Chapter Text
Kevin Creeley tried so hard to be the son his parents wanted him to be. He got good grades, tried his best to keep his room clean, did his chores in a mostly timely manner, and even participated in multiple extracurricular activities. He practiced violin, ukulele, and harmonica unprompted, made color coded flashcards to study on his own accord, and even rewatched every Disney movie until he knew them all by heart just so that his parents would maybe acknowledge him.
But it was never enough. No matter how hard he tried, how close he got to being perfect, his parents still treated him the same. It was like he was barely there, only acknowledged when they needed him, when they wanted him to do something for them or when they wanted to act like they were great parents who cared for their kid.
At school, he tried to connect with the other kids his age. But seeing them happy with their parents, their parents who cared about them who treated them like individual human beings rather than a trophy on display on the mantle above the fireplace, hurt too much. Kevin started distancing himself when he was around 9 years old, when he realized how different his upbringing was from the other kids in his class.
“Kevin, mate! You’ll never guess what my mum did this weekend,” a boy with spiky brown hair whose name Kevin could never remember said.
“What? Did you go to the movies or summat,” Kevin asked, inwardly shriveling up a little. He wasn’t sure that he wanted to know.
“So you know how I went home on Friday, ‘cause I was feeling bad?”
“Yeah,” Kevin replied unenthusiastically. Truthfully, he hadn’t noticed the boy - Michael - leaving early at all, but he wasn’t about to tell him that.
“Turns out, I had a fever, and so my mum went and picked up a bag of my favorite crisps and brought them home for me, and then she let me choose what we watched for the whole rest of the day!”
Michael continued talking, but Kevin didn’t really hear any of it. The last time he was sick, his parents hardly noticed. He could barely stand and nearly passed out multiple times, but when his mom came in to check on him, she simply told him that his room was a mess and he couldn’t lie around all day, and then proceeded to list all of the other things he had failed to do on that specific day.
Kevin actually did try to talk to the school therapist about this. She was a middle aged woman with slightly damaged straight blonde hair and unnaturally white teeth. Kevin expressed all his struggles to her, opened his heart and told her everything that was bothering him. His teacher had told him that the therapist would be a safe person for him to confide in, and that everything he said would be confidential. Apparently, "confidential" didn’t actually mean "confidential," because after only three weeks of talking with the therapist, he walked in to find both his parents sitting in the room with her.
“What are they doing here?” Kevin asked her, his eyes widening in shock and his heart beating a little bit too fast. This was wrong. They shouldn’t be here. This was his safe space, with someone who finally understood him and listened to him and cared. She was someone who actually cared. But now here she is, bringing his parents into his safe space, the very people who he cried to his therapist about were here in the room with him.
“Oh Kevin, don’t be so harsh! Dr. Green sent us an email asking if we could come in and have a little chat with you two. She said you’ve been struggling at home, and we want to understand where you’re coming from,” Elizabeth Creeley said, placing a gentle hand on his shoulder. “You know you can always come to us about this kind of thing, right? We’re here for you, Kevin, and we love you. You know we love you, and that we will listen. You don’t need to be going off to other people to get help. Right, Simon?”
“Of course, honey. Kevie, you know you can come to us whenever you are having problems,” Simon said, grabbing his wife’s hand and interlocking their fingers.
“Alright! So, it seems like Kevin has some concerns about not feeling seen and respected at home. Kevin, do you want to tell your parents how you’ve been feeling?”
Kevin froze. “I… em… I just feel like sometimes… it’s like I’m never good enough for you,” he said. He could feel his hands starting to shake, his heart beating too fast, the world going blurry.
“Oh Kevie, honey, you know we’re proud of you no matter what! We care so much about you, and I’m sorry that you feel like we don’t care. I’m sorry that you’re feeling unseen,” Liz said, pulling Kevin into a hug.
Why was she touching him? The walls were closing in and he could barely breathe and here she was, the person who was supposed to be his guardian, his mother, his family, squeezing him and trapping him and holding him against his will. Tears began streaming down his face as he gasped for air, trying to swim to the surface of the crushing weight around him but falling short again and again and again until it was all too much. He needed to scream, needed to make a noise before he suffocated.
“STOP!” Kevin shouted, pushing Liz off of him and shoving her into his father, who stumbled backwards in surprise. “GET OFF ME!” He stumbled backward until his back hit the wall. He was trapped, cornered, stuck, like a mouse in a glue trap trying so hard to break free but only making it worse. He couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t see. He couldn’t-
“-Kevin?” a tentative voice reached out to him through the chaos like the beam of a lighthouse on a shore miles away. But the voice… it wasn’t right. It wasn’t safe. It was the voice of the very person who caused all this mess. The light flickered, as if someone was closing the curtains from inside the lighthouse. Then it went out, and Kevin plunged back into the void.
“Kevin? Kevin, are you alright?” a different voice called from the darkness. This voice was safer, the light was constant and strong. He could feel his breathing even out as the tears stopped streaming down his face, his body and mind calming down enough to function again.
“Just take some deep breaths, that’s it. In and out, nice and easy,” Dr. Green said, her voice low and calm.
The world slowly filtered back into view, although still a bit hazy around the edges. Dr. Green was kneeling on the floor in front of where Kevin was curled up in the corner, not touching him but close enough that her presence was reassuring.
“What is going on? Kevin, what is wrong with you?” Liz asked, an accusatory tone in her voice. “Dr. Green, step away from my son right now before I-”
Dr. Green held a hand up, stopping Liz in her tracks. “Let me handle this.”
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It took a full hour for Kevin to calm down enough to go back to class. His parents stopped trying to comfort him, opting for a few comments about how they never acted like this as kids and how Kevin ought to get himself together before his recital tonight before eventually giving up and going home. Thankfully, Dr. Green was able to help him reset and wrote him a note to go to the music lyceum instead of having to go back to class.
Music had always been a huge part of Kevin’s life. It was his parent’s idea to put him in violin (and later ukulele and harmonica) lessons. He took to it quite quickly, flying through the first two violin Suzuki books within his first year. His parents seemed genuinely invested in his success, showing up to all of his recitals and helping him practice when he got stuck on a passage.
But as the music got harder, his parents got more intense. Instead of empathy when he messed up, he got snide comments about how he wouldn’t be making mistakes if he practiced more. Instead of being rewarded when he figured out a new piece, he was told that he could be learning much better music if he tried harder. They started ignoring when he played well, only commenting when he messed up or wasn’t performing to their standards. They recorded his recitals so that they could go through and pick apart every phrase, highlighting every mistake and shortcoming in his playing.
He started to avoid practicing when his parents were around, preferring to sneak into a room alone at school for an hour or so after classes let out. Performing alone was safer. If no one could hear him, no one could judge him. No one would notice all his mistakes. But playing alone hurt too. He missed being able to play for others without fear. He missed being able to play simply for the love of music.
He had a concert tonight with his school orchestra. He was excited to play with his friends, but he was so nervous. His parents would be there. They would be watching. They would be listening. They would record his playing to critique later. If he messed up, he wouldn’t hear the end of it for weeks. It had to be perfect. He couldn’t let them down, not after what happened in therapy earlier. They probably were already mad at him, but maybe if he played well enough, they would forget about it and actually be proud of him for once. Maybe they’d stop being so hard on him. Maybe he could love music again. Maybe they’d actually love him.
No, that was silly. Of course they loved him. Right? If they didn’t love him, why would they spend so much time and energy helping him learn violin? They were hard on him because they cared. That’s what it was. Of course they were proud of him. Right?
Right?
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“Hey Kevin! Are you ready?” Michael asked, walking over to where Kevin was sitting putting rosin on his bow.
“I guess so,” Kevin said, looking down at the bow in his hands. Truthfully, Kevin was anything but ready. He had been practicing for the past two hours, but he kept messing up his solo in Tchaikovsky’s Romeo and Juliet Fantasy Overture, and he was terrified he wouldn’t play it correctly during the concert.
“Come on bro, you’re first chair! And your solo sounded so good during class this morning, they’re gonna love it.”
“Yeah, it’ll be great. Come on, let’s go to our seats to warm up,” Kevin said, forcing a smile onto his face. He couldn’t let Michael see how nervous he was. He was supposed to be good at this. He wasn’t allowed to be nervous. He had a performance to do.
He slowly walked over to his chair. His stomach hurt. Why couldn’t today just be over already? All he wanted was to curl up in his bed with Timon and cry himself to sleep.
What if his parents didn’t even show up tonight? Maybe they were still mad at him about what happened with the therapist. Kevin couldn’t decide whether that would be better or not. On one hand, if they didn’t show up, then they wouldn’t be there to record him and see him mess up. But on the other hand, they were his parents. They showed up because they cared about him. If they weren’t there, would that mean they didn’t care about him anymore? What if he embarrassed them so much with his outburst that they don’t want to associate with him anymore? Honestly, it didn’t matter. Either way Kevin would still have to see his parents tonight, and they’d be mad at him for something regardless of if they came or not. They were probably mad about multiple things right now anyways. They were always mad at him for something.
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Kevin stood in the wings of the stage. His classmates were already in their seats, and his teacher was about to go out. Even with all the things he hated about performing, he had to admit he loved this part.
The conductor beckoned him onstage, and he stepped into the bright stage lights and walked to his spot on the left of the podium. The audience cheered respectfully as he shook hands with his teacher. He took a deep breath and glanced out over the sea of indistinguishable heads in the seats of the auditorium, both hoping and dreading to see his parents’ faces. Either to his fortune or misfortune, he couldn’t find them anywhere.
He lifted his violin up to his left shoulder, allowing it to rest between his shoulder and chin while his left hand ghosted over the fingerboard. Using his right hand he picked up his bow then slowly dragged it across the string to produce the concert A.
One by one the other instruments in the orchestra lifted up their instruments and joined him. The sounds swirled around the room until the conductor tapped his baton on his stand, stopping the music almost instantly. Kevin sat down in first chair, bringing his violin down to rest on his left knee. He went to open his music binder but found his stand partner had already turned it to the correct page. He flashed a quick grateful smile at her and she smiled back. The gesture eased his nerves a little bit, but his stomach still felt as though it was doing somersaults.
The conductor finished addressing the audience and turned back to the orchestra, lifting his baton. The rest of the orchestra followed suit, and Kevin placed his violin back on his shoulder and raised his bow.
Then the music began, and Kevin allowed himself to be swept up in the melody. He lost himself in the music, all thoughts leaving his head save for the ones used to follow the conductor and lead his section. This was what he loved - the feeling of the music filling the room and consuming the world around him. It was freeing, like a crow soaring through a clear blue sky on a crisp autumn morning.
He felt himself snap back into reality when he heard the piece approach his solo. His heart started beating quicker, and his stomach churned. This wasn’t good. He played the first few notes of his solo correctly, but he could feel his parents listening for any mistake, any deviation from the notes printed on the score.
His fourth finger slipped a little bit, causing one of his notes to be a little sharp.
*Shit,* he thought, his breath catching. He kept playing, but as soon as he finished his solo, the panic began to flood through his system. His stomach hurt so much and he could barely breathe.
He must have swallowed a lot of air when he was crying earlier, because he could feel gas bubbling around in his stomach. This wasn’t good. Maybe if he waited until the music got a little louder, he could let out a little fart and no one would notice. He kept playing, his stomach muscles clenching as he fought to keep it in until the finale. But his stomach hurt so much, and he couldn’t keep going anymore. All he could do was pray that no one heard it, or at least no one realized it was him.
Nothing could have prepared him for what happened next. As he shifted in his chair, a stream of magic left his asshole and wound its way up through the air, glowing and sparkling like Tinkerbell’s fairy dust. Staves of music shining gold in the stagelights floated around him, spreading over the whole stage. But the magic wasn’t silent - a very bad version of Madonna’s “Like a Virgin” came out of his asshole, amplified by the shells at the back of the stage so that it rang out across the entire auditorium.
Time froze as the orchestra stopped playing, all turning to look at Kevin. The conductor laid his baton on his music stand, a mixture of concern, alarm, and disgust flitting across his face as he met Kevin’s eyes. Then, from the trumpet section, a snicker escaped someone’s mouth and the entire orchestra burst out in laughter.
Kevin’s face went bright red as his heart pounded in his chest. His mind went straight into fight or flight mode, and he immediately moved towards the second option as he gently set down his violin (or as gently as one could set down a violin whilst on the brink of a panic attack) and then promptly sprinted out of the room.
He ran as fast as his legs could carry him all the way to the practice room he had been in before. It was a safe space, no one else was there to see him and laugh at him and judge him for whatever just happened on stage. His heart was still beating too fast, the blood rushing to his head too quickly. He felt as though he was about to pass out, the realization hitting him and sending him further into his spiral. He’d never passed out before, what if he got hurt and no one was here to help him? Not that anyone would help him now, after they all saw what a freak he was. Something was wrong with him. He was cursed, and now everyone knew. His vision was so blurry. He couldn’t breathe. Why couldn’t he breathe? Was this the end? Was this what dying felt like?
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Kevin woke up to find himself back in his room at home, lying on his Tangled bedsheets with Timon in his arms. He couldn’t remember how he got home. The last thing he remembered was being in that practice room before the world went dark.
He sat up slowly, still feeling a bit out of it from last night. His stomach clenched again – he must have swallowed a lot of air last night again. He let out a fart, and this time a bad rendition of “How Far I’ll Go” from Moana came out. It was much quieter than it had been the night before, but the floating staves of glittering gold music still flowed from his asshole.
He put his face in his hands, dragging his fingers down his cheeks with a sigh. Was this going to be his life forever? What would happen if he was at work and needed to fart? How would he get a job or find someone to marry or finish school or even just survive at home with this curse? Maybe he was just doomed to a life of misery. Maybe this was punishment for something that he’d done. He was already so tired of this curse. How was he going to make it through the rest of his life with it?
His mom opened his bedroom door and walked in, not bothering to knock.
“Mum! You scared me,” Kevin said, jumping a little. “Can you knock next time? What if I was changing or summat?”
“This is my house, I can go where I please. I’m the one who pays for this place,” Elizabeth Creeley said, her hands folded over her chest indignantly. “Now get up and pack your bags.”
“What? Why? Mum, what’s going on?” Kevin’s eyes widened. This was it. His curse was so embarrassing for her that she was kicking him out. He’d have to learn to fend for himself out on the streets. Or she’d send him to an orphanage, where he’d spend the rest of his years because no one would want to adopt a freak like him.
“We got sent some coordinates that you’ve got to go to. Some sort of school for other freaks like you,” she said, opening up his drawers and haphazardly throwing clothes into a duffel bag.
“Wha- for freaks like me? I’m not a freak! I just have to not fart, and I’ll be fine. I don’t want to go to a different school. I want to stay here.”
“You don’t have a choice. The department of education sent us a letter about it,” she said from his bathroom, throwing his toiletries into a plastic bag.
“But what about my classes? Or my orchestra? What will I do-”
“-I don’t think you’ll want to go back to your classes now. Especially not your orchestra, with how your solo sounded.”
“I know I messed up one of the notes, but it wasn’t that bad, mum!”
“You know your father and I love you very much, Kevie,” she stopped moving about the room and sat next to him, pushing Timon out of the way.
“Yeah, but-”
“-So that’s why we decided that this new school will be better for you. You’ll get to make new friends, ones that are just as weird as you,” she chuckled, laughing at what she seemed to think was a funny joke. Kevin didn’t get it. Was she making fun of him? Surely not, right?
“Come on, Kevie. Hakuna matata. It means no worries,” she sang, smiling at him. “Let’s pack your stuff.”
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The sound of Disney’s Incredibles 2 soundtrack filled the mid-range family hatchback as it navigated along the highway to St. Churnleys. It wasn’t quite loud enough to muffle the sounds of rain pitter-pattering along the front windshield, or the sound of the wipers squeaking back and forth, but the lowest notes still vibrated the back seat where Kevin was sitting surrounded by various Disney plushies and his bags.
“Yes, I- I think this St. Churnley’s will be a great spot for the boy. What’s more, it’s fully catered, and apparently there’s a huge playground! You’ll be home for the summer, Kevin, but it looks like you’ll be getting to spend the rest of the year there. Are you- are you excited?” Simon asked. He was in the passenger seat reading the flier the UK’s Department of Education sent them about St. Churnley’s. He didn’t bother to turn to listen to Kevin’s reply, instead swiping off of the flier and pulling up the Disney merch website and browsing through the new collection of water bottles.
Kevin let out a huff of air, “I don’t see why I have to go, like- as long as I hold it in, it’s not a problem.”
“I- I know,” his father replied, pausing his shopping to look out the window for a moment in thought. “Your new condition can make you… um… probably a little bit self-conscious and nervous, Kevin, but in this new school, you won’t have to worry about sticking out. You’ll be a freak like all the other boys.”
Kevin’s mouth fell open indignantly and he crossed his arms over his chest. “I’m- I don’t wanna be a freak! I-”
“Oh, Elizabeth, if Kevin’s away, perhaps we could fit in another trip to Orlando over Christmas!”
“What?” Kevin cried.
“What do you think, Liz?” Simon continued, ignoring Kevin’s outburst.
“Oh yes, I think there’s that Disney World deal for two adults and a free child ticket, but- I’m sure we can just tell them that we don’t need the free ticket, if Kevin’s going to be at school,” Liz chuckled to herself.
“But I want to go to Disney-”
“If Kevin’s going to be at school for the rest of the year, he won’t want to go to Disney World,” his mother was beaming now, obviously finding great joy in teasing Kevin.
“I DO wanna go to Disney World!” Kevin shouted, his eyes beginning to tear up in frustration. “I don’t wanna go to school!” He grabbed the handle next to him and tried to open his door. Even falling onto the pavement of the road below him would be better than being stuck in this car, suffocating beneath the Disney plushies with his parents teasing him and ignoring him.
“Uh huh! Safety first!” Goofy’s cheerful voice blasted through the rear speakers, causing Kevin to let go of his hold on the door handle.
“F- stupid!” Kevin huffed, pulling his knees up to his chest and hugging them as close as he could. If he could make himself small enough, maybe they’d forget he was there.
“Glad I had these alerts on,” Simon said, pointing at his Goofy themed phone case and chuckling to himself. “Look. I don’t want you raising your voice like that. Not at school.”
“You’re not gonna be there anyway, so it doesn’t matter. I’m gonna raise it all I like, and it’s gonna be the loudest voice at school, and all I’m gonna be saying is, ‘My dad is stupid and he hates me,’” Kevin said, his face still tucked between his knees, silent tears now streaming down his face. Simon sniffed, and Kevin could hear him shifting a little in his seat.
“Right. Well, this is going to be a quiet car journey from here, isn’t it?”
Kevin’s stomach was starting to hurt again. He knew what he said hurt his father, and he felt really bad about it, but he knew his parents wouldn’t listen if he tried to apologize now. He felt a fart building up in his stomach and decided that it wasn’t worth it to try and hold it in. An out of tune rendition of The Raider’s March came flowing out of him, drowning out the Incredibles music in the background.
Kevin’s mom reached over and turned off the sound system, sighing, “You were a little pitchy there, Kevin. Besides, I’d like to hear something from The Lion King.”
Kevin, with his head still tucked between his knees, rolled his eyes and let out another fart, and a stream of “He Lives In You” filled the car instead.
After that song faded away, the Creeleys were left with nothing but the sound of gentle rain and the squeaking of the windshield wipers as they sped down the highway towards St. Churnleys.
Only a few more hours and Kevin would be free.