Author's Note: Winter. I'm sad/excited now from the season finale (which was a while back... though I haven't gotten a chance to really update in that time), so I won't say much more. All fans will probably go now, I'm guessing, while most have (from before most of you readers even got here). I will finish this story, and see what happens with the others. Sorry I haven't updated in a while. I had an online course that I had to get done, and I went away to the Caribbean for eleven days. WHOOHOO.—Nuuoa
Disclaimer: I'm just going to leave poor Archie out of this and get straight to the point. I don't own Class of the Titans.
R.I.P. Class of the Titans (2006-2008), June 22nd, 2008. You will be missed, and forever loved.
Review Replies:
Anya-Paradox: WHY MUST YOU BE SO BEAUTIFUL? AND AN EPIC REVIEWER? And such a Cronus fangirl xD. ARCHIE DOES SUCK, but we still love him so... I did so not still that quote ;D... GAH, GAH. You have already reclaimed the title. VERY EXCITINGGG... V : )
Becky Sky: Haha, oh geeze. It's not grammar, it's me losing a thought and then coming back to it later. Thanks for pointing it our though, I need to go fix that.
TheDragoness1992: Thank you, thank you. OMG, A WHIP?! HAHA. OH, HOW COULD YOU?! DO YOU KNOW THE POSSIBILITIES THAT COME WITH THIS?! NOOO, I MUST RESIST.
Lepidopteran: Well geeh, if you're repetitive, than I certainly am. 'Thank yous' and 'That means a lot' are getting old ;), but they're still true. I hope Winter lives up to its reputation!
Demenior: FFKLDSJFLASDKJKLFJDSFJ DEM. THANK YOU, WITH WHIPPED CREAM ON TOP, because you're too good to me 333. AND YOU DID DO FANART, WHICH I STILL WORSHIP. ... wow, too much CAPS LOCK. Archie is dumb. I think that is just a natural law of nature, as well as the fact that he is a CLOSET POET THAT SULKS IN ALLEYWAYS 8DDD. Winter may be a bit more harsh than usual... YOU ARE THE ASSASIN SILLY.
FuNnY cIdE: That's right, I'ma younglin' child thing. It probably only because of obsessive writing on this site xDD. HP fics, hmm? I'll go there on a bad day to cheer myself up then xDD.
reborn-fire-bird: Thank you :3, means a lot that you're still here and reviewing, and that you're observant enough to pick out my little author memories. Haha, well, I didn't base him off of her Archie. Demenior's Archie tends to be a little more... violently psychotic than my own. My Archie is just a lovable idiot 3, though I'm flattered you would connect me to such a talented author. Yes, the finale was ubertastic.
o—With Winter Comes A Loss Of Senses, That You Can't Feel.—o
Chapter Four: Winter
o—o
Winter kissed my eyelids and I awoke from slumber, or at least the slumber of a long walk home from school. I was met by a beautiful bitter sight. The ground beneath my feet was a blanket of white that danced and sparkled. I had to watch my footing as my boots smacked down on the covered pavement. Winter really didn't take any prisoners.
I had already forgotten my gloves in the haste to leave school and return to the brownstone, I didn't want to make any more mistakes. Remembering my forgetfulness, I tumbled back down into the despair I had been wearing just a moment before. I was reminded why I was having to take the long way home. Over the hills and through the woods to hell and back we go.
This park could pass for Hades as far as I was concerned.
The trees were barren of colour. Brittle and stark of life. Nothing breathed anymore, nothing lived. The only rustle of life came from the caw of a crow overhead.
Death sure was pretty.
I closed my eyes and inhaled deeply. I savoured the slim layer of ice that coated the inside of my lungs and throat, but exhaling released it all too soon into the air. Before my eyes it became the wisps of smoke, smoke that sparkled. Warm dust that was barely there. I had to watch it disappear.
I sighed again, but this time I did not open my eyes to watch as I let my sigh go. Maybe if I kept my lids this way for long enough they would freeze over. I would never have to watch the world around me pass me by. Darkness never shifted, but I did.
Though it seemed my thoughts were poisoned by the harsh summer memories, my body was not. So I was still moving. My corpse of a body still retained some of my past joy, the same medicine used to keep me breathing, to keep me alive. I could hear the crunch of newborn snow beneath my feet; the clear, hazy death cries. Winter claimed them too.
Yes, I was being melodramatic, and I hated myself for it; but if I gave into that sickening man it would be even worse. So what was I to do? Let my anger go? Forget all the pain that he had caused me? Or go on forever in a world where I refused to open my eyes? Wasn't there some way I could receive a sign? Swallowed pride tasted bad. I was trapped, trapped within the mental confines I could just as easily break. I wanted too. I did not.
I did not know.
My eyes opened in frustration. The darkness left too much time for thoughts I had no desire to confront. I was surprised to find my hand resting against something frosty brown. I hadn't even felt it before my sight had returned. With the last piece of my senses back in place, only what I was doing mattered. Without even wanting too, my hands began tracing familiar patterns along the wood.
I heard my crying before I felt it. The water against my cheek chilled instantly. It was so cold, and yet my vision was burning. My fingers spent eternity tracing over the forever, and even longer tracing the second word. Yes, the patterns were words.
'F. O. R. E. V. E. R. F. R. I. E. N. D. S.'
My fingers were numb, and my mind was too. My body would not stop its endless motion. I went back over the F and my hands were forgotten.
O, over and over again.
R, repeating.
E, endless.
V, verging on unstoppable.
E, eternal.
R, returning.
F, f-f--...
I couldn't go over the last word, as much as I tried. The heat had melted the left side of my message, but the side bearing a lost friendship reflected back my pale, hollow face. It wasn't until then that I noticed I had lost my favourite hat. Something worse diluted this tragedy.
Though I had not been able to go back over the second curse word, I must have pressed harder, or struggled to move on to the next letter when I had first engraved it into the bark. The F, R, and the I were barely visible, but the E, N, D, and the final and only S stood out from the white-brown hue of my unconventional paper.
My brain did not take long to do as it had been drilled since the first fragile years of education. I spelled.
'FOREVER ENDS'.
My lament evolved into hysteria. I was laughing—okay, more like wailing. It was too funny in all honesty. The irony in it all. In this situation. Throwing my head back as I sunk to the ground, I even saw the branch on which he and I had sat.
It had split straight in half.
I guess if I had been blindly searching for a sign, I had gotten a pretty clear one.
My insane laughter, just as my breath had, eventually faded away. I was on my knees, head resting against our tree, nearly totally engulfed in snow.
"You're losing it Atlanta." the words did not sound like my own. They were croaked. All of that deep inhaling had iced up my throat. I coughed, but it sounded more like I was choking.
"Only slightly."
Okay, those words definitely did not sound like my own. They were all it took to send me into overdrive; and it really weren't the words that had unsettled me. The walls were back up, and before I could prepare to attack, my heart bound my face to his. Every reason for wishing I had kept my eyes closed came back to me. Or, at least...
One.
Oh, crap.
"Archie," his name congealed between us, "How long have you been there?"
He stood above me, higher above me than ever. This was because I was still on my knees, I knew that, but it still took me by surprise. Maybe it was because I hadn't allowed myself to stop and really look at him. If I were to scan through my memories of him since the beginning of grade eleven, I would find his face a pale, purple blur.
He was exactly how I had remembered him though, from a happier time before that. 'No,' my thoughts reminded me, 'not happy. Naive, foolish, pointless. The whole cause of our pain.' Great, now I really was crazy, but I suppose that the voices came as a package deal where insane laughter bubbled forth. But the other me was right, I was stupid, but they were still happier than this.
"Long enough." I was glad for the interrupting of thoughts, I didn't think that I could've held my angry composure for much longer if I had gotten the chance to go over his face; the sun still partially blinded me. Despite his tone, Archie looked at me with concern. I didn't deserve his kindness, I think it actually made it worse. I knew he knew that this was our tree. I knew that he knew that my ravenous crying hadn't been for my own personal enjoyment. I knew that he knew that I knew all of this! ... Knew.
I must've looked hurt, because Archie spoke again, with wisps of purple hair covering his face. I barely noticed the red fire of my own.
"Are you alright, 'Lan?" Archie's eyes were too calm for a storm. They added fuel to the flame under my chest. Was he trying to provoke me?! Why couldn't he just yell at me? Or maybe slap me up a little? I deserved it; I had been nothing but awful to him for the past few months. He made it so hard to stop.
Ever since our... unfortunate conversation, as well as my tearful run up to my bedroom—and I was not hiding!—Archie had been trying to talk to me. Of course, being the awful, stubborn, terrible person I was, I couldn't talk to him when I had vowed otherwise. Atlanta simply did not do that! Not Atlanta! So I had... avoided him—not hiding from him—and made sure that whenever my dork radar detectors went off, I ran.
That happened to be often.
In fact, since the beginning of the school year I had actually dropped weight. Maybe avoiding Archie, making sure to take shortcuts to school, waking up early—and then late when Archie found out about it—to eat, and actually bolting the door caused the worry and vigorous activity needed to lose weight.
I think the main cause of worry was that I was doing all of this.
"Perfectly fine, if you must know," I hissed. Archie flinched, and I hated how I hated that he hated when I spoke like that. ... Hated. I had to stop these trains of thought.
"Good... good...I haven't seen you in a while... or at least, really seen you. How've you been?"
"Ha. You honestly don't know the answer to that question?" It was ridiculous, why would he even ask me that? Right, to rub it in. My brown eyes glittered with shards of mirth.
Archie didn't react to my sneer, like he had... back then. He seemed timid, far too timid for my Archie. Dammit, I meant to say... the normal Archie.
"You're right. We need to talk." Archie's brow furrowed, like he was debating something. It was also the look that he used to wear snowboarding, when we were on speaking terms.
"I'm done talking, the last time we talked things didn't really go well, you know? I'm not really a verbal person, I speak more with my actions, you know? So I'm... gonna go now."
"Atlanta." My body disobeyed me and froze in mid-motion.
"What is it, oh great master of all?" I hissed through my teeth.
"Stop it." Oh, so he was getting some of that ol' Arch back now, was he?
"Oh yeah, why should I?" I still couldn't move, yet I had managed to turn right back around.
"You know we need to talk, and that we can't go on. This needs to happen." Yes, I knew but the fact that he said it aloud made it all the worse.
I had never really thought myself a coward, what with fighting the immortal god of time being an everyday
after school activity, but as the man that had broken my heart gazed deep into the shallow corners of my soul, I was afraid.
How much further could I push him?
"No."
That seemed to do it.
"DAMN IT, ATLANTA!" Archie's hands were around me in an instant, violent pulling me off the ground. I had left a large imprint in the snow that was quickly filled up with what fell from my jacket. So Archie was yelling now? I guess I had asked for it, I was prepared for it really. Still, why did I shudder at his touch? Why did I loathe the way he was touching me, but longed for his touch?
Damn him.
"DAMN WHAT, WHAT ARCHIE?" My frame quivered in his iron grip, and I bit my lower lip until I almost tasted the metallic swell of blood.
"YOU, ME, IT, EVERYTHING." I was going to be severely bruised the next morning. I hated how I savoured the pain. The brute force numbed my arms to match my hands, my brain, myself. I no longer cared of hypothermia; if I died I could be free. Free of this world, and the hurt that was momentarily taken away by a more pressing physical one.
"I-It?" Why did I have to tremble to ferociously? Why couldn't I stay calm? My heart roared in my ears.
"YES, IT! THE FACT THAT YOU NEVER EVEN BOTHERED TO ASK WHAT OPPOSITE EVEN MEANT!" Archie spat. He was a burning man, though I could feel no heat through his gloves and my coat. I watched, just as always, as the groan that escaped my chapped lips turned to smoke in the air. Like the smoke in his eyes.
Shivering, he let me go.
"What you do to me, Lannie..." Archie seemed to be in agony, and his hands did wicked work on his hair instead of me. I watched his thinly covered back wearily. It seemed like the grudge of Winter was losing, and fast. I wanted to reach out, and warm him. He never did wear enough clothing, my happier memories remembered that all too well. I was pushed back into despair, and I rubbed my sides gingerly.
"What do I do to you, Archie?" I said gently. The crazy person inside my head was screaming at me for being stupid again, but I ignored her.
Archie seemed to be the one that was not alright.
He stood there, looking like he was losing a battle within himself. His hands were definitely breaking the skin covering his skull. My worries were confirmed as I saw droplets of crimson stain the snow.
Locking the little voice away for good, I reached out and my hand alarmingly caressed the side of Archie's face. To even more of my horror, the hand didn't stop. If I was cold, he was frigid.
He was...
Pulling away?!
The evil whispers broke free from the prison I had so newly created. Their fragile foundations broken forever, just after being mended. I felt a new shiver envelope my body. Rage. Pure, unadulterated loathing.
I HAD JUST FORGIVEN HIM AGAIN, AND HE DID THIS?!"DO YOU CARE TO EXPLAIN, ARCHIE!" I yelled. For the first time I noticed some people watching us from a far. I couldn't give a far cry from hell, "Because it seems to me like the moment I actually let myself be vulnerable around you, and actually want to talk, you go ahead a destroy everything you've built right back up!"
"It's just the opposite really..." Archie had to get over his mode swings and quit PMSing. He was back to being shy and reserved. My rage grew white hot.
"OH YEAH, SURE. I suppose that you accidently said that word then, hmm? Just to get on my nerves again? WELL, IT WORKED, YOU ASSHOLE."
He ignored me, and Archie's head moved from the hazy blue sky back down to me. I must've looked horrible. Panting like some feral beast; hackles raised and snarling. He didn't smile, or make a move to stop the attack that was boiling up inside of me. I had no common sense left. That boy was dying today, I didn't care if the murder was obvious, I didn't even care that I was contemplating murder. I knew that he knew I was plotting, and I knew that I knew I would regret it later. I knew that he—
"When I said you were opposite, I had meant that I hadn't loved her."
I knew nothing.
"And until you have an answer to my question, I don't want you to talk to me. I cannot bear to go one more day without knowing, Atlanta. Without knowing if you feel the same way. Goodbye." Archie turned from me, and ripped away the last faint trance of the sanity I had left. I lost control of my mind, body, heart, head, soul, sight, hearing, nothing, everything, him, the world, all I knew, myself, him, us, my memories... My memories of us.
HE LOVED ME?! B-B-BUT, b-bu-bu-t—t I knew that he knew I cared, a-and I knew that I knew that I cared too, at least... kinda knew. My whole being shook with the newfound information, and my knees sunk back in the cold confines of the snow. It was all too new! So I knew now that I knew, and that he knew that I knew, because he knew, and now I knew. At least, I knew that he knew! Oh no, but he knew that I knew, or didn't... I knew?
Maybe I had never really known at all.
And Winter melted inevitably into the green of a New Spring.
o—With Winter Comes A Loss Of Senses, That You Can't Feel.—o
Author's Note: NUU KNEW THAT YOU KNEW THAT NUU KNEW THAT YOU'D REVIEW.—Nuuoa