wickerpark | Family Matters

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Family Matters

It wasn't like it was actually a rule, but somehow it'd become habit that when Elisha had the door to his studio closed. If he was honest with himself - which he was for most things, but avoided for a few others - it was probably because he had a tendency to snap when he was interrupted.

In any case, it had the often welcome consequence of uninterrupted quiet whenever he wanted, and he sighed a little as he started his coffee pot and wandered towards one of the unfinished canvas. Needless to say, the sharp knock at the door was a surprise.

"Yeah?" He said.

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"And I don't think you do, either. Or do you think life ends after you hit sixty?" Elisha managed to get out before Hadyn opened the door, and his mouth thinned into a line. He crossed his arms over his chest.

"Well, then, it's a Kagan family holiday, isn't it?" He said. "We can't get through one without someone screaming at someone else."

"I never said life ended when you turn 60!" Ty snapped from around Hadyn, moving to step around his father as the man held up his hands in an effort to silence father and son. "You want to know why I don't call more? This! This is why I don't come home or call. All I hear when I do is 'you should have...'"

"Stop it!" Hadyn finally shouted over both of them. "For the love of God, do either of you hear yourselves?" He asked, looking from one to the other. "Tyler, your father just wants to feel like we're still a part of your life. We both do."

"Yeah well, part of my life is Oliver Byrd, and he doesn't seem to want to have anything to do with that." Ty snapped, glaring at Elisha.

Elisha cast his eyes up towards the ceiling. "Let's not kid ourselves," he said. "If I was falling all over Oliver, you'd find another reason. You've been edging away from us since you were thirteen. You stopped wanting me in your life, Tyler," he said. "And I don't really believe you've ever started wanting me back again."

"Elisha, don't..." Hadyn started, looking back at Elisha.

"No, no it's alright. Because as much as he says that, we all know he'd find it easier to just not deal with me at all. And he's felt that way a long time." Ty snapped back.

"No, that is not true..." Hadyn started, feeling as if the two of them were far too much alike for their own good.

"Dad, just...no. You two used to hide outside to talk, and you always thought no one could hear. But, heh, ironically, when you open the bath window you can hear it all. I seem to recall a few conversations about how much easier your lives would be if I weren't there."

Elisha stared at Ty for a moment, his lips tightening. "I'd be lying if I said I'd never said that," he said in a quieter tone. Of course, he'd at least thought the same thing with Sarah at one point, and even with Izak. He wasn't, maybe, a natural parent. Even if it'd been his idea.

"But our lives would have been worse without you, too, Ty. We love you."

"Ty," Hadyn started, feeling entirely guilty and ashamed for something he couldn't change or even begin to apologize for. Except that he'd never meant those words to be heard by any of their children.

"Just, don't. I just...I'm tired of doing this, okay. I'm tired of the guilt trips, and the arguing. And yeah, it would be nice if someone didn't act like Oliver kidnapped me and never let me go home."

Elisha rubbed his forehead and shook his head when Hadyn looked at him. "There's nothing I can say," he said, as much to Hadyn as Ty.

Nothing, at least, that wouldn't just keep spiraling them into worse.

"Yeah, pretty much the same as always." Ty said, finally snatching the door open and slamming it shut behind him.

Hadyn just sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose before turning to look at Elisha. "There are times...I..." Just didn't know how to deal with Ty. Sarah, even at her worst, was not the hurricane that Tyler could be. Nor was Elisha- who just simmered and stewed until he broke a brush on a canvas.

"Are you okay?"

Elisha flopped into a chair and threw his hands up. "I don't know," he said. "I just...I feel like that would have happened eventually no matter what. Even if Ollie and I got along like gangbusters, that was going to happen eventually."

Well, that was probably true. Regardless of what Hadyn wanted to believe, Ty was a simmering pot of....whatever it was that was buried so very deep inside.

"Maybe," Hadyn said as he moved closer to Elisha and sat next to him. "But...maybe we haven't done enough on our part either." It didn't seem fair to blame themselves for being left behind, but...they were parents. "He hasn't needed us for a long time, it was almost like he never...really needed us at all."

Which was the problem, he supposed. A parent just wanted to be important to his kid. "Do you remember when he was about ten, and....he was skateboarding, I think, and fell. Just...busted himself up pretty bad. Only, he didn't go home or even a friends. He walked, bleeding, down to the corner store and tried to buy all the bandages he'd need by himself. If Alan Goldstein hadn't called you, I don't think we'd ever have found out about it."

Elisha laughed a little. "Sometimes it's more like he would have preferred to raise himself," he said, slumping down in his chair. "Sarah needs us. Shit, Izak even needs us sometimes. But Ty can't stand needing anyone."

He picked up his cold coffee. He sort of wished it was whiskey, but it was too early for that. "Especially not me, apparently."

"He needs us, Elisha." Hadyn said, leaning in closer to Elisha. "He just needs us in a different way. He...doesn't know how to ask. He's so much like you, Elisha. You might as well have been his own parent for all he got from me."

He took one of Elisha's hands in his, squeezing it gently. "If....you let him leave like this, you'll regret it. And I love both of you too much to watch that."

"He's not going to listen to me," Elisha said. "Come on. He listened to me more when he was fifteen, when no one listens to their damn parents." But despite that, Hadyn was probably right, and he sighed. "After he gets back from the airport. Oliver's jumping ship, I don't know if we'd reached full decibel for that part or not."

"No...But...Oliver mentioned it when he came in search of coffee." Hadyn said, sighing a little. Oliver was, he figured, always going to be the one that actually stole Ty away from Elisha. Maybe, at the heart of it, that was why Elisha couldn't get over it.

"They make each other happy," he said after a moment, "maybe that is the only thing we can ask for. For better or worse, we're a family."

Elisha slanted Hadyn a look and shrugged. "I guess so," he said. There was something of a tone of defeat in his voice, something that hadn't happened very often in the years he and Hadyn had been together.

"I'll try talking to Ty when he gets back," he said, standing up. "I can't guarantee he's going to bother listening to me."

"So make him listen, and try not yelling at him." Hadyn suggested with a smile. "Have you eaten yet? Because...Micah is daring to cook in your kitchen, with the help of Izak. and...assuming that the canvas hasn't seduced you yet, it would be nice for you to join us."

He smiled at Elisha, before leaning in and kissing the man he loved. "Just...remember that he loves you, darling. No matter what it might seem like."

Easier said than done, Elisha thought, but he just forced a half smile on his face. "It didn't have time," he said dryly. "I was interrupted pretty quickly. What are we having? And Micah does realize that our kitchen doesn't stay kosher very long, right?"

He didn't respond to the last part of Hadyn's statement, though, because he didn't doubt that Ty loved them both. He just doubted that he wanted them as anything other than figures on the edges of his real life.

"Oh....I don't know. Hashbrowns, something...else. I don't really remember the various things he mentioned, but Izak assures me it taste well enough." He said, with a shrug. "And I assume he knows it won't stay kosher. He does live with Izak." He didn't say it, but it was perhaps ironic that the two members of the family who tried hardest to remain kosher...was Ty and Elisha.

"Come on, then." He said as he stood. "Lets try to have some holiday cheer. We could go look at the lights tonight." Something.

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Family Matters

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