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wildbornsiren · 2 days

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Megan, this is beautifully written. I'm loving the setting and the emotions in this part alone are incredible. You've managed to capture the listlessness of that last summer before adulthood and balancing between being a kid and an adult on your own.

I love this, and am eager to read more.

𝐩𝐚𝐢𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠: john egan x gale cleven.

𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: the last place that john egan wants to be the summer before he graduates high school is the egan family cottage, a place where time and everyone else seems to have forgotten. having been intent on finding a summer job, spending time with his friends, going to parties, and making out with pretty girls, john is irked that the egan family matriarch has other ideas and wants the family to spend "one last" summer together.

john's sour mood shifts just a little when he meets local, but also not-so-local, gale cleven, a boy his age who works at the small town's one pizza joint. through teenage angst and a desire to break free of the awkward position of not being children anymore but not yet men, the two form a bond that makes their summer a little more bearable. a bond that comes to shock the both of them.

but what happens when more than the summer comes to an end?

𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠: teen, though later chapters might have a slightly higher rating.

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 4.2k

𝐚𝐮𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐫'𝐬 𝐧𝐨𝐭𝐞𝐬: YEAH FIRST MASTERS OF THE AIR FIC. thank you to everyone who reblogged the mood board and expressed interest in the story. special thanks to @wildbornsiren for being my ride or die and @swifty-fox for letting me share snippets and bouncing ideas off of you.

likes / comments / reblogs are very much appreciated! thank you for reading! 💚

» mood board. » read on ao3.

𝐏𝐀𝐑𝐓 𝐈.

Summer 1986 Somewhere in Wisconsin

“Johnny!”

Evidently, John Egan had ignored the shouts from his mother to come inside for the last time. Her voice turned into something shrill that he could hear even down by the lake, where he could normally escape all manner of ruckus that came from the cottage. It wasn’t that noisy, he supposed. But it was difficult to get a moment of peace and quiet when his whole family - his ma and dad, his sister, and himself - were all crammed into the small two bedroom space.

When they were kids, John and his sister, Billie, would bunk together in one room, at first sharing the one bed, John then eventually sleeping on the floor when he “got too long,” as his dad put it. But when one is suddenly seventeen, and the other is fourteen, bunking together isn’t on the table anymore, no matter what Ma said. John would just as soon take the couch, which he was too long to fit on comfortably anymore, in the living room, or grab a tent and camp out under the stars if the weather was nice enough.

“Johnny Egan!”

The last name had been included, it was getting serious.

John pushed himself up with a soft grunt, hands instinctively wiping grass and dirt from the ass of his shorts. He reached over to pick up the battered copy of ‘Salem’s Lot and the empty bottle of Coke that he’d brought down to the edge of the lake with him, cramming the book in his back pocket, and holding the empty bottle between his long fingers.

He didn’t know what all the fuss was about, having dinner at the same time every night. It was summer, no one else seemed to be on a set schedule. Kids, teens, and adults ran wild in cottage country. At least that had been the way. Once upon a time, he and Billie had been allowed to miss dinners and stay out past their bedtimes. Yet somehow, as they got older, Ma and Dad were trying to tighten the reins. Ma had tearfully mentioned that it might be the last time they all got down to the lake together for the summer, as if one of them were fuckin’ dying or something.

John tramped through the brush and tall grass to get to the path that would lead him back to the small cluster of cottages on the the top of the hill. There had been four that had always been there, as long as he could remember, situated around the lake. They went back generations, passed down through handshakes and wills, little more than a handful of rooms for families to sleep, eat, and unwind after a day in the sun.

But over the past few years things further up the road were beginning to be developed, real proper like, and it was only a matter of time before it reached the older cottages down by the lake. John had ridden his bike past them shortly after they’d arrived a week ago; they looked almost as nice as the house that they lived in ten months out of the year back in Manitowoc. John had heard the stories about how the Egan Family Cottage had come to be, put together by his grandfather and a few friends over the course of the summer in 1945, a product of coming home from the war, too much time on their hands, and a lot of packs of cigarettes and beer.

“Jo -”

“I’m comin’ Ma!”

When he was a kid it seemed like a much greater distance between the cottage and the lake, and now he realized that they were within spitting distance of one another. He’d taken up less space then.

John crested over the small hill at the top of the path, the cottages in full or partial view now. Theirs was on the far right, and despite its location amongst the small cluster, had been the center of his universe, and the universe of all the other kids, summer friends, that spent summers there, for as long as he could remember. But the Miller kids were both off to college the last couple of years, and Amos Cook had passed away early that spring, and his widow couldn’t bear to come down and bring their grandkids with her.

Suddenly, at seventeen years of age, John felt too young and too old all at once.

—

“Lucia’s dad said he would drive us to the mall the next town over tonight. If that’s okay? Ma? It closes at eight.”

John pushed the remnants of dinner around his plate with the prongs of his fork, desperately wanting to be set free from the small dinner table shoved into a corner of an equally small kitchen, to go and find somewhere to finish his book. He only had a couple of chapters left before he was finished, and he really wanted an excuse to take his bike (or the truck if Dad was in a good mood) into town the next day, go to the library, maybe spend some time at the pizza place that had Galaga and Time Pilot arcade cabinets, see a pretty girl. Any girl, really. He was beginning to think his summer would’ve been better spent in Manitowoc. At least then maybe he stood a chance of feeling up something pretty in the back seat at the drive-in.

“Who’s Lucia?” John Egan the Elder asked, reaching over and opening the fridge door. The perks of the small kitchen and its small dinner table meant that the fridge was often within reach. Egan Senior pulled out a beer and held it up, looking at John with raised eyebrows. John nodded, and his dad pulled another one out. He popped the caps off of both and then handed one to his son.

“A new friend,” Billie replied after a sip of water. “Her parents have one of the cottages up the road. I met her today. She’s really nice. Ma, you’d like her.”

“Oh, Billie. Why would you want to go to the mall on a night like this?” Ma Egan asked, dabbing her lips with a napkin.

Dinner had been steaks and vegetables that Dad had cooked on the barbeque. It dawned on John that in the summer that his dad did most of the cooking on the grill, which meant Ma got a break from cooking. Perhaps that was why she had been so eager to come down to the cottage every year.

“Oh let her go, Ma,” John Sr. said, then taking a sip from his bottle of beer. “She’s met a new friend and wants to go to the mall. Ain’t no danger in it. So long as she doesn’t spend her entire allowance.”

John swore his Ma still believed that they were children who needed coddling and protection from the world. He had his own feelings about his sister getting older - for one thing, she was infinitely more annoying than he had ever remembered her being - but Billie didn’t need Ma looming over her shoulder at all times.

“Well, who will John spend time with if she’s gone?” Ma asked John Sr., as if neither Billie or John will be present.

“He’s seventeen, he doesn’t want to spend summer nights with his kid sister.” Again, they may as well have not been there. “Am I right, John?”

John inhaled, waiting for a moment of quiet in which he could reply in, before Ma was filling the void. “Oh, all right. Is Lucia’s dad going to pick you up from the mall?”

Billie brightened. “Yes. Eight o’clock on the dot, he said.”

“Then I suppose it’s all right. But I want you home no later than eight thirty.”

“May I be excused?” John asked, looking between his parents.

“Of course,” Ma replied, before immediately turning back to Billie to go over the five new rules she’d just concocted for going to the mall with Lucia.

John cleared his plate, grabbed his beer, his book from off the table by the back door, and made his way back down to his spot at the lake. He still had a couple of hours of daylight left, and even after he finished his book (he was a fast reader) there would be plenty of time for him to just lay by the lake, sipping the remnants of his beer, and enjoying the sounds of the crickets and the lake.

—

Back in Manitowoc, the library had a couple of girls John’s age who worked there part time. While he did enjoy going there to check out something new, he also enjoyed leaning over the counter, smiling with all of his teeth, and asking what their favourite books were. He also enjoyed watching them duck their heads and giggle, and on occasion following them to the very back stacks where their favourite books were not at all located and putting his hands under their skirts while they tried to stifle their moans against his shoulder.

In the town library down at the cottage it was small enough to be staffed by one woman, and that woman was old enough to be his grandmother. John wasn’t opposed necessarily … she just wasn’t his type.

His solitary errand completed for the day (he picked a couple more Stephen King books), John glanced at his watch. It was only ten in the morning.

Letting out a huff, he leaned against the brick exterior of the library and looked up and down the one street the town possessed. So many shops weren’t even opened yet, their proprietors moving as lazily as the out of towners who took over in the summer. John didn’t know much about business or economics (despite Dad’s best efforts), but thought that opening earlier would be more profitable.

Or maybe it wouldn’t. He was just bored out of his skull.

They had six more weeks there.

Books placed in the milk crate at the back, John mounted his bike and began lazily cycling down the street back toward the direction of the cottage, passing by the pizza place. It was open, and John spotted a couple of kids Billie’s age playing Galaga. It felt far too early for a slice, but John wasn’t quite ready to go back to the cottage and get through another book in a day.

Parking his bike outside, John then opened the door to Rush Hour Pizza. What passed for rush hour in this place he would very much like to see. The boys were playing Galaga, one shouting very unhelpful directions at the other, but aside from that the shop was empty, save for the thin blond working behind the counter, her back turned to the entrance. He leaned over the counter, one hand pressed against the linoleum and set his voice to purr.

“Hey pretty thing.”

The blond turned around, eyebrows shooting up to his hairline, blue eyes wide.

Fuck.

“Um.”

“Yeah,” the boy around John’s age supplied, tucking a piece of his long blond hair behind his ear. “My dad’s been saying I should get a haircut.”

He was slender, but not so slender that John should’ve been mistaking him for a girl. John was scarlett with shame, but tried not to let it show, instead just clearing his throat and looking down at the counter for a moment to get his bearings.

“What can I get for ya?” the boy asked.

“Uh,” John replied, finally glancing up. Okay, so he may have been a boy but he was still extremely pretty in a masculine sense. Was that a thing that men were? John had never thought a boy was pretty before. He’d looked at men with curiosity, but never -

“You okay, man?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine,” John replied. “Can I, uh, get a slice?”

“This early?”

John looked at the boy across the counter incredulously. “It’s … a pizza place. You sell pizza. You’re open.”

“Yeah, but … it’s ten in the morning.”

“Then what …” John trailed off, gesturing to the boys playing Galaga.

The blond boy leaned over the counter, looking at the two younger boys shoving quarters into the arcade cabinet, and then looking back at John. “They’re playing Galaga.”

“I see that they’re playing Galaga. But isn’t this the sort of place where you, I dunno, have to buy something in order to use … the facilities?”

The boy chuckled and John kind of hated him. He stole a glance at the nametag pinned to the boy’s apron - GALE - and then lifted his gaze to his face once more.

“When my dad is here, probably. But I dunno, it’s summer and this place is boring. I don’t care. If they wanna feed quarters into the machines they can go for it. We get their money regardless. At least, that’s what my dad would say. They bought some Cokes about an hour ago,” Gale said. “Pizza’s not even ready yet.”

John blinked. “Then why are you open?”

“Galaga,” Gale replied, pointing at the boys and the arcade cabinet once more. “I was here making the pizzas anyway.”

“So when you asked what you could get me, it was limited to beverages,” John said, letting out a sigh.

“There’s a menu,” Gale said, pointing to the large board above his head. “I can make you a sandwich. Or a sub.”

For the first time, John picks up on Gale’s accent, and cocks his head. “Not from around here, are you?”

“No sir,” Gale replied, leaning against the counter. “Born in South Dakota, grew up in Wyoming.”

“Then what the hell are you doing here?” John asked. Gale opened his mouth to speak and John interrupted him. “If you say ‘Galaga’ one more time -”

Gale laughed, something big and bright, showing all of his perfect fuckin’ teeth. It stretched up to the corners of his eyes and made his nose scrunch up, and John’s face felt strangely warm again. “Change of scenery. Dad got tired of Wyoming.” He tilted his head at John. “You’re not from here either.”

“Well, I’m from Manitowoc. My family summers here.”

“Summers. Fancy,” Gale said a little teasingly, straightening back up. It was far from fancy, but John didn’t correct him. “Can I make you a sandwich or what?”

John reached into his pockets and pulled out his wallet, rifling through his cash. “Yeah. Yeah, sure. Cold cut sub sounds great. Not gonna get on my ass about it being too early for lunch?”

“I would never,” Gale replied with a slow smile.

—

“You were gone long,” Ma said the moment that John walked in through the back door of the cottage, a stack of books under his arm.

John rolled his eyes and placed the books down on one of the side tables next to the couch, which had been serving at his nightstand. “Ma, please.”

“Well, I’m just sayin’ is all,” Ma Egan said defensively, looking up from washing dishes in the kitchen. “Said you were going to the library. Figured you’d be there and back in half an hour or so.”

With an exasperated sigh, John flopped down onto the couch. He wasn’t certain if he could bear even just another day of his mother being overbearing. “Ma, we’re on vacation. I’m almost an adult -” Ma snorted, and John ignored her. “- can you stop hasslin’ me about being a bit longer in town? It’s not like I have anywhere else to be.”

“Now John Egan, I’ve had just about enough of your complaining,” Ma said with a sigh, tossing her washcloth into the sink.

John sat up a little straighter, hands stretched out in front of him, eyebrows raised in confusion. “I haven’t complained once since we got here.”

“Oh yes you have,” Ma Egan said. “Maybe not in so many words, but you’ve been throwing yourself around like a rag doll since you set foot inside this place. Mopin’ about, spendin’ all of your time down at the lake.”

“There’s nothing for me to do here,” John said, and he sounded much whinier than he had meant to. Definitely not an adult.

“Like hell there ain’t,” Ma Egan said, hands on her hips. “Your sister has been makin’ friends up the road, and don’t tell her I ever said it, but you’re far more personable than she is.”

“Ma,” John began, his voice firm and level. “Billie is a kid. There are other kids around. I, your son who is a completely different person, am not a kid. There’s no one my age around here. They’re probably all working jobs. Which is what I wanted to do this summer back home, but you and dad insisted that we all come here. So forgive me for feeling a little bit put out that I’m spending my summer vacation with nothing to do, when I wanted to get a job, make some money for school, and spend time with my friends.”

“And get up to no good,” Ma Egan said quickly.

“Ma -”

“Those boys you pal around with aren’t exactly model citizens.”

“Neither am I,” John muttered, really wishing he had thought to buy a pack of cigarettes while he was in town. He hadn’t thought he would need to take the edge off there, but it was becoming apparent that he would.

“Not if you keep aligning yourself with that lot,” Ma Egan said, stepping into the small living room, cluttered with John’s belongings. “Look, the reason why your father and I insisted that we all come here this summer is that it’ll probably be the last time we all get the chance to.”

“Ain’t no one dyin’, Ma!”

Sighing, Ma sat down next to John on the couch. “John, it ain’t about that. You and your sister are getting older, you’re not going to want to come down here anymore with the whole family. Hell, you already didn’t want to. But next summer you’ll be off to college, or getting a job somewhere, and you won’t be able to make it down. And your father and I aren’t gettin’ any younger.” She paused and reached over, taking one of John’s hands. “Our lives are all going to change one way or another in the coming years, and ain’t nothin’ guaranteed. But we could have this one last time. Some time together. I’m sorry that we dragged you here. But I ain’t sorry that you’re here. You understand me?”

John glanced over at his mother, letting out a small sigh of his own. He loved his family, he did. But he was filled with that sort of unbridled rage that all teenagers feel when they’re on the cusp of adulthood. Even if he couldn’t identify it, quantify it, it was there. He did an excellent job of keeping it to himself for the most part, unless his mother drew it out of him, like she was doing then and there.

He didn’t quite understand her insistence that they all be together at the cottage when they could’ve been together back home. But, agreeing with her in the past had sometimes been a better option than arguing with her, and John couldn’t bear to break her heart with his own teenage angst anymore.

“Yeah, Ma. I understand.”

—

That afternoon, John had found his father, who was working on a truck for one of the newer neighbours up the road. Turns out it had been Billie’s new friend’s father. Billie and Lucia were inside, enjoying some air conditioning and listening to New Kids on the Block, while their two dads stood over the open front hood of the blue Dodge Ram, each holding a beer in their hand. John the Younger managed to lend a hand, which seemed to please his father, who really wanted his son to one day take up the mantle of the family business back home.

John was still undecided if he wanted to be a mechanic or not. In fact, he was still undecided on what he wanted to be at all.

As a thank you, Lucia’s dad suggested they get pizza. John was about to take his leave when Lucia insisted that he stay. John didn’t miss the way that Lucia looked at him, and couldn’t find it in himself to break the girl’s heart, so he agreed. Billie looked equal parts shocked and disgusted, and he later heard her say, “My brother? Seriously? Ew.”

“He’s got a moustache, Billie.”

“Not a good one.”

John was glad he was out of sight, if not out of earshot, rubbing at the hair above his lip absentmindedly. The moustache was a work in progress. He thought it looked just fine. And Deborah Jensen back home in Manitowoc had seemed to be quite fond of it as well.

Lucia’s dad gave him the keys to the newly fixed truck to go pick up the pizzas, and John Sr. reminded him to be on his best behaviour with a truck that wasn’t theirs. John fought the urge to roll his eyes, wanting to be a good guest, and after taking his time to ensure that the mirrors were properly adjusted, hands at ten and two (he knew his dad was watching), John drove ten under the speed limit until he was out of sight.

—

John pulled up to Rush Hour Pizza with a groan, not really in the mood for Gale. He didn’t know why, they’d gotten on well enough that morning. Gale was clearly bored to tears waiting for the pizzas to come out of the oven, so he’d chatted with John from across the restaurant while he ate his sub (it had been really fuckin’ good).

When the bell above the door chimed, Gale popped up seemingly out of nowhere, looking a little bewildered to see John again. “Couldn’t get enough of me?” he asked.

“Very funny,” John said, looking around. The arcade cabinets were abandoned. He supposed it was dinner time, all the neighbourhood kids were probably at home. “I’m just here to pick up a couple of pizzas. My dad’s friend ordered them.”

“Oh yeah. Of course,” Gale said, hands braced against the counter. He paused. “What’s the name?”

John blinked at Gale. “I don’t fuckin’ know.”

“You don’t know your dad’s friend’s name?”

“... Lucia’s Dad?”

Gale chuckled, shaking his head. “Can’t say I recall taking that order, man.”

John sighed, shoulders slumping. “Okay. Well. Are there any orders here?”

“Yeah, a few.” A beat of silence passed between them. “Do you know what he ordered?”

“Pizzas.”

Gale smiled, cocking an eyebrow and folding his arms across his chest. “How in the hell do y’all get by in Manitowoc?”

“I’m beginning to wonder that myself.”

Still smiling, Gale pulled some receipts from a small pile to his right. “Here. We’ll go through them both together. You tell me if any of the names or orders ring any bells.”

“Doesn’t this violate pizza-client privilege or something?” John asked, leaning over the counter slightly to look at the order slips with Gale.

“That’s not a thing.”

Apparently, all twelve people in town had ordered pizzas for pick up that evening. As Gale rattled off names and orders, John realized that the pizza boy didn’t even know his name. It seemed very unfair that he knew Gale’s.

“I’m John,” he said, interrupting Gale mid-sentence.

Gale glanced up at John, blinking slowly. “Well, all right. Hello John. I’m Gale.”

“I know. You have a nametag.”

Gale glanced down at his chest and smiled. “So I do. Forgot I had that on. Okay, where were we? Carlos -”

“That’s it! What’s his last name?” John interrupted excitedly.

“I was gonna get to that, y’know,” Gale said, looking up at John and smiling. “Navarro.”

“That’s the one!” John said, taking the slip from Gale and looking at the order. “One pepperoni, one meat lovers, and one vegetarian.”

“Coming right up,” Gale said, heading toward the back as John pulled cash out of his wallet.

While John waited for Gale to come back with the pizzas, he craned his neck to look into the kitchen. “Do you work here alone?” he called out.

He heard Gale laugh. “Why? Comin’ back to kill me tomorrow night?” he replied, still hidden in the back.

“Not my style,” John replied. “Just … you’re the only pizza place in town it seems, and it’s just you here. Seems like a lot of work.”

Gale returns to the counter with three boxes of pizzas, setting them down and then taking the cash from John. “I like to keep busy. My dad comes in during the rushes, but once the pizzas are actually in the oven the rest is just … transactions. Making sandwiches and stuff like that.”

“Right,” John said, watching Gale as he rang up his order and handed John back the change. John tossed some into the tip jar. He picked up the pizzas and nodded a thanks to Gale, who nodded one back and tucked a piece of his hair behind his ear. John was halfway to the door, before he stopped and turned around. “Gale, what the fuck do people like you and me do around here for fun?”

…

#masters of the air #mota #masters of the air fan fiction #mota fanfic #john bucky egan #gale buck cleven #clegan #bucky x buck #buck x bucky #john egan x gale cleven #1980s summer au #shelly reads fic

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