Okay, so this right here? This is a cliffhanger warning. If they really make you insane, you might want to put off reading this last little bit here until the next book in this series is out (and be forewarned, that may take a while). Proceed at your own risk.
RAPHAEL:
"I'm sorry."
Michaelangelo looked up, placing his padded weapons back on the rack. "For what?" he asked, although I was sure he already knew. News of her death had been on TV all day long.
"For Mel," I answered quietly. But I reconsidered that. "For everything. All the way back. I don't know if I ever said that before but... I am sorry."
He stopped, his hand resting on the nunchakus, his back turned to me. "Sometimes I really wonder, Raph," he whispered.
"You wonder what?" I questioned.
He sighed deeply, his fingers running lightly over the chain. "There's gotta be more to life than this," he whispered. "There's gotta be a reason I'm here." He turned to face me. "You know, ever since he died... I can't seem to find it. I don't know why. I just... I feel lost."
I watched him carefully. He glanced away for a moment, then looked back at me. "I just..." he stammered. "I feel so alone, you know? I mean, I'm happy for you and for Donny, I really am. But it's like I don't even know you anymore. And I could never talk to Leo, even before he was with Madonna. I think that's... why I did it."
I caught the double meaning, and memories rushed back to me. I felt my chest tighten as I considered how easily the past was resurfacing. All those things we had tried so hard to forget, to put behind us. Suddenly, it was right back in our faces. "Why you did what?"
His eyes closed. I watched as he lowered his head and shook it slightly. "All of it. Then and now. I just wanted to... to feel close to someone. It was never about the sex or the high or the freedom from the pain, it was..." Tears overflowed from his eyes and his voice caught. "It was about loneliness. She told me I could trust her and I needed to trust someone. And I believed her."
I studied him carefully. "Does Donny know you feel like that?" I asked. Ever since I could remember, he and Donatello had been much closer than he and I ever had. My stumbling through my teenage years, and that one night in particular, hadn't helped our friendship. And I'd known he was never really tight with Leo. Not even in the way I was, with a love-hate relationship that kept us closer than we wanted to be most of the time. But he and Donny had always spoken the same language...
Mike stared down at the floor, like he was ignoring me. "Do you realize... just how little we all mean to each other now?"
I shook my head. "Mikey, that's not true and you know it."
"How?" he pleaded. "How do I know that? Ever since he died, we've..."
"Changed," I interrupted him. "We've changed. Because time changes things. That doesn't mean we're any further apart from each other."
He looked up. "Do you realize that we, like, never talk to each other?" he whispered. "We never practice together. You're with Kat and Donny's with Amy and they both take care of Salome and Leo's off in his own little world thinking god-only-knows-what about all of this that's going on and I feel like I'm looking through a window at my life and pounding on the glass going, 'Will somebody please let me in on the joke!' and it's taken me this long to figure out that it's a goddamn one way glass!" He was sobbing now, and he turned his back to me. "And you can't even see me..."
I watched him for a moment and felt grief prick at my soul. I took a step forward and rested a hand on his shoulder. He didn't react. "Mike..."
"Don't, Raph," he cut me off. Not that I really had anything to say. I was totally at a loss for words at the moment. I knew what I had to say, but I wasn't sure I could at this point. "Just don't. There's nothing you can say and nothing you can do that's gonna make it hurt any less so don't try."
His words cut me, although I wasn't entirely sure why. "Mike, I..."
He spun to face me, throwing my arm aside. I stepped back, surprised. "I'm almost twenty-nine years old now, Raph, do you realize that?" His eyes were clouded with tears. He brushed them roughly and stared at me pleadingly. "Do you realize we've almost doubled our age since we met Shredder? Since we started all this. And Splinter's gone now and you've all changed and I still just keep livin' my life like I'm thirteen fucking years old."
"No."
"Yes!" he cried. "And it's wrong. And I can't do it anymore."
I felt dread creep into the pit of my stomach. "Mikey, don't you dare."
He growled as he spun away from me. "Oh for cryin' out loud, relax, Raph," he laughed cynically. "You always think..."
"What I think, I have a reason to think," I interrupted him, feeling bold anger resurface at his patronizing tone. "And a damn good reason, too."
"Fuck your reasons, Raph," he mumbled, his fists clenching at his sides. "Just leave me alone."
"I can't do that."
"You been able to do it just fine before, now suddenly you can't?" he challenged.
I could feel the anger growing inside of me with every word he spoke. He made it sound as if I didn't give a damn about him, and that couldn't be further from the truth. "You want things to change, Mike?" I shot at him. "You wanna grow up?"
He turned and looked over his shoulder, challenging me. "Don't even try and..."
"There's somethin' I've gotta tell you that's gonna change your life," I interrupted him. He stopped mid-sentence, and didn't move. "If you want it to. But you damn well better be ready to hear it." He turned fully to face me, his eyes still narrowed. "'Cause it ain't somethin' I can take back and once I make it known, it becomes my responsibility to do somethin' about it if you won't."
"What are you talking about?" he challenged.
I knew I was spewing this way too fast. I knew it was gonna knock him on his ass when he heard it. I knew I had to tell him, but I knew Kat was right. I should be doing it a little more gently. But right now, my mouth was working without my brain. "You got twenty-four hours to get your priorities straight and figure out where you stand. You decide if you wanna live or die and you decide how and where you wanna do it. Because whether or not you choose to stay, I'm about to turn everyone's world upside down. And if you ain't ready for that, you'd better make other arrangements."
I spun. I could hear my heart beat in my ears as I walked out of the dojo. He didn't follow me. I didn't expect him to. I caught Donatello's eye as I passed the kitchen and stopped. There was a long silence that passed betweeen us. "Did you tell him?" Katarina asked from behind him, her voice quiet and pleading.
I clenched my teeth. "No," I managed. I could hear the biting tone, and knew I should curb it, but I couldn't. I was mad. At Mike, at that woman, at myself, and at fate. Fate most of all. It wasn't right. "No, I didn't," I growled. "He's got twenty-four hours to decide if he wants to hear it."
Katarina's eyes lowered and she nodded slightly. I began walking again, toward the entrance to the lair. "Raph?"
I turned and met Don's stare again. "I got the address," he informed quietly. "Do you want it?"
I shook my head. "No," I answered. "Not yet."
I darted up the stairs and disappearing up the ladder into the tunnel. Not yet.
Fanfiction.net, in my opinion, is dying a slow and painful death that began somewhere around the time they banned NC stories and pissed off many of their older writers, myself included. (Not that I have ANYTHING against the younger writers that have "overtaken" the site, because I really don't. My work at your age was comparable if not WORSE. lol But an experienced, in-depth portrayal of the tmnt is something I need every so often to advance MY writing, and generally speaking, those writers have fallen silent as of late.) In addition to being more than a little annoyed, and less than inspired, posting links to my stories has gotten to be a pain in the ass (esp since they're apparently not allowed now), and filling in the gaps on portions missed is an even BIGGER pain that also tends to bring the emotion of the story to an abrupt HALT.
So with that in mind, I must formally bid you farewell. With the exception of a few people, all of the reviews I received from this last book were from people I know and talk to on a regular basis and could've just as easily been given on the review page on my website. The review system here was really the only reason I was staying and I have decided that it's not worth the headache anymore when I've got a similar one on my site anyways.
So for those of you who follow my work, please visit my website. If you'd like to be notified when I have new work available, email me and I will let you know. To those of you who will, for whatever reason, not visit my site, it's been a pleasure. Thank you for reading, and syonara.
-sss979
