CHILDHOOD:
(TW: Ableism, implied violence)
Life has that funny way of kicking you when you are down, doesn't it?

Life certainly took that approach with Paris. His father, Jericho, had been warned time and time again that this is what would happen if you married a muggle. But the heart wants what the heart wants, and neither of them really believed it would happen.

Then Pairs came along. Their bouncing baby boy who would never respond to their voices, and who cried silently at night, and whose laughter sounded like little hiccups. A deaf boy with big brown eyes was always destined to struggle in this life, because being deaf in a magical world with a muggle mother wasn't enough of a bad roll in life. This boy was born without an ounce of magical apptitude.

His fathers family would have nothing to do with him or his mother. It was the unholy alliance that had left them with a disabled son after all. It would be another five years before they felt brave enough to try for more children. They perfect children. The real one they were always meant to have.

Was Paris jealous? Of course. He was a child who felt like he was being mistreated for something he couldn't help. He resented his sister and started to act out as a result. And these temper tantrums and impulsive behaviours would serve to prove the point that he was just born wrong. So he'd act out worse.

By the time he was a teenager and old enough that his lack of magic was growing increasingly evident he wasn't even surprised when his extended family stopped having anything to do with him. His mother and father tried to relate to him still, but all he coud see in them was the part that resented him. He was the symbol that represented everything they had ever done wrong, the cost of loving a mortal. His mother believing herself less than her husband - a power trip Paris wasn't going to touch with a barge pole. 

Fights occured, animosity grew, Paris fell with the wrong crowd and eventually this culminated in all classic squib behavior so he was told. Then his father came to him with a solution. An experimental treatment. Something which would spell disaster for him so many years later. Obviously they didn't work, and they left Paris with lost time. His father would act reasonable suggest they go to the doctor, Paris would refuse, and then he'd wake up three days later with no recollection of what happened, covered in injections. It was the lecture his mother gave him about knowing what's good for him that he broke - to this day he can remember nodding calmly, before going upstairs, and when everyone else was asleep he packed his bag and caught the next bus to the city. 

From there things were tough. He was just a kid, one who had lived around the convienences that magical life offered. Now he was out on the streets unsure how to do anything. His go to was always keep moving. At the time he didn't know if wizards would appear from nowhere to take him home, or if the muggle authorities were looking for him.

In the end no one came looking. He found small groups of likeminded youths who had for one reason or another nowhere to go, and othertimes he didn't. Sometimes he would have enough to eat, and sleep in a bed, othertimes he hadn't seen food for days and was hoping shop owners didn't find him hiding in their doorways as the heavans burst .

Ever notice those urchens who hang around places like knockturn alley hoping to steal a sickle or two? That was Paris. He live this way for almost two years doing odd jobs of varying degrees of shadey. But he met good people along the way, people who recognised he had a brain between those ears and could do more than beg and scrap. This was also where he met the love of his life, Alex. They pushed him to go back to school, helped him save money for it, and getting a job as a tutor to some rich guys kids, and then as his assistant, Paris started to work his way to a respectable career working in a small magical foocused law firm which dealt with injured muggles and wizards alike - many of their clients didn't even know why they were there, but they helped them all. He kept up the teaching in the evenings, it came to him easily, and was pushed into taking extra classes aimed at being a certified teacher and not just someone who helps them with their homework

Life took shape, he had a fancy job, a found family whom he loved, a partner he adored.

And then it all came crashing down. Remember I said those experiments would be his undoing? Turned out he'd been left on some list, his blood still on their records, and when they needed a new squib for their tests...well, suddenly someone out there cared what happened to little Paris. 

Almost two years spent locked away in some dark hole in the ground being injected with godknows what, being told to do things which made no sense. Pain was a common bedfellow, and then loss. His Partner didn't survive the tests, they died writhing in pain, forgotton in some hole. Somedays Paris isn't sure he made it out, that this isn't all some sweet dream.

He still doesn't know what really happened. One day no one was there to drag him to his tests, and he took his chances.

After that it was like he was that kid again - the one on the street, afraid someone would find out he was alive and drag him back. It was why he never told anyone from his old life he was back - that and the shame of telling them of what had happened. He could never.

Eventually, after some long dark months trying to find meaning at the end of a bottle. Then he saw her. He'd recognise her anywhere. She was one of the security guards, the one who would always manage to drop some of their food on the floor, or who always knew exactly where to twist the knife. Paris followed her home that night, and every night since. He knew her routine intimately, and eventually she caught him, just as he knew she would. And then...she was no more.

He'd taught before being imprisoned, and so he started teaching again - evening classes to struggling young wizards who could control life and death but didn't know how to add. After a year he applied for something more perminent. Something which would put him in reach of people he really wanted to get to know.

The connection Paris had to his little Texan hole in the ground was something he had preferred to keep to himself. There were old demons and secrets which could get him killed if they fell into the wrong hands. He was still under the delusion he was hiding it all so well, and that Joey had no idea Paris had any kind of past. In their interactions he had preferred to focus on Joey, not himself. It was something he felt Joey wouldn’t question – like a lot of young people when they deal with anyone over the age of twenty-five. That he was being observed never occurred to him, and he would later kick himself for underestimating the kid.

Had he been able to tell Joey’s thoughts in those moments while Joey focused on what he did or didn’t deserve, Paris might have considered hitting him again. When things like this happened deserve had nothing to do with it. Some of the most wretched people could come through a near death experience with no more than a sense of shock, while those who were nothing but noble and kindhearted could have their live shredded by one seemingly innocuous decision. Someone like Joey.

Painkillers were things Paris sometimes forgot. A lifetime around those with the ability to heal had made him forget there were such marvels of modern medicine, and when he felt Joey flinch Paris paused in his work, pulled off the bloodstained gloves and handed Joey a blister pack of painkillers. ”You’re alive. It’s a life.” Paris said aloud. Simple. No one said that lives were pretty and routine. They were what they were. He spoke with a heavy impediment as always, and had to pause his work when he talked, unable to focus on both what he was doing, and the difficult task of forming coherent words at the same time.

”Yes.” Paris agreed. There was no point sugar coating it, or lying. Everyone would be safer, but that in itself wasn’t a determination of the future. ”But you haven’t hurt anyone yet. You do have a choice. A CENSORED choice sure but…Whatever you decide, whatever you decide, if you do hurt someone I will take that choice away from you. I promise you that much.” Paris honestly couldn’t say what he would do in Joey’s shoes. Being a werewolf would be one of his last choices if he was forced to pick a supernatural side. Thankfully infection wasn’t something Paris had to contend with, which also made him ideally suited to helping Joey with his little problem should the young man need that kind of help.