adam "now he's a spooky 10" lynch (parrish) (tamquam) wrote in valloic, @ 2023-06-02 15:44:00
WHO: The little versions of Adam Parrish and Yue! WHAT: Being little guys who explore stuff outside and talk about never wanting to leave Vallo (Also, about how cool Goku from Dragonball is.) WHEN: Sometime during the age/timeslip plot WARNINGS: Implied mentions of child abuse because both of them have shitty parents. STATUS: Complete
The water burbled through the creek, rippling a little as it flowed passed the rocks, the water cold and so clear that Yue could see the tiny fish the tiny fish swimming along the stones and the weeds. Nearby, a dragonfly flitted down onto the water, and then away again as another dragonfly took flight after it. Tokyo had plenty of waterways, but none like this, nestled among the grass and surrounded by the quiet of the country; Yue had never seen anything like this. At least, not since the last time he’d come to Vallo.
He wished he didn’t have to go back home. He wished he could stay in Vallo forever. He wished, at the very least, when he went home he could remember Vallo, and how nice everyone was, and all the friends he had.
He’d managed to jump to one of the large stones in the middle of the creek without even getting his feet wet, and now he crouched on in, peering down into the water. “I bet I could catch one of those fishes with my bare hands,” he announced after a moment.
This place reminded him of home. Adam didn't live in a big city, he had only seen pictures in the books his teachers read to him or the ones he found in the library—but never, ever took home. The rolling farmlands and low-lying forests were a familiar backdrop to Henrietta. It also helped that he had been here before, only once in Vallo, but once was enough to make it a dream he wanted to return to again and again. It also meant it was a place he wanted to show his new friends.
He wished he could take them home with him as well. But that was silly, illogical, not something that was real. Just like catching a fish with their bare hands. He squinted at Yue, dubiously.
"No way," Adam said, from the safety of the shore. He didn't think he could get to a rock without getting his sneakers wet, and he only had one pair. If they were ruined he would not have any. "You would have to leave your hands in the water for a long time so they came close enough to you, but—" Adam stuck his hand in, then immediately out. "Your hands would freeze, I think."
“Totally way. You just gotta be really fast. Like Goku.” Yue was very confident about this. He’d seen it in anime all the time. If you were fast you could catch all the fish you wanted.
He plunged his hand into the water, with all the speed and power that Goku would, no doubt, display in such a circumstance. His face and then the rest of him cheerfully followed after when Yue discovered that his balance hadn’t been nearly as stable as he thought it was.
He came up sputtering, sitting on the creek bottom, the water coming up to his chest. “I think I almost had one!” he said, trying, but coming nowhere near succeeding in pretending like all of that had been completely intentional. He squinted into the water around him. “All the fishes are gone now though,” he pouted, standing.
Adam had not expected Yue to fall in. He had been patiently watching for him to not catch a fish, because it was impossible unless you had been doing it all your life and even then it seemed really difficult. He also, simultaneously, did not know who Goku was and was attempting to sort through his small internal rotary of information and see if he could figure it out. He opened his mouth to finally say, "I don't know who Goku is," when he was met with the splash.
Adam's eyes went wide. He no longer cared about Goku or fish or anything but Yue in the water. "Are you okay?" He asked, as he started to tear off his sneakers and his socks. He was going to go in after his friend. Even if the creek was shallow, Adam didn't know if it was safe.
"I've seen all kinds of stuff in the creek, and sometimes snakes live in there—" Not that there were but there could. Adam stepped into the water, which was much colder than he expected. But he was tough, he wouldn't let cold water stop him. He held out his hand. "The fish will come back, but maybe not right now."
“I’m okay,” Yue said, examining a scraped elbow. It stung a little, but it wasn’t too bad. “Thank you,” he added, taking Adam’s hand and pulling himself up. “You didn’t have to come in after me, you know. The water’s cold. Do you really think there’s snakes in here? Do you think they’re poisonous?”
Getting bitten by a poisonous river snake sounded terrible, and even though the sun was warm, the water was cold enough that he thought his teeth would start to chatter, so it was probably best to get out of the river. He headed toward the shore.
"Yes, I had to," Adam responded, without missing a beat. No one would come after him, not back in Henrietta. Maybe someone here at the Barns, where he had new friends and adults who care about what he was doing and where he was going and believed his art was good enough to hang on the fridge. So he wasn't going to take other people for granted, and he definitely wasn't going to let them get waterlogged in the creek.
Adam followed Yue back to the shore. "Sometimes there are venomous snakes that could bite you. Water snakes that—'' Adam made the zigzagging-winding motion with his hand to indicate the movement of a snake. "Right across the surface of the water. "
He frowned a bit at Yue's wet clothes, and then looked down at his own wet muddy feet. "I know where there are blankets to dry off and then no one will know you fell in, except for me. But I won't tell anyone. I'm good at keeping secrets."
Yue shot Adam a look of profound relief. He'd been trying to figure out how to suggest they find somewhere in the sun to wait until they dried off. He'd never actually seen Syd angry before, not really, though sometimes she looked it when he mentioned his dad (so he tried not to mention him often), but he was pretty sure even Syd would get mad if she found out Yue had jumped into the creek with all his clothes on.
"Thank you," he said, meaning it. He took a couple steps in his squelching runners before he stopped to take them off. "Japan has lots of snakes too. Some of them swim on the water too! I don't think they can hurt you though." Now he wondered if they really were venomous. He considered putting one in Sae's bed to scare her – she deserved it – but he didn't like to think about what would happen if his dad found out. "You sure know a lot about things."
Adam felt a little bad about worrying Yue. Sometimes his need to explain all the knowledge in his brain wasn't always tactful. Sometimes adults thought he was being rude. Sometimes his dad would tell him no one wanted to hear him speak. Being quiet and observant was Adam's specialty, one he had learned from habit and necessity. But what was he supposed to do when he knew a piece of information?
He picked up his shoes and socks, and started to lead the way to one of the barns that was close to the creek. If Yue was going to walk without shoes on, so was Adam. He gave a half of a shrug about knowing a lot of things; no one liked a brat who thinks he knows more than adults.
"I like to read," Adam said instead. He did, but that didn't really explain why. It was just easier to say that instead. "And I like to learn about things. I like going to school. I've never been to Japan. I know where it is, though. And I've seen some pictures in the geography books in the library. Do you like it there?"
Yue thought about the question for a time, frowning to himself. “I like the anime and movies,” he said after a moment. “And I mean, obviously I love my mom and dad.” His dad hit him a lot, but Yue knew that was his own fault. His dad loved him and just wanted him to be better. His mom told him how his dad had given him his name, Yue, only one character different from his sister’s name, Sae, whom his dad loved a lot, and even though his dad had never given him anything else, obviously his name was the most important thing he could ever be given.
“I like it better here though. I don’t want to go back.” He felt a stab of guilt about it. He should want to go home. But Vallo felt safe, and there was magic, and there was Syd and El and all the friends he’d made the two times he’d visited here. He loved art camp, and the fact that no one thought he was a loser for wanting to draw. No one yelled at him. No one beat him. No one called him names. “Vallo’s the best place in the whole universe.”
"I know what you mean," Adam said, probably the most honest he had ever been in his short life. "I didn't want to go back either when I was here the first time." Adam didn't remember the Barns or Vallo when he was back home in his bed, and maybe it was better that way too. He wouldn't know what to do with his whole heart bursting to get away from the double-wide trailer knowing that people like Ronan and Gansey were in houses so close to his. That safety was just a bike ride away.
"But I think," Adam said carefully, as he slowed his walk on the incline of the hill. "We should just do a bunch of things we don't get to do at home. Where no one can say we can't do things we like." Adam was allowed to run around outside for as long as he wanted for fun not because he was afraid of going back inside his house. And he could eat warm meals and sugary snacks because he was offered them, not hiding them because of the generosity of strangers in front of his parents who wouldn't take handouts.
"I saw your art. It was really nice. We can do that all the time too if you like making art. And maybe Syd will let us watch anime and you can tell me who Goku is." Because it was absolutely bugging his little mind not to know something.
“What’s the point if we can’t even remember when we get home?” Yue muttered to himself bitterly, kicking at the grass. He didn’t expect an answer though, not really. He tried to enjoy Vallo for what it was, he did. When he’d woken up in that bed in the strange, messy room again he’d been overjoyed. But the longer he stayed, the more he remembered that he wouldn’t remember, wouldn’t be able to stay.
“But yeah, I can show you Dragonball! There’s a bunch of other anime movies on CDs in my bedroom too! I haven’t seen a lot of them, but they’re probably pretty cool.” There were a lot of non-anime movies too, though some of them had looked pretty scary. “But if you haven’t seen Dragonball you gotta watch it. It’s like, the best ever. Goku’s really small but he’s also really strong too and always wins fights even when the other person is way bigger than him, and he’s kind and pure-hearted too!”
Adam frowned. What was the point of not remembering? It seemed like a lot of work to bring him and other kids here for a few days. "I think," Adam started to say, stopped, reconsidered. "I think it's to know that not everything is bad. That maybe one day things can get better. And there are people who care about the things you say and if you get hurt." Accidentally breaking a plate while cooking dinner with Ronan and Gansey last time came to mind.
"A lot of the people here are like Goku," Adam said. Even if he didn't know who or what Yue was talking about—soon to be rectified by watching—it was easy to think of the other people at the Barns who were kind and pure-hearted. Adam was already becoming cynical so young, but that was because he was met often with the unfairness of the world. The people here showed him it didn't have to be that way.
"Do you think they will watch Dragonball with us?"
Yue thought about what Adam, frowning. He liked that Adam seemed to understand what he meant. When he was in Vallo, he felt, well, hopeful. He felt like people cared about him, and that if he loved them enough they’d love him back. If he couldn’t stay in Vallo forever, then he wished that he could at least hold onto that feeling when he went home. He knew that he just had to try harder, but sometimes it was hard to want to try. “I wish…” He frowned, thinking of how to say it. “I wish we could just put all the good stuff about Vallo in a jar, and then when we’re home we can open up the jar and remember it all over again.”
You know, assuming that he couldn’t just stay. Maybe someday he’d get to.
“You mean like Ronan and everyone?” Yue asked, brightening a little. “If they want to they can! Everyone should watch Dragonball!”
Adam wished for that too. Vallo could be his secret, stashed under the bed in the shoebox with his other secrets. The scraps of happiness and wishful future he wanted to build for himself. It changed over the years, as he got older—and would change more when he grew into that determined, hyper-focused highschooler—but right now it felt like Vallo could be the only thing he ever wanted.
But he also knew it was not possible. People couldn't bottle things up into jars. He looked at Yue, and just nodded. "Me too," Adam said. Agreeing was easier than trying to fight it. He didn't want to be unhappy and he didn't want to make Yue unhappy either.
"And yeah, everyone. Ronan. And Gansey. And Matthew. And Syd, and Blue. And Chainsaw. And Chorizo. And Houdini." Adam was counting them all on his fingers, afraid that he might have missed someone. "And then we can all talk about Goku together."
He gave Yue a once over, scrunching up his face. "After we get dry, I think."
“After we get dry,” Katou agreed, but already the sun was warming him. He didn’t think it would be that long to get dry. “And then everyone can come and watch! Maybe we can even build a big blanket fort that all of us can fit inside? And I can make popcorn! Oh, I’ll invite El, too!”