Chapter Text
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Sometimes You’re Born With It
Chapter One
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Growing up, Evan Buckley’s parents had never paid much attention to him. They’d ignored him and left him to his own devices most of the time. And he had found that the only time they ever paid any sort of attention to him was if he was hurt. So he’d taken to doing dangerous things, getting himself hurt to gain their attention. Though that attention only lasted for a short while, and as the years passed the amount of time they paid to him when he was hurt got shorter and shorter.
His older sister Maddie had taken to looking after him. Teaching him how to ride a bike, and tending to any of his injuries. Doing her best to make Christmas a special occasion for both of them, and getting him a cake for his birthday when their parent’s forgot. She gave him as much love and attention as she could, but she could never make up for their parents' neglect. And then when he was 13 she left for college, following her boyfriend off to another state, leaving him home with their parents in a big empty house.
The only person Evan had in his life who never left him and who always made him feel truly seen was his grandpa Alex. Alex O’Connell, Margaret Buckley’s father, had fought and won his rights to see his grandchildren after Margaret and Phillip had tried to cut him off after their son Daniel’s death. He had to promise not to speak of Daniel Buckley to Evan or risk losing any rights to seeing the boy, a promise he was not happy about having to make. But he’d keep the promise if it meant he got to spend time with his grandkids.
While he wasn’t able to tell Evan of his brother he did tell the boy all about the adventures he’d had over the years as an archaeologist following in his own parents footsteps. He told Evan all about his adventures as a child, from resurrected mummy’s to cursed bracelets. Evan grew up hearing exciting stories of deserts, tombs, and digs of all kinds, much to his parents' annoyance. And Grandpa Alex supplied him with any and all books on Ancient Egypt and Archeology that he ever wanted. Grandpa Alex even gave Evan his great-grandmother Evelyn’s old leather bound journal, which she used to record the events of her and her future husband’s and her brother’s trip to Hamanaptra in 1926, on his sixteenth birthday.
All of this inevitably led to Evan wanting to become an archeologist just like his grandpa. Unfortunately, the Buckley parents were not too keen on Evan following in his grandfather's footsteps. Neither of them believed Alex O’Connell’s stories of cursed Mummies and giant scorpion kings. And they absolutely despised the idea of Evan following in Alex’s footsteps and wasting his life digging in sand for magical books and things that didn’t exist. They outright told him that if he pursued archeology that they wouldn’t help pay for his college. Luckily for Evan his Grandpa Alex was very willing to pay any and all college expenses no matter what career path he chose.
And on his eighteenth birthday, Alex sat him down and told him about his older brother who had died. After all, Evan was an adult now and his parents couldn’t stop Alex from spending time with Evan for telling him. Evan had been mad, and heartbroken to find out he’d had a brother who’d died, and that it had been kept from him his entire life. He understood why his Grandpa Alex had kept it a secret for so long, and the man had told him the second he was able to. But his parents, and his sister had all kept it from him. It hurt to find out the reason his parents were so neglectful of him was because he’d failed to save his older brother, the only reason he’d even been born in the first place. The shouting match he’d gotten into with his parents that night had gone on for over an hour, and had ended with Evan packing most of his things and moving into his Grandpa Alex’s home. He lived with his Grandpa for the remainder of his senior year of high school, and his Grandpa Alex even helped him to apply to multiple colleges. He got acceptance letters from just about every college he applied to, but in the end he decided he wanted to go to The University of Oxford.
Before heading off to college in England he decided to change his last name from Buckley to O’Connell. He hadn’t spoken to his parents since their fight on his eighteenth birthday, and he wanted nothing more to do with them. They’d never really been parents to him anyway. His sister Maddie had been more of a mother to him growing up, and his Grandpa Alex had been more of a father to him as well. He felt it was only right to take on the O’Connell name, especially if he was going to follow in his Grandpa’s and Great-Grandparents footsteps and become an archeologist.
Going to college in a different country had been a massive change for Evan, who had never left his home town in Hershey PA. He had to get used to the cars driving on the other side of the road, and half the time he didn’t understand the slang that his fellow classmates used. And living in a dorm instead of a house was a completely different experience of its own. He and his roommate became friends pretty quickly. His roommate always had friends over, whether to study or to just hang out, and they always included him whenever they all hung out. So living in the dorm was actually less lonely than living with his parents had been.
Evan technically didn't need to live on campus since his Grandpa Alex had a home in England that he’d inherited from his parents. But he had wanted the full college experience and had opted to live in the college dorms instead. And while he did go to a few college parties here and there, he spent most of his time studying and focusing on his classes. And out of all of his teachers over the next ten years his favorite had been his Archeology and Anthropology teacher, Professor Bobby Nash. The man had lost his whole family in a house fire while he’d been away on a dig in Egypt, and had decided to take a break from field research to teach. And the man had taken one look at Evan O’Connell and immediately decided to take him under his wing and teach him everything he knew.
His ten years at college seemed to fly by. Getting his bachelors, and then his masters degree had seemingly taken no time at all. Going for his PHD had seemed to go by both quickly and slowly. His Grandpa Alex had worked with the college to fund and put together a dig for Evan’s class to work on to gain some field experience that would go to helping all of them earn their degree. What had made the last few years of his college education feel like moving through quick sand had been trying to write his dissertation. He’d spent almost two years writing and rewriting it. But eventually he had gotten it written and had Grandpa Alex and Professor Nash read it over first before submitting it.
He’d invited Maddie to his graduation but she hadn’t responded nor did she show. He was hurt but he understood she had a life of her own. But his Grandpa Alex had been there for him and had even thrown him and his whole class a graduation party. After his graduation Grandpa Alex had taken him on a couple digs and had even taken him to meet Ardeth Bay’s grandson, Amen. The two young men had hit it off right away and become best friends. And Evan had even spent some time among the Medjai learning self defense and the things they were entrusted to protect the world from.
As the years passed, Evan made a name for himself in the Archeology world. From discovering new tombs, to dealing with grave robbers, he became a well known name among his peers. And he built a life for himself in Egypt. He had his own flat, and he occasionally worked shifts at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo now and then when he wasn’t off on a dig. And he even had a place among the Medjai as well.
His life was going great. And despite what his parents used to say about him and the career he wanted, he was happy with the career he’d chosen and the life he had. But with each passing year he couldn’t help but feel like there was something out there in the desert, waiting for him.
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