Happy Together 06

San Diego, 2016: I know what you did that summer

Summary:

"I finally figured it out, you know?"
He uncaps the first bottle and takes a long drink.
"All this time, I was breaking my head because it didn't make sense. It was so inconsistent with what I knew about Mav. When I found out what he had done and went to Viper, I realized he didn't understand it either. Not only was he illogical when he withdrew my application from the Academy, but his silence was also illogical. Mav is bold but not illogical. Never illogical. I thought it was about me. That he wanted to get rid of me, and he hadn't found any other way. Which is absurd because he could have told me he didn't love me. I would have accepted it. Only, he couldn't tell me that because Pete Mitchell was in love with me."
Bradley stops. He wants to punch the tombstone but settles for squeezing the neck of the bottle.
"And you knew it, right mommy?"

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Fandom: Top Gun (Movies)

Relationship: Bradley "Rooster" Bradshaw/Pete "Maverick" Mitchell/Jake "Hangman" Seresin, Carole Bradshaw/Nick "Goose" Bradshaw/Original Character

Characters: Pete "Maverick" Mitchell, Jake "Hangman" Seresin, Bradley "Rooster" Bradshaw

Additional Tags: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Implied Mpreg, Age Difference, Grammarly is My Wingman, Homophobia

INDEX: https://palabraspulsares.blogspot.com/p/happy-together.html

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Miramar Naval Base Cemetery, a week before the summer solstice

Bradley strolls, looking around. It's Tuesday morning, as he expected, the cemetery is literally empty. He sits in the space in front of the grave, puts the beer bottles to one side, and slowly studies the three headstones. Those of his father alpha and mommy omega are next to each other. His beta dad's is a bit further back. A perfect triangle in death as in life. Bradley has vague memories of Nick Bradshaw, but he remembers absolutely nothing of Luis Jaramillo, his beta dad. He knows he was Goose's pilot and died in a car accident when he was six months old, and Maverick replaced him.

Looking back, he can imagine that the higher-ups were hoping that Nick would end up marrying Pete. They would have had one less problem. It never happened. From what everyone has told him, Nick Bradshaw gave his heart only once. He loved Maverick like an annoying little brother.

On days like today, he feels he has had incredibly shitty luck. Why did she have to survive the trio? He looks at Carole's tombstone with hatred.

"I finally figured it out, you know?"

He uncaps the first bottle and takes a long drink.

"All this time, I was breaking my head because it didn't make sense. It was so inconsistent with what I knew about Mav. When I found out what he had done and went to Viper, I realized he didn't understand it either. Not only was he illogical when he withdrew my application from the Academy, but his silence was also illogical. Mav is bold but not illogical. Never illogical. The rest of us simply don't see what he sees, but if he explains it, everything becomes clear. That day, he did not explain, nor did he defend himself. He held on in silence while the alpha of the clan berated him. If I hadn't been so hurt, I would have realized that his refusal to give a reason beyond the stupid "you're not ready" and the resignation with which he accepted his expulsion all screamed that he was not acting out of his free will. But I was a boy. At seventeen, it is easy to believe that the world revolves around you. I thought it was about me. That he wanted to get rid of me, and he hadn't found any other way. Which is absurd because he could have told me he didn't love me. I would have accepted it. Only, he couldn't tell me that because Pete Mitchell was in love with me."

Bradley stops. He wants to punch the tombstone but settles for squeezing the neck of the bottle.

"And you knew it, right mommy?"

He lets out a bitter laugh.

"I was such a fool! I remember when I started looking for jobs in the neighborhood, and you asked me what I wanted the money for. I told you I was saving to buy an engagement ring because I had already found my omega. I told you with the confidence and pride of someone who believes the world is fair. I told you because you were my mommy, and I never, ever, in any way, would have thought that you would betray me. I told you I was marrying Mav, and you didn't react for a moment, then you blinked a few times and nodded. Suddenly, there were a lot of things to do at home. None of the jobs offered by the neighbors seemed safe or appropriate to you. You convinced me to enter the baseball Little League. My savings project never took off."

He takes another drink. Fight the urge to cry.

"You did everything to keep me from my goals. You sabotaged my childish attempts to woo him. When he returned from his deployments, you always spoke about my supposed crushes on betas and omegas from school. Do you have any idea how humiliating and painful it was to hear you tell all that gossip? I had to spend the little time we had alone convincing him that it was your imagination, that he was the only one in my heart. Seeing his sad, ashamed green eyes is one of the most horrendous memories of my teenage years. Now I realize that he was fighting against what he felt."

He leans his torso and rests his face on his hands. Broods for a few moments.

"It's fine that he held back, of course. Pete was an adult, and I was a bedazzled child. It was not, it could not be a healthy, balanced relationship. But there is a difference between waiting and despairing. You, Mommy, made him despair. You hurt him every time he returned home, and you did it knowingly. Pete loved you like a sister. He got us within Viper and Jester's clan! Was it really so disgusting to you that I loved this wonderful omega whose only mistake was being born twenty-two years before me?"

He stares at the orange slab and waits as if Carole's spirit would appear and explain herself. He realizes the gesture's uselessness. Moves his head from side to side and takes another drink.

"You know? The key was a phrase Pete used when Jake finally forced me into having an adult conversation with him about it. He said he didn't want to be responsible for the death of four Bradshaws. That makes no sense. He may have believed all these years that my father's death was his fault, but your cancer wasn't his fault, and he wasn't even in our lives when Dad Luis died. So where had he gotten that idea? I came home with Jake and couldn't get it out of my head. Everything else made some sense if you're in the middle of the most horrible depression. I can live in a world where you hate me, but not one where you don't exist, please! Oh, and another line I'm sure was also your doing: I prefer for you to be resentful of me than for you to be resentful of your mom. Illogical. All illogical. Mav was never fond of accepting other people's faults. Unless someone made him believe it was actually his fault."

He bites his lips and runs his hand over his face. He discards the empty bottle and opens another one.

"So I realized that I was hearing you through him. You somehow used his guilt over my father's death and convinced him that everything else was his fault, too. Luis, you, I don't know... You probably even mentioned Duke, Daniel, and Dora. Pete's self-esteem was weak, and you took advantage of that. You made him believe that he was the problem, and you invented a pattern: everyone who gets close to you dies. You also created a solution: staying away from me was the only way to keep me sound and safe. You didn't care about the consequence: that he would believe he deserved to be alone, that my hatred was a penance he deserved. How could you be so cruel, Mommy? What I'm asking? Of course, I know how. You tried to get me into every omega or beta that came my way for seven years, and when you realized it wouldn't work, you decided that if you couldn't destroy our love, you would at least separate us. We're both proud, and damn, you were right. It took us fifteen years to see death face to face to talk about it."

Bradley takes another long drink and lingers a bit before continuing his tirade.

"One of the worst things is realizing that you never really care if I flew or not. For that, it would have been enough for you to talk to me. Even if you wanted to do it behind my back, Viper or Jester would have been much more effective aids in preventing me from becoming a pilot. Instead, you made Mav believe he was the only one you trusted. You manipulated him into not asking for help, but Mav has never been good at subtlety. You knew it. You knew it was a matter of time before it blew up in his face. Not only did I yell a thousand horrible things at him, but I got him kicked out of the clan, and he lost all contact with his only friends. My sweet, trustworthy Mav -sighs- accepted my insults, the scoldings of the alpha he considered a father, and the loneliness of being left clan-less again. Fifteen years. Fifteen damn years! All because you couldn't accept who I was and who I loved."

He laughs bitterly. He remembers the horror he felt in 2006 when he thought Mav had died. How he shielded himself in his pride instead of…

"Although I must admit you played beautifully, I can't tell him anything about this. Can you imagine that talk? By the way, your great friend, the one you thought was your sister, for whose memory you gave up on me? She was a lying and vindictive bitch. What kind of wedding gift is that? Tell him we lost fifteen years together because you couldn't accept him as a son-in-law? Add one more person to the list of those who manipulated and exploited his generous heart? Take away a friend? To stain, in retrospect, his life since 1985? No, I can't. So, congratulations, Carole, you won that battle, but you lost the war."

He looks at the sky and back at the tombstone with the inscription "Carole Bradshaw-Jaramillo. 1964-1998. Exemplary wife, mother and friend." What a joke, he thinks bitterly.

"You almost got away with it, mommy. Almost. You didn't count on the persistence of Tom Iceman Kazansky, and, of course, you couldn't imagine that I would find someone as wonderful as Jake Hangman Seresin. I wonder if Ice knew the truth or just had suspicions. Clearly, he knew that Mav and I were just denying our feelings. Him because he believed he didn't deserve anything good. Me because the rage of betrayal blinded me. I owe Ice to bring us together. I owe Jake to finally talk to Mav like an adult. I love him so much."

He moves his eyes towards his father and dad's tombstones. He smiles genuinely for the first time.

"I think you'd like Jake. He's a pilot, like me, and... Well! They call him the new Maverick. That's how skilled and bold he is in the air. Oh, I forgot, Jake is an alpha. Yes," -he lets out a mocking laugh- "I'm bisexual, fuck you Carole Bradshaw."

He takes another drink and moves his hand around with the half-empty bottle in it.

"Of course, I never told you! Your constipated face every time the topic of gay or bisexual people came up was enough to shut my mouth. But you're dead, and I'm going to marry those two wonderful men. I'm not afraid of you anymore." He brings his free hand forward to caress Nick and Luis's tombstones- "I want you two to know, and I want to believe that…" -He hesitates because, in reality, he doesn't know. He only has second-hand opinions.

The day after telling Viper and Ice about his "preferences," he received a call from Slider. The beta reminded him that he had been with his father and dad in Annapolis and told him, in no uncertain terms, that Nick and Luis were faithful Christians who never looked down on omegas, people of color, gays, or bisexuals. He told him about an alpha from his same year at the Academy, whom the other students helped to get away to see his girlfriend. No one ever said anything, but she worked in finance, and he never brought her to official events. They all did the math. Just as Slider assured him that Nick and Luis would have accepted him, he remained silent about Carole. Brad didn't ask him either because he knew the answer.

Still, the doubt remains. It is one thing to accept naturally that a friend or colleague is not heterosexual, another to accept it in your own family. There's Jake's example. It didn't matter that he was the heir. They still did everything possible to break him. But he already knows that his mommy didn't want him, so he chooses to believe Slider and Mav.

He takes a deep breath and speaks again.

"I want to believe that you two would have understood me. No, my family is not conventional, but I am proud of my love for them. Mav is a little old but still fertile." -he looks askance at Carole's slab- "Thank you very much for forcing my husband to have a geriatric pregnancy." -he says venomously- "And if we can't be biological parents, it doesn't matter. Do you have any idea how many infants there are in the United States foster system? Takes your breath away, honestly. A good chunk are omegas, although I don't know why I was surprised when I read it. This world is very fuck up, really."

He gets up with difficulty. His legs shake a little from the time he has been sitting and the amount of alcohol he has ingested. He looks at the two remaining beers, thinks for a bit, and finally nods. He uncaps the bottles and spills one on Nick's tombstone and the other on Luis's tombstone.

"Enjoy it, dear dads!"

He walks slowly and with a slight sway towards the cemetery exits. Once on the street, he takes out his phone to order an Uber.

"Are you going somewhere fun, gorgeous?"

He raises his eyes in surprise.

"Jake? What…? What are you doing here?"

His boyfriend is across the street, leaning against the trunk of his car. He wears a shirt and pants of undyed cotton and sandals. His hands are casually stuffed into the side pockets of his pants. He smiles and shrugs.

"Taking your drunk ass back home, apparently."

Bradley looks back with some fear. Then, on both sides of the street, and crosses. He stops a few inches from Jake.

"It's not what it seems," he says in an embarrassed voice. By the Trinity, that phrase never sounds good.

The blonde just raises an eyebrow, skeptical.

"It seems to me that you came to get something off your chest, Brad. I don't need to know anything else. This is a marriage, we have the right to keep our secrets. As long as you don't tell me you're canceling the wedding..." -he shrugs.

"No, it's not that," he assures and smiles.

Rather, he thinks, it's about the fact that there will definitely be a wedding.

Jake leans down, gives him a brief kiss on the lips, frowns in displeasure at the smell of beer, and walks towards the car's driver's door.

"So come on, your fiancé is at home waiting for you to cook."

"I think we have to review that part," -he complains while sitting in the passenger seat- "This relationship is starting to seem unfair to me."

"Come on! You love to stuff Mav's belly with your homemade food. It's always the same, the tougher the alpha is on the street the softer they are at home."

"Be careful, Seresin, it seems that you have fallen in love with a cliché."

"I have fallen in love with the two most difficult men in the world to please. That is what happened to me. Thank goodness you two are pretty, and I have money."

Bradley leans on his shoulder and sighs happily.

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Note: 

Nick Bradshaw's character is heavily based on the real-life person, Luis Claudio Jaramillo. He was also a RIO at TOPGUN and flew a decade or so before Top Gun was "set". He died in similar circumstances to how Goose did in Top Gun when he had to eject from his plane after an engine fault. His pilot, Lt. Daniel "Ace" Oxley, was investigated for the incident but was ultimately found not guilty.

INDEX: https://palabraspulsares.blogspot.com/p/happy-together.html