Authors Note: Again, I swear I didn't have this planned out... but the
posting of this chapter is oddly in tuned with what is going on the show,
it's actually quite creepy.
Joy- We all (well, okay, not all of us, but those of us who actually like Ric) want Sonny to give Ric a fair shake. Of course, if Sonny did manage to give Ric a chance, he'd find a way to ruin it. Thusly is the problem between them. Yes, the Jones' are the epitome of all that is good in the sibling world, very much in the way that the boys of Adela (I think that's her name...) are the stark contrast. Funny how that works out, no? Yeah, poor Damian, I put him through hell... and have fun doing it.
Journeylove- For future reference, it's 'you're.' Sorry, I'm an English major... but, worry not, I was once extremely bad with the ways of the grammar. Anyway, wait no longer, for you shall get not one, but TWO chapters.
Chapel-
Sonny had gone to the chapel out of instinct. It seemed like it was the best place for him to be while he was busy worrying about the life of his oldest son. Seeing the lit candles, some for people who were fighting for their lives and some for people who had lost that fight, made Sonny put his life into perspective. Someone was trying to get to Michael. That was the entire reason why Damian was hurt. Someone was trying to take away one of his children, and they had failed if they were going for Michael, but they could have succeeded when it came to Damian. Sonny didn't doubt that his son was strong and wouldn't just roll over and die, but sometimes people got taken away from him because that was how it had to be. Sonny wasn't allowed to feel true happiness, it was his curse. It wasn't something that he truly believed, but he had to look at the track record that he had amassed since he had started down the path that he was now on. He was elated when he realized that Lily was pregnant, but he lost them both. He had found love with Brenda, only to have himself be betrayed and broken. He and Carly had found each other, only after being enemies and still they would often find themselves at odds with one another over various things. He lost one child of Carly's, and he almost lost Morgan and Carly as well. Now he was in the hospital, waiting to find out if he would have to bury another person that he cared about. Sonny didn't think he could take that. He wasn't sure he could bury another child before himself. It wasn't easy doing it the other two times, but he had never spent time with either of the children that were already lost to him. They didn't have fights like he and Damian had, they didn't have the talks that he and Damian had. There was so much that Sonny loved about his relationship with his son, he didn't want to lose him. He couldn't stand to lose him.
The chapel was empty. Sonny didn't understand why there was a chapel in the hospital, but it would often provide him with an outlet for his expressions when he needed to let them out. He needed to let them out at that moment. "Is this some big karmic payback?" Sonny asked. "Are you making me suffer because of the horrible things that I've done in the past? The things that I know I did but tried to justify in my mind? Are you telling me that the people I killed didn't deserve to die? Because if you are, then you're wrong. I've killed a lot of people who needed to be killed because they would only keep on hurting people who didn't deserve to suffer. I'm sure that on some level that doesn't matter to you, you're not very objective about a lot of things, are you? Fine, I accept that. But what I don't accept is that you're using someone who is completely innocent against me. You're trying to get to me by using my son, and that isn't something that I can accept from anyone, even you. You want to break me? Do it. Send someone to kill me or set me off like you've done plenty of times in the past, but you have no reason to continue making other people suffer because you want me to take notice. I'm not going to stop doing what I'm doing for anyone, not even you. The only way that I'm going to stop doing this is when I'm cold and dead. You want to end me? Do it. Damian's too precious to a lot of people, least of all being myself, to just be killed because this is some plot to make me suffer. You can't take him away from the people who he cares about, who care about him. Take him away from me again, just don't let him die. I can live better knowing that I have a son who hates me than knowing that I had another child who I couldn't save."
Sonny sat on one of the pews and sighed. "Do you want him back, Ana? Has it been too long since you last saw our son that you just can't stand to be without him anymore? I'm sure he'd like that. He loves you more than he loves anyone else. Even as a ghost you're the one person that he comes to time and time again. You raised up one of the finest people I've ever met in my life, and I'm proud to know that I had a hand in him being brought into this world. I'll never stop being sorry for how it happened. I'll never stop feeling grief over the way that I had to use you like I did. You know I didn't have a choice. You know that you, on some level, brought it upon yourself. It was worth it in the end, wasn't it? If we didn't meet on that night, if we weren't forced upon one another the way that we were, neither of us would have had Damian around. I don't want him to be taken away from me yet, Ana. Please, if you're trying to make him leave, don't. You had fourteen years with our son before you died. You held him when he was sick, helped him feel better when he was crying. You watched him grow up and I never got to do any of that. I didn't see the transgression that our son took from a little boy into the man that he is now. You got more time than I ever did, and I don't want to continue on with my life knowing that I didn't use everything that I had to my advantage. We're barely becoming close and now people are working against us to break us apart forever? I know I sound selfish, and on some level I am, I'll always be selfish. But on some level I'm not. I'm not just asking that you keep him here for myself, he has a family that he cares about and that cares for him. You really want to take him from your parents? How are they going to feel when they lose that one last connection that they have to you? You want to take him away from his brother? I'm sure you've been watching, seeing the way that they act around each other. Michael loves Damian, and I know that the feeling is shared. Are you going to take him away from a little boy like my son just for yourself? Do you think that doing something like that is even acceptable in any way?"
Sonny pushed his head back, "A lot of the actions that I've taken in life are not acceptable, and I acknowledge that fact without a doubt. But if there is one thing that I will ever do in my life that will be, without a doubt, something that I know I did right, it's going to be fighting for my son's life. I don't care what it takes. He's not going to die on me. He's not going to leave me."
A hand gently came up across Sonny's shoulder. Carly had been watching for a little bit, not the whole time, but enough time to see that Sonny was acting as desperate as she had ever seen him. A few tears had gone down her cheek as she watched her husband pour out his heart and soul to someone that wasn't even there. But Sonny was desperate, and he didn't have any answers. When that happened, Sonny would always turn to the strangest places possible. It wasn't that Sonny didn't believe in God, he just didn't understand what could go on. After all, how could someone who was supposed to love every single person on the planet allow a child to be beaten by his step-father? To be denied something so simple as a sense of security? Sonny's faith was constantly being called into question, and it wasn't hard to see why. Everything that Sonny did was to please someone, and it was never really him. Sonny was trying to please God, on some level, or at least trying to justify himself to the one that he thought could be the only one to bring him salvation.
"If she heard you, I'm sure she listened," Carly said, sitting down next to him.
"I don't know if I can say goodbye so soon, Carly. I know that I don't want to, but what if I have to?"
"You won't."
"I can keep on trying to believe that," Sonny leaned forward. "But my heart is telling me something and my mind is telling me something else."
"You've always been the type of person that relies on your heart, Sonny. You've never been a rational person."
"You think this is the place to be telling me something like that?"
"I'm just saying that you've always listened to your heart even when your brain was telling you something else because your heart is always right, Sonny. Even when you know that something doesn't seem right you'll still follow it until the end if you feel that it's right. How many times have you fought against people who were telling you that you were wrong about something, and then you ended up being right in the end? How many times have you done that with me?"
"More than I'd care to count," Sonny replied, completely deadpan. "Maybe I am the type of person that always trusts my instincts, and maybe I'm almost always right, but there's going to be a time when I'm not, and I'm going to lose something that I care about a lot. Carly, I don't care about many things as strongly as I care about my children. If someone wanted to hurt me considerably then the easiest way to do it would be to strike at me through one of my kids. Faith already tried it and she almost succeeded."
"But she didn't."
"Just because she couldn't do it doesn't mean that someone else won't try and won't get the job done right." Sonny's hands began to shake, "I don't even know how badly he's hurt. What if there's something wrong with him? What if he'll never be the same? How much will he hate me if he can never do anything with his life because of the sheer fact that I'm his father?"
"He'll never hate you for what happened, Sonny. You didn't have anything to do with this."
"You're wrong, Carly. I always have something to do with what happens around my family. I'm always going to be the common link that places them all in danger. You would tell me that sometimes, remember? And I'd never listen. Maybe now I should start."
"What are you saying?" Carly asked.
"Maybe I should just stop and leave, truly leave."
"Sonny, you can't leave!" Carly grabbed him. "You can't let them win. The people who tried to do this to Damian only want to know that they've somehow managed to dent the shield that you put up in everything that you do. You can't show them that you're weak, remember? How many times have you told me that showing weakness is not acceptable? How many times have I had to listen to you tell me about how important it is to be as strong as you can be?"
"He only wanted to be a doctor and find out who his father was," Sonny recalled what Damian's goals were when he first came to Port Charles. "How did something so simple end up turning into something like this? Something that's so twisted?"
"I don't know."
"It's because of me, Carly. You know that!"
"Sonny, stop!" Carly yelled. "I won't let you do this to yourself again. I won't let you beat yourself into submission."
"How... how's Michael?" Sonny knew that the only way he was going to get his mind off of what was going on was to think of something else, anything else. At that moment he'd be open to talking about Ric, but things hadn't regressed that badly, so there was no need to do something so drastic.
"I managed to get him calmed down somewhat," Carly said. "But he thinks that this is his fault. You Corinthos men enjoy blaming yourselves for every little problem that goes on the world, even when it's not your fault at all."
"It's not his fault."
"And it's not yours either," Carly pointed out, hoping that driving the point home yet again would actually have some amount of success on her lamenting husband.
"Did you see your mother?"
"No, I just came to the station and saw that you weren't there. When I knew that you weren't there I had a feeling that you would be here." Carly looked at the cross, "Challenging God when you don't have the power to fix the problems that go on in your life all by yourself, you're one of the only people that I know who would be so bold."
"Bold, Carly?" Sonny inquired. "Maybe I'm not bold, maybe I'm just scared."
"We're going to pull through this." Carly grabbed Sonny's hand, "He's going to pull through this. If you can survive being shot at in front of the police station then why wouldn't your son be able to survive getting hit by a truck? He's your boy, Sonny, that means that he's got the same fortitude that you do."
Sonny kissed Carly on the cheek, a quick brush. "Thanks, Carly." She had changed so much since the time that Damian had came into their lives. She would have been against anything that had to do with saving him, now she was trying to save both Sonny and Damian. He was glad that she had come to realize that Damian was important to all of them.
Joy- We all (well, okay, not all of us, but those of us who actually like Ric) want Sonny to give Ric a fair shake. Of course, if Sonny did manage to give Ric a chance, he'd find a way to ruin it. Thusly is the problem between them. Yes, the Jones' are the epitome of all that is good in the sibling world, very much in the way that the boys of Adela (I think that's her name...) are the stark contrast. Funny how that works out, no? Yeah, poor Damian, I put him through hell... and have fun doing it.
Journeylove- For future reference, it's 'you're.' Sorry, I'm an English major... but, worry not, I was once extremely bad with the ways of the grammar. Anyway, wait no longer, for you shall get not one, but TWO chapters.
Chapel-
Sonny had gone to the chapel out of instinct. It seemed like it was the best place for him to be while he was busy worrying about the life of his oldest son. Seeing the lit candles, some for people who were fighting for their lives and some for people who had lost that fight, made Sonny put his life into perspective. Someone was trying to get to Michael. That was the entire reason why Damian was hurt. Someone was trying to take away one of his children, and they had failed if they were going for Michael, but they could have succeeded when it came to Damian. Sonny didn't doubt that his son was strong and wouldn't just roll over and die, but sometimes people got taken away from him because that was how it had to be. Sonny wasn't allowed to feel true happiness, it was his curse. It wasn't something that he truly believed, but he had to look at the track record that he had amassed since he had started down the path that he was now on. He was elated when he realized that Lily was pregnant, but he lost them both. He had found love with Brenda, only to have himself be betrayed and broken. He and Carly had found each other, only after being enemies and still they would often find themselves at odds with one another over various things. He lost one child of Carly's, and he almost lost Morgan and Carly as well. Now he was in the hospital, waiting to find out if he would have to bury another person that he cared about. Sonny didn't think he could take that. He wasn't sure he could bury another child before himself. It wasn't easy doing it the other two times, but he had never spent time with either of the children that were already lost to him. They didn't have fights like he and Damian had, they didn't have the talks that he and Damian had. There was so much that Sonny loved about his relationship with his son, he didn't want to lose him. He couldn't stand to lose him.
The chapel was empty. Sonny didn't understand why there was a chapel in the hospital, but it would often provide him with an outlet for his expressions when he needed to let them out. He needed to let them out at that moment. "Is this some big karmic payback?" Sonny asked. "Are you making me suffer because of the horrible things that I've done in the past? The things that I know I did but tried to justify in my mind? Are you telling me that the people I killed didn't deserve to die? Because if you are, then you're wrong. I've killed a lot of people who needed to be killed because they would only keep on hurting people who didn't deserve to suffer. I'm sure that on some level that doesn't matter to you, you're not very objective about a lot of things, are you? Fine, I accept that. But what I don't accept is that you're using someone who is completely innocent against me. You're trying to get to me by using my son, and that isn't something that I can accept from anyone, even you. You want to break me? Do it. Send someone to kill me or set me off like you've done plenty of times in the past, but you have no reason to continue making other people suffer because you want me to take notice. I'm not going to stop doing what I'm doing for anyone, not even you. The only way that I'm going to stop doing this is when I'm cold and dead. You want to end me? Do it. Damian's too precious to a lot of people, least of all being myself, to just be killed because this is some plot to make me suffer. You can't take him away from the people who he cares about, who care about him. Take him away from me again, just don't let him die. I can live better knowing that I have a son who hates me than knowing that I had another child who I couldn't save."
Sonny sat on one of the pews and sighed. "Do you want him back, Ana? Has it been too long since you last saw our son that you just can't stand to be without him anymore? I'm sure he'd like that. He loves you more than he loves anyone else. Even as a ghost you're the one person that he comes to time and time again. You raised up one of the finest people I've ever met in my life, and I'm proud to know that I had a hand in him being brought into this world. I'll never stop being sorry for how it happened. I'll never stop feeling grief over the way that I had to use you like I did. You know I didn't have a choice. You know that you, on some level, brought it upon yourself. It was worth it in the end, wasn't it? If we didn't meet on that night, if we weren't forced upon one another the way that we were, neither of us would have had Damian around. I don't want him to be taken away from me yet, Ana. Please, if you're trying to make him leave, don't. You had fourteen years with our son before you died. You held him when he was sick, helped him feel better when he was crying. You watched him grow up and I never got to do any of that. I didn't see the transgression that our son took from a little boy into the man that he is now. You got more time than I ever did, and I don't want to continue on with my life knowing that I didn't use everything that I had to my advantage. We're barely becoming close and now people are working against us to break us apart forever? I know I sound selfish, and on some level I am, I'll always be selfish. But on some level I'm not. I'm not just asking that you keep him here for myself, he has a family that he cares about and that cares for him. You really want to take him from your parents? How are they going to feel when they lose that one last connection that they have to you? You want to take him away from his brother? I'm sure you've been watching, seeing the way that they act around each other. Michael loves Damian, and I know that the feeling is shared. Are you going to take him away from a little boy like my son just for yourself? Do you think that doing something like that is even acceptable in any way?"
Sonny pushed his head back, "A lot of the actions that I've taken in life are not acceptable, and I acknowledge that fact without a doubt. But if there is one thing that I will ever do in my life that will be, without a doubt, something that I know I did right, it's going to be fighting for my son's life. I don't care what it takes. He's not going to die on me. He's not going to leave me."
A hand gently came up across Sonny's shoulder. Carly had been watching for a little bit, not the whole time, but enough time to see that Sonny was acting as desperate as she had ever seen him. A few tears had gone down her cheek as she watched her husband pour out his heart and soul to someone that wasn't even there. But Sonny was desperate, and he didn't have any answers. When that happened, Sonny would always turn to the strangest places possible. It wasn't that Sonny didn't believe in God, he just didn't understand what could go on. After all, how could someone who was supposed to love every single person on the planet allow a child to be beaten by his step-father? To be denied something so simple as a sense of security? Sonny's faith was constantly being called into question, and it wasn't hard to see why. Everything that Sonny did was to please someone, and it was never really him. Sonny was trying to please God, on some level, or at least trying to justify himself to the one that he thought could be the only one to bring him salvation.
"If she heard you, I'm sure she listened," Carly said, sitting down next to him.
"I don't know if I can say goodbye so soon, Carly. I know that I don't want to, but what if I have to?"
"You won't."
"I can keep on trying to believe that," Sonny leaned forward. "But my heart is telling me something and my mind is telling me something else."
"You've always been the type of person that relies on your heart, Sonny. You've never been a rational person."
"You think this is the place to be telling me something like that?"
"I'm just saying that you've always listened to your heart even when your brain was telling you something else because your heart is always right, Sonny. Even when you know that something doesn't seem right you'll still follow it until the end if you feel that it's right. How many times have you fought against people who were telling you that you were wrong about something, and then you ended up being right in the end? How many times have you done that with me?"
"More than I'd care to count," Sonny replied, completely deadpan. "Maybe I am the type of person that always trusts my instincts, and maybe I'm almost always right, but there's going to be a time when I'm not, and I'm going to lose something that I care about a lot. Carly, I don't care about many things as strongly as I care about my children. If someone wanted to hurt me considerably then the easiest way to do it would be to strike at me through one of my kids. Faith already tried it and she almost succeeded."
"But she didn't."
"Just because she couldn't do it doesn't mean that someone else won't try and won't get the job done right." Sonny's hands began to shake, "I don't even know how badly he's hurt. What if there's something wrong with him? What if he'll never be the same? How much will he hate me if he can never do anything with his life because of the sheer fact that I'm his father?"
"He'll never hate you for what happened, Sonny. You didn't have anything to do with this."
"You're wrong, Carly. I always have something to do with what happens around my family. I'm always going to be the common link that places them all in danger. You would tell me that sometimes, remember? And I'd never listen. Maybe now I should start."
"What are you saying?" Carly asked.
"Maybe I should just stop and leave, truly leave."
"Sonny, you can't leave!" Carly grabbed him. "You can't let them win. The people who tried to do this to Damian only want to know that they've somehow managed to dent the shield that you put up in everything that you do. You can't show them that you're weak, remember? How many times have you told me that showing weakness is not acceptable? How many times have I had to listen to you tell me about how important it is to be as strong as you can be?"
"He only wanted to be a doctor and find out who his father was," Sonny recalled what Damian's goals were when he first came to Port Charles. "How did something so simple end up turning into something like this? Something that's so twisted?"
"I don't know."
"It's because of me, Carly. You know that!"
"Sonny, stop!" Carly yelled. "I won't let you do this to yourself again. I won't let you beat yourself into submission."
"How... how's Michael?" Sonny knew that the only way he was going to get his mind off of what was going on was to think of something else, anything else. At that moment he'd be open to talking about Ric, but things hadn't regressed that badly, so there was no need to do something so drastic.
"I managed to get him calmed down somewhat," Carly said. "But he thinks that this is his fault. You Corinthos men enjoy blaming yourselves for every little problem that goes on the world, even when it's not your fault at all."
"It's not his fault."
"And it's not yours either," Carly pointed out, hoping that driving the point home yet again would actually have some amount of success on her lamenting husband.
"Did you see your mother?"
"No, I just came to the station and saw that you weren't there. When I knew that you weren't there I had a feeling that you would be here." Carly looked at the cross, "Challenging God when you don't have the power to fix the problems that go on in your life all by yourself, you're one of the only people that I know who would be so bold."
"Bold, Carly?" Sonny inquired. "Maybe I'm not bold, maybe I'm just scared."
"We're going to pull through this." Carly grabbed Sonny's hand, "He's going to pull through this. If you can survive being shot at in front of the police station then why wouldn't your son be able to survive getting hit by a truck? He's your boy, Sonny, that means that he's got the same fortitude that you do."
Sonny kissed Carly on the cheek, a quick brush. "Thanks, Carly." She had changed so much since the time that Damian had came into their lives. She would have been against anything that had to do with saving him, now she was trying to save both Sonny and Damian. He was glad that she had come to realize that Damian was important to all of them.