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Pappa had always been with them.
When they were three and just formed their first memories they might remember in distant futures when all was quiet and nothing was holding them back from reminisent, they would remember about the time they’d gotten two big stuffed bears bigger than themselves When Papa had still been alone and Dad hadn’t been with them yet.
They would remember the soft fur in their little hands as they cuddled close to the things when it was naptime.
Pappa was always there for them
When Roman was five and he woke up from a nightmare where a squirrel was chasing him around the playground pappa was there to wrap his long arms around him and tell him that he was safe and that he would get his squirrel catching gear out of the supply closet the man they had started calling Dad had built for them, first thing in the morning.
When Remus faked being sick the first day of school because a kid in his class had laughed at the white streak in his hair he’d had since birth pappa had come and picked him up, explaining that poliosis is nothing to be ashamed of and laughing warmly as his son tried to pronouns the word.
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Pappa would always protect them.
When Roman first talked about his pappa and dad in school the teacher had looked like she’d eaten something nasty. Later on Roman was moved to the same class as his brother, his own teacher saying she didn’t want to be associated with his kind.
When Pappa came to pick him up that day Roman asked what that ment. And for one of the first times in his life he’d seen pappa frown.
They baked a cake to celebrate them being the same class that evening and Pappa and dad lifted the two of them high up in the air and twirled them around while cheerful music played.
When Remus got told off by a teacher for the first time because he had pushed another kid in his class he had to sit in the corner for ten minutes.
When he was allowed to go back to his spot Roman thanked him for protecting him and Remus threw the paper ball that had been thrown at him right back.
When Pappa came to pick him up he and the teacher had a long talk and they left quickly afterwards. Pappa holding both his and Roman’s hands in his own big one’s and telling them about how they had done the right thing.
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Pappa would always comfort them.
When Roman came back home with scrapped knees and an attitude Pappa had asked him what had happened.
Roman hadn’t answered and his brother had later told their dad’s that he had seen Roman getting pushed around by some older kids. The had been yelling a word he didn’t know the meaning of. When he had told it to pappa he had looked angry. And told his boys that those kids were mean and to never use that word because it made fun of good people.
When Remus began to get more friends his pappa asked him to include Roman in all of their games.
His brother had trouble connecting to people and was quickly becoming the bullied kid. And while Remus would gladly take any bullets for him he couldn’t protect him at all times.
And while Remus played star wars with his friends, running around the playground and pretending to know the characters, Roman sat and drew in the little notebook pappa had given him for school.
And Remus bought him a new one with his own pocket money when a mean kid threw it in the lake nearby when they went there to explore with the class around the time that eggs would magically appear in their garden and they pretended like it was a bunny putting them there.
Pappa would always be with them.
When they went to highschool and Remus his friends could no longer play starwars with him because one moved away, one said she’d never liked him and two others went to the same school but suddenly forgot about their being friends, he sat with his brother more often.
And when Roman got friends that he wasn’t sure he liked but hung around anyways because it was better than sitting alone, Remus was left sitting at a table at lunch, other kids coming to sit at the same one in the hopes he would get up and leave.
When he had refused to do just that they’d began whispering about him pretending he didn’t hear them. And when he acted like he didn’t hear they had began calling him mean things.
After two months at the new school they came home and both called for their Pappa with shaky voices too quiet to bare any sort of good news.
And when Remus showed off his bruised wrist he’d gotten when a kid had grabbed him harshly and Roman told him about how his friends hadn’t been friends but bullies in a trenchcoat and a mustache to make him think they were friends before telling him he was too weird to hang around, Pappa had brought them both into his arms. Whispering something like ‘oh my poor, brave boys,’ before holding them a bit tighter and then telling them that sometimes, the world was mean like that and that, sometimes, it takes a while before you find the right people.
And when they went to bed that night they laid in the room and stared at the same ceiling. Both pretending they couldn’t hear Pappa arguing with Dad in the hallway.
Both pretending they weren’t crying silently until they fell asleep to Dad accusing Pappa of being a vile and horrible human being.
Pappa didn’t have all the answers.
They learnt that when they were on their second year of highschool and both of their pet bunnies died in the same night.
Roman had sniffled and stood near the gardendoor as he watched them dig a deep hole all the way at the back of their garden.
Remus decided that he would be sad about this at night when nobody would see or worry and stood close by Pappa as he put the two bunnies in a shoebox and put it in the hole. Saying they had probably died because of the rat poision Dad had spread across the lawn and that the mice must’ve gotten into their food somehow.
They learnt this when Dad and him had sat them down after breakfast that had strawberries to tell them that sometimes love died and that weddingrings would rust and be put in two seperate homes in two seperate boxes that would never be opened again.
They learnt this the fifth time that Remus came home with bruises and Roman began to listen to darker music and emote less dramatically. Unlearning all the expressions he’d picked up from those animated childrens series they weren’t allowed to watch but watched them anyways. He faked having imagined a happy place when the woman that was supposed to help them through the divorce told him to invision one. Instead invisioning Remus, and how he should have punched the guy that had made him drop his books the moment he saw it happening.
Pappa was a human being.
They realised this more clearly than ever when he’d found out why Remus only wore long sleeves and got sent to therapy after their Pappa had hysterically cried over it and begged his son not to leave them before he could grow old.
When Roman stared at the ceiling after he’d taken 14 paracetamol and googling how many it would take to leave them before he could grow old, only to find that he would probably be fine and go to school the next day feeling as empty as usual. Pappa had yelled at him when he had gotten back to be more careful and not get invloved with his brothers troubles after he’d shown off the scratched shoulder from where he’d been thrown against a fence when he’d tried to stand up for him.
And when Remus got diagnosed with dyslexia and Roman with depression they said nothing. Roman shaking his head when the doctor suggested therapy and Remus sitting quietly as they explained that he might have adhd aswell.
Their father wasn’t perfect.
They learnt this when Remus came back from school with a black eye and a failed math test and the test was all that was focused on. Shouting not unlike the one they’d heard all those years ago when love began to die and rings began to rust booming through the house and piercing through the music Roman was listening to in his room. A bottle cap with water falling off his desk and the little growing plant in it falling with it.
They learnt this when Roman said he was asexual aromantic and their father said that he should consider therapy again because surely that couldn’t be normal.
And when Roman told him that maybe they weren’t normal he’d been send to his room. Doors slamming shut and noises too loud for Remus to process.
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Their father was wrong sometimes.
They realised this when Remus first brought a friend home and jokes about countries the kid wasn’t from were made around the otherwise uncomfortably quiet dinner table. And when religion was brought up in a house full of atheists Remus stood and took his friend’s hand, saying that they’d eat something at a foodtruck and storming of, leaving Roman to feed little stripes of unseasoned meat to the cat.
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Their father was bad sometimes.
They learned this when the both of them started college and the racist microagressions turned into jokes about how they’d never make it since they were both going to art schools.
And when Remus showed him his homemade costume he huffed and said it looked great in a tone that Implied anything but. And when Roman showed him the finished piece he’d worked months on he said it looked nice even if it had mistakes while pointing at every single one of them while his son, hands still stained with markers and pencil smudges, gave a watery smile and the artwork was put in a art map to never be looked at again.
Their father wasn’t good for them.
They realised this. Finally realised this, when Remus was twenty and had decided to move out, getting a small apartment would have been to expensive had his brother not eagerly asked him if he could come with him.
And they told their father while their bags were already packed and the rent was already payed.
And their neighbours registered a noise complained and whispered about calling childservices when their father started another screaming match to tell them how much he didn’t want them to leave and how they wouldn’t make it.
And they painted the walls mint green while Roman painted a mural around the spot where their couch would be.
And they ate lukewarm noodles from the plastic canisters while sat on the empty apartment floor.
And Roman bought a dozen succulents to take care of and make it feel more like home.
And the wall was always covered in outfit designs and storyboards as the jar they had put the sticker ‘for a couch’ on slowly filled up.
And they still send him Christmas cards but didn’t plan on visiting that house for a long long time.
And their father would have killed them for the mess they made of the apartment sometimes.
And they preferred it that way.