Chapter Text
“You are not wearing that to school.” John said, narrowing his eyes at the nine-year-old standing in front of him dressed in his batman costume from Halloween. Jemmy didn’t seem to agree, crossing his arms and huffing. There truly wasn't enough time for John to stand there and argue with him, but he knew folding to every demand of his siblings was something he needed to work on.
Mustering the best dad-voice he could, John narrowed his eyes and Jemmy seemed to get the message before a word even left his mouth. “You can put it on when you get home. Change, now.” John said, and when Jemmy sulked but stalked off down the hallway to change he considered it a win. Shifting Frances on his hip, he took the brief moment of quiet to pick a few of toys up off the ground, tossing them across the room into the cardboard moving box that they’d been using as a makeshift toy-box. There were still moving boxes everywhere, John having been telling himself that he’d find a sitter to send the kids to and unpack everything this weekend every week for the past month. His stream of thought was interrupted when he heard yelling from down the hall, Frances putting her hands over her ears and leaning into John’s shoulder. He rubbed her back but turned to where Martha and Harry were sitting at the kitchen counter.
“Can you watch her for a sec while I go sort them out?” He said and Martha took the toddler into her own arms, Harry only glaring as John took off down the hallway towards the sound of commotion.
When he reached the doorway of the ‘little kids’ bedroom he was met with Mary-Eleanor sitting on the ground in tears, Jemmy throwing his arms up and insisting he didn’t do anything as soon as John stepped over the threshold. After some coaxing, the five-year-old explained through sniffles that Jemmy was taking too long to brush his hair, and had hit her with the comb when she tried to grab it off of him. Jemmy made an attempt at fleeing the room but stopped in his tracks when John cleared his throat.
“Do you remember when we all sat down and made new family rules?” He said and crossed his arms, Jemmy turning around and giving him a small nod.
“Tell me the first one.” John continued, Jemmy looking at the ground and mumbling his response. Crouching down, John raised an eyebrow, the nine-year-old chewing on his bottom lip for a beat before repeating himself a little louder.
“No hitting, ever.”
Looking back to where Mary-Eleanor was sitting on their air-mattress still sniffling through tears, John gave his little brother’s hand a squeeze and motioned back to their sister with his head. “Apologize and go wait with the big kids.” He said, Jemmy giving the five-year-old a hug and a sincere enough apology for John to let him scamper out.
Picking the comb up from where it had been thrown on the ground John sat down behind Mary-Eleanor, brushing her hair back and pulling a hair tie off of his wrist with his teeth. She seemed to calm completely down in the time it took for him to braid her hair, turning around to hug him before grabbing her backpack and running down the hallway. John followed her out, ducking into his room to grab his own bag and slinging it over his shoulder. Taking Frances back from Martha, he scanned the gaggle of kids in front of him to do a headcount.
“One, two, three, four- five.” He said, patting Frances’ head on the five and smiling when she giggled.
Having made sure no one had gone AWOL in the past ten minutes he ushered everyone out the door, grabbing Mary-Eleanor’s hand as they walked down the steps and outside into the humid August air.
“What if I don’t like kindergarten?” She said quietly, Jemmy whipping around from in front of her before John could respond and walking backward as he talked.
“I did kindergarten in South Carolina at home but it’s probably the same stuff in New York, you get to play more than you do in first grade.” He said, almost tripping over his own heels until Harry grabbed him by the shoulders and pivoted him around to walk normally, huffing.
John couldn’t remember the last time he had seen Harry in any form of a good mood, and every time the thought crossed his mind he felt overrun with guilt. The younger kids had been too little to fully understand what was going on when their father got taken to court but Harry, previously Henry Jr. until a screaming match was the end of that some odd six months ago, had been in the epicenter of it alongside John and his twin. And while Martha didn’t seem to walk out of it with a grudge against the eldest Laurens sibling, Harry certainly had.
The first school they hit on the drop off route was the highschool, and Harry walked straight up the steps without so much as a goodbye. Martha turned around to press a kiss to Frances’ forehead, John giving a small smile and squeezing her shoulder.
“You’ll be fine kiddo, look out for your brother.” He said, the teenage girl giving him a solemn nod before walking into the building.
Daycare drop off was thankfully uneventful, but Central Park East 1 Elementary School posed an entirely different story. There was apparently some sort of error with the way the kid’s registration paperwork had been processed the week before, which resulted in John having to sit in the absent of air-conditioning front office, Mary-Eleanor in his lap while Jemmy paced around unable to sit still. After about twenty minutes the front desk receptionists were finally able to sort the error out, a teacher’s aide coming to get the kids to class. While Jemmy took off without so much as a goodbye, Mary-Eleanor didn’t budge, and the second John tried to set her on the ground she burst into tears.
“No- I- I wanna go to grown up school- with you Jacky,” She got out between sniffles, furling the fabric of John’s shirt in her fists and starting to hyperventilate. The teacher’s aide, to her credit, tried her best to sweet talk Mary-Eleanor off of his lap by telling her how much fun they were going to have, but it took John making about six hundred promises not to abandon her at kindergarten before she finally agreed to go. He watched them walk down the hallway until she was out of view before going to leave himself, one of the front desk receptionists giving him a sympathetic smile
“First days are always hard dad, she’ll be okay.”
John didn’t have the energy to explain that he was her brother as he rushed out the door, wondering absentmindedly if the past few years had truly aged him enough to look old enough to have a fourth-grader and a kindergartener. Taking a deep restorative breath, he pulled his headphones out of his pocket and stuck them in his ears as he got on the elevator to the subway, turning on his ‘motivational bangers’ playlist as he found the right train to get him to Columbia.
~~~
Free of kids for the first time in months, John Laurens almost felt like a normal twenty-year-old as he stepped onto the Columbia University campus. And the knowledge that none of the other students he walked past had any clue who he was made it even better. In South Carolina, his reputation was impossible to escape. People stared at him in the grocery store, put their forks down to watch him with the kids when they walked into restaurants, and the whispers that came with those occurrences weren’t exactly quiet. But he shook those memories out of his head, for the time being, searching out the lecture hall where Masterpieces of Western Literature and Philosophy, the freshmen year core class he was looking forward to the most, was being held. The professor instructed them to have read The Iliad by the first day of class and while the state his life was in meant John hadn’t quite finished it yet, the story never left his mind.
Sliding into a seat in the back of the lecture hall, John about jumped out of his skin when someone sitting behind him tapped him on the shoulder. Turning around cautiously, half-expecting to have been recognized, he relaxed when he wasn’t met with a grimace, but with a smile and a head full of curly hair like his own.
“You look exhausted, you want a caffeine pill?” The other student said, turning to fish a bottle out of their backpack, John nodding wordlessly and stealing a glance at his reflection in the locked screen of his phone. Did he really look that tired?
“Gilbert Lafayette, everyone calls me Laf though, and I use they/them pronouns.” The student continued as they placed the small pill into his hand.
“You’re a first-year too?” John asked as he washed the pill down with a swig of his water bottle, and Lafayette looked like they were about to answer, but the booming voice of their professor speaking into his microphone made John whip back around. He felt a little disheartened that his conversation had been cut short, but after a minute he felt a tap on his shoulder and turned, Lafayette handing him a folded up piece of paper. Turning back to his desk, he carefully unfolded it.
Yeah, I’m a first-year. International student from France. You have a name too, or should I just call you Freckles?
He stifled a laugh, grabbing a pen to write a response on the next line down. Passing notes like they were twelve felt somewhat juvenile, but having grown up at the school-of-the-Laurens-dining-room-table, he never really got to experience that the way everyone else did anyways.
John. France is neat. I’m half Puerto Rican but born and raised in the deep south, which is much less fun.
He wrote, re-folding the paper before passing it back behind him. After a minute he felt it being set back down on his shoulder, ignoring the look another student was giving the two of them as he opened it.
I’m getting brunch with my roommate after this class, you’re welcome to join.
The paper said at the bottom, John smiling and turning around to give Lafayette an affirmative nod before sticking the note in between the pages of his journal and turning his attention to the professor.
Class got out early since they hadn't done much besides go over the syllabus, John walking in lockstep towards the nearest dining hall with Lafayette, who was currently telling him all about their roommate, apparently the most eccentric person they’d ever met which “says a lot, since I’m from Europe.” John laughed, pulling his phone out when he felt it buzz against his thigh.
Harry
School is boring, can you pick me up???
John shook his head and shot back a text telling him to put his phone away, immediately pulled away from his worry about his brother when he sensed someone running towards them.
“Laf, oh my god- I’ve never been so happy to see you in my life.” The person yelled as he approached, taking Lafayette in a bear hug. John assumed this was the roommate they had just been talking about, Lafayette chuckling. When they pulled away John could fully take in the other student’s appearance. He had dark hair pulled back into a short ponytail, his eyes expressive.
“You’ve known me for three days Alex.” Lafayette said and John shook himself out of the trance he didn’t know how he wound up in to begin with, Alex continuing to rattle on.
“Yes but I have not been stuck in economics sitting next to a ‘social liberal, fiscal conservative’ until today. The entire class he was mumbling under his breath calling our professor a communist and honest to God, I could have punched him.” He said, his hands moving around as fast as his mouth. Lafayette shook their head and wrapped an arm around him, gesturing to John.
“And on that note, we have a new friend joining us today.” They said, Alex finally noticing John standing there and thrusting out his hand for him to shake.
“Alexander Hamilton, at your service.”
John shook his hand firmly, in spite of how uncomfortable the gesture made him. He had spent his entire life shaking hands in stuffy crowded rooms and would be perfectly content to never have to do it again, but it was more or less inescapable.
“John, nice to meet you.” He said, Alex pulling his eyebrows together.
“Just John?”
“Just John.”
He felt the way Alex tilted his head at him in his gut, but he couldn't exactly place if it was a bad gut feeling or not. It was endearing, in a way. Realizing that he was starting to stare, John pulled his eyes away, as they got in the line for food, trying to look significantly more interested in the buffet than he actually was.
“So what other classes are you taking?” Lafayette asked as they settled into a booth in the corner of the dining hall, John looking back up.
“I’m trying to get as many of my core classes as out of the way as I can, but I’m taking a political theory class to see if I’d actually get something out of majoring in political science.”
“Hey, I’m taking that class too!” Alex jumped in, “I know someone dating the TA who was able to get me the syllabus early, you can have my copy if you want to look over it before Wednesday.” He said excitedly, turning to pull his backpack up from where it was resting on the ground. John felt his phone buzz again, hoping it wasn’t Harry continuing to badger him as he tapped open his text messages.
Frances’ Daycare
Frances says good luck at college daddy, I like books too!
Attached to the message was a picture of Frances sitting in a beanbag chair looking at a picture book, with a whole mess of other books strewn around her. John was unable to keep from smiling fondly at the image and saved it to his camera roll, but when Lafayette took notice of his expression and leaned over to see what he was looking at he lurched to the side, locking his phone and dropping it into the side of his backpack. He said a silent prayer of thanks when Lafayette didn't question him about it or so much as give him a weird look, instead turning their attention to Alex, who had started on another rant about his Economics class.
John grabbed the syllabus that Alex had slid across the table and took a moment to center himself before jumping back into the conversation; the words of the judge the day he was granted custody of his siblings, the guidance counselor who told him he had been awarded a full ride to Columbia, and the family friend who helped him pack his life in South Carolina into a U-Haul thrumming in his head like a mantra.
Laurens, do not throw away your shot.