Roads That Never End {Dempseys}

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charade
Retired Staff

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Thinking

Roads That Never End {Dempseys} Nov 30, 2012 0:53:00 GMT -5

Post by charade on Nov 30, 2012 0:53:00 GMT -5

Broken vows and blood shot eyes
My weathered hands grow weary
In this crowd of masks and disguise
Going at this alone
I thought I found my independence

Tired were the eyes that appraised his suit as Ambrose affixed a tie around his neck tighter than any hangman's noose. Dressed my best, and prepared to face the world like the gentleman I am.It was an old article of clothing, a relic of when he had had a steady job, as grey as the storm clouds that were gathering in the afternoon sky.How fitting. She always liked the water.A streak of royal purple hung from his throat, the only tie he owned that wasn't completely threadbare. Laughable is it not? There remains nothing of the false status I once held. There is nothing that this family is rich in.A leather belt wound its way around his middle, even as he placed his feet within midnight black shoes of the same material.To wear fake finery for such an occasion. Another grand joke in the dark comedy that is my life.A moment was taken to appraise himself as he combed his graying hair. Was it a trifling thought, or had a handful of new streaks appeared in the past fortnight? The very fiber of his being would clamor about his inner-most thoughts whether he verbalized them or not. It was a strange sense of deja vu that surrounded him, strange in the sense that he had t experience these feelings again.No parent should ever have to bury a child of theirs. And to dance this dance for the second time in my life is almost too much for me to bear. Oh Siberia, when the earthquake took you from us I never thought that I'd have to bury your sister beside you. It's just not right. It's just not fair in the grand scheme of things. hasn't this family suffered enough?

It was a cruel sense of humor that seemed to invade everything about his life. Why else would the second daughter he had to bury be the twin of the first? At the very least you can look out for each other now my dears.Ambrose had to study his face in the mirror, some section of his mind telling him to remember to dust it at a later time, but for the most part all he could see were the bags under his eyes rimmed with circles and red from grief. That vilest of substances, the drink that killed his brother had not been touched since the day that Kiera died and it was not likely to be picked up again. It had been a poor substitute and a useless bandage for what he was feeling. A monogrammed handkerchief poked lazily from one of his pockets; a father's day gift, though from which daughter he could no longer remember. They were waiting in the cemetery even now, with the exception of Blair, who despite what the Peacekeepers had told him about what they were doing, was still very much missing. He hoped that she'd be able to take care of herself out there, but with families like the Moreno's on the prowl for children to brainwash it was a small wonder that he was so worried. He had excused himself during the ceremony to fix his attire, though little enough was wrong with it. In truth he merely wanted a moment to collect himself before he had to deliver the closing eulogy. There were two pieces of paper in his other pocket, one the aforementioned speech and the other a letter he had only written to get his thoughts out before they consumed him.

Screaming out by myself
Just to hear an echo
This ringing in my ear, it will not end
This night feels as if there
Will never be a day
And it seems to me
That all my dreams have become nightmares

It was quiet as he began his slow walk back to her grave and the sky wept with him every step of the way, fragments of an old lullaby he used to sing to his daughters winging through his head.

Goodnight my angel, now it's time to sleep
And still so many things I want to say
When we went sailing on an emerald bay
The water's dark and deep, inside this ancient heart
You'll always be a part of me
Someday we'll all be gone
But lullabies go on and on, they never die...

It was a small gathering that had come, in part because it needed to be kept that way, and partly because no one else would have shown up anyway. That was a mixed blessing in of its own, as it was only family it allowed his erstwhile nephew and his nephews lover to attend without fear of reprisal from the enforcers. Even so, Ambrose had admonished him to use some form of disguise; there were only two gravediggers and a chaplain at this event, but one could never be too careful. The past week had been an interesting one in their household, with the arrival of one Colt Hanlon in their district. Kae had never really explained where the other boy had come from, but that they were friends of a different nature. However, given the nature of his nephew's activities, this really didn't come as a huge shock; and there were far worse things to be worried about. It had only given rise to several awkward conversations where the full meaning of double entandre was utterly and totally explored. There was a certain chocolaty dessert that Ambrose had lost his taste for and other things of that nature, like a conversation wherein he had warned Kae not to use one of the older chairs, for it was quite splintery and tantamount to having a cactus shoved in his posterior. Of course, this had led to a silence in which he had to wonder if that was not his nephew's intention to begin with.

Family is a wondrous, weird machine.

The other five Dempseys ~~and colt~~stared at him as he exchanged places with the chaplain and coughed into his hankie. The very air seemed heavy with expectancy."Yes. Well. As the good chaplain here has already explained, we are gathered here today to bid farewell to our dear Kiera, as she goes to join her twin in the great beyond. I...My daughter Kiera was as precious to me as the rest of my daughters are. She was an artist, both with her words..." The paper blurred before him, whether because of his eyes or the misty rain he could not tell. Ambrose cleared his throat and tried to begin anew before giving up entirely and crumpling the paper and leaning heavily on the rickety wooden podium. The words were coming, dancing on his tongue, but they were not the words that written. Ambrose stood silently for awhile wringing his hands as the rain pattered away softly before exhaling a large breath and staring at the sky.

My wages want death
In your light I found beauty
I silenced your voice
I scream for apathy over peace
I thought I could hide in the darkness
But in your light I see your blood is
All over me
I thought my scream fell short
And you sang the melody
You took my cold heart and brought it alive

"That she was taken from us the way that she was is a tragedy. But... it is also a travesty." There. He had said it. But there was oh so much more than he wanted, nay, needed to get off of his chest."Kiera took the lessons that I had taught her. The lessons her mother taught her, even the ones that her cousin taught. And to my regret she applied them in a way I never would have imagined. It took great courage and moral fiber of the utmost capacity to do what she did. To take the place a kennel dog bred for fighting and rescue that Ella girl. It breaks my heart everyday that some of the families in this district would frown upon my family when we have so little to give. So little to give and yet it was still taken from us without a second thought and with more a few sneers. Congratulations to the Moreno family! This is the third year in a row that they have failed to live up to own their lofty expectations. But the first that anyone other than they had to suffer for it. They can sit in their mansions and cavort with the likes of the Lightwoods and the Shore's all the while mocking the very one who gave them their daughter back at the expense of her life. A child they would not have missed they way I...We miss our Kiera. Goodnight my angel. I know that you are watching over us from somewhere with Siberia by your side. Farewell."

We've lost what we have won
The power in our love
From the sea floor I see the stars
They shine more brightly now than ever
We've lost what we have won
The power in our love
Through these murky waters
I see more clearly than before

The unopened letter was placed on her casket, his intention being for the words to be buried with her as the clouds began to release their burden in full, sending down a cascading waterfall to wash everything away like a purifying fire. It ran down in rivulets from her gravestone and dripped to the freshly planted flower petals like the shattered hopes and dreams of a young girl. The rain was cool to the touch, tapping on his skin like infinite minuscule caresses, her eyes reflected and refracted in every single drop. A roll of thunder rumbled across the atmosphere as a streak of lightning zapped something in the distance. As he watched, the casket was lowered into the ground, every creak of mechanism another knife in his chest as his eyes flicked over to the grave of her sister. A blustery wind picked up, spraying his suit with its debris as his thoughts continued on their descent into anger.

Am I not a pacifist? Did I not turn my back on the life my brother led, the life I was leading? I tried my best to be everything that society said I should be to make something of myself and for the actions of my brother's seed they all turned their backs on me. For the actions of my daughter they shun my family. For saving one of their own. For dying in the place of one of their powdered elite. And not just any, but a child of her. For this...For this there is no apology, there is only further mockery. No, there will be a reckoning. I will see the Moreno family cast down from their lofty perch to the ruin they so abhor. I've spent far too much time worrying about my own actions, too much time toeing the line to keep my daughters safe and I couldn't even do that. Too much time under the heel of their proverbial boots and I will not be beholden to it any longer. I do not know what I am going to do, but the talk of my daughter, regardless of what she did in the arena and after all she did for those mewling sycophants is the straw that has broken my back. They salt my wounds with their tainted words and I have had enough. This is the final insult. Its been a long, long time since I was any kind of criminal but it they were have committed the real crimes. For the longest time, I was one of the ones tasked with reading their mail, balancing their checkbooks and fudging their numbers. It would be a shame if certain secrets were to find their way out into the open for all to see. Dare I say the thought makes me giddy with excitement? Could I, Ambrose Dempsey, really stoop so far as to attempt to blackmail members of the elite? I, the self avowed pacifist and well-known doormat? Your actions mean war Moreno, so we will just have to wait and see.

But know this. To use the vernacular, You ain't seen nothing yet.

OOC:
Kiera's Funeral takes place a week after the end of the Finale. Which is still technically in the future, but South has asked to be get this up now. A thread I'm sure we've all been waiting for.~~I'm also somewhat hoping that this will become a piece to the puzzle that is the D1 Gangwars~~

16 Jul 12, 23:43
GB: I bet you just sit at your computer with a tea cup and a monocle

Deleted

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last seen May 5, 2024 3:04:24 GMT -5

Roads That Never End {Dempseys} Dec 2, 2012 22:22:02 GMT -5

Post by Deleted on Dec 2, 2012 22:22:02 GMT -5

some nights i stay up cashing in my bad luck
some nights i call it a draw
some nights i wish
that my lips could build a castle
some nights i wish they'd just fall off
Kaelen and I are the only ones who don’t cry when they put my sister in the ground.

I thought I would be angry. I’m so angry at everything else in the world all the time that I’d assumed when Kiera died I would explode, would get lost in fury and drown in it. But I’m not. I don’t feel angry or crazed or even sad. I feel nothing, and watching my family’s tears makes me wonder if I’m just as much of a monster as the only other dry-eyed person sitting in the rickety folding chairs. Kae looks even emptier than I do, a hollowed hull that needs the support of the dark-haired form beside him to even breathe – he looks so empty that I want to scream and hit him and yell that he doesn’t deserve the reprieve of numbness. Maybe my anger isn’t quite so gone after all. But doing so would be hypocritical when I’m numb too, maddeningly removed from the pain that tears at the rest of my family, wishing I could feel it because maybe then I would feel a little bit closer to human. Even Colt looks dreadfully sad, this strange, stuttering boy that I only know because he showed up at our house the day after Kiera died, offering his stammered condolences and introducing himself as Kaelen’s boyfriend to a universal reception of raised eyebrows and dropped jaws. He grieves for my sister whom he never even met, and I remain statue-still and expressionless with my eyes fixed on the polished wood of her casket. What sort of wrong does that make me?

My whole universe has been a haze of others’ tears ever since Kiera set foot on that stage, and I have stood like a ghost in the middle of it all, trapped behind a veil that won’t let me come to terms with the loss that sits like a cavern behind my chest. She told Cora to be strong, but she never said the same for me because she assumed I would be strong inherently, the quiet pillar with flames beneath my skin the way I’ve always been. Part of me hates her just a bit for that, for placing a burden on my shoulders that I never asked for and can never live up to. How can I hold a family together after it’s already shattered? Kiera and Siberia are dead and Blair and Moira are gone and Cora has been keeping up a steady wail for a week, my mother is mad with grief and my father is more fragile than I’ve ever seen him, Kaelen is a half-dead shell of himself, and me? I’m nothing. The rage that’s always ruled me at a moment’s notice isn’t nearly as horrible as this hateful neutrality.

The wake last night was the worst of it. The Capitol made her pretty for us, lasered away her scars and curled her hair in a way she never wore it and put her in a white dress that mocked her nonexistent innocence, but they could do nothing to hide the place where her arm should have been, couldn’t trick us into thinking she was only sleeping when her skin looked so pale and waxen and dead. My mother threw herself over Kiera’s immobile chest and sobbed while my father looked at the family photos on the wall with silent tears streaming down his face and Cora’s unearthly weeping made everything seem ethereal and not-quite-real. I saw Kaelen cry for the first time in my entire life last night, something breaking inside of him when he saw what was left of her until he collapsed into Colt’s waiting arms, his whole body shaking with tears. The rest of the well-wishers descended like a swarm of buzzards after Kae and Colt left, and all of them wanted nothing more than to simper and tell me how sorry they were and touch me, looking offended when I stiffened and backed away from their greedy hands. They all cried, too. But not me. All I did was lay a curious hand against Kiera’s cheek and think to myself that nothing should ever feel that cold.

My father steps away from the podium and the heavens open, the roar of the thunder and the soft shh, shh of the rain masking the labored groans of the machine that lowers my sister beneath the damp grass. The droplets spatter against my dress, more gray than black because the fabric is so worn, each impact staining it a darker shade until the whole garment is soaked and slinging to my skin with a permeating chill, cold as Kiera’s skin beneath my fingers last night. She’d always said that the water sang to her, that if you cared to listen closely enough you could hear the wisdom of the ages in a rainstorm. But no matter how hard I try, all that I hear within the downpour is her voice, her laugh, her pretty verses that only she understood.

She’s gone.

Maybe that was the finality I needed, because all of a sudden my haze of numbness shatters like a mirror beneath the crushing hammer of grief that bursts through it, knocking into my chest hard enough to rip a single sob from my throat. Maybe I’m crying and maybe I’m not, it’s hard to tell through the rain that streaks out of my soaked hair and over my cheeks, but I can finally feel the pain ripping away at the lining of my soul and despite the fact that it makes me all sorts of wrong and warped and messed up (when your last name is Dempsey, you’re doomed to a madness of some variety), I smile, because the pain means I’m still here, I’m still real.

Without really registering what I’m doing I stand, the water running in icy rivulets down my back at the action – in a way, it feels like the comfort of a hand on my shoulder that I’ll never really feel again. My feet move of their own accord, the toes of my hand-me-down shoes poking over the side of the grave as I look down at the spray of flowers on top of the casket, my father’s sealed letter perched carefully among the blooms. That’s not my sister down there. That’s only her shell, the vessel that was never big enough to hold her in. My sister is falling from the sky, singing softly as she paints herself over our skin and on our hearts in permanent, invisible ink.

“You were the strongest person I’ve ever known, Ki,” I say, my voice as soft as always and almost lost under the roar of the storm. “You were stronger than any of us.”

The Capitol measures strength through blood and battle cries and Victor’s crowns, but Kiera measured it in wisdom and righteous intent and the drive to fight another day. I hurt all the way down to the core of myself now, but that’s okay, because I can finally hear the whispers in the rain meant only for me. You can let yourself feel the pain, Aurora. The pain will make you strong.
but i still wake up
i still see your ghost
oh lord, i'm still not sure what i stand for
what do i stand for, what do i stand for?
most nights i don't know anymore

Last Edit: Dec 2, 2012 22:40:34 GMT -5 by Deleted

Jimmeh!
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Roads That Never End {Dempseys} Jan 15, 2013 14:27:01 GMT -5

Post by Jimmeh! on Jan 15, 2013 14:27:01 GMT -5

She stands in the storm, tears washed out by the rain, hair whipped into a frenzy, tumultuous as the roil in her thoughts. A sister lost to the Capitol, dead forever... Another lost to her own internal conflict so confused... A third to her bitterness such anger... From five to two in scant few weeks. How long until the last two fell? Coramine and Aurora. Each as broken as the other, in totally different ways. Aurora fuelled by fury. Coramine weighed down by perpetual sorrow. Gripped by the crippling chill of grief. The wails that came from her house for the past week could reveal that much. The same anguished cry that had been torn from her lungs when Kiera had first stepped up to claim the mantle of tribute.

These days however, it was less her sister that caused her misery. Her sisters death was tragic, unjust and horrible of course. The way the Capitol sent her body back in better physical condition than it had arrived, but devoid of all life had caused a fresh round of tears, great wracking sobs from a heaving chest. That they dared to sully her with their clinical, unfeeling touch, tore deep rents in her heart, bloody furrows criss-crossing over the scarred mass that was left. A heart that even the Capitol and it's surgery could never fully restore. Could never make perfect. It was far too damaged. Twisted and warped beyond recognition with forbidden desires and untold sorrow. Both reared their ugly head on this somber day of ceremony.

As her sister’s last rites were being conducted, Cora’s thoughts were elsewhere. Not even remotely attached to Kiera. All of them directed at Kaelen. Few of them pleasant. His return should have sparked joy in her, but the unwanted baggage that he trailed behind him like a lost puppy had drowned any semblance of happiness as swiftly and surely as Kiera had done to so many hapless victims. Cora refused to look at him, or Colt. Colt. The name ran sour across her tongue. His boyfriend. Incandescent rage boiled within in, roiling and bubbling so much she wanted to scream out her fury. She remained silent. Stony faced, despite the tears running down her features. Smudges of black marring her otherwise near-perfect face. A face Kaelen refused to love. Another stab of rage punctured the fragile fabric of her sanity. A tapestry so fragile that the most delicate of caresses should be able to shred it. And yet it held together. Just...

She barely heard what her father said, so absorbed in bottling her own malignant musings as she was. That he had not only abandoned her, but dared to move on. To find another to fill the whole in his heart he had willingly carved out of himself, someone to fill that hole that was so perfectly Cora shaped. To jam an ill fitting, hopelessly clumsy person as Colt into that recess. His Cora he had once said. No longer. It was his Colt now. That much she knew. Walls were thin in their house, and enough times she had heard them, enough times she had buried her head in her pillow to smother the voices she so desperately didn’t want to hear. The worst part was she couldn’t even hate Colt. It was just impossible. No, it wasn’t Colt’s fault he had fallen for the same inexorable charm that Kaelen had snared her with. Kaelen and Kaelen alone was responsible for the mess he’d left them in. Tiny hands balled into fists as her eyes glanced up at Kaelen, morose, and yet so beautiful…

Her attention snapped from Kaelen at the mention of Ella, bitterness and fury filling her. So much for the famed Moreno pedigree. A family of victors? No… A family of life-takers, predators of hope and joy. Whether on the arena or off it, accepting the Hunger Games or running from it, they left death and misery in their wake. The words her father spoke span the strands of her agonised rage together, words that finally began to sink in through the wet blanket of misery she had been staving off so ineptly, turning the weak strings of her heart, so riddled with holes, into steely cables, binding her broken heart and frayed sanity together. Her eyes narrowed upon the casket, a sudden brutal realisation cascading over her. She’s abandoned us. She left to chase her own lofty, self-perceived deity status, to take the place of someone weaker, to wreak bloody ‘justice’ upon the unfortunate others in the arena with her. And how well had that turned out for her…

Was this how Aurora felt? Anger, bordering on the white-knuckle? It was a peculiar feeling for Cora, so used to sorrow, anguish and loss. To be able to feel something so acutely, without wanting to burst into tears at every utterance. It was liberating, if not somewhat consuming. She wiped the tears and rain from her eyes, from her face, the smear of delicately applied, but so hastily decimated makeup making her look even more dishevelled than the snivelling mess she had been. Her wrath gave her clarity, to the point of purpose, dragging her back to the night before the Reaping…

”You will, won’t you Cora? Promise?” Kiera had Cora by the shoulders, looking her dead in the eye, amber locked with russet, the elder Dempsey looking as meek as always in the face of her seemingly indomitable younger sibling. “Promise me you will Cora? Please?” The seriousness on Kiera’s face scared Cora, terrified her even. It was clear in the way she shook her head, the look in her eyes. “Why are we talking about this? You’re not going. No. No, you can’t go. You can’t leave us!” She was beginning to shake a little, Kiera still holding on to her, trying to keep her calm. “What if I’m Reaped Cora? What then, what if my name’s the one they pull from the ball? Promise me you will.” She continued to tremble, shaking her head. “You won’t… You can’t… Th-there’s too many who’d volunteer! You won’t have to go!” Kiera sighed, exasperated at her sister’s abject refusal to listen to her. A sudden embrace gripped Kiera, Cora squeezing her tight, as though she may vanish at any moment. “Don’t leave us Kiera… I don’t know what we’ll do without you… I don’t know if I could stay strong if you left...” The embrace was returned, a small smile on Kiera’s face. “You’re stronger than you realise Cora. Remember that… Promise me you’ll stay strong…”

Cora’s eyes locked on the casket, before she stood, walking over next to Aurora, placing one hand on the casket, eyes filled with tears, but steely in their resolve. Hair whipped about her head, a frenzy of deep brown locks, a nest of vipers crowning her head. Clothes darkened through the sheet of rain falling upon it clung to her slender frame. Her voice was steady, but quiet, much like Aurora’s, words almost drowned out by the storm. “I won’t break my promise Kiera. One of us has to keep their word…”

(OOC: I AM SO SORRY FOR ABANDONING THIS THREAD D:)

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