I Guess It's All Alright {Clover}

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“And now that you don't have to be perfect, you can be good.” - steinbeck

I Guess It's All Alright {Clover} Sept 11, 2012 5:09:09 GMT -5

Post by gamemaker kelsier on Sept 11, 2012 5:09:09 GMT -5

Cause I know that tone.
I remember the first time
we wished upon parallel lines.
Waiting for a friend to call
and say they're still alive.

There's nothing but animalistic pain and fear running through my veins. I'm panting, breath coming out in short, accented gasps, but I don't stop. I'm too afraid to stop. What if he's following me, and what if he actually kills me? I can't stop, not ever. I'm cradling my right wrist in my left, almost sobbing whenever I land too hard on my feet. Every bump or jostle hurts, and there's blood, so much blood. Mom! It hurts! Mom! I want my mother so badly but I don't know how to go to her anymore, or anyone. There is no one who can help me, no one who can save me. I am so alone. I'm afraid, I'm so afraid. All I can do is run, that's every thing. I forget everyone, my father, my mother, and even my brothers. There is nothing left inside of my chest, not a heart, or any veins, just a fear that's blacking everything else out. Just one foot in front of the other until all that's left is the thump, thump, thump of my feet hitting ground and my body pumping away.

"Oi....NOX."

With great sensitivity, I am slipped out of the memory with a thump to the back of the head, and the shout of the old man behind me. In surprise, I almost drop the tray perched delicately on the fingertips of my left hand. Eyes widening, I steady it, and then turn around in annoyance. "Stupid Geezer, I could have dropped your precious merchandise!" Rolling his eyes, we waves me forward impatiently, towards a small table near the front of the shop where a couple of girls sit. Muttering angrily under my breath, I paste on a smile and walk to the table, carefully switching on my porch lights, a sudden charm excluding from every orifice even as I make a mental note to spit in the geezer's tea. I'd been lucky to get the job at the Tea Shop when I first popped up, or at least I thought I was.

Who would have thought that the owner would turn out to be some perverted old man. The girls giggle as I carefully place their tea on the table and I smile the way Carmen taught me to. She said it's pleasant, and makes the customer happy. Mr. King says his business has spiked up since I started work, and he keeps making the uniform tighter and tighter, dumb old man. After setting down the tray with a clatter, I pull off my white gloves with my teeth, and stand at the cash register. It's Carmen's shift in T-minus two minutes, and all she has to do is breeze into the tea shop and I'm out of here. The money's good and all, but I finished being someone's play thing years ago.

I almost felt bad for him, when he came back to himself and realized that he'd gone too far this time. That this time he had bent to hard and the bone had snapped like a twig. They used to be stronger bones, but there are side affects to damage like that, proteins forgotten in an all consuming fear. It used to always be fear back then, nothing but. He looked so sad, his father, when he heard my screams of pain. But that had just been a flash of emotion, before that rage came back, that rage that I am so afraid I'll inherent. That need to create my screams was bigger than the need to silence them, and he didn't stop. He got another kick in before I pushed the door open, and slipped out, shoes forgotten in my haste. I didn't notice my bloody soles until much later.

"Oi.....NOX." Once again, I'm pulled away from that particular memory, thankfully, by a voice calling my name, but it isn't with a back hand but a sashay to the hip, courtesy of one Carmen. She winks at me, five minutes late, and she doesn't care. She shouldn't, seeing as a lot of the time I forget to even show up. She should come later, really. But I'm a drama king that doesn't like to be kept waiting, and she knows that. "I swear," I drawl out, "You just spent the last five minutes waiting outside to piss me off." Knocking my forehead against her's in response, I slip into the back to get out of my monkey suit and into my street clothes. Today's selection is a black trench coat with accentuating black pinstripe pants and a vest over a black cotton shirt. Out of one monkey suit and into another.

"You're just annoyed because you need to feed your nicotine addiction," she teases as I make a beeline for the door. Making a point to turn back and stick my tongue out at her, I head out, immediately pulling out the carton that's always in my breast pocket. It's raining lightly in the twilight of the day, and I turn up the collar of my coat to block the smoke. I half consider going back to my room in the Goravich family house, until I consider the fact that I really don't want to be alone with my thoughts right now. Or with any of my cousins, they can be so very gloomy. No, the only appropriate thing to do would be to find the nearest bar and drink it. I'll go in a minute, but first comes the enjoyment of this cigarette.

I had run all the way to the edge of the woods before stopping, to the tree where my brother died and had started it all. I had screamed at a tree for the first time in my life, hating it, hating the pain that it had caused me the last four years of my miserable existence. Why I had to be the one to deal with it. Why had I always been the one? Even when Chejae had been alive, I'd always been the one to have to explain things. So it only made sense that if my father was going to get mad at anyone, it be me. It made sense to blame me for my mother's depression and my brother's death. Still, it had hurt when he had howled after me, even though he must not have been able to see me anymore, "If you ever come back, I'll kill you. I never want to see your face again." At the time, I didn't understand how my father could hate me so much.

Funny, because now I sure as hell do.

[/color][/size][/blockquote][/blockquote]

And now all my loves that come back to haunt me.
My regrets and texts sent to taunt me.
I never claimed to be more than a one-night stand
I've given everyone I know
a good reason to go.

Last Edit: Sept 11, 2012 5:12:22 GMT -5 by gamemaker kelsier

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I Guess It's All Alright {Clover} Sept 25, 2012 5:37:40 GMT -5

Post by florentine, d4b ❁ on Sept 25, 2012 5:37:40 GMT -5

[presto]

omnia nox
seventeen
district three

[/presto]

LET YOUR LUNGS FILL UP WITH SMOKE

The boy spent a week scouring the town to find a place as hollow as he. Tendrils of darkness gave the shadows reason to dance, and as they did he would take to the streets and walk through the darkness without fear. There is no reason for him to glance about and strain his eyes for danger - nothing is left to inflict more hurt upon his weakened stance than the horrors that already hold him hostage. No cavernous alleyway or deserted side-street offers him the proof that he is not alone. Omnia Nox spent a week looking for himself in all the wrong places.

Now, he finds himself with wide eyes and a broken step, right back where he began. Arms clinging to his knees, holding himself together. A boy in an attic with tear-stained cheeks and a hole in his chest the size of the world. Lonely, and yet afraid of all the awful things that people can bring to an otherwise perfect life. But what was the forest without the kings that ruled over it, what was the endless sea without the brave sailors, the universe without the three brothers who loved it? Empty. A single word explains why Omnia is hiding in his own house, counting the footsteps of his father. Empty. It tells of the lines that dig deep into his mother's flesh. Empty is why you can hurt and hurt until you think that there is nothing left to hurt and then hurt some more.

With inanimate eyes, the boy turns away from the window. This is, of course, the wrong attic. Not once did it witness an impatient game of cards, three children who sheltered from the cold during the violent storms that kept them inside for days at a time. Never once did Omnia press his nose to the glass, Chejae pointing out the monsters in the garden and poking playfully at the small boy. Although the attic is wrong and the window holds an entirely different view, Omnia Nox can still see the monsters if he closes his eyes. Chejae, first, then his father, his mother. Aliquot. The four people he loved the most in the world and trusted with everything he had - they had all left him behind and broken the promises.

Once, when Omnia was very young, all five of the Nox family had lain out on the grass in the darkness, counting the stars. Blankets heaped over their shaking bodies, hands clutched at each other in a silent promise to never let go. When the first star fell from the sky, each of them wished to never be apart. Like all wishes, this one failed to come true the very next summer, and again in every summer that followed. The boy, however, naive and so very willing to trust anybody who told him what he wanted to hear, had trusted that the wish would come true.

After counting the uneven floorboards over and over - coming up with a different answer each time - Omnia tired of waiting. The pacing below him grew quicker, his father's boots upon the floor louder with every step. Fear rose uncertainly in his chest, an unsteady mind filled with memories. Never again did Omnia want to feel a hand sting his cheek. The boy had been thrown backwards, weightless, enough. This was the end. Today was the last day of mindless searching for something better, always returning to the same font door and the same dark hiding places. After a year of deliberation and decisions
, the boy was going to render himself more lost than ever in the hope that freedom was worth finally being the one to leave his world behind.

The afternoon sun did nothing to warm the gripping cold inside. It was so easy to walk out into the street and keep on walking. Nobody called after him, nobody begged him to stay. Omnia Nox walked all the way into town before he realised that he was going nowhere. What did it matter, when the place he was leaving was not a place that wanted him? Just like that, the boy was free. Moments later the reality of free began to burn at the pit of Omnia's stomach - he could no more bare the thought of turning back than face his father when he arrived. So he walked, aimlessly, his own footsteps drowning out confusion. Nothing was left in the boy's mind other than the overwhelming sensation that could only be described as 'lost'.

After rounding countless corners, every shop began to blur into the next, every street the same as the last. Lined with houses in which he did not belong - filled with things called families, a concept he could no longer face. Omnia stopped. For a moment, he simply breathed, and then he turned back just enough to check. Perhaps, like every other time he thought he saw his brother in a crowd, he was wrong. And then perhaps he was right. Blinking, Omnia spun on the spot, his heels digging into the ground and his breath catching in his lungs. Not a dream, not something he made up to stem the constant flow of nightmarish figures that plagued him. Cigarette in hand, surrounded by a cloud of smoke that could not be shifted by Omnia's curious eyes.

He was the same, and yet he was different. Aliquot's eyes were darker, as though filled with the very same monsters that haunted his brother's mind. Lines etched into his face that had not been there before, signs of age and sadness - painting neglect on his frame like paint upon a canvas. Hundreds of emotions flooded through the smaller boy at once; conflicting feelings battling in his veins. With every muscle in his body, he wanted to run to his brother and hold him and never let go - this time do everything he should in the hope that he was good enough. He hesitated, biting his lip, fighting the tiny flicker of anger that sparked in his heart. How could Aliquot have left him with their fading mother and violent father, when they were the only two left? How could he? In that moment, all Omnia knew was that if he was Aliquot, he never would have left.

Another step forward, and then another. Keeping to the shadows, weary and unsure. What if his brother turned on his heel and fled for the second time in Omnia's life, leaving him behind again? I need you, he did not open his lips, and yet the words seemed to pulse around his being. I needed you.. Somehow, without warning, the child found himself before his brother, eyes wide. More than anything, he was afraid of not being good enough, again. "Ali-" he choked, words bitter and verging on a torrent of inescapable tears. For a second, he deliberated demanding answers, an apology, a reason for the years of absence that taught Omnia to stand shakily on his own two feet. "I missed you." He meant to be sure and certain of himself, stating a fact. He meant to let Aliquot know how much it hurt.

Instead, it was an accusation. I missed you. You weren't good enough, you weren't brave enough, you weren't strong enough. You lied.

FORGIVE EVERYONE

Last Edit: Jan 17, 2014 23:29:00 GMT -5 by florentine, d4b ❁

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I Guess It's All Alright {Clover} Sept 30, 2012 15:33:36 GMT -5

Post by gamemaker kelsier on Sept 30, 2012 15:33:36 GMT -5

Cause I know that tone.
I remember the first time
we wished upon parallel lines.
Waiting for a friend to call
and say they're still alive.

I've spent a lot of my brief existence pretending to be someone I'm not. In fact, I'm not sure when I was someone I was, instead of what I am, which is someone who is really not sure of who they are. The point is, in all this confusion, I think I've forgotten who I was along the way, like a freight train slipping slowly away from the tracks until it's running on air, until it speeds right off of a cliff. I haven't been Aliquot Nox for a very long time. Just Nox. No one has called me by that name in what seems like ages, because none of them know me by that. If they knew me by that name, then they'd know too many other things about me, that don't need knowing. Maybe I'd give them a blank look, and tell them that my name was Nox. But never Aliquot. I don't think I ever was, I have spent years convincing myself that I wasn't. Remembering that name is as useless as trying to pull a cement block out of a sinkhole.

I've changed since I was him, become someone entirely new. He still is there sometimes, beneath the surface, waiting, for something. I don't know what, but whatever it is, I don't think he even knows how much he wants it. It's something, or someone he can't ever have. the one person who ever felt like family for a long time, since his mother abandoned him so long ago, and his father never forgave him. Out in the sun, there were never clouds, but Aliquot always seemed to find them anyway. There was one person he could pretend with, that never seemed to see, that believed every word he said. He couldn't have not heard the screaming, Aliquot thought, but he pretended it was monsters, and Aliquot would only reinstate that.

"Aaahh! Careful, it hurts!" "Sorry! Sorry, Ali! What happened?" "Oh, I don't know if you want to hear this one, it might be too scary." "Nuh uh! I'll be okay! Please!" "Okay fine, listen careful."

"I was sitting downstairs, near the fireplace, reading. After a moment, I feel kind of odd, and when I look up, there is a little black coal almost shifting beneath the flame, almost like it's alive. It couldn't really be alive though, so I laughed and went back to my book. The feeling of an oddity happening comes right back, and when I look back up, now there are two coals shifting together! I began to feel uneasy, so I stood up to fill the fire bucket right up with snow from outside. I packed it in nice and tight so that it would put the fire out slowly. As I stood outside, I felt a great heat almost attacking me, and when I turned about and went inside, there was a massive fire demon made from the little black coals of our fire! It was wreathed in flame, and had a ghastly face, so I did the only thing I could do! I grabbed the bucket, and tossed all the snow at the ugly thing, and as it screamed in it's terrible voice, it took my hand. We screamed together, both from pain. It melted, and I didn't, but I got a burned hand."

I cried that night, after the telling of that story. Clutching my burned hand to my chest, Aliquot had cried. It hurt, it felt like it was still burning. I never told my little brother about the real monster, the much scarier one. Who had taken me by the arm when I lay in front of the fireplace reading, and brought me to the stove, how he had taken my left hand, and forcefully held it to the hot element. How he hadn't let me take my hand away, and had simply held it there for what felt like forever, even as Aliquot screamed bloody murder. I didn't talk about holding it in the snow for a long time after, tears streaming down my face, and a whimpering cry for a mother to come and save me.

No one is going to save me. When I had realized that, that was when Aliquot had died his small death, and Nox buried him whole. The night I had run away, and Nox had done the running. A small boy named Aliquot forgotten somewhere in the sun and snow, but dead all the same. A boy named Nox running and running until he couldn't breath anymore. I didn't forget that I left my little brother with that monster, but i also didn't forget that my little brother had never done a thing. Maybe it was my duty to protect him, as his older brother, but he could have protected me too. He could have said something, to someone, to anyone. But he never did. If he actually believed all those stories, then he was dumb. He was dumb and I hated him for ignoring the beatings. So maybe that's why I left without him. But I always regret it.

No matter how much I hated him for not seeing what I was going through, I loved him more than that hatred. I always will. More than I love myself. Quietly, I take another drag from the cigarette, and watch the people pass by, lost within my own little world. I can almost hear Carmen shouting at the stupid old man inside the tea shop, but they seem so very far away in comparison to where I am. Sometimes everyone seems too far away, too distant, because they don't quite understand. They only see, Nox, never Aliquot. If they saw Aliquot, they wouldn't like what they saw.

"Ali-"

A choked whisper from in front of me and suddenly I'm staring into eyes reminiscent of my own, looking at dark locks that I used to have as well. I don't know what called him up, if all this blatant remembering had made me a shade to look at. The last time I had seen him, he'd been so much younger, just little. I had tucked him into bed, kissed his forehead, and gone back down stairs to wait for my father. he had a hollowness about him that hadn't been there before, no more than it had been four and some odd years ago. How small he had always looked, always, even when they were a whole. He still seemed small now. I'm still taller than him. A panic almost seems to congest inside me, but I keep my face carefully blank, and simply take another drag from the cigarette, Nox's eyes watching coolly from shadow.

"I missed you."

It's meant to cut, and it doesn't. I don't flinch, I'm too used to pain to let it really bother me anymore. This feels to surreal. I don't really know how he's found me, or if that's really him right there. It might be just some drug induced hallucination for all I know. I could be talking to another dark haired, almond eyed boy that looks like my little brother, and now he might think me insane. I wish that desperately to be true, because I'm not sure if I can face my little brother, if I can look him in the eyes and apologize because I am sorry, I really am. But I don't know how to say it, I've lost the ability to speak somewhere between the tea shop and right here. It's a closed door to my brain at the moment as i struggle to formulate a response that won't make him upset. I think it's a bit too late for that, he's probably already upset. Hell, I'm upset. I don't think I really wanted to be found. I was meant to disappear, and that's what I did. I don't know what I can say to him.

"Nia?" I say it carefully, as if speaking a new language, tasting each beat and infliction to the nickname that he had when we were younger and less ruined. A wave of overwhelming fear and pain flips my insides upside down, and for a moment, I almost feel like I will burst into tears very quickly. I feel lost, my sense of ground gone as he stands here in front of me. My name isn't Aliquot anymore, it hasn't been for a very long time. I'm Nox, I'm nobody, big brother to nothing, family member to no one. I'm just a vapor, nothing substantial. Cruelly, I glance away from him, unable to look at him, at his searching eyes, and the angry twist to his mouth. Lost and uncertain, I do wha tI do best, and I become Nox.

Smiling softly, I pull the door to the tea shop back open, and stub my cigarette out on the floor. "Care for some tea?" I ask quietly. the tea shop will close soon, Carmen has a short shift, and it will be emptied out. It's already only got just a few lingering school girls, soon the lights will be turned out, and we shall be sitting in the darkness, alone with our fire and ice.

And now all my loves that come back to haunt me.
My regrets and texts sent to taunt me.
I never claimed to be more than a one-night stand
I've given everyone I know
a good reason to go.

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I Guess It's All Alright {Clover} Oct 5, 2012 3:05:07 GMT -5

Post by florentine, d4b ❁ on Oct 5, 2012 3:05:07 GMT -5

[presto]

omnia nox
seventeen
district three

[/presto]

LET YOUR LUNGS FILL UP WITH SMOKE

Omnia Nox sat with puzzle pieces scattered around him, trying to put together a picture. So far, the left hand edge and the top corner were complete, but there was a great gap on the carpet where the middle should be. The boy agreed completely with this picture - he too had a hole in his chest where many things should reside. They didn't, though, and that ruined the picture. Hours were spent lining misshapen cardboard squares up before he realised that half of the pieces had been swapped with another set by a careless child. No amount of sorting and staring at the floor could ever make it whole again. The last person to use it, Omnia realised, was Aliquot. Like with everyone else, somehow his brother found some way to stop Omnia being complete. Life was a jigsaw, and Omnia lost more pieces than could be counted.

Now, the street stops dead. The people continue their meaningless journeys, however Omnia Nox does not. He is still, his heart stalling in his chest and his breathing laboured and heavy. He hurts. It's beyond his explanation, the way his entirety seises to continue when he looks at what he has lost, but it does. Chejae being lowered into the ground. Mother's smile. Aliquot's goodnight kiss. Father's hand raised and ready to come down yet again, the stove already burning into his fingertips. The forest, because when he is alone in a place he once battled to be King of, the imaginary pleasure is gone. If nobody else wants to rule the world, then neither does he.

Aliquot Nox says his name with a careful precision reminiscent of winters long lost. Nia. Omnia does not remember the last time anybody called him that, but it burns just the same; a slow kind of fire that begins inside and consumes him whole. For a boy who always knew the right thing to say, Aliquot had changed a lot. "Care for some tea?" Suddenly, Omnia Nox was alive again. Blinking through the haze of emotions flooding his vision, the boy shook his head faintly. How dare he pretend like he hadn't abandoned him? How dare he act as though nothing was wrong, that any amount of tea could fill the hollowness inside of Omnia. How could he?

He shook his head again, strong and defiant. His eyes betrayed him, however, a fat tear trickling down his windburned cheek. Aliquot Nox; the boy that was once his everything, stolen away. Aliquot; the one who held his hand and tugged the covers right up at night before wishing the bad dreams away. Ali; he who made Omnia feel as though he might be worth it, after all. Of course, nights spent waiting up in the hope that the older boy would pay him a visit or take him away to join him. He told bottomless lies to himself, promising that he was coming back - he was caught up, had things to do, was waiting until the right time to save him. All along, Omnia knew the empty wishes were lies that he told himself, but Aliquot had taught him to always hope, so hope he did.

"No, Ali. I don't want tea." His words threatened to break as he spoke them, and yet he did not dare stop for fear of falling apart before he said what he must. "It's been too long." He winced - it's been too long to fix? Too long to forgive? Suddenly the boy is stricken with a thought he has not considered as yet - what if Aliquot still wants nothing to do with him? Perhaps he wont apologise and will run back into the night for a second time. Despite everything, Omnia mightn't yet be worth sticking around for. "I want to know why you left and why you didn't take me with you. I want to know how you could leave me there by myself for so long. I want to know what I can do to be good enough for you, for Chejae, for Mama or for Papa or myself." He took a deep breath, fists clenched inside his sleeves.

He was an honest boy, never one for lying to himself or others. Omnia Nox did not pretend he was somebody he was not, and perhaps, he thought, that was why he was so alone. Strangers passed, heads down on the pavement. Although his voice was not raised, he could feel the emotion thick in the air between then. Maybe, finally, someone else could feel it, too. He smiled, then, a small, sad smile. There are more to stories than they are if told from one perspective, and all the boy knew is that his brother abandoned him. After that, years of fingers held to flames and shards of glass surrounding his fragile frame followed. The woods were empty. He was empty. The puzzle was all mixed up and no amount of trying could put it back together again. "And I want to know if you're okay."

"I was worried about you."

Little boy Nox swallows, not so selfish after all.

FORGIVE EVERYONE

Last Edit: Jan 17, 2014 23:30:02 GMT -5 by florentine, d4b ❁

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I Guess It's All Alright {Clover} Nov 16, 2012 4:06:44 GMT -5

Post by gamemaker kelsier on Nov 16, 2012 4:06:44 GMT -5

Cause I know that tone.
I remember the first time
we wished upon parallel lines.
Waiting for a friend to call
and say they're still alive.

I'm still not completely sure if he's actually here, standing in front of me. Could be my cigarette was laced with something or other, I can't say. I have been waiting to see him for four years. It doesn't make sense that he would find me, it's thrown me off balance. I always thought that I'd be the one going back to get him, and I'd feel the floorboards creek under my feet. I'd always thought that it'd be me initiating our reunion. I always believed that I'd be prepared to. It's been four years, and every day and night I've told myself, in a week, I'll go. In a month. I never went. He's always on my mind, always present, but I never went to save him, and the more I waited, the guiltier I felt.

He's real and his breath is coming out in little puffs. I'm itching to reach out, to wrap my arms around him and hold him to me. No, scratch that. Aliquot is. Nox doesn't touch people, not unless he chooses to. Sometimes people I'm close to will reach out to hold my hand, or to hug me, and I can never help flinching away. I never had good experiences with physical contact. I'm at a loss, for once in four years, awkwardly holding the door open, letting the wind blow in to chill the cozy little shop. I know I'm staring at him, and his almond shaped eyes, so much like mine. I know that he is expecting something from me, some kind of apology, but I can't give one. Not when all the words I could and should say to him would leave us here for hours. I should be begging for his forgiveness, but begging and pleading are also things that Nox has given up.

I struggle with it, everyday, this guilt. But not only is it the guilt, but the damned fear. It makes me twist and turn at night, has me opening up my eyes from nightmares that are memories. It is crippling, and I am weak. I think I've always had issues with that, with letting Omnia see my fear. Even now, as I stand here, stock still, standing a good foot away, I'm afraid to blink. I'm afraid that when I blink all the fear that I've stored away will live for that fierce moment underneath my eyelids and he'll see my shaking. I'm his big brother. I have to be strong.

"No, Ali. I don't want tea."

I flinch at the little nickname he used to call Aliquot, and snap, "Don't call me that, I'm not Aliquot. Not anymore.", a sudden rush of anger forces it's way through me. It narrows my eyebrows, and I almost stamp my foot like a petulant child. I introduce myself as Nox for a reason after all. I'd rather not be associated with that weakling. Looking away from him uncomfortably, I mutter a quick sorry and let him continue speaking, hating the way my anger can come and go like that. It's worse than the fear when it comes to grip me tight. It isn't uncontrollable, not yet. Not like father's had been.

I want to give him answers, I do, but I don't have any good ones. What does one say to a brother they abandoned to their father's hatred? What does a protector say to the person he failed to protect. I don't have anything to say to him. The part of me that screams for help, screams that he didn't hear. That part of me, that part that's all fear and anger, almost hates my little brother. Maybe that's why I've stayed away. I'm a fucking mess. The part of me that's everything Nox isn't, that's all Aliquot. It's stored away so deep inside my head that I doubt I'll ever be able to pull him back out. The problem with Nox is, is Nox doesn't give a shit about anyone else. Nox is the person that helped me run away, the fight or flight mechanism that finally kicked in. That's who Nox is. So appear as stable as concrete, pull the bed sheet away and I'm made of wood and rope.

"And I want to know if you're okay. I was worried about you."

Softening slightly, I stare hard at him. Wondering if he can somehow see through my mask, and understand the extent to which I am absolutely not okay. I mean sure, if you're asking, I am positively fine. But they're just words that people say, completely meaningless when people don't say what they mean. It's the easiest lie that people tell. One doesn't have to be a great detective to see that the person they're asking isn't okay. But they don't care about the answer, they never do. That's why people get away with it. People don't really care, they simply ask because it's polite. It's the same as saying 'good morning.' They don't care to see past the words. They only care about looking good. So I grin lightly, as if I'm talking to a brother I haven't seen in four years and drawl out a quick, "I'm fine. Great even. How are you?"

I don't give him a chance to answer, he'd only lie. I don't care about looking good either. I mean, I do. Just not in that way. If I wanted to be seen as some polite kid from down the street, I could. But I've never been that way, I've been Nox too long. It's cold out here, and I don't care to freeze. I might've even been on my way to a bar right now, but he found me and all that's close is the tea shop. So ignoring his dismissal of the tea, I usher him in ahead of me anyway, leading him to a corner booth, away from most everyone else. It's usually used for romantics, and it's more of a little alcove with benches and pillows added.

When we sit, he's still half smiling in that sad way he was outside. Emotion had been thick around us then, covering us like a blanket of snow, and I thought I was suffocating. This smile adds to it, adds to everything. The guilt, the pain of the last eight years of my life, oh god has it been so long? But it's a smile that used to be happy. I've never seen it so sad, holding so much weight, and sadness flits through me as well. I can remember a time that I used to idolize Chejae, our older brother. Now whenever I think of him, I only feel indifference or hate. It makes me wonder if nia hates me as well. I would not blame him if he did. I deserve his hatred, anything he might want to direct at me because I did abandon him. I failed him. I deserve anything he says to me. He deserves anything he wants from me.

So I begin by answering his questions, settling myself into one cushioned chair, not looking quite at him, but not looking away either. I still can't quite believe he's here.

"I left because I was never fighting any monsters. I never really fought anything. Dad would abuse me every night." I stop suddenly, letting the weight of words I've never said aloud seep into the table cloth. I've never told anyone about my father, or where I came from. After four years of holding words in, this doesn't feel right. I begin again, hesitantly, then more quickly, the words tumbling out now that I have unlocked the gate.

"I left because I was afraid, and I didn't take you with me because I was certain that I was going to die. I was going to freeze to death or I was going to fall out of a tree like Chejae. I bolted, because my wrist was broken and I...I was so scared, Nia, I'm s-....I...I meant to come rescue you, after I made some money. But life was hard, Nia, I was scared every day. I thought that if he didn't...if he didn't find me....I'd..well, I'd kill myself first. But I've been working here, in this tea shop. I've been making the money to...to come and res- well to have a comfortable enough life. I'm so-...I....well."

"When did you come to the city?"

ooc: Ugh. Sorry. In advance. This sucked.

And now all my loves that come back to haunt me.
My regrets and texts sent to taunt me.
I never claimed to be more than a one-night stand
I've given everyone I know
a good reason to go.

compendium / avriel
clown car / pietro
2022 tracker / 2023 tracker / 2024 tracker

florentine, d4b ❁
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I Guess It's All Alright {Clover} Dec 6, 2012 17:53:39 GMT -5

Post by florentine, d4b ❁ on Dec 6, 2012 17:53:39 GMT -5

[presto]

omnia nox
seventeen
district three

[/presto]

LET YOUR LUNGS FILL UP WITH SMOKE

Omnia Nox believes in many things. In coincidence and love at first sight, in fairytales and promises. He belies that everything will be okay if you just wait long enough. Even looking into the vacant eyes of his mother, he believes in happy endings. His father reminds him that anything can change, that deception can be hiding behind every corner. His childhood taught him to believe in Kings and Queens and flying high, in getting back up after falling down. Omnia Nox believes in almost everything

He doesn't believe in monsters. For a boy who slept every night with the candles out, trying desperately not to see in the dark, he is brave. To him, monsters are simply excuses for not facing up to things one should. They are lies, designed to conceal the crumbling truths that should never be kept. When Aliquot told him that he was fighting monsters, he was protecting the true evil that lurked within their walls. Even as a child, Omnia did not believe in the sorts of things that hid inside closets and came out at night. He didn't want to believe that the bruises were the work of their father, however. So he stayed silent, closing his eyes and telling himself that the places he could not see were filled with danger. When Aliquot left, he opened his eyes and finally faced the monsters.

He had know all along, and that was when guilt began to creep into his mind. Perhaps he should have risen from his bed and padded down the stairs and changed everything, but he listened because he didn't want to believe the truth. From then on, the monsters died. There were people hurting, people confused, people afraid and scared and frantic. People who had accidents and never opened their eyes again. People hurt people. Never monsters.

Aliquot's words burned. They didn't just suggest the simple innocence of childhood, or even ignorance. They said, Omnia, you didn't know. It's okay, I don't hate you because you had no idea. Omnia blinks. He did know. If he'd really thought about it, opened his eyes and seen, he would have been able to stop it. Surely that is not forgivable, casual, calm as the words his elder brother speaks now?

The next words that Aliquot speaks confirms to Omnia that Ali is not a believer. That perhaps he does not believe in happy endings or dreams come true or wishing on falling stars. He believed that everything was going to get worse, not better. He let the ideas of monsters break him. They took him away. Those invisible villains paired with Ali's own disbelief stole Omnia's brother from his bedside, and that was unforgivable. Regret sinks inside Omnia, replaced with a churning feeling of anger.

It's not so hard to believe. The boy lifts his head slowly, watching his brother finish. Stutter, stumbling over his words with the shattered confidence of someone who is ashamed of what they did. Despite his mistakes, Aliquot is honest. Something Omnia never was, not to himself. And if he lied, does that make him as equally awful as the monsters who stole away his life?

The child frowns as his brother explains. He was afraid. Always afraid, too afraid to stay and then too afraid to return. Never did come back for the little boy he left behind. Scared, was Aliquot. The anger that burned inside of Omnia stopped all at once. Not because Omnia thought it was okay to be afraid. It wasn't truly forgiveness that made Omnia smile sadly to himself. It was the knowledge that they were one and the same. Both far too afraid to do what was right, living surrounded by regret and questioning themselves.

Aliquot stopped, and then he asked why Omnia was there, what brought him to the city. Without missing a beat, the boy replied. "The house was empty. Mama, she's empty too. I never was awfully good at hide-and-seek, and hiding from Father was no exception."

The truth dawned on Omnia all at once. "I left because I was afraid, and I forgot that I have nowhere to go." He left out the part about his eyes constantly scouring the streets for Aliquot, the way his heart jumped when he saw his weathered face. He left out the longing and the hoping and even the forgiving, even though it was there.