Fic: "Free" (Cobb/Fischer) Chapter 1 Rated R
Title:"Free" Chapter 1 out of 6
Rating: R (Will change to NC-17 for future chapters)
Summary: Cobb and Robert are finally free after Inception. Can they find a way to be free together?
Notes: There is really not enough Fischer/Cobb fic IMO. This is their chronicle of failure, redemption, turmoil, longing and eventually love! This is the fic I believe they deserve! So there!
Word Count: Roughly 3000
Free
He pushed through the revolving hotel doors-the humid air mingling with his cool skin.
He shielded his eyes from the glaring sun that had bathed everything in its glorious intense light.
He inhaled deeply taking in the smells of the summer afternoon- grass, rhododendron, and lilac. Everything looked so marvelous like he wanted to take a picture of the scene so he would never forget.
His eyes started to ache a little from squinting so he donned his designer sunglasses and checked his designer watch. If he continued to stand around and take in the sights he was going to be late. A small smile played on his lips.
He wouldn’t miss him for the world.
___+++___
It had been a year and a half since he woke up on the small charter plane taking him home to LA after the terribly long flight from Sydney and equally as long dream- the day that had cheesily enough changed his life forever.
He didn’t realize it at first though. He was only aware of how surreal and dare he say-happy and free he felt when he woke like he was seeing everything differently. It was like living one’s life looking at everything through opaque glass and then finally someone lifting it-making everything perfectly crystal clear. His shoulders were not slumping seemingly from some oppressive weight he was carrying and he didn't don his usual forced complacent face-the one that his father’s people told him made him look dreadfully older.
He felt bewildered (was he still dreaming?) but with that strange feeling he also felt calm. He felt like he could take a deep breath after holding it in for so long.
He moved about that day like he was in a fog-everything was real and not real. He was very afraid that the calm feeling would pass-that it was a fluke and that he would wake up the next day and again feel weighed down, lonely and miserable.
But it did not! Even going to his father’s funeral and watched as they lowered him into the ground, crying softly at the realization that his father never DID want this for him-the burden of having to run such a huge company-not having time for anyone, having to become someone that you are not. Robert gulped, stifling back another cry that threatened to bubble up thinking of his own family. He wasn’t sure of much but he had made a huge decision that day as he threw a rose on top of his father’s casket, saying his last goodbyes. He was tired of hiding, tired of living in someone’s shadow, having them make decisions for him. He was just tired and he wanted to make his own life. This seemed ridiculous at 34-why now? The dream, he just couldn’t shake the dream and he couldn’t shake him.
Once he was sure that this feeling, this strange but miraculous feeling of being free wasn’t disappearing he set out almost immediately in dissolving his father’s hard earned multibillion dollar company-the one that he supposedly was going to leave all to him one day. He didn’t want it. He only wanted two things now and both were going to be very hard to get.
He painstakingly tried to keep everything from his uncle Peter which was very hard since he had his hands in the company as well. Robert knew that his uncle sensed a change in him since he came home that day but he didn’t care. He distanced himself as much as he dared. He still loved his uncle but the residual feelings of the dream, the feelings of betrayal made him feel a little bitter towards him as well. Could his uncle have been keeping things from him all this time? Could it be possible? Robert thought about this a lot. If he was able to wake from such a profound, influential dream and feel like a new man then he faintly thought that maybe anything was possible.
He had begun to believe the unbelievable. He wasn’t a faithful or religious person but the freedom he felt now was one he was almost ready to thank the heavens for-like he had been reborn.
Could the dream be a sign from God himself? Robert laughed to himself lightly blaming tiredness.
He was doing research in his dimly lit grandiose study again; it must have been after two in the morning. He rubbed at his bleary eyes and shut the thick law books he was poring over.
He was a busy man these days-busier now than when he was still linked to his deceased father’s company.
It was a long, drawn out, tedious process. The money, lawyers, consultants, the list went on. The Board of Directors, creditors and shareholders were nonstop calling him with relentless questions about the sudden dissolution. When he had done as much research as he could and stopped production on the manufacturing and R&D levels he brought in the Board of Directors including his uncle for an impromptu meeting. He had never run a meeting like this before and should have been nervous but he wasn’t. He was calm and steady in his decision. He told them in a simplified speech that the company was dissolving and things would be divided accordingly. He had no desire to continue the company at this time. That was all. Faces were white, aghast; people gave out muffled cries of shock, worry and outrage. He didn’t stick around long to take in their objections or persuasions to think it over more-he was just dealing with grief after all. “No”-he firmly stated to them, resting his large hands on the huge table. “This is what I want. This is what my father wanted from me before he passed.” And he left-his uncle hot on his heels.
“Robert!” He cried out after him.
“For God sakes Robert hold up a minute.”
His uncle was keeping him from the other thing that was keeping him busy, up till late hours in the night. Robert ignored him.
He was practically sprinting down the grand hall to the equally as grand elevator. He looked at his watch and realized he would need to fly like the wind to get across town to meet with his other lawyers.
A warm hand was on his shoulder then. He turned almost begrudgingly and met his uncle’s tired eyes.
“Robert. Let’s talk about this just you and me. I didn’t realize you had these feelings. You could have came to me if you felt that you were in over your head.”
Robert blurted out a little sarcastic, exasperated laugh.
“But I don’t feel like I’m in over my head. Far from it. There’s nothing left to talk about. I just don’t want this,” he shrugged off his uncle’s touch. His uncle was keeping him from him-like him and his father were always doing.
“Robert,” he was pleading now, practically begging him to take some time to think about things, to take a vacation to clear his head, maybe talk to a professional if he didn’t want to speak to him-his uncle and confidant.
Robert tuned him out. For so long he complacently stood back and let him and his father take the reins but not anymore.
The elevator finally dinged-alerting him that it was available.
His uncle was still asking him to think about it, to reconsider. Robert stayed close mouthed until he heard his uncle say something almost hurtful.
“Robert, think of your father. He would want you taken care of!”
Robert had to restrain himself from coming out of the elevator and slapping his uncle.
He had never once felt any aggression towards him until then. He took a deep breath and buried the hostile feelings.
He stepped inside the elevator and pressed the “Door open” button on the elevator console to keep the door from closing. He wanted to make his last point clear.
He tried to keep all emotion out of his voice.
“Sweet uncle. You forget that I too am a father. He needs to be taken care of, he has been forgotten for too long. I don’t want him to grow up the same way I did..,” he pressed the “Door close” button. His uncle faltered and looked like he had been slapped-the precise reaction Robert wanted.
The elevator door started to close.
“Totally fucked up like me,” Robert finished, pasting a sarcastic grin on his face as the elevator door closed completely on his uncle, on his old life.
___+++___
Robert had many regrets but not being in his son’s life was his biggest.
Robert’s childhood was very strange after his mother died. He was only 11 years old and forced to be raised by a father that never gave him the time of day and nannies. He was home schooled and didn’t have much interaction with the outside world.
He was a lonely and bitter child-one that acted out just to get attention.
First it started with not doing his school work. Robert thought that if he didn’t do his homework or keep up with his studies then his father certainly would be cross, come back from whatever exotic location he was in and give him the belt himself.
This sadly was not the case. His father showed no interest in his studies and if he was keeping up with them or not. He would be scolded by his uncle and would get the belt from one of his private tutors-“A direct order from Mr. Fischer” they would always say. But where was his father? Why wasn’t he the one to discipline him? Robert would often cry himself to sleep wondering this very thing-scheming up other ways to get him to come home, to look at him, to just be around.
When slacking off in his studies didn’t work he then moved on to other more drastic ideas. Running away, causing small fires, swearing, stealing, getting aggressive with the tutors and destroying his bedroom. None of this worked to his dismay. He was only greeted with the same outcome-a strong verbal lashing from his uncle and the belt from a house assistant or tutor.
His uncle threatened to send him away to a boarding school abroad if he didn’t control himself. Robert thought madly that he should do it-he was 12 by that time and his father had only seen him twice that year. He figured his father wasn’t coming around anyway-why not go abroad? As much as his uncle would sit him down and sternly tell him to behave he couldn’t see leaving him. He didn’t want to lose his uncle the same way with his parents.
So he behaved but just enough to not get sent to boarding school.
When starting chaos wasn’t getting his father’s attention Robert thought of other mutilating tactics. When he was 14 he launched himself out of a tall tree-shattering his arm in the process. He claimed he fell and pleaded for doctors to contact his father-his only emergency contact. Well his father was in South Africa on business and most certainly could not come home though he wished Robert a speedy recovery-relayed to him from the hospital staff. He was in the hospital for weeks-his father never once coming to his aid. He never felt more alone.
___+++___
The last found memory he had of his father, when his mother was still living, was when they went to the city zoo together as a family. Robert had just turned 11 and his father made him a paper pinwheel-the only gift his father ever gave to him out of pure love and not necessity.
His mother was so pleased at his reaction that she took a picture of the two of them. That was the picture that Robert carried around with him to this day. To remind himself of his last day of his innocence.
His father loved to make things-he was always good with his hands. He often told Robert back in those days that if he wasn’t pressured to join the business/corporate world like his father that he would have been a carpenter. A faint smile would always creep up on his weathered face when he spoke of that Robert remembered.
Robert wanted to be a carpenter and work with his hands too because it seemed to please his father so much and he loved to see his father smile which was rare. He took books out of the library and tried paper Mache and origami-failing horribly at it in the process. If only he could construct things like his father had like with the pinwheel he loved so much.
In his free time he would mess around with the few tools they had in the shed. He tried to make a birdhouse taking the instructions from a book. It resembled more like two pieces of small wood steepled together. He presented it proudly to his father, a few months before his mother passed, who seemed put out but gritted his teeth and patted Robert on the head saying: “You need practice boy.”
There was little time for practice however-his mother passed that winter and his father became a ghost in his life. He was discouraged from any carpentry or side projects and to solely focus on his studies on business. He was to be a successor after all.
Robert kept the now brittle and falling apart pinwheel in a shoe box hidden away along with a couple of his mother’s processions he was able to squirrel away before the lawyers could get a hold of them. It was strange how he felt he needed to protect what little happiness he had in his life. Could everything that made him happy possibly fit in a shoebox? For him it could. He didn’t want his own son to feel the same.
His acting out for attention continued into his teenage years. No longer hidden away in the mansion when he turned 18 he immediately immersed himself in the party lifestyle during college. You know the types-the sons and daughters of the elite who are emotionally fucked up, fabulously rich and spoiled gather together for lavish parties getting ridiculously high and drunk (maybe at the same time) having orgies and complain loudly about their fucked up lives.
He made a point to sleep with men and women-hoping it would come back to his father. PR covered it all up-his father paid them handsomely so that none of the parties or wild sexcapades he went on ever came out to the public-damaging the Fischer name. That just led Robert to do it more.
He tried to step out publically with a boyfriend or a slutty girlfriend-these again were smothered by PR almost immediately.
When that didn’t work Robert thought of another completely selfish tactic. When he turned 30 and had no wife to speak of he went over to Russia. He had brief email correspondence with a young woman named Natalia. She worked for a mail order Russian bride service. Robert really did not want to get married but he figured that by marrying so quickly, so rashly and so over the top-it had to draw the attention of his father and not just the angry PR people he surrounded himself with or his uncle.
Natalia was beautiful but not his type at all. She was skinny as a rail, white as bone with wavy black hair and a set of big lips. Robert always liked blondes with a little more meat on their bones. He liked darker complexions. He believed this was because he was a brunette with pale skin and pale eyes and he was pretty thin himself-he wanted to lose himself in someone completely opposite of him.
He spent about a month with her, gauging if he could stand being married to her. The sex was fantastic but was boring after a while since she wanted him to take control every time-calling him “Big Daddy” (he was anything but big but took the compliment).
He resolved that he could not force himself to marry this woman. She had a very bad temper, was not really in love with him and was using him for his money-huge shocker there.
He remembered the day he learned he was going to be a father well. He was throwing things in his expensive leather suitcase, hurrying to pack to get to the airport for his private jet to take him back home, away from this folly. His uncle had sent urgent messages to him telling him that his father had collapsed at the office, was rushed to the hospital and that he was needed back home.
Robert was guiltily full of joy at the possibility that his father had asked for him! Finally after all these years and his father was possibly wanting his help!
Natalia was hanging on his arm, frowning her big lips, tossing her hair, pleading with him not to go. He argued vehemently with her telling her that it was over-the money was gone and she wouldn’t see him ever again.
“But your child!” She screamed wildly, throwing a book at him but missing.
Robert was dumbfounded. He never wanted to be a father though the thought had crossed his mind as an attempt to yet again get some kind of reaction from his father.
They argued for hours after that. Natalia saying she would not abort it-Robert trying to bribe her to do it.
He wasn’t sure if it was a lame effort on her part to get him to stay or the money or maybe both. She agreed to take another pregnancy test to prove to Robert she really was and the hospital would phone him the results to a private cell phone he would purchase. He said that if she refused to abort it then he would give her money to keep the child quiet. This shut her up and he was finally allowed to fly home.
A week later the results were sent to him. She indeed was pregnant. Further private DNA tests proved that the child was indeed his. After a few more days and agonizing long phone calls she agreed to keep the child a secret for a handsome sum. He hated her for it. He hated the idea that some cheap Russian, money hungry whore was having his child and he didn’t even want a child! How could he be a father when his own was horrible? He didn’t even love this woman-he couldn’t even stand her!
He was done with women for a while he told himself. He wasn’t ashamed that he liked the company of men. At least they couldn’t get pregnant and fuck up his life further.
His uncle and only a handful of his father’s best PR people knew of the pregnancy. His father learned of it as well but never said anything to Robert about it directly-basically not acknowledging it at all. It was best swept under the rug he supposed. Anybody that did research on him would never know that his son, Julian Alek Novikov, born in the summertime in Moscow was alive and well never knowing of his real father.
And at first he didn’t want to know him-he wasn’t even sure of his exact birthdate. He was a mistake-a child born out of selfishness on his mother’s part. But the more Robert thought he realized it wasn’t the child’s fault and something pulled at his heartstrings.
He requested through his secret email account that she should send him pictures of him and she did. He didn't speak to her at all but he would wire her extra money for videos and pictures of his son. He looked like him-he had his eyes and cheekbones but had his mother’s black hair and lips. He paid her a huge sum to make sure Julian went to a good school and learned English. He wasn’t sure why he cared but he figured he wanted him to speak his father’s native language too even though he wouldn’t hear it.
When Julian turned two and Robert’s father was definitely taking a turn for the worse health wise-another relapse of the cancer Robert took a mini vacation to Moscow to visit his son-needing a distraction from the death looming over the office.
Natalia sent the nanny (she was living high on the hog now and he didn't doubt that the surplus of money was funding her expensive tastes) to meet Robert with his son at the hotel he was staying at. Of course Julian didn’t know him but he was a friendly enough child once Robert showed him the many gifts he brought him from the States.
Julian seemed surprised Robert spoke English and Julian-though his vocabulary was limited at that age-did speak English words pretty well.
The visit was short however. Robert was very flustered and ashamed with himself, having a mini panic attack and beating himself up internally. He had to stifle back tears as little Julian-his flesh and blood turned and gave him a little hug saying: “Bye Dada” before running into the arms of the trusted nanny.
He couldn’t work up the courage to see him after that. He figured he was better off not knowing him and what a coward his father really was.
___+++___
Rating: R (Will change to NC-17 for future chapters)
Summary: Cobb and Robert are finally free after Inception. Can they find a way to be free together?
Notes: There is really not enough Fischer/Cobb fic IMO. This is their chronicle of failure, redemption, turmoil, longing and eventually love! This is the fic I believe they deserve! So there!
Word Count: Roughly 3000
Free
He pushed through the revolving hotel doors-the humid air mingling with his cool skin.
He shielded his eyes from the glaring sun that had bathed everything in its glorious intense light.
He inhaled deeply taking in the smells of the summer afternoon- grass, rhododendron, and lilac. Everything looked so marvelous like he wanted to take a picture of the scene so he would never forget.
His eyes started to ache a little from squinting so he donned his designer sunglasses and checked his designer watch. If he continued to stand around and take in the sights he was going to be late. A small smile played on his lips.
He wouldn’t miss him for the world.
___+++___
It had been a year and a half since he woke up on the small charter plane taking him home to LA after the terribly long flight from Sydney and equally as long dream- the day that had cheesily enough changed his life forever.
He didn’t realize it at first though. He was only aware of how surreal and dare he say-happy and free he felt when he woke like he was seeing everything differently. It was like living one’s life looking at everything through opaque glass and then finally someone lifting it-making everything perfectly crystal clear. His shoulders were not slumping seemingly from some oppressive weight he was carrying and he didn't don his usual forced complacent face-the one that his father’s people told him made him look dreadfully older.
He felt bewildered (was he still dreaming?) but with that strange feeling he also felt calm. He felt like he could take a deep breath after holding it in for so long.
He moved about that day like he was in a fog-everything was real and not real. He was very afraid that the calm feeling would pass-that it was a fluke and that he would wake up the next day and again feel weighed down, lonely and miserable.
But it did not! Even going to his father’s funeral and watched as they lowered him into the ground, crying softly at the realization that his father never DID want this for him-the burden of having to run such a huge company-not having time for anyone, having to become someone that you are not. Robert gulped, stifling back another cry that threatened to bubble up thinking of his own family. He wasn’t sure of much but he had made a huge decision that day as he threw a rose on top of his father’s casket, saying his last goodbyes. He was tired of hiding, tired of living in someone’s shadow, having them make decisions for him. He was just tired and he wanted to make his own life. This seemed ridiculous at 34-why now? The dream, he just couldn’t shake the dream and he couldn’t shake him.
Once he was sure that this feeling, this strange but miraculous feeling of being free wasn’t disappearing he set out almost immediately in dissolving his father’s hard earned multibillion dollar company-the one that he supposedly was going to leave all to him one day. He didn’t want it. He only wanted two things now and both were going to be very hard to get.
He painstakingly tried to keep everything from his uncle Peter which was very hard since he had his hands in the company as well. Robert knew that his uncle sensed a change in him since he came home that day but he didn’t care. He distanced himself as much as he dared. He still loved his uncle but the residual feelings of the dream, the feelings of betrayal made him feel a little bitter towards him as well. Could his uncle have been keeping things from him all this time? Could it be possible? Robert thought about this a lot. If he was able to wake from such a profound, influential dream and feel like a new man then he faintly thought that maybe anything was possible.
He had begun to believe the unbelievable. He wasn’t a faithful or religious person but the freedom he felt now was one he was almost ready to thank the heavens for-like he had been reborn.
Could the dream be a sign from God himself? Robert laughed to himself lightly blaming tiredness.
He was doing research in his dimly lit grandiose study again; it must have been after two in the morning. He rubbed at his bleary eyes and shut the thick law books he was poring over.
He was a busy man these days-busier now than when he was still linked to his deceased father’s company.
It was a long, drawn out, tedious process. The money, lawyers, consultants, the list went on. The Board of Directors, creditors and shareholders were nonstop calling him with relentless questions about the sudden dissolution. When he had done as much research as he could and stopped production on the manufacturing and R&D levels he brought in the Board of Directors including his uncle for an impromptu meeting. He had never run a meeting like this before and should have been nervous but he wasn’t. He was calm and steady in his decision. He told them in a simplified speech that the company was dissolving and things would be divided accordingly. He had no desire to continue the company at this time. That was all. Faces were white, aghast; people gave out muffled cries of shock, worry and outrage. He didn’t stick around long to take in their objections or persuasions to think it over more-he was just dealing with grief after all. “No”-he firmly stated to them, resting his large hands on the huge table. “This is what I want. This is what my father wanted from me before he passed.” And he left-his uncle hot on his heels.
“Robert!” He cried out after him.
“For God sakes Robert hold up a minute.”
His uncle was keeping him from the other thing that was keeping him busy, up till late hours in the night. Robert ignored him.
He was practically sprinting down the grand hall to the equally as grand elevator. He looked at his watch and realized he would need to fly like the wind to get across town to meet with his other lawyers.
A warm hand was on his shoulder then. He turned almost begrudgingly and met his uncle’s tired eyes.
“Robert. Let’s talk about this just you and me. I didn’t realize you had these feelings. You could have came to me if you felt that you were in over your head.”
Robert blurted out a little sarcastic, exasperated laugh.
“But I don’t feel like I’m in over my head. Far from it. There’s nothing left to talk about. I just don’t want this,” he shrugged off his uncle’s touch. His uncle was keeping him from him-like him and his father were always doing.
“Robert,” he was pleading now, practically begging him to take some time to think about things, to take a vacation to clear his head, maybe talk to a professional if he didn’t want to speak to him-his uncle and confidant.
Robert tuned him out. For so long he complacently stood back and let him and his father take the reins but not anymore.
The elevator finally dinged-alerting him that it was available.
His uncle was still asking him to think about it, to reconsider. Robert stayed close mouthed until he heard his uncle say something almost hurtful.
“Robert, think of your father. He would want you taken care of!”
Robert had to restrain himself from coming out of the elevator and slapping his uncle.
He had never once felt any aggression towards him until then. He took a deep breath and buried the hostile feelings.
He stepped inside the elevator and pressed the “Door open” button on the elevator console to keep the door from closing. He wanted to make his last point clear.
He tried to keep all emotion out of his voice.
“Sweet uncle. You forget that I too am a father. He needs to be taken care of, he has been forgotten for too long. I don’t want him to grow up the same way I did..,” he pressed the “Door close” button. His uncle faltered and looked like he had been slapped-the precise reaction Robert wanted.
The elevator door started to close.
“Totally fucked up like me,” Robert finished, pasting a sarcastic grin on his face as the elevator door closed completely on his uncle, on his old life.
___+++___
Robert had many regrets but not being in his son’s life was his biggest.
Robert’s childhood was very strange after his mother died. He was only 11 years old and forced to be raised by a father that never gave him the time of day and nannies. He was home schooled and didn’t have much interaction with the outside world.
He was a lonely and bitter child-one that acted out just to get attention.
First it started with not doing his school work. Robert thought that if he didn’t do his homework or keep up with his studies then his father certainly would be cross, come back from whatever exotic location he was in and give him the belt himself.
This sadly was not the case. His father showed no interest in his studies and if he was keeping up with them or not. He would be scolded by his uncle and would get the belt from one of his private tutors-“A direct order from Mr. Fischer” they would always say. But where was his father? Why wasn’t he the one to discipline him? Robert would often cry himself to sleep wondering this very thing-scheming up other ways to get him to come home, to look at him, to just be around.
When slacking off in his studies didn’t work he then moved on to other more drastic ideas. Running away, causing small fires, swearing, stealing, getting aggressive with the tutors and destroying his bedroom. None of this worked to his dismay. He was only greeted with the same outcome-a strong verbal lashing from his uncle and the belt from a house assistant or tutor.
His uncle threatened to send him away to a boarding school abroad if he didn’t control himself. Robert thought madly that he should do it-he was 12 by that time and his father had only seen him twice that year. He figured his father wasn’t coming around anyway-why not go abroad? As much as his uncle would sit him down and sternly tell him to behave he couldn’t see leaving him. He didn’t want to lose his uncle the same way with his parents.
So he behaved but just enough to not get sent to boarding school.
When starting chaos wasn’t getting his father’s attention Robert thought of other mutilating tactics. When he was 14 he launched himself out of a tall tree-shattering his arm in the process. He claimed he fell and pleaded for doctors to contact his father-his only emergency contact. Well his father was in South Africa on business and most certainly could not come home though he wished Robert a speedy recovery-relayed to him from the hospital staff. He was in the hospital for weeks-his father never once coming to his aid. He never felt more alone.
___+++___
The last found memory he had of his father, when his mother was still living, was when they went to the city zoo together as a family. Robert had just turned 11 and his father made him a paper pinwheel-the only gift his father ever gave to him out of pure love and not necessity.
His mother was so pleased at his reaction that she took a picture of the two of them. That was the picture that Robert carried around with him to this day. To remind himself of his last day of his innocence.
His father loved to make things-he was always good with his hands. He often told Robert back in those days that if he wasn’t pressured to join the business/corporate world like his father that he would have been a carpenter. A faint smile would always creep up on his weathered face when he spoke of that Robert remembered.
Robert wanted to be a carpenter and work with his hands too because it seemed to please his father so much and he loved to see his father smile which was rare. He took books out of the library and tried paper Mache and origami-failing horribly at it in the process. If only he could construct things like his father had like with the pinwheel he loved so much.
In his free time he would mess around with the few tools they had in the shed. He tried to make a birdhouse taking the instructions from a book. It resembled more like two pieces of small wood steepled together. He presented it proudly to his father, a few months before his mother passed, who seemed put out but gritted his teeth and patted Robert on the head saying: “You need practice boy.”
There was little time for practice however-his mother passed that winter and his father became a ghost in his life. He was discouraged from any carpentry or side projects and to solely focus on his studies on business. He was to be a successor after all.
Robert kept the now brittle and falling apart pinwheel in a shoe box hidden away along with a couple of his mother’s processions he was able to squirrel away before the lawyers could get a hold of them. It was strange how he felt he needed to protect what little happiness he had in his life. Could everything that made him happy possibly fit in a shoebox? For him it could. He didn’t want his own son to feel the same.
His acting out for attention continued into his teenage years. No longer hidden away in the mansion when he turned 18 he immediately immersed himself in the party lifestyle during college. You know the types-the sons and daughters of the elite who are emotionally fucked up, fabulously rich and spoiled gather together for lavish parties getting ridiculously high and drunk (maybe at the same time) having orgies and complain loudly about their fucked up lives.
He made a point to sleep with men and women-hoping it would come back to his father. PR covered it all up-his father paid them handsomely so that none of the parties or wild sexcapades he went on ever came out to the public-damaging the Fischer name. That just led Robert to do it more.
He tried to step out publically with a boyfriend or a slutty girlfriend-these again were smothered by PR almost immediately.
When that didn’t work Robert thought of another completely selfish tactic. When he turned 30 and had no wife to speak of he went over to Russia. He had brief email correspondence with a young woman named Natalia. She worked for a mail order Russian bride service. Robert really did not want to get married but he figured that by marrying so quickly, so rashly and so over the top-it had to draw the attention of his father and not just the angry PR people he surrounded himself with or his uncle.
Natalia was beautiful but not his type at all. She was skinny as a rail, white as bone with wavy black hair and a set of big lips. Robert always liked blondes with a little more meat on their bones. He liked darker complexions. He believed this was because he was a brunette with pale skin and pale eyes and he was pretty thin himself-he wanted to lose himself in someone completely opposite of him.
He spent about a month with her, gauging if he could stand being married to her. The sex was fantastic but was boring after a while since she wanted him to take control every time-calling him “Big Daddy” (he was anything but big but took the compliment).
He resolved that he could not force himself to marry this woman. She had a very bad temper, was not really in love with him and was using him for his money-huge shocker there.
He remembered the day he learned he was going to be a father well. He was throwing things in his expensive leather suitcase, hurrying to pack to get to the airport for his private jet to take him back home, away from this folly. His uncle had sent urgent messages to him telling him that his father had collapsed at the office, was rushed to the hospital and that he was needed back home.
Robert was guiltily full of joy at the possibility that his father had asked for him! Finally after all these years and his father was possibly wanting his help!
Natalia was hanging on his arm, frowning her big lips, tossing her hair, pleading with him not to go. He argued vehemently with her telling her that it was over-the money was gone and she wouldn’t see him ever again.
“But your child!” She screamed wildly, throwing a book at him but missing.
Robert was dumbfounded. He never wanted to be a father though the thought had crossed his mind as an attempt to yet again get some kind of reaction from his father.
They argued for hours after that. Natalia saying she would not abort it-Robert trying to bribe her to do it.
He wasn’t sure if it was a lame effort on her part to get him to stay or the money or maybe both. She agreed to take another pregnancy test to prove to Robert she really was and the hospital would phone him the results to a private cell phone he would purchase. He said that if she refused to abort it then he would give her money to keep the child quiet. This shut her up and he was finally allowed to fly home.
A week later the results were sent to him. She indeed was pregnant. Further private DNA tests proved that the child was indeed his. After a few more days and agonizing long phone calls she agreed to keep the child a secret for a handsome sum. He hated her for it. He hated the idea that some cheap Russian, money hungry whore was having his child and he didn’t even want a child! How could he be a father when his own was horrible? He didn’t even love this woman-he couldn’t even stand her!
He was done with women for a while he told himself. He wasn’t ashamed that he liked the company of men. At least they couldn’t get pregnant and fuck up his life further.
His uncle and only a handful of his father’s best PR people knew of the pregnancy. His father learned of it as well but never said anything to Robert about it directly-basically not acknowledging it at all. It was best swept under the rug he supposed. Anybody that did research on him would never know that his son, Julian Alek Novikov, born in the summertime in Moscow was alive and well never knowing of his real father.
And at first he didn’t want to know him-he wasn’t even sure of his exact birthdate. He was a mistake-a child born out of selfishness on his mother’s part. But the more Robert thought he realized it wasn’t the child’s fault and something pulled at his heartstrings.
He requested through his secret email account that she should send him pictures of him and she did. He didn't speak to her at all but he would wire her extra money for videos and pictures of his son. He looked like him-he had his eyes and cheekbones but had his mother’s black hair and lips. He paid her a huge sum to make sure Julian went to a good school and learned English. He wasn’t sure why he cared but he figured he wanted him to speak his father’s native language too even though he wouldn’t hear it.
When Julian turned two and Robert’s father was definitely taking a turn for the worse health wise-another relapse of the cancer Robert took a mini vacation to Moscow to visit his son-needing a distraction from the death looming over the office.
Natalia sent the nanny (she was living high on the hog now and he didn't doubt that the surplus of money was funding her expensive tastes) to meet Robert with his son at the hotel he was staying at. Of course Julian didn’t know him but he was a friendly enough child once Robert showed him the many gifts he brought him from the States.
Julian seemed surprised Robert spoke English and Julian-though his vocabulary was limited at that age-did speak English words pretty well.
The visit was short however. Robert was very flustered and ashamed with himself, having a mini panic attack and beating himself up internally. He had to stifle back tears as little Julian-his flesh and blood turned and gave him a little hug saying: “Bye Dada” before running into the arms of the trusted nanny.
He couldn’t work up the courage to see him after that. He figured he was better off not knowing him and what a coward his father really was.
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