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hydrangea
The flower of heartfelt emotions and comfort.
The rigged pages of an encyclopedia hung heavy in Lucas's hands. He was not up for learning anything today. He couldn't focus. He dogeared the page he was on and closed it.
His eyelashes closed over his eyes like a cat curling their tail over their nose in cold winter months to keep warm.
Really all he felt like doing was sleeping.
Lucas hadn't slept well in days. It seemed like a dream to just... Dream.
His sky blue eyes were cloudy and troubled. Tears shone little clouds that would flutter and fall from their sky every night. A picture too big for the frame. Clouds carved pathways down the Earth, leaving streaks of cold residue behind in the muddied face.
He really just hoped his tears would eventually dry out. One day try to just flutter his eyes shut after a bout of uneasiness, only to find no clouds. No hope of rain.
Then he'd be tired enough to sleep.
Nothing in the way.
Or he'd dry heave himself into exhaustion.
Either would be fine.
He placed the heavy book next to him on a pillow next to some doodle papers he'd been working on. He crumpled in on himself and leaned on his bay window where he went to sulk.
It was raining. Perfect.
He had an itch to go outside and fetch the mail, just foe something to do, but quelled it simply with a short disapproving push from his left brain.
His brain was divided into quarters, he swore.
He quietly grabbed a blanket near him and lazily wrapped it around him.
The small patter of raindrops hitting his gutter and the splat of them hitting the ground from the hole stationed in it was the best background noise he could've asked for, and his worst nightmare at the same time.
The splitting sound moved through his sore head with slow, but obvious tension. Seemed his headache would stay nestled in his head for a little longer. Lucas moved around his face, trying to relax the tensed muscles, with little to no luck. He moved to his attention elsewhere.
His house smelled the same, neutral way it always did.
The chatter of the raindrops' conversations was welcome, but uncomfortable at the same time.
Soft fibers from the blankets his mom knit hung warmly around him. The lingering smell of her perfume resonated in the yarn.
His eyes started to sore again, his tear ducts tensing in preparation.
His mouth dried with the taste of Granny Smith apples hanging lightly on his palette.
Lucas wanted to cry.
He missed human contact.
He missed the soft song his mother used to sing to herself that his grandmother wrote.
He missed backrubs and people playing with his hair.
He needed someone to make him happy.
The soft knocking sound at the door made Lucas almost faint.
Unsmoothily untying himself from the blanket's grasp, he rushed to the door, not bothering to fix his appearance.
His hands numbly unlocked the door and pulled it open.
The sound of the rain came flooding into his home, and the sight of a short teen with a very familiar curly hair that wrapped around his round face swarmed into Lucas's retinas and boring further into his head.
"Hi Lucas," he smiled, his rainwatered face shining brightly despite the dark clouds overhanging above.
"Good evening, Ness? What are you doing here at such a late hour...?" Lucas rasped, clearing his throat lightly.
"You didn't respond to your phone for a few days, so I got kinda worried." His smile fell. "Are you doing okay...?"
Lucas hesitated.
"Come in."
Ness's complexion seemed to drop as he walked in and took off his soggy shoes.
Lucas walked over to his bay window after closing his door, slealing the rain outside, and sat down, inviting Ness to sit with him. Reluctantly, Ness obliged.
"So, to repeat my question aformentioned," Ness broke the shuffled silence when he was comfortable, knees drawn into his stomach and intently meeting Lucas's eyes, before the blue irises sheepishly moved from his vision. "Are you okay?"
The blond sighed. "I-I guess not."
"You're worrying the lot of us. What seems to be the issue?" He inched closer, resting his hand on Lucas's. "I'm here for you."
Day met night. The sky's two sides clashing. Purple met blue. Their eyes locked.
"Thank you." Lucas whispered, struggling with breathing.
He wasn't going to tell Ness what had been bothering him...? Would he treat him differently? Would... Would he stop talking to him altogether...? What if-
Ness scooted closer to Lucas, placing his hands on the sides of his face. Startled, Lucas tensed under his touch, but the distance in his mind faded into fuzz as Ness's relaxed eyes carried through with his smile.
"You're safe here. I'm not going to hurt you."
Lucas knew that Ness couldn't hurt anyone if he tried, but hope seemed to swell in his chest, making his lungs expand and retract rhythmically.
"I..." Lucas began. "...What's it like in your family?"
Ness kindly answered the question, drawing back from Lucas, triumphant in receiving his attention.
"It's quiet. Tracy isn't home much, and my mom's busy off improving her social issues. My dad's never home. If it weren't for the pictures my mom plastered everywhere, I would've forgotten what he looked like..." Ness's eyes clouded for an instant with a reluctant melancholy haze, before being pushed away. "It's really, really quiet. I come home to an empty house, I cook for myself and clean for myself. No words exchanged unless I'm up after 10 when Tracy returns and asks me how school is..." He drifted, and Lucas wanted to catch his attention for a split second, before his mind was crowded with anxiety. The restrictions unbound Lucas as Ness continued talking. "I know you have it worse. I don't even want to imagine what it's like. My problems aren't as important as your's-"
"Ness." Lucas softly ordered his attention; he gave it. "Problems are problems. They need to be fixed. Sure, there's a spectrum, but no one's problems are less important than another's. Everyone deserves help for what troubles them."
Ness smiled up at him, wiping his eyes chuckling to himself. "Yeah, you always say that."
"Because it's true you dimwit!" Lucas laughed playfully.
"Yeah, yeah. I know." Ness sighed. "I'm just addicted to grounding myself so I don't fly too high, y'know...?
"But, anyways. Why do you ask?"
"I guess, 'cause my family isn't a family anymore. There's people who make it that way, and..." He hesitated. "They're not there."
"I think a family's what you make it, not the amount of people." Ness smiled, his eyes carrying it lightly. "There's lots of people who are your family, whether you share the same last name. I could be your family for all I know. People are separated from their kin all the time, but they find a family with friends or people who adopt them as their own. You don't need blood to be loved."
Lucas smiled with a small huff. "It's nice to not be ripped away from your family, though." He sighed, tears welling at his eye crease.
Ness didn't hesitate in answering. "I'll be all the family you want."
Then Lucas started crying; sobbing, really.
Ness extended his arms.
"C'mere."
Lucas sheepishly filled them. The warmth and comfort was welcome against his prickly skin.
It was all Lucas needed to feel safe as Ness spoke to him with as much emotion as he could.
Sweet nothings filled his ears.
His eyes eventually stopped clouding over with tears.
Lucas's hands wrapped around him and squeezed him tight, the way Claus used to do when he had a nightmare.
Ness's soft tone seemed to counter every question and blurt for help Lucas cried out.
"I-I miss Claus and M-Mom. They were everything to me. Dad won't even talk to me anymore. ...What did I do?"
"You didn't do anything, Lucas. You're human. Flint is human. Humans make mistakes."
"... I told my dad I forgave Claus for running off. I... I didn't. He got himself killed. Corrupted-"
"Lucas, Claus was a child. So were you. You didn't know better."
"He killed himself."
"I know. You didn't want Claus to suffer, did you?"
"Why can't mom talk to me like she talked to Claus...?"
"She wants to protect you. She wants you to move on."
"I don't want to... I want to stay back there in... In her arms."
"You can't. But, you can cry in mine as long as you want." Ness winked
Lucas laughed wryly and covered his face from embarrassment.
The silence that stretched between them was comforting.
"Can... Can you..."
"Hm...?" Ness asked softly.
"Can you... Just... Be here for me...? Like... Like..." Lucas drifted.
What was Ness to him?
"...Family?" Ness offered.
He liked the sound of that. Being close to him.
"Yeah... That sounds... Nice."
Lucas wanted to be as close to Ness as he could.
He didn't want him to leave.
Frantically, Lucas grasped Ness with all of his energy.
"Please never leave me alone." He grappled for words. "Keep texting me the days I don't reply; be persistent even when I tell you to stop; tell me ypur stories and laugh with me through the darkness of 3 AM-"
"I'll do whatever you need me to." Ness smiled. "You're important to me."
All Lucas could do was smile.
The next day Lucas woke to the doorbell.
He groggily shoved his way to it, and opened it.
... A... Hydrangea...?
He picked it up, and noticed the tag sticking to it.
He read it to himself.
Never let anyone tell you you're not important. Your heartfelt emotions continue to brighten people's days, and deserve everything kind the world has to offer.
Never continue to not;
always continue to do.
Lucas looked up.
Strange...?
He looked back down and flipped the tag, checking for more.
P.S. I love you, and the way you ruin books with dogearing the pages.
P.S.S. Stop doing that. Dead trees don't deserve that :(.