Work Text:
“Stop. That plank is crooked.”
“Are you sure? It looks straight to me.”
“Boy…”
“Fine fine. How ‘bout now?”
“No.”
Atreus huffs in frustration. He adjusts the wooden plank once more. “Now?”
“Better.”
Atreus positions a nail and moves to bring the hammer down on it before Kratos stops him mid-swing. “Wait.”
“What?”
“You are not holding either tool correctly. If you swing now, you will have swollen fingers or a crooked nail.” Before Atreus could let out another exasperated sigh, Kratos moves in and helps his son position his fingers around the nail and the hammer. “Now strike it flat in the center. Do not hit the edge.”
Atreus does.
“Good. Continue until it’s in place.”
Leaving him to work on the board, Kratos selects another piece from the wood they cut and gathered. The house needed a new roof after his fight with Baldur. They’d scattered Faye’s ashes and come back to a broken home. He thinks fixing it would be something that Faye would have wanted them to do. All three of them.
“Father? Does that look okay?” Atreus had finished securing his plank.
“Yes. Well done.”
Atreus beams. “Thank you, Father!”
The boy continues his work and Kratos notes that he takes a bit more time to line up the wood and the nails. Good. He’s learning well.
Kratos focuses back on his own section. It’s silent for a time, save for the sounds of their hammers hitting the new roof.
“Did we chop enough trees for this?”
Kratos surveys the pile on the forest floor and does a few quick mental calculations. “Yes.”
“This roof seems so much bigger now that I’m on it. It must’ve taken a lot of wood to build initially.”
“It did.” Kratos easily recalls when he and Faye built this house together. It feels like a lifetime ago. “Many trees were felled.”
“Was mother a good carpenter?”
“She was better than I.”
“That makes sense. She was going to teach me how to make little animals out of wood, you know, like my toys?’ He trails off, lost in his grief. Kratos lets him be. After several moments, he perks back up with an addition. “But she did teach me how to make my arrows.”
“She taught you well.”
Kratos doesn’t want to saturate Atreus with praise, but the fact that the boy’s face lights up so easily at any praise directed at him spoke volumes on what he expected from Kratos as a father.
He would need to do better. Be better.
Rebuilding the roof together ends up being an acceptable transition from their larger-than-life journey to a relatively calm life. They can both learn how to live with one another while standing still. The threat of Odin lingers, along with the knowledge that Freya is out there planning some form of revenge on them. But that is for another day.
For now, they can take a breath and learn how to be a family. Kratos may not deserve it, but Atreus does. He deserves a father than can teach him to be a better man. A better person.
A better god.
If he can do one thing right, let it be that.