Archive of Our Own ^beta

It was the small things that stuck out to him later. The things that he wished he had noticed; the things he had been completely oblivious to. He had seen the way her hands had been wracked with tremors, staring ahead blankly into nothing, and had heard the way she got confused, sometimes, forgetting his name, or his brother's. But it never registered as something bad. She was his mother, and he was sure she could take on anything, after all. That's just how the brain worked when you were a child.

Captain was the oldest, by five minutes. Sometimes, since he was older, their parents would get him to do things for them, and so it wasn't unusual for Captain to bring their mother meals or help her into the bath. But he saw no issue with this, not really. He didn't mind doing it when Captain was sick, and he figured this was just how all mothers were, didn't see what it actually meant.

So when he came home from school to find her gone, he was confused. He was only a child, then. He didn't know what was going on; he just knew his mother was gone, and it scared him.

He had, initially, assumed that Captain was with her, maybe. But when he went to Captain's room, she wasn't there. That's when he had learned about the farm.

The way he had described it sounded so wonderful and peaceful. But when Mister went back into the living room, looking at the chair she usually sat in, he couldn't help but feel so upset. Because, she had all of those good things here, right? A family to care for her... games to play. They had plenty of toys, and treats. He had curled up by the window and wondered, maybe he had done something. After all, Captain was the one that was told she was leaving; Captain was the one who fixed her meals and gave her baths. Maybe he didn't do enough, maybe he wasn't enough...

He had fallen asleep staring out the window and had a nightmare, then, his first one about being alone. And that's when the fear first formed.

- - - >

Mister tried harder from then on, got smarter, better. He wasn't that good with school, but he was good with making people happy, and he chased laughs and smiles. Yet his relatives still went to the farm, one by one, and a growing panic was lurking inside him, a panic that made him stare out the window on bad days.

It didn't fully hit him, really, until he came home to his father gone. At this point he wasn't a child, shouldn't be this scared, but it was his father. And when Captain delivered the news to him that he had been left, again, for this cursed farm, he knew he had to get out of the Peninsula before it claimed his brother too.

He didn't have any plans to leave; it just happened by coincidence, and suddenly he was in California, signing a contract to be on a show, and he thought, yeah, this is better. Because now he didn't have to worry about Captain leaving him for the farm anymore; all he had to worry about was earning smiles and laughs from people.

It wasn't enough.

- - - - - >

The thing about Hollywood is that it was a very lonely place. And sitting in his new house with his new money from his new show felt suffocating. He couldn't breathe. He was suddenly back at that window, somehow, watching, waiting, wondering what he had done wrong, wondering how he could have been more.

So he started dating.

It wasn't the first time he had dated, of course. He had some high school girlfriends, but it was nothing serious. All high school romance; all, "who should I ask to the dance?" This was more real, this was adult dating. It started out wonderfully, but he guessed that people in Hollywood didn't think about finding life partners very often, because most of his relationships would end within a week. It stung, but he could tolerate it. He hadn't gotten attached by then. But that changed when he met Katrina.

It was fine at first, of course. Two young adults in love, happy and ready to take on anything. They even got married, and he thought that meant they would be forever. But it changed on that one Halloween night.

He didn't know why he had such a fascination with BoJack, really, but he liked being around him. He was happy being at his place, and with a little bit of alcohol, he felt good. Really good. Of course he heard her when she asked him not to leave her alone, but as the night progressed, his head got more fuzzy, and he got more obsessed with smiles and laughs smiles and laughs until suddenly she was no longer smiling and laughing. And it was at that point that he knew he had failed her.

He really did try to make it up to her. But she didn't want to hear anything he said. He was locked out of the bedroom that night.

- - - - - >

She scared him, and it sucked. Actually, it sucked a lot. He didn't know she had such a cruel side to her.

No, calling her cruel was unfair of him. It was him who had made her feel unloved at that party. She was just... doing what she had to to protect herself. Yeah.

(That's what he told himself when she would pull at his fur or point knives a little too close to his face or, much later, during another marriage, she suggested the town cannibalize him).

He was more afraid of the emptiness of the house than he was her. So when he saw her putting her hand down someone else's pants while with him, he didn't leave her. Just hoped she would feel better, soon, and maybe he could fix what he had broken.

(He would never be able to. Not after she slammed the divorce papers down and left him in the quiet again. He had a panic attack that night, filling the silence with soft whimpers, refusing to take the bed back and sitting on the couch that he had been banished to, waiting for her to come back.

She didn't).

- - - - - >

Back on the market, a single dog! Great, great. He ignored the media attention that wanted to know what happened between him and Katrina, and instead focused on himself. That's when he met Jessica.

She made him feel like a new dog. And he felt like he could spend his life with her. They got married, eventually. But it didn't last long. Not after... Halloween. Again.

He had been so focused on getting it right this time. But it started a disaster (why did he think she was referring to a literal notebook? Stupid dog) and ended one, too.

If he were anyone else, he would have blamed BoJack for once again not getting a Halloween costume and instead making a last minute mummy one out of toilet paper. But, well, he was Mr. Peanutbutter. And he couldn't blame his good friend. BoJack didn't know.

But Mister did. And he still let it happen. Got yelled at. And returning home was so scary. Because he knew what happened with Katrina. So he had stolen some of BoJack's alcohol ("Hey? What are you-" BoJack had protested before staring in absolute shock as he proceeded to down the whole bottle in one go) and decided to deal with it in the morning.

(Morning wasn't great. They didn't speak for a long while. He couldn't stand the tension. Took out a few jobs, tried to do better at respecting her boundaries. She tried to push him into other roles, but he liked his jobs. And then once again he wasn't enough for her.

And she left).

- - - - - >

Diane.

He took everything from his previous relationships and tried so hard to show her that he cared. So hard.

But him and Diane were just so different. And it sucked. It really fucking sucked, because Mister thinks he might have been loved by Diane more than Katrina and Jessica had ever loved him.

He just didn't want her to leave. And he resorted to what he knew best, which was smiles and laughs. He was scared when she wasn't smiling. And maybe that was the downfall, really, that he couldn't handle real emotions like that without the fear.

Later, when he was with Pickles, he realized there was something terribly wrong with him, when he was too scared to break the news to her, to hurt her, because she might leave. And he realized, oh fuck, he really was manipulative. And maybe he should do something about that.

(He still didn't leave her. But when she was sleeping next to him, he clicked through various articles online about abandonment issues and Borderline Personality Disorder, wondered if he had something up with his brain. Later, she left, and it was just him and his phone. He told himself after that, no more dating. No more marriages. Not until he figured this out. He looked up a number and rang a therapist).