Decode-10
Deeply rooted Pain
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The next day, she decided to go to school because her parents were coming home to see Chris. Or rather they were coming home to see her, disguised as Chris and she had no intention of spending any time with them at all if she could help it. Especially since her hair had grown out and her body had become more feminine looking.
It would be dangerous to place herself anywhere near either of her parents until she got a hair cut and maybe broke her nose or something to make herself look a little more...guyish. But since she had done that several times before, and it hurt like a mother fucker, she had decided that going that route simply wasn't something that she was willing to do now that she was a little bit older.
Which meant that she was simply going to have to rely on evasive maneuver's and avoid the hell out of her parents until they were gone again.
If that didn't work, then she'd run away from home. Sure she'd be worrying her grandpa, Sonic, Amy, Tails, Cream, Cheese, Tanaka, and Ella. But worrying them was much better than terrifying them if her parents started to flip out and tried to kill her again.
Like they had when she had been helpless in the hospital the day that Chris had died.
She still remembered the way her own father had held his hand over her nose and mouth and told her how much he wished that it had been her who had died instead of her brother. He had told her what a disappointment she was. How much he couldn't stand looking at her.
How much he hated her.
And her mother had held her arms down and told her that she had never wanted her. That the only reason she had been born at all was because her grandfather had wanted her.
If not for the fact that several doctors had walked by her room that day she had no doubt in her mind that she'd be as dead as her brother. And that knowledge pained her greatly since she had always, and still did, love her parents.
Her eyes teared up a little bit as she pulled on the clean shirt that she was wearing to school today, and tried to breathe through the painful ache forming in her chest. She had known long before Chris died that she meant nothing to her parents. They hadn't exactly gone out of their way to hide their disappointment and hatred of her.
Chris had meant everything to them.
He'd been the one that they doted on. Threw parties for. Bought expensive toys for.
She was the one that they had slapped every time she had been seen. The one who wore rags while her brother wore nice clothes. She'd been the one who hadn't been allowed outside of her room when they had company over.
It was as if she had been their dirty little secret.
And though her brother had loved her and had often cried when their parents had hurt her. It hadn't changed anything.
Just like her grandfather telling her father that he would disown him and throw him and her mother out of the house and leave them penniless if the abuse continued, hadn't changed anything. They just didn't care.
She wiped her eyes, not wanting them to be red rimmed and grabbed a small box of band aids from the bathroom and placed three on her cheek to hide the yellowish blue bruise that Teiger's fist had made on her face and studied her cheek for a second, noting that the band aids hid a majority of the bruise but not all of it. Then studied her split lip in the mirror for a second then sighed.
There was nothing that she could do about her lip, but at least the swelling had gone down so that it didn't hurt as much. She walked out of the bathroom and grabbed a rubber band and pulled her hair back into a pony tail at the back of her head.
It might be a mistake to wear her hair like this out in public, but if anyone said anything to her she'd come up with an excuse like, 'I'm a hermaphrodyte' or 'I'm gay and long hair is acceptable' or 'I'm in the middle of a sex change operation' because those were believable excuses.
Besides the highs for today were supposed to be in the hundreds and wearing her hair down would be uncomfortable and might even cause her to become over heated and pass out. Once she was done with that she grabbed a jacket and slipped it on and zipped it up then slipped on her shoes and walked over to the bedroom door and opened it and froze dead in her tracks when she noted Tails standing there with his hand raised, ready to knock.
Tails looked at her, and for a moment he had an 'oh' look on his face followed by a narrow eyed look as he looked her over from head to toe then let his expression go blank. "Sonic told us about what happened yesterday with Eggman and-" He lifted one hand and ran his fingers over his furry cheek, indicating that Sonic had told them about her being hit by what he thought was just some random person. "I came to see if you were okay since you weren't at dinner yesterday." Tails said.
She gave him a small genuinely amused smile. Oddly enough she knew that he had just figured out that she was a girl, and instead of being mad about it. All she could think was; Nice save Tails.
"I'm fine. I'm on my way downstairs to grab something to eat for breakfast before I head off to school."
"Great. I'll walk with you." Tails said cheerfully as he stepped back out of the way to let her out of the room then fell into step beside her when she started walking. He was quiet for a second then said.
"You know that if you even need to talk to someone that you can talk to me. Right?" She blinked and looked at him for a second. Understanding that Tails knew that she was hiding her gender for a reason and felt the need to let her know that if the pressure of hiding herself ever started to wear her thin, that she could talk to him.
He wouldn't tell anyone since he knew all too well how important it was sometimes to keep secrets.
It was sweet of him to offer his ear if she ever wanted to talk to someone. One that she might be tempted to take him up on if she didn't have so much metal and emotional baggage. Frankly she had decided a long time ago that it would be cruel to dump her baggage on someone else.
That was why she kept to herself.
"I know."
"But you don't want to talk about it." It wasn't a question. Merely an observation.
She gave him another small smile. This one sad. "It isn't that I don't want to talk Tails. It's more like I feel it would be cruel to talk of it."
"Cruel? How so?"
"It's complicated. And painful. And I'm not totally sure that anyone would understand my point of view or anyone elses."
"So you keep it all bottled up inside-"
She snorted. "No. Not really. I have my outlets."
"Like what?"
"Well, up until several months ago, I smoked."
Tails stopped walking and grasped her wrist, pulling her to a stop too and leaned in and sniffed her. A suspicious look on his face. "I told Sonic that you smelled like tar. But he didn't believe me. He said that you were way too smart to give in to peer pressure at school and do something stupid like smoke."
"Technically he would be right. I never smoked at school. I stole some from grandpa and let him think that he had lost them."
Tails made a humming sound and moved back away from her, his ears flattened back against his head, his dark blue eyes looked a little angry as he asked. "But you don't smoke anymore?"
"Nah. That stuff can kill you so I quit."
"Good. I'd hate for Sonic to tear you a new one over that if he ever found out."
"Threats Tails? Really?"
"Who's threatening? I was simply pointing out a fact. Sonic would be very upset with you if he knew." Tails said innocently.
"Extortionist." She hissed at him. He gave her a sunny smile, not in the least bothered by being called an extortionist. He was what he was. And unfortunately for her an extortionist was just one of those things.
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They walked the rest of the way to the kitchen in silence and once there they both walked up to the island in the middle of the room and pulled out a chair.
Preferring to sit in the kitchen and eat instead of moving to the dining room where they could hear Amy, and Sonic arguing about something in the dining room. While Ella dug around in the fridge for a second while humming and then straitened her spine and closed the fridge with one hand before turning and nearly dropping the eggs that she held in her other hand when she saw her sitting there.
"Master Chris!" The woman gasped as a horrified look crossed her face.
"Hi Ella."
"What happened to your face?" The woman asked as she finally seemed to snap out of it and set the eggs aside on the counter before walking over to her and grasping her face in her hand and tipping her head back and studied her busted lip and the bruise that she had tried to hide.
"Freak accident with a door. You know how clumsy I am." Chris lied hoping that Ella would drop the matter and just feed her already. Her stomach was starting to cramp. Ella made a humming sound and leaned in and kissed her on the cheek.
"My poor Master Chris. You always seem to get hurt by the strangest things."
"What can I say? I'm a misfortune magnet... Feed me."
"Is that any way to ask for a favor Christopher?"
"No...but I'm desperate and short on time. Feed me."
Ella and Tails both snickered a little bit as Chris started to sort of fidget in her seat. Finally after several minutes Ella put a plate down in front of her and Tails and then stood back and let them both eat.
A few minutes and two plates of food later Ella finally ventured to ask, "Are you looking forward to seeing your parents Master Chris?" Tails glanced over at the red head as she dropped her fork and lifted her head to look at the woman.
"Would you be pissed at me if I said no?"
Ella looked shocked for a second before growling, "Master Chris! How dare you use such language!"
Chris was quiet for a second, before wiping her mouth on a paper towel and standing up. "Thanks for the food Ella, I've gotta go to school now." She said quickly before running out the door.