A/N: I can't believe I'm doing this. I'm feeling a strange combination of excited as hell and worried beyond belief. This story despite the premise is serious. While there will be comedic moments the objective of this story is to genuinely try to explore what such a scenario would be like for both the person with DID and those that are involved. I am going to do my very best to be as accurate as I can to the disorder, but I am by no means a medical professional in any field. So, if anything, anything at all is problematic, please inform me. I want genuine feedback here.
Life was complicated for Mike. He supposed one could say that all teenagers think their life is complicated but Mike was one who actually had a complicated life. Most teenagers don't come to in random places, wondering how they'd gotten there. Most teenagers didn't have chunks of their day and on rare occasion weeks or even months, missing from their memory. Most teenagers were in control of their actions to some extent all the time. Because most teenagers had only one identity and he had six. Five alternate identities that did have specific triggers but could also randomly decide to front any time.
Naturally Mike had very little stability in his life. How could he have stability when he wasn't even the same person a lot of the time? People wrote him off as weird, and even those he'd befriended eventually decided he was too much to handle and left. There were certain classes at school he never remembered because he was never himself at the time. Gym class for instance was almost always fronted by Svetlana.
One of the few points of stability in his life was his best friend Camron, Camron was the only friend he'd ever made to stick by him. Having grown up in a bubble for much of his life, he had researched a vast number of things. So it was only a matter of time before Camron figured out his Dissociative Identity Disorder.
When Mike had first found out Camron knew, he'd been terrified. Now that Camron knew how abnormal he was he would surely leave him, but Camron had not. In fact he was nothing but supportive of Mike. Camron knew a lot about the disorder. Obviously not as much as a psychologist trained in that field, but far more than anyone else in Mike's life. Even school counselors, not that Mike knew much about what happened in those sessions. Mal almost always fronted during those. It was nice to have someone to rely on.
The other constant in his life was his girlfriend Zoey. Zoey was the most beautiful, most amazing girl he'd ever met. In his opinion anyway, he was sure most of his alters would disagree with him. She was sweet, she had a lot of the same nerdy interests he did, and she was supportive of him.
But because he was one of the only stable things in his life, Mike was terrified to lose her. Terrified that if she ever found out about his alters she'd leave him. So he lied. A secret like multiple identities living in your head was not easy to keep up. After all he had no control over when his alters decided to front. So Zoey was very quickly exposed to his secret.
He told her the lie he'd told many over the years. He was an actor and his alters were characters he would occasionally slip into. Zoey believed him, and things were okay for a bit, but Zoey really wanted to see more of the actual Mike. Honestly Mike would love to see Zoey more too, but his alters did as they wished.
Still aside from Zoey occasionally feeling frustrated with his 'characters' they had an okay relationship. As okay as a relationship where one of the couple is lying to the other could be anyway. So imagine his surprise when he arrived at his locker on Monday to see an angry Zoey standing in front of it. "Mike, we need to talk."
Mike gulped. Had she figured it out like Camron? Was she going to leave him? "What about?"
"Look Mike. I get that you're a method actor, but that doesn't excuse cheating." Zoey said.
Cheating? What cheating? Had Manatoba been flirting with random girls again? "I don't know what you're talking about."
"I'm talking about the fact that I saw you making out with Anne Maria under the bleachers yesterday afternoon!" Zoey snapped.
Anne Maria was one of his classmates. A Jersey girl who had come on to him a few times. He'd never flirted back though. She wasn't his type. He'd certainly never made out with her before. Of course he wasn't fronting yesterday afternoon. Mike could feel himself spiraling. No,no. His alters were going to ruin his relationship with Zoey! "Sorry, sometimes I get so into-"
Zoey stopped him right there. "Mike I don't care how 'into character' you were. Cheating is still cheating!"
Mike sighed. She was right. He couldn't really explain this away with his acting lie. The only way he could ever explain it was telling her the truth. "Zoey, I promise there is an explanation, but I can't tell you right now." He needed to know what was going on himself first.
Zoey sighed. "Okay Mike. I really like you. So I'm willing to give you a chance to explain yourself." Her face became serious. "You have until Friday to figure things out. I need a satisfactory explanation by then or we're through." Her gaze hardened. "And don't lie to me. I will not be made a fool." With that she stomped off. Mike decided to find a quiet part of the school to talk to his alters.
He walked to the library and went into the most isolated corner he could find. He lifted up a book in front of his face so it looked like he was reading, Then closed his eyes. It wasn't long until he arrived in his mindscape, an area made out of wrinkly pink brain matter. It wasn't a physical place, it was his mind's way of explaining where he was then he talked to his alters. Mike didn't go there often, but this was something they needed to talk about.
Chester, Vito, Svetlana, and Manatoba were all playing cards. Well to be more accurate, Manitoba was playing cards, Svetlana and Vito were arguing over whether or not the latter was cheating, and Chester was complaining that the deck was stacked against him.
Manitoba was the first to notice him. "G'day Mike. Ain't you a sight for sore eyes. I haven't seen ya since ya told me to stop laying the charm on that sheila of yours. Speaking o' which how's she doing?"
"She's furious at me." Mike glared. "Apparently, 'I' was making out with Anne Maria yesterday afternoon."
Manitoba chuckled and turned to Vito. "Looks like the gig's up mate."
"I should have figured it was you, Vito. Do you know what you've done?!" Mike snapped.
"Ey yo lay off me! It's not like I'm the only one who's been dating!" Vito said.
Mike's eyes widened. "There are more?"
"I'll say. Svetlana's been seeing a real gem of a sheila for 'bout a month now!" Manitoba said.
Mike turned to Svetlana who was looking at her nails. "Svetlana, I expect this from Vito but you too?"
"Vell, she vas really nice, and ve both love ze gymnastic life! Ve 'ave been competing en gym class and she asked me out! I vasn't going to say no!" Svetlana defended.
"Great! Anyone else been secretly dating?" Mike asked.
"You won't find me wasting time on all that romantic nonsense! You whippersnappers can't stop fallin' over yourselves!" Chester exclaimed.
Manitoba shook his head. "Ain't no sheila that can tie me down! Wouldn't be fair ta the rest of 'em."
"So it's just the two." Mike said in relief.
"Vait, vhat about him?" Svetlana brought up.
"Are you off yer nut? Can you see a bloke like 'im dating?" Manitoba asked.
"Ey' if I'm being given the shake down, then so should he! Only fair." Vito said.
"As if you vould know anyzing about that!" Svetlana rolled her eyes.
"Are you still on about the card game? I tell ya I was playin' fair!" Vito confronted.
"Come on. We might as well ask him." Mike sighed. The four of them went deeper into his mind. Most of his alters knew of each other. Knew what the others were up to. When they were fronting etcetera. His final alter, Mal, was different.
Mal was both a protector/prosecutor and a gatekeeper. Protector alters were there to keep him safe in dangerous situations, that was their prerogative. Keep him safe. Mal had started off like that, but somewhere along the line his prerogative had changed from keeping him safe, to harming anyone he considered a threat. He was also a gatekeeper. In other words, if Mal was fronting, the only one who could make him recede was Mal himself. He was by far the strongest of Mike's alters.
Mike had ended up in Juvie because of Vito. Several bullies had been beating him up and Vito had just been fighting back. He got a little too carried away and they ended up in the hospital. So he'd been charged with assault and sent to juvie. While in juvie Mike was in greater danger than he'd ever been before. Even Vito wasn't enough to protect him. He needed someone scary, someone who could make everyone leave him alone. Out of that need Mal was born. The entire time Mike served his sentence Mal was in charge. It wasn't until he'd gotten out that Mal let someone else front.
Mike didn't know what had happened in juvie, but it had made Mal into a violent sociopath. So naturally he and the alters avoided him as much as possible. They finally reached him in a dark corner of his mind. Mal smirked at them. "Oh? You're paying me a visit? To what do I owe the pleasure?"
Mike shuddered. "Look. I just found out Vito and Svetlana have been dating without telling me. So we were wondering…"
Mal chuckled lowly. "If I was dating someone too? I thought you all considered me heartless?"
"Answer the question!" Vito snapped.
Mal's smirk widened. "Believe it or not I am."
Everyone's jaw dropped. "Well I didn't see that coming." Manitoba admitted.
"What? I have feelings too. It's my morals that are messed up." Mal said.
Mike shook himself out of his stupor. "So what you're telling me, is that we've been dating three people right under my girlfriend's nose!"
"Ey, don't act like you're the only one entitled to a girlfriend!" Vito said.
"For ze first time I agree vith him!" Svetlana said.
"Yeah, Mike. You think just because you're the original, only you should get to date?" Mal smirked. "And you all call me heartless."
"It's my life!" Mike argued.
"It's our life Mike. We're here." Mal challenged.
Mike sighed. "We can discuss this later. Zoey is going to break up with me on Friday unless I tell her the truth, and I think you should tell your girlfriends too."
Svetlana looked down. "I suppose zhat vould be a good thing."
:"Anne Maria does need an explanation for why I'm so lame half the time." Vito said.
"Fine by me." Mal said. "In fact I think we should invite our significant others to Mike's little rendezvous with Zoey on Friday."
"True, it'd be better to tell everyone at once." Manitoba said. Then he paused. "Hang on a tic, did you say significant other?"
Mal rolled his eyes. "All of you have been assuming I'm dating a girl."
"You're not?" Mike said.
"No." Mal smirked.
"You youths and your radical ideas!" Chester remarked. "Back in my day we never needed to ask that! Of course you'll do what you want."
"Is that your way of saying you're not against it but you find the idea ridiculous?" Mal asked.
"Yes." Chester said shortly.
"So we're really doing this?" Mike gulped. "We're really going to tell them?"
"I think ve 'ave to." Svetlana said.
"How about we meet Friday on the roof?" Mike offered. Everyone agreed to this. Mike sighed. Now all he had to do was figure out how to tell Zoey.
A/N: And that's chapter one. Now other chapters may not be as long. The next three are all meet cutes. In fact you can decide with I'm doing first. Your options are:
1: Canon couple meet cutes: Both Mike and Vito will be covered in the same chapter.
2: Svetlana's meet cute
3: Mal's meet cute.
I've set up a poll on my profile
Let me know what you thought of the chapter.
