Tick, Tick, Ticking On.
In a motel somewhere in Spain, James and Warren are just waking up as the sun rises. Things are slower across the ocean. In America, James felt like they always had to be on the move, every second of every day, because if they weren't moving, then the people looking for them were getting closer. SHIELD, mainly, since it is based in the US, but James still sometimes gets a shiver down his back when he thinks of the fact that HYDRA could still be around and looking for him and Warren.
But in Europe, James feels like he can take breaks. SHIELD isn't going to find them here. This isn't so much their territory anymore. Sure, he still has to pick a place safe enough for them to really settle in—a proper home for Warren—but some of the pressure weighing him down before has been lifted off of his shoulders.
When one problem goes away, though, another always arises. And this time, it's Warren's doing.
Warren's never been a spoiled boy. He knows what it's like to have just about nothing at all. He knows what it's like to live without food, without a bed, without a family, and even without bodily autonomy. He spent the first seven years of his life without any of it. Without any freedom whatsoever. So anyone in their right mind would think that a kid like Warren would be grateful for every little thing they had, right? And usually, Warren's pretty good about that, too. He still looks at candy bars like gold, considers books God's finest gift, and says thank you more often than any other pair of words.
There's just one thing, though, that Warren isn't so grateful about. And that's their move to Europe. He is not happy about leaving America and he will not shut up about it. James doesn't know when his son turned into America's proudest patriot, but he has a sneaking suspicion that it has something to do with Captain America. With all of Warren's whining, James is considering investing in earplugs from the nearest convenience store.
On top of all that, James can't even work up the nerve to scold Warren about it. He still feels guilty about the whole museum thing. That day was supposed to be their last fun day in America for Warren to enjoy, and James ruined it all because of that stupid question. He didn't mean to be so stern or scary about it. It's just that he knows the rules of society, for the most part, and it's his duty to teach Warren as much as he can to keep him safe. But, then again, lots of things have probably changed since James was last free. Maybe he should consider looking into more modern parenting tips to keep up to date. But where would he even find anything like that?
James has really got to look into it, especially considering how Warren's behavior is becoming increasingly more childlike. Well, Warren's behavior has always been somewhat childlike. He's only seven, after all, but it's different with him. For his whole life, all he's ever known to be is 100% obedient all of the time. Now that HYDRA isn't here to threaten him, he's testing his limits.
Yesterday, Warren spent the entire day pouting and looking like a sad cartoon character. James could hardly get him to speak, and when he did say anything, it wasn't very nice. At bedtime, he threw a fit when James told him to turn the TV off. And now, this morning, out of pure stubbornness, Warren is refusing to eat the breakfast bar that James has given him.
James sighs and rubs at his eyes exhaustedly. "Warren, I get that you wanted us to stay in America, but it's safer here. End of story."
"Why?" Warren asks without looking away from the TV screen, just because he's that type of kid nowadays. Earnestly curious, usually, but sometimes challengingly curious.
"You know why."
They've talked about it a thousand times. It's not like James has been hiding the reality of their situation this whole time. Warren knows exactly what's going on—probably more than a seven-year-old really should know, but the whole seven-year-old card doesn't realistically apply to a kid like Warren. His chances of growing up without chronic stress were dampened down to zero the day he was born. Warren knows what's going on, and he always has.
"Eat your breakfast," James says for what feels like the thousandth time.
"Why?"
Oh, God.
For some reason, James sort of thought that he was free from the endless why's thing with Warren just because Warren had never been a purposely obnoxious child. Not until now, anyway. Now, it's like Warren is pushing every possible button, just testing and testing until he figures out which one will make James snap. This is probably a natural stage of development, or something, but James doesn't really care. He just doesn't want to deal with it. The only way to get rid of it, though, is probably to address what he believes is the root of the problem.
So, putting aside his frustration like a proper parent probably would, James sits down on the bed beside Warren, takes the remote, and shuts the TV off.
A fire sets alight in Warren's eyes, and he jumps off the bed, shouting and grappling for the remote. "Hey! Turn it on again!" he yells.
James holds the remote tightly behind his back with one hand and uses the other to keep Warren from being able to grab at it. Nails scrape against the titanium metal of James' arm, and he's suddenly incredibly grateful that he happened to be holding Warren off with his left arm. Otherwise, Warren would be scratching painful red marks into his skin. That thought alone makes James' stomach churn.
Warren is a very sweet and gentle boy. Usually, at least. When he's given orders, he'll complete them to the best of his ability, no matter how violent, because he doesn't know any better. But naturally, he is a good person. He's soft. James has seen that in him since the day he held him in his arms for the first time. And that's why HYDRA ended up using Warren more often as leverage rather than as a tool.
There are things that are changing Warren. The real world is changing him. Freedom is changing him. A lack of consequences is changing him, maybe, and that's probably James' own fault. He feels too guilty to ever actually discipline the kid.
But he has to. He has to. Warren has to learn. He has to be a good person, and James does, too. They could both use a little more discipline.
"Stop it, Warren. Stop!" James tosses the remote across the room, and before Warren gets the chance to run after it, he's being pulled back by his papa. No matter how loudly he shouts about the damn remote, James does not give in. He pulls Warren toward his chest, sort of like a twisted kind of hug. A hug that makes it so Warren can't scratch or bite him, and a hug that feels more like being held hostage than anything else. "Enough with the screaming, Warren, and maybe—"
"Let go of me!" Warren howls.
He kicks his feet against the air, desperately trying to make contact with something. His head thrashes around, left and right, searching for something to sink his teeth into. He needs to do something that will make Papa let him go. He hates feeling like this. He hates being grabbed, hates being controlled, hates not being able to do what he wants to do.
HYDRA was just the same, wasn't it? They would grab at him, control him, rip away any shred of light he ever managed to get his hands on.
Again, "Let go of me!"
"Stop hurting me, and I will," James says firmly but without yelling.
All of a sudden, something clicks inside the thunderstorm that is Warren's brain. His muscles go slack, and an uncontrollable ocean wave of tears streams down his cheeks. Rather than screaming, now, he's softly wailing. As softly as anyone can wail, anyway. James doesn't know what has caused Warren to suddenly break, but he doesn't care right now. Whatever it is, it's heavy, so he wraps his arms around Warren and rocks him, slowly rubbing his back up and down, up and down with each shaky breath Warren takes as he sobs into James' shoulder.
It takes two and a half minutes for Warren to collect himself again. Cheeks wet, red, and sore, breaths wobbly, and muscles weak, he grips the fabric of his papa's shirt tightly and pulls his face away from Papa's shoulder. "I didn't mean to hurt you, Papa," he croaks.
The last thing Warren wants to do, he realizes, is to hurt his papa. Papa has been hurt enough, and so has Warren, so there is no use in hurting each other any more.
It's just that, sometimes, Warren doesn't know what else to do. He technically has control, sure, but sometimes it doesn't feel like he does. Sometimes it's like his body is disconnected from his brain, and his muscles move without him telling them to. Like that night at the hotel a few months back. Warren doesn't think about it until it's already done, and only then does he realize that he never wanted to do any of it in the first place.
"I'm sorry. I'm sorry," Warren says, frowning so deeply it looks like his mouth is melting off his face. "I—I never mean to hurt you."
"I know, bud," James assures him.
Truthfully, though, James doesn't feel like he knows anything. As much as he loves Warren, as much time as they have spent together, as much as he feels like he should know every nerve beneath Warren's skin and every fraction of Warren's soul, he doesn't. Warren isn't like normal kids, and it takes time to understand him. Half the time, he acts just the same as James had acted as a kid. The other half of the time, however, it's like he's an alien species who has just landed on Earth.
But what is James supposed to say? I don't understand you. I don't know what you want. You can't say those types of things to a child.
Warren shakes his head at James. "You don't know, Papa. I can see you don't know." With small, trembling hands, he reaches up and brushes his fingers over James' face from left to right, over his stubbled cheeks and across the sharp bridge of his nose. "I can see on your face," Warren whispers. "You don't know."
James doesn't know what to say. All he can get himself to sputter out is an unsure sort of, "Yeah?"
"Yes." Warren nods and uses his sleeve to wipe his tears dry. "I don't know, either."
Sinking. James feels like he's sinking, or maybe his heart is. He's not sure, but either way, it isn't a good feeling. "You don't know about me, or about you?" he asks. It feels like the right sort of thing to ask.
"Both," Warren tells him. Eyes of ocean blue shadow themselves a shade darker as Warren squints just a bit. That's a habit he's always had, as far as James can remember, and he usually does it when he's thinking deeply about something. His voice gets firmer when he says, "I don't know about everything."
The conversation weighs a thousand pounds. James feels like Atlas holding up the sky.
I don't know about everything.
Curiosity has never been something Warren lacked. He's always grasped at knowledge like straws, and only now that he's free and able to take in knowledge is he starting to realize just how much he lacks. Not just about facts. Not just about letters, numbers, science, and history, but about the world itself and how it works. How time tick, tick, ticks on with every passing second, and it keeps going away. No one can catch it. Everything has a rhythm—a rhythm that Warren can't keep up with.
Time tick, tick, ticked on when Warren was in foster care. He had a house for a little while, and then just as he settled in, he would be taken right back out of it. Time tick, tick, ticked on with Steve, Natasha, and Sam just as Warren was getting to like and trust them, and then Papa showed up, and it was time to go again. Time tick, tick, ticked on when Warren was starting to like their life on the road in America, and then Papa said it was time to leave again. Now, they're across the world, and time keeps tick, tick, ticking on, and Warren doesn't have time to breathe, let alone to release all the pressure that's been building up inside of him.
Why, why, why can't Warren keep up with the rhythm that everyone else seems to live by?
"Everything is too fast, Papa."
James blows air out of the side of his mouth. "Tell me about it," he says. Hell, he blinked in 1945 and opened his eyes in 2014.
"And I don't like things being fast or changing so much. I can't even try to read the street signs here, Papa. It's all in a new order, and the letters look different, and the library is gonna different, too. I can't learn."
With a soft huff, James puts Warren down on the bed next to him. He brushes away Warren's overgrown bangs. He's going to need a haircut soon. "You can learn anything you want, Renny. You were learning to read in English, and we'll keep working on that wherever we go. And when we find a home, you can learn to read whatever language they speak there." He smiles at his next thought, almost positive that it'll pull Warren right out of the slump he's in. "All we need is a book about Captain America, and you'll be learning in no time, right?"
"No," Warren says, and he sounds sure about it. "I can't learn because it doesn't make sense. The rules don't make sense. They're all made up and pretend."
"You sound like a philosopher," James jokes. It's still weighing down on him. He just wants it all to ease up for a moment, but Warren won't let it.
Warren isn't joking. It's all been driving him crazy. "No, Papa. It doesn't make sense."
It really, truly doesn't. Who made up all these rules, and why did they get to decide how everyone else in the whole entire world is supposed to live for the rest of time? Why did they decide that you buy things with special pieces of paper? Why did they decide that some people get to have lots of that paper and some people get to have none? Why did they decide that boys are in love with girls and girls are in love with boys? Why can't boys be in love with boys? Why do the stars look dark in the city and bright when driving on gravel roads? Why doesn't Papa want to remember Steve Rogers?
It's all made up. That's why. It's all those made-up rules that are mixed right in with the made-up rhythm and the made-up tick, tick, ticking on.
"I don't get it, Papa. I can't," Warren says again.
"I'll help you get it. I'll get it whenever you can't," James tells him. He's honest, too. Warren can see it on his papa's face and feel it in the beat of his heart. If Warren were drowning, his papa would swim for him, and if Warren were suffocating, his papa would breathe air into his lungs.
Between the two of them in that quiet, early morning hotel room, the air grows lighter and their breaths get a little softer.
"Are you sure?"
"Always."
✮
Times keeps tick, tick, ticking on, and in a month's time, Warren and James are spending their days in quiet train cars with young couples probably going on their honeymoon adventures and tired parents taking their six children to visit distant family for the winter holidays. Sometimes, Warren tries to make friends with the children they end up sitting near, but most of them find him strange and tell him he talks funny. They should try speaking over ten different languages and then see how easy it is not to talk funny.
Luckily, the days on the trains are short-lived, as James has finally, finally selected a place for them to stay for good. At least, temporarily for good. For the foreseeable future for good. More than anything, he's just glad to be able to give Warren a place to call home for a little while, aside from the back seats of stolen vehicles and stinky, sweaty train cars.
Bucharest.
It's going to be good for both of them. James is sure of it. He's going to get a proper job, so they won't have to steal anything and everything they own anymore. Warren will have to either come with him to work or stay home alone, which is somewhat anxiety-inducing just to think about, but it will all be fine. No one is going to find them in Bucharest. Not for a long time, anyway. So it will be good.
Warren is going to have a bed with a thick, warm blanket—a blue one, per his request—and he's going to stay up way too late into the night reading by flashlight under the covers. And if Papa saves up enough money, they'll get a little TV to have in the living room for Warren to watch movies on when he's not filling his notebooks with fairytales.
According to Papa, people in Bucharest speak Romanian. Warren is somewhat fluent in it, but he can't read a single word of it. Papa has been teaching him to the best of his ability, though, to pass the time on the train.
They'll probably have to drive again, at least for a little while. Not days on end anymore. Just for a bit to make the last few hours to Bucharest. James doesn't mind. Part of him is going to miss their flighty way of life. Maybe it hasn't been the best, and maybe they had to resort to taking from others just to survive, but the closeness and the realness of living with each other in that little car was warmer than anything James had experienced for the last seventy-plus years of his life.
For years and years, James and Warren, father and son, were pulled apart. HYDRA would rip them out of each other's grasp every chance they got, like it was some kind of sick game. HYDRA liked seeing the pain in James' and Warren's eyes when they took them from each other and tossed them into cages.
Not anymore. They had each other during all those car rides, and they have each other now. They'll have each other until the end of time. James is never letting go, and when he says it out loud, Warren believes him like a dog.