I'm sick. My sinuses are stuffy. So stuffy that my left nostril feels like it's having a baby. Um…after that awkward moment of too much information, lemme just say that I'm very happy with the reviews I got for the last chapter! Mucho thankies guys!!! You make my face feel better! Again a little bit too much information…just ignore me, OK?
Disclaimer: I don't own Gakuen Alice. If I did, it would be more Tsubasa/Misaki centered…I think.
SWIMMING IN THE FLOOD by Passion Pit
What can I do?
The river's overrun
We're swimming in a flood, you know?
I thought I felt your touch
But the water's rising up
Misaki bit her lip. Again.
"You can tell me, you know," Tsubasa grumbled. He leaned against a tree in the hospital grounds and Misaki moved next to him.
"Tell you what?" Misaki asked, immediately on defense. Tsubasa grinned and a bad feeling swept over Misaki. Whoops.
"Either you really want to say something, or you're purposely biting your lip in a tantalizing way in an effort to sedu—"
"Don't finish that sentence if you want to have children some day."
"Sure thing," Tsubasa squeaked, knowing that she meant it completely. He recovered quickly. "So are you going to tell me?"
"Huh?"
"Don't play dumb," Tsubasa snorted, rolling his eyes. Misaki cursed his ability to notice things when she didn't want him to.
"What if I want to play dumb?" Misaki retorted.
"So you admit to playing dumb?"
Misaki let out a parade of profanities that made up for her lack of them in previous years. Again with him noticing things. Boys were supposed to be oblivious!
"You can tell me," Tsubasa repeatedly more gently. It reminded Misaki of the time Mikan had tried to coax a squirrel out of its home. In the end, the squirrel had tried to attack Mikan, much to Natsume's amusement.
"I was thinking of when I was a little kid," Misaki said slightly evasively.
"I bet that must've been interesting," Tsubasa noted. Misaki closed her pink eyes and memories flashed.
Red stains on the carpet. They looked like blood but no, no, no they weren't. Wine, her father said after he patched them both up. But the stain…the smell...the glass.
"Fascinating," Misaki said and for the first time in her life, the need to tell someone else swept over her in a wave of unexpected emotion. Tsubasa didn't say anything. Didn't even look at her expectantly. It was like he just…knew. He wasn't going to make her tell him, he was only offering an ear.
Damn it all…
"Want to listen?" she asked softly.
"Only if you want to talk," he said and Misaki was gone, back to places she spent most of her time trying to forget.
"Daddy…does Mommy not love me?" Misaki asked quietly. Her father stared down at his sad eight-year-old daughter who was on the brink of tears.
"No, Mommy is just…she's really sick," he said in an attempt at an explanation.
"But she'll be fine in a few days, right?" she asked. One glance at her father's face crushed the thought.
"It's a little bit more than that," her father replied. Misaki touched the mark on her arm where her mother's iron grip had been.
"Does it make her not love me?" It would only make sense. Her mother was fine at first, but then something weird started.
"Misaki, your mother will always love you," the man promised quietly. An angry scream echoed through the house.
"Get back here!" the monster roared and Misaki winced.
"Stay here," her father ordered and walked down the pearly white carpeted stairs. Voices snapped at each other. Misaki wanted to cover her ears, but her body was frozen still. She heard snippets of the fight. It was her fault. Her teacher had called about Misaki rolling in the mud. Mountain Monstrosity had exploded and her father struggled to protect Misaki from it all. But she wasn't deaf to any of it.
"We need to talk to her about this behavior!"
"It might be a little late for that!" her father snapped. Misaki inched out of her room and watched the fight from the balcony.
"I don't know what you're talking about," the monster raged.
"Hurting her isn't going to make her want to talk to you," her father said sharply. More screams and arguing. Loud sounds of breaking things. Misaki crawled toward the stairs, hidden by the blanket of her parents' oblivion. They were too busy yelling to see her as she creeped her way down the steps. The carpet used to feel so soft....
This is all my fault.
Tears fell at words in her mind and the frail girl pulled herself into a small ball. Breaking slowly, bit by bit.
"I HATE YOU!"
Misaki glanced up to see her mother reach back into the cabinet where the glass things were kept. The monster seized them, one by one throwing them in every direction. One shattered against the wall near Misaki and glass fell down, some pieces coming close to her. She closed her eyes and let it all fade away. The flood came crashing down at last.
The next morning she was in bed, tucked up tight with two band-aides on her arm. Her father was sleeping by her door like a knight, hiding the princess away from the beast.
"Oh," Misaki breathed and the pointless tears that she didn't understand returned again. Her father jolted up and stared only for a moment. Quickly he was by her side, trying to help despite the fact that she was beyond comfort.
"She hates me," she sobbed hysterically.
"Not you, sweetheart, she can't hate you. It's me, just me," her father chanted over and over again.
"Where is she?"
"She left last night. I don't know where she went."
"Is she coming home?"
"I don't know, Misaki. I don't know." Misaki didn't want her to which made her feel horrible. She was a terrible daughter.
Hand-in-hand they walked downstairs to find breakfast. Misaki stared at the living room with sick fascination. Glass was stuck in the carpet all around the room and there were speckles of red.
"What—"
"Wine."
Lie. Lielielielielielielielie lying liar. Why lie to me?
Misaki remained silent as she ate the toast on cinnamon bread with sugar on top that her father made for her. There was a loud sound as the door opened and the monster strode in. She walked into the kitchen and set down a bag of groceries.
"Get someone to clean up the living room," she said calmly.
Silence followed. After a long pause, her mother spoke up again.
"What are you two staring at?" she demanded. No answer came so she walked away. She acted like nothing happened. It became a cycle. There would be a fight—although Misaki and her father rarely fought back—and the monster would leave. She would return and things would go back to normal. Secretly Misaki wished the monster would admit to the fight. Because that would mean the monster was accepting that she was doing wrong. Then maybe, maybe, maybe they could all move along.
"We have to keep everything quiet, Misaki," the monster explained "otherwise there will be people all around the house. They'll separate all of us and they won't leave us alone." So Misaki remained quiet.
A year later, her father would leave for work as quickly as possible. Like debris from a flood being whisked away, they all grew distant. Misaki decided to become what her mother wanted so badly to keep things calm. She went on like a robot, following commands without words. She didn't cry anymore. She wouldn't let herself cry anymore. She wouldn't let herself be vulnerable to anyone. Ever.
Silently, Misaki drowned, unable—or maybe not wanting—to find to surface. She would forget. She wanted to forget.
She forgot.
Until she remembered.
By then she was shaking slight and gripping herself, eyes wide. Tsubasa counted the tears that fell. One tear, two tears, three tears...it got to ten before he snapped. He grabbed her and pulled her as tightly to her as humanly possible. She didn't move away. Of course it probably wouldn't have mattered if she did because Tsubasa would hold her, keep her in one piece no matter what. For a reason he wasn't ready to ponder on, watching her crumble was more painful than it should've been if his plans were going accordingly. Probably not a good sign, but in the moment it didn't matter.
Silence fell over them because for the first time in a long time, Misaki actually, truly, really cried and for the first time in a long time, Tsubasa actually, truly, really cared that someone was hurting other than Kaname or himself.
"Thank you," Misaki said finally.
"For what?"
"Letting me babble and blubber." She smiled slightly.
"Any time, Misaki. Any time." He meant it.
Her tears had stopped, but he hadn't let her go. Misaki closed her eyes and breathed deeply. She was ready.
She surfaced. At long last, she was swimming in the flood instead of drowning in it.
Well...that turned out differently than I planned. Venting is now my new favorite thing ever. I just had a realization! I have a weird obsession with metaphors! Sorry about that.... Anyway, you all know you want to review and tell me about how corny and cliché this chapter was. So go ahead and do it. It'll make me want to update faster and hey, maybe next time I won't use corny metaphors that are totally cliché! Or maybe I will……Yeah, I probably will.
