Chapter Text
Philza Craft hadn’t expected a lot of things in his life. If someone had told twenty-year-old Phil he would be a single parent one day, he probably would have laughed at them. And now here he was. A proud father of two precious sons he would give anything for.
He was also severely sleep deprived, which tends to happen when both of your sons are traumatised and sometimes need a little extra attention to know that they are loved. Even though it was only 6 p.m., he was ready to fall into his bed and sleep for at least twelve hours. However, he still had work to do, which left him in his office, staring at his computer while his boys were watching a movie downstairs.
Another thing Phil definitely didn’t expect was getting a call from Tommy’s old social worker at this time.
Immediately, worry flooded through his entire body. He had adopted Tommy four years ago and the last time he heard anything from his social worker must have also been at least two years ago. So, he really had no idea why she was calling now.
Hesitantly, he picked up the phone and answered the call. “Hello?”
“Hellos Mr Craft. It’s good to hear you again,” she responded with a loud voice. Miss Mayers was her name, if Phil remembered correctly. Her contact in his phone was only saved as `Tommy’s social worker´.
“Is there a reason you are calling me?” Phil immediately cut to the case.
“Oh, yes. There is a reason. But don’t worry. It has nothing to do with Tommy.” Those words took some wight form Phil’s shoulders. Though, it immediately returned as she continued on.
“I have a request for you. I know you didn’t plan on taking any more children but I have a pretty special case. I promise he is actually really kind and not violent or anything like that. I know you did a really good job with Tommy and Techno, so you have some experience with special cases. And it would really be preferable if he could stay with other hybrids, so I decided it won’t hurt to ask, though I would understand it if you declined.”
Phil’s first instinct was to say no. Like she had said, he hadn’t had any intentions on taking in another child, caring about his two boys already took a lot of time and effort. However, he had always been both really soft and more curious than is good for him, so what came out of his mouth instead was, “Why is it a special case?”
There were a few moments of silence from the other side before Miss Mayers finally started talking again. This time a lot more hesitant. “Well… first of all, his name is Wilbur and he’s seventeen. I’ve just recently become his social worker; he was assigned to someone else before that. The problem is… oh god, there isn’t really a good way to put this. You see, up until recently, Wilbur had been fully human. He has been in the system since he was six. Well… There has been an incident in his last home. We don’t actually know the full situation; he refuses to talk about most of it. But we do know that Wilbur got killed by his former foster father. Not by accident, it was with full intent on killing him. He got stabbed multiple times and then shot.”
“What!” Phil interrupted her. Loud enough that he was sure Techno and Tommy must have heard him.
His entire body was filled with a strange mixture of anger and confusion. Anger, because how could you not be angry after hearing such a story. After hearing that someone just decided to kill a teenager when he had promised to give him a home, a place where he would be safe.
He also was really confused because he had absolutely no idea what Miss. Mayer wanted him to do with that story. Apparently, Wilbur was dead. So Phil had no clue what his job here would be. Maybe Wilbur had a younger sibling that had witnessed everything. But then again, why wouldn’t she lead with that. And it also didn’t fit the way she was talking about the whole situation. Absolutely nothing about this made any sense.
“Mr Craft, I know this story is really strange, and also infuriating, but pleas let me finish before you ask any questions or make a decision,” Miss Mayers continued in a somewhat calm voice. “Wilbur got killed, but he isn’t dead. After he died, he came back as a Phantom. We don’t know if there is a reason behind it or if it just happened by chance, but that’s how it is.”
Phil didn’t know what to say. Everything within him just seemed to have come to a stop, because he didn’t know how to deal with a situation like this. He didn’t know much about Phantoms. Only the most basic stuff and that they are extremely rare. Like, there weren’t even a thousand in all of the United States kind of rare.
Miss Mayers kept talking before Phil could even give any kind of reaction, “He can’t control his ability to go invisible or intangible yet, which means he can’t go into the sun at all. He can’t live in any of the group-homes because of that, and that’s also the reason why it is so hard to find a place for him. There is a special kind of sun-filter, that needs to be applied to every window of the house in order for him to not burn in the sunlight. The problem is that you would need to buy these filters yourself. They are not that expensive, but for a full house it would still add up to a few hundred bucks.”
The first full thought Phil had after hearing all of this was that he just wanted to hug this boy and protect him from the entire world. The second thought was that he wasn’t sure if he could do that. If he was the right person to deal with something like that. Sure, he had taken good care of Techno and Tommy, and they both had their fair share of trauma, but this was on another level entirely. However, he also knew that he was really soft. He couldn’t just look away from someone who needs help and hope someone else would do it. The world often wasn’t kind to those who needed it the most. It certainly hadn’t been kind to Wilbur.
He needed to focus. Phil knew he can’t decide this right now, and also not on his own, but he could at least get some more information. “Where is he currently staying if he isn’t at a group-home?”
“He had been in the hospital for a few weeks. Now he is at a rehab clinic that luckily had a room fit for Phantoms. It is still less than ideal because he can only really leave his room when it’s night and he seems to dislike small spaces.”
“Okay. Can you send me his files?” Phil asked. That would be the fastest way to get all the information he would need.
“Of course, I’ll send them to you. Does that mean you will take him?” she asked with a hopeful tone. She seemed to actually care for Wilbur, which was a rare thing with social workers from Phil’s experience. But he also remembered her taking at leas somewhat good care of Tommy, so she really wasn’t all that bad. At least she was definitely far better than Techno’s old social worker.
“It means I’ll at least consider it,” he replied. “I need to see if I can actually do it. And I need to talk with my boys about it. I can’t just decide this alone. But I’ll give you an answer by tomorrow evening, if that’s alright.”
“Yes, that’s perfectly fine. Thank you so much for at least considering it. If you have any further questions just contact me.”
After saying goodbye, Phil hung up and leaned back in his chair, spreading his wings a little further. After only a few moments, a notification popped up on his screen. He clicked on it to open both Wilbur’s files and a link to where he could buy the sun-filters. Wilbur’s files were mostly just records form previous homes, which appeared to be quite a lot. The last house probably wasn’t the only problem the boy had.
Phil rubbed his face with his hands, suddenly feeling even more exhausted than before.
“Fuck.”