Work Text:
It was just a little graze. Roy had been in the garden, kicking a ball around and avoiding stupid Lasso and his stupid moustache while he cooked some stupid spaghetti for dinner. It was getting dark, and sooner or later the American wanker was going to be calling Roy in to ask him to set the table, and then they’d sit with each other at the table and Roy would glare angrily at the noodles and meatballs on his plate while Lasso asked him stupid questions like what he did at school today and if he had fun. The answer was always Nothing, and No.
It was almost annoying, how interested Lasso was in Roy’s life, how intent he was on caring despite Roy’s best attempts to get him to stop. It didn’t matter how much Roy swore, or broke things, or ignored him, Lasso always tried again. Because he was mental. It was hardly the worst place Roy could’ve ended up, but it was still annoying.
So Roy did what he did best, and avoided the man as much as possible considering the fact they lived in the same house and Ted drove him to school and back every day in his dumb SUV even though Roy told him he could take the bus. It meant Roy spent a lot of time kicking a ball in the backyard. He was getting really good at penalties.
He hadn’t really been focusing on what he was doing, busy thinking about all the stuff that mattered a lot when you’re seven. Like how he hoped he got to sit with Keeley and Barbara at lunch tomorrow and how he needed to finish his home reader and get stupid Lasso to sign it so Ms Keridan didn’t throw a fit about Roy lying, and how he was going to be really good at football one day, and then maybe he could play on a real team instead of just kicking a ball in his backyard on his own. It wasn’t even his ball, he’d nicked it from the sports shed at school a few weeks ago. It was inevitable that he’d trip and fall on his face, thinking that much and trying to run around at the same time.
If he were still in south London, still with grandad in the perfect world where everything was right in Roy’s head, grandad would laugh at him for falling over and tell him that was what he got for running around with his laces untied, then he’d tell Roy to dust himself off and get back up, like a good lad. But Roy wasn’t in south London with grandad. He was in stupid Richmond with stupid Lasso, and when he tripped on his own laces that his grandad would’ve reminded him to tie if he were still there to remind him to tie them, he stayed down.
It was just a little graze, barely any skin off his knee but it stung, and there was a thin dribble of blood racing down Roy’s grass-stained legs. It didn’t hurt, not really, but Roy felt hot behind his eyes and funny in his stomach anyway. He didn’t even notice when stupid Lasso came rushing out into the garden until he was kneeling in front of Roy still with his dumb “Mr good looking is cooking apron” on. Roy, embarrassingly, wasn’t able to stop himself from crying before the man could see, even as he furiously scrubbed at his face to get rid of any the evidence.
"Hey, hey, it's alright; it's just a little scrap, nothing a plaster and a kiss can't fix,” Lasso murmured gently, a warm hand on Roy’s ankle and looking at the cut with weary, soft concern all over his face. Roy scrunched his nose up, because that sounded gross.
“If you kiss my fucking leg, I’ll kick you in the face.” He hiccupped, copying the angry face he’d sometimes make in the mirror. Keeley told him once that he needed to practice smiling, but it was more fun to try and look scary. Lasso didn’t seem very afraid of it though, so Roy thought he probably needed to practice more.
“I appreciate you setting that boundary Roy, that’s a real good skill to have.” Lasso said, instead of telling Roy off for swearing, or threatening to kick him in the face like any other grown up would’ve, because Lasso was a weirdo. “I promise I won’t be giving you or your leg any unwanted kisses, but I do think this scrape of yours needs a good clean and a band-aid, don’t you?”
Roy didn’t think that, actually, but Lasso wasn’t really asking him. He was doing that thing adults did to make kids feel like they had a choice when they really didn’t. So, Roy mumbled a sullen “Whatever.” and pulled himself up off the grass, his ball forgotten.
Lasso followed Roy into the kitchen, where he was indeed in the middle of making spaghetti. It smelt nice, and Roy was actually kind of glad that he was with Lasso if only because he was the first foster parent he’d had that could actually cook for shit.
“Why don’t you park yourself at the table?” Lasso said, still doing that not-really-a-choice thing. On another day, when Roy didn’t feel a bit like a balloon that had been popped, he probably would have fought a bit more about it. Told Lasso to go fuck himself and that he didn’t need a fucking band aid for a dumb scrape. Roy was good at being angry, it was what got him bounced around from home to home so quickly, but he didn’t have the energy for it today. Thinking of Grandad had knocked the wind right out of his angry-at-the-world sails. So Roy sat at his seat at the kitchen table, right as Lasso said “I’ll be with you in just a minute.”
Roy grumbled in response. His face was all hot and his stomach still felt funny and his knee still stung, but he wasn’t really crying about it. Only a tear or two had actually managed to escape, and Roy didn’t think that counted as really crying. It was only sort-of crying, which was still more crying than Roy ever wanted to do especially in front of Lasso, but it was fixable. When Lasso came back, he had a box of muppet themed plasters and a wet cloth in hand.
“I’m gonna clean your knee up a bit first,” he explained as he knelt in front of Roy, holding up the wet rag to show what he meant “then we’ll put a good old band aid on there, and you’ll be right as rain.”
Roy grumbled again. He didn’t really want to talk to Lasso, but that had never stopped Lasso from talking to him before. He kept up a stream of one-sided conversation, as he dabbed at Roy’s knee with the wet towel gently, moving Roy’s leg back and forth with a warm hand guiding it where it needed to go.
“You know, I’ve noticed you really like kicking that ball around,” he said, pausing for Roy to answer and then continuing like he had even though he didn’t “I don’t much about soccer, but you seem like you’d make a mighty fine player.”
“Football.” Roy corrected tersely. Stupid Lasso and his stupid americaness. He got a lot of words wrong, like he called chips fries and he always called football soccer.
“That’s right, my mistake.” Ted said with a grin, like he’d accomplished something spectacular just by getting Roy to speak to him “as I was saying, I don’t know much about football but I was thinking if you’d like, we can go out and get one of those little nets to set up in the backyard. That way you can stop using the flower pots as your goal.”
“Really?” Roy asked, flinching a bit involuntarily when the rag was dabbed against a particularly deep part of the scrape. He tried not to be hopeful, in case Lasso was just trying to get Roy to talk some more by saying things he didn’t mean.
“Heck yeah,” Lasso replied with great enthusiasm, smiling all bright and fucking cheerful at Roy like he was trying to imitate the sun or something. “If it’s something you enjoy, I want to do everything I can for you to be able to enjoy it as much as possible.”
Roy didn’t really know what to say to that, so he didn’t say anything. Lasso didn’t seem to mind, continuing on like nothing had happened, patting Roy’s calf happily to signify that he had finished cleaning the scrape and offering a couple of band-aids to Roy to choose from.
“What’ll it be Roy, Kermit or Miss Piggy?” he asked, showing the two options to Roy. It was a hard decision, because Roy liked them both a lot. He and Keeley had gotten into an argument at recess a few weeks ago about if Miss Piggy or Kermit was better, because Keeley thought Miss Piggy was and Roy thought Miss Piggy and Kermit were both good, and would be upset to be separated. But Roy didn’t have two scrapes, he only had the one.
“Kermit,” He said, pointing to the right plaster just so Lasso couldn’t get confused. In the end he figured Kermit would do. He was the most iconic muppet, and Keeley had already laid her claim to Miss Piggy being her favourite.
“A solid choice, Kermit is my favourite.” Lasso said, still grinning. It made his moustache move funny, whenever he frowned or smiled. Roy wondered if it ever got itchy, or if it was like just having an eyebrow for your mouth. He wondered about these things as Ted ripped open the band aid, smoothing it gently over the surface of Roy’s grazed knee. True to his word, he didn’t press a kiss to the plaster once it was on. Which was good, because Roy didn’t really feel like kicking him in the face today. Ted stood back up, once Roy’s knee was all patched up, with his dumb apron on and his hands on his hips, all self-satisfied like he’d done something cool and amazing.
“Well, now that that’s all dealt with, how about you set the table for dinner?” He said, another not-really-a-choice, dusting his hands off and heading over to the kitchen counter where the spaghetti was still doing whatever it was spaghetti needed to do to cook. And Roy was hungry, so he didn’t see a point in digging his heels in now.
He slid off the chair, and went about the now familiar routine of getting out two cups, and two sets of cutlery to be placed at their chairs while Ted went about putting the finishing touches on dinner and plating everything up. It didn’t take long, after Roy had drowned his spaghetti in cheese and Ted had chuckled at the mountain of cheddar that sat on top of his pasta for Ted to start with his usual dinner time spiel.
“So,” He asked, twirling some of his pasta around his fork while Roy shoveled his directly into his mouth in a much more efficient manner “did you do anything interesting at school today?”
Roy was going to say No, just like he always did but, that wasn’t really true. Keeley had taught him how to braid hair at recess, and it had been fun. That was kind of interesting, and Ted did ask if anything interesting had happened. No one else ever asked Roy about his day and Ted liked Kermit too and he wanted to get Roy a goal so he could have more fun kicking the ball around in the backyard so maybe he wasn’t as stupid as Roy had thought. And Roy didn’t like lying, because he wasn’t very good at it. So instead, he said, “Keeley showed me how to do her hair at recess.”
“well, ain’t that fun.” Ted replied, quiet and proud like Roy had done something good, though he didn’t know what it was. It didn’t matter, Roy decided, turning his attention back to his spaghetti. He wondered if Keeley would want to play football with him at recess tomorrow.