Chapter Text
Elliot’s day had started out fine and dandy as it always did, he had risen from his bed, blinking though the soft rays of sunlight peeking out of his thin curtains, prepared a quick breakfast he shoved in his mouth on record time, then off he was, jogging to the pizza place where he took his keys and started the process of opening the pizzeria. He had felt accomplished with how normal the day had been in a way, singing under his breath to the same few lyrics of a song stuck in his head while cooking up a few orders to go in the quiet morning of another uneventful day at the pizzeria.
But now, all Elliot could feel was tired, just a few feet behind him builder brothers' pizzeria was burning to complete ashes, firefighters and civilians running around hysterically, graffiti all over the walls. Elliot had been freaking out at first, too, internally of course as he didn't want to alarm anyone else, but when he had gotten over his surprise and had actively started to try and help those around, he had found that the culprit was one small little red rascal he had then held up by his shirt collar and taken outside, who now clung and hid behind the nervous figure of his father.
‘I'd be absolutely furious if i wasn't already getting used to this’ Elliot thought and huffed almost imperceptibly, Seven had been apologetic about the chaos his kid has caused, despite his teenage years of rebellious behaviour and hacking, he had sort of shown he had changed his ways, but his kid seemed determined to follow on his fathers teenage footsteps ‘i get its difficult to be a single father but…’
‘Someone needs to parent that kid’ he thought furiously, looking at the wet cat looking man that stood in front of him, who bowed while nervous apologies tumbled out of his blubbering mouth.
“Sorry! I'm really, really sorry Elliot. I swear!” said the man, sweat sliding down his brow behind pink glasses. however the expression of the kid who stood at his feet told a different story, clinging to his father, barely hiding his giggling behind brown khakis. “You know he's a good kid…”
Elliot wasn't paid enough to deal with this, his father's pizzeria or not, no money in the world was worth dealing with this, but still, he dealt. He just nodded at the man, trying to not be an asshole and get the situation over with so he could call his dad and talk about how to proceed, waving him away. even when he tried to hide his anger, he knew Seven had noticed as the man had lowered his head ashamed and quickly scurried away with his son in arms.
Hours later, only when he found himself sitting alone on a chair in his home, pondering the situation once more while breathing out the flowing smoke of a cigarette, did Elliot allow himself to somewhat relax. Tapping the stick on a makeshift ashtray he had made of his untouched glass of water, he let his thoughts wander. Head tilting back, blond curls jumping and racing over like waves on his forehead and freckled cheeks, he hummed quietly.
‘That kid needs a parent that's not a total pushover…’ Elliot continued tapping the cig on the rim of the glass, following a faint rhythm even though there was no more ash to tap away. He kept Remembering the nervous way Seven had fidgeted and curled around himself, apology through apology elliot didnt want to keep on hearing. and yet. ‘...maybe…’
Maybe, maybe, maybe. A crazy idea, insane, perhaps, But right now, Elliot was kind of operating on maybe’s, unemployed and uncertain of the pull of tomorrow, the long haired man began to daydream in a makeshift world where Elliot helped that family to grow, nurturing the kid and the fathers lives and decisions with careful but firm hands. In between his fingers, the stick of tobacco slowly burned itself to complete ashes, and Elliot continued the dreaming he knew would get him nowhere.
an opening and opportunity presented itself days later, on a cold autumn morning, Elliot had taken one look at his empty fridge that held the sorry sight of a soggy tomato and a packet of hot sauce, armed himself with his warmest gear, and set out to buy groceries.
Usually he would go to the grocery store closest to his home, but today he decided against it, seeing as he was relying on his savings for the time being while the pizzeria was being rebuilt and repaired, he might as well be careful with how he spends his money.
Stepping outside, his body involuntarily shivering, he heard a voice call for his attention.
“Well, if it isn't the handsome young man next door!” His neighbor, an old gray haired lady that lived next door to his, loudly announced his presence to anyone within hearing range. He decided it was worth it to stand a few more minutes in the cold to talk to her, seeing as she was also heading out, it seemed, even when he could see his breath fogging in front of his face.
She was really the nicest old lady out here, helped him settle when he had moved into his new place, and taught him to cook quite a lot of meals from her own personal recipes that helped him prepare himself a meal with anything and everything he had in his fridge, which he took to easily with his experience with cooking, helped when one lived on a budget and needed to keep some savings. Also gifted him quite a lot of handmade crochet sweaters, gloves and scarfs, which he wore now, as those were the nicest and warmest pairs he owned.
After exchanging formalities, and promising a visit for tea and cookies soon, he finally entered his vehicle and drove off. Head bobbing and Humming to whatever was on the radio and wishing the heating in his car worked, Elliot reached his destination in a flash.
He parked his car as close to the entrance as he saw possible, and speedwalked to the inside of the beaten down grocery store, his breath already fogging in front of his face despite his red scarf wrapped tightly around his face and neck.
Taking the first of the grocery carts he came across that were left around by other customers, then cursing its wobbly wheel, he scanned his surroundings and pushed the shaky cart around the scarcely lightened ailes.
Elliot was in the process of evaluating if a particularly shriveled head of lettuce was worth it when not so far his ears caught onto the tail end wailing of a familiar voice, his shoulders jumping up to his ears in surprise.
He had thought about ignoring them, and walking as far away as possible in the medium store, but his only escape route was right behind the duo that stood now just a few steps from him. settling what he had in his hands down carefully, he turned around and faced the scene happening right behind him like a man accepting fate.
“NONONO! No i dun’ wanna!” C00lkid currently sat on the dirty floor of the dimly lit hall, waving his arms up and down rapidly, chubby red clawed fingers curled into fists. Seven seemed to be completely done with this situation, pinching the skin between his furrowed brows in tired exasperation and exhaustion only a parent could have.
“Look, kiddo,” Elliot wrinkled his nose at the fact he was close enough to be overhearing their conversation, and pondered at the scarce space between the man and the aisle, looking for a way out that wouldn't have to involve speaking to the two. Unfortunately, Seven chose that exact moment to lift his gaze from the pouting figure of his son to scan his surroundings, reading label after label on the shelf before landing on Elliot, who was just standing there. “I just think it might be better if you actually tried some mushrooms before rejecting them entirel…y..”
The two adults now stood staring at each other, Seven’s face did this complicated, kinda constipated expression before smoothing itself out, Elliot felt the same way. Though, the blond could admit he found himself feeling a kind of sympathy for the man over his current position, he himself related to it.
Caring and cooking for Mia as a teen with a workaholic father himself made him deeply familiar with the concept of picky children, so, cursing the awkwardness and his social nature but still being unable to combat his need to interact and empathize, he approached the two of them in purposefully slow strides. He knows he must look goofy, but he is at least trying.
“Hey,” Seven seemed to be stunned into silence by the fact Elliot was directing his gaze and words at him. This might have thrown the blond off were he anyone else, but Elliot is a professional at customer service-ing, so he kept his face plainly neutral “You two alright?”
“Elliot! Yes, of course. How have you been? With the whole..” Seven winced, already seeming to regret the words he had spoken. He gestured nervously at Elliot, waving in his hand a tin can labeled ‘mushrooms’ “you know”
Elliot almost laughed at the absurdity of the question, what do you even say in this situation, ‘oh no, i'm totally fine. Amazing even! Thank you for this forced unpaid vacation, man. I'm certainly enjoying the uncertainty of the future that awaits me!”
“It's fine” Elliot coughed to disguise how the question had kinda thrown him off. C00lkidd, who was at this bored of the two adults having a stilted conversation above him, had seemed to be done with laying on the cold floor of the store, and was now tugging at his father’s pants looking for his attention, then seemed to get distracted by an empty place in the shelves “you know, canned mushrooms are really gross, id recommend switching to fresher ones. Those are weirdly salty sometimes”
Seven watched Elliot for a moment, not understanding what the blond was even talking about, before a loud shrill voice pitched into the still conversation.
“Yes! They taste soooo bleghh” both adults turned around, and found that C00lkidd had shoved himself into the shelves, his words slightly muffled, she shelf then shook strongly. “We should just eat pizza instead, all the time!”
“Huh?” Seven instead of answering, simply blinked, surprised, but Elliot didn't give him any time to process or speak about his comment, immediately taking his leave while the man was surprised, speed walking out of there. The man stood shocked for a minute before finally reacting by a tug on his shirt, looking down, he saw C00lkidd who had gotten out of in between the shelf, now standing on his tippy toes and tugging once again at his shirt, loudly exclaiming that he was bored and wanted to go home.
‘I don't even like mushrooms either’ Seven now examined the can in his hand before placing it gently into the shelf. Lifting c00lkidd and placing him on the shopping cart's little seat, he kept shopping.
Elliot himself simply continued his trip around the store, checking prices and tossing whatever he was going to buy inside cart
‘Mia loves these ones, but they're sort of small to buy just one or two. She might finish those in under ten minutes’ he pondered the price on the bag of heart shaped cherry lollies, and decided ultimately to throw them in, he had come to like them, too. ‘i should just buy a whole bag, they're cheap anyway’
The blonde spotted the pair once again in the checkout section of the store, C00lkidd was trying his best to crawl out of the cart to the candy bars that were beside the cashier, who looked slightly uncomfortable but ultimately done with it all as every part time job having teenager seemed to be, Seven trying to hold him back with one hand and trying to scan his card and pay with the other.
Looking around to see if there were any other ones available he found that they were overfilled with long lines of customers, all of them sending badly concealed glances filled with nervousness and disdain towards the pair. He heard Seven release a sigh of relief at the ping of the machine that finally took his card. Elliot, who had already been placing his items in the conveyor belt, watched the cashier relax slightly as Seven hurried to place all of his items in a cloth bag, C00lkidd still grabbing longingly at the direction of the candy that were now too far to reach.
Like any adult who has had a positive experience with kids, Elliot was weak to the cuteness of children, even if those children had weird fire starting tendencies, so, opening the bag of lollies the cashier had already scanned he placed one in c00lkidd’s hand. The kid made a surprised noise at him, then giggled and immediately tore open the plastic wrap with his sharp teeth, chomping right at the candy without a second thought.
‘Figured he'd like those, like any little kid under ten, just pure solid cherry flavored sugar’ the cashier smiled tiredly at him and Elliot just shrugged, having been shoving his items while they were being scanned quickly in a red cloth bag, he was up and ready to pay and go.
“What is that? What’s in your mouth?” Seven asked his son, who he had now in one arm, the cloth bag hanging off his other one. c00lkid was covering the stick connected to the lollie with both hands, and just looked at his father ‘innocently’ “did you steal that? You know you can't steal, right? Oh no, im-”
“dude, chill,” Elliot was confused on why C00lkidd hadn't told his dad that it was him who gave him the candy, but figured that maybe the kid was just trolling his father, as he seemed to enjoy doing “i gave it to him, thought he could use something to distract him, he was getting fidgety”
Seven seems to finally have noticed Elliot was there, head snapping upwards at his voice. Elliot, already done with the man’s earlier stammering and apologies and the awkwardness every time they encountered each other, lifted his bag to his shoulder, and took off towards the sliding doors of the supermarket, not without waving thanking at the cashier, wishing him a good day. He could hear Seven walking behind him too, talking softly to his son, both of them stepping out to the cold air at the same time.
“Dad, It's freezing…” c00lkidd said, clinging to his father searching for warmth, Seven simply sighed, seemingly used to it and held him tighter and up.
“I told you it would be cold, you should have let me put your scarf on” the man mumbled and adjusted the bag on his arm, while c00lkidd whined and his teeth chattered “Take my scarf, I cant put it on you myself, my hands are occupied..”
‘Should have taken my keys out while I was inside, this is what happens when you are impulsive and impatient’ Elliot was checking his pockets for his car keys, feeling increasingly cold, bag placed at his feet. while checking his pants back pockets, he glanced at the pair who was still beside him.
C00lkidd was cozy now in his dads big scarf, snuggling into the warmth left in it by his father, but Seven didn't look warm at all, in fact, he could see the man's nose rapidly turning red while balancing the bag and his son in his arms.
‘It's so cold, I should have bought c00lkidd’s scarf, at least the walk home is not that long’ the man, having already practiced this routine a few times, turned his back to the blonde in the direction of his home. He was prepared to deal with the cold, even though his nose was already sniffling wetly from the cold, he couldn't help thinking of snuggling into his cozy bed back home, when something started strangling out of nowhere from behind, it was only years of practice with the fidgety toddler that was c00lkidd that helped him keep ahold of his son and their groceries while struggling against his attacker. ‘What the hell! Is someone trying to kill me?!’
Seven risked a glance backwards, and there he was, that thing that was strangling him turned to not be a weapon at all, but a brilliantly soft red scarf, that now laid wrapped tightly around his neck, Elliot simply stared at the man, narrowed his eyes as if defying him to say anything at all and turned in direction of his car, walking stiffly but decisive, bag in hand.
The man continued to stare as the blond loaded his groceries into his car quickly, sat in the driver's seat then took off in only a few moments. Only then did Seven continue his journey home, blinking in disbelief at what just happened, and slightly flustered at the feeling of being taken care of, even if it was by the man he seriously thought hated him.
Meanwhile, Elliot continued driving his car, the radio turned up to a familiar song from his childhood, and grumbled to himself about his now lost scarf, and how he was going to explain to his neighbor why he wasn't wearing it anymore.
‘I'm never getting it back, am i?’ He was an idiot, Seven lived quite far from where Elliot's house was it seemed, judging by the direction the man had walked to. But he couldn't find it in himself to be too upset, yes, it was one of his favorite scarves, but the man was on a straight path to catching a cold if he kept that up, and he couldn't let someone go if they needed help, it would weigh him down all day. Even if it was 007n7 ‘It was necessary, i guess, i have a car so i can get home faster than he can, who knows how far his house was from the supermarket’
While Elliot continued justifying his own actions to himself, he heard a loud ping, then buzzing slightly beside him. He quickly glanced down and found that someone was calling his phone, the words ‘EMO’ and a matching picture of his little sister glaring viciously at the camera flashing besides a few texts.
‘NEED candy’ ‘bring candy’ ‘ELLIOT’’elliot elliot elliot’
He slowed the car to a stop at a red light, took those precious few moments to bring his phone close to his face, and thought about answering the texts he knew Mia had sent desperately, then he promptly pressed the ignore button, placed his phone screen facing down, and continued driving home, now a smile lifting the corners of his mouth.
“If she wants candy that bad, then she can come visit me, heh” he spoke out loud to himself, giggling softly imagining how angry his sister must be right now at being ignored. His phone kept buzzing through the whole drive home, Elliot simply resumed humming to songs, now more enthusiastic and joyful.