Warnings: Boylove, swearing, violence, mentions of anorexia, self harm, paedophilia, and of course, the horrible butchering of Kingdom Hearts and Final Fantasy characters.
Pairings: AkuRoku, Zemyx, XigDem, MeganxSeifer, some MarVex, possibly Cleon later on... what? I'm a fangirl, so sue me!
This is my first fanfic, so if you guys hate it... well, I don't blame you. Feel free to flame me, but just so you know, every time you flame a fanfiction, a chocobo dies...
Oh, and I don't own these characters, which is probably for the best, since I would do things to Axel that would... ANYWAY, on with the story!
Demyx
Everyone just kept touching me.
On the bus. In the halls. In lessons. Everywhere I went, people bumped into me, brushed against me, walked too close to me, and now I was almost about to scream. I could hardly breathe, barely knew which lesson I was trying to get to, and wanted nothing more than to escape to my room with a knife and –
"Demyx?" Oh, God, Zexion. "Are you okay, babe?"
"No," I whimpered, recoiling when he went to take hold of my hand. "I can't – I just – it's like – ugh! I just can't – I just –" I couldn't get the words out, if there were even any words in my head to start with.
"Demyx, just breathe, yeah? What lesson do you have now?"
I bit my lip. "Uh, um, French. And then English."
"Okay, babe, I'll walk you to French, yeah? Just keep calm." He went to hold my hand again but I whimpered and shied away from him. "Demyx, what's wrong?"
"I... I just –" I took a deep breath. "It's just, my head's just so full of stuff, I can't breathe, people keep touching me and being too loud and this school is too small and I don't want you to leave and my cat already left me and Megan's gonna die and Roxas isn't anywhere and what if he's dead and –"
"Demyx." I stopped, realising too late that my voice had steadily got more and more high-pitched and less and less understandable. "Calm down, babe. Your cat will come back, of course Megan isn't gonna die, she's Megan for fuck's sake, Roxas is probably just with Axel, and even if I do leave, I'll still call you and email you and visit in the holidays –"
"What if you forget?" I asked, feeling tears gathering in my eyes. "What if you stop caring about me?"
"I couldn't stop caring about you even if I tried." We stopped just short of my French classroom and Zexion laced his arms around my waist. "You're the single most beautiful person I have ever met in my life. How the hell could I stop caring about you?"
"Well, apart from anything else, I don't do the stuff you wanna do." Because all the stuff you wanna do is really weird and icky and I don't understand what you're trying to do half the time anyway. "So what if you find someone prettier than me who wants to do all that stuff, and you just forget all about me because you're too busy with them?"
"First of all, I doubt I could ever find anyone prettier than you, and second, just because you don't wanna do stuff doesn't mean I want to run off and find someone who does, it just means that I have to wait a while for you to be comfortable with it. Demyx, sweetheart, I really do love you."
"I love you too, Zexy." I leaned down and kissed him on the cheek, feeling his face stretch into an almost-smile. "I've gotta get to French. I'll see you soon, okay?"
"Okay, Demyx. Keep calm during French, all right? No freaking out. Promise?"
"Promise," I nodded, letting go of Zexion and stepping into my French classroom.
My French lesson was full of "Demyx, stop clicking that pen" and "Please could you stop drumming on the table?" and eventually "If you don't stop being disruptive you'll be in detention" and then "Right, that's it, detention, tomorrow night" which put me in an even worse mood than I had been before. I spent the last five minutes of the lesson biting my own thumbs, the urge to make myself bleed getting worse and worse with every passing second.
The second the bell went I leapt out of my seat, snatched up my folder and my back, and shimmied around my desk rather than trying to get past Larxene so I could just get to English.
"Dem? You okay?"
I just shook my head and fell into Xigbar's arms, screwing my face up as tears started falling and sobs started shaking my entire body. "I... I'm sorry..."
"Why are you sorry, Dem? What's happened?" He rubbed my back, swaying slightly on the spot. I could barely breathe, let alone speak, and Xigbar seemed to understand that, because he didn't ask again. "Okay, DemDem, it's okay. You'll be okay."
After about ten minutes of just clinging to him, half-listening to him alternating between giving the rest of the class instructions and whispering in my ear to calm me down, I was able to talk. "I've had the worst day ever."
"You wanna talk about it?" he asked, sitting down on an armchair and pulling me onto his lap with him.
"Well, my cat's disappeared, and I'm scared that she's lost or sick or injured or..." I shook my head, not wanting to think too hard about all the horrible things that could have befallen Bowie. "And Zexion's been offered a place at Traverse University and he really wants to go, and I can't find Rox anywhere and I'm scared that something's happened to him, and Megan's looking worse and worse every day and what if she dies, Xigbar? What if she ends up in hospital and there's no one to save me from Dad, no one to help me when I can't sleep, nobody to sing while doing the laundry and make me laugh and watch Spongebob with me and..."
"Okay, Dem, okay. First off, I know exactly where Roxas is. Axel asked me to cover for them, they've both skipped school to hang out and eat ice cream." I sighed. That was one thing taken care of, at least. "Zexion is, well, a prick, but he really does love you, and he wouldn't just fuck off and leave you, okay? And if he does, well, I'll have you all to myself, right?" I giggled even though my face was covered in half-dried tears and I was hiccuping now and again. "But seriously, he wouldn't just up and leave. As for Megan, well, in all honesty I think she's going to just drop one day, just faint out of exhaustion, and then she'll go to hospital and she'll get the help she needs whether she likes it or not. But you shouldn't have to worry about her, right?" He reached up and started dabbing at the tears on my cheeks with his sleeve. "You're too young to be worrying about everything all the damn time. Just relax and be a kid, yeah?"
I sighed. "But the thing is that we don't have any adults in my family. My dad just goes off and works or something, and then every now and then he comes back and he yells at us, especially at me because I'm so gay and sometimes Megan because she always talks back..."
Xigbar wrapped a hand over my mouth to keep me from talking, and I almost smiled. "Enough of that. You don't need to think about your dad right now. You're in school. Just forget about all the horrible shit you've got going on at home, and enjoy my fabulous company."
I pulled his hand away from my face. "I love you, Xiggy. Don't forget that."
"I love you too, DemDem." He held me tight and kissed the side of my head. "You haven't hurt yourself or anything, right?"
"No, I haven't." Apart from biting myself a little, but that barely counts.
"Okay. You know if you have, I won't be mad at you, right? It isn't your fault."
"It upsets you, though," I said quietly, remembering how shocked he'd looked when he'd first seen my arms. "It's so gross..."
"Of course it upsets me. I hate the idea of you hurting even a little bit. When I see you crying, I want to cry too. I just..." He sighed. "I don't think that getting mad at you, or making a point about how bad I feel about all of it, I don't think that that would help you at all, would it?"
"No, it wouldn't," I said quietly, taking one of his hands and putting my fingers into the gaps between his. Perfect fit. "But you deserve to be upset too, you know. And it's, like... it's so icky. I hate the fact that the blood gets everywhere and it stings afterwards. And I just..."
"I know, gorgeous, I know." Xiggy sighed and shifted me slightly on his lap so that I was more comfortable. "I'm sorry that everything is so shitty."
"Oh, yeah, because it's clearly your fault." I rolled my eyes. "You know, I, um, I... I tried to kill myself once." Once, yeah, let's go with that. "But I didn't, because of Zex, and because of you."
"Just because of us? Not because of your siblings or your cat or anything?"
I grinned. "Well, you know, maybe a little..."
There was suddenly a flurry of giggles on the other side of the room and I looked up to see Xion and a couple of her friends hurriedly making an effort to look anywhere except Xigbar and I. Aw, how cute, they thought that they weren't totally obvious. Still, I doubted they were saying anything totally evil, and apart from anything else, I don't really care about the opinions of girls my age, because very few of them are actually deeper than the average puddle.
"I really am worried about Meg, though. Seifer said something earlier –"
"Oh, God, Dem, don't listen to Seifer, he's a fucking idiot."
"I know, but still. He just mentioned that, you know, she doesn't get round to eating as often as she should, and she stays up all night sometimes so that she doesn't have bad dreams, and just that, you know, it's not really all that healthy..."
Xigbar sighed. "If you need me to, I can get the school nurse on her case, or even Social Services, but that would mean a whole lot of disruption for you and your brother..."
"Speaking of disruption, I got a detention in French today because I kept drumming on the table and clicking my pen and basically doing everything I could to keep myself from... you know..." I swallowed. "I really am trying, Xiggy."
"I know you are. Who's your French teacher, Belle? I can have a word with her if you like, see if we can't get that detention taken back, yeah?" I nodded. "Are you going to be okay tonight at home?"
"Yeah. Roxas made Megan confiscate my knife, anyway." Although I have a whole plethora of other things I could use if I tried, but I was trying not to think about that at all. "And I'll try and stay out of my room if I can, stay around Meg, you know."
Xigbar nodded. "Good boy. I don't wanna put any pressure on you or anything, but if you can avoid doing it..."
"Yeah, I know. It's really ugly, apart from anything else."
"Ugly? You? Yeah, of course. And I suppose the earth is flat and cookies are made out of turtles." Xigbar rolled his eye and then his face broke into a smile. "You really are gorgeous, you know that?"
"So are you," I returned almost automatically, because it didn't really require any thought, he really is just amazing. "Don't forget that, all right?"
He nodded. "I won't if you don't, all right?"
I smiled. "I love you."
"Love you too. You want a cookie?"
Like he even had to ask.
Megan
"Megan." Roxas was mildly irritated with me and my zoning out. "Listen to me, yeah?"
"I am listening. You want to spend the night at Axel's place, right?" It was a wild guess, but really, how wrong could I be?
"Yeah. Is that okay with you?"
"Of course it is, bro. Be careful, don't scare his parents, you know, the usual." I waved a careless hand, shuffling forwards in the queue to get onto the bus, Demyx clinging to my hand for dear life.
"Promise you'll eat dinner? And breakfast? And get a decent amount of sleep?" Roxas pressed, crossing his arms like he was the responsible one or something. Aww, how cute.
"Rox, I'm the older one, and I look after you. I'll be fine, don't worry. I'm a capable human being."
"It's not about whether you're –"
"Hey, Roxie." For once I was glad to see Axel wrap his arms around my brother and grin at me. "Hey, Meggy."
"Hey, Axie. Make sure he washes his face before he goes to bed, yeah?" Axel chuckled as Roxas went pink. "Be good, you two."
Dem and I got on the bus, picking out our favourite seats and getting settled for the half-hour journey home. I noticed Zexion looking over at us, doing some sort of non-verbal communication with Demyx, and picking a seat on his own. Smart kid, I was still pissed at him for being a dick to Dem.
"Megan?" I looked up at Demyx, who was regarding me with worried watercolour eyes and suddenly looking his age, or older, rather than the usual hopeful little kid in a seventeen-year-old body. "I need to ask you something."
"Ask away, Dem." I couldn't look him in the eye any more. He looked so... not himself. So mature.
"Do you always do the stuff you say you're gonna do?"
"Yeah, of course," I said easily, pulling my feet up onto my chair and resting my chin on my knees. "Why?"
"I'm not talking about things like beating people up and forging notes for me and Rox and skipping class and things like that. I know you do that. I'm talking about when you say things like "Oh, yeah, I'll have lunch in just a minute" or "I'm going to bed now" or whatever." He took hold of my hand. Very few people are allowed to touch me, especially my hands, my neck and my knees, but Dem was an exception. "Do you really look after yourself properly?"
"Yeah..." I said more slowly. "I mean, I do skip the odd meal or whatever, but teenage girls do that, you know? I'm still a healthy weight –"
"Are you? The bathroom scales are broken, Meg. Have been for, what, three months? You couldn't know. If you were a healthy weight three months ago, you won't be now because you've lost so much."
"I haven't," I said, shrugging. "Anyway, I was like, a couple pounds overweight last time I weighed myself, so now I'm –"
"Megan, you have never been so much as an ounce overweight in your entire life. When you first came home, when you were little, Lisa completely freaked out because you were too thin. Don't you remember? For, like, a week it was all cookies and chips and all your favourite foods, and if you left even so much as a mouthful you weren't allowed to listen to your MP3 player. You remember that?"
"Vaguely..." In truth I remembered precisely the rage I had felt when Lisa had taken my MP3 player from me and refused to give it back until I ate everything she wanted me to eat. In hindsight I think that she must have had a set amount of calories I had to have every day. "Look, Dem, I'll gain weight if it'll make you happy. It's just that sometimes I forget to eat, that's all."
There was the sound of a chocolate bar being unwrapped and Demyx handed it to me. "Go on, then."
I genuinely didn't care about the food. I wasn't Naminé. I took it and ate it, then went back to staring out of the window.
"We worry about you, Meg," Demyx said softly, screwing up his chocolate wrapper and slipping it into his pocket. "Not just me and Roxas but Naminé and Marluxia and Yuffie and Xion and all those people you think don't care about you. You're kind of a big presence at school, Megan. People all notice you, and I think they'd all miss you. A lot."
I fought the urge to laugh. "Yeah, sure they would."
"They would, Megan. Even the ones that avoid you like crazy because they think you're, well, crazy. People like you, Megan."
I sighed. "Dem, you're so naïve..." I whispered, knowing he couldn't even hear me.
The only other interesting thing that happened during that journey was a huge bump in the road that made Yuffie topple over and laugh hysterically.
We arrived home to find Dad semi-conscious on the sofa with a beer can in his hand, which was not a fun thing to find when you get home. I sent Demyx to sneak upstairs and do some homework or some shit; just as long as he was quiet, it was okay.
I spent about an hour tiptoeing up and down the stairs looking for my favourite jeans, because I had misplaced them and I was kind of sort of hoping to go to some kind of party that some kind of a blonde fuck-up may or may not have been planning. Because his parents never fucking came home. Not that it was any of my business, especially considering I had thoroughly bitched him out this morning.
Demyx emerged from his room after an hour, his face an absolute picture of happiness. "Meg!" he hissed, flapping a hand to get my attention. "Meg, Bowie came back!"
"That's great, Dem!" I whispered. "Listen, have you seen my jeans with the silver bit? I can't find them anywhere and –"
"Kids?" Oh. Fuck. "Megan? Demyx? Roxas?"
"Go back into your room, Demyx," I muttered, slipping back down the stairs to take the brunt of Dad's drunken rage. Or maybe just drunken confusion, I don't really know yet. "Dad?"
"It's you! You slut!" Hm. Implying I ever get any. "You did it, didn't you?"
"Did what, exactly?" I asked quietly, deciding that I didn't need any yelling or violence if I could avoid it.
"You killed Lisa!"
"Um, no..." I bit my lip. "I'm pretty sure she had a heart attack, Dad. I didn't give her that heart attack. How about you go to bed?"
"You little bitch, you killed my wife!" Dad lunged at me and without thinking I started running up the stairs, getting to the one that was second from the top before realising that I had just led him towards Demyx. Out of the corner of my eye I could see the frying pan that was broken, sitting on the landing windowsill for some unexplained reason, and decided not to rule it out as a self-defence option. "Get back here, I'll kill you!"
I really didn't need to end up in a fight with my drunk adoptive "father", so I took another step up, and Dad followed me, eyes narrowed and breathing heavy. "Look, I really don't wanna hurt you, but –"
"Megan, get into my room!" Demyx was standing with his door open, beckoning me over. Without thinking twice I turned and sprinted into his room, hearing him slam and lock the door behind us. "We... we should be safe here." Demyx took a deep breath. "I'm sorry, I should've stepped in sooner than that, I'm the older one –"
"Don't worry," I cut across him swiftly, bending down to stroke the cat that was winding itself around my ankles. "This is Bowie, huh?"
"Yeah, it is. Isn't she gorgeous?" Demyx grinned. "I found her in the back garden when I was..." He trailed off, clearly reluctant to tell me why he was in the back garden.
"What were you doing out there, Dem?" He was silent. "C'mon, you can tell me. I don't bite, you know."
He chuckled. "Yeah, I know, but..."
"Come on. I'll tell you something. You can have one free question."
Demyx sat down on the floor and I sat down next to him, Bowie curling up on his lap. "Um... well..." There was a loud bang on the door and he grabbed my hand, clearly terrified. "Is that Dad?" he whispered, eyes wide.
"Yeah. Don't let it bother you, he can't get in." I shifted so that I could peer at Demyx's cat. She didn't look injured, and she didn't look pregnant, either, which was my big worry because I doubt Dem would be able to cope with looking after kittens as well as a cat and, most importantly, himself. "So come on, tell me why you were in the garden."
"I was playing with the pond. I wanted to see whether I could talk to water."
"Ooh!" I squealed, sounding momentarily very teenage girlish. "Could you?"
"Well... a little..." I bounced slightly on the spot, suddenly very excited. "I've kinda been practising and I can summon water now, look." He held both hands out in front of him, cupped and steady, and took a deep breath as a pulsating ball of water slowly took shape just above his curved fingers. "It's really cool, huh?"
"Demyx, this is amazing," I breathed, as the water span and formed random, abstract shapes. "That's... wow. You taught yourself to do that?"
"Yup. Kinda like with instruments. It feels like playing an instrument, actually. Except without the sound, which is a little disconcerting." Bowie was purring loudly from Dem's lap as another thump came from the landing, followed by Dad's drunken voice swearing. "Megan, I'm scared." The water was suddenly gone and he took hold of one of my hands again.
"Don't be. We're safe in your room. You have the door locked, right?" He nodded, burying the hand that wasn't clutching mine in Bowie's thick black fur. I had to wonder whether she was a good thing for him, really. Kept him company, at the very least, and gave him something to be responsible for all on his own. The thing about cats is that they are capable of catching their own food, so if he was underfeeding her, she would just wander off and kill herself a pigeon or two. And the thing is that sometimes all Demyx needed was something or someone to cuddle with, and in spite of being a relatively capable sister, I fail at cuddling. Roxas is okay, or so I'm told, but really Demyx is the only hugger in our family.
"At least Roxas is safe," Demyx muttered, his hand tightening around mine. "He and Axel are so cute together, aren't they?"
"Yeah, they are." I bit my lip. I didn't want to think too hard about my little brother being cute somewhere with that annoying redheaded dick, even if he was an annoying redheaded dick that made Roxas happy. "So, Dem... Zexion and Xigbar."
"I was waiting for you to bring them up," he said, smiling slightly. "I guess even when things are really bad," he pointed towards the door, on the other side of which Dad was still stumbling around drunkenly, "you're a nosy little so-and-so, huh?"
"You love it though," I teased, kicking off my shoes because, hey, I may as well get comfy. "So, come on, who are you leaning towards at the moment?"
"Well... I don't know. The whole thing with Traverse Uni has got me thinking just how much I would miss Zexion if he left me. And he was so sweet about it, Megan, he's promised that if he does go then he'll text and call and everything, but..."
"But?" I prompted, hoping for a proclamation about Xigbar next, and preferably one that would cheer Naminé up, because she had been down lately too. (I think things were getting a bit kind of stale between her and Luxord, but you know, I didn't want to mention it to her until she was ready to talk.)
"But Xiggy was really sweet about everything as well. Like, he doesn't care that I'm seeing Zex as well, and he doesn't seem to mind holding me and listening to me whining about Zexion, as long as I'm okay, you know what I mean?"
"That's because Xigbar really really loves you and wants to make sure that you're okay no matter what, Dem," I said quietly, scratching a bug bite of some kind on my right arm. "What if Xigbar left? Would you miss him as much as you'd miss Zexion?"
"Yeah, I would," Demyx said slowly. "But the thing is that I think I'd trust Xigbar a little more, you know? Like, he would call me exactly when he promised to and he wouldn't even look at anyone else, whereas Zexion..." Demyx frowned. "I don't know. He did promise to keep in touch and not cheat or anything, even though it's kind of a weird promise to make because I'm technically cheating on him with Xigbar..."
"You are going to have to make up your mind one way or another, Demyx," I said. "I'm not saying now, or even soon, but they aren't going to wait around forever, either of them." You're also going to have to figure out sex sometime soon, but I'll leave that for Roxas to explain.
Demyx sighed heavily. "I know, I know. Anyway... you said I was entitled to one free question about you."
"Ah, yeah, I did say that." I was pretty confident that Demyx couldn't ask me anything that I wouldn't really want to answer. "Go ahead, then, do your worst."
"Hm..." He regarded me with a tilted head and thoughtful eyes. "You and Seifer. Tell me everything."
"There are parts I can't really tell you..." Most of those parts involve oral. "But, well... I was really in love with him." I think that was actually the first time I had admitted that. "And, well, I didn't want to go out with him or anything, because I was scared of ruining what was already there. But it got to the point when we were, to all intents and purposes, a couple." I sighed and closed my eyes, remembering, immersing myself in bittersweet half-memories. "He would get so jealous," I laughed, "and I would get pissed at him for the littlest things, you know, like I was his fucking wife or something, and everyone would refer to us as Seifer-and-Megan, instead of, you know, Seifer... and Megan." If Demyx didn't know what the fuck I was on about he didn't let it show. "And things were tense, yeah, but in an electric, dangerous, fun way, and I wouldn't have given it up for the world, except..."
"Something happened, didn't it?"
"Yeah," I said softly, "something really did. And I don't know... I just realised that I cared about him far too much. And I didn't want that, didn't need that. I was scared of getting hurt, so I hurt him instead. I'm kinda selfish that way."
"You're not selfish, Meg. Domineering sometimes, reckless and clueless and thoughtless, yeah. But also loving and sweet and understanding and honest and the best little sister I could have. And I really, really love you." Demyx was holding my hand again, and really, I didn't mind half as much as I should have, because he was my brother and he was an exception. "So what's going on with you and Seifer now?"
"Well, he keeps pestering me. And I don't know whether he just wants me to be his little lapdog or some shit, or whether he really does care about me and miss me the way he says he does. The thing is, he's so manipulative, but he's also so damn vulnerable, and I really don't wanna hurt him any more than I already have..."
Demyx sighed. "Megan, I think that you need to put yourself and your feelings first for a change. If you like him, just tell him that and see where it takes you."
"Well, I would, but... well, apart from anything else, I was a complete bitch to him this morning and I don't want to have to apologise to him, you know?" Demyx nodded. "But... I guess I have to, really."
"You don't have to do anything you don't want to do," Demyx said slowly. "By the way... you know all the weird stuff Zexion does to me... did Seifer ever do that to you? Is it, like, normal?"
"What, you mean touching you in weird places and trying to take off your clothes and that?" Demyx nodded. "Well, yeah, he did. But that doesn't really make it normal. Just... don't let him do anything that you aren't comfortable with, and all the rest of it. I'm assuming you've heard this before?"
"Yeah, from you, and from Xiggy. Oh, and Marly kind of mentioned it in passing." Good old Marly. I really should ask him about Vexen when I can be bothered. "You know, I'm starving."
"I don't think it's the best of ideas to leave your room at the moment, Demyx," I said, listening to Dad kicking a wall and muttering about how he was going to kill "that insolent slut" which probably meant me, although, repeat, that's implying I ever get any. "Let's wait until he falls asleep or something, yeah?"
Demyx nodded. "So much for making sure you eat plenty because you've lost so much weight."
"I know, Dem, I know. I'm really glad I have you around to look after me, you know."
"Even though you're the one who does most of the looking after in this family." Demyx pulled a face. "We need real parents. Maybe Nami's parents will adopt us and she'll be our sister."
"Yeah, but then Cloud would be our brother so we couldn't enjoy his cuteness any more," I pointed out, and Demyx grimaced. "What would be really great is if Axel's parents decided to take us in after Roxas and Axel get married. I really like Axel's parents."
"Apparently his grandma is real nice too," Demyx said.
"Ooh, he has a grandma? I wanna meet her, I bet she's awesome. Hey, does Axel have any siblngs?"
Demyx shrugged. "I dunno, Roxas never mentioned..."
"I think there are a few things that Roxas hasn't mentioned," I muttered, thinking mostly of things I had overheard and couldn't be bothered to confront Roxas about. "So... I reckon we're gonna be in here a while. You wanna play I Spy or something?"
"You always win," Demyx complained. "I guess we don't have much else better to do, huh? I Spy, with my little eye, something beginning with Q."
I began looking around the room for things that began with Q and smiled to myself at the pure strangeness of our lives.
xxx
I wanted this chapter to be shorter, but it wasn't. I apologise for making you suffer this much.
I decided to update before school so that if I had a really shit day full of double Chemistry and teenage girls PMSing at each other, at least I could come home to one or two nice reviews. I finally have more than a hundred reviews on this fic, and I'm SO happy! Except I'm not happy right now because I've just had a fight with my dad, but you know. Details. Reviews please? (I sound pathetic, I know. Oh, well.)
