The Parent Revolution (A Hamilton AU)

16. The Knock

There was a knock on the door, and no one wanted to answer it.

-- 12 hours earlier--

"I think she's the one," Alexander said, laying back on the cool grass to look up at the stars. "I really do."

Beside him, Laf was doing his best to hold in his emotions. Fear, anger, confusion, sadness. He was afraid that if he let any of them show, even just a little bit, like a silent tear, he might not be able to stop. Instead, keeping his voice even, he asked his father, "What about Mum? Did you think she was the one, too?"

Alexander shifted, turning so he was on his side, looking at his son. For a moment, all was silent. Should I tell him? he wondered, guilt churning in his stomach. Thomas has a right to know. But that doesn't mean I want to tell him. 

"No. I knew she wasn't."

Laf's breath caught. He couldn't breathe. Hands trembling, he reached up to his throat. Finally,  he suck in some air, but that didn't stop him from shaking.

"I know what you must be thinking, Thomas," Alexander continued, looking back at the indigo sky. "What sort of sick sociopath would do that to another person? Especially someone as kind and as loving as your mother..." he trailed off, and shifted position for a third time. When he started speaking again, his voice was softer, more vulnerable. "I did it because I wanted her to be the one. More than that, I needed to be the one. And as the years went on, I knew in my heart it was a lost cause,  but I was too damn desperate to make it work that I refused to see it. And then she got pregnant. Then you were born, Thomas. And I saw you, and I knew that you were the best thing that could ever happen to me. I swore I'd be around for you.

"So I refused to let you go. We fought for weeks over you, Thomas. I think I lost a part of me in the fight. I don't know. I'm thinking that maybe I didn't leave that battle a winner. I got you, which is a victory I never thought I'd deserve, but I came out of it changed. Instead of being everything I could be, instead of giving everything I had to you, I was selfish. You were just a kid, and I was so selfish..." 

Alexander couldn't finish, a strangled sob cutting off his words, silent, guilty tears rolling down his cheeks and onto the lawn. Laf was finally unfrozen. "Do you think that, maybe, you're doing the same thing with Angelica?"

He watched Alexander's dark form, and saw it start to shake. Laf thought it was sobs, but then his father turned around, and Laf saw the tears and the smile. His father was laughing so hard he was crying. Either that, or he was crying so hard he was laughing. 

"Of course that's what I'm doing!" Alexander managed to say, his body still racked with mirth. "Angelica's not what I want. She's what I want to want, what I need to want! And this time, I'll make it work. She's as smart as I am, she's beautiful, kind, and funny. It has to work!" 

He was no longer laughing.

Slowly, Laf put his arm around his father. "You need to tell her," he said quietly. "She deserves to know."

--4 hours earlier--

Emerging from his bed like a butterfly from a cocoon, Laf decided to go downstairs to check on his dad. After their talk the night before, Alexander had left to go talk to Angelica, and Laf had fallen asleep while Alexander was still out. Since the door to the master bedroom was wide open, Laf knew that if his dad was home, he was most likely on the couch on the living room.

When he reached the main floor, his entire body relaxed when he saw his father's crumpled form on the couch. Laf hadn't even noticed he was tensed up. 

--3 and a half hours earlier--

Alexander woke to a splitting headache and the sound of eggs frying. Opening one bloodshot eye, he saw the figure of his son in the kitchen and the sunlight streaming in through the window.

He pulled himself up with a groan, his whole body screaming in protest, but his head screamed the loudest. Laf saw he was awake and hurried over to him, a plate of warm eggs, bacon and toast in hand. Neither of them said anything, but Alexander took the offering and started working on it, forcing down his nausea.

Laf was washing dishes. Technically, it was Alexander's turn to do them, but, given the circumstances, he decided to let it go. The only sounds in the house were the gentle clinking of glasses against silverware, the spray of the faucet, the sounds of Alexander eating, and the distant patter of the housekeeper many floors above. To any onlooker, it was just another lazy Saturday, nothing extraordinary. 

That's where they would be wrong. This was, in fact, a very, very important Saturday. 

Eventually, after minutes and minutes of silence, Alexander broke. "I guess you're wondering what happened last night," he started. Laf said nothing. "I told her everything, including your mother. I told her I was afraid, but that I was sure she could be the one for me. I could be the one for her."

He took a long, shuddering breath, then continued. "I begged her to stay. I've changed,  I kept telling her. You've changed me. Please don't leave me. And then she told me I could go to hell. So I found a liquor store, and I drank it."

Putting his head in his hands, Alexander hiccoughed-sobbed, both out of shame and out of anguish. Laf watched, wondering how in the goddamned hell this man was still able to get up in the morning, how he was able to churn out thousands and thousands of papers, typing away furiously at his computer. Alexander Hamilton was a man with incredible strength, he realized. The strongest man he'd ever known.

Laf sat down beside his father and waited for the tears to subside. When they had slowed from a torrent to a trickle, he decided to tell him everything. He deserves to know.

"So, you remember that summer camp...?"

--1 hour earlier--

"You've got to be shitting me," Alexander said, mixing himself another hangover remedy. He'd had four of them already, and his head was still pounding at the rate of his racing heartbeat. Clearly, four wasn't enough. 

Laf didn't say anything to that, since he knew his dad was just in denial. Some part of him knew that it was real, not a joke, but he just didn't want to face it. And who could blame him? He'd had a rough couple of days, what with the breakup and all, and then he learned that his long-lost son was pretending to be his other son in order to get to know him. Talk about crazy.

"There's just one more thing--"

Alexander jumped up, nearly spilling the puke-green, soupy mixture all over the kitchen floor, and shouted, "No more! I am the man of this house and there will be no more words spoken here today!"

They locked eyes and stared at each other for an uncomfortably long amount of time. Then Laf broke the law. "Mum and Thomas are in a plane, flying here right now."

Everything froze. Time no longer existed. The light was gone from his father's eyes. 

Alexander staggered, no longer able to support himself with his legs alone. Half falling, half sliding onto the couch, he stared forward into nothingness. Then, slowly, he raised his glass to his lips. He tilted his head back in one violent motion, then dumped the entire contents down his throat. Setting his now-empty glass onto the floor, he curled up into a ball and promptly fell asleep. 

All things considered, Laf thought it went pretty well.

--the present--

There was a knock on the door.

Alexander shot up into the air, his hair an unbelievable mess. He was awake now, and overcome with fear. There was a reason he hadn't kept in touch with her. And he had changed, but maybe not enough. 

Laf glanced at the door with unease. Somehow, he felt as if he was a traitor, even though he thought The Plan was something good, something to bring them together.

There was a knock on the door, and no one wanted to answer it.