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Bradley’s sitting on Jake’s couch, hitting his arm to try to knock him off course while Phoenix beats everyone’s asses at Mario Kart, when his phone rings. Bradley immediately tosses his controller aside to answer it, heart pounding. No one calls him except for Jake, who’s obsessed with the sight of himself on FaceTime, and Jake’s currently spiraling off the Rainbow Road.
“Bradshaw,” Bradley says tersely into the phone, stepping around all the other Daggers to the relative quiet of Jake’s kitchen.
The person on the other end of the phone inhales softly. “Hey, Bradley,” Maverick says.
Bradley leans against the counter. He hasn’t heard from Mav since they all got leave after the mission - well, the occasional “good morning” text, usually featuring a picture of the P-51, but no real conversations. Frustration bubbles up in him - why now? What does Mav want?
The tiny part of him that’s still a kid underneath it all just wants to hear Mav’s voice.
“Hey,” Bradley says.
“Why don’t you come by for dinner on Sunday?”
A decade and a half ago, Mav wouldn’t have asked. He would have called Bradley at his friend’s house and said “Get your ass back in time for dinner” with so much warmth that Bradley would have gone straight home with only a little grumbling.
Bradley’s been grown for years. He can say no. For the first time, he and Mav are on an even playing field.
“Ice is grilling,” Mav says, and just like that the playing field isn’t even anymore.
“Beef brats?” Bradley says hopefully.
“You know it.”
“Damn. Okay, yeah, I’ll be there.”
“Great,” Mav says enthusiastically. He pauses. Bradley can picture him consciously dialing it down. “Ice’ll be happy to hear that. You should text him, by the way, he’s been asking about you.”
Bradley’s chest twists. His beef might have been with Mav, but all of his Navy uncles were a casualty of his grudge. The last time he had a true conversation with Ice was when Ice called him at his apartment between freshman and sophomore year to tell him that DADT had been repealed. Bradley had been so damn excited and relieved for all of his uncles and for himself, and all he’d said to Ice was “Thanks for letting me know.’
“You’re welcome, kid,” Ice had said gruffly, and that was it. End call.
And now, well. Bradley’s not even certain Ice can talk like that at all now. He certainly doesn’t as an admiral - everything comes in the form of emails. And Mav said “text him.” The Ice that Bradley grew up with was just as committed to old-school phone calls as Mav apparently still is.
Coyote hollers, “Where the fuck are you, Rooster?”
“Yeah, where’s my wingman?” Jake echoes. “Phoenix and Bob are wiping the damn floor with us, c’mon.”
Bradley’s pretty sure his dubious Mario Kart skills won’t do anything against Phoenix and Bob, but he still says, “Rooster incoming.” To Mav, he says, “Sorry, gotta go save Hangman’s ass.”
“Dogfight football?” Mav guesses.
“Mario Kart.”
“Good luck.”
Bradley should say goodbye before he hangs up. His parents and uncles raised him right.
He doesn’t know how to say goodbye to Mav now. He hangs up and launches himself onto the couch to experience the privilege of Phoenix wiping the floor with him.
#
“Okay, who the fuck are you texting?” Jake demands. They’re lying on the beach, reading, of all things. Bradley’s a little ashamed to admit he hadn’t thought of Jake as a particularly deep thinker. But there he is, nose buried in The Things They Carried while he sprouts new freckles along his golden shoulders. Bradley had been rereading Dune, the copy Mav lent to him when he was 12 that he never returned, when his guilty conscience pricked him enough that he opened a text message to Ice. He’s been typing and deleting for close to ten minutes now.
“Man, just send the thing,” Jake groans when Bradley starts typing again. “She can’t be that intimidating.”
Bradley snorts. “Hangman. Look at me.”
Jake drags his gaze over Bradley’s entire body. He lingers on Bradley’s ass, which makes Bradley’s face heat exactly the way he wanted. “Oh, I’m lookin’, Roo.”
“Yeah, exactly. And you think I’m texting a woman. ”
“Well, my advice is gonna be the same for a man.”
“It’s not like that. It’s, uh, family.”
“Hell, even easier. It’s not like they can get rid of you, though Lord knows my family’s tried.” Jake reaches for Bradley’s phone. Bradley rolls out of the way, holding his phone just out of Jake’s grabbing hands. “I swear, I’m gonna send it for you so you quit interruptin’ my reading time with your tap, tap, tapping - ”
“Fuck off,” Bradley says. Jake gives up on the phone and decides to shove his fingers into Bradley’s armpits. Bradley squawks. Before he can drop his phone, he stabs the send button. His phone hits the sand as Jake buries his face in his armpit and blows a big wet raspberry. “What the fuck, Bagman?”
By the time they’re done wrestling around, they’re both covered in sand and sweat. “Asshole,” Bradley laughs. Jake smacks his ass. “Ow, what the fuck.”
Jake slaps his other cheek. “Now let me read,” he says as if he’s not the instigator here. He shakes the sand off of his book and dives back in. A serious furrow forms on his forehead. It’s nearly as endearing as his dimple.
Bradley retrieves his phone from the sand and wipes the screen on his towel. He unlocks it to discover that what he ended up sending Ice was simply “Hi.” Fuck, Ice doesn’t have his number. There’s no way he’ll respond.
Bubbles pop up. Then a message: Hey, Brad. Mav says you did some incredible flying. Are you enjoying your well-deserved leave?
Bradley glances over at Jake. yeah, he sends back to Ice. heard you’re making brats this weekend
Heard you’re coming over.
Bradley hesitates, thumbs hovering. If that’s not a problem, he finds himself saying.
Bubbles pop up and disappear, pop up and disappear. Bradley shifts anxiously. One of Jake’s hands comes to rest on his ass, then slides up to the small of his back. When Bradley looks over at him, Jake’s still deep in his book. His callused thumb rubs soothing circles on Bradley’s damp skin.
You are not and have never been a problem, Ice says. Bradley can hear the words in his voice: stern, a little irritated, as if Bradley’s goodness should be obvious to him. We are excited to have you over. We missed you.
“We missed you.” As if it’s that simple. Just a few months ago, the words would have spiraled Bradley right into rage - how dare Ice or Mav miss him when they’re the ones who drove him away? Who brought him up to fly only to clip his wings?
“We missed you.” They missed so fucking much. Bradley’s first flight. His college graduation. His time at TOPGUN. Every deployment, every birthday, every Hanukkah and Christmas and Fourth of July when they should have all been swimming in Uncle Sli’s huge pool like always. Would Ice have been there, if Bradley had asked? Would Mav have answered if he’d reached out?
Bradley knows the damn answer. Doesn’t make it any easier to bear the guilt. How about I come over early and help with food prep, he says. An olive branch. Something, anything.
See you then.
Bradley sighs. He melts onto the towel and closes his eyes. Jake grips his shoulder briefly before he returns to petting Bradley’s back.
“See, that wasn’t so hard,” Jake says. Bradley groans.
#
Bradley pulls up to Ice and Mav’s place just as Mav’s getting on his bike. They both freeze, Bradley with his hand still on the gearstick, Mav with one foot hovering near the kickstand.
Bradley rolls down his window. “Where you goin’?”
“The store.” Mav pulls a list out of his pocket and waves it at Bradley. “Ice gave me an assignment.”
“The hell are you on your bike, then? C’mon,” Bradley says before he can think better of it. “There’s a lot more room for groceries in the Bronco.”
He ignores the way Mav’s whole body seems to go light with wonder.
Mav climbs in shotgun, and Bradley has an intense flashback to when Mav taught him to drive. That feeling only intensifies when they get on the road. “Quit hitting that imaginary brake,” Bradley grouses.
“I’m not,” Mav says, like a liar. He grits his teeth when Bradley comes up on a red light too quickly for his liking.
“I’ve had my license for almost twenty years now, I know what I’m doing.”
“There are plenty of people who’ve had theirs for longer who don’t. Are you sure it’s been twenty years?”
“Pretty damn close.”
“Huh,” Mav says softly. Bradley keeps his eyes on the road.
Mav has him go to some fancy supermarket that they never would have gone to when Bradley was a kid. “Don’t tell me that being an Admiral made Ice all bougie,” Bradley fake-complains as he gets out of the Bronco.
Mav shuts his door behind him. “This grocery list is highly specific,” he says. They start walking toward the store. He shakes the piece of paper at Bradley and jokes, “Mission parameters.”
Bradley rolls his eyes as they enter the crosswalk. “Yeah, because you’re so good at following those - ”
Mav grabs Bradley’s elbow and yanks him back out of the crosswalk. A minivan screeches to a halt right where Bradley had been. Mav smacks his hand on the hood. “Watch where the fuck you’re going,” he snaps at the driver. Bradley startles. Mav’s never had as much of a mouth on him as some of the uncles, and Bradley’s never heard him swear at a civilian. He stumbles along after Mav while Mav drags him into the store by his wrist. The whole time, Mav’s grumbling to himself about shitty drivers in this shitty town.
Bradley extracts his arm from Mav’s grip and grabs a cart. He holds out a hand to Mav. When Mav frowns, Bradley checks, “We’re splitting the list, right?” It’s what they always used to do on grocery runs - Mav would take one half, Bradley the other, and they’d race to see who got finished first. Supermarket trips were one of Bradley’s favorite chores as a kid. Mav always knew how to turn them into a game.
Mav gets that wondering look on his face again. He folds the list and carefully tears it in half. “See you at the end,” he says.
“You’re on, old man.”
Bradley quickly realizes he’s at a disadvantage. Apparently Mav’s used to shopping at fancy supermarkets that play classical music, but Bradley’s been raised on Wegman’s and Ralph’s. It takes him longer than he’d like to navigate the aisles.
The final item on the list pulls him up short. Kate Farms, Mav’s scrawl says. Dammit, Mav, putting him at a disadvantage. Bradley thinks about finding him and asking him what it means, but he decides he’d rather google it than swallow his pride.
Google helpfully says Kate Farms is on aisle 12, so Bradley jogs his cart over there.
He stops and stares. He’d like to say it’s because he’s overwhelmed by choice, and there are many options, but he’s truly frozen by what Kate Farms is.
Our blended meals provide high-quality nutrition that flows smoothly through feeding tubes with little to no manipulation, the boxes say.
Bradley’s seen Mav shirtless. He knows he doesn’t have a tube. Which means….
A cart rattles up behind Bradley. “Sorry, I forgot that was on your half of the list,” Mav says, a little out of breath.
“Does it matter what flavor?” Bradley checks. He’s only had a feeding tube once, briefly, an NG in his nose after he had to eject in Kandahar. He doesn’t remember being able to taste anything coming through it. He does remember violently vomiting it up more than once.
“Grab the multipack and then a few extra of the mango strawberry. Ice says those ones are the best.”
Bradley does as he’s told. He frowns a little when he sees the label that says pediatric.
“Extra calories,” Mav says quietly. “It’s taken us a while to figure out the right balance.”
“Does he - ” Bradley shakes his head. “None of my business.”
“He would want you to ask instead of wondering.”
“Can he eat anything by mouth anymore?”
“Small portions, cut up. He aspirated early on and he just…” Mav looks away and blinks a few times. “Anyway, don’t say anything about him having to eat his brat with a fork, okay? He’s a lot more self-conscious than you might assume.”
Maybe other people who serve under Admiral Kazansky don’t see him as self-conscious, but Bradley grew up with Uncle Ice and knows the quiet anxiety he carries with him always. “Heard and understood.”
They go to the checkout together. Bradley’s adding up the cost of everything in his head when he glances over at Mav and sees him mouthing numbers, too. The total makes Bradley wince, but Mav doesn’t bat an eye. Bradley supposes the combined salary of a captain and an admiral makes grocery shopping easier.
They combine all the groceries into one cart to go back to the Bronco. Bradley’s about to step into the crosswalk when he looks back at Mav and sees the tension around his eyes. He thinks about Mav slamming his hand down on the hood of the minivan and how tight his grip had been on Bradley’s arm afterward.
Bradley backs up and grabs hold of the handle next to Mav. Mav’s shoulders relax a fraction. He gives Bradley a wry smile.
The yard smells like charcoal grilling when Mav and Bradley get back to the house. They unload the groceries silently, with the practice of two people who have done this work together a million times before. Bradley nearly says something more than once, but every time he opens his mouth, he loses all his words.
Then the back door clicks open, and Ice is there, spatula in hand. He’s wearing a blue polo shirt and khaki shorts - the most relaxed he’s ever gotten in Bradley’s memory, though he’s seen enough pictures from Mav and Ice’s TOPGUN era to know Ice wasn’t always so buttoned up. His hair’s all gray now, not even a glint of blond the way Bradley remembers. He’s wearing glasses, real ones now, not just reading ones. His trach’s right above the collar of his shirt.
Bradley hasn’t hugged Mav since the carrier deck. He can’t break through the invisible glass that separates the two of them, can’t decipher how Mav feels about him enough to risk being vulnerable in that way.
But Ice -
Ice sets the spatula on the table and holds out his hand like he’s ready to shake.
Bradley rushes into his arms.
Bradley feels Ice’s oof more than hears it. He’s knocked off-balance when he realizes that he’s got about two inches of height on Ice now from his final growth spurt in undergrad. He ducks down and rests his forehead on Ice’s shoulder. Ice’s arms are warm and strong around him. Ice pats his back and squeezes him tight.
When Bradley pulls back, Ice keeps a hand on his shoulder. He smiles and covers a hole on his trach with one finger. “Did you win at getting groceries?” he rasps.
“No,” Bradley says, exasperated. “This asshole didn’t warn me in advance that the mission parameters had changed.”
Ice laughs. “Did you hear what he called you?” he says to Mav.
“Loud and clear.”
Bradley throws his hands in the air. “I’m not taking it back.”
“I wouldn’t expect you to,” Mav says far more seriously than Bradley expects.
Ice sighs. His smile fades, though his eyes still have that serious warmth that Bradley’s been missing for fifteen years. He uncovers his trach and pulls his phone out of his pocket. He types, and his phone reads out, “Wash up and help me with the grill.”
“Yes sir,” Bradley says.
The bathroom’s right next to his old room. He lingers outside it for a long minute. He can’t decide what would be worse - opening the door to discover Mav and Ice have repurposed it as a guest room, or opening the door to discover it hasn’t been touched since he left at eighteen.
Mav’s chopping veggies in the kitchen. He passes a plate of skewered mushrooms and onions to Bradley. “Take these out to Ice.”
It’s so easy, Bradley discovers, to slip back into being someone’s child, or at least to go through the motions. Of course Mav hands him a plate and tells him to take it to his uncle. Of course Bradley takes the plate without question and brings it straight to Ice. Ice has the radio on, tuned to an oldies station that when Bradley was a kid played the Beatles but now plays all the 80s rock Mav and the uncles loved to sing at karaoke.
When Bradley was a teen, Ice would have been singing along while he grilled. Now, he taps his feet while he checks on the brats. He smiles when he sees Bradley’s plate of mushrooms and onions. Thank you, he signs.
You’re welcome.
You sign?
Learned in college. I forget a lot.
Good, still good, Ice signs. I’m learning. Mav too.
Bradley doesn’t poke at any of the food on the grill. In his experience, that’s a good way to get poked in the side with a spatula. Instead, he stands shoulder-to-shoulder with Ice in companionable silence. He catches himself singing along to “Footloose” when it comes on. He stops himself, unsure if it might offend Ice. Ice elbows him hard and raises his eyebrows at him. Go on, he signs. Bradley relaxes and keeps singing. When it comes down to the final chorus, he even throws in a little dance. Ice claps, grinning, and Bradley takes a bow.
The next song is “Like a Virgin.” Ice wrinkles his nose. Bradley laughs. They fall back into their relaxed quiet, only Bradley’s got tension growing in him that spirals tighter every time he glances at the back door and sees the shape of Maverick moving around in the kitchen.
It all tumbles out of him at once: “I have so much to apologize for.” Ice looks up at him sharply. Bradley doesn’t want to hold eye contact, but he doesn’t want to seem like a coward either, so he holds himself perfectly still under the fierce gaze of one of the men who raised him and clarifies, “I never should have cut you out. No, let me finish,” he insists when Ice waves a hand at him. “I was eighteen and stupid, and maybe I would have been eighteen and stupid anyway, but I - I was 29 when you got cancer, Ice. 29 years old, a grown man. Uncle Sli emailed me about it as soon as you got diagnosed. And I didn’t show up.” Bradley swallows. “That was my decision, and I am never going to forgive myself for it.”
Ice grimaces. He holds up his hand and takes out his phone. He types, “I didn’t want you to see me like that anyway.”
“Maybe I needed to see you,” Bradley says hotly. “Maybe I was too fuckin’ prideful to admit that being an adult means stepping up for your family even when they’ve screwed up.” The tears come hot and fast. He blinks them away the best he can.
The brats pop on the grill. Ice adjusts them with his spatula. Bradley swipes a hand under his eyes.
“I have to apologize to Mav, too,” he says.
Ice types, “You don’t have to do anything.” He taps a finger on the word have to emphasize it.
“Yes, I do,” Bradley insists. “If I - if, uh.” He looks up at the trees waving gently in the breeze. He remembers the tire swing that hung in one of them all of his childhood. He wonders if it broke or if Mav and Ice took it down. “If Mav hadn’t ejected - if that had been it - I would have died with so damn many regrets.”
Ice rolls the kebabs with his spatula, then sets it aside to type, “I understand what it’s like to not want to die with regrets.” Bradley grabs Ice’s wrist the way Mav caught his arm in the crosswalk. Ice patiently lets him hold on until Bradley can convince himself it’s safe to let go.
Ice eases the brats onto their plate and hands it to Bradley. He shoos him inside. Bradley takes the brats to the table, which Mav has set with one of the tablecloths Mom embroidered when she was going through chemo and bored out of her mind. She hated embroidering, but she said everything else made her too nauseous. Bradley traces the crooked little flowers.
Mav comes down the stairs with a metal pole with a pump attached. He sets it next to Ice’s chair and puts one of the Kate Farms blends by Ice’s plate. The back door creaks open, and Ice comes in with the veggies. He sets them next to the brats, buns, and condiments. He raises his eyebrows at Mav. Mav gives him the thumbs-up.
Ice hooks up his g-tube easily. He smiles when he sees the mango strawberry blend and gives Bradley a thumbs up, too. When Ice sits, the other two do, too. Some things never change.
Bradley sees Ice’s mouth move in the familiar blessing - baruch atah Adonai - while on his other side, Mav mumbles “God is great, God is good.” Mom always said she didn’t care what religion Mav and the uncles raised Bradley in, as long as he was good, so Mav always made himself recite dinnertime prayers even when he didn’t believe, and Ice taught Bradley everything he learned in Hebrew school. When Ice and Mav are finished, Bradley says, “Amen, yeah!” the way he always did as a snarky kid. Ice rolls his eyes, and Mav grins.
The brats are fucking fantastic as always, and Bradley says as much around a mouthful of his second one. Ice spreads his arms wide as if to say obviously, I am the king of the grill, thank you.
Bradley’s phone starts ringing - the FaceTime sound, of course. He declines the call. Jake immediately calls again. Bradley declines it and texts, Eating w/ family, call later.
Bradley honestly expects Jake to try to call again. He’s strangely touched when Jake texts back heard.
When Bradley looks up from his phone, both Ice and Mav are staring at him. Bradley’s in his thirties; are they allowed to hold him to the no-cell-phones-at-the-dinner-table policy that ruled his teen years?
Yeah. Yeah, they probably are. Bradley will let them, at least. His ears burn as he says, “Sorry. Hangman.”
Ice’s eyebrows climb a little higher, and Bradley knows he’s got his number. Maybe Mav hasn’t connected the dots, though. Bradley’s hopes in that regard are dashed when Mav says slyly, “Brad was at his place when I called the other night.”
“Yeah, with all the Daggers,” Bradley protests weakly.
“Sure, of course.”
Bradley can’t quite manage to smile back. All at once, the layer of adulthood on top of childhood memories is too dizzying. He pushes away from the table and grabs not only his empty plate but Ice’s, too. “I’ve got dishes,” he says, and goes to the kitchen to throw himself into the task before either Mav or Ice can protest.
He can hear them talking quietly over the water running. He can’t make out the words; Mav’s keeping his voice low, and Ice is either whispering or typing his responses without activating text-to-speech. Talking about him, Bradley’s sure. The idea makes him feel a little sick.
It’s not that he doesn’t trust them. Well, he doesn’t. He does. He doesn’t know if he does. He loves them, and he’s still angry with them, and he’s drowning in guilt and anxiety. He’s not paying enough attention to the dishes. A knife slips in his slippery grasps and nicks his thumb. Bradley swears and pops his thumb in his mouth.
Immediately, Mav’s there beside him. “You okay?” he asks. Bradley shows him his thumb. “No, don’t put it back in your mouth, wash it.” Mav waits until Bradley starts dutifully scrubbing his hand before he darts out of the room. He comes back with Neosporin and a Spider-Man Band-Aid.
Bradley laughs a little. “You know I’m not actually a kid anymore, right?”
Mav shrugs. “Ice said these made injections more tolerable.”
Bradley can suddenly, vividly see Ice, hair thinning or gone entirely, covering an injection site with a Spider-Man Band-Aid. He thinks about him wearing his uniform over them, never letting anyone aside from Mav see him at his weakest.
Dammit, he does not want to cry in front of Mav. Mav wouldn’t be bothered by it. That’s the problem. Mav isn’t a crier, per se, but he was always getting watery-eyed when Bradley was a kid, whether it was because Bradley hit a home run or because Bradley cracked his head open falling off his bike.
Bradley doesn’t trust himself to see Mav that vulnerable. Doesn’t trust himself to react as anything more than an ungrateful, cranky kid.
Bradley doesn’t want to feel like that kid anymore. He just doesn’t know how to stop.
“Brad,” Mav says softly. His hand hovers near Bradley’s elbow. “I…”
“Why?” Bradley says hoarsely. “Why did you invite me?”
Mav hesitates. He looks over his shoulder at Ice, who’s scrolling on his phone at the dining room table while he finishes his tube feeding.
“C’mon, Mav,” Bradley says. “Don’t think. Just tell me.”
Mav looks back at Bradley. His voice is as raw as it was after they both got shot down when he says, “Because you’re our kid.”
Bradley grips the counter with his good hand.
“I know you don’t want to hear it,” Mav says. “I know I don’t deserve to say it. But it’s true. You’re our kid. You’re always going to be our kid. You’re always invited no matter what.”
“Would I have been before?”
“Yes,” Mav says insistently. “It was never about not loving you. I’ve always wanted you here.”
He’s got lines around his eyes that he never had before. He’s still strong, still capable, still Maverick, but he’s undeniably older, just as Bradley’s undeniably a man. Mav always seemed like a kid compared to all of his friends’ dads. Bradley thinks they both missed each other growing up.
He has so much he needs to say to Mav. Apologies and anger, hope and grief, stories he needs Mav to know. Bradley’s not quite ready for all of that.
He touches Mav’s hand. He takes a deep breath. He pulls him into a hug.
Mav’s breath catches in his throat. He clings to Bradley. He reaches up and pets Bradley’s hair the way he used to when Bradley was small. Bradley thinks of having his hand held in the crosswalk and being gently teased about Jake.
“Hi,” Bradley mumbles into Mav’s hair. Mav squeezes him tighter. Bradley takes a deep breath and makes the jump: “Missed you, Dad.”
When Ice comes into the kitchen to wash his feeding tube parts, he brings a box of tissues with him. He passes them to Bradley and Mav. They both blow their nose with a honk, which sets them laughing and crying again.
Ice tousles Bradley’s hair. He covers his trach and says, “There’s our boy.”
Ice and Mav make Bradley finish washing the dishes even though the water in the sink’s gone cold. He can’t complain. He’s home.