XXX
Welp. I meant to post this like 2 days ago since it was already finished, but I've just been way too tired. I've been having problems with my physical/mental health, and school is making it all worse, and I'm exhausted all the time now, so.
Anyway, here's the fic. It is, like me, a ball of angst:
XXX
Janus was alone.
Maybe he didn't have to be, but he was.
Patton, Roman, and Logan never wanted to be around him anymore. They kept getting into arguments, arguments that Janus would always lose- arguments that just seemed to make things worse. Janus really was trying to help, but they just didn't understand that, and no matter how hard he tried, they never even wanted to listen.
He probably could have gone to find Virgil or Remus, though. At least the two of them didn't hate him. But, even still, Janus felt apprehensive.
He wanted to play a game, but he knew he couldn't do that with either of them. If he wanted to spend time with them, he had to do something more mature, more serious (after all, Janus was supposed to be the serious one, supposed to be the 'straight' man, supposed to keep everyone else in line. Even if Remus wasn't ever serious, Janus would still be expected to be, so that didn't matter). And besides, he really was getting too old to be playing these games. He was almost 14- he shouldn't still be playing with stuffed animals and dolls, shouldn't still want to have tea parties, shouldn't be acting like a baby.
But he wanted to. And, well, selfishness was kind of a big part of who he was, so it was hard to deny himself things that he really wanted.
He didn't want to stop playing with his toys, didn't want to stop playing his games. But he also didn't want to be alone. Why couldn't he have both?
He'd almost considered trying to ask one of them to play with him a little while ago, but that idea had quickly flown right out the window once Thomas started preparing for high school. Virgil had been growing in influence, and it was putting everyone on edge. Virgil was terrified of Thomas not fitting in, and that made everyone else feel it, too. Logan, especially, had started insisting that Thomas start to act more like a grown-up, saying he needed to take school seriously and start planning for college (even when Thomas hadn't officially started high school yet). Patton was gaining more of an interest in current events, trying to push Thomas toward improving the world (which wasn't bad or anything, but there always seemed to be an implication that Thomas needed to take on more responsibility because he was older). Then there was Roman, who kept going on about Thomas finding true love and getting a fabulous career onstage. Remus had gained a similar boost in passion, though he was passionate about far darker things (things like horror movies that Thomas still wasn't actually old enough to watch). And Virgil…
Well, maybe Anxiety was the reason for a bigger chunk of Deceit's apprehension.
Virgil had gone on a few different rants at this point about Thomas being too childish. He wanted Thomas to fit in, and Virgil believed that that meant Thomas had to act cool and mature. He didn't want Thomas to get bullied or ostracized for acting like a baby when he was already in high school.
And it's not like Janus wanted that, either. But…
He couldn't help that it stung. Thomas had been getting rid of more and more of his old toys and childish things, mostly because of Virgil's and Logan's prompting. And it wasn't like anyone told Janus to do the same, but that was probably only because they didn't know he still had them. After all, why would Janus, of all sides, still be hanging onto a bunch of toys? They were for little kids, and Janus was supposed to be the mature one.
Except he wasn't, and every time he heard Virgil or one of the others say something about Thomas being more mature, another little pin dug itself into his chest.
The fact was that Janus wasn't ready for Thomas to grow up. The adult world was scary and complicated, and Janus wasn't ready to face it. And he would have to face it because he was Deceit, but also Denial, so it would be his job to protect Thomas from all of the terrible things that could hurt him. He would have to be the barrier, have to be the shield.
But that meant he'd also have to face all of it himself, without having any buffer of his own.
And Janus wasn't Anxiety, but he was scared. He didn't want to have to deal with all of that, to worry about Thomas dealing with all of that. He just wanted to hide in his room and play with his toys and pretend that nothing was changing (why did things have to change? Why couldn't things have stayed the way they were when they were younger? Everything was so much better back then).
Janus didn't know how to let Thomas grow up. And maybe that was selfish of him (because he shouldn't hold other people, especially Thomas, back because he was a coward), but he was Selfishness. He wanted what he wanted, but right now, he wanted something he couldn't have.
So he took what he could have- which was hiding in his room and pretending like things weren't changing, pretending he didn't have to grow up, pretending that the others wouldn't mock him for acting like a child and take him even less seriously than they already did and hate him and push him even farther into the subconscious because they wouldn't want a babyish side stopping Thomas from growing up and-
And Janus just felt so alone.
Even when he did spend time with Virgil and Remus, he still felt lonely. He felt like they'd hate him if they knew about the parts of himself that he hid away (though, being Deceit, he didn't think he could ever really be fully honest with them, not about who he was or anything else). He could feel a gap growing between them, and he didn't like it. He felt like everyone else was growing and changing and leaving him behind because he didn't know how to do what everyone else was doing. Were they all pretending too? Did any of them really know what they were doing, or was it all just one big lie that Deceit somehow couldn't detect?
He sighed, picking up his toy cat and brushing a finger over its paw.
No, he definitely couldn't play with anyone else.
But he could play by himself. He could play with the toys that couldn't move or speak or mock him for playing with them. He could keep himself safe in his little bubble of make-believe so he could have more energy to keep Thomas safe when the time comes.
And he could continue to play pretend, pretending that he was the mature one, and pretending that he wasn't struggling to find his footing. He could pretend to be like the others.
After all, he was Deceit.
And what was Deceit without his lies?
XXX
Heads up: This series is getting toward the end now. There's still 3 parts after this, but I really don't think I'm going to continue it any farther than that.
So, I hope ya'll stick around to the end.
XXX