Work Text:
"You think the kids would like to go shopping sometime?"
Izzy is at his workstation, busy with a custom wooden frame for a customer, when Ed sits at the other side of the table, idly picking at his nails.
"How would I know," Izzy responds. "I can't read their minds."
Ed sighs, and pouts like a child. He continues staring as Izzy starts to carve out intricate patterns onto the wood. He's always fascinated by Izzy's craft, having learned it from his mother and turned it to a career after their sailing days.
"They haven't had the time to go out for quite a while now, always busy with studying or soccer stuff. Hell, sometimes I feel lonely when they're not home for dinner because they'd been hanging out with friends," Ed complains.
"That's just what children do, isn't it?"
Izzy's full attention is still on his project, he doesn't seem to care about the conversation, which makes Ed whine.
"Iz, c'mon, you're so good with the kids, why not try convincing them to go out with us? All 5 of us, one day out, that's all I ask. Hell, Louis loves you to death, he'll probably convince Alma even if she disagrees!"
Izzy rolls his eyes. "Edward, you're their Pa, why would you think they even need convincing in the first place?"
Edward crosses his arms and puts them on the table. "I don't know. I just feel afraid they'll reject me, I guess."
"Oh, for fuck's sake," Izzy groans. "Ed, if they choose to go hang out with friends, doesn't mean they love you any less. Get your head out of your arse before I shove it deeper myself, ask Stede, then ask the kids."
"Okay, but are you coming though?"
Izzy has to hesitate for a moment. "Fine, I guess."
Ed does a fist pump, and continues to watch as Izzy starts to paint in details of his carvings, head propped up by both of his hands.
===
In the end, they do go for a day out shopping with the kids.
When Ed had told Stede about it, he was ecstatic. Stede had immediately turned to ask the kids, and when it was met with a resounding yes, Ed had breathed a sigh of relief.
Which is how the 5 of them, including Izzy, are now in Stede’s minivan and driving to their local mall. The kids are excited to know that Izzy is coming along, and would not stop pestering Izzy with various questions. What were they gonna do at the mall? Are they gonna go to that really nice smelling donut place? Is there an arcade they can go to?
Izzy entertains them, with Ed and Stede chiming in.
Izzy likes to tease the kids, playing along with their antics, saying they won’t win anything from the claw machines if he’s not there, makes up weird drink names for them to make fun of, suggests places that they probably won’t go to once they’re overly distracted by all the other ones that Stede and Ed had planned to go to.
They arrive at the mall soon enough. Ed takes them clothes shopping first, deciding it’s time for the pair to get some fancy new clothes, especially with a school event coming up that would require them to dress nicer. Izzy doesn’t give much of an input, just following along, occasionally giving a nod and thumbs up to the kids when they show off their outfits. Stede and Ed are much more enthusiastic with their responses, and Izzy gets a little self conscious over it. It’s not that he doesn’t care, he just doesn’t know what’s best for them, so he decides to leave all decisions for the parents to deal with.
They go into a few more stores, getting a pair of shiny new kicks, some snacks, and getting Ed a new bomber jacket. Stede insists on getting Izzy something, so he begrudgingly picks out a navy blue fanny pack. He cringes at the price tag, but Ed disagrees with it.
“You deserve nice and expensive things once in a while, Iz. I get that you’re anti-luxury and all that, but sometimes having an expensive gift isn’t so bad, y’know? Just enjoy it, yeah? Bring it around, show it off, Stede would love it if you’re wearing it all the time.”
Izzy sighs and takes the fancy paper bag that Stede hands him after he had finished paying for it, face absolutely beaming as they continue to the next store. They end up in a little music store, selling all kinds of instruments. Louis had gotten curious with the piano, so they decided to go in for a look.
The store is relatively empty, with a couple standing by the white grand piano, one of them pressing some keys idly. Louis wanders off to the electronic keyboards with Stede and Ed in tow, while Izzy accompanies Alma to the guitars and ukuleles.
Alma stops in front of a row of ukuleles, and points towards one of them. “Can I try the red one, uncle Izzy?”
Izzy nods and gets it for her. She brings it to a nearby stool and starts to strum it. Eventually, she actually plays a tune, Izzy distinctly recognizing it as a nursery rhyme. He was a bit taken aback that Alma knew how to play, despite not knowing if Stede had signed her up for any classes.
“You play?”
Alma nods. “There’s a girl in our class who plays. She’s super nice, taught me how to play, I can play 3 songs!”
Izzy smiles. “Show me, then.”
Alma plays, swaying to the beat as she strums the notes. She plays well for someone who had never really had any experience with any instruments at all. She looks happy as she quietly sings along to some of the songs, and Izzy taps his foot as well.
When Alma finishes with her songs, she stands and hands the ukulele back to Izzy.
“You don’t want to get this?” Izzy asks.
Alma shakes her head, “It’s expensive.”
Izzy melts a little on the inside. He sighs, gives a lingering look on the ukulele, before gently placing it back on the rack. He doesn’t move to follow wherever Alma wanders off to for a good 10 seconds as the gears in his brain start turning while he continues to stare at the red ukulele.
“Uncle Izzy!”
Izzy snaps out of it. “Yes, Alma?”
=====
The second Izzy gets home, he throws his keys, wallet, and the fancy paper bag onto the couch, and immediately rushes to his workstation. Within a minute, he has his notebook open, alongside 2 pieces of paper already messily scrawled with notes and sketches. For an hour, Izzy buries himself in looking up information online, messily sketching out his plans, writing down in his notebook. Time passes, Izzy doesn’t realize it until he’s done with his plans, a bigger piece of paper with all the details of this project finished, before the exhaustion from the entire day crashes down on him.
The plan Izzy carved out is simple; for a month, he will dedicate himself to making a ukulele for Alma, purely from scratch. He’d written down the online resources he would have to look into, made plans to get in touch with Ivan and Fang, both who are musicians and know their stuff. While his knowledge may still be limited, he’s determined to make something Alma could play with.
Izzy cannot explain the sudden desire to pursue this project, all he knows is that the happiness on Alma’s face as she played the ukulele is something he hopes she can continue experiencing. He pushes aside the creeping memories of childhood away, as he takes a step away from his workstation and decides he should take a shower and head to bed.
The thoughts about how Izzy should work on the project don’t stop coming, even when he’s all tucked in. If given the option, Izzy would choose to dream about it and continue working on it in his dreams. He doesn’t, so he gets a full night of rest, his body jerking awake at 7am sharp, and he finds himself getting ready for the day much quicker than usual, already finishing his coffee and breakfast by 8am.
Izzy begins to work on Alma’s ukulele. After finding a good supplier for the type of wood he needs, and finishes up on his research with the different types of strings he could use, Izzy starts on drawing up proper schematics for the project. He find himself getting distracted by choosing different shades of red paint just as Fang texted him about it. In the end, he spent a good chunk of time jumping in between different sites, only to not even come up with a proper shortlist. At least his browser now has 12 additional tabs for different brands of paint and their reviews.
The following day was spent driving to get all the materials he would need. Ivan and Fang tagged along. When asked, Izzy doesn’t say anything about making it for Alma, but Ivan was quick to figure it out. Izzy grumbles, hoping he could just stay silent about it, not wanting to make it a big deal.
“Hey, don’t worry, boss. It’s kinda cute, and sweet that you’d do this for her anyways. Kid probably deserves it,” Fang comments.
“Yeah, yeah,” Izzy sighs. “Just a little thing for her, nothing big.”
“Whatever you say, boss. We’re just here to help,” Ivan laughs.
They take about half a day going around to different places, loading up a chunk of wood into Izzy’s car, then helping to decide for the final time which color of paint Izzy should use. Ivan complains how long Izzy takes to decide between 2 shades of burgundy and 3 other shades of deep red, but in the end, it only took Izzy an hour to finally land on a deep red that looks similar to the one Alma had saw at the shop, figuring he could easily change the color if she genuinely doesn’t like it.
Fang takes them to a bandmate’s food stall for lunch. Izzy doesn’t take his time, wanting to be done as quickly as possible to get ahead with Alma’s project. He begins to scrawl on a napkin when Ivan and Fang start idly chatting over their food, while he’s already almost done.
When Izzy finally gets home after dropping off the two, he begins to prep all the things he needs, pulls on an old shirt and begins trimming down the chunk of wood he has. He has a copy of his schematics pinned on the wall outside, and another just above his workstation. By dinnertime, the wood had been trimmed to the right size, with spare chunks laying around for a nice little display stand.
3 days later, Izzy had begun chipping away at progress on the ukulele. There was still a lot of looking online to see how people work on their projects, and finding out the best ways to make his work more efficient. For the most part, it’s very simple stuff, but Izzy wanted to be sure that he’s doing it right nonetheless.
The following week, Izzy had to look after Louis and Alma as Ed and Stede went out for a little date night. Izzy had to try his best to hide his work from the kids, and Alma almost saw his initial sketches in his notebook when she flipped through it. He gently redirected her attention to the cool wooden frog he had carved that makes a nice and deep croaking voice.
Louis had almost gone into the storage room that Izzy kept the half-finished ukulele in, Izzy had panicked and called them out for a trip to McDonald’s. His wallet may have $20 missing, but at least the surprise isn’t ruined.
For the remaining 2 weeks, Izzy worked diligently. The shape of the ukulele is quite standard, but Izzy had added in some carved details that make it look different. He had also carved in Alma’s initials at the back, small enough to not be distracting, but still noticeable.
When Izzy starts to paint the base color of the ukulele, he damn near loses his mind over the design. He had planned to add sunflowers along the neck, but ran out of yellow paint right in the middle of it all. He had stormed out of the house and drove to his usual store for one single jar of yellow paint, spending 45 minutes just to get one thing. It’s worth it though, because he finishes the flowers by the end of the day.
3 days before Alma’s birthday, Izzy is admiring his handiwork.
He had just taken it back inside from his backyard to his workstation, where the glue and sealant had all dried off completely. All that’s left is to fasten the strings, get Ivan and Fang to check the condition, and he’s all done.
The strings don’t take too long to finish, but Izzy takes an extra hour watching more tutorials and process videos before he feels confident enough to start doing it himself. By midday, the finished product is staring right back at him, and he breathes a sigh of relief.
Izzy digs through his small fabric collection and makes a little bag for the ukulele, a dark green fabric that feels like felt to the touch, cut and sewn to make a simple drawstring bag. He carefully puts the ukulele into the bag and pulls it shut, and gently sets it in one of his storage boxes.
As Izzy comes down from the adrenaline of a whole month of working on the ukulele, relief and fatigue settles deep in his bones as he heads into his bed tonight. There’s a sense of accomplishment that hasn’t quite settled yet, and Izzy falls asleep thinking about how he’ll give it on the big day.
=====
Today is Alma Bonnet’s 13th birthday.
There’s a slight tinge of nervousness that flows through Izzy when he walks up to the Bonnet-Teach house, the dark green drawstring bag in hand. When the door opens to reveal Edward, Izzy sighs a bit in relief. At least he won’t really get questions just yet.
Edward gives Izzy a hug, and he returns it with a smile. Edward eyes the bag, gives Izzy a questioning look, and he merely makes a shushing gesture. He places the bag on the table, next to some presents that Stede and Ed had presumably prepared.
“Uncle Izzy!!”
Louis is the first to see him, and Izzy turns to see the boy barrelling towards him, and crashes into him with a hug around his waist. Izzy laughs, and before long, he’s getting another pair of hands excitedly wrapped around him by one Alma. He leans down to give them both a kiss on the forehead, and leads them to the living room.
“Pa is making lasagna, you have to try it, uncle Izzy! He said he’s adding extra cheese for today, it’s gonna be so good,” Alma gushes.
Izzy smiles, “I’m sure it’ll be good. Are you getting cake?”
Louis pipes up, “I made it with Dad! It was so much fun, it’s actually not that hard to make cake, I want to bake more cakes soon.”
“Oh? If that’s the case, I’m counting on you to make me a cake for my birthday, deal?”
Izzy holds up a pinky, and Louis happily takes it. “Deal! You’ll have to tell me what flavor you like best, and a bunch of other stuff, so I can make you the best cake ever.”
“Alright, you kids have fun, gonna go see if I can help your dads,” Izzy gives them both a pat on their shoulders and heads towards the kitchen.
Izzy is greeted with the sight of Edward bent over and watching the oven, while Stede is still slowly putting final touches to the small cake he’d made with Louis. When Stede sees Izzy, he gets up with a smile, and reaches out for a hug.
“I’ve missed you,” Stede whispers into Izzy’s neck.
“What do you mean ‘you missed me’? We literally just saw each other 2 days ago,” Izzy chuckles.
“I still miss you, dearest. Ed told me you got Alma something?”
“Yeah,” Izzy pulls away from the hug. “It’s… I made that something, actually.”
“Oh, Izzy,” Stede breathes out. “You didn’t have to, what did you make her?”
“Well, you know, a ukulele, kid’s been wanting one, so I thought I’d make her one,” Izzy shrugs.
“Oh Izzy… You’re the sweetest, you know that?” Stede smiles, reaches up to hold Izzy’s face in both his hands and pulls him in for a kiss.
“Yeah, yeah. She just deserves it, probably just a fun thing for her, don’t care what she does with it anyway, it’s hers now.”
Ed scoffs, “You absolutely do. I think she’ll start showing it off to her friends immediately.”
Izzy feels a hint of pride swell in his chest. “Well, that would be nice, think she’ll really like it enough to do that?”
“Oh man, Iz, she loves you, of course she’ll love it,” Ed reassures him. “Now come check out this lasagna, you think it’s a good enough crust at the top?”
Izzy helps around in the kitchen. Today’s celebration is rather small, just between the five of them before a bigger celebration at school on Monday, where the teachers usually put up a bit of a party for the birthday month kids. Izzy helps to set the table, and they’re all gathered up to enjoy all the food prepared.
They have a nice spread of lasagna, fish fingers, mashed potatoes, fruit salads and mango pudding to go around. Alma excitedly praises the food, and wishes they could have food this good at the school party. Stede promises they can contribute some extra food if the kids help out, and so they readily agree, excited to treat their classmates.
After the meal, Stede brings out the cake. Alma excitedly puts on her birthday hat, and they sing together, Ed recording the entire thing on his phone. Once the candles are blown, and slices of cake served, Stede announces they should do presents now.
“Yes!” Alma cheers. “The one moment I’ve been waiting for.”
Ed brings the presents over, 3 neatly wrapped boxes and one green bag. Izzy feels the anticipation creep up on him, as he watches Alma unwrap the other presents first. Louis had made a bunch of stickers for Alma, and she got the most excited over them, immediately peeling off one to stick on her phone case.
Alma finally reaches for the green bag. When she reaches in and pulls out the ukulele, her face brightens up, and she turns to Izzy.
“Uncle Izzy bought this?” Alma asks.
“I made it, you like it?”
Alma gasps. “You made this? All by yourself?”
“Yes, darling.”
Alma squeals. “I love it! Oh my god, this is so cool! Thank you, uncle Izzy, thank you! I wanna play a song!”
Izzy smiles, feels a weight lift off his shoulders as he watches Alma excitedly start to play a tune. It’s another nursery rhyme, probably a new one she learned from her friend. The happiness on Alma’s face is priceless, as she giggles and laughs as she shares it with her brother.
There’s also Stede and Ed, looking back at Izzy with such adoration and gratitude. He feels himself let loose as Alma comes over to sit with him and asks all kinds of questions. How did you make it? How long did it take? How did you know I like sunflowers? What do these letters mean? Can you show me how to make one too?
“Maybe next time, Alma. It’s a bit too difficult, even for me.,” Izzy strokes Alma’s hair as he gently answers all of her questions.
“Aw. Well, it’s still really cool. Maybe you can teach me how to make something easier?”
“I don’t know, are your parents okay with it?” Izzy glances at the couple.
“Iz, Alma’s my supergirl, she can do whatever, just don’t slice a finger off or something, yeah?”
Alma pumps her fist. “I’ll make you something, Pa!”
Stede pouts. “What about me?”
“Yes, Dad, I’ll make you something too.”
They end the celebrations after finishing the cake and clearing the table. Izzy takes his leave after that, but not before Alma tackles him in another hug and thanks him for the gift once more.
“Don’t tell Pa or Dad, but you’re my favorite,” Alma whispers.
Izzy chuckles. “I won’t.”
“Elly is going to be so happy I got my own, we can totally play together, maybe we’ll start a band! I bet all the other students are gonna be green with envy.”
“Wow, you learned that phrase in class? Alma Bonnet, smartest girl in the whole world, soon to be best ukulele player too,” Izzy smiles, ruffling the top of her head a little.
“Couldn’t do it without you, uncle Izzy.”
Izzy bids his farewells. He gets giddy with all the thoughts of Alma showing the ukulele off to her classmates. He tries to not let it all get to his head, and gives himself some time to come down from the hype of the birthday celebrations.
All that matters in the end, is that he’s willing to do anything for Alma. If Alma likes it, he’ll be content.