Adventures of Matt Parkman, Chapter 15: Wait til dad gets home
Matt woke up as his father came into the bedroom and told him to get up. The younger Parkman blinked up from the bed, wiping sleep out of his eyes. Maury looked angry, very angry - disappointed in his son. He took off his belt and hit him across the face with it.
Matt woke up with a start from the dream of his father hitting him, adrenaline running through him and making pins and needles rush through his fingertips. It seemed so real, so certain. He touched his face where the edge of the belt had caught him. It felt fine - it had just been another bad dream. He had those almost constantly these days. He slumped back against the pillow. He didn't need to look over - he knew Patty was gone. She must have left earlier for some errand. It was probably a good thing. He had a bad habit of pulling her mind into his nightmares. He shifted, pulled the sheet up and started to go back to sleep.
He shut his eyes and heard Patty's keys rattling outside the door. He smiled slightly. She must be back already. The timing was good. He was awake enough to want her. He tried to push away the premonition it was his father, not his lover. His father was dead, after all. In his mind's eye, he saw the deadbolt slide back and then the main lock and the knob turned - his father's hand was on it, he was sure. It was an irritating certainty, because it was not the reality Matt wanted. He closed his eyes, wishing he could convince himself he was dreaming again.
The door opened. Someone walked in with a heavy tread that wasn't Patricia's. He knew the time had come for his father's arrival, or at least the arrival of the person impersonating his father. The visitor walked directly to the door of their bedroom, which was hanging open. Had Matt been looking, he would have seen his paterfamilias approach. "Get up," he told his son curtly as a way of greeting.
Unsurprised, but still disappointed, Matt sat up and put his hand to his face, feeling the phantom pain of being hit in the dream. He waited to see if that was next, but apparently not - not yet. His father tilted his head like he heard something and walked over to open the door of the second bedroom. He opened it quietly, cautiously. Ryan was in that room, lying on Matt's futon on the floor. He raised his head at the sound of the door opening, but had no other reaction to it.
Maury looked at the man there and exhaled slowly, tightly. He turned and stalked back into his son's room. Matt was sitting on the edge of the bed, recovering from a yawn. He yanked a sheet over himself as the person who looked like his father intruded again. The older man asked, "Is that… yours?" His lip curled in disgust, as if he'd found some abused child chained to a bedpost. "Whose else would it be?" Maury muttered softly to himself.
Matt shrugged and grimaced. He was still trying to parse how he was certain in the future this was his dad, but he had his doubts at the present time. He wasn't proud of what had happened to Ryan, but it had worked out okay. He was like a dog, a family pet. He was taken care of, so Matt didn't see what his father was so shocked about. The younger Parkman looked around the room uncertainly for his clothes, still trying to wake up. Maury grabbed his pants from where they were hanging on the back of the door and threw them at him with barely contained fury. "Get up! Get dressed!" he said through clenched teeth. He turned on his heel and walked out to the living room, pacing.
Matt staggered out a few minutes later, dressed in only his pants. It had taken him a while to get into them. He was rarely very coordinated in the mornings anymore. He'd be weak and out of sorts for a little while. He rubbed at his eyes and went in the kitchen, starting some coffee. Caffeine would help. He looked over at the angry man in his living room. Yep, definitely looks like Dad. He shook his head. It had happened. Things would change now. He wasn't sure how, but he knew they'd change.
His father walked towards him slowly, stopping in the entrance of the kitchen. Matt looked up at him from where he was putting away the container of coffee. Maury was looking him up and down with an intent scrutiny. His son was still shirtless, which did him no favors but made his physical condition apparent.
He was thin, very thin, approaching half his previous weight and it did not look good on him. His muscle tone, that which he'd had, was degraded. His skin was sallow and slightly jaundiced, unusually rough on his face. His hair was coarse. Matt had bags and dark circles under his eyes, which even now, even sleepy and tottering slightly, had a faintly maniacal look to them.
"Matthew," his father said simply, "What have you done to yourself?"
Matt grimaced at him, uncomfortable at being called his full name. Only his parents and teachers had ever called him that and then only when he was in trouble. The question went unanswered. He said, "I thought you were dead."
"I'm not."
Matt grunted as Maury gave him no other explanation. "What are you doing here?" He decided to accept the truth of the future, even if it still didn't make sense yet in the present. This was his father.
"I came to get you." The elder Parkman frowned and rephrased. He was already screwing it up, straying from Angela's advice. He worked on getting back on target. "I came here to give you a choice, to offer to bring you out of this. You don't have to come with me. You can stay here if you'd prefer." He stopped as the door to the back bedroom opened again and Ryan came out, slouching and slightly shuffling. He'd been woke up. He'd heard the new voice. Matt assumed some residual curiosity brought him out.
Ryan stood up straighter and moved more gracefully in a sudden transition. Maury's head snapped around to Matt, who moved one shoulder in something of a shrug. He preferred Ryan to move correctly, so he made him do so when he was around. The boy sat down on the couch and stared vacantly at the older man.
Maury put his hand over his face, closed his eyes and shook his head slowly. "You made a zombie. You made… a fucking… zombie." He dropped his hand and looked at Matt, who shrugged with both shoulders this time.
"He's fine. He's off the street."
"He's what?" his father's voice was quiet, dangerous. When Matt didn't answer right away, he paced out next to Ryan and cocked his head at him. Ryan stared at him blankly, but Matt knew his father was in Ryan's head. He could feel it brushing at the edges of his consciousness. Something snapped and Matt could no longer sense Ryan linked to his mind.
Matt pulled himself together and walked into the living room. "Leave him alone!" He shoved his father on the shoulder.
The man let him, ending his connection to Ryan and looking to Matt. "Why? Why do you care? Look what you've already done to him." He pointed. "Do you think I'm going to poke around in there and do something worse?"
Matt glanced down at Ryan, who was still staring off at the same point he'd been looking at earlier. Matt's presence, Maury's motion, the pointing - none had elicited a reaction. He stared, turned off. Matt reached into him and found all as it had been before, other than the link being severed, but for some reason the man wasn't processing what was happening around him. Matt looked at his father. "What did you do?"
"I took off your glove; took the saddle off your horse. You don't need him, Matthew. That's disgusting!"
Matt blinked at Ryan, not sure what his father meant.
"What have you been doing with him anyway? Keeping him around like some brain-damaged tard? Do you use him in the bedroom like a blow up doll, maybe ride him to have sex with that woman you keep?" At Matt's expression, Maury staggered back a step in surprise. One of those last things he'd said was true. He'd been grabbing at what he thought was the worst possible thing he could be doing with the man. "Oh God, Matthew," he breathed. He hadn't seriously believed he might actually be doing any of that.
Matt snarled at him, "I've had enough of your disapproval, 'Dad'! Now get out. Get out before I make you."
Maury matched him. "Is that your answer for everything these days? Control everyone who disappoints you, disagrees with you, argues with you? What did this one do to you?" He gestured at Ryan. "Give you the finger?"
Matt flinched again as his father guessed far too close to the truth for his comfort. "Get out!"
He thought his father would fight him, resist him, stay there and argue with him. He figured if anyone could, it would be his dad. For a moment it looked like he would, but then he turned and walked out. He stood on the other side of the door for a moment, in the hall outside the apartment. He turned around, having done what was ordered.
Matt exhaled as his father merely stood there silently, saying nothing. He was looking at his son standing next to Ryan, looking at Matt's poor health, thinking about his instability, feeling sorry for him… but Matt knew none of this. He looked at his father and couldn't read his mind like he could everyone else's. He had to rely on his expression and right now it was difficult to make sense of.
In a strangled voice, his father said, "Please Matthew, please. Think about this - think about it very carefully. This is one of those choices you have to make and only you can make. I'm willing to walk away from here and leave you…" He gestured past Matt at Ryan. "… leave you to it. If that's… if that's how you want to live." He took a deep, steadying breath and leaned one hand on the doorframe. He seemed uncomfortable with what he was saying. What he was uncomfortable with was that it was true. He would leave. That was how it worked with precogs, or so Angela Petrelli had told him. Lying about what you were going to do was futile.
He went on, "You're dying, inside and out. I'm not a stranger, Matt." His son walked closer, looking at him with narrowed eyes. Maury guessed at the reason for that expression. He'd had decades of seeing into people. He knew what made them tick, what motivated them, what mattered. He went on, "I might not know you as well as you wish I did, but I know myself. I have your power, your ability, Matt. I know… the temptations. I also… I also know how empty that is, how pointless life becomes. You're a good man, Matt. I've looked at what you've done with your life… graduating, becoming a cop, getting married, having a little boy… a family, while you had your ability - I know how hard that is, Matt."
His son was close enough for Maury to look back and forth between his eyes and he did, searching his face. His father asked him, "I can help you. Do you really want me to leave you again?"
Matt rocked slightly as the words made an impact. One of the most traumatic events of his life had been Maury leaving them when he was thirteen, abruptly and with no explanation. He'd always wondered if it was something he'd done. He was almost sure it was - things half-remembered, tickling at the back of his mind, a feeling of guilt, but no facts, no clear recollection. Thirteen was old enough to know and see how it made a difference in their life. Maury had been many things as a father, and many of them bad, but his absence had left a hole that had never been filled in Matt's life.
Matt exhaled, then looked down and back and forth across the floor. He walked over to one of the wooden chairs near the table, sank down on it and covered his face. All he could think of was little Matty and how whatever it was Matt had become, it had made him leave his family. He'd left them just like his father had left him, except Matty wouldn't even have what memories Matt did of having a real family, an intact family. He wouldn't know the difference. He'd never know what he'd lost. He drew in a shuddering breath and looked at his father, still waiting at the door. "Help me then," he said.
His father leaned in the door, but he didn't come in. He said, "Do you really want help, or are you just asking because you feel guilty?"
Matt shook his head, uncomprehending. "Why else would I be asking? Of course I feel guilty!"
Maury stepped into the doorway, leaning his back against the opposite side of the frame. "I don't know. I guess I thought maybe you'd feel compassion or a desire to accomplish something meaningful with your life. You know, one of those things you seem obsessed with."
Matt stood up and paced, angry. "What are you talking about? I have accomplished meaningful things in my life! I've saved people." He held out his hands at his father as if showing him something. The older man looked at them like they were stained with blood. "I've prevented horrible things from happening!" He threw up his hands at his father's look and snarled, pacing away. I ask for help and I get more recriminations?
Maury stepped into the room as Matt turned and came back. He pointed at Ryan. "Did you save him? Did you stop that horrible thing from happening?"
Matt paused, looking at Ryan with dead eyes. He'd been a piece of street trash. Matt had removed someone who was a drain on society, a leech, a festering wound who went around hurting people and causing problems on a daily basis. As moving as his current state was, it was difficult for the younger Parkman to feel he'd done something wrong. He snapped his head back to his father and said, "You don't know what he was before I got to him."
"Oh yes I do," he said, his voice deep and thick with emotion. "Matthew! He was a MAN before you got to him. He was a human being." He shook his head, lowering it, reaching out towards his son. "He's not that anymore."
Matt swallowed and walked further away. "It doesn't matter," he muttered.
"It doesn't matter?" Maury's voice rose. "It doesn't FUCKING MATTER? What the fuck are you, Matt? It doesn't fucking matter!" His face twisted in rage. He grabbed at his waist, unclasping his belt. For a moment Matt was confused, thinking he was going to drop his pants but then he remembered the dream. Matt stood there silently. He was going to be hit. There was no point in trying to evade it so he didn't even try. His father took off his belt and struck him across the face with it.
The pain woke Matt up to the here and now, rather than the inevitable and unavoidable. It didn't matter if it was fate, that had hurt like hell! He grabbed his face and lurched away, cursing. His father said, voice heavy, "Turn around!"
"What?" he looked up at him, head pulled in, wary. The other man was still holding the doubled belt up like a weapon.
"I said fucking turn around! I'm going to hurt you for what you did to him because it fucking DOES MATTER!"
Matt glared at him. He wasn't a kid.
His father stepped closer to him. Matt held his ground, balling his fists. The older man said huskily, "It's the only revenge he's ever going to get for what you did to him. That's your body." He pointed at Matt. "It will heal. This," he lofted the belt, "might hurt, but you will heal. What you did to him can't be healed, Matthew. It's over for him! And if you don't, I'm going to use this!" he pointed at his temple with his free hand, eyes bright and seeming abnormally large, boring into Matt's. "And in my current state, that's not going to be good for you." He shook his head menacingly and then smiled, baring his teeth. "Your choice, Matthew."