My Guardian Angel//Lams//Post Laurens Death

Chapter Three

Philip Hamilton
I've just turned five years old today. I'm in the living room, or, as my Daddy says, the common room. He's here today, which is super cool because he's always at the big white building with the tall man with dark eyes and the mean guy with big hair.

Daddy, Mommy, and my two Aunties are done singing to me now, so I get to open presents soon. Auntie Angie and Auntie Peggy got me three big gifts!

"Philip, do you want to have the first slice of cake?" Mommy asks me.

"Yes!" I say excitedly. "Yes, yes! Oh, I mean, yes please." I use the voice Daddy used around General, who's here now, too.

"It's your birthday," says General. "You don't need to be polite."

"Yes he does!" Daddy calls from his desk. "Etiquette is very important Philip!"

"What is e...eti...etiquette?" I ask Mommy.

"Nothing you need to worry about yet," she tells me. "Now, it's time for cake! Why don't you go sit with Papi and General, hm?"

"Papi!" I grab my plate of cake and hurry outside, where Papi, Mommy's daddy, is sitting in a the chair that rocks.

"Oho, there's my adorable grandson!" Papi smiles at me. "And Mr. Washington of course!"

"George is perfectly well, Philip," says General.

"I wanna hear a story!" I say, climbing into Papi's lap.

"Really?" General laughs. "What about?"

I think about it. I see the man with fluffy hair and shiny sky eyes and decide then and there:

"The man with fluffy hair!"

He turns and looks at me, his sky eyes full of something called 'panic'. That's a word I learned from General.

"No!" he shakes his head. "Not me, Philip!"

General doesn't seem to know what I mean. "Fluffy hair?"

I nod, ignoring the sky eyes man. "Daddy doesn't like me talking about him. He always says he'll tell me when I'm older. But I am older!"

Papi hugs me close. "Maybe another time."

I pout a little; I wanna know why Daddy hates the sky eyes man! And why no one else can see him but me!

"Ask about the Revolution," says the fluffy hair, sky eyes man. "About your dad."

I light up with joy. "Yes! The Revolution! Daddy says that word all the time, so I know how to say it right. I wanna know what Daddy did in the Revolution."

General smiles. "He did many things, Philip, not just one. But I'll tell you about how he stole British cannons with John Laurens and Marquis de Lafayette."

I settle into Papi's lap. "Tell me, tell me, tell me!"

Papi and General laugh. I'm a little surprised when Sky Eyes stays around. He never does when General tells stories. But maybe he just wants to hear this one. I reach for his hand and he takes it.

"It was one of the coldest weeks of winter, the midst of New York City and the Revolution," General begins. "And there were three men who were very close. They were young and all of them had dreams. One of them was French and had a very long name; the other was called John Laurens, an abolitionist and someone who hated slave owners; and the last man was Alexander Hamilton, the immigrant from the washed up shores of Nevis."

"Daddy!" I say.

"Listen." Papi scolds gently.

"Lafayette, the French man, led the pursuit, while Laurens backed him up with encouragement and bullets he knew how to aim to perfection. Hamilton, however, was the brain of the mission. The mind. He played the most important role.