Work Text:
Martha Kent is twenty-eight years old, but feeling much older. She's constantly tired, and doesn't get better.
That spring, John takes the old truck to town and hangs a "help needed" sign on the local board. Then he hangs another one by the church, and one by the bus stop, where any travelers or newcomers might see it. He puts the last one by the post office, then calls it a day.
They can't offer much, but there are always those looking for a bed, three full meals, and a small paycheck every weekend.
Ben stumbles into their life, full of hard looks and silence. He tells them he's eighteen years old, and nothing more. They don't need to know more. He works hard and doesn't make too much noise. He doesn't take days off, and it’s good enough for them.
He said he was looking for a summer job, but then he stays for apple picking in the fall, and when Martha knits him a sweater for the winter he looks at her weirdly, almost surprised, but still wears it.
He stays for the winter.
He's good with the animals, and he likes music. He has a few precious records he treats carefully.
For his birthday, Martha and John get him a portable turntable. It's an older version, bought secondhand, but Ben stares at it like it's diamonds.
“I can't take it,” he says. “That's too expensive! You don't need to give me anything!”
“You're a good kid,” John says. “We know you like music. You take care of your records and all. This way, you can always have it with you.”
Ben leaves it on the table and goes to his room.
He stays for spring.
[One late night, John hears an old story of a missing father and a dead mother, growing up in foster care and just needing a place to "get his shit back"].
Ben stays to help during the summer.
Some mornings, Martha can hear music from the barn. If she goes check, she knows, she'll find Ben spreading the hay and screaming about a teacher who needs to leave the kids alone.
(The cows seem to enjoy this.)
Ben ends up staying with them for over a year.
Every other month, he takes the bus to the city for a day, and comes back with a new record: one with a triangle and rainbow, another with a man with colored lightning on his face.
He leaves a few months shy of his 20th birthday, and they tell him to visit. His stomach is full and he has a new scarf (homemade), a heavy coat, and a jar full of cookies in his suitcase. He puts his precious records in a protective sleeve, and shields the turntable's box with all of his socks. He's leaving for the big city.
(He won't be back, but they will get some postcards in the next few years.)
They hang his photo on the staircase, and it's sort of a promise:
[You were here, and you were loved, and you are missed].