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Ted has managed to lose his father somewhere in the house, which is... not great.
He knows it might be more than a little bit hypocritical of him to be thinking like that, feeling that old familiar dread pooling in his guts, considering he is the only reason his dad is still invited to visit in the first place. It's not because Captain Logan cares too much about Ted being his son or anything like that, it's just that Ted's the one who keeps pleading with the others to try to convince everyone (himself included) that things will somehow turn out different this time, even though things never change.
Ted isn't oblivious to his dad's flaws or anything, he probably knows them all the best - more than Deacon and Captain Logan himself, even. He knows, but there's just some whack instinct hardwired into him still, there to placate his father and try to make stuff go easier for him, there to try really hard to be a good kid. It's dumb, but it won't go away, not even after all this time. Ted's all the way in his thirties and still trying stupid hard to make his dad happy, even though he knows it won't work and that his dad's just bad news and that the others only barely tolerate him just for Ted's sake. It's dumb, but somehow Ted still hasn't learned.
So now he's got to go find his dad before the man can find something in the house that wrecks all the carefully built lies that they've been balancing out over the years, or even just something petty he'll use as a threat for the next 30 years of Ted's life (planting cameras and microphones, digging through Ted's belongings, taking stuff, reading personal notes - it's hard to figure out where the line blurs into paranoia when Ted grew up with a cop for a dad, one who did random searches of his room and bags and never stopped looking for proof of all Ted's failings so that he could ship him out to the middle of nowhere to get brainwashed).
Things don't change. The twisting of his stomach and the half-numb ache in his chest that makes it hard to breathe and his sweating palms are all the same ones from being sixteen. Maybe his dad had a point when he says Ted never learns.
"Hey T," he says when he stumbles across Thea in the garage, jumping on the distraction and trying to act like his hands aren't shaking. "You need any help?"
"Nah, I'm just looking," she says, flicking her little fingers through the crate of old vinyls. They're not really supposed to touch anything other than the cassette player, but Ted will let it slide on a day like today. "We're gonna use the tape player, but Billie left to get her mixtape and hasn't got back yet."
Ted nods. "I'll let her know you're looking for her if I see her."
"Uncle Ted," she says, and he very deliberately doesn't grimace at the title. She only doesn't call him Dad when she knows there are other people around - some part of Ted wilts to know he's raising kids as adept at hiding as he was, even if the reasons are all different. "Is Grandpa Logan gonna leave soon?"
That he really can't help but grimace over. It's not like she's wrong for wanting the man gone or whatever, but Ted just never really likes acknowledging that he's having to pick the happiness of one family over the other.
(It really kills him, it really does, and everyone knows it which is why no one pushes the issue too much. Ted wants really hard to make everyone else happy - he tries really hard at it and has been trying since he was a kid, but this is one of those things where just not everyone can be happy at the same time. He's got to pick one over the other, and he wants to pick his family more than anything, but he's been choosing his dad in all these little ways for so long he doesn't know how to get himself to stop. He can't figure out how to pick himself either.)
"Probably," he says, biting back the guilty apologies already crawling up his throat like flies. "Lunch is over already, he'll probably want to go home soon. Do you want him to stop by to say goodbye?"
"No, that's okay, you can tell him," she says quickly, which he figured would be the case. The only reason he really asks is so that she doesn't have to worry about wondering.
"Sounds good," he tells her, drumming a bit on the doorframe, watching as she bops her head to it. "I'll see if I can find Billie for you."
"Thanks dad," she says softly, and this time the smile he gives her feels far less strained.
So now he's on the hunt for his daughter and his dad, and even though he'd hope to find them in two separate places, he runs into them together.
First off, he's not expecting to find either of them just standing around in the hallway, so turning the corner to see them practically makes him jump out of his skin. On one hand, he's almost lucky his dad is busy looking at Billie because it means that Ted gets to miss out on the man ranting about how easily spooked Ted still is. On the other, his dad is practically snarling down at Ted's daughter, and no single reason why Ted keeps letting him come over is reason enough to let that slide.
"Hey Billie," he says to keep things casual, because the last thing Billie needs added to her plate is seeing two grown men shout at each other when she's already looking totally stressed out. Ted knows from experience how freaky it was to see grown-ups fight in front of you, about you. The way she scurries over to his side just underlines the fact that she doesn't need the strain, and he reaches down to wiggle his fingers against hers to try and reassure her a little.
While he does that, he acknowledges his dad coolly. Once Billie leaves he'll make his latest attempt to tell his dad to leave her alone again - Ted's dad can give him all the shit he wants to heap on, but Ted's kids are another story.
"Thea's waiting on your tape," he says to try and encourage Billie to get out of here, since she looks like she needs a reason to leave. Instead, she just nods and sticks close. Maybe it's coward shit, but Ted is almost grateful that she stays - he's not desperate enough to fight his father to not take her presence as a reason to just bail out instead of pushing things.
"What were you two talking about?" he asks instead, because maybe that'll be a way to do this whole thing without upsetting anyone. Ted's not too good at talking really, but he tries really hard, so maybe this is something he can work with? He feels his fingers start to stretch and twist together and quickly shoves his hands into his pockets before his dad can see.
(Ted's past thirty and he shouldn't still be afraid of his father, but part of the reason he'd started to and still does like baggy clothes with big pockets is because there's enough room in them to fidget without his dad seeing - even through the errant certainty that his dad can just see straight through the fabric anyway. Sometimes Ted doesn't even want to think about how much of himself is just built out of ways to hide from and placate his father.)
Of course, the hiding is almost a moot point because his dad speaks and Ted's body goes so cold he stops moving altogether. "I'm talking to your son about utilizing some body control for once."
Ted doesn't like to think about all the people aching to be cruel to them for being queer, even though it's constantly burning a hole in the back of his brain. There every time he steps out of the house, every time he sees their name in a magazine, every time he lays down next to Bill at night and wonders if he should worry about someone somehow being able to see. Every blessing tempered with reality (or as close to it as Ted's brain can get). As much as he loves it overall, he also doesn't like to think about how brave his daughters both have to be for being way more open than any of them have ever been before. Ted knows how to be queer in quiet, hiding behind best friends (because that's what he calls Bill to be safe, and that's what Liz is even though everyone else thinks she's his wife. Ted is good at hiding), but his daughters are open in every way Ted could never let himself be and he hates it when other people push against that instead of celebrating it.
"She's doing just fine," he says firmly, because at least if nothing else his dad does occasionally take casual reminders instead of trying to open a whole new challenging conversation. "Doesn't run into walls anymore or anything!" which is a point to be proud of. As endearing as it had been in a way, it was still scary as all hell when Billie gave herself dozens of bruises just trying to get from her room to the kitchen.
His dad clearly doesn't share the sentiment. "She moves like an alien," he snaps, and Ted goes still at that too.
He wants to say No she doesn't, because he knows his dad says it like an insult and nothing insulting could apply to her. But the word sticks in Ted's head - an insult from their mouths that Ted can't shake off in a different way. Not that his dad has ever gotten that, and Ted's not going to hand him another reason to call Ted delusional (even if maybe Ted kind of is).
"She's doing just fine," he repeats instead. "Leave her alone," he adds, firmer. Ted doesn't challenge his dad, not even about the stuff he knows he's right about, not even about most of the stuff that he should - that's what Bill does usually. So when Ted says it stern and lets himself glare out from under his hair, his dad doesn't have the sure footing to snap back so easily.
The sound of Liz's heels coming close down the hall is are the only reason Ted backs off after that - Billie's still clinging to him like a little limpet and as much as he'd like to try to get his dad out the door, he doesn't want Billie to have to stick around to hear Chief Logan's voice longer than necessary. Plus, Liz is always better at getting his dad to leave than he is anyway, so he doesn't feel too guilty leaving the task up to her.
He tugs on a strand of Billie's hair to make sure she realizes he's about to move and isn't too surprised when she sticks real close as he walks off.
"Can we jam?" she asks him, words slow and careful, shaped in her mouth with delicate precision.
"Musically?" he asks back, almost hopeful that maybe she's able to brush off the confrontation easier than Ted is able to.
But she shakes her head, so sadly that's not the case. "Verbally," she clarifies, and something in Ted's chest is still wiggling and whining, but he's always tried real hard to make sure the girls feel and are heard, and that their questions get answers, so he agrees like he always does despite his quiet reservations.
He lets her take his hand and lead him to her room, trying to keep his fingers still. This time it's not fear, just care. As much as he likes to smooth his fingers over the delicate skin of her impossibly small joints, like he's done since she was just a baby, she doesn't like the way his callouses rub and so he makes sure they don't.
Ted hopes he never runs out of that kind of love.
He sits on her bed and Billie stays on her feet, pacing around the room while she thinks through whatever thoughts are in her head. He watches her feet trace lines over the rug, her shoulders pulled back and hands twisting into rigid shapes, and loves it, or, he loves it until she starts to change it. She pulls her arms in close to her body, elbows tight against her ribs, she walks with a stiff control, heels planting firmly instead of staying lifted off the ground - mimicking. He's watching her tease out how to hide herself right in front of him and Ted hates it.
See, Ted's good at hiding some stuff, but some stuff he just doesn't have a choice with. Lots of people act like he does, they talk and think that he made a choice somewhere - they call him brave or they call him stupid, depending, but the thing is that Ted just doesn't have a choice really. He doesn't know how to be any other way, and not from a lack of trying. Ted's always managed to fail at being different in every way he's tried - it's as much of a burden on himself as it is all the others around him. No amount of knowing that he’s doing things Wrong makes him know how to do them Right. Maybe he should just be grateful his daughter's better at it than he is, because maybe that means she'll be safer than he was. Mostly he's just angry they have to work to hide at all.
Eventually she stops, walks over to him to climb into his lap, and Ted pulls his arms around her and hopes she never gets too big to do it. She leans her head against his shoulder and looks squarely at the little pocket on his stupid dress shirt he still tries to wear when his dad stops by - like maybe if he just learns how to dress the right way his dad won't hate him as much. It's a losing battle, but he feels like it's a habit that's just getting worse as he's getting older. Paper thin masks to try and hide everything about Ted that's just wrong somehow.
"Are we aliens?" she asks him, and Ted almost doesn't know how to answer.
Cause, see, he knows that maybe he should lie, only maybe it doesn't count as lying because Ted knows that the way his brain thinks is different and that this isn't real, even though he can't quite bring himself to say the words that it's not. Ted heard T.Rex's The King of the Mountain Cometh when he was in middle school and looked up what a changeling son was, and the knowledge never left him. As much as he knows it doesn't make sense, he also knows that's what he is. That's what they are. That's the reason he's always been different and it's why he's always been so bad at hiding that he was different, and sometimes he used to wish that his father had just kicked him back out into whatever forest he had come from, so that way he'd be able to find all the others like him and finally fit somewhere.
And Billie's always been the same. He would stay up sometimes - especially back when they were touring and the six of them slept in the same hotel rooms together, where the nerves and excitement would keep him up for hours, some inexplicable energy under his skin refusing to leave. Ted mostly slept in the van those days to keep from bothering anyone. He'd stay up and watch her, watch the way she rocked her head side to side over pillows and the way her hands would twist clumsily against blankets and plushies, watch her watch him back, and knew already that they were the same sort of creature and always would be.
He was never sure if maybe something had swapped them out when he wasn't looking - as much as they tried to always be close to the girls, they also couldn't really take the babies up on stage much; even with their huge headphones the noise and the lights would be way too much for their little brains. So, there was always the chance, sort of. Or maybe it was just that whatever was wrong with Ted got passed down along with his eye color and stuff. Either way, she was his and he was going to make sure she stayed safe and whole no matter what.
So maybe Ted's supposed to tell her No, because even though Ted thinks and wonders he's also always knowing that it's not quite real. But the denial gets caught in his throat anyway, because he doesn't like lying and he likes lying to the girls even less.
"Maybe," he decides to say, which is really just dodging the question. But he doesn't want to tell her Yes and set her up for more vitriol than she already gets from other people, and also doesn't want to tell her No and try to explain all the ways his brain doesn't work to her when she's like, eight.
But maybe the specifics don't matter too much, really. If he knows his dad, then he's called her that and meant that she was strange and even stranger because she was alone in it. Maybe Ted just has to let her know that she's not alone in any of it - because really, Ted never needed to know that he was different, he just needed to hear that there was a word for people like him because there were other people like him.
"Maybe we're all aliens. Me and Bill and you and Thea," he hesitates over the princesses, because they get it like no one else does, but they also don't 'get it' because they are it. There's a difference. But whatever. He shrugs. "Or maybe elves or changelings or whatever," he adds, because he still likes those words more than Alien most times.
"Like Changeling Eyes," she notes, and he smiles at it. Writing that song had felt like pulling his skin off his bones, but even all the technical criticism couldn't break the fact that they'd gotten lots of fan letters saying that the song felt like finally seeing another skeleton like their own. His daughter one of them, it would seem.
"Exactly," he tells, giving her a high five for having good taste in music, bias aside. "I do not think it matters too much if we aren't the same as other people," he continues, trying to make it sound certain because maybe being taught it makes it more solid than stumbling around in the dark for it. "We fit in somewhere, even if it's only with each other, and your mothers. I'll always understand you, and the princesses are proof that even people that aren't the same can love you just the same. And if the people who aren't like us aren't kind because they think we're different-,"
"Then I will show them how to be kind first," she finishes for him, and no part of Ted can hide his joy when she wiggles in excitement just at the words, squealing happily.
Then, like everything else today, the joy gets dragged back down. "Should I hide it though?" she asks him, and Ted wants to cry from it. "Grandpa Logan thinks I should."
Conversations like these always cement the idea that Ted needs to keep his father away from his kids; he hopes he'll actually gather the courage to follow through on that soon, instead of caving the second the man asks. Soon, before they wind up like him. "Chief Logan has never been most kind, even when I was your age," she says, which is the kindest way to explain his relationship with his father without scaring the hell out of her.
But they don't have to get into all the shit that's been done to Ted. He's got to figure out a way to explain to explain all the unexplainable feelings he's been holding in his chest since he was her age instead, and that's already hard enough. "Do you want to hide being a strangeling? Does it hurt anyone?"
Does it hurt you, is the question he wants to ask, but it's not the question he can ask. He already knows the answer - of course it hurts to be different, it also hurts to try so hard to hide it all the time. The hurt is inescapable - they all have to decide for themselves which hurts less.
(Ted hates it, he hates it, he hates it. She's too little for this hurt, she will always be too little for this hurt. All of them are, really.)
She thinks about it for a while, and he doesn't push her to hurry, letting her wrinkle the fabric of his shirt and thread the buttons in and out of their places. It's an important decision, a heavy one, one she'll have to make over and over again, and Ted will never try to make it for her.
"No," she settles on eventually, and Ted's chest loosens even as his stomach drops at the words. "You don't hide it much," she points out, which is...
Well, like Ted said, mostly he's just too fucking stupid to figure out how to hide it like other people can. He doesn't truly hate it, not really, which might just be the problem. Maybe if Ted couldn't stand it he'd be just a little better at hiding the way other people can. Maybe he just doesn't hate himself enough and that's the big problem, even if thinking like that is kind of... shitty.
But the thing Billie doesn't know is that there were years spent trying desperately to hide it - before he met Bill and after he married Liz and after more pressure from the bigger labels and all the way up to right now. It's just that lots of people don't know it because they've all been able to see straight through it anyway. No matter how he dresses or cuts his hair, no matter how carefully he tries to talk or how little he lets other people get to know him, somehow it's always there. Ted's good at keeping his mouth shut, but there's something on his skin or in his eyes that he can't identify well enough to hide but that everyone else can still plainly see.
You can only try so hard before eventually realizing you're playing a losing hand, and that nothing you do can ever change it.
"I've never been good at it," he says, instead of trying to explain all this to her, twirling a lock of her hair around his fingers. "Bill and little Thea don't hide it either." Bill's a natural at lots of things that Ted doesn't know how to do, but he's a good teacher - hopefully the girls learn more from him than they will from Ted. "Lots of people don't, really. You've just kind of got to find them."
"Isn't it safer though?" she presses, and it tears him apart to know that she's eight and trying to learn how to stay safe in a world she already knows wasn't made for her. He wishes he found that forest when he was younger, the one full of the creatures like him, where they could have hidden and been safe on their own for once. But he never did.
"But is it joyful?" he has to ask back, even though it terrifies the hell out of him to know that she'll have to choose between happiness and guaranteed safety the same way he does. But maybe, maybe, maybe, maybe they'll get lucky and things will change and she'll find that safer space younger than Ted ever could have dreamed of.
She nods like she understands, and he nods back like it doesn't ache to know that she does.
"Changelings," she tells him decisively, and the word rings with the choice she's made.
"Changelings," he agrees, and wishes that could make it easier for any of them.