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Tom and Maddie have always been big on boundaries. With Sonic, it was easy. They could figure it out as they went along, adding bits of information into their mental inventory when needed.
But with the addition of two new…allies…confidantes… friends living with them, it's become increasingly difficult to keep track of what not to do.
Which is where the lists come in.
A week into their new living arrangements, the couple handed out pieces of paper and pencils. A list of boundaries is what they asked for. Things not to do, things to do more often. Triggers and special interests - anything Tom and Maddie needed to know, needed to be on that paper.
Sonic's was pretty easy, if long.
don't NOT buy me chili dogs
don't walk into my room without knocking DAD
buy me a new controller so tails stops stealing mine
Tails' was…helpful. And sad.
Could I have some tools?
If anything is broken, could you let me fix it?
And, most notably,
Please don't call me names.
That…was easy enough.
The most concerning, at least to Maddie, was Knuckles' list.
Which came back completely bare.
"He probably just couldn't think of anything," Tom says, reaching over Maddie to place his phone on the nightstand.
"He's a teenager! Teenagers are - I mean when I was a teenager, everything bugged me! There's gotta be something he doesn't want us to do. Or something he wants us to start doing." Maddie lays her head on Tom's chest. "I just don't want to mess up."
Tom chuckles. "You won't mess up. But if you do, I'll be there to fix it."
Maddie reaches back to smack his cheek. "I'm serious!"
Tom frowns, playing with her hair soothingly. "I'm sorry, that was a bad joke…you won't mess up, Mads. He can always add things as he goes. Maybe he doesn't really know what he wants right now."
Maddie nods, flipping over to take Tom into a hug. "I love you honey."
"I love you too. An’ don’t forget, we gotta take Tails to the store tomorrow. Kid asked for tools and I have no idea what to get him.”
“Better take Sonic too,” Maddie mumbles.
“Yeah…night baby.”
“Night…”
~ ~ ~
Knuckles awakens deep into the morning, if the bright sun shining through the skylight is anything to go by. He wakes slowly, content to rest his eyes for the moment.
He’s never been able to do that before.
When he does manage to pry himself off of the soft sheets, he calls down the stairs. “Lady Pretzels, what is for breakfast?”
No response is issued.
“Hm,” he hums, tapping his knuckles together. A spike of anxiety pushes his legs forwards. He barely registers himself moving even as he lifts the door to the attic and walks down the stairs. “Lord of Donuts?”
No answer.
“Hedgehog? Fox?”
He bolts into the living room, greeted with nothing but an empty couch and silence.
Horrid, deplorable, crushing silence.
And suddenly that spike of anxiety morphs into a wave of hot despair.
He doesn’t take a moment to think before he’s out the door, following the road through the woods and into town.
~ ~ ~
“Ooh! This too, I’ll need this!”
Tom sighs as Tails places a fifteenth tool into the cart - plopped among piles of candy and cookies. They can't keep up with what Sonic puts in there, and even if they could…the kid eats a lot anyways. Sugar's probably good with all the running he does.
"Oh!" Sonic exclaims, gone and back in a second. He waves a bag of pizza rolls in Tom's face. "Can we get these?"
Tom isn't able to answer, interrupted by the ringing of his phone. He gestures to Maddie to take over, and steps away from the group to answer the phone. "What's up, Wade?"
Wade's voice on the other side is nervous, rushed. "You might wanna finish whatever you're doing, cause the red one's running around town totalling people’s cars and threatening them."
Tom blinks, taken aback. "He's - he's what?"
"Threatening people! I've gotten three calls! Nessie says her husband's chasing after him with his rifle, and I don't know if that's true or not but you've gotta -"
"Where was he last?" Tom interrupts. His tone of voice - stern, concerned - catches the attention of his wife and son. Tails fiddles in his seat in the front of the cart.
"Mean Bean. But he's heading off on that road towards the drug store."
"Thanks Wade. Lemme know if you get any more calls." Tom hangs up without waiting for an answer, and leans towards Sonic. "Run ahead, towards the Mean Bean. If you see Knuckles, calm him down and then call me. 'Kay?" Sonic salutes, and then he's off in a blur.
"Maddie, Tails, you two can stay here but I gotta take the car real quick."
Maddie shakes her head, even as she reaches into her purse to pass him the keys. "What's going on?"
"Knuckles is harassing people, apparently."
Tails gasps from his seat. "No! He hasn't even left the house before, maybe they've got the wrong guy!"
Tom winces. "The wrong big red alien?"
Tails chuckles sheepishly, red hues coloring his cheeks. "Oh…right."
"Just be careful, Tommy." Maddie warns.
Tom nods, and then he's off.
It takes less than five minutes - thanks to Sonic's speed in locating his friend - for Tom to pull up beside the smoothie bar where Sonic had found Knuckles. Much to the man's dismay, several disgruntled people hover around the two interdimensional kids.
Before he deals with them, Tom surveys the kids themselves.
Knuckles appears innocent enough, sitting on the curb without a care in the world - except, his posture seems a little tight, and his fists are clenched tighter than usual. Sonic jokes around beside him, hand on his shoulder, but Tom sees a telltale blur every so often that indicates his head turning to glance at the crowd accumulating behind them.
“Hey,” he greets, jogging up to meet the duo.
“Thomas!” He resists the urge to shove Phil away as the rifle - toting man intercepts his path. “I understand Sonic. Sonic’s a good kid, and he’s useful. But this thing walks in the middle of the road shouting for you and when people drive up to help, it threatens ‘em.”
Tom shakes his head. “I’m sorry, the kid’s just - ”
Phil shoves a finger into Tom’s chest. “The damned thing’s a monster, not a kid. If you’re gonna keep it, you better put a leash on it.”
“Hey!” Dan - the owner of the smoothie bar, Tom knows him only vaguely - interrupts their conversation smoothly. “The kid didn’t actually hurt anyone. Threats don’t mean nothin’ comin’ from a teenager.”
“He punched my car, it’s wrecked!”
Sonic and Knuckles arise from their spot on the curb. Sonic has a hand on Knuckles’ back, guiding him to Tom gently. “Knux’ll fix your car!”
“I do not know how to do that.”
“Tails’ll fix your car! And he’ll do it for only three thousand, that’s pretty cheap, right?”
Tom sighs. “Sonic, we’re not making Tails fix his car, and we wouldn’t charge for it if we did.”
Knuckles holds his hand out to Phil. “I apologize for destroying your property. In a moment of bad judgment, I believed it to be following me. We will shake hands, and this will amend my mistakes.”
Phil glares at Knuckles’ outstretched hands. “Whatever. Tom, keep this under control !”
With that, the man stalks away. Tom pushes his anger down, somewhere the kids won’t see. Similarly, Sonic pushes Knuckles’ arm down, much to the echidna’s apparent distress. “He didn’t accept my apology!”
Tom shakes his head, waving his arms to disperse the crowd. With a few rolled eyes or pouts of disappointment, the crowd does as he asks. Perks of being a beloved townie. “You don’t need his acceptance. Just - let's get some smoothies.”
In the car, they drink their smoothies in silence. On the house, courtesy of Dan. Tom may just have to frequent this place more often.
Tom breaks the silence when his smoothie is half gone. “What happened?”
Knuckles frowns. “In what sense?”
“You - why did you leave the house?”
Sonic nods, tapping Knuckles’ shoulders incessantly. “Yeah! And why’d you go and freak out?”
Knuckles frowns, ripping his straw like a human would do to a napkin while bored at a restaurant. “I didn’t mean to ‘freak out.’ I only…saw that you had left and…wanted to catch up.”
Tom shakes his head. “I don’t believe you.”
Knuckles growls. “I have no reason to lie!”
Sonic hums, crossing his arms mischievously. “I don’t believe that. ”
Knuckles narrows his eyes, raising his fists to rain down on Sonic.
“Knuckles, no!”
~ ~ ~
Later that night, when Tails and Sonic are asleep, Maddie and Tom sit alone at the dining table.
Maddie shakes her head. “That was… so weird. There was no reason for him to leave the house, he’s never wanted to before. So what was different?”
“What was different,” Knuckles’ voice appears in the doorway, startling the - now sheepish - couple. “Is that you were all gone.”
Tom pats the seat next to him, which Knuckles takes silently. “What do you mean?”
Knuckles launches into an explanation, one he must’ve been thinking about all evening. “I attacked those vehicles because I believed them to be enemies. When my tribe left, all that was left behind for me were the foes they were not able to destroy. Any being who approached me, in those following years, had a reason to harm me. I…I woke up alone this morning. Like I did…I left to look for you, and I suppose it was muscle memory. Not to let the - car - get close. So,” Knuckles clenches a paper with both hands, wrinkling it on the sides. He hands the paper off to Maddie. “I have…only one thing to ask of you.”
Maddie inhales sharply at the title of the paper - it’s his boundary list. She’d titled them herself - color coding them so they’d be easier to remember. He must’ve retrieved his blank one from the fridge after dinner that night.
DO NOT LEAVE ME ALONE
“Sonic helped me write it…these pens are too small.”
Maddie smiles gently at the boy despite her aching heart. “Thank you, Knux. This’ll be very helpful.”
Knuckles nods, succinct, and rises from his seat.
Tom only calls out to him once he’s reached the doorway. “Hey Knux? We love you.”
Knuckles doesn’t turn to acknowledge them. “...thank you.”
Maddie swallows her disappointment. “He’ll come around. I guess he probably hasn’t heard those words in a while.”
Tom shrugs. “Yeah. At least we avoided…anything bad.”
Maddie laughs. “Until we figure something out, Sonic’s just gonna have to be his buddy.”
“You mean his brother.”
“Don’t be too hasty. Knuckles and Tails might not want that,” is what Maddie says. But what Maddie thinks is completely different.
What Maddie thinks is God I can’t wait to break through these boundaries.