Chapter 4: No One Understands
No one seems to understand how you feel. You come to realize just how much you are needed.
"Aerrow. Aerrow, wake up, man."
Aerrow opened his eyes lazily. He had fallen asleep at the kitchen table. Someone was shaking him awake. He lifted his head and blinked, trying to clear his blurry vision.
"So . . . is this more comfortable than your bed or did you just decided you wanted to beat me to breakfast?"
Aerrow finally figured out who it was. Finn. And he sounded surprisingly cheery, as if nothing had change the last two days. Aerrow wondered how he could act like that when everything had changed.
"Speaking of breakfast, what is for breakfast?" Finn asked. "I'm starving."
"Don't know," Aerrow mumbled sleepily before laying his head back down on the table.
Finn looked over at him sympathetically. "Rough night?"
"Yeah."
Finn seemed to sober a little. "Yeah, it's hard," he said. On a lighter note, he added, "But hey, he wouldn't want us to stop living. Life goes on."
"What's got you so happy?" Aerrow grumbled. He wasn't in the optimistic mood and didn't need to be preached to.
"I just got tired of being sad," Finn answered.
Aerrow wiped his eyes. "Aren't we all."
"Oh," Finn exclaimed as he slipped his bread into the toaster, "after breakfast, want to go spar or something?"
"No," Aerrow answered flatly. For some strange reason, Finn's happy mood was really ticking him off.
"Ah, come on," Finn begged. "It'll be good for you. It will get your mind off of . . ."
"I said no, Finn!"
Finn shied away. "Alright, you don't have to be snappish about it. Sheesh, I was just hoping to have some fun. You don't have to be so mean about it."
Aerrow left the room stiffly. He didn't understand. Some people deal with loss by getting their mind off of it. Aerrow wasn't one of those people. He didn't want to get his mind off it. He needed to have time to just shut down and deal. If he didn't, he wouldn't come back the same.
Finn grumbled as he went back to his toast. He truly was tired of being sad, and he wanted to have some fun. He needed to have some fun. Whenever things went wrong or when he needed something, he had always relied on Aerrow to help him. Aerrow's flat-out refusal to help made Finn angry.
The calmness that Aerrow had when he accepted Radarr's death was still with him, but he was a long way from healed. He was back to being himself, but it was a different part of himself. He hadn't even realized it until almost halfway through the day, but he wasn't laughing and smiling like he normally did. He was frowning a lot and snapping at any small thing that irritated him. He had the overwhelming desire to be with his friends but just as strong a desire to be nowhere near them.
Stork seemed to have disappeared and Finn seemed a bit angry, but after the first few hours Aerrow was awake, Junko seemed to cling to him for dear life. He was talking a lot about various things and hugging him a lot. Aerrow's bones ached and swore the next time Junko embraced him he'd probably break a few.
Finally Junko was telling Aerrow how much he missed Radarr and how Radarr used to do this and that. Aerrow liked talking about Radarr but not so much about how he was feeling. Junko was really big on discussing feelings. Aerrow couldn't see any escape from the topic until Junko turned his back and the Sky Knight quietly slipped away.
When Junko turned back around, he stopped in mid-sentence and was hurt. Aerrow didn't even want to listen to him. But why? Aerrow always listened.
There wasn't any formal lunch that day. People popped in and out the kitchen, picking up food as they pleased. That's why, when his hunger was satisfied, Aerrow stayed as far away from the kitchen as possible.
Piper finally found him sitting on one of the couches at the round table. "Aerrow?" she asked tentatively.
Aerrow gave her a small, strained smile and invited her to come sit down. He was as pleased to see her as he was to see Dove yesterday.
Why is it that the easiest people for him to talk to were girls?
Piper sat down next to him. "How are you doing?" she asked.
Aerrow shrugged. "I'm okay," he lied. To be honest, he didn't really know.
Piper could see that he wasn't telling the whole truth. "You know," she said, "when I little, before I met you, I had a cat named Sissy."
Aerrow raised an eyebrow. "Sissy?"
Piper shrugged. "I was five years old when I named her, okay? But anyway, the same thing happened to her. Hit by a skyride when I was nine." She sighed. "It was really hard."
Aerrow looked away. Here it comes again. Another one of those 'I know how you feel' stories. He wasn't expecting that from Piper, who was also upset about Radarr.
Piper was quiet for awhile before she asked, "Do you ever have trouble crying after something bad has happened?"
Aerrow looked at her in surprise. "Trouble crying?"
Piper nodded. "I've wanted to cry for Radarr, but I can't seem to."
"No," Aerrow answered flatly. Why would someone want to cry anyway?
"Look, Aerrow, I know it's hard. He was special to all of us. We all loved him. And I know the two of you were really close. But you've got to stop moping around and just let go. Whether that means just letting it out or just accepting it is up to you." She leaned against his shoulder, adding, "And I guess I should, too."
Aerrow felt uncomfortable. He'd heard enough of this. If he could stop moping around, he would, but he can't. Not yet. And the one thing she didn't seem to realize was that he had accepted it. There was no point in continuing this conversation. He didn't really want to comfort Piper right now, either. He wasn't sure he could handle his own emotions, much less everyone else's, yet that seemed to be what everyone else wanted him to do.
Aerrow stood and started to leave. Piper called after him and he could hear the disappointment in her voice. She needed him. But he couldn't handle it now. "I've gotta go," he insisted.
"Aerrow, let's . . ."
"Look!" he snapped and turned around, shouting. "I don't want to talk now, alright?! I don't want everyone pitying over me like I'm some sort of infant, and I don't want to pity others like infants, either!" He turned away. "You just don't understand!"
"I was just trying to help," he heard Piper grumble irritably. "Obviously I'm not worth your time!"
"Maybe your not," Aerrow agreed, letting his anger take control of his tongue.
She shook her head. "You're so . . . selfish!" She stomped off the bridge, the door slamming behind her.
Aerrow stared after her. She didn't understand. No one understood. His heart pounded in his throat angrily, and he plopped back on the couch, snarling.
It took a few minutes for him to calm down. When he did, he looked at the closed door. The misunderstanding was on both sides, he realized. They were trying to comfort him by asking him to comfort himself instead of giving him space. And they wanted to be comforted, leaning on him for support. They didn't realize that there was nothing left to lean on. He was abandoning them because he couldn't handle it. He'd get better, he knew, but he wasn't ready now. Not yet.
The first thing to do, he thought, was make up for his own wrongs. He stood and left the bridge, heading to Piper's lab where he figured she might me.
Piper was just coming back to her lab when she ran into him in the hallway. "Piper . . ." Aerrow began.
"Pardon me," Piper told him, furrowing her brow. "I've got more important things to do!" She brushed him aside and headed for the lab.
"Piper, wait . . ." He wasn't quick enough.
The door slammed in his face. Aerrow turned and walked back to his room. He couldn't do anything right today, not even apologizing for being wrong.
