#ice pops

Chapter 1

Seems like it was yesterday when I saw your face

You told me how proud you were but I walked away

If only I knew what I know today

Ooh ooh

I would hold you in my arms

I would take the pain away

Thank you for all you've done

Forgive all your mistakes

There's nothing I wouldn't do

To hear your voice again

Sometimes I wanna call you but I know you won't be there

Oh, I'm sorry for blaming you for everything I just couldn't do

And I've hurt myself by hurting you

Christina Aguilera - Hurt

-

It took Bradley three months to force himself to listen to voicemails on his old phone, after he found out Mav and Ice "resigned" from the Navy.

It didn't take genius to know it wasn't voluntary resignation.

He knew it was his fault.

If he was being totally honest, some ugly part of him was glad at first when he heard about it.

When he made those anonymous reports about them being gay to the Navy, in the heat of the moment, he was sure it wouldn't do shit.

Mav and Ice were like no one else in the air.

Thomas Senior Kazansky was a retired Navy Vice-Admiral.

Mav had Viper backing him up.

Not even counting his Uncles.

Ice and Mav were simply untouchable.

At least so he thought.

(He also thought he could always trust them.)

-

A few first voice messages were mostly begging him to come home.

The first one was from Mav. He was crying.

The second one was from Ice. He sounded like he wanted to cry.

The next three ones were from Mav. He was crying in every single one of them.

That made him feel sick.

He should listen to them before.

He should have just come back home.

He could never go home now.

-

Mav didn't suspect him.

When he finally got to voicemail that mentioned the "retirement" he started to cry when he realized Mav didn't even suspect him.

Bradley ended up puking.

He fucking done it, and Mav didn't even fucking suspected him!

-

Ice did suspect him.

It was the shortest voice message yet.

"I need to know. Was it you?"

Bradley never heard Ice's voice sound so cold towards him.

-

Ice's only blood brother, Uncle Jerry also suspected Bradley.

"Kiddo, I know they did something fucked up, but please tell me you didn't reacted by doing something that should be considered a hate crime against your own parents." He sounded heart-broken. "Kiddo, please tell me, you haven't actually done that, because I don't think they will survive that."

-

Uncle Merlin knew it was him.

His voice message was just "What have you done? Bradley, do you realize what have you done?" in broken voice.

-

Uncle Slider also knew it was him.

"You little ungrateful fucking shit." He almost dropped the phone when he heard Slider's furious voice. He even sounded drunk. "Maybe they shouldn't have done what they did, but what you did is so much worse. Do you even fucking realize that?"

Bradley did realize that.

He wasn't that's stupid.

It's very different not to let someone start building something, than to destroy something that has already been built.

Especially to destroy TWO established careers over one potential.

"They raised you for fucking seven years! And this is how you repay them?! They didn't even fucking had to take you in even. Do you even know how raising a child together was risky to them, considering DADT?!" Slider was screaming so loud, Bradley was worried someone walking by his dorm room might overhear him. Then he suddenly stopped and laughed ugly. "Maybe you actually think you would get in the Academy, if you had spent seven years bouncing around foster care? Mav might have been able to do that if it wasn't for his Father, but you have always been such a spoiled little shit. You probably wouldn't even survive in foster care."

-

Bradley knew he should probably take a break after Slider's message, but he also knew he deserved punishment.

He figured whatever he will hear next couldn't be worse than Slider practically disowning him in any way that it counted.

Yet, it was.

"I'm so disappointed in you, Bradley."

Thomas Senior Kazansky kept his voice message on that topic short like his son.

-

After that Bradley was sure it couldn't get worse.

Then he heard Uncle Wolf's voice.

"Bradly, please tell me it wasn't you." Uncle Wolf sounded calm. "Just please tell me, it wasn't you."

Somehow it was worse than Slider's yelling.

Uncle Wolf and Uncle Wood were actually dishonorably discharged since they both got AIDS in the early 90s.

There was no saving suspected gay couple with AIDS in the 90s from dishonorable discharge.

Uncle Wood died from AIDS two years after they got discharged.

Uncle Wolf never fully recovered from that.

Bradley felt like the worst person in the world after that short message.

-

Yet somehow Aunt Sarah's voice message was even worse.

"I don't know if you have done that or not, but regardless I think you should know the truth. I don't think they would tell you that, even with everything that happened now." She sounded resigned. "Your Mother practically blackmailed them with your father's death, into making them promise her, they wouldn't let you serve. They weren't even going to do that, but then 9/11 happened, you had your car accident and Mav started having nightmares about you taking Goose's place in Hop 31 accident and Carole blaming him for your death."

Bradley didn't think he could feel more guilty than he already did, yet he discovered a new horrible level of guilt after hearing that.

"I hope it wasn't you, and hearing this will make you understand and come back to help them." There was a long pause. Bradley thought he wouldn't say anything more, then he did. "If it was you, then I hope you'll find a way to forgive yourself someday. Because I'm not sure if even Mav will be able to forgive you and I definitely don't think Ice will. I know I won't."

-

Bradley decided it was fate after all that he ended up being roommates with a small time pill dealer.

Antonio Brown warned him, that if he touched his shit he would kill him, but Bradley was planning on killing himself, so he figured out it will just be a great insurance policy, if he somehow failed to do the job himself.

He mixed a bunch of pills and he washed them down with some expired orange juice.