Part Seven
Legals: Same
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Pietro drew back into the blankets, eyes wide when he looked at Lance. His thin arms pulled the blanket closer around himself, forming a protective layer. The other boy didn't say anything, looking over at Todd who was sitting in the corner, his arms drawn tight over his chest.
He coughed a little, trying to smile at his friends, "Hey...Guess you found me last night, eh? I can explain about being on those stairs, you see--"
A bag dropped down onto the coffee table in front of him, glass hitting psuedowood with a descive clink. He cringed a little, seeing Lance's hand go back to gripping the sides of his chair, "Want to tell us something?" His voice was half dead, cold, emotionless. He swallowed a little, blinking his bloodshot blue eyes, wishing that maybe they'd go away, this was a dream.
Still there. Still glaring reality. His little game of keep-away with Lance was over. Blue eyes flicked over to Todd, asking of him. The younger boy's head drooped, and he nodded. He'd been the one to betray him. Fred looked at him with a sad, confused expression, that age old 'why didn't you come to us for help' look craved into his features.
He coughed again, sitting up slowly, "I don't think I have to. You got the proof right there."
Lance didn't say anything, just breathing. He looked like some mythical dragon about to strike, smoke emitting from his nostrils as he sized up the victim, waiting for it to show first weakness. His fingers clenched around the arms again, knuckles turning white. "Look at your arms. You like them looking like shit?"
"I don't care about them."
"Pietro..."
"Leave me the hell alone, Lance." He dived under the blankets again, the warmth hiding the voices, hiding his friends. The warmth took him away from all of this. Warmth pulled his eyelids down and delivered him to sleep once more.
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"Fred, take the jeep. Here's fifty bucks. Don't come home for a couple of hours, okay?" Lance stared at the lump in front of him, the shaking lump of cloth. "Take Todd."
"What about--"
"Just do it, okay, Freddie? Pietro and I need to talk." He glanced at his friend, the larger boy's features taking on a sudden understanding, a look he'd not quite seen in all the years they'd spent together. He nodded, taking Todd out through the door quickly, efficiently, quietly.
The house was silent now but for the slow breathing coming from Pietro's quilts. Lance just sat there, watching the clock on the VCR steasily blink 12:00 AM, his head pounding. Vaguely, he heard Mystique's clock, some old relic she'd found in a garage sale, chime three times...Then four. Then five. He blinked, looking away from the blinking lights, glancing down at the floor. The clothes Pietro had been wearing last night were still in the middle of the floor, the damp spot slowly drifting away.
His dark eyes flickered a little. Carrying Pietro back into the house had been harder than getting him out of the rain. When his body was warm, it did weird things. The muscles in his legs twitched or something, and he kicked. According to Todd, whose head seemed to be Pietro's favorite target, he kicked pretty hard in his sleep.
Aside from that, it had been scary. They argued about leaving him in his clothes. Fred didn't want to embarass him when he woke up....and he really didn't want to be the one to undress Pietro. Todd had the same feelings about taking off Pietro's clothes, but didn't want him to ger pnuemonia. Lance ended up being the one to strip the pale boy down to his boxers and shove him into the blankets, though he regretted it.
The insides of Pietro's elbows were covered with bruises and open wounds, the skin discolored from too many little injections. His body was bruised a little, fresh bruises. His clients enjoyed roughing him up a little from the appearance of things. What wasn't covered in bruises was a strange looking blue white, darker blue viens criss-crossing through it. Without his clothes, he looked like one of the starving children you would see on those "Light of Life" commercials, begging for your money. Ten cents a day to keep a child alive... Only they were sad little photographs... This was Pietro
The red light was blinking on the answering machine, tearing him away from the dismal picture being forced up into his face. One probabally to tell him he was fired. One from school, for his little tiff with Summers. There was probably one from Rogue. Two more unknown messages...
He hit the button, scrolling through the first message. He was fired, not yet, just needed an explaination of why he wasn't there. The next was the secretary, saying that he had a meeting with the principal and guidance counsellor. His gaurdian was expected to come. Inwardly, he groaned. Not fun, not fun.
Rogue's. "Ah know ya'll are gonna kill me for this, but ah told them. Everythin'. Ah know ah promised yah that ah wouldn't, Pietro, but yah need help. Ah just thought that... Ah'm really sorry, but ah had too. If Lance wouldn't listen, ah thought Scott would...." The message was at nine o'clock the night before, just after they left.
He hit the button again, hand shaking a little, "Hey, Pietro, it's me... Evan. Look, I'm sorry about that shit I said to you before. It was low, man, real low. I didn't know you were having these problems. Look, meet me later tonight at the courts...around ten, okay? I have to talk to you." Funny how now that Pietro's secret was out, they all wanted to say they were sorry. It made Lance sick. Rogue...he could almost understand. She'd talked to Pietro from the sound of her message... If only she hadn't been so stupid.
"This is General Electric calling for a Ms. Raven Dark--" He switched it off, making a mental note to pay that bill later.
"That's the best call we've had all day, eh?" A gravelly voice whispered from the living room.
He turned back, watching Pietro emerge from his cotton cocoon. He looked worse than last time, the dark crevices in his face becoming more and more prounced with each passing moment. His eyes flicked hungrily down to the bag on the table, fingers twitching just a little. Lance grabbed the bag away before the smaller boy could get the message across to his fingers.
"Why the hell did you start this shit?" Lance looked at the bag in disgust, putting it down next to him.
He sat up, crossing his arms over his naked chest, "I don't have to telll you. You're not my father." His chin jutted out, eyes flickering with a childish light.
"Your father is dead, Pietro." Lance clenched his jaw. "Mystique told us what happened to your family before you got here. Lost them all in a fire. This isn't going to get them back." He crindged a little. He sounded like the school counsellor. Calm and patient and rationalizing. He'd be talking through sock puppets if he wasn't careful.
The other boy cackled a little, grinning like a demented china doll, "No, my dad isn't dead. My dad's pretending that I don't exist. My dad hates me more than he hates any of us. Because I'm gay. And he can't have a fairy son prancing around while he takes over the world." He flashed a grin at Lance, "Yeah, that's why I was on those stairs. That's the community center I work for." The grin faded a little, and he stared down at the table.
Lance didn't say anything, shrugging that off. He'd been figuring as much since that confusing discussion he and Rogue in the car all those nights back. Nothing really surprised him anymore. "It's okay, Pietro. It doesn't matter."
The boy laughed a little, sticking his tongue out between his teeth. "Whatever."
They sat in silence for a long time, niether looking up. Pietro was getting agitated, his body crying out for the drugs next to his friend. Lance finally held the bag up, getting his attention. "You have to stop this."
"Why? What difference does it make now?" His blue eyes darkened a little, fists clenching, "I'm not going to quit."
"You don't understand." The house trembled a little as Lance dumped the vials still containing heroin into his gloved hand, "I won't let you take this shit anymore." He held the icy gaze for a moment before clenching his hand into a fist, letting the subtance leak down his arm to prove his point.
Pietro was on his feet in a flash, "Whatthefuckdidyoudothatfor!?"
His smile was cold as he shrugged, "I know what you did for it. And I don't want you doing that. It's not worth it." He walked over, supporting his friend's shoulder, trying to meet his eyes again, "Promise me you're done with that shit now."
A moment passed, the white head bowed, "Why should I listen to you?"
"Because I care about you." He smiled a little, raising the other boy's face to meet his own, conflicting emotions swirling in the blue depths before their lips brushed.
Pietro pushed him away, jumping back, "Don't....justdon't." And he was gone, speed fully returned to his feet as he took to the stairs. Lance sat down hard on the couch, hearing Pietro's window shatter in his room. He threw a tremor out, but knew it was too late. He was gone.
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The boy shoved his hat down over his head, shivering a little. It was late. He could go back, go talk to Lance. The kiss still burned his lips, taunting him. It was soft and sweet, a gentleness that he couldn't remember feeling for so long. But it was Lance... And that alone said it would never work out in his mind.
He stuck his hand into the pocket of his jeans, feeling the syringe. Its presence calmed him. Lance had broken his usual one, the tiny little number that fit so well into your hand. This one was larger, a bit more to the point with the chamber that could hold 50 cc's of whatever you wanted to force into your viens. He never really used it...It was too large, too dangerous.
His watch beeped, blue eyes flicking up to the courts. He was there, waiting for him in the dim light. A basketball was wedged under his arm, beckoning to Pietro to come and talk to him. He drew in a breath, steadying himself. One last hurdle to cross now. One last hurdle before this hell was over. He forced a smile, "Hey, Daniels, what's up?"
The perkiness in his voice was ignored, "I want to apologize...About the things I said." His dark eyes never managed to quite meet Pietro's as he pressed on, "I didn't want to seem like a pansy, you know. You were part of my crowd, you know what it's like. I don't mean that you're some kind of freak because you're...."
"Gay, Evan. You sang Deck the Halls like the rest of us in fifth grade. You can manage to say it now." The old sarcasm snuck into his voice as he watched the other boy squrim a little.
Finally, they were staring straight into each other, no secrets between them. Not anymore. "Gay. Yeah, you're gay... Rogue said I said something when we were younger about that...I don't remember man, really. I'm sorry."
A soft laugh tickled his throat, "You don't remember. What you said kept me up at night for three months. You were my friend, Daniels. You should have been there for me. That's what the counsoler said, I mean. She says that you said something pretty--"
"You're seeing a counsoler? Aw, hell, Maximoff, I though things were cool. I didn't know you were have head problems too. Everything going to be okay?" He looked away, unable to take the pity in Evan's eyes. What did he know? He was just some selfish, selfserving ass...that used to mean the world to him. Evan wad the first person to think he was "cool".
He shook his head, "Yeah, she says you scarred me or some shit like that. And you did. I couldn't tell anyone about it after you almost found out. Even my dad. I tried...I really did...She told you about the other problems, right?" His laughter was hollow as he reached into his pocket. Lance had taken all the vials, every last one, and destroyed them. It felt so good to see them go.
Evan just stared as he brought the thing Lance forgot, the one syringe that Pietro hid between the window panes. The one syringe that could hold two vials if need be. "Yeah...you should stop that....what are you doing?" His voice was tiny, awed as the older boy pulled back on the stopper, pulling back until it was nearly falling out.
He just stared at it for a moment, at the lines and numbers. They swarmed in front his eyes as need struck him again, his body begging for the drug Lance took away. His hard, hollow eyes met Evan's, locked on, "According to her, you scarred me for life. That's what she said...I think maybe I should return the favor, don't you?"
"What do you mean?"
His lips turned into a smirk, pulling his shirt sleeve back absently, relishing in the horror and disgust in his old friend's eyes. The smirk grew into a full fledged grin as the boy began to studder, pointing down at the bruised, thin flesh. The bony arm, skin stretched so tight that you could see almost every blue vein through his skin.
"Quiz time, Daniels...." The needle slid into his arm effortlessly, no pain registering in his mind, "What happens when you empty a syringe in your blood when there's only air in it?" Before Evan could even answer, the stopper slid down, Pietro's eyes still staring straight into his as the answer came.
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^_^ This comes from reading Christopher Pike: Remember Me before I was ten. If you've never read those books, you should. They're not that bad at all. Oh, R/R please. ^_^