i believe i can fly

[self_composed]

Alice eventually goes home for the evening.

Bella goes up and sits in her room.

She has five hexes.

Five.

That's rather a lot of hexes.

She gets out her notebook, with the lists, and she makes some wishes.

And then she goes to bed, grinning.

In the morning it will be time to make plans.

Comments

[self_composed]

"So we talk to Charlie," Bella says, but she's still frowning. "And if he says there's nothing he can do that you think has an acceptable margin of safety - then - hm." She looks up and makes eye contact. "How weird would your mom and Hilary find it if your dad just forgot you exist and could not be reminded or notice your presence in any way? Would this cause a lot of changes in his behavior, or by making yourself sufficiently actually scarce could this just seem like him deciding he doesn't want to be bothered anymore? Also, is there any risk that in this case he'd start going after someone else?"

[edgeofyourseat]

He thinks about it.

"...Hilary doesn't know enough about him to notice the difference," he concludes, "but Mom..."

His mother knows his dad better than he does - well, obviously. His mother knows that his dad wouldn't do that, that whatever combination of possessiveness and duty drives him to lay such a claim on his son is not something he would ever, ever willingly give up.

"And I have no idea what he'd do. I mean, I take up a pretty big space in the guy's life. Who the fuck knows what he'd put there instead. Maybe it'd be totally fine. Maybe he'd wanna have another kid."

Actually, the more he thinks about it, the more likely that is—he only exists in the first place because of his father's desire for an heir. And it is not a prospect that fills him with joy. A vague sympathy for the hypothetical second try, more like.

[self_composed]

"I have not a flicker of conscience with also sterilizing the bastard," Bella says helpfully.

[edgeofyourseat]

Alice grins. "Yeah, that's better."

[self_composed]

"But your mom would notice something is up. How bad would that be?" Bella says. "What would she do?"

[edgeofyourseat]

"...I don't really know," he says. "I mean, she's been pretty fucking clear that she wants me gone," no specific memories accompany that, just a vague sense that it has been repeatedly confirmed, "so it's not like she'd be unhappy. But I don't know if she'd care that he'd gone totally bugfuck overnight," because 'totally bugfuck' is an accurate measure of how far he would have to depart from his usual behaviour in order to act like he'd forgotten his own son, "or what she'd do about it if she did. Uh," because this seems like relevant information now, "he gets really pissy if anybody mentions divorce when they're both in the room, and she never seems to notice." As he recalls, Bella has witnessed one such instance for herself.

[self_composed]

"Huh." Bella chews her lip. "This is looking like, maybe not a dead end, but a risky avenue. Let's see what else I can think of." Think, think, think. "In jail and dead are probably the best places to put him, I'm not quite frustrated enough to vote for dead yet... has he done anything else illegal you happen to know about or suspect?"

[edgeofyourseat]

"Mmm..."

What things does his dad do? Hang around at home getting pissed off if anyone has fun where he can hear them, mainly.

"Well, getting that teacher fired was pretty sketchy, but I don't know if it was against the actual law."

[self_composed]

"It almost certainly depends on how he did it. Maybe all the algebra was hiding a sordid double life and your father was just motivated to dig it up." She sighs. "And we're back to involving Charlie."

[edgeofyourseat]

"I am weirdly okay with that," says Alice.

Okay with it because it is so screamingly obvious that Bella's family (the subset of it that he's seen) works in a way his doesn't, and that Charlie is not the kind of asshole Alice expects him to be. Weirdly because in the face of all evidence he still expects Charlie to be an asshole.

[self_composed]

"But," Bella says, "we do need a contingency plan for what happens if Charlie is more cavalier about the possibility of a failed charge than us - or if we agree on the risk and then it doesn't pan out." Pause. "Would the mere fact of a trial having occurred be a plausible trigger for your dad to pretend you didn't exist, so we can fall back on that? I mean, I don't think he's been publicly accused before, has he?"

[edgeofyourseat]

"Uh... maybe," he says. "I mean, I can't imagine him forgetting about me, but I also can't imagine him on trial for kicking my ass, so."

[self_composed]

"Okay." Bella closes her eyes. "We're probably going to want more complete documentation of the whole mess than 'you went to the hospital that one time in November'. We want to be able to have the lawyer for the plaintiff drone on and on in the most sickening terms possible about years and years of systematic abuse until the jury wants to eviscerate somebody and your dad is the most convenient target. Would you rather I just try out my new memory-browsing feature and write it all down myself, so you don't have to talk about it?"

[edgeofyourseat]

He grins.

"Sure, go nuts. I mean, I'll talk about it too if you want. Probably shouldn't get me up in front of that jury, though, 'cause I'll laugh and it'll just confuse 'em."

[self_composed]

"Nervous laughter in small quantities would probably be fine, but yeah. I wonder if you can wish yourself temporarily serious about it? If you don't act as a witness we're relying on hearsay from me and coerced testimony from Theo and fluttering ignorance from your mom if she goes up at all which she can't be forced to. That's thin stuff."

[edgeofyourseat]

"...I can probably just act," he offers, rubbing the back of his head. "I guess."

(The thought of getting up and having negative emotions in front of a bunch of strangers is slightly uncomfortable, slightly arousing.)

[self_composed]

"Yeah, you're gonna have to pentagon that," says Bella flatly, inspecting his thoughts. "You have to be sympathetic to a bunch of randomly chosen people. You have to make the jury enraged that anybody would hurt you so that they're on a hair trigger when the judge wants a verdict. You have to do this even though your dad's lawyer is going to tell everyone in the courtroom every remotely socially unacceptable thing you have ever done. This would be easier if you were a girl - no, wearing a dress will not help - but it's still doable if you pull off a good victim persona. Do you have an actual record - for the hooking or the getting into fights or anything else? If you do, that's bad, though not insurmountable - if you don't, that could be good, since it means the prosecutor's slinging around unsubstantiated claims that may or may not have run out the statute of limitations and yours can keep saying 'Objection!'."

[edgeofyourseat]

"No record for the hooking," he says. "You probably couldn't even find a customer by now; it's not like I kept in touch. And oh, Dad's gonna shit himself if he has to drag out anything that's not public knowledge like the fighting. He only puts up with the fighting 'cause he knows I'm covering for him and he can't stop me anyway, I'm pretty sure. Although maybe he won't care as much about trying to cover up everything that's wrong with me when he's busy trying to cover up everything that's wrong with him."

[self_composed]

"So maybe he'll handicap himself," Bella says. "Maybe he's sufficiently embarrassed not to tell his lawyer, or thinks you'll flinch."

Pause.

"Are you going to flinch? Because if you recant halfway through this process it all falls apart."

[edgeofyourseat]

"Yeah, I am not gonna flinch," he says with absolute certainty.

[self_composed]

"None of that 'you told my dad a funny joke' crap," Bella says. "Double jeopardy is a thing. Cops and judges and so on don't like it when they think plaintiffs are crying wolf."

Pause.

"And you're going to need someplace to crash while this is all happening. I think it is pretty obvious you can't live in a house with your dad during this process. And it could take a long time. My dad can probably arrange protective custody, but as a temporary measure maybe you want to look into the underground lair anyway?"

[edgeofyourseat]

"Sure," he says cheerfully. "Sounds like fun."

[self_composed]

Bella nods.

"Documentation time," she says, and she wishes a brand new notebook from her box of them upstairs. "Here goes memory-trawling. I can probably remember your memories better than you can 'cause I can just query them directly instead of having to elicit them from the inside."

She concentrates, and searches by keythought.

[edgeofyourseat]

Alice closes his eyes and sits back and luxuriates in the feeling of being read, even though he can't tell what she's reading.

The list of search results is very, very long, and all of them have the pain symbol attached.

Here is Alice's father standing by a lit fireplace and grabbing a poker out of the stand. Here is Alice's father with clenched fists and a thunderous expression. Here is a memory with no visuals, just touch and sound.

All the iconized visuals contain Delaney Hammond Sr.; some of them show his wife, too, invariably covering her face or leaving the room. They span nearly every room in the Forks house and dozens more in what must be the old house in New York. In some of the latter, Delaney Sr. is holding a weapon of some kind—cane, belt, ruler; in one, a lit cigarette. But apparently, by the time they got to Forks, he was mostly inclined to beat his son with his own two hands.

[self_composed]

Bella grits her teeth, opens up the less sensory data around each one in turn, and writes dates - approximate when she has to, exact when she doesn't - and implements where applicable, exact details of each attack, instigating incidents especially when trivial, injuries and scarring and where it may be found, and all relevant visits to the hospital. She fills pages. And pages. In neat and tidy handwriting and careful, consistent formatting. She adds a footnote attached to each incident where Mrs. Hammond was there.