Title: Tears on the Runway
Summary: Best friends aren't supposed to hurt you. Best friends are supposed to be there for you, care about you, and love you. What do you do when your best friend starts to twist the meaning of friendship into something much darker and more twisted? With every bruise, Kairi hopes she can fix him. But some people are too monstrous to be fixed. Can she be saved before he goes too far? SxK ; VxK
Warnings: Abuse, foul language, sexual content. Rated T for now, but rating may go up in later chapters.
Disclaimer: These characters do not belong to me, and belong entirely to Square-Enix and Tetsuya Nomura. The only thing that belongs to me is the events of the plot, and how I have arranged them.
Song Used in this Chapter: 'Bela Lugosi's Dead' by CHVRCHES.
xxx
White on white, translucent black capes
Back on the rack
The first time my best friend hit me, I didn't know how to react. I had read stories of this sort of thing, but so many different things didn't add up that I couldn't quite comprehend it. First of all, I was a straight A student, top of my class, popular . . . Not reckless by any means, and certainly not reckless enough to get myself involved with someone who would purposefully hit me. Secondly, the girls who usually were abused by boys were the girls who just so happened to be dating the boy who hit them. My best friend and I weren't dating. We were just best friends. For our entire lives!
So you could imagine when I found myself on the hardwood floor of my living room, parents out for the night, holding my stinging cheek, that I was feeling a bit bewildered if not shocked. I didn't know what to do with myself. Last I remembered, I was teasing my friend as usual, about whatever nonsense I always teased him about. What possibly could have caused him to snap . . . ?
"K-Kairi, I . . . Oh, shit, I'm . . . I'm sorry." He was kneeling in font of me now, his sunset-colored eyes were wide and full of remorse. He gently removed my hand from my face, took my chin in his gentle grip, and inspected my cheek for bruising. His handsome face was contorted in an expression of concern.
"Wh-What . . . What did I do . . . ?" was all I could manage to choke out, my cerulean eyes staring directly into his.
"It . . . It was me, I just . . . I don't know what came over me," he replied, pulling me into one of his warm embraces. His spiky-haired head of raven hair pressed against the side of my face, the strands tickling my skin slightly.
I tried to go over what had happened in my mind, what I had said to make him so angry, but nothing made sense anymore. It could have been anything—from me teasing him about how low he always wore his skinny jeans, to how funny his stretched ears looked when they flapped with each movement of his head, any of it could have been the reason for him snapping. Any of it could have been the reason why he whirled around and backhanded me.
What was I supposed to do in this situation? Push him away and run to the phone to call the police? How could I do that when he was the only friend I had that I completely and utterly trusted? Something had to be bothering him, something else. There was just no way that he would consciously and willingly hurt me.
So I hugged him back and told him it was okay. "I forgive you, Vanitas. I'm sorry for whatever it was I said, if it was teasing you, or . . . Or . . . I'm just sorry."
"It's okay," Vanitas said, pulling back and smiling down at him. His smile was dazzlingly bright. "And for the record, it was completely an accident. It won't ever happen again, I promise."
I smiled back at him, not because I was trying to hide the fact that I was still upset, but because I truly believed him. I truly, utterly believed that Vanitas was telling me the truth—that he would never hit me again.
Oh, how truly, utterly wrongI was.
The bats have left the bell tower
The victims have been bled
Red velvet lines the black box
"Kairi, come get your dinner!"
I looked up from my Anatomy homework, feeling slightly panicked. I didn't want to go eat dinner. I had two more classes' worth of homework to finish before the night was up, and a midterm to study for, not to mention I didn't want to have to find a way to explain to my parents how in the heck I'd managed to get a B in AP History. Oh, and let's not forget the faint bruise that had purpled on my shoulder.
Vanitas hadn't stopped after first time, nor after the second. The third time was right out, and the fourth time had me wondering if maybe I was doing something in particular to make him so short-tempered with me. It seemed like every time we hung out, I pissed him off about something or another, and he grabbed me, or slapped me, or even pushed me.
Part of me knew that what he was doing was wrong to some extent, but how wrong was it if it was my fault that he was hurting me? He kept apologizing, telling me that sometimes I just made him so angry because he cared about me and didn't want me screwing up, but whenever I asked him what I was screwing up on, he just got angry all over again. I tried asking him if something was going on at home, but according to him, everything was perfect. Parents were happy, things were great between him and his brother, he was doing great in school . . . So that left me to understand that it really was my fault, because he had never acted this way before.
"Kairi!" my mother called up the stairs a second time, switching to our native Korean tongue like she did whenever she was peeved. "Dinner is ready!"
"Coming, oma!" I responded, slamming my pencil down and trying not to completely break down. My mother didn't care how much homework I had or when it had be completed by; all she cared about was the end result being A's all across the board. I was stressed out more often than I was happy, and the only time I was ever happy was when I was laughing and hanging out with my best friend. Perhaps that was why I was overlooking his temper so much . . . Because when I was with him, it was the only time I was happy.
On my way out of my bedroom, I scraped all of my elbow-length crimson hair up into a messy bun at the mirror (my parents had been outraged when I'd first dyed the natural black strands red, but had since gotten over it). My face was still perfectly covered in the right amount of make-up, and none of the bruises were showing. Wonderful. I supposed eventually I would have to find the right time to ask Vanitas about his issues with anger, but until I fixed whatever it was about me that was bothering him so much, I would have to endure and focus on my studies.
"Mianhaeyo," I said as I entered the dining room. My older brothers were already waiting at the table, and I stopped dead in my tracks when I saw them.
They both had dyed their long, spiky hair as red as mine. Both of them.
"Reno! Axel!" I hissed, scrambling closer and smacking them both on the backs of the head. "Have they seen you yet? They'll kill you!"
Axel smirked, and I couldn't help but look at the small black diamonds that were tattooed underneath his emerald-green eyes. Our parents had not been happy about that (Axel was lucky they still let him live in their house), let's just say . . . He reached up to flick me on the nose.
"Ne," he chuckled. "They're pissed off, what do you expect?"
Reno reached around behind Kairi to slap high fives with Axel. "Stop worrying so much, Kairi. We did it to take the heat off you for once."
"Oppa," I complained, turning to Reno to glare at him. "Getting yourself kicked out isn't going to take the heat off of me at all—it's only going to make it worse!"
Reno rolled his eyes and peered up at me. He looked about to say something, but then changed his mind. Reno was like that—not a fiery as Axel, but still cheeky and definitely not the type to think things through all that thoroughly.
"Been practicing really hard at the gym, have you?" Axel suddenly said.
"Huh?" I frowned, confused.
"At cheer practice." He gestured to my bare collarbone, where a bruise was peeking out from the edge of my wide-collared raglan tee. Blushing furiously, I hurried to pull it up a bit further, visions of a few days ago when Vanitas had grabbed my shoulder and violently turned me around so he could yell at me to leave him alone. I still didn't know what I had said that day, as like with every other time I upset him, but I guess I just hadn't hidden the bruise well enough.
"Yeah," I lied smoothly to my brother. "Coach has been working us girls really hard—we have a competition next weekend."
"Aissh, another one?" Reno complained, prompting me to twist his ear playfully.
"You have one every weekenddddd~" Axel whined, earning himself an ear twist as well.
"Boys, your sister's competitions are very important to this family." Our father came strolling into the dining room, pushing his glasses up his nose. He had an overall stern demeanor, and all three of us teenagers' backs straightened almost immediately.
"Yes, sir," Reno and Axel said simultaneously.
I scrambled to sit down at the table as our mother started bringing in dishes of food for a traditional Korean dinner. I kept my gaze lowered, knowing that just by the way my father was completely refusing to look at me that my mother had showed him my progress report for school. I fought tears back, knowing I was about to get a lecture.
I felt a kick underneath the table and glanced up briefly to see Reno shooting me an encouraging wink. My heart warmed a bit. If there was one thing I could count on even more than Vanitas' friendship, it was the support of my brothers.
After all the food had been set out and plates were placed, my mother took her seat, and the awkwardness settled in.
Reno and Axel were the first at the chopping block.
"Axel, Reno . . ." my father said between bites. "When did you two decide to go out and embarrass this family more than your sister already has?"
My brothers exchanged jaded glances and then Axel was the first to speak.
"Appa," he drawled with a roll of his eyes. "It's just hair."
"And I'm just the first Korean to run for Senator in this state," our father responded coldly, setting his chopsticks down to glower at his sons. "I have press conferences to attend, commercials to film . . . I can't afford to have anyone seeing me make mistakes."
Reno scowled. "Mistakes? Having your sons dye their hair is not going to lose you votes. That's just stupid."
"And so is looking like a wild child who does drugs and . . . And . . . I don't know, hooligan things!" Our mother slammed her fist lightly on the table, eyes blazing.
"We are not hooligans, oma," Reno spluttered, obviously trying not to burst out laughing.
Axel covered his mouth, eyes shining with tears of mirth. I wished I could be as carefree as them, doing whatever I wanted without caring about what my parents said. But the difference between them and I was that they both had no desire to go to college and I did. I just wanted to go to college and make my parents proud—to put it simply, I loved my parents. So whereas Axel and Reno loved our parents but didn't want to follow the rules, I wanted to follow the rules and see my parents smile at me.
And that was why it was going to be so hard to deal with my parents' disappointment at my low grade.
"One more slip up, and you two are out of this house," our father warned, pointing his chopsticks at each of them in turn. "Axel, you're nineteen and Reno, you're eighteen. You're old enough to live on your own, to make your own decisions . . . But if you're going to live in my house, then you're going to follow my rules. Dye your hair back before the week is out, or you're out."
"Tch," Axel and Reno scoffed at the same time, digging into their meal. I knew they didn't care what our father said—they already had plans to move out. They both had jobs, and were planning on moving out with Vanitas' older brother Sora. Sora was eighteen and about to graduate, so the three of them living in an apartment would be ideal.
The thought of Sora made my stomach flip over. Wasn't that the cliché? Having a crush on your best friend's older brother? Except usually, your best friend was a girl, and you were twelve or thirteen. And in all the stories, the boy was always the popular one that was way out of the girl's league. Vanitas was most certainly a boy, and I was seventeen. Sora was in the same grade as me, but nowhere near as popular as me—he was quite a recluse, actually. Everything was all backwards in my story and yet still, Sora had never shown any friendly interest in me, let alone romantic interest. Not to mention, he was moving in with my brothers!
All thoughts of my silly schoolgirl crush flew out the window when my father addressed me.
"Kairi, explain the B grade. Now," he growled, jamming food into his mouth.
I lowered my gaze, pushing food around on my plate with my chopsticks. Everyone was looking at me, waiting.
"I . . . I missed a couple questions on a movie quiz," I mumbled. "That's all."
"'That's all'?" my father spluttered, finally looking at me with so much disappointment in his eyes that I felt as though it were tangible. "You think that if I screw up an answer to a question during a TV interview during my campaign, that people are just going to say that's all?"
"I'm sorry," I whispered, my appetite completely erased. "I'll ask the teacher if I can redo it."
"You bet you will," my mother said. "Kairi, we are so disappointed in you. You can do better than a B."
"Until you bring home signed proof that the grade has been raised, you will be allowed to go to cheer practice outside of school, and that's it. No hanging out with friends, no having Vanitas come over, nothing. I want an A grade from everything in every class. Colleges aren't looking for half-assed GPAs."
"Y-Yes, sir . . ." My voice was a strangled whisper.
Reno reached for my hand under the table and squeezed it. There was once a time where he would have spoken up in my defense, and Axel as well, but there was no changing my father's ways. He was old school, and he was just as hard on us as his parents had been on him.
I kept my head down for the rest of dinner, finishing my food only because my parents instructed me to do so.
The virginal brides file past his tomb
Strewn with time's dead flowers
Bereft in deathly bloom
Alone in a darkened room
The Count
I started sobbing as soon as the door to my bedroom closed. I turned the lock and fell against the wooden door, collapsing into a heap upon the carpeted floor. I could still see the way my father had looked at me. I was so angry with myself for messing up on those quiz questions. If only I had gotten an A, then the dinner conversation would have gone very differently for me.
Sometimes, I felt as though I deserved to be hit. Whenever Vanitas blew up on me, even though it was only one slap here, or one grab there, I still felt as though it was what I deserved. I couldn't seem to do anything right, so maybe . . . In some weird way, Vanitas was helping me? As sick and twisted as it sounded . . .
My cell phone began to ring, but I was crying too hard to pull myself up and go answer it. I knew I had homework to finish, and I knew that it was probably Vanitas that was calling me, but I just didn't have the inner strength. I knew I needed to do better. I needed to do better in school, with my parents, with Vanitas . . . With everyone. I needed to do better for myself.
Eventually, when I couldn't take the constant vibrating, I dragged myself over to my bedside table and looked at my phone.
12 New Messages.
My heart skipped a beat and I wiped my eyes free of all remaining tears. Twelve messages? They couldn't all be from Vanitas . . . Could they? I turned and plopped myself down on the edge of my bed, sliding my finger across the touchscreen and scrolling through the texts. Relieved bloomed in my chest. Only three of the texts were from Vanitas, the others were from my friends: Olette wanted to tell me about a boy she'd met at work, Namine had sent me pictures of her newest painting, and Tidus had asked me if I'd talked to Yuna yet about whether or not she might possibly have feelings for him. It all seemed trivial, though, compared to the fact that Vanitas had messaged me.
I just wanted to figure out what I was doing to make him so angry.
All of Vanitas's text messages were similar . . .
Hey, where r u?
Why aren't u answering my calls?
Yooo, u there?
I tapped out a reply as quickly as possible, because I didn't want him to freak out. He had a tendency to think that if I didn't answer my phone, that meant I was hurt or dead. Once, he had even shown up at my house, pounding at the door and insisting that I was hurt. It had caused my parents to panic, and my brothers to get irritated at him for acting so weirdly. When he had found out that I was indeed okay, and that I had just been busy working on an essay, he had hugged me so tightly that I had no doubt in my mind he had actually thought I was in trouble. It was a little flattering, so I had guiltily relished in his embrace.
I'm ok, I texted. Just getting a lecture from my parents.
His reply came almost instantly, as it usually did—like he was always waiting by his cell phone for me.
That sux, he replied. Try to txt me before u go down to dinner tho, so I kno ur ok.
Ok. Sorry! I frowned. Sometimes, Vanitas had a tendency to be a little overbearing. I didn't really see why he would need me to check in with him like that, but I supposed that he just cared about me and worried, was all.
Don't forget next time. U always forget, and it's annoying.
My heart fluttered. Was he really angry about it? I set my phone down. I had homework I needed to finish, and it was already after seven. I didn't want Vanitas to feel like I was ignoring him, but . . . After the lecture I had just gotten, I really needed to do better than a B in school.
My phone vibrated again, and I couldn't resist the urge to look at it.
Well? Call me.
I sighed. He wasn't going to let it alone. I selected his number from the contacts and held the phone up to my ear. I was feeling a bit weird—something inside of my gut that twisted only when Vanitas was angry with me. I wasn't sure if it was fear or concern over the reason for his anger, but I didn't want to delve too deeply into it, lest I ruin our friendship.
"Hey," Vanitas answered on the first ring. "Are you okay?"
"I'm fine," I said softly. "I'm sorry I forgot to message you before dinner. I was doing homework."
"You know better, though," Vanitas complained. "I always tell you to text me before you're going to be away from your phone, just in case I can't get a hold of you."
I bit my lower lip. I could hear it in his voice—the irritation that marked the start of his spiral. I needed to tread carefully, or he was going to get angry with me.
"I truly am sorry, Ani," I whispered. "It won't happen again."
"It better not," he warned, his voice lowering. "Remember, I'm not too old to climb into your window. If I think you're hurt, I'm going to come up there and check on you."
"Ani, no!" I protested. "What if my parents found out?"
"I wouldn't do it if I didn't care about you, Kai. You're my best friend." He sighed. "Just . . . Don't fuck up next time, got it? You know what happens to me when people screw up . . ."
I closed my eyes and remained silent. Of course I knew what happened. I got a bruise and an apology, both from him. I answered him quietly, and then he let me hang up the phone. Slowly, I set it down on the mattress and stared at it without making a move to answer my other texts.
Sometimes, I felt as thought my world was slowly being swallowed up by Vanitas and his short, explosive temper.
Undead, undead, undead . . .
xxx
Author's Note: Please leave a review, favorite, follow, whatever you'd like. I will respond to all of my reviews in the next chapter. I started this story because I was working on another, and needed a break from it. I hope my other readers won't be angry but I just really, it was like pulling teeth. I want to work on this one for a bit to get the creative juices flowing so that I can finish Finding Hikari. T.T I just needed a break. Anyway, I hope you all will like this story!
