Hey. I'm still around. Tennis Racquets, Chocolate and Gold will be updated as soon as I have access to my computer at home. Which I hope is soon. I can't write much without my documents so send good thoughts out there for me.
I've got tons of short stories lined up and this is just one of them. I can't tell you what the pairing is because I'm still trying to figure it out myself. But romance won't become a thing until friendship does. But, we will get there.
This is an AU and it's written in a drabble form because I can write more chapters that way and that's kind of how I write everything. Love me.
Keep in mind. Nobody knows Ryoma. No one. He's fourteen and has no friends. Which sucks.
Warnings: Child abuse.
Let me tell you something, Ryoma.
He tried to blink it away. This was school and he was better here. Not good or great, but better. He didn't know these people and these people didn't know him so nothing hurt because nothing mattered. The boy beside him shifted, inching his paper closer to Ryoma's accidently. His lashes were fluttering.
You're a kid. You still need someone to cook you food and do your laundry. You're still weak. You probably always will be.
Everyone was a kid, really. Everyone was too young. He focused on the teacher. She was talking about exponential and linear expressions. Tedious. He couldn't distract himself with it.
I do this to make you stronger. I do this because I care.
Did caring matter? If being cared for was being stripped of clothing and lying on the floor gasping for breath because air was a commodity denied to you for more than too many seconds then he didn't want it. Fun. But not for him. Sometimes he woke up drowning. Sometimes Ryoga was there.
You really don't appreciate how much I care, do you? You should. I love you. No one else is going to do that.
He'd push Ryoma's hair back against his forehead. Tell him a story about angels and demons and a world running with blood. "I'll protect you." Was what he'd hear in the curve of his ear. And he'd hear it in a little hole in his heart where light use to live and grow a garden full of flowers. Innocence was paradise because it existed and hell because it didn't last.
No one is going to love you out of this, little brother. Look at our parents. They don't love us.
He snorted quietly. The girl in front of him turned around and raised an eyebrow before returning her attention.
They lie and pretend to. Remember when I was twelve? And they buried me in the yard? You snuck out, at seven, and told them to put a straw in the dirt so I would be okay.
Ryoma clenched his hands on the desk.
Dad and mom agreed because they didn't want to kill me. They wanted to punish me for staying out too late with my friends.
It was funny growing up with people telling you that you were disgusting, unimportant, undeserving. Because you believed it, but you could laugh about it. Every joke was on you, everything that went wrong was your fault. He couldn't grow out of it. He couldn't not believe it.
I didn't hang out with my friends for months after that. It's like you and water. Every night I woke up with dirt in my mouth and no cover could get me warm again.
And everyone had something. Their dying sister in a hospital. A million pennies stashed in a jar. Hidden notebooks with dreams disguised as stories. There were always things that tied a person back down to earth when they were in danger of flying away. Those things were vulnerability, weakness but also strength. And Ryoma wanted that. He wanted something, or someone, that made life mean more than just its definition. He felt stupid for it. He didn't stop.
I'm going to get you through this. I promise. You're not going to be another story.
They were dismissed for lunch. He could feel the air whispering on his neck and he rubbed it away but tried to store it somewhere inside where he could reach it later.
Love ya, everyone. Mwah.