Author Notes: So this is going to be a little weird, since Gil is kind of drugged up. Fair enough warning? I sure hope so. I'm also going to try to fit in what happened into Gil's thoughts. Shouldn't be too difficult, but because of his current condition things may get confusing. Also, fair warning, I've never taken a drug so this is like wading into water I've never touched before. I haven't really observed someone except for customers coming in to order food while they're high. Which is hilarious and annoying at the same time. Anywho.
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Incomplete
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Chapter 11: Gilbert
Having Lizzy find me was probably the luckiest break of my life. My employer turned out to be a part of the Chinese gang and a direct rival with Toni's Spanish gang. Hah. Lucky me, right? Of course, Antonio was still my friend but his help for me could only go so far when his "brothers" were watching. Blood was thicker than water, after all. Family over friends. Too bad I didn't really get the chance to understand that family bond, except for with my own brother and even that was strenuous at best sometimes.
Sure, our silly small town wasn't the center point of gang activities. Most things happened on the outskirts or deep inside New York City, which was a few hours away, but the influence reached out this far and that was all that mattered. We were like the last major point before stuff could really go down in the city. This was why I never visited New York. Not that I would try to convince you not to visit. Every major city had its bad places, but it wasn't like the entire city was full of them. No, it was just that once you were trapped in the gang circle anywhere you went with their influence was kind of a death sentence waiting to happen.
Or at least the focal point for an even greater mess. Sorry, Toni, didn't mean to fuck things up for you. It's not my fault my dad was so involved with the Chinese gang. Why the hell was he involved with them anyway? Opium? Did he get addicted? Just a seller, then, not a real member. Like me, hah! And here they were trying to get me all addicted so I'd work for them easy enough, too. Toni had saved my ass from a worse situation, but he could only help so far. Not that I was expecting much. I would like more, but...I didn't expect it.
Anyway, focusing was pretty hard with this stuff inside me, and I needed to focus because Lizzy was here. Lizzy. I smiled at the thought, seeing her green eyes twitch. She huffed and said something that I didn't catch, mumbling beneath her breath no doubt about my lower intelligence, since she seemed to do that all the time. I loved teasing her, riling her up, seeing her active. Heck, I even liked seeing how strong she could be when she was seriously pissed about something. She would make one hell of an activist, well, once she learned a better way to debate, but she sure would be fun on a march or in the midst of a riot or...
I shook my head. Damn it all. Focus. Focus, Gil.
Taking a breath to try to calm down, not like it did anything, I started to mumble something back at her. I think I was giving instructions for how to handle the knife wound on my side, but she just looked at me like I was an idiot so I was pretty sure nothing intelligent was making it out of my mouth right now. A glance to the side, a reminder of my broken flute, and I felt my chest constrict and my eyes water. Damn it all...
Focus!
"So, Lizzy," I managed to say clearly, getting her to stop whatever she was doing or thinking and look up at me. "You gonna help me walk home or not?"
"Right," I heard her say. "But first I think we should take care of this bleeding."
"Ah, it's fine," I mumbled, waving my arm in the air, and then giggling it because I was pretty sure I could feel the air. "Just gotta keep a little pressure on it."
With a smile, I watched her frown. She wasn't going to take me seriously. Hell, I don't think I would take my self seriously at this point. Giggling like a fool. Feeling air. Yeah, I was pretty gone. Damn drug had a great feeling, though. I was injured and probably in danger of blood loss but I didn't feel anything – well, not much when I didn't move – and I didn't care either. I was so fucking relaxed it was like I was dreaming or something.
Yeah. Totally had to be dreaming. No other reason for Lizzy to find me and worry about me so much. Don't get me wrong. I hated pity, but a part of me did like the idea of having a girl fret over me. I could take care of myself just fine, but having her here was...even more relaxing than the drug itself.
"Right," I heard her again. "Then I guess there's no helping it."
"Hm?" I hummed, trying to frown when her hands left my skin. I really liked having her touch me and I didn't want that little warmth to go away. "No helping what?"
She sighed and shook her head, the brown strands of hair shaking against her shoulders, circling around her back as she leaned over. I could almost not see her face anymore because of all the hair framing it, but the pose itself seemed to be one of serious concentration. So I hummed as I watched her, my brain imagining something a little unsavory as I was left to just stare at the girl of my dreams.
Hah. What? God, the drug was effecting my thoughts too. Insane shit.
The sound of ripping fabric made me actually frown. What was she doing? She wasn't tearing up her dress, was she? Why would she do that? I mean, I guess I could see the point if we were out in the middle of nowhere and she didn't have a bandage or anything to wrap around my wound, but girls liked their dresses. Why would she go and rip hers up just for me? It didn't make sense.
Except when she shifted positions and held up the plaid fabric I knew that was exactly what she had done.
"Lizzy," I protested, reaching out to grab her hand and completely missing the mark much to my chagrin. "You shouldn't have done that."
Her eyebrows raised as she quite easily pushed my hands away this time, pulling my shirt up enough to reveal the wound, even if it was sort of visible through the cut made with the knife anyway. "I do what I want, Gil."
Warmth tickled my chest again at the nickname and I fought the urge to giggle. Okay, so I giggled again like a silly junior high girl, but I honestly did try to fight it. "But, Lizzy, you didn't have to."
She didn't say anything back at first. Maybe she was focused on wrapping the dress fabric around my side. Around and around and around it went, and my eyes eventually fell to her shorter dress, licking my lips at the amount of leg she was showing. So much skin. So much I couldn't touch. Even without the drug, I think I would have been torn at seeing her dress length now; she would definitely not be allowed to wear it at school anymore, that was for sure.
"You idiot," she mumbled, smacking me lightly on the shoulder. "I told you I do what I want."
"But-"
I didn't get a chance to voice anymore of a complaint. Completely coming out of left field, her hands moved upwards, gripped my shirt collar, and I prepared for a smack to the face or something since that's what usually followed such actions. My eyes closed, wincing back at the supposed slap to the face, but something else happened instead. Warm lips touched my own, and the grip on my shirt collar pulled me in closer. I didn't know how to react. Not at all. All I could do was sit there and wonder where it came from, what was happening, believing I definitely had to be dreaming now.
Then she pulled back and huffed at me. "Don't get any weird ideas now. That was just to help you focus so we can get home easier."
I cleared my throat as she got to her feet, put my arm around her shoulders, and then helped me to my feet so we could start walking again. "Ah, okay. Focus. Right."
Because getting your first kiss from the girl of your dreams was totally a great way to focus your thoughts. Yep. No problem here at all.
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We made it back to the house eventually. Slow walk for sure. The sun went down on our way, but we kept pressing forward. All the time Lizzy kept up a mantra, a rhythm and numbering system that would have made the marching band members cry. But it was enough to keep me going and enough to get us to our destination without any falls or failures along the way.
Of course once we got home, there was the whole deal with Ludwig. My little brother freaked out like he should have, like Lizzy should have honestly, and Lizzy had to calm him down while I tried not to giggle. Which meant I was giggling like a madman while Lizzy was both yelling at me to shut up and trying to speak sweetly to Ludwig at the same time, which only made me giggle more to be honest.
Once my little brother was able to help, he did a marvelous job. Not as amazing as Lizzy, but yeah I was pretty glad to have him for a brother then. Ludwig raced to get the first aid kit while Lizzy led me to the couch. I guess we would worry about the blood stains later. Hah. Explaining to her parents was still going to happen. Except, maybe not, because Lizzy was thinking of everything apparently, even while I was stumbling around like a fucking idiot. She grabbed a few towels to place on the couch to keep the blood from touching the nice leather, and I once again just had to sit back and marvel at her thought process and how she was still willing to help keep this a secret. Missing towels was a lot easier to explain than a blood stained expensive leather couch, after all.
After getting me settled on the couch, Lizzy had me remove my shirt so she could clean the wound. I laughed because by this point cleaning was almost pointless, but I let her have her way. For one, she was going to do it whether I fought her or not, and for another, it wasn't going to hurt anything. A nice way to show off my super pale albino skin, though, something I was a little uncomfortable with since I'd been bullied for it when younger. But, heh, I had learned not to care too much, and she didn't seem to care beyond her task of cleaning the dirt and dried blood anyway.
She didn't ask any questions. She didn't pester me about the gangs or the drugs or why I got into this mess. She just did what she could to take care of me, and for that I was grateful. After the one comment about feeling sorry for me, I had been sure she'd want information and start bugging me for the reasonings. But she didn't. And when I told her not to show me pity, she did that too.
Was this the same Lizzy who had beaten me up the first week of school for daring to go along with the rumors? The same one who had shared detention with me and thrown me from my bike multiple times on the way to and from school? Yes, it was. The same girl who had caught me in a personal moment and stopped me without saying a word. The same girl who took whatever issues I had and refused to bring them up unless I did it myself.
The same girl who kissed me.
I licked my lips at the memory, wishing I could feel another kiss. One just wasn't enough, and it seemed more like a tease than anything serious. I wanted more, though, and even my drug-addled mind could agree on that much. As I watched Lizzy work hard to take care of me, I decided then and there that I had to stop fucking around with her. I wanted her. I wanted her away from Roderich, away from the wuss of a rich kid. Heh. Maybe it was the drugs thinking for me. Who was I kidding? Why would she want me? Why would she want someone stuck in the midst of a gang war? Why would I want to even bring her into that?
My life was a mess, broken and ruined just like the flute her dad had made for me. I couldn't ask Lizzy to be my girlfriend until I could promise to protect her...and there was no telling when or if that would ever happen.
~!~
It wasn't until the next night, the one before the talent show, that I realized how deep I was. And I wasn't talking about the drug dealing gang fighting problem, either.
Sitting outside Antonio's shack of a house – a place where he lived with his older brother and younger sister – I smoked on a cigarette and chatted with the best friend who had abandoned me. Lizzy would have probably been mad to know I smoked, but it went with the image and attitude and was a little hard to deny. Not to mention, it was a good excuse to use when drug dealers came calling. You know, 'no thanks, man, I'm already regretting the cigarette decision; not gonna add another one to it.'
Granted, I had an itch for more opium anyway, but that was because my employer and his men had to beat the shit out of me and then force the drug on me. Yeah, I'd rather not talk too much on it, but the itch to have more was still there, especially because of the pain still present in my side. When you have the option of taking something for pain resisting starts to become a serious problem. I was hanging on, though. I was holding on with everything I had, and smoking a cigarette with a friend in hopes that it would help calm a part of the itch. At least that part was working fine.
"Mi amigo," Antonio muttered beside me, leaning against the wall looking a little out of touch with reality, but that was Toni almost all the time. "My city contact sold some more for you, but tensions are high now."
There was accusation in his voice. Accusation. Like it was my fault he was having a tough time with his gang. I guess, from his point of view, it was my fault. His decision to help me sell the stash by using his contacts had led to a greater mess than either of us could have foreseen. Of course, from Toni's view, I should have been able to figure out who my employer was before accepting the deal. Toni had been dealing with this for a long time and still couldn't accept my story as the full truth or my best effort.
"I honestly didn't know, Toni," I said, blowing smoke into the night air. "What would you have done if I'd known, though? If I had been able to tell you who it was, what would you have changed?"
Antonio shrugged. "Not much. I would have known to proceed with more caution, but I still would have helped, amigo."
"Then stop bitching at me for it every five minutes."
Toni sighed. He wasn't quite as happy as I remembered. Then again, if you managed to catch either of my friends alone in their house facing their own problems neither one were very happy. Except for Francis. His happy wasn't really faked, even if he dreamed of better things. Francis at least had a mother. I had a dumb ass for a father, and Toni...well Toni didn't have either. We had grown up fending for ourselves, and we both kept the gang problems and drug issues – and the problems with my dad for the most part – a secret from Francis. So much for the trio. If he ever found out, he'd probably murder us both for being terrible friends.
Oh well. I was as good as dead anyway. It didn't matter much to me how it happened now.
"Lo siento, amigo," Toni went on in that Spanish language of his; I could understand most of what he said nowadays, but that was probably only because I was busy working with him and his gang members now. "Pero...I don't think we can sell it all by Christmas."
"Yeah," I grumbled, flicking the cigarette butt into the rocks out front. "You said that the first time."
Antonio's normally bright green eyes appeared sad as he frowned, another pose I wasn't used to seeing from him. "It is so much, amigo."
With a grunt, I stood up and stretched, wincing slightly at the pull to my knife wound. "Yeah. At this point, I think it's a setup to trap me indefinitely."
"Probably," Toni murmured. "Such is life."
In the chill air, those words made me shiver more than the incoming breeze. Leaves rustled in the trees, some of them falling at the wind. The earth was going to begin its cycle of death soon. Death and rebirth repeated constantly. Being a tree probably sucked, but at this point I wanted to be anyone else, anything else, anywhere else.
"Hey," I said after the wind died down, holding my hands in my autumn jacket pockets. "That line belongs to Francis."
Antonio laughed, the typical brightness returning to his demeanor. I loved being able to make people laugh, and Toni loved to find things to laugh at. No wonder we made such good friends. "I am sure Francis would not mind if I translated his favorite saying when stealing it."
I rolled my eyes. Francis did like to spout out fake French or anything French sounding he could pick up. Whereas Antonio was legitimately Spanish, having immigrated from Spain with his family at a very young age, Francis had only discovered the French in his family line and declared then and there that he was French enough to speak however he pleased. Even if the rest of us knew he sounded fake, something I had laughed with Lizzy about early on when she got to meet the three of us under better circumstances.
"Whatever," I mumbled, kicking at a red leaf, watching it swirl around the air before settling down a few feet from where I kicked it. If that didn't show how much control I had of my life, nothing would. "I'm gonna head home. See ya at school tomorrow."
"Your home?" Toni's voice echoed, a clear peppy laugh imbued in the words. "Or Lizzy's?"
Despite myself, I turned and took the bait, my face heating. "Hey shut up. It's not my fault her parents took us in when my dad was arrested."
Antonio shifted his position, still smiling like a loon. "She took care of you, huh?"
And if that didn't make my face flush, nothing else would. "Uhm. Yeah."
A quiet moment drifted between the two of us, sliding in and out and taking all the sounds of the world with it. My thoughts returned to the moment of Lizzy finding me at the tree, worrying, fretting, helping, kissing. Even with the drug out of my system, I couldn't get the image, the feel, or the taste out of my mind. My tongue longed to touch hers, instead of the simply kiddie lip lock of the kiss that shouldn't have meant as much as it did.
Spanish words broke me from the longing daydream. "Lo siento, amigo."
When that was all he said, I raised an eyebrow, noting the puff of breath I could see in the air. "Huh?"
"Sorry," he repeated in English this time. "About your flute."
Immediately, my chest tightened. My stomach dropped. The tears threatened. If you didn't own an instrument you wouldn't understand. Once something precious was taken from you at an early age, and then a second chance presented itself into your hands only to be ruined worse than the first time... It was like trying something difficult and failing harder the second time, even if both times had not been your fault. Well, not directly your fault.
"Oh," I managed. "Right."
"I'm sure you can find another way to impress her, amigo."
I didn't look up at him. I didn't have to. All I had to do was turn around, shrug, and start my walk back to the house, reminded once more of the love I craved and the little chance I had of ever seeing that craving being satisfied. "I doubt that."
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A/N: A little more emo than I would prefer to see from Gil, but everyone goes through these kinds of stages. Again, I think he has reason, and his outward show is much more tough-guy I-don't-care so at least it's the inward personal problem I understand it to be and not some show of being needy. At least I hope the emo doesn't come out too strong. I'm usually so good with Gil's personality but for some reason I threw too much on his plate this time and he's stumbling along trying to deal with it all. I guess.
~Reda
