The chapter title is a line from Little Toy Guns by Carrie Underwood.

WARNINGS: BULLYING, MENTIONS OF KIDNAPPING, LANGUAGE

Disclaimer: I own nothing except for my OCs.

Wish Words Were Like Little Toy Guns

New Orleans, Louisiana

Ms. Sharp's Dance Studio

May 26th, 2018

3:55 PM

"Those poor kids…"

Evelyn stopped in her tracks, fingers freezing on the way to stick a piece of strawberry gum in her mouth. She stood there, stuffing the piece of gum in her mouth and pocketing the package of gum in the sweatshirt she'd pulled on over her ballet uniform until class started. She subtly leaned closer, listening to the unmistakable voice of Ms. Sharp around the corner.

"I know. It's horrible," Jennifer, Ms. Sharp's assistant, agreed, voice dripping with sympathy. "Frankie is only nine, and her brother's… twelve, you said?"

Evelyn frowned. She knew Frankie and her brother, Carter, the weirdos who were dating each other. She rarely ever spoke to Frankie except to make a few jabs. Who would blame her? They were siblings, and they were dating each other! She didn't have a problem with people being gay or bi or whatever, but incest was just… ew.

Anyway, why would Ms. Sharp and Jennifer be discussing Frankie and Carter like something terrible had happened to them?

"It's hard to believe people could be so cruel as to take two kids," Jennifer muttered.

Evelyn barely resisted the urge to gasp. Take… as in kidnap? Carter and Frankie had been kidnapped? By who? And why?

"They're such sweet kids," Ms. Sharp said, and her voice sounded softer than Evelyn had ever heard it. She knew the dance teacher had a soft spot for Frankie (whether Frankie knew, Evelyn wasn't sure), which Evelyn could never understand because she was in a relationship with her brother, and that was just disgusting, but since Evelyn wanted to stay in the class, she didn't point it out. "From what Whitney told me, they were just in the wrong place at the wrong time."

"I'm glad they made it back safely," Jennifer stated, her voice and the clicking of her shoes against the floor growing further and further away as Mr. Sharp and Jennifer headed down the hallway. "I can't imagine going through an ordeal like that."

Evelyn pressed herself against the wall, the things she had just heard rolling around inside her brain.

Who on earth would kidnap Carter and Frankie, and why? Evelyn couldn't withhold a sharp gasp this time as a thought struck her…

What if Carter and Frankie had been kidnapped because of their relationship? Evelyn thought kidnapping was extreme, but she could understand wanting to rid the world of the disgraceful thing that was incest. She often made little comments about Carter and Frankie's relationship to let them know what she thought about it. What if someone decided to take that mindset further?

Evelyn turned on her heel and bolted back to the main studio room to tell her friends.

New Orleans, Louisiana

Outside Ms. Sharp's Dance Studio

May 26th, 2018

3:59 PM

"Frankie, it hasn't even been a week. Maybe we should wait just a few more days-"

"Carter-"

"Or I could at least stay with you-"

"Carter-"

"Just in case you need me-"

"Carter!" His name was not spoken with anger, but it was said in a firm exclamation, and hearing the stern tone in his sister's voice startled Carter enough to stop short in the middle of his sentence.

Frankie sighed, and she took his hands, holding them in hers. They stood in front of Ms. Sharp's dance studio, the entrance standing tall behind Frankie's back, like a mouth ready to swallow her whole, but they both knew that was irrational. It didn't stop the feelings of anxiety or foreboding, though.

"Carter," Frankie repeated, quieter and gentler this time. "I love you so much, but this is something I need to do on my own, and you need to let me. At least for today."

Carter swallowed. He hated it, but he saw where she was coming from. Being around each other was calming, but they weren't stupid enough to try and fool themselves into believing they could be around each other all the time. One, no matter how much they loved each other, being attached at the hip could prove to be too much. Couples require closeness, but they also require space, and it's a delicate balance, one that can be tipped before either even realize it. Two, recovery, healing, and life itself requires the ability to stand on your own, as well as relying on others to catch you when you need them to. Sometimes, you need to take baby steps to learn how to march; sometimes, you need to do small things on your own to learn to start living again. A person cannot be escorted through life. They need to forge their own path. Carter knew this, and he was willing to step back to allow his sister to blaze her own trail, and he would walk alongside her, but that didn't mean he should guide her through her own life.

He could step back and allow her to do this on her own, and when the day was over, he would be waiting for her.

Carter nodded. "Okay. You have those disposable phones Mom got us, right? If you need anything… if your head hurts or you get anxious or if someone's mean to you, call Mom, and we'll be here to pick you up in a heartbeat."

Frankie smiled in what she hoped was a comforting manner, but she wasn't sure who she was trying to comfort: her brother or herself.

"I'll be okay," she assured him, "And if I'm not okay, even for one second, I will call Mom. I promise."

Carter nodded, if a bit shakily. "We'll be here at five to pick you up," he told her, leaning forward to kiss her lips before pulling back a little reluctantly and stepping away to the curb, where he climbed into their mom's car. Her mom waved, and Carter smiled at her before her mom pulled away from the sidewalk and the familiar vehicle disappeared down the street.

Frankie smoothed down her standard pink leotard and her frilly tutu, running her hands over her pink tights and retying her ballet shoes (even though she knew she didn't have to. She'd already tied them and retied them three times in the car) one last time before she straightened and took one last deep breath, inhaling the slightly muggy air of New Orleans… and then, she pushed open the door.

The minute Frankie walked inside, she debated running back out the door again. Everyone was staring at her. It wasn't rare for her to receive a couple of Looks when she walked in the door, looks of disgust, like they smelled something bad, but this was different. These were looks of pity, of discomfort, like nobody was quite sure what to say. Some gave her a glare that could only be described as good riddance, a look she got when she was shoved in the hallway or when someone dumped food all over her or splashed a slushy in her face in an action that you thought only happened on Glee, but for the life of her, she couldn't figure out why she was receiving that look now.

Frankie took her place in the front row, already doing calf raises and arm circles to stretch out her muscles before class began, but she wasn't two seconds into her stretches before Evelyn Shapiro leaned into her personal space and whispered something that chilled Frankie to the bone:

"So… why did they do it? Because of your relationship- if you can even call it that- with your brother? I'll admit, it was a little extreme, but I can understand wanting to rid the world of people like you or at least frighten you out of continuing to make this mistake."

Frankie's heart immediately began to beat faster. Evelyn didn't say it outright, but Frankie knew what she was talking about: the kidnapping. But how did Evelyn know about it? Her mom said that only Ms. Sharp and Jennifer would know, and Evelyn… Evelyn was a notorious eavesdropper, not to mention gossip. Ms. Sharp and Jennifer would never tell the other students without Frankie's permission, so the only way Evelyn could know was if she overheard Ms. Sharp and Jennifer talking about it.

"Or maybe it was some creep who gets off on incest?" somebody- Frankie thought it was Liliana- murmured.

That almost made Frankie throw up. Her heart was beating faster; sweat was beginning to drip down her face; every breath seemed to rattle the room as she clenched her hands together, as if that would stop her world from shaking.

"I wonder what happened to her brother. Why isn't he here?"

"Maybe he's too scared to be around her, afraid someone else might take them because they're together." The emphasis on the word together made the deeper meaning obvious.

"Or maybe he blames her. After all, the class slut would be sick enough to date her own brother. Maybe he blames her for their kidnapping because she dragged him into the relationship."

"Sounds like something she would do."

"Yeah. Anyone who's enough of a slut to date her own brother deserves to be locked up and to have the key thrown away. That's just sick."

Frankie couldn't breathe. The voices were swimming in her ears, overlapping and colliding in a harsh cacophony of whispers that seemed more like screams, and she wanted to clamp her hands over her ears to turn off all the noise, but she couldn't. She was suffocating under the weight of all these words, like bullets against her skin, and tears wanted to spring to her eyes, but her mind was too muddled to even allow herself to cry.

All of a sudden, a soft touch appeared on her arm, and she slowly opened her eyes (when had she closed them?) to see Molly, who was probably her only friend other than Carter, lightly placing a hand on Frankie's arm to ground her.

Frankie found that she could breathe again, and she nodded in thanks to her friend, still trembling slightly but back to Earth, the panic attack slowly fading, chased away by Molly's kind brown eyes.

"Frankie Hughes is such a-"

Frankie forced herself to shut off her ears, refusing to listen to another word. She could almost feel each word like a knife cutting into her skin or like the bang of a gunshot beside her ear.

Man, she wished words didn't hurt more than physical wounds ever could. She'd take bruises and broken bones over those horrible insults, those terrible labels, those pain-inducing words any day.

Thankfully, the door to the studio room opened, and Ms. Sharp glided in, drawing everyone's attention away from Frankie (thank goodness).

"Hello, class," Ms. Sharp announced from the spot she had taken at the front of the class. "As you know, we have our recital this weekend, and we still have a lot of work to do, so get into position!"

Frankie hurried to do as Ms. Sharp instructed. She could still hear people giggling, hissing rumors and awful speculations, but she resisted the urge to call her mom. She loved Carter and her mother and trusted them to swoop in and take her away from these judgemental stares, from the words that sliced her skin like daggers, but if she didn't stand her ground right here and now, she never would.

She promised Carter she would call if she wasn't okay, even for a second, but with another glance at Molly, who smiled at her reassuringly and glared at Evelyn and anyone else who even looked at Frankie the wrong way, she decided that she was okay, at least a little bit. She was ready for this, ready to face the bullies and the harsh words and take it all in stride. Well... as ready as she would ever be, anyway.

Molly will appear again!

Thank you all for reading, and I hope you enjoyed this chapter. Not much romance, but a lot of awesome Frankie.