Work Text:
Teddy Duchamp was fourteen when he first looked Ace Merrill in the eyes.
“Hey, give me back my glasses!” He shouted, pathetically clawing at Castle Rock's polluted air.
It was twelve in the morning. Teddy sat at a gas station’s curb with Vern Tessio, sneakily smoking cigarettes Vern had snagged from his brother Billy’s room. His vision was abruptly taken from him after the boys had spotted a Ford pulling up right in front of them, its left door cracking open.
The car was black; it could've blended in perfectly with the night sky if it wasn't so flashy and hideously decorated. “I can't fuckin' see!”
After eleven more seconds of struggling, Teddy's glasses are handed back to him, mercifully from up above. He slams them back on his face in a rush so he could get a good look at the perpetrator, wondering if he was scrawny enough for him to beat the piss out of or not.
It was quickly realized that Duchamp wasn't going to have one of his famous screaming fits that night, no. What he saw was John Merrill standing tall, his expression cold like a statue. Shit, he was terrified of the guy, especially after what happened down at the Royal just two years ago.
He turned his head away from Ace, looking through the gas station store’s window to see Vern and Billy arguing by a refrigerator. Teddy couldn't hear them, but he tried to imagine a back and forth that consisted of:
‘What’s mom gonna say when she finds out you were out here smoking?’
‘What’s mom gonna say when she finds out you had cigarettes in your room?’
‘What are you doing out this late?’
‘What are you doing out this late?’
He looked back at Ace, who was still just standing there. God knew he wanted to take a swing at him, but something made him freeze. It wasn't just the normal kind of fear that Ace had struck into every kid in Castle Rock this time, it was something different.
Teddy was stunned, looking up at his face and directly into those eyes. Ace Merrill had irises that were more grey than blue. Teddy thought he looked like his dad a bit— no, not even just a bit, it shook his core, really. It wasn't even just the eyes, Ace had the same haircut Teddy saw in photos of his old man, shit, even the same nose.
Teddy didn't even have a smudge of that face; his eyes were brown and he had a hooked nose, just like his mother. He found something new to hate, how he could barely see his father in himself but could see him in the delinquent standing in front of him.
“You rat bastard…” Teddy muttered out as he clenched his fist, waiting for Ace to take a swing and punch his lights out— this didn't happen. The man only used his hand to light the cigarette that hung out of his mouth, taking the form of a grin.
“Listen, Four Eyes El Punk-o, I'm driving Billy and your girlfriend back home. If you need a ride, say something.”
Teddy scoffed, “I'm not getting in your car.”
He watches Ace shrug walking back to his car. Billy comes out of the store, tugging Vern by his right arm towards the Ford. The boy turned around to give Teddy a small wave that said ‘bye, Teddy’ as he got into the backseat. Ace gave the boy ten more seconds to rethink his decision.
Goddammit, he really did hate to take the walk home alone.
Teddy coughed. “Wow, it sure is cold out here!” He spoke loud enough for Ace to hear him. “Guess I better take you up on that ride, huh?”
Ace rolled his eyes as he got back into the driver's seat, like he could predict this kid's every action with ease. “Alright kid, get in.”
Teddy followed, getting in the back with Vern.
It was a nine minute drive to the Tessio residence, the boys talking the whole way there. The music from Ace's radio was loud enough for him and Billy to tune out Teddy and Vern's juvenile whispers, not a single word spoken about school.
“Did he hurt you?”
“No man, just took my glasses.”
“What a jerk.”
“Jerk with a cool car.” Teddy made sure to say that part the quietest, he didn't want Ace to hear a single praise given to him.
The ‘cool car’ in question stopped. Vern and Billy exited, this was their stop after all. The Tessio Residence was a house Ace and Teddy both have seen and been to a thousand times, placed on the side of the street that the sun shined perfectly down on— y'know, when it was out.
“Vern says if you lay a finger on Four Eyes back there he's gonna beat you up.” Billy snickered out through the car's window.
“Shut up, you know I didn't!”
“How about you two just both shut the fuck up while I drive Four Eyes home, okay?”
It was an eight minute drive to the Duchamp residence, a sad-looking part of Castle Rock that used to house three people, now it was only two. The car was still moving when Teddy maneuvered towards the passenger seat. He didn't know what was more unsafe, unbuckling his seat belt and lunging his foot over to the front of the car, or the sudden urge he got to sit next to Ace Merrill and talk to him.
Ace didn't care at first, his eyes stayed on the road with a new cigarette between his lips as they sat in silence, silence Teddy would break.
“Why'd you give me back my glasses?”
“Cause.”
“Cause' what?”
"Cause' I can't call you four eyes without 'em."
"That's it?"
“And also cause' you looked pathetic. Made me feel bad, stealing some mangled kid's glasses is low hanging fruit.”
“I don't want your pity, piss-face.” Teddy's voice rose slightly, out of nowhere and out of his control. “Why don't you give that pity to someone who needs it.”
“Yeah, like who?”
“I don't know…" He wasn't expecting Ace to respond with a question, Ace wasn't expecting an answer either. Teddy paused and thought of one, closing his eyes and picturing Chris and Gordie, people he hadn't seen in awhile.
"How about you go and give Gordie Lachance his hat back!" He doesn't even know what he himself is talking about. He wasn't on good terms with Gordie at the moment, getting splinters in shop class while he was in his college courses with Chris. Ace’s cruelty overpowered, digging out the emotions Teddy had kept locked away, he'd hate him forever for that. “His dead fuckin’ brother’s hat!”
The car sped up; it scared Teddy, but he kept going.
“You pulled a knife on poor Chris Chambers!” He started to feel a tear roll down his cheek as he remembered it, how he fled. Teddy hated crying— 'Nobody is gonna make a crybaby out of you and get away with it’ he would tell himself— Ace Merrill wasn't gonna get away with it. “Same Chris Chambers with that shit-bag brother you hang around with!”
“Kid-”
“I mean, do you have any clue what it's like- what it's like for them? Have you ever even felt anything in your life?"
“Jesus Christ, shut the fuck up!” Ace joined Teddy's screaming match, looking to win. The car went quiet besides the sound of the radio. Ace continued, calmer this time, “I gave you back your glasses because I know who your old man is, kid. It's not pity, it's me making sure some looney’s brat doesn't kill me in my sleep.”
Ace may have gotten Teddy to shut up, but that didn't mean he was calming down. “Don't talk about my dad that way…”
“Why do you care about that nut?”
“Because you don't know shit about me and my old man. All your dad ever does is go down to bars and drink with the rest of Castle Rock's scum.”
“Better than a psycho.”
“You're as much as a psycho as my father is a psycho, you grease guzzling-” Ace slammed his foot down on the brake, almost sending Teddy flying forward.
The boy thought this was it, he was gonna be murdered in Ace Merrill’s car— and you know what the worst part was? He wasn't gonna put up a fight, he was just going to sit there and accept it. Theodore Duchamp, a life cut short at fourteen; what a lovely looking gravestone... This didn't happen though, he lived. Teddy looked out of the car window and saw his roughed up house. The greaser was true to his word, he took him home.
He turned his head to look back at Ace, trying to see if he was angry with him. While he wasn't mad, Teddy thought he was doing something even weirder, he was laughing.
“Goddammit, you're a funny kid!”
This is the most of an emotion Teddy has seen out of Ace, but an emotion the boy couldn't say he shared like rage. There was no hyena sounds that broke out of him to join the man, he just furrowed his eyebrows and got out of the Ford. Before Teddy could slam the door shut and run back inside, his ‘chauffeur’ called out.
“Wait, kid...” He had to catch his breath after laughing so hard, then he reached into his jeans’ pocket and pulled out his carton of cigarettes. “You need it more than I do.”
Ace took a single fag out and flicked it to Teddy, who near instinctively jumped to catch it in-between his palms. It was like throwing a biscuit at a dog.
“Good catch.” He flashed a stupid grin. Teddy felt somewhat humiliated, he hated how Ace's tone was as cool as James Dean, he didn't think rat-face deserved to even be in the same sentence as James Dean. However, Duchamp had to admit, Ace Merrill could've talked someone into anything— y'know, if they were pathetic enough.
“Your car fuckin’ blows.”
Teddy slammed the door as the car started to rev back up again, so did Ace's laughter. The boy could hear that cackle all throughout his walk up to the porch and to the front door, how haunting.
He held onto that cigarette for a week before smoking it.
“I heard his mom's a whore!” Teddy listened to Vern's voice keen as he inhaled the smoke and exhaled. “All her kids got different dads, at least that's what Chris says.”
“Shut up, Vern.” Teddy silences in his best impression of the Chambers kid, it got a chuckle out of Vern. Being told to shut up didn't seem to affect him that much anymore, it made an unconventional sense of nostalgia wash over him.
“What'd your mom say, y'know, when you told her who gave you a ride home?” It was another late night for the two, late nights where they wasted time in parking lots with smuggled booze and cigarettes.
Vern walked Teddy back to the Duchamp residence, their footsteps and the sounds of crunching leaves being the only things they could hear in Castle Rock. Breezes that hit Teddy's Beatle cut told them winter was approaching. “I don't know, she just stood there, completely quiet.”
“Billy's kinda like that!” Vern exclaimed. “He won't tell me nothing about Ace, sometimes I think he's as scared of him as we are!”
“I'm not scared of Ace Merrill...” Teddy attempted to speak with enough confidence to make Vern believe him. When the filter started to burn his lips he spat and stomped it out. “I think he looks like my dad.”
“Jeez…” Vern muttered as they finally waltzed on to the Duchamp front yard. “Different dad for every kid!”
He just wanted to make Teddy laugh, but he watched his head fall and shake instead. Teddy slugged across his lawn to the porch, grass blades sticking to his shoes, waving goodbye to Vern with a hand behind his back.
The first thing Teddy noticed when he shut the door was how dark the home was, with the exception of a single lamp, illuminating a corner of the living room. The second thing he noticed was his mother on the couch, a glass of red wine dangling in her hand. When she heard the door Clarice jumped to get up and put her glass down next to the bottle on the coffee table, a small drop spilling over and splashing on the cold floor.
“Theo, Theo!” She greeted, making room for him and patting down on the couch cushions. “Come, come sit.”
Teddy took his seat. She reached out to fix his bangs, he could smell the wine and shoe glue on her.
"You know I love you, right?"
"Yeah, I know..."
"And nothing's ever gonna change that, okay?"
"I know..."
“I think you're old enough now…” She pauses to collect herself. “I think you're old enough to know... more about your father.”
“Know what, mom?”
“Well, for starters…” She droned in her nurturing voice. “Your father wasn't always protected.”
‘Gross,’ Teddy thought as he watched Clarice take another sip of wine. What ended up cracking out of his mouth was very different though, a very different tone. “You saying I'm a mistake?”
“No! Theo, don't even think that...” Her hand moved down from his bangs and caressed his cheek, planting a small kiss on the forehead. “You were the best thing to ever come out of that man, okay?”
“Okay…”
"What I'm saying is… well he spent a lot of time with whores.” She slurred that last part out with venom. “Lotta whores, had one right here in Castle Rock. Before we had you he came home... screaming about how he got her pregnant.”
Teddy froze right there.
“I don't know anything about the kid, I have my theories, but that's it. Boy would be about twenty-one now... that's all I know.”
“So I have a brother?”
“You probably have a brother in France, you probably have a sister in Maine... but yeah you got one... right here in Castle Rock…”
Teddy Duchamp came to two conclusions that night.
Neither of them were about how much his father sucks. He'd been quietly learning to accept that since Ace dropped him off— no, before that even. He'd been learning to accept that since walking home from Ray Brower’s lifeless corpse— no, not even that either. He'd been trying to accept that since the junkyard.
The real two conclusions that hit Teddy that night were the following: one, Vern Tessio might've been the smartest guy he knew, and two, Ace Merrill was his bastard older brother.
“Sorry for keeping it from you..." Clarice had begun to doze off, “thought it would break your heart…”
“That's okay, mom.” The last thing Teddy heard from his mom that night was a snore. When he had realized his mother had fallen asleep he leaned over to give her a kiss on the cheek, and then finally went up to his room for the night.
He didn't go to sleep until nearly two hours later.
Teddy Duchamp was still fourteen when he ran in front of Ace Merrill’s car.
He had to get the courage to do it when it was raining, out of every perfectly dry day of the year. It was that stupid kind of courage that you left the house with instead of a coat. He must've been running through Castle Rock since the sundown; the moon was out now, but his glasses were so wet he couldn't see it. However, even with the darkness and rain blinding him, there was still no mistaking that car.
The Ford came to a screeching halt, leaving tire tracks that would be somebody else's problem. Teddy stood in front of it with both his arms out, like he was either shielding something or asking for a hug. His breathing was heavy, shakey, getting heavier as he heard the window roll down.
“Jesus, kid, get out of the way you're gonna get yourself killed!”
He was willing to take him up on that. “Ace, buh- be a man and talk to me!”
The man peaked his head out of the window, making a note on how Teddy froze in his headlights with his voice shivering and cracking like ice with the chattering of his teeth.
“Don't think I won't run you down!”
“I nuh- nuh- know you won't!”
“Yeah?”
“You- you- you wouldn't do that to your buh-” this was the hardest part to get out.
“Spit it out.”
“You wuh- wuh- wouldn't do that to yuh- yuh- your brother.”
He must've forgotten who he was talking to.
The only thing Teddy heard after that was rain hitting the street. He closed his eyes, either waiting for Ace to run him over, or for himself to fall over and succumb to the cold. The boy could feel himself being picked up; the Reaper must've been cradling him, he assumed. It wasn't that, no.
“Christ, you're chasing hypothermia down, kid.”
The next time Teddy opens his eyes he's inside Ace Merrill's car, laying down with his head in a lap, the music coming out of the radio becoming clearer— it was nice, comforting.
His eyes are bare and a jean jacket is covering him like a towel. The jacket smelt like cigarettes and cheap beer; Teddy didn't need glasses to know who was drying him off, but Ace’s hand still pushed them on his cold face.
“You up now? You warm?”
“Yeah…” He replied weakly. It had stopped raining, Teddy noticing the absence of pounding on the hood. “Did you hear me... what I said out there?"
“Yeah, kid, I heard you.”
“You knew, didn't you?”
Ace would've been snarky and replied with ‘knew what?’ if the way his half-brother’s shoulders quivered in his hand didn't make him feel a little sorry. He bit his tongue and replied, honestly. “Yeah, I knew.”
“You smell like him, y'know that?”
“You smell like shoe glue.”
Teddy laughed then coughed, Ace started hitting against his back to try and help. He stretched his arms through the jacket's holes, putting it on. Obviously, it was bigger on him than it was on his brother.
“C'mon Ted, let's get you up.” That was the first time Teddy heard him call him something other than ‘kid’ or an insult. Ace grabbed him by the shoulders and pushed him up off of his lap, sitting him in the passenger seat. “I'm getting you a drink.”
Teddy leaned against the Ford, now parked outside of some bar every Cobra was an attendee of. Ace came out of the swinging doors with a bottle of beer in each hand. He hands one to Teddy, then cracks his own open on a car handle.
“Don't tell anyone I'm buying you booze.”
“I doubt anyone here cares if I drink.”
“No, not that...” Ace takes a swig. “I don't want you telling anyone 'cause you're a dweeb.”
Teddy copies him, even down to opening it on a car handle. He took a swig and almost spat it out immediately, but he swallowed it.
“My mom told me, told my dad too…” Ace confessed. “Hates us both for it... he'd put his cigarettes out on me. Don't even know if I should call that man my dad, don't even know what he is... you're lucky, you never got that.”
“What?” Teddy turns to look at him. He pointed to his ear, his bad ear, the ear Ace and his lackeys compared to melted wax. “You're the lucky one, you don't have this.”
“Alright, alright…” Ace takes another swig, a larger one. “Maybe no one should have a dad.”
“Yeah, we're both all messed up…”
“Everyone's all messed up, kid.”
“Right, right…” Teddy's head falls. “Maybe it's better that we didn't live together, all my friends’ brothers are either dead or assholes...”
“Watch out, I'll tell Eyeball you said that.” Ace jests, reaching out to awkwardly ruffle the kid's hair. While the gesture made Teddy crack a slight smile, it didn't stop his mind from his moping.
“It would've been less lonely, though.” He places his beer on top of the engine's hood, and shoved his hands into the jacket's pockets. “Lot less lonely… I haven't seen my dad since I was ten...”
Ace watched the kid slide down the side of his Ford and curl up on the ground, taking the hint that his attempt at comforting didn't really work.
“Goddammit,” Teddy laughs out, on the verge of a sob.
“C'mon, kid...” He shook him around a little, “get up…”
“Goddammit…” He's full-on crying into his jeans now, “Goddammit, I think I hate him more than I hate you...”
Ace goes silent as Teddy can only sob louder. He lowers himself to his level, trying to wrap an arm around the boy. “C’mon, Ted, let's get you home…”
Teddy Duchamp was fifteen when Ace Merrill took him out to play mailbox baseball.
He let him keep the jean jacket, like it was his way of trying to make up for something. Vern thought it looked cool on Teddy, tuff. If he saw Ace wearing the same jacket he'd probably accuse him of trying too hard.
“Ace is picking you up again?” They walked outside of school with their binders in their hands and their backpacks weighing them down. Teddy hadn't told Vern about Ace being his half-brother yet, he felt like it was time to stop treating him like an idiot and to just let him piece it together instead.
“Yeah!”
“Last time Billy took a ride with Ace Merrill he got arrested.”
“No juvie can hold me.” Teddy replies with a smirk, it makes Vern laugh. The two watch as that Ford they had become familiar with drives in, honking loud. Teddy ran to the passenger door, waving goodbye to Vern as he pulled on the handle.
“We gotta get out of here before some teacher recognizes me.” Teddy got in and saw Ace, smoking with the windows up, no wonder his car smelt like skunk. “Can't stand their fuckin' conversations...”
“Yeah, I get what ya’ mean…” Teddy trailed off as he tried to sneak a cigarette out of the carton by the radio.
Ace noticed this out the corner of his eye. “Ted, I don't care if you steal my cigs. I won't hound ya."
Teddy nods along, taking that cigarette and pushing it into the car's lighter before smoking it down. The first cigarette after school got out was like inhaling freedom.
“I got Charlie's old bat in the back... haven't seen him in awhile so I'm giving it to you, he sucked at this anyway.”
“Alright, yeah!” Teddy cheers, immediately turning towards the back of the car and grabbing the bat’s handle and pulling it towards the front, he's careful as he tries not to hit Ace's head.
“You play ball?”
“No shit I play ball.” He replies, trying to sound offended, but obviously more focused on toying around with the baseball bat and trying to get a good feel of it.
“Okay, so just stick your head and arms out of the window and pretend you're playing ball..." Ace explains, laying down mailbox baseball to Teddy— an amazing role model, truly. “When you see a mailbox, just close your eyes... and pretend it's the ball.”
“Got it…” The boy replies, rolling down his window and leaning out of it.
He positioned himself like he was at the plate, readying the bat. The wind was strong, it blew through his hair and sent cigarette embers flying. He felt like a bird, like he was on top of the world. He caught a glimpse of the mailbox— a pastel blue painted thing, 'Davis' painted on the side in faint red.
He did what Ace told him to do: shut his eyes, swing back, pretend it's the ball, and…
‘Wham!’