High Collars and Long Sleeves
Agent Malkere
Disclaimer: Yu-Gi-Oh GX – it is not mine. sigh Great sadness.
A/N: Once again from Chazz's POV.
When I was a kid, I used to hate wearing high collars and long sleeves. They always made me feel like I was choking and trapped. Now I wear them all the time – even in the summer. I don't mind them any more; they've become a part of me. They hide the truth that the rest of the world doesn't want to know and I don't want them to see either. They don't need to know why I wear high collared shirts; let them make absurd observations about my taste in style. I don't care. They don't know. They can never understand. Even if they could, I don't want to risk it.
They all think that I'm over confident, but I'm not. All of the bluster is just a shield like my long sleeves protecting me. Hiding the real me away deep inside where I can't be hurt as easily. In reality I'm not confident at all – I'm terrified. They say that I don't feel so they try to guilt me into 'feeling' with their words. I do feel – probably even more acutely than they do, so their words just make me pull farther away inside of myself where they can't touch me. They think they're helping me but they're not. People think a lot of things that aren't true about me but I don't usually correct them. I just use their assumptions to build higher shields around me to keep me in and the world out.
Not that the world tries to dodge my barriers that often. What's the point? It's so much easier to believe the lie than to search for the truth. Some have tried but I reject them quickly; old habits are hard to break. I'm too scared of being hurt again. Whenever I open up to anyone, I'm rejected and I just can't take it anymore. I'm sick of the pain they cause me because every time they look away, I die a little more inside.
Sometimes during a duel, if I'm losing badly enough, I can almost feel my brothers standing behind me and could swear that if I turned around fast enough I'd catch a glimpse of their snickering faces. I've even heard them talking to me during a couple of duels, which makes me feel like I'm schizophrenic. Their snide comments snarl in my ears making me want to scream and, for some reason, my back begins to ache again with remembered bruises and sting with ghostly gashes.
There are no more bruises on my back – there haven't been for nearly a year – and all that remains of the gashes are long scars which tare their way across my pale skin. One of the longest scars lashes up and across the back of my neck coming to a halt just below the lobe of my right ear. That's why I wear high collars. A scar like that would make people ask questions I'm not willing to answer, not ready to answer.
People can think what they like, most do anyway – I won't correct them. Let them misjudge me, misunderstand me, accuse me of crimes I have never committed, just let me keep my shields – my high collars and long sleeves.
A/N: Hm. That was… well, at least it wasn't nearly as dark as Razor was, but it was still depressing. Oh well, I like writing first person depressing stuff! What did y'all think? Thanks for reading!