them both tumbling to the bottom of a long jagged hole they've dug for themselves, Luckily for them living that kind of life makes you very good at pretending.