Chapter Text
It had been gradual. Being the youngest, Tommy was used to being the center of attention; always one for easy affection and causing a bit of havoc, his family had practically been forced to dote on him. His father spent more time shepherding him out of harms way than sleeping, and he cajoled his brothers into indulging every impulse he had. If he was being honest, his early childhood had been a happy one, of lawns flush with dandelions and rough-housing with his brothers, late nights spent whispering ghost stories under covers and all the things that made growing up bittersweet.
But things changed, they always did, and his family was no different.
It had started off simple; his brothers were suddenly spending less time with him, occupied with high school and the separate hobbies that kept them out of Tommy’s orbit. Tommy would knock on Wilbur’s door to find the teen with headphones on his head and a notebook in hand, hunching over the pages as he scribbled down whatever song lyrics or fragments of a poem must thunder in his head, shouting at Tommy to get the fuck out of his room. Tommy didn’t even bother with Techno, he was never home anyways. Always practicing fencing or studying at the library.
It was times like that where Tommy saw how his two brothers, so different than the other, were twins. They were like parallel streetcars, always rushing along the trolley-lines of their own lives that kept them separated, never crossing but always brushing past one another. Tommy rarely saw the two in the same room, but sometimes, late at night, he would hear them chatting quietly in the living room in tones softer than he’d heard in a while. No matter how much they pretended to hate each other, how many hours of ‘silent-treatment’ they condemned each other to or how much they bickered, they were twins. They understood their other half in the way no one else could—and they mutually agreed to ice their youngest brother out.
Tommy used to joke to his dad that the twins only got along when they ganged up on him, but as the years passed and Tommy grew from five to six to seven to ten, it seemed like his brothers had turned humor into reality. The days of light hearted teasing and kicked shins under kitchen tables were gone, now it was just rolled eyes and too-rough shoves and huffs of would you shut up and leave me alone for five minutes?
Dad was no help. The man was either driving Techno to a tournament or at work, rarely giving so much as a quick ‘see ya later mate’ to Tommy as he hurried out the door. The few hours that he spent in the house was split between knocking out on the couch or braving Wilbur’s constant need to pick a fight. The two were constantly arguing now, over dinner plates and morning pots of coffee, and Lord help anyone caught in the crossfire. Tommy did his best to avoid the two when they got into it, and Techno was always gone anyways, but it was like they were two black holes trying to drag him into their chaos; every shouting match either had his name crop up or ended with both of them telling him off.
And today was just the same: Wilbur and Dad were getting into another pissing contest, and Techno was out of the house. At first Tommy had tried to block out the harsh whispers of his family in the kitchen, trying to focus on the DS in his hands, but the whispers soon bloomed into shouts as Wilbur’s venomous snarl floated from the other room.
“—no, it’s because you keep leaving to take Techno to tournaments! It’s the middle of the semester year! Why can’t he take a break for a month?”
He’s not wrong, he thought even as he feigned indifference, watching Mario jump over a koopa shell on his screen.
“Will, mate, you know that this is important to your brother—“
“As important as our family? As me? Oh, and don’t get me started on Tommy—“
A Bullet-Bill rushed towards him, and he scrambled to press the up button, barely making it to safety.
“Now Will…”
“You just leave me alone! With him! Do you know how hard it is? Knowing that I could go out into the world, enjoy my life, but noooo, I have a stupid little brother to look after—“
“I know he’s a hassle but—”
He was approaching Bowser’s castle now, the red flag promising a struggle with every pixilated wave. He gripped his DS tighter. It was fine, he’d done this level a hundred times before, what was once more?
“Hassle? Oh, you have no idea. He’s always talking or whining, always making things about himself! I barely have any friends because I always have to hang out with him, no one wants to talk to the weirdo and his bratty brother!”
His thumb slipped just as Bowser spat fire at him and Dad let out and indignant Wilbur! Tommy’s heart pounded in his ears and he felt his lungs seize, the forgotten screen in his hands flashing black and red as YOU DIED appeared on screen. He was acting stupid, it wasn’t anything he hadn’t heard before—hell, Techno called him a brat or a gremlin practically every day—but he had never heard Wilbur say it before, especially not like-like that. There was something acidic in his tone that burned to even process; it sounded like disgust.
The DS shook in his hands, the same grainy song pinging out his speakers as he stared blankly in front of him—YOU DIED. YOU DIED. TRY AGAIN? SAVE & QUIT? —and he couldn’t stop himself as he listened to Wilbur’s footsteps, how they thundered down the hallway and up the stairs, slowly ebbing away as he grew farther and farther from the man in the kitchen and boy on the couch.
He crawled into bed that night and tucked his head underneath the comforter, hoping that if he could burrow deeper into his mattress and the blankets swamping him, he could pretend that there were no tears on his cheeks or that everything hadn’t just changed. This was just another night, he soothed himself, bleary eyes trained on the cotton sky above him, another argument where Wilbur said things he didn’t mean and Dad threw his hands up in exasperation. This wasn’t the ending or beginning of anything—it was just another night. And it would be better in the morning.
When he woke up, it was to cool air and a stucco ceiling. He had thrown the blankets off in his sleep.
The rest was practically inevitable. His brothers graduated from high school the following year, and suddenly Tommy was alone. Techno had flew across the country to some pretentious-ass private school back east, riding on a full scholarship from fencing and the title of high school valedictorian, while Wilbur went to a state school to study theater and music. The young adult bitched about it, came over on weekends to do laundry and complain about his dorm-mates who reenacted the entirety of Les Mis at 3am or professors who were ‘hard-asses’, but Tommy could tell he loved it. He could see it in the way he rambled about their latest production or the house parties where he played in a band with his friends. Friends, what Wilbur had craved so much (apparently enough to leave Tommy behind), were suddenly in abundance. He skipped weekend dinners to drive down highways late at night, ignored Tommy in favor of constantly texting his crew (Niki and Eret, if he remembered clearly. Maybe some kid named Furry or Funky), and missed birthdays in favor of practicing with bandmates. Tommy pretended he didn’t mind, told Dad that he was glad Will had ‘finally stopped lurking around the house’, but his father never did more than shoot him a pinched smile and nervously laugh.
Then his brother took a year abroad to a London school and never came back, claiming that it was cheaper to stay with his current program, reassuring Dad that the degree would transfer if he came back home. If. Apparently his friends were going too (which Tommy found suspicious, as if it was planned all along and not some happy accident) and Will would share a flat with them to cut down on expenses. For all intents and purposes, his brother was being rational, and Dad easily gave in.
So Tommy didn’t see either of his brothers for four years. That was fine: Techno was horrid company anyway, and Wilbur had fallen into this whole ‘sad boy’ aesthetic a while ago, definitely people he didn’t want at Thanksgiving.
With his two oldest in college and with Tommy getting old enough to stay at home alone, Dad spent more time at work than ever. He was a software engineer at a local development company, and was working really hard for a promotion that would help secure Tommy’s college savings. It was necessary, his father would say, that he was sorry, really mate, that he couldn’t take Tommy to his first middle school dance or go to back-to-school night, he just had to work.
Tommy said he understood, and he did. It was necessary, it was rational, just like Wilbur going to England or Techno taking the scholarship in Massachusetts.
Now he awoke to an empty house, Dad already gone for an early shift and the bus on its way. He cultivated his own little routine: brush his teeth, take a shower, make a breakfast of pop tarts or staled cereal, and grab his back-pack before heading out.
By the time he was entering high school, Wilbur had decided to live in England permanently and Techno had signed on for another four years of grad school in Western Mass. Dad had been promoted from software designer to the executive lead of the company’s location he worked at, and life hummed along. The phone calls from both his brothers still came every day like clockwork, and the family was happier than ever; being abroad had smoothed over Wilbur and Dad’s relationship, and Techno was on track to become a professor almost right out of grad school with an impressive tenure at an elite school. Life was perfect.
For everyone but Tommy apparently. Four months into his first semester in high school he had more Ds than Cs, and was mandated to at least five hours of tutoring each week. It wasn’t that he wasn’t trying (he was, God, he was trying so hard), but he just…couldn’t get it. Even as stayed up until 2am every night pouring over course materials and study guides, even as he watched video after video on Khan Academy, he couldn’t pass the countless tests that came his way. Teachers would hand back quizzes with a sour face and a ‘meet me after class’ scribbled in the margins of an in-class FRQ; the tutor he was assigned to quick gave up, complaining he was too hard to teach. They told him he needed to get his grades up or he would have to repeat the year, and Tommy wanted to scream. He was trying, he was, but it didn’t seem like it mattered.
(By now he expected Dad to notice the progress reports he just happened to ‘lose’, or the desk lamp that never seemed to turn off in his room and countless papers, but he never did)
And then Tommy had met Tubbo, and everything had just clicked.
They had met during a group project in honors bio (one that Tommy needed a 100% on or he would definitely fail this year) and the two had gotten along like a house on fire. Tubbo was able to tell when Tommy was struggling and never hesitated to explain a concept to him, words slow but not demeaning and always using practical analogies to make it easier to understand. It wasn’t that the kid was good at school necessarily, or that he was somehow a natural genius, but he understood Tommy in a way no one had before. Likewise, Tommy was there to read words that Tubbo got twisted around because his dyslexia, and ease the tension out of the room when the boy got frustrated with a piece they were reading in lit class. Funnily enough, lit class was the only one Tommy had an B in, and he loved rambling to Tubbo about the readings the boy didn’t do as if a personal Sparknotes. They were an odd pair—a dyslexic kid who wanted to be a nuclear physicist and a boy who hated all sciences and only wanted to read classics—but they knew the other more than he knew himself. Sometimes, Tommy wasn’t sure where he started and Tubbo stopped, but he found that he didn’t really care. It was nice to be a part of something, someone, like that. He hadn’t felt that connected to anyone in a while.
Within a month and a half of them knowing each other, Tommy’s grades had raised significantly, and he had almost straight Bs with the exception of an A in lit and a high C in biology. By second semester, he had a healthy mix of As and Bs to immortalize on his final transcript for the year. To celebrate, him and Tubbo saw a movie and got ice cream; as they sat on a bench outside of the theater, happily licking at their ice-cream cones, Tubbo had called Tommy his best friend for the first time.
Tubbo would never let him live down the tears that exploded from him.
That evening he had raced home with his report card in hand, a grin on his face, and chocolate ice cream staining his hoodie. As soon as his father had walked in the door, he pressed the orange envelope to his hands, practically bursting with pride.
Phil had taken one look at the assortment of As, Bs, and Cs, and managed a weak smile before saying, “alright, how about next year we try a bit harder, okay Toms?”
When night fell he went to bed with his comforter tugged over his head. It was still there when he woke up.
In junior year his English teacher had pulled him aside to chat after class. Tommy tried to shrug off his anxiety; Mr. Sam (or Mr. Awesome-Dude Tommy had taken to jokingly calling him) had a bit of a soft spot for Tommy since becoming his Honors Literature teacher in freshman year, watching him struggle and all that, and was more than thrilled to see Tommy sitting in his AP Language class the following year. Tommy practically lived in the man’s classroom, eating lunch in there when Tubbo or Ranboo were in club meetings or just showing up after school to chat the man’s ear off. When all the other teachers had given up on him, it was Mr. Sam who had believed in Tommy, staying after the final bell rung to explain difficult texts to him and recommend outside reading. He had granola bars in his desk drawer for the days that Tommy was too late to have breakfast or pack a lunch, and snuck him Coca-Colas after all-nighters. Plus, he was a young teacher, around the same age as his brothers, and didn’t make cringe-y jokes or force his presentation to have stupid pinterest memes.
Easily, Mr. Sam had become his favorite adult ever. So why was he nervous?
“You’re not in trouble,” was the first thing Mr. Sam had said as Tommy watched the other students file out the classroom to their fourth period, “I just wanted to talk to you about an opportunity I think you’d enjoy.”
“An opportunity?” Tommy clutched his binder tighter to his chest, allowing one of the straps of his back pack to slop off his shoulder and tug his arm down at the added weight. “Is it extra credit? That’s very kind, but I don’t think I need any this year.” He had all As other than a B in environmental science (which honestly, fuck that class), and his highest grade was a 98% in this class. Tommy didn’t see why he’d need any extra credit.
Mr. Sam’s lips twitched into what could be called a smile—he wasn’t the most expressive man, kept his voice lowered even when lecturing and his laughs were nothing more than gentle puffs of breath caught in his throat, but Tommy recognized the subtle shift in his expression for what it was: pride.
“You’re right, you don’t need extra credit. In fact, you’re doing so well in my class that I wanted to offer you an opportunity I haven’t had the ability to give to many students. Tommy, not many kids have an eye for literature the way you do, and even less have a genuine love for writing the way I see you have. In fact, some of your analysis during our poetry unit was the best I’ve seen in a while, nonetheless from someone in high school.” Tommy felt something warm bubble in his chest at that, and he fought off a grin. He really had loved the poetry unit, and loved making sarcastic jokes in the margins of his paper about classical poets more; to hear that Mr. Sam had enjoyed that analysis, had thought it some of the best he’s seen, had him practically over the moon.
“So,” Mr. Sam started, voice pitching upwards as he dug something out from a manilla folder and handed it to Tommy, “I wanted you to check out this open mic that’s going to be nearby. It’s the first of a few poetry events that are happening this month, and there’s going to be a few workshops happening alongside it, and I think you’d really enjoy it. Might get to write something new and share your work.”
Tommy was handed a small flyer in printed in black and white, with the words “POETRY NIGHT - OPEN MIC” splayed across the front in bubbled font. He fumbled with his binder as he took it, eyes wide as he said, “are you sure? I mean, I love poetry and all, but I don’t think-I’m not sure—what if I can’t write poetry?”
Mr. Sam’s dark eyes softened, and he reached out to place a hand on Tommy’s shoulder, squeezing it gently. “Everyone has to start somewhere; every poet, from me to Rudy Francisco, started off without knowing a clue about what we were doing. Tommy, it’s not about if you can or cannot write poetry, it’s about if you want to.”
Tommy’s eyes were practically bugging outside of his head. “You write poetry? Really?”
Mr. Sam let out a laugh, quiet and airy. “Yeah, I’m actually reading at the event with a few of my friends. If you go, I’m sure they’d love to tell you all about my embarrassing days as a new poet, and how many persona poems I butchered.”
Tommy felt a grin tug at his face, and he gripped the flyer tighter. Mr. Sam, a poet? Sure it made sense in retrospect, the man always was more vibrant when talking rhyme scheme and form than he ever was talking logical fallacies, but still: he had never met a poet in real life before. Heck, he hadn’t read any other poets than the ones that were assigned in class. Sure, he knew the famous names like Maya Angelou or Robert Frost, but he didn’t know anything about contemporary poetry.
Yet, a small voice in the back of his head buzzed, one that sounded suspiciously like Tubbo during a late night studying session, but you’ve got time to learn.
Tommy looked down at the flyer, marveling at the picture of a person stood in front of a microphone with a notebook in hand that was printed in dark ink. Something in him, the hopeful part of him that he liked to keep hidden, the part that used to whisper that his brothers would return and his father would stay, was screaming to go. This could be it; this could be his thing. Tubbo had Science Olympiad, and Ranboo had Model UN—this could be something just for Tommy.
And, the thought crept up, I wouldn’t have to come home to an empty house.
And just like that, the decision was made.
“So, when exactly is this whole thing going down? And do I get to boo you if the poem sucks?”
This time Mr. Sam’s smile was wide enough to show teeth.
~~~
And so was the beginning of something beautiful. Poetry became Tommy’s saving grace, his release: had had never been too good with feelings, heck, his family outright avoided talking about them, but poetry was the outlet he needed. The pages of his notebook were a sanctuary, where his thoughts tumbled over one another in ink stains and the stray marks of a pen, where his words were able to breathe and die—he could seethe in these pages, write odes to sunsets and ice cream trucks, and eulogize his childhood in pantoums about photo-frames and dandelions. There was something magical about the way he lost himself in the act of creating, words becoming the wings he launched himself into the sky with, that let him to swoop and dive and free fall and all the weightlessness he was afraid of allowing himself.
Poetry was Tommy.
At his third open mic he saw a poem read that changed his life. Rather, not read, but performed. The writer had come up to mic, notebook missing with eyes unflinchingly trained ahead, and opened her mouth and spoke.
The performance was nothing like Tommy had seen before; it catapulted itself into a narrative of grief, the tiniest grimace of her face implying a whole world of emotion that existed beyond the page, each bitter smile at mentions of broken hearts and ruined friendships giving Tommy an insight into the soul of another person. But more than anything, Tommy loved her voice: the way it trembled upon mentions of a mother, the way it blossomed as she reminisced about cherry-bombs on swings and summer nights…he could see her unspool the story’s thread a bit more with each inflection of her voice. It was all so delicate, like a spiders web coming undone.
Then he saw a group slam poem, and knew he had to get in on this.
Mr. Sam mentioned offhandedly that he used to perform in a slam team competitively in college, and knew a few folks that could get him involved. One being the woman who had performed earlier, Puffy.
Puffy, to put it simply, was a badass. She apparently was a national champion in slam poetry, and had a few collections out that Tommy couldn’t wait to get his hands on. Not only that, but she gave on such strong ‘Don’t Fuck With Me’ vibes all while being nurturing towards those she loved; she was a multitude of things, but mostly, she was just really fucking cool.
“I’d love to talk slam with you! Have you ever competed before?” She smiled up at him from where she sat, nursing a cup of mint tea. Tommy shuffled awkwardly, and next to him Mr. Sam gave an encouraging nudge with his elbow. Tommy flushed pink.
“Uh-no. You actually were the first performance I’ve ever seen so…”
Puffy blinked. She looked thrown off, curly hair falling in front her eyes before she pushed it off her forehead and grinned so bright Tommy though he’d have to shield his eyes. “Oh! I’m your new Slam Mom, aren’t I? That works, I’ve already got a few kids under my wings, and you’ll vibe with Foolish and the others.”
“Um, what?”
“Of course, you’re still going to need to try out, no one gets on the team without working for it, but I have a feeling you’ll surprise me. Slam season starts up in March, and we have a big one coming up this summer, so I’d get your classic and response together. I’m sure Sam’ll help you.” She paused and took a sip of her tea, before squinting back at Tommy. “How old are you again?”
“Uh, sixteen. Seventeen next April.” Tommy hadn’t a clue what was going on, but he didn’t want to get on Puffy’s bad side by ignoring her question.
“Ohh, a young one? You’d probably be the youngest we’ve ever had on our team. Interesting. Well, Sam will give you the details about the try outs once I figure them out and I can’t wait to see you there.” She stood, smile still plastered on her face as she extended a hand for Tommy to shake. He took it hesitantly, jolted by the eager pumps she gave it. “Great to meet you, Tommy! See you this spring!”
And with that, the poet walked away, leaving a starstruck Tommy and chuckling Sam. The older man looked down at his student and gave him a gentle smile, nodding his head towards the cafe door as the two began to depart for the night.
“Looks like we’ve got to get you prepped for an audition.”
Tommy grinded for weeks to prepare his classic and response for this audition. For his classical poem, he chose “Constantly Risking Absurdity” by Lawrence Ferlinghetti—it was one he had always loved, a poem disjointed by form but brought flesh together with the reader through images of acrobats and high-wires. Sam walked him through the process of writing a response: he was supposed to write a poem that aligned or contradicted the same themes that the classical author was discussing, as if in a conversation with the original material. At first, Tommy had no idea what that meant—how were you ‘in conversation’ with a poem? Yet, as he spent time re-reading the poem, looking at each line, he started to figure it out.
Truthfully, to be a poet was to ‘constantly risk absurdity’, to live in constant apprehension that one day you’d push the boundary too far, make yourself an outcast amongst outcasts. To be a poet was to stand on a tight rope and balance over the chaos of daily life as you tried to make sense of it, to do flips and perform for the masses all while holding your breath. It was the same feeling he got whenever Mr. Sam read one of his drafts, the same breathless fear in his stomach he got when Tubbo stole his poetry notebook and flipped through the pages. To constantly pursue beauty while alienating yourself from its bounds; he was a poet. And so he decided to write about that, what it meant to him to be a poet.
So Tommy wrote, rewrote, scrapped draft after draft of his response as the date of his audition loomed closer. He took each critique Mr. Sam gave in stride, keeping a special page in his notebook full of edits he wanted to make to each new draft. He practiced memorizing his classic all the while, workshopping his performance with Mr. Sam and testing it out on Tubbo and Ranboo (who knew absolutely nothing about what he was doing or what made a good performance but hey, it was just nice for your friends to clap for you sometimes).
At home he would go about his chores reciting lines from his poems. His father would walk in late at night to find his son pacing the length of the kitchen as he scrubbed at countertops and dishes, muttering to himself (“And he, a little Chaplincharley man…no, wait. And he, a little charleychaplin man who may not catch her…fair, eternal form. Get it together, Tommy,”).
His father didn’t ask questions about where his son went every Friday night or why he was seemingly reciting poetry like a mad man, and so Tommy didn’t tell him. He was content to let the man live his own life, separate and parallel from his. He had something to do now, no longer staring forlornly at locked doors and empty bedrooms. He was on a mission, and he wouldn’t let his father’s inquisitive stare distract him.
And when the audition came, Tommy killed it.