Chapter Text
My name is Henry ‘Monty’ Montague. Yes, that Henry ‘Monty’ Montague. And yes, the stories are all true. I am, as they say, a deviant little shit. Very ironic, really, because it’s being a deviant little shit that saved my life as I know it.
It all began the morning I broke into my father’s desk in the downstairs study. I was looking for some alcohol to sneak into school to share with my enemy-with-benefits, good old Dick Peele—I didn’t expect to find The Paperwork. I should have, I’m sure—honestly, what else was I going to find in my father’s study, of all places—but sometimes the universe unilaterally decides to go ‘hey, Monty, fuck you’ and I’m just swept along for the ride.
So there I was, all of sixteen years old, standing in front of my father’s desecrated desk with the form that was meant to end me as a person clutched tight in one hand. I was staring at the check-boxes on the front, specifically the ones that said ‘reason for unwinding’. My father—because of course the form was filled out in my father’s handwriting—had ticked off the box that said ‘behavioral issues’.
Now, look. Finding a form that cites ‘behavioral issues’ as reason to denounce me as a sack of harvestable parts because of said behavioral issues? That’s hilarious, and that isn’t even the funniest thing about the situation. The funniest thing about the situation is that up until that very moment, I was convinced I wasn’t going to live to the age of twenty. I’d drink myself to death or ‘accidentally’ take all the meds in the cabinet or break all my bones in a car accident—whatever the cause, I was sure I’d be gone soon. But the moment I was faced with that damn piece of paper, and I realized that my parents had voluntarily agreed to have me medically dismembered, I felt, for the very first time in my entire goddamn life, the will to actually stay alive.
…That, dear friends, is what we in the business call irony.
And that isn’t all! Because my life is a comedy of errors, there was more irony to come, starting with the fact that in my panic to steal the car and go on the run I didn’t realize that my thirteen-year-old sister was sitting in the backseat reading while she waited for mom to drive her to school, which became the third domino to fall in the path that would eventually lead to the future that I’m living now, the future wherein I’m a wanted felon. It aaall started right here, when looking for alcohol led to finding The Paperwork which led to trying to run away with my sister in the car, three dominoes that were quickly followed by high speed car chase, accidental airbag inflation, and unintentionally taking my sister hostage fleeing from tranq bullets on the side of the road.
…So, an average morning for me.
Now look, before we get any farther here I just want to say that in my defense, I didn’t think they would try to shoot her, too. All I was doing was hiding behind her and using her as a human shield so that I could, you know, escape the cops.
…Which sounds very bad when you say it like that. God, this is hard. Who would have thought it would be this hard to tell the story where I became a wanted felon without coming off as a reckless asshole? Certainly not me.
Whatever. The point here is that I’d taken Felicity’s hand and was dragging her into the forest on the side of the highway amid a hail of (admittedly mostly harmless) bullets. Forget the Akron AWOL—he wishes he was as cool as I was. I was doing this back in the days before there was a National Juvenile Authority. The National Juvenile Authority was, in fact, created in response to me. At the time, it was all real cops all the time.
I’m getting a little off track here. Where was I? Oh, yeah, running into the untamed New York wilderness. With my stuck-up little sister. Who, first chance she got, wrestled herself free to demand, and I quote, “Just what the fuck are you doing?”
We’d lost the cops for now, but I was willing to bet they were on their way. I placed myself in front of her, planting my hands on her shoulders and walking backwards deeper into the trees even as she glared at me through the reading glasses that made her look like an old-school spinster. “This is going to come as a surprise, but mom and dad—they sent the cops after me,” I said, doing my best to soften the blow.
She rolled her eyes, clutching her bookbag to her chest. “Yeah, I know. Why won’t you turn yourself in? It isn’t as if they’re going to hurt you. They were shooting nonlethal rounds.”
I spluttered. “Weren’t going to hurt me? I was going to be unwound, Felicity!”
“So?”
I came to a dead stop with my mouth agape, staring into her ferocious eyes. I had never thought of my sister as cold. Annoying, maybe. A little standoffish. Rude, definitely. But for her to—just—brush me off as if I wasn’t my own whole, entire person who deserved to be a whole, entire person? I was blindsided.
“So?” I repeated. I couldn’t think of anything wittier or more profound to ask.
She crossed her arms, rolling her eyes as if I was the dimmest person she’d ever had the misfortune of interacting with. “Tell me. What’s so bad about being unwound? You won’t technically die—”
“I won’t technically—are you listening to yourself?”
“—and it’s better than whatever you were doing to yourself, anyway—”
“Uncalled for.”
“—so I just—I don’t understand why you’d be against it!”
I stared at her. Then, all at once, I felt my face twist into a sneer. I raised both hands, releasing her with a snarl. “You think it’s so glamorous to get picked apart by vultures? You think we’d all be better off in pieces? Fine! Go tell mother you want to take my place on the chopping block! Good riddance, I say!”
She huffed, rolling her eyes again. Thirteen-year-olds, amirite? “God, Monty, you’re such a fucking prick. This is exactly why you should be unwound—at least in pieces you’d be doing some good in the world.”
And… look. I wasn’t the best at managing my emotions back then. I’m still not. But aside from discovering The Paperwork, the unequivocally tangible proof that my parents were fine throwing me out with the garbage—aside from that, I had never, ever felt as hurt as I did right then.
“May the universe grant me the relief of never seeing your face again,” I hissed, and turned away.
I would have stalked off, too, and left her for the cops to find, if a voice I didn’t know hadn’t interrupted our sibling bonding right then and there with a small-sounding, “Excuse me?”
Felicity and I both turned, me with one foot raised, ready to kick my way to freedom should I be abruptly seized. Only it wasn’t a cop—it was just another kid, a tall, wiry one with umber skin and long-ish curly hair tied back in a messy ponytail. He had an instrument case on his back—a violin, maybe—and he was holding unsteadily to a tree.
“Who the heck are you?” I demanded. “Are you here to lure me in?”
“Please take this,” the kid said, without answering either question. He held out the violin.
More stunned than anything, I took it. And then watched in shock as the kid’s eyes rolled back in his head and he collapsed to the forest floor. His limbs stretched, and for a moment it looked like he was coming around—then, all of a sudden, he began to shake, to convulse.
“What—” I started, only to be shoved unceremoniously out of the way by Felicity, who was busy tucking her book bag under the kid’s head.
“Just go, Monty,” Felicity spit. “You don’t want to be here when the cops catch up.”
Which was all well and good, and exactly what I planned to do as soon as I set down the kid’s violin, which I did. I turned away with a huff, trying to block the sounds of gasps and grunts from my ears.
…And yet. I couldn’t go far before I paused, counting seconds despite myself. Five, six, seven… eleven, twelve, thirteen, and finally, after what felt like a short eternity, the sounds stopped.
My shoulders untensed just slightly.
“What’s wrong with him?” I asked, my back still to Felicity.
“He had a seizure. He might need medical help.”
God, she sounded so calm. It made me want to scream. “And what are you planning to do, drag him back to the highway? All on your own? He’s like twice your size.”
“I was going to wait here for the cops because your stupid ass dragged me into the middle of nowhere!” she hissed.
I shook my head. Then I picked up the violin, swung it onto my back, and reached down for violin kid’s gangly knees. “Get his arms,” I said, hefting. He was quite a bit taller than me, but he was thin enough that it didn’t take much to haul his lower half up. “I saw a billboard for a town off the next highway exit, if we can get him there—”
“I’m not going anywhere with you!” Felicity said, a decent snarl curling her lip.
“Fine, stay here and get shot by the cops!” I said back, lowering violin kid down with a huff and throwing up my hands. I again went to walk away, fuming—only to be stopped a moment later as Felicity groaned aloud.
“…I hate you, you know that?” she asked.
I cocked my head, smirking, one dimple cutting into my cheek, just to piss her off. “Hate you, too, dear sis,” I said. “Now do we have a truce?”
“…Fine.”
Which was how me and my little sister came to be crashing out from the wilderness—cops on our tail—carrying between the two of us an unconscious teenager, a bag of my sister’s dumb books, and a violin—into an all but abandoned pharmacy that was absolutely deserted except for one very old man who was sitting behind the counter reading a book.
Not the greatest first impression I’ve ever made, but admittedly not the worst, either.
And that, dear friends, was the start of my story.