Dichotomy
A/N: This chapter is more comical than tragic. It's in preparation for the rather sinister twist in chapter five :p
Summary: Christopher Peregrine Halliwell died. Yet he is now alive and well. Surely that doesn't happen so easily? And if it does, whatever happened to the Chris who died to save him?
Disclaimer: Charmed belongs to someone who is very rich, so we can immediately assume it is not me. Don't sue, you'll only get a half empty jar of old fashioned jelly babies.
Chapter 4
All was not so serene in the Halliwell household. Perry woke to hear raised voices, and stretched, although the action was unnecessary. He had no body, after all. He frowned, and hurried to the top of the stairs, where he could see Chris and Wyatt apparently in the middle of yet another argument.
"Shut up! Shut up before I fry your twice blessed ass!"
"Twice blessed-!"
"Yea! A blessing for each buttock, cos' it's so big and FAT!"
There was a pause, and Wyatt's face fell comically. Chris blanched, regaining his balance at the last moment and gaping as his older brother seemed to actually pout. Perry raised an eyebrow and leant against the banister.
"You think my butt's big?"
Wyatt turned around to scrutinize his behind over his shoulder. Chris barely swallowed a laugh and made a strangled snorting noise, before eventually having to yield one of his hands to stuff his fist in his mouth. When Wyatt gave said behind an experimental wiggle, however, Chris lost all control and collapsed to the floor, howling with laughter.
Fortunately or unfortunately, at that moment the front door swung open, and their mother entered the room, followed hastily by a slightly red faced Leo, who was staggering under a large pile of shopping bags. Piper froze and raised an eyebrow at the scene.
"Good heavens, what happened here?" she asked, turning briefly to relieve a now purple Leo from a few of the bags and sighing.
"Well, I suppose at least you didn't curse each other while we were out." She muttered.
"Mum…?" Wyatt asked in a small voice quite unlike his usual tones, still frowning. Concerned, Piper hurried over to her eldest son and put a hand on his shoulder.
"Yes, honey?"
Wyatt looked her in the eye, surly faced and deadly serious, and shot a scathing look at Chris, who Leo was now attempting to lever off the floor without much success, as he was still giggling uncontrollably.
"Is my…butt big?"
This caused Chris to once again fall to the floor in a fresh bout of laughter, and Leo to drop him in surprise. Piper, taken aback, smiled wryly after she overcame the initial shock, and suppressed a smile as she watched her youngest rolling on the floor clutching his chest with now wheezing sniggers. Perry chuckled slightly and turned to the newly erected peardrop bowl.
"Sweetheart," she rubbed his shoulder consolingly "I tell you from uncountable nappy changing experiences, that you have a very nice bottom."
Now Leo, who was halfway through a second attempt to get Chris to stand on his own, doubled over with determinedly suppressed laughter and quickly turned them into a hacking cough. Chris, now red in the face, could only manage a few choked hiccoughs.
Piper crossed her arms indignantly as Wyatt turned a smug smile into a look of mild mollification, and glared at her husband frostily.
"And I'll have you know, Leo Wyatt, that your bu-"
"What say we get the shopping into the kitchen, Pip?" Leo said loudly and hastily, grabbing Chris by the arm and hoisting him up. Wyatt raised his eyebrows.
"Pip, Dad? I could have sworn it was Pipsie last time I checked…"
Leo raised his eyes to the ceiling as if to implore those above for a miracle, as Piper blushed then glared at her eldest son, and Chris took a deep breath, repeated the nickname under his breath and once again fell to the floor with silent giggles. Perry nearly fell down the stairs, as he repeated the name himself, thinking, then he too began to laugh.
Piper rolled her eyes and marched over to the fallen bags of shopping; gathering them into her arms resignedly and began to issue orders abruptly.
"Leo: bags, kitchen. Wyatt, make sure your brother doesn't suffocate. Chris; up, now."
They all obliged, Wyatt reaching down on the way to jerk his brother to his feet and peering carefully into his flushed face. Chris took one look at him and nearly fell over as he attempted to laugh again, but lack of oxygen prevented this. Wyatt smacked him upside the head and dragged him out of the room, shaking his head but still smiling.
Perry made to follow, then stopped abruptly.
No matter how much they may look, sound, and even act like his own family…they would never be the family he once knew. Perry slid to the floor, leaning against the banister, and placed his head on his folded arms resting on his knees, watching the now empty doorway with an unreadable look in his eyes.
Perry wrinkled his nose and raised an eyebrow at the rather abysmal attempt spiraling across the surface of the notebook, and sighed. It was legible, he supposed, but looked more like the writing of a three year old than anything else. He hoped he had spelled 'ignoramus' right…
The door swung open, and Wyatt entered, blond curly hair sticking up comically on one side. Perry looked up, and wondered how precisely such flat, straight ever turned out to be so rebellious. His brother's long hair would never…
The potion vials in the dresser on the opposite side of the room suddenly began to rattle and shake ominously, and Perry calmed himself with gritted teeth. It was no good growing bitter now. He had achieved what he had wanted, wished for, hadn't he?
Hadn't he?
Although, ending up dead and watching himself live a happy and fulfilled life hadn't been exactly what he had in mind. In fact, being dead at all hadn't even entered the equation either.
"Hey, Perry? You in here?"
Perry was about to answer with a sarcastic variation of an affirmative, folded his arms, then froze, remembering he could not be seen nor heard. He sighed, frustrated, and instead chucked a peardrop with more force than perhaps was necessary at Wyatt's head.
"Ouch! Hey!"
Wyatt rubbed his head indignantly, and Perry smiled as he pouted once again. Well, at least it hadn't all been in vain. His brother was most definitely now a 'goodie', much as Perry hated to use such a cliché term.
Wyatt eyed the scrawled attempts on the many disregarded pieces of note paper which littered the floor, and whistled.
"Wow. You know, I really wasn't kidding when I said I wanted you to practice."
Perry raised another strawberry flavored peardrop threateningly, and Wyatt clasped his hands, pleading;
"NO! Not the strawberry one, please, I beg of you!"
Perry sighed, dropped it, and walked over to large book lying propped open on its stand, and turned a page idly. Wyatt stood up from his kneeling position, and came over to stand beside him.
"It usually repels spirits like you. Who are you?"
Perry stooped to retrieve the ballpoint pen he had dropped, grasped a piece of paper, and sat on the floor in order to write comfortably. Wyatt dropped beside him, eying the pen and paper eagerly.
' You would never believe me if I told you.'
Wyatt snorted, and rolled his eyes.
"Well, I've seen and heard a lot of strange things. Try me."
'My name is Perry. I'm 20 years old, or I was, when I died.'
Wyatt's eyes widened, and he turned to look at the air where Perry was sitting. He paused, before speaking.
"You…died? So your…I mean…your dead, so…are you a ghost, then?"
Perry smiled bitterly.
'You could say that. I am, however, still alive on this earth.'
Wyatt frowned, and thought for a moment.
"But…that makes no sense. How can you be alive, and dead, at the same time?"
Just then, the door slammed open, and Chris poked his head round the door, looking troubled.
"Hey Wy, are you talking to yourself, or something?"
Wyatt quickly grabbed the paper and stuffed it into his pocket, eying the strawberry peardrop on the floor with trepidation.
"Uh…no. Just…calling someone on my cellphone. Yeah."
Chris closed the door behind him, leant against it, folded his arms and raised his eyebrows, a slight smirk growing on his face. Wyatt shifted uncomfortably under the scrutinizing gaze.
"You were always a terrible liar, Wyatt."
Wyatt opened his mouth to answer, when Chris suddenly dived for something on the floor. Wyatt's hand shot to his pocket to protect the incriminating piece of notepaper, but breathed a sigh of relief when Chris grabbed the peardrop instead. He held it up and his lip curled in disgust.
"Ew! I thought I got rid of all these ages ago! Wy! You KNOW I hate peardrops, they're so bitter! How could you?"
Chris feigned a sad sniffle, and chucked the peardrop towards the bin, where he did not see it seemingly caught and suspended by thin air. Wyatt gulped nervously, trying not to follow the flying red sweet with his gaze as Chris ranted about the evils of peardrops.
"Hey, Wyatt? You even listening?"
Wyatt jumped as his brother's sea green eyes were suddenly right up close to his face, narrowed. Chris frowned and placed a hand on Wyatt's forehead, looking comically like his mother.
"You've been really out of it today. You sick or something?"
Wyatt batted his brother's hand away and rose to his feet, stretching.
"Yeah, I've got a bit of a headache, actually. I'm just gonna-"
Suddenly, a blue china vase which had been sitting on top of the dresser fell to the floor and smashed. Both brother's jumped.
"-go get an aspirin. Damn."
Wyatt started towards the dresser, but Chris' hand on his arm prevented him from going further. Wyatt eyed the strawberry peardrop which now sat innocently where the vase had been anxiously.
"No, I'll do it. You go."
Chris shoved his brother towards the door. Wyatt gave the room one last sweep for any sign of the spirit, but found nothing, submitted to defeat and left, giving his brother a concerned look before closing the door behind him.
Chris hurried over to the dresser and gathered the fallen pieces into a pile, before grabbing the bin and beginning to sweep the china shards into it. He froze, and frowned, then cursed as a particularly sharp edge caught his finger and blood welled in the cut. He sucked it hastily, thinking.
He was sure he had chucked that peardrop over into the bin. He hadn't heard it clatter on the floor beside it. He glanced about, looking for any sign of it on the floor.
There was a ringing smack and Chris jumped, looking towards the mirror on the chest of drawers, in front of which the peardrop still wobbled ominously. Chris' heart began to pound painfully fast, and he rose to his feet to stare at the shaking sweet, then his gaze rose to see his reflection in the mirror.
Wyatt was halfway down the stairs when he heard a resounding cry, then a crash, then silence from the attic he had just left. He whirled about on the stair as his mother came hurrying out of the kitchen, apron askew, calling to him.
"Wyatt? Chris? What the hell was that noise!"
Wyatt didn't answer, but leapt back up the stairs two at a time, cursing his own stupidity, fear rising in his chest.
He should have known.
A/N: Not as long as the other chapters, but this one was a little difficult to write. Well, things get a little more 'bloody' from now on, but there will still be quite a bit of humor.
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