Work Text:
We loved too fierce, held too tight and died too bloody.
2027
Abel can hear Chib’s voice in the back of his head, stay away from the moors, watch your brother and don’t get each other killed. He’s going to be pissed to see the gash on Thomas’s hand; still bleeding through the thin layer of the shirt Abel had given him to wrap the wound. It’s just a flash, a millisecond of a moment, but he imagines seeing it before, a bandaged hand, the material coarse against his cheek. He shakes the feeling away, righting Thomas as they come through the clearing towards the cottage, already seeing Chibs standing there waiting, like he knew, no expected, that something had happened.
Abel watches as Chibs stitches up Thomas, something he’s done for both of them countless times over the years. There is a rhythm to his movements, his hand steady as he pulls the needle through the skin, slowly knitting it back together. He pushes the glasses up the bridge of his nose letting out a puff of air, “used to help your mum with this stuff.” Abel can feel Thomas tense a little, his fist clenching as the tears cloud his blue eyes. They don’t talk about her much, at all really. Sometimes dad is mentioned but Chibs can’t really make it through talking about him without disappearing. They don’t have much. Some pictures, the odd story and maybe if it’s a really good day the video from Opie’s wedding. It’s full of people they don’t know, aren’t allowed to know anymore, but their parents are there. These two people neither of them know, looking so happy and in love. The words are just so flippant, but Chibs gets distant, standing to pack everything away, a slight shake to his hand.
“Do you remember them?” Thomas’s voice is so low, Abel almost misses it completely, he can hear Chibs in the kitchen, Fi helping him fix dinner. His brother is already itching at the stitches, hidden beneath a thick strip of gauze, but there is something in his eyes that cuts a little too deep for Abel. He stretches his legs out, pulling the pack of cigarettes from his pocket, his coveralls are still covered in mud from the yard, hands tacky with blood.
“A little, not much, nothing important.” He breathes out a puff of smoke moving to stand in the doorway, knowing Abel won’t follow. He thinks he remembers her smile, but that could just be from staring at a picture his father had taken of them; maybe a little of her voice, just wisps of what she used to sing but even that could just be an illusion. He cracks his knuckles, the cold settling a little deeper into his bones. He knows where they came from, some place called Charming, a little town where everyone died bloody, including their parents. That’s his legacy.
Abel gets the box on his eighteenth birthday, its dark and him and Chibs are sitting at the kitchen table playing cards, Thomas already in bed. It isn’t anything fancy, no wrapping, not as nice as the knife Chibs had engraved for him ‘just like Jackie boys’. The cardboard smells like damp, almost falling apart in his hands. Chibs looks sorry for handing it to him, something in his eyes dims, that same look he gets when talking about the past. He pauses in the doorway, resting his hand on Abel’s shoulder, “don’t tell your brother, he’s not ready.”
Abel can’t seem to move, he puts the box to the side, breathing out, hoping the heavy weight in his lungs will dissipate, it only gets worse, before long he can feel himself choking on the tears. He knows what’s in there; it’s a stack of journals, his fathers. It’s the one of top, not like the simple notebooks his father used to carry. Its leather bound an intricate design on the front. His fingers ghost along the binding, feeling the ridges and dips. The first page is blank save for “to my boys, love mom.”
He so badly wants to shut it back up and hide from whatever is trying to claw its way out. He remembers blood; the kitchen had been covered in it, their kitchen; his home. He never told Thomas. It had been a mistake, she’d been late, Chibs and Tig didn’t know. He can still see her lying there, not moving, his father right beside her. That’s it, the memory is just a blip but it’s so clear, the thing that sticks with him so many years later. He can’t tell you the color of the cabinets but the tiles were grey with specks of blood, threading out from the pool under her head. He can’t remember if he screamed out for her or who took him away, he just remembers thinking she would open her eyes and smile, that smile he thinks he remembers.
------
This is our past, your history, not the clubs. - Mom
16
The first time Tara sees him, her stomach bottoms out, butterflies turning to wasps. Her breath rasps against her ribs, and even as she fidgets with the hem of her skirt, her eyes never leave his. She doesn’t think there has ever been anything so blue, it makes her cheeks redden and she finally tears her eyes away and back to the ground. It’s one of those restless summer days, where the wind is warm and the sun too bright. Tara hates Charming; it’s a dust bowl on the best of days, just a single main street with mom and pop shops. It’s nothing like Tahoe, but when mom left and her dad lost his job there wasn’t much choice than moving in with her grandmother. When he got his job at the Teller garage, Tara wasn’t expecting to be ordered to some bbq, to meet the locals. She wasn’t expecting to meet Jax.
He swaggers over to her, already wearing his first cut, he’s lean and muscular but still gangly as he grows into his height. Tara doesn’t think she’s ever met someone like him. He ducks his head and whispers, “lets get out of here.” And for some reason she nods and takes his hand, because she’s sure this is exactly like some movie with Molly Ringwald, and her prince has come.
17
Gemma hits her for the first time when she’s seventeen, it’s not a slap either. Tara curls a hand around her jaw, feeling some of the blood from her split lip, pooling in her palm. All she wanted was for Jax to leave with her for college, to get out of this cesspool of a town; away from Gemma and the gang. She forgot her place and the queen had decided her punishment. After that she’d just tilted her head and smirked, “darlin’ he’s not going anywhere, Charming is his, that club is his; you want to take that away from him?”
Tara’s mouth felt dry, her tongue too thick to form words; the heady taste of copper against her lips. Her voice rattled out “he’s mine,” tears already falling quick and fast. She felt stupid, standing in Gemma’s kitchen, begging her to let him go, her entire world spinning on its axis. Only she knew the answer, no amount of pleading or crying would ever change the sway this world had. Tara shook her head, hiding behind her hair, burying her face in her hands. She so badly wanted something better for them, but she was so young and already too tired. She’d watched two people die in a matter of months, and washed the blood out of Jax clothes like a good old lady would. Her hands never seemed to stop shaking, she wanted to heal and he wanted to harm.
“You gotta’ decide which side of this you fall on, you love the man you love the club, otherwise you leave and don’t look back, you understand that?” Gemma leant against the kitchen counter, stirring her tea and Tara knew she would always remember that moment, for how casual the threat had been. It sent a shiver down her spine, “I get it.”
32
The first time Tara sees Abel her heart skips a beat. It isn't the same as with the other babies, she knows immediately that she loves him like her own, that he is meant to be hers. When the hospital goes quiet, its own little ghost town, she sits beside him and just stares, marvelling at how perfect he is, hand curled around her finger. She doesn’t want to feel so connected to Jax but it happens a little more everyday, because she can’t imagine not being there for Abel. Their past sort of pales to whatever this thing is now. She promises Abel she’ll never leave, before she even manages to say it to Jax. She promises to protect him, even if that means from Jax. I made that promise before I was your mom, because I knew that, no matter what, I loved you like I already was.
Dec- 9-2013
I hope you’re safe, I hope you know I love you both more than anything in this entire world. Abel, protect your brother, protect each other, no matter what. Remember that you are more than this town, than your father and I. The choices we made… I wish I had gotten you out, I wish I could be there to see you grow into the boys I know would make me proud, the person your father never got to be. Love him and don’t blame him. Don’t ever be afraid. Live.
Mom
His father's last note is at the end of his mother's journal, not in one of dozen or so small pads of his own. Its scribbled on the page next to hers, his final testament beside hers where it belongs, one final grasp at keeping them together, even in death.
March 4th 2014
I don’t want you to be sad. The things I have done, the person I have become, letting your mom get hurt, I have to answer for those. I have to be the man I promised to be, for her and for you. I’m sorry I won’t be there for you that I won’t be able to watch you grow into the man I was too weak to become. The gavel I fought for was never worth your lives or hers. Chibs is going to take you home, he’s going to keep you from this legacy, break the cycle. Your mom fought for that and it cost, her, her life and I want you to know she loved you, I love you. I’m not your ghost, I’m the end of the line, remember that and stay away from this place, there ain’t anybody left to kill, nobody left to blame.
Dad
----
Tellers Die Bloody
“Family reunion.” Bobby follows him into the graveyard, limping behind; the only sound his cane against the ground. Abel sees the rows of headstones, stretching for a good mile to the edge of town, his breath fogging in the cold. His stomach clenches, that feeling at the back of his throat making it hard to swallow.
“Right here.” Bobby points to the row in front of him, shaking away the rain, he looks too worn to be real. The ravages of time creasing his face, wearing away any bit of youth, and Abel finally gets why. In front of him lie four headstones, one for his father, his mother, grandfather and one for his uncle Thomas. Beyond that, are graves for Opie, Tig and some of the other brothers; Abel realizes later that all the death dates are within the same year.
Thomas bends to place a flower on his mother’s grave. “I shouldn’t have lost her… Thomas shouldn’t have, she wasn’t mine but,” His breath catches and Bobby’s hand settles heavily on his shoulder. “She was yours, we cost you something, for an ideal… I’m sorry.” He expects Bobby to keep going to explain what all this amounted to, explain why it was worth it, but he doesn’t.
“There ain’t nothing I can say.” His footfalls grow heavy as he walks back to the truck, cane tapping.
The rain is cold; soaking through the thin t-shirt Abel wore. His hands shook as they traced the lettering on his father’s grave, the ring on top just an SO, the NS on John’s headstone, rusted to the point of being unreadable. There ain’t nothing I can say.
“Why?”
———
“I got no right to ask you to forgive me, but darlin’ you need to let this go, this place, these people, or it’ll crush you like it did Jax. Your mother wanted better for you.” Gemma looks down at her hands; they’re a gnarled mess of veins and bone, curled in on themselves, almost useless.
“You should have let them go.”
She sucks in a breath, staring at him head on, “I know baby.” Her hand reaches for his and stops halfway between, a shock of white against the metallic table top.
“Your mother was the smart one and she was right, she saw the future, all I could see was the past, the good ‘ole days.” Her lip curls up in disgust, one hand shakily reaching for the pack of smokes. “I wish I could take it back but that ain’t in the cards, what I did,” a tremor racks through her as she lets out a stream of smoke. Abel thinks she might break down and cry and maybe he wants that, wants someone to burn a little of what’s left of their soul, to mourn like they have. But his stomach is roiling with disgust and he suddenly can’t breathe.
“You can’t bring her back.” It’s the last words he says as he signals to the guards, the clanging on the bars drowning out anything Gemma might try to say.
He’s sick in the parking lot, against the brick wall by the entrance. There are tears stinging his eyes that he desperately rubs away, but they just won’t go.
“It’s okay baby.” She’s so beautiful in the dress from Opie’s wedding, her hair up in curls. She reaches out for him and he shuts his eyes breathing in the scent of vanilla and spice. “It’s all gonna be okay.” She pulls back, her fingertips pushing his hair back. “Mom?” His voice cracks.
“Go home baby.” Her hand lingers in his and then it’s gone.
He catches a plane that night.
-----
Beannachd Dia dhuit.
Abel thought he would find peace, but really its just reopening a wound and taking on a bit more hate and bitterness. He can’t even look Chibs in the eye when he gets back, instead he avoids him, making sure to be up and out by dawn to work in the fields, and in bed before dinner. A part of him blames them all for what happened, there is blood on everyone’s hands, but they got to live.
Chibs finds him over by the barn a week later, tosses a beer at him.
“Whaddya want me to say?”
“I dunno.” Abel squints at him, the sun setting behind him and for the first time he took in just how worn Chibs looked.
“Your mum came and asked me to take care of the two of ya’s, before she died she made me promise to get you out if anything happened to yer dad. You may not believe it but I loved them both, Beannachd Dia dhuit.” Off his look Chibs smiles a bit, “Said it at their wedding, happened in a whore house.” Abel can’t help but laugh, because of course it did.
“You gotta find your place Abel, not based on where you came from but where you’re going. They loved you and you got a bum deal havin’ to lose them like that, but you need to let that die with them.”
“Yeah I know.” Chibs ruffled his hair standing to make his way back to the cottage. “You miss it?”
Chibs paused but didn’t bother turning around, “Every day, son.”
Abel sees the occasional Sons cut when he goes to the city, but he doesn’t pay attention anymore, he doesn’t want to remember the club or what it did to his family. Instead he remembers his mother’s smile and the way his dad used to read to him and that time they drove away from Charming, its not a real memory just little snippets, but it makes him happy and that’s the place he wants to be.