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No, there was no where to hide this time. Every place in the past had something else associated with it -- ghosts, real and imagined, lay in the musky scents and dust, just waiting to join the laughter cackling in the back of his mind like an alarm clock he couldn't turn off. It was a jarring and disturbing noise that kept him nervous and fidgety, unable even to escape into nightmares. Instead, he was awake with thoughts and wandering through places he had never been before because there was no where left to go. The library was in ashes and he wished the house was as well (how many people have you slept with in there?). The caverns echoed with footsteps that weren't his own and his daughter had made a home in his den. The snow on the path was clean and undisturbed, but this was a lie: he had been here before too. Maybe.
He sat a withering tree facing an unfamiliar lake and for a moment felt as if he had really run away to a distant land where no one knew him or remembered him. It was just a moment though and it passed with the next breeze. Drawing his knees up to his chest, the tattered hybrid stared half-dazed into the landscape. He had avoided thinking about it for a long time already, but as long as he had a brain in his head, it was an inevitable exercise -- he would think and he would remember and his throat would knot and his chest would ache with memories. It was a confusing mess of things and he didn't know how to pick out the truth of how he felt. There were too many layers that he didn't trust and it was too simple to conclude that he just wanted someone to hold him, nevermind who it actually was. After all, couldn't that be interpreted as why the demon in his head had been so promiscuous? They were the same. And he was just a whore.
The scar over his throat pulsed even though he was sure it was just a result of his guilty imagination. Physically, it had already healed, but physically, all of his other wounds had healed too. It didn't mean anything. Laruku swallowed and closed his eyes. They will all learn to hate you in the end.
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indent Things had changed.
indent He knew that the moment he had woken up, unaware of where he was, cold but aware he had not been alone long. The smell was all around him, familiar and sickening. The red eyed male scrambled to his feet, swaying, his head ringing. It was as much a warning as it was from the booze. Why had they found that, how had they found that? The step went backwards then, staggering like a madman through a jailhouse. The wound on his arm ached and Ahren was certain it would need more then a ragged and blood-stained cloth to heal.
indent Somehow, he found him. Ahren lit a cigarette, his hands shaking from lack of food, and sat next to Laruku. The distance between them was what he needed now. One hand went to his forehead, ran over the shortly-cropped hair he now had, and settled in the small of his neck. “We shouldn’t have done that,” he said coldly, unwilling to accept what he had done.
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He could have blamed it on the alcohol if he had wanted, but what did the drink do but take away inhibitions? What had he ever done under the influence that he wouldn't have done otherwise if he could just suppress his thoughts? The fact still remained that it was the first time he had let anyone else touch him, the first time he had touched anyone else, while he still had his own head, even if it had just been a fragment of it. It hadn't been Ryoujoku this time. And wasn't it hilarious? Wasn't it? I never slept with Ahren, he had told him once in a quiet cave on his birthday while it was raining outside. And he had been telling the truth then. And now? And now, and now, and now? It isn't betrayal. He hates you anyway. But Ahren would regret it and that was all that needed to be said. It had been wrong. It had been very, very wrong. Fuck. (YOU DIRTY, DIRTY WHORE.)
This time, the hybrid flinched when his friend (are you really still friends? how many times have you asked this?) sat down beside him. This time, his silence wasn't peaceful or welcomed; it wasn't because he had no words. It was because the words were collided against the gash in his throat and being devoured by the ghost that lived there. The words were cold and the air was too, despite the proximity of the hot springs and dormant volcano. Laughter in his head and aching in his chest. We shouldn't have, he echoed in agreement, voice weak and soft. I'm sorry. You're always sorry. It's not good enough.
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indent Ahren’s hands shook still, but the right, the one not holding the cigarette, began to scratch at his side. It was subconscious because he felt dirty, he felt wrong. He inhaled and curled his toes, unable to remember much of anything (because you can’t or because you don’t want to?) and unwilling to try. It had happened. He knew that. The scent was as unmistakable as it had been with Kaena, Matinee, Poe…had there been more? He couldn’t remember. He couldn’t remember anything.
indent For a long time, he stayed quiet, drawing his strength from the cigarette.
“So what now?” He heard himself ask this, wonder what exactly he meant, and wished he could have taken it back. This was wrong, wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong. Ahren shuddered once, and kept his gaze out at nothing in particular
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Laruku actually did not know why Ahren disapproved as much as he seemed to; he didn't know if it was because he still felt attached to his ex-mate or because. The hybrid found himself thinking of that day in suburbia on the old, rotting porch. Maybe it was paranoia; he didn't know. Homophobia was not something he had ever really encountered, but very few people had known about his relationship with Tsunami anyway. He had never considered whether he was more attracted to men or women because he had only ever been involved with one person he cared about. Until now. If this counted at all. And he didn't know how to classify his feelings for Ahren, or whatever they were supposed to be called. He didn't know whether the pain in his chest was from regret or rejection and he didn't know which would be the better of the two.
Do I disgust you? the tawny coyotewolf wondered quietly, ignoring the other's question, if he heard it at all. It was just as well if he did. Disgust was better than hate and if they stayed away from each other from now on, at least that would just become the status quo. Or maybe Ahren would just leave. Why was he even here now?
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indent Nurture over nature. “No,” Ahren said quietly. “It’s just…my father, he…” Something hazy filtered through his eyes, something he did not want there. Damian was dead, his mother was dead, they were gone so why the fuck did it matter? Because he sold her out. Because he sold you out. His jaw tightened, and only released enough for another long drag on the cigarette. His right hand stopped moving, and instead dug into the loose skin over his rib cage. He held it, aware he was holding so tightly that he had begun to feel pain and bleed.
indent Only then did he let go, drawing his hand away and bringing it to his face. Id fought superego as his mind began to reel with the very real dilemma it was facing.
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He didn't know much about Damian at all, only that he had died of cancer. Everything else had happened before his return, in that stretch of time he had spent in the mountains, abandoned by his surrogate father and then again by the surrogate's replacement. He didn't know about the man's relationship with a name he only really knew as Tsunami's father, another rapist, another killer. It was twisted, the way they were all connected, the way he could trace a line somehow between himself and virtually everyone he met, despite the fact that he had never really felt like he had a real family. What? it was still a quiet question, uncertain and hesitant. He didn't know and wasn't sure he wanted to, wasn't sure it mattered. Ahren had reasons. That was fine. He didn't need to explain if he didn't want to. The "it's just" had already negated the "no" for him and the walls had already been put in place.
YOU. ARE. DISGUSTING. For one reason or another. A liar, a cheater, a thief, and a whore. A murderer, a cannibal, a monster, a demon. There was a buffet of reasons to think he was disgusting, that Ahren had settled on but one of them wasn't the point. It's okay if you do, anyway.
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indent Spider-webs of fate bound everyone together, like some Greek tragedy. Incest, turmoil, murder and death; things they had been raised around, things in their blood. Ahren sat quietly, his fur fluttering in the soft breeze. What could he say? He didn’t know what he knew, only what he felt. Even that was fickle and as unpredictable as the ocean or a summer storm. “I don’t,” he said again, firmly. Putting his hand to his forehead, he shut his eyes and exhaled heavily.
indent “He was with Salvaged,” Ahren finally said, his eyes still shut. He didn’t want Laruku to see his eyes.
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He hadn't heard the name in a long time. The monster of another generation, and the father of this one, perhaps. Laruku didn't really know what to make of the information. Was this the first time he couldn't really relate to what the other was thinking? There was plenty from Ahren's past he didn't know about, but what he had known he had always been able to imagine well enough, to empathize with well enough. But Salvaged's name didn't stir any real thoughts in his head besides those that were already there. Monsters from under the bed and in the night, filthy animals that society needed to weed out and destroy before they could hurt more people. It was what both of them were, right? And Tsunami. He couldn't stop thinking about Tsunami.
Salvaged... was Tsunami's father, he murmured softly, not really sure if he was telling himself again or Ahren. So what? He'd slept with the man's son and now the man's lover's son. So fucking what. I didn't know Damian was with him. Obviously, dipshit. How could anyone love a rapist? Unless it was just another fucked up relationship like everything else. It probably had been. They had probably ended up hating each other, destroying each other. It was what everyone deserved. And he was the same.
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indent There was a moment of consideration, a moment that to Ahren felt like an eternity. He saw a world that had once been his own twist and turn, mutate with each passing emotion. Everything was unreal but too bright and clear for him to deny it anymore. Instead, he opened his eyes, eyes that were all too similar to his father’s and stared ahead at the unnamable distance between the here and now. The monsters were very real here, and while he was a lesser evil, Ahren was among them. Just like his father.
indent He heard Laruku speaking and comprehended what he said, but failed to grasp what he meant. It would be no different then admitting he had slept with Poe. They crossed blood here all too often, trying to find something perfect, something that fit. Nothing ever lasted or made sense, this least of all. “Yeah. Until he raped Misery.” It sounded so worthless now. She was gone. Salvaged was dead. Ahren took another drag on his cigarette, and finally looked at Laruku for the first time. “I never wanted to be like him,” he heard himself say, hearing a young boy who at one time may have been him cry out and roll over in his grave.
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You're not, he said and the words were out in the frosty air before he really realized it. Vaguely, he recalled that the man beside him had once raped a cousin of his, but it had never mattered much to him for one reason or another, so why should it bother him now? The hybrid had spent a long time trying not to be like the people that had wronged him only to come out arguably worse. He had tried too hard, maybe, and that was why he had fallen so far. He had never been strong enough to perservere, to stand and fight for those ideals and values like Tsunami had. He had never been good enough; instead, he had gone the escapist way, had done stupid things while trying to forget and pretend and deny. And of course that had only fucked things up even more.
Laruku did not meet Ahren's gaze. If the other was ashamed of the eyes he had inherited, then Laruku did not feel like he deserved his own. Everything else about his appearance belonged to his father. He was almost perfectly coyote in every physical aspect; he was smaller, faster, more agile, and he felt like he had inherited that madness. No one had ever told him that his mother had been crazy, but it probably wouldn't have changed much about his perception of her. She was the angel and her eyes did not belong with him. Who knew? Maybe Ryoujoku had existed in him even as a child and he had dug up her grave to pluck her eyes out. That wouldn't have surprised him either.
He didn't look at Ahren and he had nothing else to say. He was trying too hard to disappear again instead.
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indent Unbelieving, Ahren stared at his companion. A vicious, mean voice reminded him that this man had no right to judge. He knew about all the monsters in Laruku’s closet. His own was locked tight, barred and sealed shut. The fact he could not remember half of the terrible things he had done was both a blessing and a curse. Each night, he would dream about them, unaware they were real. He had not killed a stranger on the back-roads of some French city for no reason. He had not started that fire. He had done nothing wrong since the day Matinee had walked out on him. Even that felt like a lie on his tongue, though he would never speak it aloud.
indent Folding his ears back slightly, Ahren finished off the cigarette and tossed it away. “You never met my father, did you?” He didn’t know why he brought this up. Perhaps because he had never told anyone the truth about the dark man who had brought him into life.
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For the most part, there was no reason for him to believe in others. Despite their prettiest words and most sincere promises, they always ended up less than whatever crazy ideal he had conceived in his head. No one lived up to what they said and no one was good enough. He didn't really believe in anyway. He did, however, believe that there were many, many people better than himself and took some sort of comfort in that thought, that fact. In their dreary and very much fucked up world, there were still people that strove to be good, that still did their best to be... not like everyone else, not like their parents, not like their grandparents. Laruku, on most days, had given up and didn't fight or care much anymore. Tsunami still tried. And, he believed, Ahren still tried. So he was better than his father, whoever he had been.
No, he admitted quietly, still not meeting the other's eyes. But it doesn't matter. I know you're not like him. Oh, in spite of everything, it was still easier for him to believe in other people. But how much could anyone else believe in his words and his judgment? What did "I know" mean to Ahren? Laruku didn't trust himself, so why should anyone else?
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indent Ahren smiled, but it was a smile that did not meet his eyes. “I think we all turn out like our parents,” he said, looking out to the horizon. He had been there several times, and seen the world over. Still, though, in the end he was here. He was going to die here. That much he knew, like the constant flow and ebb of the tides and the cycle of the moon. It would happen one day, through violence or disease. Those things ran in his blood.
indent “I don’t think we mean for it to happen, but it does.” He heard himself speaking and didn’t know why anymore. Maybe he was philosophizing. Maybe he was trying to make sense of this. Maybe he couldn’t stand the silence between them. “I think our kids are going to end up the same way,” he added, thinking suddenly of what he had told Gabriel.
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Ending 'cause I suck for dragging it out. We need a new one!
It wasn't true. Not as far as he could know, not completely, anyway. His father had been crazy. His mother had been too, really. He was crazy, fine. They were all crazy. It wasn't really a matter of the specific blood anymore -- all of them here had something wrong with their head. It wasn't even worth noting. But everything else? His father had been a rapist. That was something the hybrid had yet to become, though he didn't trust himself to abstain from it forever, no matter how much he wished otherwise. They don't mean to do anything. What ever happened to free will? Nothing ever happened as they intend; their lives weren't their own and they were mere puppets dangling on some sick god's strings. Was is really true?
Ideas like that drove out the crazy romantic in him and kept it alive. Believe in anything but that, believe in anything else, a lie or not. Denial kept you sane on rainy days.
I'd put them out of their misery first, he muttered, eyes burning and head screaming suddenly and all at once. He heard again his threat to Andre and the child's words back. They grew up fast and destroyed themselves just as quickly. Why did everything have to happen all over again? They should have never existed and part of him (maybe most of him) still felt like they were a mistake he needed to correct. It was the monster in him, but maybe that was the realist too. I hope not, he amended, standing up. A few moments ago, he had been uncertain and lonely, feeling dirty and ashamed. He had become stony again now, quietly bitter and forcibly apathetic. It was an even lonelier state, really, but there was nothing for him here. There would be again.
We're not the same. You're not the same as your father. Change happens; maybe not for the better, but there it is. I guess that just means they'll turn out worse. And he walked away, tired of the conversation more than he was of walking away from people who may or may not care about him.
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