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Chapter 7: Thicker Than Water
AN: You have no idea how tempted I am to put in a 'got milk?' joke.
Disclaimer: I do not have any rights to Naruto.o
White.
Beautiful, pure white.
Thickly, around him, his hair swishing and melting into it, barely seen. He drifted, alone but not lonely, knowing the difference. He closed his eyes, which had become cold from the liquid gliding over them. They didn't sting though. He could see perfectly, endlessly, forever. There wasn't a lot to see...
Until drops of red started appearing, swirling, trickling down the sides of his vision. Bright and enigmatic, the drops formed a river. Dark vermillion against ivory, unmixing, dancing, spiraling. The milk started to become turbulent, it became harder to stay fixed, his control slipping.
Blood is thicker than water. What about milk?
The blood begin to come closer to him, whirlpools about his ankles, not yet touching the skin. Gently, it brushed by him, sending a shock through his whole body. The blood seemed overjoyed at this, and touched him again, snaking up to his knees. He tried swimming upwards, but the undertow had him. He opened his eyes fully, staring at the red, churning, half-way up to his waist, forming chains around his wrists. His skin became cold and waxy, as the blood dripped from him, soaking him completely. He ignored it. It meant nothing to him.
He began to enjoy it, as it curled around his stomach, snaking up his spine. It found the back of his neck, and he thought he heard a whisper but dismissed it as insanity. He let it crawl up his front, under his clothes and across his skin. Then up his neck, tingles arose as it continued. He tilted his head back, saying nothing, as it covered his scalp, so comforting and beautiful. More beautiful than the white, he thought, while it spun webs over him, slowly coming down, down his forehead, and over his eyes.
All was red. His could no longer see.
Did he want to see...?
Its tendrils brushed his cheeks, softly, working its way into his nose, like soft worms, crawling into his flesh. Inside, it softly hushed him, making him quiet, making him cold. Oh, how he liked being cold. He felt it, so vivid, when it molded to the shape of his lips, partly open, and ventured into the unused cavern that was his mouth. It plunged into him, deep and cold and painful. He did not panic, but found he could no longer breath. Painful, raking its fingers along his arms, his fingernails splintering, skin wearing thin over his bones. He was its doll, its lover, he alone.
He wondered vaguely where the hand had gone, the hand that had shown him... the warmth that lay buried, in the very center of the milky world...
He couldn't look for it, he was blind, and he couldn't shout for it, he was mute. He couldn't hear it, for he'd become deaf, and paralyzed, he wasn't able to search for it. All he had was the cold, metallic taste in the mouth, weighing him down, so heavy.
Blood is thicker than water. What about milk?
o
Temari groaned as she glanced at the clock. It was fucking 3:00 in the morning, for Pete's Sake! She wasn't a fan of mornings, not at all, and waking up at obscene hours for absolutely no reason wasn't on the top of her priorites list, to say the least. She reached up her arms, shivering violently as she discovered just how cold it was. It seemed she had left her window open, not noticing as she crashed in bed at 11 after finishing her essay, and it had still been raining. It rained, a cold, wet, miserable rain.
"Shit..." she muttered, pulling herself to sit. She reached over blindly, knowing her sweatshirt was on the floor somewhere within arms reach... This was definitely one of the perks of sleeping on a mattress on the floor. Also, you could never fall too far down, as Temari was a restless sleeper.
Wanting something to drink before she went back to sleep, the teenager lugged her body off of her mattress, after pulling her sweatshirt over her head, cursing herself mentally for wearing sleep-shorts instead of pants. She swished saliva around in her mouth, grimacing at the taste that still lingered there. What she wanted was alcohol, and checking Mariko's wine racks seeming very tempting, but unreasonable, as Temari knew once she got going she wouldn't stop... and they had school the next day. Besides, she didn't do many intelligent things when she was drunk, so she had learned.
When their father had died, things had gotten rough. He had been a bastard, yeah, but he'd still been her father. The last thing she did in her old town was going to a party, to cheer herself up.
Yeah, that'd been an interesting experience, to say the least.
Sluggishly, she made her way from the hall to the living room, freezing as she discovered she wasn't the only one awake. Soft moonlight filtered in from the open window, and on the sil was a small figure, tracing lines on his finger with a knife, not quite hard enough to break skin. He went from fingertip to fingertip, aware she was watching him, but uncaring.
"Gaara!" she rushed over to him, shock and horror on her face, "What the Hell are you doing!"
He continued his ritual, switching hands. He wore his day clothes still, and the rings around his eyes seemed to have darkened in color.
"Couldn't sleep," he answered simply, which did nothing to ease her rapidly beating heart.
"Gaara, stop it," she said firmly, but he ignored her. His eyes were so blank, so detesteful, refusing to meet hers. So vague and sharp, vividly green. His breath flew silently over his lips, almost visible in the air. Temari nearly drew back in her fright, relieved when she caught sight of his wrists, and they were unmarked. That was the last thing she needed, having her youngest brother go suicidal...
"Gaara, I want you to give me the knife. Now."
He went on, tracing the curve of his forefinger to his thumb, and back again, the metal of the small kitchen knife making whiserpings against his pale flesh. She watched, barely able to stomach it. He watched, daring himself a little more, pushing just a little harder with each pass, the skin beginning to give in...
"Dammit, Gaara, give me the fucking knife!"
Though she was afraid, truly afraid, Temari snatched his wrist, pulling it towards her. She was almost surprised when he didn't attack her. He looked so deadly there, so lifeless. So able to take life. Usually, is she saw his face like that, she'd leave him alone. But this was different.
His ungiving eyes peirced into her, no emotion showing. Struggling to pull away his hand, she found him a lot stronger than she'd before thought. Her other hand made it's way to the knife, trying to break his death-hold on the handle.
"Come on, Gaara..." she nearly begged, bowing her head as she pulled. He could see she was shaking... her muscles strained, her lips pushed tightly against one another to keep herself from crying out.
And he let go, so suddenly Temari fell back, her hands fumbling against one another, and glinting silver met her skin. She yelped, the hand holding the knife breaking her fall, the blade tainted red. Gaara's eyes widened, as she gasped, lifting her hand so she was able to see the lesion. It wasn't very deep, thank whatever deity, but that didn't mean it didn't hurt. It spread from and inch below her ring finger across her palm to below her thumb, and blood had already begun to pour out of the wound, trickling over her wrist.
Dark vermillion against ivory.
"Fuck!" Temari exclaimed, not careing about the word's leaving her mouth, in her drowsy stupor. She pushed herself up, letting the knife rest on the chair. Her blood was on it, her blood. He could smell it, almost taste it on the air.
Unmixing.
Her navy sweatshirt was darkening where the blood had flown onto it. The First-Aid training she had recieved at summer-camp came flashing before her eyes, as she clamped her other hand over the wound, and elevated it. Her eyes were wide and scared, as she felt the cold liquid meet her other palm, breathign quick and shallow. She felt a pulse, bright, bright red squirting out, and she squealed as she released she had hit an artery.
Dancing.
Gaara watched, feeling his own heartbeat quicken. He had done that to his sister... it was beautiful, in an eerie way, the way scarlet rivers made themselves so painfully known. He intook breath sharply, coming off of the window sil to stand.
"You're bleeding..."
Spiraling.
Temari winced, but gave him an unsure smile.
"Gaara..."
"Fuck, Temari, what happened!" came an impatient shout from the hallway, as Kankurou rushed in, eyes boring into his younger brother. Temaru took a deep breath, closing her eyes.
"Kankurou, I need you to run over to the neighbour's house, and ask if they can drive me to the hospital."
"It's fucking three-o-clock in the morning Temari, I-"
"Just do it!" she yelled, sitting back on the couch, the knife still lying on the chair beside it. She began murmuring things lightly to herself, feeling light-headed and nauseous. She looked up to find her brother still standing there, like a statue, and glared fiercely.
"I said fucking go! Gaara will stay here with me!"
Kankurou sent hem both looks, before running to the front door. After his footsteps had disappeared, there was a restless silence between the two. She shut her eyes, tightly, squeezing her hand. The only light was from the moon, which soon dipped behind a large cottony grey cloud, so lonely. Gaara's hand reached out, so gently touching her hand, his fingertips becoming wet with the wetness, as she looked up at him, his bright eyes meeting hers.
"You should go back to bed," she mustered, "I'll be fine..."
He shook his head, sitting down next to her. And he stared at the blood, as it refused to stop, just kept flowing, and flowing, so thick. He wondered what it would taste like... it was warm, coming from within her, so warm inside her veins. His breath passed again over cold, pale, untouched lips, flavoured with a whisper.
"I'm sorry."
o
The atmosphere of the Hyuuga household had been nearly unbearable during dinner. No one met eyes. No one spoke. Neji had eaten quickly, before shoving his plate into the dishwasher and heading back up to his room. Even Hanabi, at just nine years of age, could feel it. But she dared not say a thing.
At about 9:00, Hinata stood outside Neji's closed door, cold and white, undecorated. She willed herself to knock, or say something, something that could fix their broken home. But it didn't work, it never did, and she walked back to her room to do her homework.
At around 10:00, Neji lay awake, staring out the window in silence. All the stars were covered up with clouds, as it continued to pour.
'Doesn't matter... wishes don't come true anyways...'
That was something Neji liked about Gaara. He didn't want the world, or didn't seem to, anyways. Everyone wants the world these days. Too bad we have to share. And the pieces are never equal.
'But at least we have something.'
o
"So what happened?" Kankurou asked from the backseat of their neighbours van, whom had been awakened rather rudely by Kankurou's screaming and knocking. But the man had forgiven him, once he'd seen Temari's hand, of course. In any case, they were already half-way to the hospital, still in their pajamas (except for Gaara), their faces tinted by the lights of the town. Temari's face was passive, he could see in the mirror, as she was sitting in the front passenger seat - which is ironically enough the most dangerous place to sit.
"I cut my hand on the knife..." she whispered, "Gaara was playing with it."
Kankurou turned next to Gaara, who sat on the other side of the backseat, looking out the window, his cheek resting on his hand. The driver said nothing, keeping his eyes and ears on the road ahead of him.
"Why did Gaara have a knife?" Kankurou asked. Temari leaned her forehead against the window as well, the strap of the seatbelt pressing into her. A towel was held over her hand, tinted horribly, but not making a mess.
"He couldn't sleep," she said simply, and Kankurou glanced from sibling to sibling, wanting to probe deeper, but he felt that wasn't such a good idea.
The large, alighted letter 'H' of the hospital sign drew nearer, and they were soon parked, their neighbour looking rather nervous. Kankurou hopped out, and opened with Temari's door with such a force it almost swung back on them, but he was able to grab her shoulder, as she undid the seat belt, and pulled her out.
"Let's go!" he yelled, and began at a run, taking her right along with him. She glared at him, wanting to shake him off, but she couldn't. Gaara watched them disappear in hospital, as he stood in the half-empty parking lot, the air still. He heard someone behind him clear their throat, and he turned, casting but one eye upon their neighbour, whose name he did not know.
"Hey, I'm sorry to leave you kids here, but..." the middle-aged man scratched his temple, "I got work tommorow, and I don't know ya... so here." He stuck out his hand, which had a twenty dollar bill in it. "Call yourself a taxi, alright?"
Gaara took the money, with but a nod, and began walking towards the large building, the lights blaring yellow. The van pulled out, rather noisily, leaving Gaara alone in the parking lot.
o
In the waiting room, Kankurou sat, glaring at the wall. Gaara was a seat over, doing the same, though he didn't look nearly as sleepy as his brother, who was sipping a coffee that he'd gotten from a vending machine. He'd already consumed a hot chocolate, a bag of Sour Skittles, and three Mars bars, all bought with the ten dollars he always kept in his coat pocket. Gaara had declined his offers with silence.
"Stupid bitch..." he muttered, referring to the secretary that had hassled him as they'd come in, "Can't believe her..."
He looked over at Gaara, silent. Sometimes he doubed his brother was human. He seemed so out of place, among the pensive mothers and crying children around them. A teenager a bit older then them lay on the floor on the other side of the room, asleep. It smelled like disinfectant, so clean. Hospitals had to use that as a cover-up for the smell of blood, and death.
People die in hospitals.
Eventually, Temari came back in, her hand stitched up, the blood washed off. She had to shake Kankurou to wake him up, rather violently, as by that time she was in quite a bad mood.
"Geez, I cut my hand open, and you can't even stay awake?" she grumbled, taking a sip of his coffee. He squinted at her through the flourescent lighting.
"Hey... shut the Hell up..."
She sighed and pulled him out of the chair, rather violently. She paused, almost as if she were going to embrace him, but turned at the last minute, and headed out the door. Gaara continued after her, taking the twenty out of his pocket. Kankurou, still half-alseep, trudged after him.
"God, she's acting weird..."
He glanced at the clock before he left, reading an unpleasant 4:22. AM.
"Must be the painkillers."
Three hours later, Temari stared at her own face, reflected up at her from the sink, filled with water. She looked at her hand again, bound, but still sore. They'd given her an injection to make it numb, but she could feel it.
Even if she denied it, she felt it.
She traced the line, sadly, knowing she couldn't stay there all day, though it would've been nice. Her hair was still wet from her shower, dripping onto her shirt, droplets rolling down her back, causing bumps to rise over her skin. Again, her eyes met their reflection.
Temari lightly brushed the surface with her fingertips, watching her face ripple, stretching, growing. Kankurou's half-hearted protests came through the door, and Temari closed her eyes, slapping the water quickly with her hand, totally destroying her reflection.
Small curls of red drifted through the liquid...
Thicker than water...
End of Chapter 7