A/N: this is the beefier sister fic to Worn Out Faces, and while you don't need to read one to understand the other, I'd recommend giving it a go. it's way shorter, for one, and waaay more concise.
quick tw for suicide and light mentions of blood and all that gross stuff.
ghosting — mother mother
i remember, i remember the days
when i'd make you oh-so afraid
and this is why I have decided
to leave your house and home unhaunted
you don't need poltergeists for sidekicks
The first time she saw you, she screamed.
It was exactly as you expected so you shouldn't have felt your heart drop to your stomach when the cry left her colorless, chapped lips.
But you had worked so goddamn hard just to reach out to her. You watched her curl into herself and sob against your cooling body (and later, coffin, gravestone, locker, pokémon, bedroom door— the list grew and grew). You would slink down to her bits and pieces and try to put her back together. You held her loosely between your arms and pressed half-hearted kisses to her eyelids and pretend to bask in the afterglow of glory.
You were so convinced that if she could just see you, you could fix her. You thought that you could make her feel better and mend all of her cuts like the hastily reattached buttons on your blue dress shirt (but dear god, you would take your time. You would make sure your hands were steady and take all the proper proceedings to bring her back).
Of course, nothing worked out as planned. (You were never afraid of spoilers. This story has an end and it's the worst thing in the world. You hate yourself for being so wickedly okay with it.)
She shrieked and thrashed the first time. Her sallow skin was too stretched over her cheekbones and you were trying to usher her hand towards a spoonful of peas. Typically, you were able to guide her without recognition, but that day she froze at your touch. You knew that she probably would have screeched right then but it caught in her throat. You barely had enough time to register the genuine terror in her eyes before screamed.
You let out a pitiful plea of, "White— White, no please don't cry, no— stop," as she kicked and called out her pokémon and ordered them to attack you. She cursed at nothing in particular and her pokémon watched her, paralyzed. They looked at you but only saw the eggshell-colored walls and knew something was so completely wrong.
Her archeops sped away in pursuit of help and within less than a minute she was held down by two pairs of hands (Cheren, Bianca — and you would complete the set) and was dosed with a sedative. You watched as she rested uneasily for hours. When she awoke, her mother was holding one hand and Bianca the other, both exchanging nervous glances and trying to act like everything was swell.
White just shook her head and tried to force herself into unconsciousness, thoughts still muddled with hate and confusion and pain.
They called you Black but she would tease that the only think "black" about you was the brim of your hat. You would count "white" things about her as she would count "black" things about you. You were always so much better at that game but she would never admit it. White would just shake her head and say you were wrong and that it wasn't her fault that you were "practically unscathed snow".
You wouldn't dare play that with her again because she would win. There were more "black" things about you than you could count on both hands.
You tore her apart. You knew that being around you made her desperate and sent her into a panic. You watched White's doctors pour over their poor, dear Hilda as the press probed at her door for stories.
They either made her out to be crazy — a starlet of the past — or a beloved martyr, consumed with grief at the death of her king. Everyone either looked upon her with disdain or pity and there was no in-between. You hated it because you knew that she was strong, much stronger than anyone would give her credit for, and that she didn't need anyone's sideways glances. She was glorious, a fighting force — the aftermath of a punch. She didn't give up.
You think that you changed her. You think you made her weaker and more like the stories because she was never so prepared to stay in bed and claim to be unwell. You only visited her when she was sick, at first, and she clamored at the opportunities. She was quick-witted and smart — she knew that you would come. She played you for a fool and you went along with it because you were selfish.
Oh, so very selfish.
You saw what you were doing to her. Your very presence made her sick. You watched her drown in her tears and mop them with your coat. You watched her sinewy limbs sag and thin out. You watched her pokémon slip away from their former glory, out of shape and without purpose.
You weren't letting her move on. You forced her to relive what should have only been a small setback. You made her see you — your tattered clothes, crippled legs, bruised skin, bloodied face, and swollen limbs. Sometimes, when you couldn't contain it, she heard your harsh, pained voice and shallow breaths. This is what it would be like if you were alive. You would be a disaster, ready to fall apart and be buried.
You knew it hurt her to see you but you couldn't keep away. You knew it would be best if she were to move on but you were afraid of being forgotten and left alone. You wanted to stay with her and you really, really did not want to be dead.
You watched her wither. You watched her descend into madness and tried to convince yourself that you were helping her because she would smile more and eat her food and seem to have some sort of motivation whenever you were around.
The thing was — and you wouldn't let yourself come to terms with it — she wanted to be with you.
She wasn't afraid to die and be forgotten.
"They think I'm crazy," she said. Her voice was smooth and her words were long and strewn together. "Because I can see you. I… tried to tell Bianca but I think I freaked her out. She rounded up Cheren and they gave me a big mommy and daddy speech." She rolled her eyes then said, in a cruel falsetto, "'We are soooo concerned with you. You're hurting inside and you need help. We'll always be here for you, Hilda.' Like anyone even knows that name anymore." Her chest expanded like she was about to sigh but instead she held her breath. It was an eternity before she asked, voice cracking, "Do you think I need help?"
You froze because you wanted to press your lips to her hairline and assure her that no, of course she didn't. She was perfect and strong and she was already at the top of the world.
You couldn't say it because you knew it wasn't all true.
"I… yes," you said hesitantly. You expected her to flare her nostrils and look betrayed because that's what she used to do when you didn't agree with her. She just looked back at you (through you) with big, empty eyes. "I worry about you, White." Your tone was soft. "You haven't been good to yourself lately and I hate seeing you so upset. You seem lost, and I guess we all are, but… you can get out of this."
She shrunk down smaller, smaller than her usual ten-foot-tall persona and down past her current low. She sounded weak and tiny.
"But I love you." Or at least, that's what you think she said, because she just as easily could have said, "But I miss you."
You held her face in the hand that wasn't held in hers and used your thumb to curve across her cheekbones and up to her eyebrows. You had to consciously check that you weren't phasing right through her. You couldn't feel the heat radiating off of her skin and she couldn't feel the wet press of blood that should have been spread along by your broken fingers but you both pretended, not daring to close your eyes out of fear that the other would disappear.
"White... White I—" You had to stretch and bend over backwards for the words to come. "I'm so sorry. You have to see me like this and it's… horrible and I know it and I… just… don't know what to do. I'm really afraid. I'm scared out of my fucking mind and I don't… I can't…" You were at a loss. "And what happens next? Do I just disappear? God, god please I don't want to just vanish— and you've been here and I've been making you miserable because I… won't let you move on. You're stuck in your fourth stage of grief because I can't bring myself to leave you—"
"So don't." White from another world would spit the words like they were obvious but she whispered them like they were a secret. It was a plead.
"I'm dead."
It was silent.
You began to cry before she did, wracking sobs bruising your rib cage. You couldn't breathe and kept pressing the ball of your palm against your lips as if it would quiet the sobs or stop the mucus (and cerebral fluid and blood) from flowing from your nose. Your tears weren't wet and they didn't seem to drip down your face but move slow like honey and still like wax. White cried next to you, soundlessly, eyes red and puffy.
She was still beautiful and it hurt to see her cry.
You pressed kisses to all the spots where bones jutted out from under her skin.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm so fucking sorry—," your lips brushed her jaw, "I love you and I'm sorry that this happened and I need you to move on because you deserve it and because I hate seeing you so sad and it's my fault and I'm a huge prick for even being here but I love you and I don't want to leave, oh god, I'm sorry—"
You visited less and preoccupied yourself with visiting the world and watching the rest of its seven billion people.
Eventually, you always went back to her.
"What's it like in heaven?" she asked one day. It was a good day when her eyes glowed and her voice didn't quiver.
"I don't know," you answered. You wondered if you would ever find out.
You weren't sure you deserved to.
There were days and weeks where you didn't see her at all.
Sometimes she would call out her serperior and they would wrap around each other for hours, wasting the day away. Other times she would let herself be pulled into one of Bianca's half-thought out plans and they would run up and down the beach just outside Nuvema before falling back on the sand, breathless and laughing.
One time she agreed to battle Cheren for shits and giggles. Both her and her pokémon were thin and rusty, no longer quite in sync, but they tried. White seemed distracted and her hits were weak but her timing continued to be impeccable.
Cheren won by the skin of his teeth.
White tilted her head to the side and a lock of hair fell over the bridge of her nose, framing her eyes. Their hue seemed frozen over and her gaze was hard, but she smiled. A genuine, slow growing smile.
"Well, would you look at that," she said, voice holding its strong timbre. "Fuck being a gym leader. You've got the road all paved out in front of you, future champ."
What she said was sad, like her time had come and gone, but you couldn't help but laugh. You thought about Clyde and how he somehow managed to greet you at every gym you entered. She mimicked his sarcasm with her tone but performed the underlying sincerity flawlessly. All she needed was some tactical advice and a free fresh water.
Your laugh bounced from apex to apex, dimming with intensity as it travelled through Twist Mountain's spiral. White was the only one who could hear it and, for a while, it was like a mix-tape made just for her. She smiled, bright as the sun, before the gravity of the situation seems to press down on her. She grimaced and the glaciers in her gaze melted into an ocean.
Frustrated and guilty, you let your presence fade like a shadow in the sun.
You knew it.
You fucking knew that something was wrong when she pulled the velvet dress from its wire hanger, still untouched from her mother's last trip to the dry cleaner's.
She had been working in ceremonies the entire day— taking extra care to stir the sugar in her coffee four times clockwise, brushing her hair in exactly two hundred strokes, and lining her shoes up out in the hall. She pushed all of her "dress up" clothes — the ones she reserved for fancy dinners of honor and birthday parties — to the front of her closet.
The velvet dress lied neatly on her bed as she showered.
White's hands moved like clockwork, falling into the pattern you had grown so familiar with. You crawled into her bed as she drew on the artful wing of her eyeliner, and the angle at which you saw the slope of her back as she worked was dizzyingly nostalgic. She dried her hair, powdered her nose, and when she turned to grab the dress, you vanished.
You gave the dress a last look before you sauntered off. You weren't quizzical or upset — you were wholly impartial. For a few brilliant moments, it meant nothing to you.
When you wandered back into her cluttered apartment, her pokéballs were in her bag and she wasn't home. A haphazardly-folded piece of paper sat on her kitchen counter. Ink bled through the page but the traces of words were illegible.
What the hell was that? A note? When she had written that?
You found her strolling carelessly along the Sky Arrow Bridge, brushing her fingers along the railing. The brisk, October weather chased away most tourists, but even then, she garnered the occasional sideways glance.
"I win," she said. Her voice was so quiet that her words were an extension of the wind whipping through her hair.
Her face crumbled. "I win," she repeated, voice bitter. "Do you hear me, Black? You can stop hiding and come congratulate me, alright? I win!" Her voice grew into a wicked crescendo. Her eyes searched the air, wildly, panning around the space for your presence.
You let yourself be seen. "What— What are you talking about?" Your voice wavered because you had no idea what to make of her cries. She croaked.
"I'm so fucking sick of this game, Black." She kicked off her shoes. "I'm not playing anymore. I give up. It's all pointless shit anyway.
"But ha — you see, the joke's on you, because I won!" She threw up her hands. "I'm making myself happy! You always told me to make myself better and now I'm doing it! I'm going to be happy!"
She laughed they way she would if she were angry. Your eyes narrowed out of instinct because you were used to the frustrated cackle she reserved for your arguments' climaxes.
"What are you saying?"
She laughed in your face.
"White, what the fuck are you talking about?"
She buckled over, holding her stomach.
"White!"
She laughed until tears came to her eyes and her giggles dissolved into sobs.
You leaned down to hover your face over hers. "White?" Her name was a prayer. She sighed.
"God, am I going to look as shitty as you when I'm gone?" She shook her head. "Probably, right? When I hit the water, my ribs will probably end up poking out of my asshole. At least we'll be a matching set again — all bruised and bloody and ugly as hell."
"What?" It was barely a whisper.
She shrugged. She glanced over the rail and just watched the waves rock against a far off buoy.
The pieces all seem to come together right then, clashing into place and leaving an utter cacophony of decimation ringing in your ears.
"White, were you… planning on killing yourself?"
She didn't answer.
The panic settled into your veins all at once. "No," you mumbled. "No, White, you're not. You're not fucking doing that because that's stupid and moronic and— just— no!
"Are you fucking out of your mind? Are you completely insane? You never even… you never even used to have any sympathy for people who would kill themselves! What happened to them being cowards? No! What happened to you? What are you doing?"
The dark ocean blue matched the color of her eyes just then. She didn't move.
"You can't be serious…. you— you can't— Shit, just, White— go home. Go back home, right now, and take a nap or call Bianca or something, I don't fucking know, just— leave. Turn around, now, and call Servine from her pokéball and… tell her you love her and make her watch some asshole talk about... legends on the history channel, or— fuck— White, I don't know, please don't make me do this, just— go home, okay? Please go home."
She didn't move her head but her eyes flitted from the waves to meet yours. You hold her gaze for seconds that stretch into years and somehow still don't seem long enough. She blinked and you began to cry.
"I fucking hate you," you sobbed. "I hate you— so much— You're such a rotten piece of shit and I can't believe I ever loved you— you're selfish and rude and you don't deserve this, White, you really don't and I can't… understand why this is… why you…"
And then you were calling her by every alias she'd ever been given and insisting that what she deserved was a diamond ring on all ten fingers. You called her your queen and you pressed your lips to every joint left uncovered. You begged and tried to reason with her but your pleas fell of deaf ears — she had simply closed her eyes and let you speak. Your voice broke and fell in all odd places.
She didn't change her mind.
You held her hand because you were selfish and because you didn't know what else to do. You weren't sure you ever hated yourself any more than you did then because, somewhere in the back of your twisted mind, you were put at ease.
The air parted in your presence and the water folded over you like drapes.
A/N: hope this didn't make for horrifically dense reading! my magnificent beta is the magnificent deerdryad and the lyrics used are from Mother Mother's song of the same name. it's actually a lovely song that doesn't sound nearly as sinister as this fic may imply — and boy, believe me when I say I took the lyrics literally.
if you can, please point out any errors I may have overlooked or review with some constructive criticism! i'm always looking to grow and improve c: thank you for reading!