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theonly-sinqueen-blog · 9 years

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She wasn’t much of anything. To think that five words could sound singularly degrading was a feat to be had indeed. Not that she could hear him as he thought the sentence. Not that she even realised he was mulling her over in any regard. She wasn’t worthy to be thought about in any sense, after all; and it would be arrogant to assume otherwise. But there was a reason for her never assuming that she was thought about. She didn’t want to know others’ opinions.

Besides, she might be an addict, but that didn’t mean she was stupid. ( Stupid in one sense, but not stupid in another. )

The hitch in his breath had her head turn slightly when she placed the X over her chest. As if she had done something to garner his disapproval. She hadn’t fucking asked for his opinion of her lack-of-faith whether it was in line with Catholicism or not. And the set in the jaw of the man before her, the priest who hesitated ever so slightly, with such resonance that only she could ever detect it and the rest of the congregation remained ambivalent to it, allowed for her to even further recognise how much she was not welcomed here. Wasn’t welcome much of anywhere.

Then, came the ultimate drag on her character, in her mind. The U L T I M A T E and M O S T U N F O R T U N A T E assumption.

No wine.

Well, for the love of the crucified Christ standing above her, looking down at her with, at least, a little more compassion than His human counterparts were capable of in this moment. Just due to perhaps the leftover residue of aroma from the night before, the one that hadn’t been, you know, cancelled out by the disinfectant and the poring over of blood and the throwing out of her person from the apartment completely.

He was making a judgement. He was condemning her in a single muttered phrase that also no one could hear. And if she had seen the miniature scuffle that had forced Hayden to go between herself and the two girls, she would’ve been even more miffed than she already was. A hot blood flowed through her opened veins, congealed in the joints of her arteries, made her feel as though she was internally stinging, as though a nest of hornets had erupted from her abdomen and fled through her glands. It was enough to make her steps falter for a moment. The whisper was enough to tantalise her head into swivelling over her left shoulder, and though she had cried and not realised it, and the sloppiness of her makeup running had started, still the ferocity of hatred she felt in that moment, the burn of stupid fucking assumptions on the back of her neck, came out in that gaze. As though he had summoned the fires of hell themselves.

And she fastened the glare on him with immediate intensity, so that the moment which stretched for less than five seconds, from the culmination of her head turn to the forsaking of it and her gaze returning back to the front, seemed to last three times the amount it actually was, and her jaw clenched so tightly, she feared some Jaws of Life would have to be procured to loosen it.

“Yes, thank you, I wouldn’t have known otherwise.”

Even if he hadn’t meant it how it sounded, the scoff and the push and the judgement all were combining into the deadliest of trios, the one that corrupted her into thinking so. Besides, she had been conditioned to this sort of treatment. Why should she expect better when even here she was being pushed around, not allowed to walk on her own and make her own decisions?

They were all the same. Made sense, considering they were the same fucking family.

No one ever bothered to give a damn if she hurt. So she would return the sentiments.

And now she was separated, potentially, from one of the girls who might have understood her a little better than the rest of the family members. The men in this family - pushy as all get out. Who in their right mind would want to marry one of them? ( Then again, at one point, she had thought she’d procure a ring from Chuck, and then he’d laughed and pulled out a package of white powder - bloody-fucking-cocaine - instead, and said that was all the marriage vows they needed, and swore them under his breath as he inhaled. ) Bastards and liars. The church would condemn her for these thoughts, but maybe God would understand. He’d died for this sorry lot.

She reseated herself, now feeling more isolated, with crossed arms and a drier face than before. The funereal dirge and the incantation over the coffin was met with the stoniest visage. They would not take anything else from her. Not her shredded dignity. Not her pride. Not her addiction and certainly not her sadness and her grief. And she had to endure a reception with this. If God was merciful, perhaps he would smite her dead. But he didn’t. He only allowed for her gaze to stray towards the same column as before, to see the ghostly figure of Chuck who also seemed relatively bored and stony-faced at this altercation.

( How nice, God. To show me that I’m not alone through the hallucination of the deceased. )

Then the regal march. The pallbearers to rise. The next hour or so of torment in another building before the cemetery was even reached. How could these ceremonies be for the living when the living weren’t wanting to be here any more than the dead? Casey scoffed low in the back of her throat as she waited, still and rigid and shoulders aching from the tension. She thought nothing of Chuck or faith or God or Hayden Sinclair or judgement. She just thought of solitude. And a mite flash of a memory arose, the sunshine against her skin, the radio a little overwhelmed by the static to get a good signal, the smell of English breakfast tea steeping in a white mug. The resonant laughter of someone she’d thought was beautiful at one time. And it wasn’t Chuck.

But her memories omitted this man’s identity. And it couldn’t be her father. She didn’t have one.

Did she?

When the time came to file out of the church, she found herself once again by Hayden’s younger sister. The girl -- Lizzie, she remembered belatedly -- turned around to look at Casey with wide eyes and a rather quivery mouth. “Are you gonna stay for the reception?” She chewed on the inside of her lip, as though expecting a negative answer and wanting a positive one ( but Casey wasn’t that hopeful. )

“Um --” Her throat felt rusty, as though she hadn’t used it in a while. “I think so.”

At least Lizzie seemed somewhat happy about it. They were, after all, united in their sighting of someone embalmed and proper dressed in a casket.

Sometimes, he could only focus on the singular in order to continue. When events piled around him, the only way to breathe, to force his way through the madness, was to hone onto one aspect and simply — do. It was a version of autopilot, he supposed, but it worked in his favor most of the time.

It somewhat worked as he stared at nothing and everything.

He was aware of his heart beating so slowly, of Casey’s breathing turning erratic beside him. He heard his sisters adjust themselves in their seats, restless and upset, and he felt his mother tremble beside him, her sobs contained only by the tissue pressed against her mouth. If it wasn’t there, he wouldn’t be surprised for her wails to overwhelm the organ playing. Or perhaps she would scream until the pastor or his father decided that the noise was too much for the funeral. Or maybe she would be the same; silent and trembling, barely able to keep herself from cracking.

Possibilities and outcomes were laid before him; he reached for none.

This was about forcing himself to be that rock. This was about sucking in a long breath tainted with awful incense and letting it sit in his chest. This was about keeping himself upright in order to support those collapsing around him. This was about him being the support until he could lock himself away and S C R E A M.

Something crawled down his neck. He moved a hand to brush it away, pausing when he felt the wetness against his fingers. He didn’t have to think to know why there were streaks, and he quickly swiped his hand over each cheek before running it through his hair (like it would mask everything with one fluid motion). He wondered briefly if his neck was stained red and his cheeks flushed. It wasn’t him being embarrassed, but him being — surprised at himself for already FAILING what he needed to accomplish.

But at least —- at least a sob didn’t crawl up his throat. At least it was only a few tears that had dripped over his face. The emptiness ( a b s e n c e ) still sat heavily on his chest, yet it wasn’t pressing the air out of him. There was no lack of air, no haze clouding his mind for there only to be a wretched sound bubbling in the back of his throat, begging to be released, wailing to be allowed to crumble —-

At least he wasn’t at that point A G A I N.

Maybe it was good he had that moment, despite Casey being there. She wasn’t a stranger, but she wasn’t an acquaintance either. She wasn’t anything, truly, and the only connection that had her here was the boy who decided so many were worthless.

{{ and yet, as their hands moved to scrub at the wall, they both had tried desperately to be people of worth. }}

At one point, his hand was intertwined with another, and he gave an involuntary squeeze as he felt his mother tremble once more. Her other hand had fluttered back to her lap before she changed her mind once more. She gripped her husband’s hand, and Hayden wondered for a moment if his mother wanted them all to be connected.

He didn’t reach for Casey.

Closing his eyes, Hayden let the music slow around him, allowed his mother’s shaking to be his focus, and let his awareness narrow so his breathing could continue with little hindrance, so his tears wouldn’t overflow once more to surprise and shake him.

When his mother released his hand, it went to his shoulder, and when he opened his eyes to look at her, the hazel eyes staring back swam in another round of tears. She turned away, quickly standing to follow his father to the end of the pew and begin walking toward the priest. Hayden followed suit, but stepping back like his father had in order to let the others move toward the FATHER, the SON, and the HOLY SPIRIT first.

He didn’t catch sight of Casey’s face when she passed; too hurried, too set on finishing this. He waited for his sisters, slow in their movements as they tried to inch by the lowered kneelers, but his father pressed a hand at the small of his back and pushed. Hayden stuttered forward, looking over his shoulder, tracing the lines around his father’s pressed lips.

He wished he didn’t understand. But this was a result of being family. There was to be separation between the outsider and them. And he was the wall to do it.

{{ did you hear them, father? do you not want INSANITY near your daughters? }}

He moved, drawing so close behind Casey that his feet almost stepped on the back of her heels. He watched as her hands rested on her shoulders, and his breath hitched at the movement.

What did he e x p e c t? That Chuck found himself someone tied, even loosely, to FAITH?

As she presented herself before the pastor, he watched the man lick his lips, giving the blessing meant for children not old enough to receive their First Communion. And before there could be a moment frozen for eternity, Hayden nudged her to the side, quickly opening his mouth for the bread of LIFE ( and of DEATH ) to be pressed on his tongue. Once he felt it dissolve on his tongue, he began to go through the motions of the cross, refusing to look at the casket and looking ahead instead of at the figure hanging bleeding his soul to protect them all.

( was he protecting chuck? or did he send him to the fires? )

Looking away meant staring at Casey, and he nudged her again, directing her on the short path back. “No wine,” he murmured. That would be a waste of time. And he was to forgo it as well. For what point would there be for another’s blood to mix with his when the one that connected him to his brother meant NOTHING at all? Right then, there was no point to it, not in asking forgiveness or receiving it.

He closed his eyes. No, there would be no forgiveness then. Not even in the house of the Lord.

#thr:hayden

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theonly-sinqueen-blog · 9 years

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The sense of nothingness prolonged itself with the sense of dissatisfaction that rippled throughout the entire main portion of the cathedral. The expectant faces stretched before her, and she wondered at whom she looked. Yet still she could not bring herself to stare at another place except where she imagined that form. She was not alone. She was not i n s a n e. Someone else saw. Someone who had perhaps loved him more than she ever thought she could. Someone who had missed him with all of the desperation of a hollowed-out metal pipe.

That same pipe of desperation would turn around and bash her temple. It would remind her that emotions could antagonise, could stretch her beyond her limits. It would serve to break open her skull and allow for all of the corrupted wings of landed butterflies to be severed from their antennae and their bodies. It would provide a sense of release where all of the rawness of the pent-up human crisis of identification demonstrated itself in front of a non-expectant congregation.

She thought she knew what loss felt like. After all, a thousand and one times, she had lost herself. But unlike this, she never bothered to find that girl. She never really wanted to, if she could help it. She hated herself, but she had loved him. Or had she hated him so much the line had blurred?

His figure leaned against the column which held the ceiling of the heavens from toppling down in ashen concrete and shards of stained glass upon their heads. But perhaps if one of those shards inserted itself into her being, then she could hope to have an accurate description for what it was that filled her when she saw the tightening of the other Sinclair brother's jaw, when she felt him shift in place, and she could swear that his hand would appear from the air, that it then would dare to press itself against the length of her jaw and bruise her harder than his younger half could ever have dared to do himself.

( And that would take so much effort )

But he did not strike out against her [ this time ] and he did not even look at her [ but she could feel the judgement because she was not one of them ] and when he rose, her gaze flickered from the ghost against the pole, who smoked a joint as though he was not in the box, as though he had not been murdered in the coldest of blood days before, and the two of them were once again united in the utter dread of the stretching moments, of the e x p e c t a t i o n s .

Casey Queen had learned a long time ago that it was better to stop expecting. It only resulted in the insertion of the razor in her veins named Disappointment.

And I loved and I hated him.

And I hated him.

Some of the words filled her ears. Others escaped her. She wouldn't remember. And it was all the better for it. But she would remember the one thing that had lasted longer than Chuck's infatuation with her reserved mannerisms, with her lack of abilities to communicate her emotions, with her lashing out of anger, with her withdrawal into herself and the caving of whatever he so wanted:

( T h a t s h e h a d h a t e d h i m )

What was God's greatest tragedy? One could not judge. Was it the taking of a young life before its lifetime should have ended? Was it a variation of watching His most devoted worshippers collapse on the ground because they reached for Him and could not reach past the markers of what grounded them to touch His hand up in heaven? Was it the thinking over and over that one was no longer worth this given life? Was it the tightening of that rope? Was it the utter realisation that even God was jealous, even God became irritated, angered, that he could lash out with the wounds that his own people had caused him? Was it the removal of a soul due to cancer, murder, jealousy, rage, abuse, rape, or the withering down of a personality from depression, anxiety, mood swings?

Was it the existence of the human race? Was it his failed attempt to make clones of himself so that He might not be so immersed in His own solitude? Was it his resentment for the monsters he created?

Casey Queen did not know God as well as she should. And with this label of Chuck's death being God's greatest tragedy, For all of his and his family's fucking professions otherwise, it seemed as though Hayden Sinclair didn't know Him, either.

The piano began a slow tune, not quite to the point of a dirge, and as it did, she could feel her heart lodge itself in the back of her throat. It was Chuck's favourite. It was the rumbling of the bass and the echo off the walls. It was his little smile which erased all of the previous loathing and despising of him. It was the lullaby which rid him of his personal demons and made him cling to her once again, as though he hadn't turned on her thirty minutes before.

[ he never used to be like this - and she hung on in hopes that he would come back, come back, come back to her as he once did, but never did he ]

The incense burned at her skin, made her itch as though she had been ignited. She heard someone collapse behind her, and her arms tightened in automatic recoil, as though she was responsible for catching the weeping woman. Hayden was weeping, and she didn't think he noticed. The priest swing the pendulum of the ended life that reeked of God's blessed fragrance as he walked up the aisle, and she knew that communion would happen --

But the last thing she wanted on her tongue was the flesh and blood of another.

So when the congregation walked forward, one bread, one body, one Lord of all, she crossed her arms over her chest in an X. X marking the spot of empty treasure chests, as someone had already stolen the contents within. X marking that she was unworthy of the faith, and that the hand upon her brow to give her the blessing would have preferred to strangle her instead. X marking that she would not, would not, would not reach out and touch the wood and pretend as though it was his cooling proverbial flesh because she did not need this, did not need this, did not need this.

He waited for her to move. He didn’t dare reach for her; when he wasn’t in a pit of anger or choking on sobs, there was no desire to touch her. Frankly, he was bothered by his mother brushing her hand by his elbow. He froze under it, swallowed hard against the roll of emotions gathering in the back of his throat. He had to bear the weight of his family’s dependence, but them reaching for it didn’t lessen his burden. And as selfish as it was, he didn’t want to carry Casey’s. God, he had to ask for forgiveness over that, but he was stricken and mangled under this grief that if he carried hers as well, he had no doubt he would B R E A K.

But she seemed to start, and once she did, he slid past her to lead them to the proper pew. Elizabeth and Cassandra adjusted to make room for them, and Hayden nodded to each in thanks. With Casey to his left (barely breathing, it seemed, barely holding a grip on reality) and his mother to his left (already unfolding tissues, already biting her lip so hard he could see a spot of red), he closed his eyes to steady himself.

( there was no possible way to do so, not when his world was shaken past recovery )

He heard the steps of the pastor before the music filled the room. He heard Casey gasp, and he furrowed his brows. But he didn’t look to her; his attention drifted back to the pastor and the altar boys, and he watched them slowly create a solemn and ominous setting as the incense filled the room. Curling his hands to fists on his thighs, he tried to concentrate on the organ and disconnect himself.

He was never one for funerals in the first place.

Cassie’s voice drifted into his awareness again, and he would have dismissed it if it wasn’t for Elizabeth taking a breath. It was then the rush of past funerals overwhelmed him, and his eyes snapped open, finally turning to voice her not to say anything, to not say one goddamn thing ———

He can feel the color drain from his face, and his eyes followed Elizabeth’s finger to where she pointed. He thought, just for a second, he might see him. He thought he would catch that familiar cut of dark hair, the smirk forever etched on his face, the red-tinged eyes that bore so much hatred and laughter all at once.

But there was nothing; nothing except the stark stone walls

He faced forward again and closed his eyes. His nails dug deeper into his palm, but he felt no sting of pain. There was no worth in forcing himself to breathe calmly, to lose himself in the aching monologue about life and readings that resounded through him.

He fucking hated this.

And then there was silence as the organ seemed to finally fade (or had it stopped long ago and he was hearing the echoes of the past mixing with the present?). His shoulders slumped, the weight of being there, being this rock that could do N O T H I N G so heavy on his being.

But then his mother nudged him. He peered at her, caught his father’s gaze, and forced himself to swallow every fear, every goddamn tear, and tuck it away for another time. It seems like an eternity, standing and walking to the podium. It seems like a millennium to attempt to unfold the paper that was haphazardly stuffed in his suit pocket. And once he does unravel it, the list of words scream at him.

He was asked to do this because no one else could handle it. And he couldn’t even write a goddamn speech.

Closing his eyes once more, he rubbed a hand over his face. “He was my brother,” he started, trying to work around the lump that threatened to choke him until he was dead beside the coffin. He kept his eyes close as he continued (because there was a coffin and his family and fucking Casey and he couldn’t look, couldn’t look, he just C O U L D N ’ T).

"There’s not much to say. We’re all humans, and we have wondrous and disastrous moments. We all succeed and we all —— screw up, and that was Chuck. That was Charles. And that’s — he was my brother. And I loved and hated him, and he probably felt the same. And now —- "

He stopped. There was a tremor running through his hands and he couldn’t stop it. It was probably covered by the raised wood of the podium, but only for so long. He pressed his lips to a thin line, trying to contain the tremble, fighting too hard to keep himself still and composed —-

( he was b r e a k i n g )

"And now he’s dead, and it’s God’s greatest tragedy."

He tore himself from the podium, opening his eyes because he had to see where he was going, and oh, his gaze immediately went to the coffin and all the breath in him left so suddenly, so terribly. When he sat back down, he crumbled the paper in his hands, curling it into a small ball that a hand covered when he fisted them again.

And finally he lifted his chin and sat still.

#thr:hayden

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theonly-sinqueen-blog · 9 years

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If his mother was not to be the one who would collapse against the coffin, then she would take it upon herself. Her heart leapt within her, moved to it, pressed itself down upon the lid as though it could sink down into velvet and be encased in remembrance. No, she answered inwardly. No, but I was the one who found him.

I was the one who found him who found him who f o u n d him . . .

She knew the grasp of chilled hands, and at least these ones which wound about her fingers had some warmth still. Her head nodded, her chin jutted, the motion of a statue being pressed to open a secret corridor, rough and rigid and uncertain of its own stone. The quiet hum of the cathedral, that tense, pensive silence occurring just before the service starts. The flipping of the stops on the organ. The quiet prelude. The muttered words. We need to take our seats. Just sit next to me. Her heart sank instead of the casket but Casey Queen had not moved. Not except to withdraw her case and be stonily led to the front pews. Just sit next to me.

Her boots scraped against the floor, alternating with her slow heartbeats. She should have taken the painkillers. She should have taken them. It then would have killed the proverbial thud behind the beating heart and made her able to stand upon her own two feet without scuffling. The vodka had been in the refrigerator; there had been half a gin standing on the sill. To be drunk at a funeral was understandable. Otherwise, her senses, all too sharp. She missed nothing. Even the slight switch of Mr. Sinclair's right eye, a nervous tic developing on the spot. Even the lack of empathetic knowing in Elizabeth and Cassandra. (Lizzie, one said, and Cassie, said the other).

A leak in the roof. ( It had begun to rain. )

Plink.

The water turned red.

Plink.

A splatter against the wall. The door on emptied hinges.

Plink.

The sound narrowing, time coming to a halt, opening at the close. Her spine hard against the back of the bench ( curling from the ache of the wall. She had been there leaning for hours, hours, hours. )

P L I N K --

She almost jerked right out of her seat, blinking at her surroundings. This wasn't the flat. This wasn't the truck. She was in church - at a funeral. When had this happened and where had she been? When had this happened? When did she get here? Hayden was on one side of her and Chuck stood in the corner by the pillar and stared at his own casket and Lizzie looked inquisitively up at Casey as her lips parted --

And the organ striking up its mighty dirge drowned out the gasp she made.

It would not have been so mighty in and of itself if the church had not fallen into a complete silence, impermeable except for the blood-rain.

"And now I'm seeing things." She hissed this to herself, Lizzie still looking at her somewhat confused. The girl poked her on the arm, feet swinging a little ( as they were too short to reach the floor ) and tugged on the arm of her cardigan. Casey's temples broke out into a cold sweat as she leaned a little to the side; she didn't wish to be reprimanded. Even if it was by someone who was half her age.

"Don't worry," the girl whispered, pointing as subtly as she could to the corner. "I see him too."

Casey started, staring wide-eyed, before turning back to the front, face drained of all colour. It was hard to breathe ( would she faint? ) and she was seeing spots. Spots and his silhouette and that disapproving face. ( She could never quite completely escape his hold. )

She just should never never never have come.

He looked to her, trying not to acknowledge how uncomfortable she appeared. He also tried not to cringe at what she said. Hayden couldn’t possibly think of anything that she could say that would create her to be likable. She was the intruder. Despite what had — transpired between them a few days before (was it understanding? was it exhaustion?), he couldn’t erase that thought from his mind. Between them and her, she did not fit with the Sinclair’s by the fact that she would never be one of them. They had known Chuck before; they had the hope he remained the same in his final moments.

Well, his family did. Hayden wasn’t one for denial, even if he did try to look the other way. He knew. And Casey knew.

( perhaps that was what pissed him off )

"It’s a pleasure to meet you," he heard his mother say, breaking the silence that encased them all. His gaze went to his father’s, watching to see what he would do. Father met son’s gaze, a damning question burning him through and through. But he nodded in answer; she was alright. For now. He wasn’t sure. He didn’t know what to make of Casey Queen, and it bothered him. Because he walked into that apartment despising everything she was doing and, almost immediately, who she was. But there had been tenderness at the end of their first interaction, though he could believe that was because he was exhausted, she was exhausted, and the fight had let them both at that point. But in the car, he didn’t pull away from her. He was tremendously confused at the manner to which they worked (or didn’t work, he just didn’t know). One could say he was distraught over the matter, and as he tore his gaze from his father, as he watched his mother step forward to offer Casey her hand, the turmoil only deepened.

They were together in this pain, and that formed a bond like no other.

Placing his hands on his sister’s shoulders, he nudged them to Casey. “Introduce yourselves,” he said softly.

"I am not a kid anymore, Hayden," Cassandra growled under her breath. (she was only fifteen, of course she was still a kid).

Elizabeth only chewed at her bottom lip, and he gently squeezed her shoulder. Cassandra stepped forward first, stiffly extending her hand to Casey, not even waiting for their mother to finish. Elizabeth followed behind, eyes downcast.

They were both too young to be mourning.

"Were you with him before he —" he heard his mother start and he couldn’t bear to hear the answer. He turned to the casket, hand over his mouth, and he blocked the rest of the world out. He wanted no outside sound, no weeping of people who felt sorry for themselves; it was just him and Chuck in that moment.

Staring at him now, there was no doubt Chuck would be forever haunting him. It was difficult to even look at him, and Hayden had to turn away. His chest constricted in what could only be GUILT, and he sore he could hear Chuck laughing at him for not even stomaching his corpse for more than a few moments.

There was a hand at his shoulder, but he slowly, gently, shook it off. He knew it belonged to his father, and yet, he couldn’t muster the effort to be kind. He needed a moment that he wasn’t sure would ever come.

"We need to take our seats," his father murmured, and Hayden granted him a nod to let him know he heard. And really, he didn’t know why or how he came to stood by Casey’s side, but he was the one ushering them all to their seats and leaning down so only she could hear him.

"Just sit next to me."

#thr:hayden

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theonly-sinqueen-blog · 9 years

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There were stares being shot at her. She had attempted to make herself look presentable. She had attempted to recall that this was an event which needed her utmost attention. Yet she was - it could not be called floating.

( It was a sensation she had felt once before when she had drunk too much and been stood up and someone's hand had been on her back to guide her but she had been walking, walking, and she saw the sidewalk, but she was not there; a half of her mind had gone somewhere else and the streetlights sparkled and she felt as though she was half-gone, half-full, one third uncertain of her own footing despite the stability. )

The harrowing dizziness. It made her tuck her arms more tightly against her abdomen, as though to keep her innards from spilling out through the wounds of change which had been gored out with a paring knife. The smell of the incense was almost too strong. It burned at her. Burned.

She was walking, but she was not walking. The blood dripped down the sides of Jesus's face and all she could see was the pattern on the wall. The same crimson splash. The same innocence spilling out.

( Oh, but Chuck Sinclair had been no source of innocence. Had he, Casey. No, no. He had been your own private hell. )

A hand went to her throat, as though she was about to choke these thoughts away. Thoughts which came to her in a voice not her own. Then, he was there, and he explained, and she didn't care because none of them belonged here. What was their grief? People who distanced themselves? They would be celebrating the life of a boy who had gone too far. They would be remembering a superficial fucking blindfold.

How she managed to remain upright, she didn't know. Not when another blow of pain reached into her and dug itself against her ribs.

( They said Adam had a rib taken from him in order for Eve to be crafted, but Casey had a couple of things to say about it, because her rib was being removed and placed in the coffin and she clutched at the blood. )

Hallucinations. In church. ( They'd think she was possessed -- )

She watched as the Sinclairs gathered. She watched as his mother clung to him. She watched as his father didn't understand. She watched his sisters keep to themselves. And here she was. Not belonging. Despite her part in his life as a fixture animation.

( "Pretty little puppet." He was high again, but he was smiling, which was a good thing, and it made her bear to grin. [ Grin to bear it. ] "Ever thought about how you'd look as a doll? I have. Long-lashed doll." )

The doctors might say he was psychotic. But he was just messed up. There was a difference. Wasn't there? ( wasn't there, wasn't there )

She ached for an embrace that she would never get again. ( "Daddy, please don't turn down the radio. I like this song best." )

She would hum it but she didn't think that it would bring her comfort.

Then, she was being i n t r o d u c e d and she would have much preferred to sink into the depths of the cathedral catacombs for all the welcome she felt from these gazes. There was relief ( more than likely at the thought of her not being associated with Hayden ) and then that hardening ( because there was confirmation she was associated with Chuck and not at a distance like these other chaps ) and she just -- wanted to go home.

( but there was no home here )

"Hi. I - heard so much about all of you." Lies. Deceit. She had heard nothing. Nothing. But she couldn't, couldn't, say that. Her teeth were clenched together. Please let us be united in loss. Let us be united in it. Don't hate me, don't hate me, don't hate me, I'm hurting, please, I'm hurting so much. My sleeve is against my mouth and I am aching and I feel like you're peeling me apart and I am going to f a l l

"I just wish we could have all met -- officially -- not like this." ( nothing you say is right you are going to ruin e v e r y t h i n g ) But how could dilapidation be ruined further?

When she stared at him, there was nothing he could connect to their previous interaction. She saw without seeing. And despite whatever he was thinking of in that moment (frankly, it was nothing at all except the image of his family TOGETHER at this wretched occasion), chills ran down his spine. She looked haunted; she made HIM feel haunted.

Chuck’s presence was near; whether he be wearing horns or a halo made no difference. He would remain in their thoughts for FAR too long.

It was the perfect revenge.

When she didn’t answer him, when she slid from the car, he lifted his head and rested his chin against the car. He had to find a way to B R E A T H E in order to remain sane. He had to stay sane.

Shutting the door, he rubbed a hand over his face and pushed himself away. When he looked up, Casey was already walking away. He was still rooted in place, immobile in his d e s p a i r. How could he do this? How could he face this wretched pain when it would only tear at his chest and rip his soul from his body?

How did anyone survive this? How could anyone think death took away NOTHING?

He was unaware. Hand after hand stopped him in his tracks so others could give their condolences. Or they wanted to attempt to do so. He shook his head at them, murmured, “Please, let me see my family first.”

( his family minus one it had been that way for so long and only now was the pain unbearable )

With heavy steps, he managed the walk through the parking lot. He wavered between consciousness of what was happening around him and what was happening within. He couldn’t — he wouldn’t — show anything for any of them to witness. He had his moment. Unfortunately, it wasn’t private, not with her eyes still looking at him (and yet knowing not to say a word), but he could accept that one person saw. As long as no one else did, he could manage.

He had to be the rock for his family. He was the one to support and hold them all from falling, falling, f a l l i n g.

( he wouldn’t think about how it was supposed to be THE LORD’S job to hold him through this time of need. he couldn’t think about how he felt utterly abandoned by the two most important people in his life. )

Casey returned to his sight; he didn’t even realize he crossed into the threshold of the Lord. Glancing up, he stared at the statue of crucifixion, memorizing the lines of blood trickling down His face. He closed his eyes to it, the image seared in his mind.

Despite everything, he was returning to his second home.

( but he didn’t feel like the prodigal son )

He took no care for the line of people waiting to seat themselves. Weaving between people, his attention was focused on the people at the very front of the church, standing over the coffin before the ceremony began. He thought they would enter once the procession was ready, but maybe his mother wanted to do this differently. Maybe his father wanted a moment with his son before so many clamored around.

Maybe, maybe, maybe.

When he drew up next to Casey, he gently took her by the elbow. When she spoke, he blinked at her, sparing one more glance at those around them. “Family friends. Those who distantly knew him. People who want to grieve for him.” They didn’t matter to him. But he didn’t have a right to determine that for his parents.

"C’mon."

I was that single word that jarred him from his own trance and set him on a determined path to make it to his family. It was a word for himself, not for Casey (because he was that selfish, he was always that selfish).

< R A I N C H E C K ? >

He pulled her along with him, not registering how people separated to make a path. They were by his family in no time. His father stared, his mother blinked away her tears, and his two sisters held hands like they would never let go of one another.

It was the sight of a perfect and broken family. The Sinclairs stuck together forever. ( until one decided that wasn’t good enough for him )

The moment he dropped his hand away from Casey, his mother fell into his arms. His father patted his back, and Hayden reached a free hand to his sisters. They held onto each other; they supplied the breaths to keep them sane.

But Hayden couldn’t bear it for so long. Yet he let his mother be the one to draw back first. ( he didn’t ache for more of her hugs like he used to. )

Clearing his throat, he looked back to Casey and murmured, “Mum, Pop, this was Chuck’s girlfriend. Casey. Casey Queen. Met up with her recently — officially.”

#thr:hayden

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theonly-sinqueen-blog · 9 years

Text

This was her grief.

Passing through town boundaries where lives continued on. Children clinging to the hands of their parents before crossing pedestrian walkways. Slashes of colour infringing upon her monochromatic universe in the forms of umbrellas and loud prints of jackets. It was all soon blackened out by the array of charcoal from the ashes of the past and the black of those who dressed in the shadows of the future. The cab of the truck - it was very small indeed. A narrow ringing in her ears, stretching nylon tights over her mouth to suffocate her. One hand clung to the door handle, but she was detached from it; it wasn't her tight grip at all, but that of a ghost.

He explained that there were expectations and in this, his voice was gentle, and his face was taut, though it was not with concern for her. She could only stare at him as she said, "I don't know who those people are" because she didn't; Chuck's personal life had been a mystery except for the public knowledge that he never wanted to go back home.

No one knew the real Chuck. She viewed the bodies through the dripping windows, and one hand came to press against the glass, as though to feel the moisture of breath - and no one knew him. It was all the projection he wished for the public to understand that had been known, that would be mourned. The lost brother. The reliable friend. The prodigal son.

So this was her grief - and she didn't appreciate this infringement. Roiling, coiled up in the corner of the truck, back pressed against the ridge of the seat, she wanted to hiss for them to go away. She had covered his mutilated body with hers, the screams of rage heard several blocks down.

( "He's dead. Can't you see it? He's dead. Leave him alone! Just let him be! He's been asked for enough, don't touch him! )

She didn't know any of these people, either. And none of them would bother to know her or the real Chuck who was capable of hurt and all the other terrible things human beings could do. He would be idolised, placed on a pedestal, remembered and carved into stone. But this wasn't for the dead; it was for the living. Because they were the ones who needed comfort. The dead - couldn't care. Didn't care. Were nothing.

( This was her grief, and she felt violated of it. Robbed of it in public. )

He peered at her, expecting something from her. They all expected something. She would be judged and labelled. The cathedral towered above her, the most judgmental motion of them all. She hadn't set foot in this church for ages. Though he would never realise this was the one she had attended as a child when she had known herself better than ever. ( She didn't know herself at all anymore. )

How ironic that this was what would make her return to what she had forsaken.

Without answering him, she slid out of the truck and shut the door behind her, arms crossing tight across her bosom in a mechanism of defence. She understood the sadness on faces, but she didn't comprehend who it was for. This couldn't be real. This wasn't actually happening. She was hallucinating from lack of sleep ( still chewing on the drugs of her failures. ) Chuck wasn't dead. Right, no, he was asleep back in the flat. Still inhabiting his torn-up body. Chuck wasn't dead. She floated above herself, saw the tousled hair - and Chuck wasn't dead. There were no tears for her. Because he wasn't dead. No -

- He was waiting for her in there. ( But not d e a d. ) He would be laughing about all this. Playing a prank. ( "Leave him alone! How can you be so cruel? ) Saying this was his chance to start over. ( "Casey, I can't die. I'm immortal and flawless." ) She floated across the asphalt, keeping her arms tucked into herself, the cathedral door yawning open. Someone opened it for her. An older man she didn't recognise. She wouldn't see him again.

( Was Hayden there? She didn't know him either but at least he was her sanity of sorts. There he was. Right behind her. )

The odour of ratchet incense accosted her straight, burning her nose. Reminding her of what she had surrendered for him. There was a line being directed around the pews in the centre of the church; a line that went around the pillars, clumped strangers and friends together with their unified comprehension of the gravity of death ( or, perhaps, their lack of it ) and arrived in front of a coffin. An open coffin.

He hadn't wanted an open casket. Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ, if you're really in this church, close that lid n o w.

She turned back to Hayden, backwards-walking into the line, shuffling along with the rest of them who didn't care, a tightness in her chest that she attempted to squeeze out with her own arms. Her head shook back and forth, ( I can't do this ), her shoulders quivering, ( Don't make me do this ) but her steps still bringing her forward ( I don't want to see it ) her jaw tight ( I can't bear to fucking see it ) - her hair all over to one side -

( I thought when people died, others finally listened to them. Guess you realise how significant you were - or weren't. ) The people at the front of the coffin, that had to be his family. A man. A woman who kept reaching into the coffin to brush her hand against his feet, the man looking uncomfortable and stretched at the temples. Two girls, sombre, one with wider eyes as she observed the milling congregation. The simultaneous wiping of tissues across the bottom lids of eyes. Monotonous. ( No one hears screams, silent or aloud after all. ) Inching forward. ( Get me out of here. )

"-- Who are all these people?" She wanted them to go.

Maybe he should feel grateful to her for not saying anything. Maybe he should feel relief that his emotions had poured from his mind to sounds that were soon echoes. Maybe, maybe, maybe. The fact remained that he felt

n o t h i n g .

( he didn’t want to feel nothing, he didn’t want to think that the Lord ABANDONED him because he failed, he didn’t want this s u f f e r i n g, he wanted to find his happiness again )

({ but who was he to blame god for abandoning him when he had done just that for his brother? })

He drove. Through highways and slow traffic, there was no sound except the backdrop of cars. No station played, no sultry singing filled their ears; he had no energy to turn the wheel of the car, much less the dial of a radio. And it seemed like she was fine with that. He glanced over at her only once when they had reached the turning of the hour on the road, and she was staring out the window. Thinking, not thinking, whatever she desired in that moment. Maybe she was feeling everything. Maybe he should be jealous of her.

maybe, maybe, maybe.

One day, there would be no maybes. When that day arrived, he would do everything in his power to keep it that way. Wondering about the different paths that he could decide upon was too much for him. He had no desire to pursue them any longer. None at all.

There was n o t h i n g left within him.

It was an ironic blessing of sorts when the highway turned into simple road through a town, and how that road led to a church that appeared more solemn than normal. There were already people lingering in the parking lot, looking lost and unsure. He didn’t recognize them as immediate family. They were strangers, acquaintances that felt like they had an obligation to attend when they received the invitation.

Hayden wanted them gone.

But he had so many wants in this world, and none would be granted. He seemed to be of the undeserving.

( and why wouldn’t he be? )

Pulling into a free parking spot, he closed his eyes again. He let the car run, as it allowed him a second to breathe; he knew the moment he turned off the ignition, people would feel the need to approach the car. Or maybe they wouldn’t; maybe they would just stare at the eldest Sinclair and judge about how he didn’t do enough.

He should just be screaming because of all the maybes and the pain and the never-ending hatred of how his life continued while Chuck’s ended.

There was one breath. Two. And then he turned off the ignition, remembered that there was another in the car.

"There are two girls," he started. "Sisters. Younger. One of them might bombard you with questions. The other’s going to judge you right off the bat because she’s fifteen and that’s what they do. But it’ll be for, like, ten seconds. And then — " Why was he rambling? He was sure Chuck already said told her all about the family; about Kristina and Elizabeth, mother and father, him. He was sure his brother spilled all the secrets of the family.

But maybe Hayden just needed to talk and focus on someone other than himself. After all, he didn’t want to fall insane.

Swallowing, he opened his door, easily sliding out, and with that motion, inherited the demeanor he would need to survive the day. He turned back and leaned a hand against the doorframe, peering at the girl who had accompanied him, who had said yes, who had fixed something so menial, and yet, somehow, needed. For him.

"Time to face the crowd, Casey."

#thr:hayden

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theonly-sinqueen-blog · 10 years

Text

If there was something to which she had grown accustomed, it was realising the significance of being shut out, the language which accompanied it. She wasn't one to pressure past a point that had been established as something which would break someone; but she was, however, one to take a chance, one to be a bit daring, perhaps reckless, and leap into the open chasm of the unknown future. She was someone who didn't care about her state of being and didn't think it mattered if she did terrible things, so long as she lived through them.

Then again, even the living was a little bit nonsensical to her. Because she had started not to care if she was alive, either. It was not such a thing, perhaps, which made her wish to kill herself, but it was the prospect of crossing the street whilst smacked out beyond recognition, and being hit by the oncoming bumper of a car. It wouldn't matter to her if it happened. She didn't want herself to die, but if she was killed, she didn't care too much. It was an odd, off-beat sort of manner in which to exist.

( But it was so comfortable for Casey Queen. It was something she knew and understood better than even herself as defined by others. Because she didn't know who she was outside of their established meanings and labels. )

Yet he turned to her when she reached for him. This - was something she had not expected. Even in grief, one who was detached from his surroundings and one who didn't wish to be touched by a girl who was tainted ( oh, so t a i n t e d , so deemed as a method of b l a s p h e m y because of what she had done with his b r o t h e r who didn't even show his true self except in private when his family was unable to witness the sharp shards of glass he shoved into her throat ) - wouldn't allow it to happen. Yet he had. He had wanted her to do this for him.

He hadn't pushed her down, or removed her hands, or thrown her out. He hadn't blamed her, or said this was her fault, or twisted her fingers. He hadn't pressed a finger to her forehead in chastisement, nor had he opened up a reaming barrage of insults to slay her. He had just let her.

She had never been allowed to do anything. Not even live.

And though the warmth between them remained, his sob dripped icicles into the flickering flame and god, it made her shiver. Because in one sound, it encapsulated how she had felt her whole life.

She pressed her spine against the back of the seat and a fist pushed itself against her lipstick and the cosmetic bled onto her hand in a slash which wouldn't be erased, just as all of this would wound her, make her open, unknown, wanting, haunted, thriving on the pain, the hole, the unknown, the wanting, and being so h a u n t e d for the rest of her life, and God, why, why God, have you been so much of an abandoning father?

Why did you leave me like my dad left me. Why did you do it, God. Why did you have to take it all away. Why'd you leave.

Crimson. Drip, drip, drip -- crimson down the side of bathtub walls, and the echo of why... god... on the ceiling her only friend before she woke up and realised she was bleeding but breathing and she had to not fail next time

He started the car, and the pain remained, but her thoughts ended there. Her terrible, tormented thoughts which would become an epitaph on the gravestone if she wasn't seen, if no one said I see you to her one day. Chuck was gone. She was here with his brother, Hayden. And life would continue through the funeral, the reception, to the day after.

( By God, she hadn't thought about the day after . . . For she thought it would never come )

When he strangled the sobs, she said nothing, just remained in herself with the dried eyes and the gentle breaths and the hand against her mouth. For she felt his pain so keenly, it was as though she knew him.

The drive would be in silence until the church came into view and that was okay because if there was a said she, said he, said she poem to be written, it was best written in silence where no hurt except the true anguish of loss could be interpreted and no other words could be set to sail across the sea.

With the wrapping of fingers around his arm, it lazily drew him back to reality. There was a sense of grogginess as he peered back to Casey, watching her with a listless gaze fix his other sleeve.

Maybe there was a small bit of shock that she had reached for him; for the same man who had shoved and spat in her face barely a day ago. But he was so t i r e d that he found himself not caring in that moment whatever reasoning she had to be C O M F O R T I N G.

But when she shifted again, when she leaned over the console and positioned herself so much closer, his response was to move with her. To give her an easier time with his shirt and tie, he arched his neck ever so slightly. He eased closer himself, just so she didn’t have to r e a c h too far. Every touch and brush against him, he felt himself react to in some way, whether it be by swallowing or repositioning himself.

And when she was finished, he couldn’t help but feel an

emptiness ( absence )

He couldn’t help the sob that started at the back of his throat.

It was an ugly noise piercing the air. It was the sob that H U R T because of the way it ripped through his veins. In that moment, he couldn’t see himself walking to his family and managing to be the rock; he couldn’t imagine continuing to be the foundation they depended on when they all faltered; he couldn’t find himself wanting to do anything that had to do with being a caring older brother or dutiful son. The pain that he felt left him gasping for air, and how pitiful that sounded to his ears. It was like he was drowning while still near the surface of the water; he was being pulled down while still managing to break the surface and suck in enough air to keep him living for a few more seconds. The way all of that tightened at his chest had him believing he was slowly dying.

( but wasn’t this how death worked anyways? )

Somehow, he managed to strangle the sobs to silence. Though his shoulders still shook, he managed to snatch control. Only a few tears had run down his face; in mere seconds, it was if there was nothing wrong. Never-mind the wet streaks over his cheeks, or the red tinge to his eyes. Hayden Sinclair was nowhere near okay, but as he swallowed another sob, he could project out to the world that he was handling the tragedy.

Such a shame, though, that one had to witness his weakness and how vulnerable he was — and how it never, ever disappeared.

He didn’t look to her. Didn’t say a word. He only, finally, started the car.

#thr:hayden

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theonly-sinqueen-blog · 10 years

Text

He was no longer there.

Hayden Sinclair remained in front of her, and then, once they had happened into the truck, beside her, but he was gone from his body, and he was elsewhere in his mind. He was ensnared in the briars, intercepted with the concept of remembrance. Things he didn't wish to recall, all of which were coming to the forefront of his memories. What she found most stifling about this entire experience was this very thing. How all of the good memories were suddenly tossed out the nearest window and bloodied on the pavement in front of the vehicle, waiting to be overrun with tires and broken treads. All of them were replaced with negative images.

As though they needed to be haunted f u r t h e r about regret and toil.

Casey knew she wasn't about to be appreciated for whatever it was she did. She had acquired a label, and there would be no shedding it. He would look at her through the lenses of girlfriend and dead weight, and the latter he had acquired from a long-deceased brother, and the first had been put in place by him, and she might scrub it, and all of its connotations, off with beaded soap and long nails, but it would never leave her.

Despite this, she couldn't resist reaching out and not touching him, not necessarily laying a hand upon his arm to comfort; it was just a gesture for her to wrap her nails ( the same ones she'd use to claw herself ) about the edge of his sleeve and curl it up to join the other one. Rolling it gently, with great care. Treating it like a lost child. And there had been a child lost, hadn't there?

When the sleeve was taken care of, she reached further with her arms - -- and just surrendered, moving over into the middle console instead.

What did she do with this closed distance? She pressed the lips of his blouse together and she pulled the two loose ends of the tie so that it formed a square knot, which she pushed, most gently, to rest underneath his collar. Nails painted glimmering dark purple, and black on the fourth fingers with a single-silver stripe, glinted in the dim sunlight.

There was no sound between them except for their breathing. And that was what connected them together.

( Surprisingly enough, she found immersing herself in the threads of air, so thin and constricted and almost unable to be given, because it would be so much simpler to cease them all together, was comforting, and it took away all of the things about Chuck which could plague her. )

Thanks.

The single word had been in reference to the truck he drove, her compliment to it, not well-placed and not needed, but that's the way of Casey Queen and that's how things would stay when it came to her.

She moved back into the passenger's seat. For a moment, she thought the air and warmth had dissipated. But when she inhaled once, it was still t h e r e.

"-- You're welcome."

( And it wasn't just in reference to the compliment. Now, she had done much more. )

Sometimes, he could look without SEEING the reality before him. It was all about the senses, he figured when he looked back on some moments. Whether it be the roaring noise or lack of it, the rank smell or sweet scents — (remember the cotton candy, remember how it used to soothe you and take you away to a better place) — it was either them or himself that whisked him away to see SOMETHING ELSE.

"Fuck you, Hayden."

”No, turn that back to YOURSELF, Chuck. Bloody hell, do you have to do this SHIT all the time? I can’t cover for you anymore!”

”I never ASKED you to. What in the world ever made you think I wanted your help? Let mom and dad know one of their precious children does this shit. Then maybe the sis’s will have a chance.”

“Have you’ve been away for so long that you’ve forgotten their N A M E S ?”

"I’ve been away long enough to know they’re FUCKED, seeing as they are on the road to ending up like you.”

The odd dissonance of knowing time had passed when it felt like anything except that had him reeling for a moment. Quite frankly, he tossed every word she said to the side, never registering what she was saying and if she was addressing him.

All he could do was fiddle with a sleeve. He was fucking out of it. He didn’t want to be here at this shit of a place picking up someone for a funeral. Not when it was his brother’s; not when it was his blood’s. No matter what Chuck had screamed at him, they were connected in that way, and would always be.

When she brushed past him, he finally stopped working the sleeve. It seemed he had fixed it so now there was only one sleeve that was caught in a mess. But the thought of fixing the other exhausted him in a wretched way.

Death sucked the energy from the leftovers, the ones who had to suffer because of the recently passed. That was the unfair part because death was so unkind to keep those alive wailing in pain for so long.

"Thanks," he replied, void of any emotion. Automatically, he reached forward and opened the door for her. But he left it at that — he figured she was perfectly capable of getting in herself. So he walked back around the car, settling in the driver’s seat, hand on the key.

But he didn’t start the car. He didn’t move his fingers. Instead, he could only swallow hard, and rest his head against the seat as he closed his eyes.

#thr:hayden

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theonly-sinqueen-blog · 10 years

Text

Oh, she was e m b a r r a s s e d.

He wasn't looking at the peeling side of the complex ( and she had been the one to mention it in the first place ) but she knew what it said about her. That whatever delinquent assumptions he had made, this seemed to confirm it. His clipped tone assisted in perpetuating her own suspicions.

She wasn't worth an ounce of a minute or an hour. There was little about her which could be called attractive. She had been forced to drop out of college. She had been dating the local dealer and doing his drugs. And she had gained a reputation for being reckless. Especially when it came to the nights where neon lights could be pressed against her skin and all of the ancient historical inaccuracies which she was composed of due to being forgotten about over and over again. Worthless. She knew it. Wasting space. That was the truth.

Once upon a time, Chuck had ensured she knew something different.

"Case. Look at me. Look at me!" His hands scrabbled against her face. "You know there is nothing wrong with you. NOTHING. Stop it. Stop talking like this. I love you. I love you."

( Yet it had been said within the heat of passion and therefore was cancelled out by r e a l i t y spilling into their next tumultuous eight goddamn months of whatever relationship it could be labelled. [[a b u s i v e]]{do.not.say.that.word.} )

"Stop. Goddamn, do you even know how to act like a person? There's something seriously wrong with you. I feel like I don't even know you!" His hands had scrabbled against her face, but in a much different manner. "Just get out of the flat. GET. OUT."

She looked at Hayden's disgruntled appearance, and the flapping sleeves still opened at the wrists, and the tie resting around his neck, and she wondered if he was going to appear at the actual funeral this way - or if she was being allowed to see his pain, his rush, his hurry, before it was concealed with the utter superficiality of small conversation and tears shed by other family members she didn't want to meet.

( Despite his resemblance to his brother which ... wasn't much at all ... and the family he represented, she could take one look at his hands and she could feel wistful in her silence, because she knew somehow that those wouldn't be hands which would claw at her and scar her more. )

"Yeah. And it's going to be fucking sweltering hot, too. Hopefully the church has air conditioning."

She didn't clear her throat. She let the hoarseness remain. She wouldn't be crying today.

"No need to stay here staring at this hellhole." ( But was she talking about the apartment complex or was she talking about h e r s e l f ? )

She picked her way over a large ridge in the sidewalk, toe of her boot scuffling against the concrete. t e n s i o n. It would stay like this. It wasn't as though she could leap into the large black truck and escape it. Yet at least she would be able to handle it with a bit more grace whilst seated. "Might as well get this over with."

Then she could come back here and end it all, if she wanted to. She just had to make it through the funeral. She had to.

Her hands brushed against the handle of the door to the truck. And one corner of her mouth twitched upward. The smile didn't reach her eyes. It couldn't. "-- Nice ride."

His tongue ran over his teeth at her directions. trying to squint at the road signs to see if he was even on the right path. He probably shouldn’t be on the phone and driving a vehicle, but he barely found it within him to acknowledge that fact. He had no room to care about much, and the distraction to driving the cell phone provided was not high on his list of things to care about. Really, that list had become so short, it was even a joke to address it.

Every moment lived was practically a joke now.

"Yeah, that might be — " he began in reply to her proposition, but he stopped at the sound of scurried footsteps. She was distracted as well, and was probably not hearing any word he said. Whatever. He didn’t care about that either. With his tie loose around his neck and his cuffs unbuttoned and flapping because of an open window, he had that air to him; I don’t give a fuck.

Truly, he had stopped trying the moment he saw his brother on that table at the station.

Turning another corner, he eyed the sign that told of Marlin Avenue. Form there, it was easy to see the red chips falling off the side of a building. God, it was sad to look at. He would go as far to say it was downright pitiful. It only soured his mood further, and especially toward the ex-girlfriend and self-righteous girl of Chuck’s.

( he tried erasing that moment of tears welling in her eyes, or how her choked voice sounded in his ears. there was no point to remembering that side of her. )

And right on cue, there he saw her exit the building in a rush, right as the cell crackled once more with her response. “Yep. See you.” With that, he hung up, soon pulling the car to the side and drawing it to a stop. From there, it was the polite drive that had him unbuckling and exiting out of the car before she could say anything. He must look disheveled — and why wouldn’t he? — but he could take comfort in knowing she appeared the same. Though it might be the same physically, she wore that face of exhaustion ( the face he was sure he wore all the time ), and it would have been impossible to ignore. Truly, she must had no skills in masking her nature.

( or maybe she did know and just wasn’t utilizing that skill because Chuck’s death caused too much PAIN to ever try and mask. though Hayden was doing okay with that he thought. A mask around the family was necessary. )

Shoving his hands in his pockets, he eyed her once more, words on the tip of his tongue but no motivation to say them. A greeting seemed ridiculous, as well as everything else. But either way, he managed to clear his throat and say, “It’s going to be a long day.”

#thr:hayden

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theonly-sinqueen-blog · 10 years

Text

It's Hayden.

Well, her sneaking suspicion had been correct. Though she couldn't think of anyone else who would be calling her right now. It isn't as though she had family to phone and inform about the news. Whomever had birthed her no longer knew her existence, nor did they give a damn about it.

Provide the address.

Because their pain was going to be covered in the laced masks of formalities and pretending.

Blinking back the sleepiness which wanted to overcome her, send her back to bed, make her be rested (and not remember the pounding she had taken the night before) and also make her not have to go to this, she pinched the bridge of her nose for a split second before going on the hunt for some sort of antihistamine for this.

"Yeah, it's on Baker Street? At the very end of the road, right before it dissolves into Martin Avenue. Tall building of shitty flats. There's red paint peeling off the left side. Hard to miss."

She found the bottle of medication and managed to open it with one hand. "I can wait for you outside, if that'd make it easier."

Of course, that was already her plan. Because she wasn't about to allow him up even near her front door, to see a glimpse into the life of sheet metal separating her from the outside world or warehouse-type walls, paper thin and distracting with how much noise bled inside ( or back out ) and the messes on the floors and the stain of coffee behind the love seat which resembled crimson blood because it was flavoured with some strange sort of pomegranate syrup due to a local festival and - --

- -- She hated and loved this place. Memories, a thousand and one. All of them with fingerprints of someone who was dead.

She didn't want to go through with this. She could handle - -- no, she couldn't handle a shred of it, and she knew it. And the last thing she wanted to be was that liability who tagged along, who was out of place. His family was going to be there. The family he didn't want her to meet.

"Yeah, at this rate, I'll be dead before you see them." Too true, Chuck. Too true. ( "and I don't know how I couldn't have seen you for what you really are, god damn it, why do you have to lie to me?" "I've never lied to you, Chuck. Never." )

She snatched up her purse and bolted out the front door. This was the sort of place where she didn't even have to bother locking it.

"Never mind, I'm outside. Because that is easier." ( and she could b r e a t h e )

There had been no rest. Even if he forced himself out of the apartment and managed to snatch an inexpensive hotel room that wasn’t out of the way, no sleep came to him. More time had been spent staring at the ceiling, imagining different colors clouding his vision than bone white. Maybe he could label it insomnia, but never had he taken the time to research what it was, so who really knew?

Maybe he did know why he couldn’t sleep. And maybe it started with a C.

But he could say that the carpet had been cleaned. It had taken hours and, at one point, waiting for the remaining red to dry a rustic shade when he debated leaving it that way. But with each scrub, there wasn’t so much an acceptance as an indifference. At least, in that moment alone in the apartment.

He had screamed afterward, so loud that someone pounded on the door demanding if another person was dying. So maybe it wasn’t indifference, but a wrecking numbness that would consume him whole and demolish who he was as a person.

But did it matter now? No. There was a funeral to attend and family to comfort and a rock that needed to be formed in the shape of him. He was the one of the family to have people lean on his shoulders; rarely did he act the same to those people. Yet those people needed that shoulder; his family needed his presence. So he would drive to the viewing and funeral, he would pretend he didn’t spend so many hours washing the blood from his mind, and he would do what he could for what was left of his family.

He just had to remember there was a plus-one now.

He had glanced at the piece of paper he had ripped from a pamphlet before dialing. He assumed Casey wrote it down in that red script for one of the workers, but since they did not take it, he would put it to use. Especially since he didn’t have her address. He figured she was near, but could not be sure as nothing they said the previous day had alluded to where she lived.

And why would their conversation loom to that topic, seeing as it would always be CHUCK, CHUCK, CHUCK?

It didn’t take long for her voice to fill his head as it crackled through the receiver. Clearing his throat, his worked his jaw as he muffled a curse at the car that decided to cut him. Finally, when he took a few breaths, he said, “It’s Hayden. I don’t know where you live, so could you provide the address?”

#thr:hayden

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theonly-sinqueen-blog · 10 years

Text

He found in that moment he could not stand tears. Kristy never shed them around him, but then again, neither were ever too sad around the other. She hadn’t been devastated like he had days before. He still had to call her, maybe answer possible messages she left over the hours he went on ‘radio silence.’ But what would be the point? She was part of the reason for the RAIN CHECK. And thought he would never blame her for that, as it was his decision to stay with her, he couldn’t deny how she was now forever tied to that text.

Nothing would be the same. Except for maybe how he would never see Kristy cry.

Biting his tongue until he could taste blood, he shrugged Casey off. Not the gentleness that occurred disappeared from view. There was none of it left for her — or himself. The tears in her eyes only welled, but he knew it wasn’t because of him of what he recently did. It was all about the WEIGHT of the trauma that would never leave them. This would make it’s mark, and it was enough to tear even the strongest person to unholy shreds.

But once she said a confirmation — he nodded. He watched her blink, observed her — stare. So what else could he do except shut the door in her face and locate all the locks to ensure she wouldn’t march back in? To him, that was the best move. To him, it was the only way they could be separated in this mess of an event.

He rested his forehead against the door. He counted to ten. Then he shoved himself from that position and back down the hall, staggering along the way. He had a room to clean and strength to muster.

No matter how tired he was, he still had to face monster hurdles the next few days. If he didn’t snatch all he could now, he would not SURVIVE. And what better way to force yourself to draw upon strength than to wipe your brother’s blood from the floor?

Was there a better way? If there was, he would gladly take it. He would prefer it, actually, if it mean his brother still LIVED.

#thr:hayden #[end]

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theonly-sinqueen-blog · 10 years

Text

She was far too sober to be awake at this hour.

Whomever had made the funeral at this time in the morning needed to be the one resting in the casket, but haphazard and uncomfortable. Because the earlier she had to wake up, the longer it took for her to clap down the mask over her features. And oh, how difficult it was to speak through a plastic face. A shining one formulated just to how she moved and spoke. She could only hope that it would last through all the proceedings. The visitation, which was occurring right before the funeral. The Catholic service itself. Whatever came afterwards.

( and there was so much she didn't know. there were a dozen unknowns. things she didn't understand. this was going to be her first funeral and it wasn't going to be her last. )

She bit down hard on the inside of her lower lip and stared at herself in the mirror. She had to look presentable. All days, she had to look this way today. She couldn't afford to appear even slightly under the weather. And it had taken a painstakingly amount of time for her to apply her makeup the way she wanted. (She had even gone so far as to ensure her kohl was gently blended out into a professional-looking smokey eye. As though she was wearing it to a job interview. No messiness. No untidiness.)

Chuck wouldn't have minded if she showed up somewhere like that. But he wasn't going to be around to sling an arm across her shoulders and clasp his hand on her bicep and insist she was beautiful on the inside.

( he'd stopped doing that, too, when he had realised she was made up more of scars than she was flawless flesh )

She hated that face in the mirror.

She was fortunate her fist didn't break it. Over her deep teal tank, she had pulled a loosely threaded black jumper. She wasn't one to own a lot of elegant or fancy clothes, and this was no exception. Her legs were clad in black leggings (and God, the right leg had three horizontal rips starting at her calve, revealing slivers of flesh underneath). Of course, laced over her feet were her black combat boots. The ones with the metal spikes on the heels and toes.

She just had to make it. But God, what would happen afterward? And if she couldn't curb the urges to claw at her arms or to pull at the back of her hair and embed her nails into scars already there, then how was she supposed to look halfway decent and composed before, during, after in front of his family?

The family she hadn't met until Hayden had appeared out of the blue. Chuck had never wanted her to meet with them. Not whilst he was alive.

I r o n i c.

Her phone ringing blasted her out of the thoughts which plagued her. Removing her black-tipped nail from her mouth, she launched herself at the cellphone and looked at the unknown number. Narrowing her eyes, (for she had a sneaking suspicion) she flipped it open.

"-- Yeah?"

#thr:hayden

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theonly-sinqueen-blog · 10 years

Text

If there hadn't been something going on within the next few days, she wouldn't have believed him. His voice was far too hollow. His eyes, they were as distant as she was. The two were in different places, not in this real world, and nowhere close to another.

Such was the problem with being immersed in grief. Different stages, not necessarily, but a different kind completely. She had lost a lover. He had lost a brother. It was of the utmost dissimilar vein.

( Yet still she managed to understand because a long time ago she had lost it all, family and friends and lovers. )

We'll talk tomorrow. Surely he wouldn't be that cruel. She had seen the loathing and the hatred in his eyes, but he couldn't erase how the loss bound them together now. He wouldn't be one of those who went back on that silent promise that the two would talk tomorrow. She needed something concrete to which she could cling with bloodied hands.

And he knew how much stronger he was than she. He could move her backwards with a few steps. She barely managed to stand on her own two feet.

Her knuckles clenched against his own, and she just willed herself strong enough to make it back to where she could acquire something strong.

( Very strong. Maybe she wouldn't wake up from it that's how strong it would be. )

When he released her, she stood in the threshold, and those shaking fingers wrapped around the edges of the jacket. It was still too difficult to breathe. That tightness. It threatened to suffocate her. She must have been gasping, and there must have been tears, but she was too numbed all over to properly sense them on herself, to know how deeply she breathed, to realise if she did this whilst not submerged, she would have made herself faint dead on the floor.

If she had the strength she would have said, Yeah, I'd like to see you try that on me, Sinclair. I'd really like to see you try. But she had no strength, so she stayed silent and let her breaths be ragged. Come back tomorrow.

She'd found him in the pool of blood. Come back tomorrow.

"Okay." It's all she said. "Okay."

( she didn't go home not right away and if you asked her she couldn't really tell you a damn thing that happened )

Their gazes were locked, but only one saw. He paid attention to that glossy gaze, of how the thoughts running in those eyes translated to him. She was beyond concentrating on just him or the blood that smeared the wall. She was submerged in memories, perhaps, or something darker. He had been there earlier; the drive to the apartment was riddled with almost-accidents as he was overwhelmed with that aching and desperation in his chest as memories flooded his vision.

It was violent and debilitating. But despite how he acted when he first entered the apartment, he waited for her to react to his statement. He would be patient because how she looked was what he imagined himself to be, even if he was aware and she — lost.

(they were both far more gone than just lost.)

As her fingers curled around his collar, as she tightened her grip and brushed those nails against his skin, he found himself shaking his head. Exhaustion crept into his veins; it pricked at his eyes and weighed down his limbs. It was a heavy burden to say the least. One that was his alone.

Hers was different from his. And he had no inclination to share her burden, or to share his to her.

So he started to push her back. Gently, but still firmly, both hands pushed along at her shoulders. He was the stronger of the two, and it was easy to guide her through the halls until they returned to the main room. There, he pulled her hands off him. He tugged at her again, pulling her to the door. And, like a gentleman, he waited for her to leave.

Such a good Christian boy, my sweet.

"You can. You will." And he nudged her a step out of the door. "Come back tomorrow. If I see you back here before then, you better count on me following through on what I told you earlier."

It felt like years since that moment passed. How long ago was it? An hour? Time was so f u c k ed when in pain.

"We’ll talk tomorrow." A promise said with a lackluster tone, but he figured it would be better than nothing; he figured it would convince her to leave for the night.

She had to be as tired as he was with how tears glazed over her eyes. His had dried, but dear God, he was barely holding on. And there was no faith to depend upon to give him strength.

No, he was by himself in his suffering.

"Okay? We’ll talk tomorrow."

#thr:hayden

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theonly-sinqueen-blog · 10 years

Text

There was a hand. And it seemed to be the hand of God. For it came out of nowhere, down from the ceiling, and there he was, in all of his glorious height, and the two of them could almost see into one another's eyes, but he had an advantage on her. She hated being so small, so weak.

Most of all, she hated not being able to breathe. Because all she could do was remember.

The doctors once said she had something akin to photographic memory. But it was more expansive than that. Instead of taking pictures when she told it to, it constantly was doing such a thing. Therefore, even if she herself did not remember taking a "photo" of something, still her mind did the action, and she could recall the memory if she dwelled on it for long enough. It was part of the reason behind the dope. Behind the drink.

Behind everything else that had almost killed her once or five times.

She didn't want to remember it all. But she was too good at it. In fact, there was little to nothing she could do to get rid of such a curse, unless she was to undergo lobotomisation. And to think those idiots offered that.

Offered it up as though it was a solution. It was as good as being dead. And if she was to die, she would do it how she wanted. Not how someone fated out for her.

Her hands were covered in the crimson, but he was right there. She didn't want to stain him, but when he reached for her, she reached back. One hand buried its fingers to their knuckles against the collar of his shirt.

"I can't just leave."

The words were so strangled. She couldn't find air. Oh, God, they were barely audible.

What would she be, if she allowed herself to just walk from this scene? To just let him clean up the mess by himself? She should've done it before he got there. But she hadn't known he was coming. She couldn't grieve. She was too all-consumed with the numbness. With the lack of air.

Her vision swam with black spots at the corners, down near the bottom. She didn't want to faint. She was not going to faint.

"I can't just leave this, I can't just leave you - --"

Was she clinging to skin? He hated her. He hated her. Chuck. Hated. Her. Too. He loved seeing her flaws. All of her fucking flaws.

"I can't..."

He wanted to ignore her presence, or at least, her every movement. There was a difference of being aware of another and being attuned to her, and he was falling into the latter of the two. It wasn’t too difficult to assume she was wrought with memories. He was as well; the difference between them? He forced them back into the deep recesses of his mind, locking them and swallowing the key so if he ever wanted to relive them, he would have to D E S T R O Y himself first.

But it was impossible to ignore her. To not be attuned. Despite himself, he peeked at her before forcing his gaze back to the wall. It was a constant repetition; peek and force. His hands were faltering in their mission to wipe the blood from the wall. How could the red stain so deeply? Why did it have to be like a knife dragging itself down his body in the way it marred his vision?

"You don’t fucking know me." "I would if you stopped pushing me away!" "Hayden, look in the mirror and say that to yourself. then when you come back to me, I might listen to your fuckin’ shitty reasoning.”

This was his brother’s blood. This was the same blood that boiled in anger at him; the the Sinclair family; at life. This was all that was left of Chuck Sinclair. The rest of him was frozen in too many memories.

Hayden didn’t want to remember.

It was her breathing that caused him to fully look at her. There was no more peeking; now, it was the steady observation of her hands working through her hair and squeezing the blood-soaked shirt. That watered down red dripped to the floor, the splatters loud cymbals resounding in his head. Her breathing was so hard, too hard.

He found himself r e a c h i n g for her.

A hand at her shoulder, he pushed her away from the wall. This time, it was gentle compared to when he first entered the apartment. He moved in front of her as something between her and the wall. His voice was soft, though eerily rough as it echoed in the room.

"Go home. To wherever you are staying. If it’s here, then you’re a fucking idiot and you need to head to a hotel. Leave for today."

It was a warning — for what? To protect herself? He didn’t know, nor was he sure. But despite the inclination to be furious at her, this was a pain that could not be spoken, but felt too harshly. That pain was what linked them together. And oddly enough, he felt she shouldn’t experience it.

"Come back tomorrow."

#thr:hayden

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theonly-sinqueen-blog · 10 years

Text

He was going to be one of the many people who didn't bother to listen to her. Just because Casey Queen preferred the feel of a blunt in her hand to the concept of doing something with her life didn't mean that she was stupid. Didn't mean that she hadn't been around. Experienced things.

"Look. Casey. We're running out of money." Chuck paced back and forth in the kitchen, alternating between which hand he slapped down on the counter as he rounded the island. She had been seated at the dinning room table with her chin resting in her palm. "I've got to take this job."

"I don't like it, Chuck." She was obstinate. She wasn't going to back down from this. "The guy's shady. He came here in the middle of the night fucked off his knocker and begging you for help. Then he sobered up the minute you said you'd help him get rid of this person. I don't like it."

"That's what fucking happens when you're in shock. You babble on, and you don't know what you're saying, and you calm down once someone gives you what you think you need. What you want."

Chuck was disgusted with her. That had been happening more often than not. She once remembered a time when he looked at her as though she was without flaws. Now, he stared her down as though searching out each and every blemish, pockmark, scar upon her body, emotional or physical.

"Chuck -- I'm not trying to put a damper on this shit, but I don't trust it."

"It doesn't matter. We need the money. Rent doesn't wait for us to get good feelings about things. Not around here."

"Yeah and sometimes it makes me wish I'd never come around here!"

That was how things had been lately. Fighting. Arguing. Making up. He had come at her for that comment. She thought, for a moment, he was about to snap once and for all and backhand her across the face. He hadn't, though. He'd managed to stop himself - and just shove a finger right into her line of eyesight. And with each scrub, it mimicked her pounding heart. The pace at which he had been walking around the kitchen. Back. Forth. Back. Forth.

Fucking his brother? She'd been doing that. But after a while, she hadn't wanted to. Saying that, though? Vocalising that to Chuck? That she didn't want to? During all this shit? Forget it.

Her shirt was almost too small, absorbing the crimson at a faster rate than she could completely erase a portion of it from the wall, leaving behind smears after a time. And forever Chuck Sinclair had smeared her. Smeared himself into her life and smeared himself right back out. She'd told him not to take the job. The guy who wanted someone else killed had been a paranoiac and shaking and almost out of his mind. She'd told him. But he hadn't listened.

And she couldn't breathe. She couldn't, couldn't, couldn't breathe. She tore her hair out of her braid with bloodied fingers and scooped it all to one side, and then she stared at the shirt, stared at the stains, stared at the red in the lines of her skin. She couldn't breathe. She couldn't.

He heard her calls — or screams. All sounds were muffled with what he was focused upon. So he didn’t care to register those cries. He had a greater goal as the suds bubbled against the carpet and grew to a pink tint.

Don’t.

Too late for do nots. He scrubbed harder, closing himself off to the footsteps pounding closer behind him. He didn’t turn when she entered the room, didn’t acknowledge her presence when he felt her near, didn’t do anything besides the movements of cleaning.

Up and down. Scrubbing and forcing himself to keep calm. His shoulders slightly shook as the tears ran. But he could take minor comfort in how slow they ran over his skin.

Or maybe he was fooling himself. What comfort was there to have in any of this?

The silence lingered. There were no voices to this mix, but instead only the rough sounds of scraping. It set the rhythm to the mournful atmosphere. (how long would they mourn? how long would they last? how would they survive?) But he finally looked over his shoulder. He finally saw her, scrubbing just like him, with her own rag — even if she was bare. Despite himself, his eyes wandered over the lines of those muscles defining themselves in her movements. What did those muscles experience?

Fucking his brother. Smoking pot between delicate fingers. Hugging and slapping random people. Fucking his B R O T H E R.

Leaning back on his feet, he wiped a hand along his jeans. Then he stood, walking over to her. He stopped beside her, eyes closing for a moment. So much, too much. But that was life. His classes always told him that God made it overwhelming for a reason.

But Hayden couldn’t turn to Him. Not in this moment. Maybe never again.

So he bent down and started scrubbing along the bottom of the wall, shutting down his mind to the images of how the blood spattered there, and merely focusing on erasing it from the wall.

That’s all he could do.

#thr:hayden

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theonly-sinqueen-blog · 10 years

Text

Oh, yes, she was still here. She was still here, and she had still been there, and at this rate, she was going to continue to be some sort of be in these parts. She would never leave this place. It wasn't in the cards for her. She had come from across the pond and turned into something different in order to fit in, in order to forget all the things she'd left behind. That was easiest. That was how it should be at eighteen. She was a grown woman and she had known everything. She knew everything.

She had a father, and his name was -- - - -- - and he used to turn on the radio and she would swing her legs against the ancient leather of his car and the two of them would harmonise to the Gospel music pouring out of the radio. She remembered some of the tunes and she still hummed them now and again, but she had forced herself to forget where they came from. She made up a story. She made up a lie. Much easier than thinking there could have been a kind face once. He -- his name. Casey Queen. Not much to her name. Wasn't her name. Casey Queen.

When she snapped out of it, Hayden had disappeared, and she buried her face into the shirt, heaving in and out, wanting to keep the air in her lungs for as long as she could manage. Save herself first. Save herself first.

Save herself the goddamn trouble of being alive, that's what her twisted mind said. And how ironic that the next item out of the box was a belt.

A leather belt. Black leather belt. Wrapped around a rod. Tug. Kick. Done.

If she wanted to die, then why did she cling to the air?

"I couldn't save Chuck. I can't save myself. What am I supposed to do?" She pleaded with the shirt in her hands, and she inhaled, and she looked through clouded irises, and one tear, one tear spilled over.

"What's left to fucking do?"

Then, it was as though it clicked. He had disappeared, and he had gone into the back room. She told him not to do it. She told him not to go look, and yet, the morbid curiosity had won him over. She was drawn to dead things. She moved towards them, she knew in her deepest of guts when something was no longer in this realm. She moved towards them with rigid steps, frail steps, and she reached out with one hand to touch the cold, stiffening shoulder, and she whispered, "Chuck?"

"No, don't!" She threw the shirt down onto the floor, and she almost stumbled over her own combat boots. It wasn't just a stain, it wasn't just red, it wasn't small, it was large, it took up the corner of the room, it was still splattered on the wall, it was walled off with caution tape, crime scene tape, yellow tape, yellow, black, d e a t h p l a g u e

And she just stared sadly at how he took a cloth and rubbed at it.

C h u c k.

She didn't have a cloth, and the movers had taken them, and she wasn't going to use one of Chuck's shirts. She would use her own. She would stain it with wanton atonement. She threw off the jacket, unzipping it and discarding it onto the floor, and then she stripped off her black wife-beater, leaving her in her bra, old and loose in the straps, one of which fell down her shoulder as she pushed a knuckle underneath her nostrils once more. She left him to his floor, and she started on the wall.

Muscles straining. Tendons extending. Strength in physique, weak in mind. Half naked. Fully vulnerable.

It was sad, he realized, that she wasn’t crying. It would be just as sad if she was. Oh, how the world cut into emotions and wrecked them. To cry or not to cry. To be numb or feel everything like a slap across the face. Maybe choosing the latter parts — because his world was turned askew anyways, so what did it matter that his emotions were as well — that made him merely stare at her when she mentioned foreclosure.

Family should’ve been called if that was the case. Maybe the bank called his father. Or maybe they really didn’t care at all.

He felt his head shake in the slightest — with anger, with distraught, he didn’t know anymore. ”You were still here. Does it matter if you aren’t from around here? You were here.” He didn’t need to say more. She was here to witness Chuck’s downward spiral. Just as Hayden knew it was happening, she was watching it occur.

He finally turned on his heel and entered the kitchen to head for the sink. Rummaging in the cabinets under the sink, he pulled out a bucket and a cloth. The faucet ran as he waited for the bucket to fill, the noise of rushing water drowning out the sound of his breathing. he forced it to calm, but it demanded to be erratic. Did it matter? He wasn’t going to breathe normally for days, weeks — years. Yes, years seemed plausible. Chuck wasn’t just gone; he left a void. There was a difference between absence and emptiness, and Hayden experienced both with Chuck’s death.

Walking back into the main room, he should have kept walking to that hall and the room. But he stopped. Because she was still there, rubbing her nose while her voice was thick with despair. Did he sound the same to her? Was their suffering the same in that matter? Either way, he had stopped as the words bubbled in the back of his throat.

"Don’t try to save someone if you’re incapable of it," he murmured. Working his jaw, he drew his gaze to the floor before turning back to the hallway. "Save yourself first."

He left her sitting there. He left her with the smell of pot and the burden of remembering. Maybe it was a fucked up choice, but the entire situation spoke of fuckery. They didn’t clean up the crime scene — so he would.

Even if when he entered the room, the urge to puke was crawling up the back of his throat. Staring at the stain, he leaned against the doorframe. For a moment, he closed his eyes to it, ignoring its presence on the floor and how it screamed at him.

He was an awful brother.

But he took a shaky breath, then another. He composed himself against the scene. If it caused his hands to shake; so be it. If it caused his stomach to churn as he knelt beside the area and dipped the cloth into the bucket, so be it. if it tainted his nightmares from that moment forward, so be it. He was an awful brother, but he could redeem himself step-by-step. This was one of those ways.

Even if the tears finally burned in his eyes, this was one of those ways.

#thr:hayden

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theonly-sinqueen-blog · 10 years

Text

She was submerged, and she could feel it. Casey could feel the coldest fingers of the deep creeping up her arms, peeling back her skin and inserting themselves into her veins, and when he started snapping at her again, it was as though the nails on the ends of the fingers had turned into talons. She sank forward, burying her face in the shirt in her hands. As though she wanted to weep. There was a part of her that did, but the tears refused to come. Her pride refused to bend.

"You're not hearing me." She mumbled this into the fabric of the shirt. "You're not even going to let me fucking explain. All these assumptions. All this, all that. Guess what." Removing her face from the shirt, she glared at him through that smudged liner and that snarling mouth. "It wasn't that simple. I was told to clear it out. I didn't have a choice. Because guess who was being evicted. That's right. Chuck. The bank doesn't care that he's dead, not around here. Clear the place out, they said. Clear it out or all the stuff gets taken with it. I'm lucky they even let me!"

She wasn't afraid of his glare and she didn't give a fuck about his judgements of her. Because they were all right. So what. She wouldn't care if the thoughts were wrong, either. She had learned a long time ago that putting stock into what others said was the biggest mistake to execute.

"You want to put blame on someone, put it on the people who put us here. And I can guarantee that wasn't me. I'm not even from around here."

She struggled to keep her composure, and her eyes were wild, and she crumpled the shirt and she bunched it against her mouth, and she tried to just breathe, breathe through the scent, through the fabric. She didn't want to have a panic attack. She wasn't going to have one. God fucking damn it, she was not going to have one.

She gritted her teeth. She continued on through the shaking. "I don't have much to my name. Casey Queen isn't worth much. Don't worry. I won't take up much space."

Perhaps she should have denied him the offer. Sniffing once, and feeling that run down of moisture from her nose, she pressed the side of her knuckle against her nostril before tucking the shirt away. Gently. As though it was her child. And the darkness bound her to him because she knew that tone of voice. And when she looked at him, it was with that same stare as before. That stare which promised she saw him. And if she didn't too clearly now, she would one day.

"You should be glad someone's bothering with warning you away instead of enticing you further in." It wasn't a snap. It was just a dry fact. "Like what happened with me. I won't save my breath if I think I can save someone from this shit." She picked up a pair of jeans and shook them at him. "From this shit. And from cleaning up -- cle --"

Clenched jaw, buried mouth. She was tired, too. She was so tired, she wanted to die.

It was by chance that he noticed her hand reaching out for him. Life always revolved around chances, offering them at the oddest times. But he saw that hand. His eyes traveled to her face, filled with fear — or perhaps horror. Either way, it didn’t matter; her expression still forced his heart to stop beating. At least, it felt that way, for he longer heard the thumping of a heartbeat drumming in his ears.

They didn’t clean up.

His stomach rolled in disgust. To keep from doing that after days of Chuck being dead was — ridiculous. Traumatic. What were they really going to do? They said they would investigate, but Hayden doubted they would put actual effort into the case. After all, he figured that Chuck stashed drugs here — it was his apartment — and no police looked kindly upon drug addicts. They would do nothing for the case, just as they did nothing when it came to cleaning b l o o d.

Maybe he should have reached for that hand. Even if it was only to stop him, maybe he should have turned his palm upward and held it for her. But as the thought passed, it was too late; she had moved to another topic, and the moment ran away with her words.

"You’re right; it wasn’t your goddamn job to notify me," he snapped. "You know what else wasn’t your job? Clearing out this apartment without even waiting for a reasonable amount of time. Because no matter who you were to Chuck, legally, you had no right. None. You don’t want to be accused of something you didn’t do? Fine. But I will fucking accuse you of being an asshole for doing that. Two. Days. You almost fucked my family over, so I will so gladly call you a fucker.”

Inhaling a deep breath through his nose, he crossed his arms. He had to find some way to calm down. He couldn’t focus with the anger and despair coursing in his veins. Looking back at her with a narrowed gaze, he gave a short nod. “Fine. Good. Don’t pack too much, I don’t have that much room.”

His car wasn’t big enough for the baggage the two carried on their shoulders; the world wasn’t big enough for that. He felt a twinge of disgruntlement that she had agreed instead of turning her nose up in the air. But he would respect the offer he made, and drive her there.

It was going to be interesting — and damning — from this moment forward.

He pushed himself off the wall in order to do something, but was stopped once more. This time, he settled her with a tired gaze, uncaring that it was no longer hidden. “I’m coming back,” he said. It was without conviction, but there was something underlying the statement. Something akin to the darkness of revenge. “I don’t need your warnings; my decision was made the moment I received a message from the fucking police. So save your breath.”

#thr:hayden

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theonly-sinqueen-blog · 10 years

Text

She glanced up from her work as he paced towards the corridor, and against all fibres of her being, her heart lurched, sank down into her abdomen, roiled there in the filth, threatened to make her throw up. It had been a disastrous first meeting, and the conversation wasn't continuing on the basis of them perceiving to like one another at first interaction. Then again, it wasn't continuing out of obligation, either. He could walk out whenever he liked, mention he would come by tomorrow, demand she stay out of his way, and slam the door to the flat.

But instead, he allowed his bestial pacing in a cage to be personified and dangled in front of her. Tempting her to do the same. To let go. Fuck, if she wanted to, she could get up, take this box of clothes with her, and finish the job back at her own apartment. Yet could she?

Could she stand to go back to that hole in the wall?

She didn't have answers to all of the questions rolling around in her head. But her hand clenched around the flannel shirt she'd just pulled from the pile and she reached towards him. Despite him stopping, despite him leaning against the wall now, still she had that hand out towards him for a moment. Because she was being vulnerable and almost pleading with what she had decided to say next.

"Don't go back there. Just - don't go back there. It's not been cleaned up. The - The feds didn't want it touched. It's a crime scene."

Her voice was monotonous as she relayed the information. She'd wanted to clean it up but she'd been held back. R e s t r a i n e d. And when she was prevented from doing something She became increasingly violent.

"Oh, what the fuck ever, Hayden. You're the one who came barraging in here saying you'd been told about what happened. Notified and not able to get here sooner and whatever the fuck else you said. So don't accuse me of something that wasn't my goddamn job. It's not like I have your number on my fucking hand or memorised."

And she was mercurial. Back to no longer pleading. Back to folding. Back to placing pieces of her past ( and her heart and the wants he desired and asked for and what she couldn't give to him because she was tired ) in the damned cardboard box to be taped up and forgotten as time passed.

So her hardened gaze perused the side of his face, his angular, handsome profile as he leaned against the wall. Because she thought this was another cruel trick. She was used to that.

"-- You'll -- what?" But she wasn't about to wait for him to change his mind and start mouthing off like a douche-nozzle again. "All right. Since we're both going in the same directions. I'll accept the offer."

She clenched her jaw, she let the folded flannel shirt drop into the box, let a pair of cut-off jeans do the same. Then, she folded her hands in her lap and looked down at them. She tried to think. She couldn't. "Why would you want to come back here? Ever? There's nothing but pain and tragedy here. Nothing but fucking sorrow for you."

Glancing up, she pursed her lips in a tight smile, half-grimace. "Just leave after it's over. Put me back in the hellhole and go. Don't get trapped like I am. Don't get sucked down into this fucked-over rat's nest."

Rolling his eyes, he shook his head again and remained in place. Right. He always talked a lot. But who else would put into words what needed to be said? Chuck never could unless a bottle was hanging from his hand. His father? Never seemed to do so either. And his mother simply sugarcoated. There was no one but him to use the voice of reason.

So he would say an awful lot if he felt that needed to occur.

He watched her approach the box of clothes, and, once again, rolled his eyes. “Rich. Absolutely rich coming from you, seeing as you were the one emptying out his apartment without notifying those who are actually related to him. What you did was the bloody definition of a fucker.”

Scoffing, he walked past her, down a hallway. There was a morbid sense of needing to find out what he was doing in his last moments. But he found himself stopping in that dim hallway, and leaning his shoulder against the wall.

God, he was an awful person. But he wasn’t an awful person. Not yet.

Because as she talked, the Christian boy in him had him listening with an offer on the tip of his tongue. Try as he might, he couldn’t bite it down. So when he walked back into sight, he said, “I’ll be driving back here after the funeral. If you need a ride here and back —— I’ll drive you.”

He could at least say he made the offer.

Now with his back against the wall, he slid his hands into the pocket of his slacks. “It’ll be my first one that matters,” he said in a low voice. No matter how many grandparents, aunts, or uncles who had passed; this was the one that slammed a fist into his gut and had him keeling over in pain that would never cease.

Chuck mattered. And therefore, who killed him mattered just as much.

#thr:hayden

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