halogen hum | poppy & justice (86th)

 POPPY  CLARKE

It’s at times like this that I don’t feel very grown up at all. Twenty-eight years of scar tissue peel back from the bone and reveal all this raw nerve I’ve been running from since I was old enough to remember how much they hurt. It’s not often I slow down long enough to get a good look at the old wounds now laid bare on the bed in front of me. My thumb skates across the back of Asher’s hand and I despise that they are not as small as I remember.

He was eight years old when I left home. His skin was so much softer then, free of calluses earned from the incessant career training my father’s iron fist facilitates. There’s sunspots in my memory, all these nightmares I made too bright to look at without burning up. We were taught to deal in mutually assured destruction, us Clarkes.

It wasn’t ignorance but cowardice that kept me from coming for him. Pretending the me that came before Cedric was another person, the ghost of a pathetic thing that I could shove under the bed in a festering heap. I do not know the pain my brother is feeling with his every heaving breath as he struggles to bear the weight of broken ribs, she does. And I am not her.

Anymore.

Asher trusts me and I wish he wouldn’t. That he’d speak of me with as much disdain as he does our eldest brother. If only he could realize that a beating heart remains the only difference in the ways that we failed him. The ending stays the same, with him alone in a house that weeps blood and whiskey.

”Shit Pops, how d’you look worse ‘en me?” He speaks through grit teeth, one eye open as his lips lilt into a grimace that has always been his best attempt at a smile. It’s pitch black in the room with only the orange light of dusk crawling through the gaps in the curtains. I’d asked Ellie at least seven times over if he thought Asher was sleeping too much; he’d told me his body was just healing ten times more than that.

It’s been a couple of days since I could bring myself to leave his side for more than an hour, though. It’s lucky Justice had a room to spare because I think it would kill Cedric to see his uncle in such a state. The kid idolizes him. ”Shuttup.” We both wince at how raw my voice sounds, heavier with tears than is comfortable. It’s safer in the dark, though, so he squeezes my fingers back and takes a breath that’s a bit quicker than the others. ”I’m so fucking mad at you.”

And it’s true. My anger has never been as caustic as his - it’s frostbitten. Gentle as it consumes, quiet enough that I don’t even realize it’s there until I can feel nothing else. ”Good. If I see one more pair of puppy-dog eyes ‘ma hurl.”

We don’t say anything after that, but I rest my forehead on the back of his hand so we don’t have to watch each other cry. Given the ache in my neck and the blanket I find wrapped around my shoulders the next time I open my eyes, I can only assume we fell asleep like that.

I don’t want to look at Asher in broad daylight, so I elect to spend an hour of staring at ceramic tile instead. The water’s too hot against my back, so heavy I have to brace my hand against the wall to stay standing. This apartment building is too fucking quiet, if Asher’s bones weren’t already broken they’d have shattered under the weight of all these unspoken conversations we’re meant to be having. Maybe I should tell him I’m sorry but words won’t extinguish this guilt.

I’ve done a lot in my life that I’m sorry for but that is hardly ever enough.

The floor in this apartment sometimes looks like shattered glass.. I still catch myself treading carefully, desperate not to leave bloodstains on the carpet and disturb whatever fantasy Justice and I have cooked up this week. Even without the weight of old wedding rings he’s still silk that's slipping in between my fingers. The tighter my grasp, the closer I am to losing him.

It should feel different now that he’s dragged my dying brother across the threshold, but if anything we’re more fragile than ever. We don’t deal in things that hurt, we shove those under the bed in festering heaps. And hell, we sustained ourselves on that synthetic happiness for longer than it should have lasted.

There’s a tornado of haphazard coping mechanisms littering empty space. Small tasks he’s worked on until frustration won out and he moved onto the next. My tongue is swollen from all the times I’ve bitten it, wishingI was brave enough to say something to him without remembering how many times I’d been burned before. As much as I’d like to trust him, I feel stupid any time I come close.

I settle on the couch instead of going right to the spare room, staring at the back of Justice’s head as he busies himself with another insignificant nothing across the room. My brows are furrowed, lost in all these fluttering thoughts, each one weaker and more pathetic than the last and-

I shake my father’s voice out of my ears with the excess water.

If I’m going to fix any of my broken things, I think I’ve got to force myself to be a little bit brave.

”Hey.” My voice doesn’t come out as stable as I’d like, apprehension staggering every step I take toward him. I try to lift my chin as I turn him toward me, to still seem so full of pride that he can’t recognize how hard it is to force these words between my lips.

My hands come to rest on either side of his face and it always manages to surprise me how comforting the scratch of stubble against my palms has become. That no matter how many times I convince myself I don’t belong here, looking up into those eyes has always been a homecoming. ”We can’t do this again. This thing where we try to pretend everything is okay because it’s not and we’re both fucking miserable and Asher almost-”

It’s better off if I don’t finish that sentence, I’ve never liked crying.

”We need to talk. I owe you an explanation.”
It’s a leap of faith and there’s no telling if he’ll be able to catch me.

But that’s what makes the fall so breathtaking.

”Anything and everything, all for you.”