New York City, NY
United States of America
March 2015
It was Aether who had to break the silence.
“I don’t want to make this awkward,” she
started, “but I noticed something weird going on between you and your dad a
while ago. Are you two okay?”
“It’s nothing,” Peters replied shortly.
Aether and Tadashi exchanged a glance but didn’t pry. Peters merely continued
unpacking his clothes, taking out an outfit that he was to wear the following
day. “It’s just been a while since I’ve last seen my old man. Or any member of
the family.”
“We can always take him up on his offer.”
She fixed her hair into a bun before continuing, “When we finish up here. I
think your parents would like it, and so would your brother—”
He interrupted her. “We’ll see.” Before she
could protest, Peters got up and excused himself to go to the bathroom, leaving
behind a befuddled Aether and Tadashi, the latter’s face appearing blank for
only a moment. They heard the door shut and Aether huffed, folding her arms
over her chest.
“I don’t understand,” she muttered.
“Don’t understand what?”
“I don’t—I don’t understand why he behaved
like that with his dad,” she told Tadashi, keeping her voice down in case
Peters would hear. “It’s like he didn’t want to see him. And now—it feels like
he doesn’t want to visit the rest of his family.” Tadashi watched her, letting
her vent out, “It just feels wrong, you know?”
“I see where you’re coming from.” He threw
a glance at the bathroom door then looked back at her, “But you have to
understand that Peters comes from a different background than the both of us.”
Aether say didn’t anything in reply. She
didn’t have to; Tadashi really could understand where she came from upon
expressing her sentiments. “It just sucks to see that kind of opportunity
wasted, you know?” she murmured after a brief period of silence. “He has them.”
“He does,” he agreed. That was when Peters
came out of the bathroom, and Aether flopped back on the hotel bed. “Aether
calls the farthest bed,” he told Peters, who could only shrugged and rummaged
through his belongings again.
“That’s not a problem.”
--
Peters knew.
Aether wasn’t exactly the best when it came
to concealing emotions she felt strongly at the moment; it was something he had
picked up on during the past months that they had knew each other. He felt the
disapproval in the eyes that followed him. Each constrained contact between his
father and himself was met in disappointment, and Peters was eventually growing
tired of it.
Tadashi had a sharp eye and most likely
caught on. When Aether left the hotel room to clarify something with the front
desk, the Korean brought up rather calmly, “Don’t be mad at her.”
“What?”
“Aether.” Tadashi couldn’t help but smile
at him, “Don’t be mad at her for pushing. “You know that she just wants the
best for you.”
“Pushing seems like a mild term,” Peters
snorted. Tadashi gave him a small look.
“I mean it. You know what happened to her.”
And he did know, the entirety of Squad A did. The administration knew. No one
really brought it up—it wasn’t exactly the kind of topic you’d bring up during
dinner—but even with that, he knew that happened to her. He knew her background
just as much as he knew his own. “You have to understand that watching this is
a little painful on her side.”
Peters exhaled slowly, counted to ten while
doing so. Tadashi waited for him to reply. “It’s way more than what it looks
like,” he started slowly.
The other nodded, encouraging. “Go on.”
“I had to leave. Lots of things were going
on and the best way to fight it was to leave. I didn’t tell them why.” He ran a
few fingers through his hair and sighed, “It’s not an embarrassment thing. I’m
not embarrassed by my family.”
“Then why—?”
“It’s a big issue that I’m not comfortable
talking about,” Peters told him. He looked away, “Just…don’t push it. Tell
Aether not to push it. It’s not what she thinks it is.”
Tadashi wanted to argue against him on
that, but could only give a nod as he reopened his laptop to update the case
files. Aether came back eventually, this time bearing food from nearby.
“Everything okay?” she asked carefully. The atmosphere was a little tenser than
how it had been when she left.
Peters opened his mouth to speak, but
Tadashi spoke first. “We’re working and hungry, how else should we be feeling?”
Aether rolled her eyes and set down the bags of food before peeling off her
coat, and Peters couldn’t help but feel a pang of guilt for hiding the issue.
They wanted to help, simple as that.
“Peters? You wanted bacon and mushroom?”
“Yeah,” he found himself replying. He got
off the bed and took the hamburger from Aether, avoiding looking her in the
eye. He’d only feel worse. “Thanks.”
--
The truth eventually came out after a
heated discussion.
Tadashi had stepped into the middle of
things when Peters and Aether had gotten into another argument; he gave both of
them weary looks while the other two glared at each other. The argument had
started about the investigation and eventually escalated into much more
personal things—it seemed like his warnings towards both of them had been
completely forgotten.
In the heat of things, Peters burst. He
exploded and yelled to the point of Tadashi grabbing his arm tightly and
hissing that they had to be quiet. Aether merely stared, face unreadable as
Peters spat statements and reasons she never thought she’d hear from him.
(Things like being overshadowed, being the
less-favored son. Trying to step out of his brother’s shadow, narrowly missing
being the family disappointed. Peters pressured himself but no one was
pressuring him and Aether couldn’t understand at all—
“Of course you can’t understand,” Peters
barked out a laugh, “Your parents are dead,
Aether.”
Ice shot up her veins and Tadashi
immediately stepped in.)
At the moment, they were trying to calm down.
Aether had locked herself in the bathroom, Tadashi was making coffees for
everyone (maybe spiked with alcohol, who knew), and Peters was itching to leave
and smoke.
“Both of you said shitty things to each
other,” Tadashi spoke. Peters flinched slightly. The comment about her parents,
if anything, was a low blow. “Maybe below the belt.”
“Mine was worse,” he admitted. Tadashi said
nothing. Peters knew he agreed.
--
The rest of the week was stiff.
The case was finished a few days earlier
than expected; reaching out towards other sources turned out to be more
helpful. Peters relented when his dad asked him to visit, and the invitation
was extended to the rest of the Squad.
On the day, he was fidgety—he had blurted
out to the two of them that his parents might have invited them to stay until
they had to leave. This resulted to a much earlier checkout, Peters calling his
dad on the phone, and a long drive until they reached his home in Bronx.
Peters and Aether were still ignoring each
other. Not necessarily ignoring—they were somehow civil, but the tension was
still there—and Tadashi worried slightly on how the visit to Peters’ parents
would be.
It was while they were driving. Tadashi
eventually had to take over and send Peters to the back, with Aether silently
looking out the window until they reached mild traffic. They heard him groan
and bury his face into his hands, and Tadashi would attempt to coax him out,
but I didn’t quite work.
That was until Aether spoke out. “Do you
really think that they’re going to scrutinize every single thing you’ve been
doing for the past few years?”
Peters was unable to speak for a moment
until, “…that’s what it feels like, yes.”
“They’re not going to do that. Tad and I
met your dad, and he doesn’t seem like the type. Especially since he hasn’t
seen you for the longest time.” Aether was still looking away, her arms folded
over her chest. “They’d focus more on catching up with you. Not criticizing
what you’ve done.”
And that was when Tadashi spoke. “That’s
what I think as well.”
“Are you serious—?”
“You have to give yourself some credit. You’re
not that much of a fuck up. If you were, then you wouldn’t be with us.”
From the back of the car, he inhaled
slowly, and then let it out. The rest of the car ride was quiet, with the radio
playing pop tunes until they reached the exact place (as Tadashi had entered on
Waze.)
Aether barely looked at him. “You’ll be
okay, Peters. We’re sure of that.”
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