(2492 words)
"And you're sure there's nothing else you want to tell me?" Raph sits in that same therapist's office, his fingers in the small water feature beside him. "Nope." He says dully. "Nothin'" She looks at him skeptically. "Well your father told me you had an interesting dream the other night. Do you want to talk about that?"
Raph glares at the ground. "'Dunno what you're talkin' about." He mumbles, pulling his fingers out of the water and folding his arms across his chest. "I can't help you if you don't try Raphael." She says calmly. Raph's face scrunches up and his heart pounds. It was that kind of thing that made him angry. Those patronizing, too kind, sickening words.
Raph doesn't talk. He wants to just wait until the session was over. He probably would be able to make it. There was probably only a few minutes left. As the seconds tick by Raph sees his therapist shift in her seat a bit before speaking once again. "Fine then. I'll make a deal with you. We can end today early, and I won't make note of how you won't cooperate but next week, you have to talk for at least thirty minutes each session."
"No excuses." She adds. Raph continues to glare but glances up at the clock. Damn. There was still fifteen minutes left, and he knew sitting in an office for that long without talking was going to be awkward as hell. But was it really worth it. Raph and the therapist's eyes lock and Raph looks away quickly. Yeah, it was worth it. "Fine." Raph grumbles out, sitting stiffly in the chair.
"Can I go now?" He asks. The calm woman nods and Raph pushes himself up quickly and barges out the door. He felt so stupid once he was out. He knew he wanted to 'get better', but he didn't like talking. At all. To anyone. He stomps through the lobby, shoving past a few people he didn't care to try and recognize and out the doors.
"Hey man, you're out early." Leo says in a bored tone, leaning up against the van. "Whatever." Raph grumbles, getting in the passenger's side door and slamming it shut. Leo follows suit and gets in the driver's seat. "Sounds like you had fun." Leo says sarcastically. Raph stares out his window. "I legit just spent an hour talking, I don't want to start up again." Raph says moodily.
They were quiet for a minute until Leo cracks a small smile. "'Legit'?" Raph punches Leo's arm half playfully, half seriously. "Shut up." Leo tries to hold in a laugh. "Where'd you get that?" Raph lets out a low growl. "I said shut up." He runs his hand through his hair, calmed slightly by the feeling. Leo takes an unfamiliar turn on the road and Raph frowns.
"Where are you going?" Raph asks. Leo shrugs. "Well, I only get the van when I pick you up, so I thought we'd go and get some ice-cream or something." Raph rolls his eyes and glares at the older boy. "I'm not some kid, you can't just offer ice-cream to fix all of life's problems." He says. Leo gets a smug look on his face. "Fine, I guess you don't have to get any. I know I want some, but if you don't want any..."
"Let's just go get the damn ice-cream." Raph says.
"So... Chocolate? I would've taken you as a vanilla guy." Leo says, trying to make small talk. Raph shrugs and stabs a plastic spoon into his ice-cream. They sit on the top of the van, a fall breeze blowing past. "I didn't think you'd want ice-cream. You've been sick or something for the past few days." Raph mumbles.
Leo nods and takes another bite. "Yeah, but I just thought it'd be nice to get out of the house for a while." Raph nods in understanding. Soon both small bowls were empty and the boys slide off the roof of the car and climb in, driving back in relative awkward silence. Back at the house Raph trudges to the living-room, plopping down on the couch and draping and arm over his eyes.
"Hey Raphie, glad you're back!" A goofy, fake voice says as something cold touches Raph's shoulder. Raph moves his arm and sees Mikey holding spike on Raph's shoulder. "You dork." Raph says, taking Spike off his shoulder and to his chest. "So what took you two so long?" Mikey asks normally, flopping backwards over the couch.
"We stopped for ice-cream." Raph says simply, patting Spike's shell. "What!? Without me!?" Mikey shouts, flinging himself up. "Why would you do this to me!" He whines. "You can go get ice-cream yourself." Raph says, waving him off. "Fine. Maybe I will." Mikey pushes himself up and stalks out of the room, leaving Raph and his pet alone.
"You understand me Spike." Raph mumbles. "I'd talk to you, you don't care about anything." He gives him another little pat and smiles. Raph huffs and slides down to a laying position. "Life is fucking stupid."
Leo sits on his bed, holding his stomach in pain. He hated that ice-cream, but he could tell his father was getting suspicious. He was eating more than those first couple days, but it still was very little. He couldn't tell if the pain in his stomach was hunger or pain from eating, but he wouldn't be surprised if the universe gave him both. He deserved it.
Even if his family didn't know, it made him feel better, like appeasing hundreds of invisible eyes. Hundreds of invisible ears gaining some sort of joy from him when he empties the contents of his stomach. The weight of guilt lifts off his shoulders every time until it comes crashing back down on him.
"Leonardo?" Leo looks up and fakes a smile. "Yeah?" It was his father. "You were out later than normal, did something happen?" Leo shakes his head. "No, I just thought Raph could use some time out so I took him to get ice-cream." Yoshi looks at Leo for a moment. "You had some?" He asks. "Yeah, I'm not gonna lie, I was kind of craving it." Leo replies with a laugh, trying to hold back a growl in his stomach.
"Tell me if you feel sick. You haven't been eating as much as you normally would." Yoshi replies in his usual calm voice. "Yeah, yeah, of course." Leo says, wanting his father to leave. "Alright. Next time, ask if you may go." Yoshi says, turning away to leave. "Of course, I'm sorry." Leo starts to fold over once again, his stomach hurting still. Finally he leaves, closing the door behind him.
Leo lets out a small groan. He really wished he didn't eat that ice-cream, but he saw how that little act made his father calm down about his 'eating habits'. "Why does everything suck..." Leo mumbles.
Mikey strolls down the sidewalk, his active mind jumping from thought to thought. "I wonder what flavors they'll have. I haven't had ice-cream in way too long!" Mikey says aloud. He looks around at the falling leaves, the colors making him smile. He wasn't far from the ice-cream place when he hears someone call his name.
He turns around and sees April waving her arms rapidly in the air, jogging up to him. She was wearing a big jacket and scarf to keep herself warm. "Mikey! Hey!" She says, catching up with the younger boy. "Hey April!" Mikey says just a bit too loudly. "What are you up to?" He asks, flinging an arm around her shoulder.
"I was going to get some ice-cream, I've been craving it since two days ago." April says with a laugh. "Whoa! Me too!" Mikey says excitedly, bouncing on his toes. "What kind are you gonna get?! I was thinking about one of the old school flavors, but then I remembered that there's tons of new flavors, and then the flavor of the day could be good and also, sometimes you just want something new, you know?"
April smiles as Mikey rambles, his words coming out a mile a minute. In no time they were walking through the doors of the parlor. "-and that's why I never eat vanilla ice-cream without sprinkles." Mikey says, finishing a story. "That's... Interesting Mikey." April says, an awkward smile on her face. Mikey smiles back genuinely.
He bounds up to the glass separating him from the frozen treat, and stares at the wide array of colors. "Yo April! Check out this one!" Mikey says suddenly. April walks over and looks through the glass at the ice-cream the boy was pointing at. "It's called play-dough and it looks amazing!" He grabs her shoulder tightly and stares her in the eyes. "You have to try it with me." He says seriously.
"Okay, okay." April laughs. They order the ice-cream and sit down at a table for two. "What have you been up to today?" Mikey asks, small talk being no problem for him. "Ah, I've been trying to work on this stupid chemistry homework, but I just can't get it. Plus, my dad is out of town for like a week, so I'm kinda on my own with this.
Mikey smiles and stabs his spoon into the ice-cream. "Donnie's really good at science and stuff! He could totally help you!" He exclaims. "Come on! We can go now!" Mikey says, shoving the rest of his ice-cream in his mouth and dragging April up and out of the shop, almost making her drop her cone. "Whoa! Mikey, what?" She says.
"Yeah, come on!" He says happily as they jog down the street.
Donnie paces his room, a path through the mess cleared long ago by shoving things aside. He'd been doing this for hours and He showed no sign of stopping. "What happened? Why were they together? They were probably on a date or something." Donnie mumbles to himself. "He's not even good looking." He groans, dropping his head back.
He shakes his hands a few times before quickly sliding into his desk chair and letting his fingers fly over the familiar keys. Within a few seconds a social media profile pops up and Donnie starts scrolling. He goes past the gap-toothed grin of the profile picture and looks at the bio. He furrows his eyebrows and frowns. "'Single, but not for long'?" He says. "What the hell man?"
He keeps scrolling and looks at the posts. "Let's see what you post Casey Jones..." Donnie glares at the pictures of Casey and hockey games, a couple with him holding a beer, but stops at one picture of him and a little freckle faced girl with jet black hair like Casey's. He clicks open the picture and reads the caption. 'I'm gonna miss this lil' freak.'.
Donnie stares a little longer. "He has a sister?" He mumbles. "Huh..." They looked happy in the picture, he didn't look like the asshole Donnie knew him as. Not in that picture at least. He hears the front door slam open and He listens as he stares at the computer screen. "YO DONNIE!" He quickly closes the tab and switches over to something he had been programming before going downstairs.
"What Mike-" He stops talking when he sees the redheaded girl waving awkwardly. "Uh... Hey..." She says. "I told April you could help her with some science stuff!" Donnie nods one too many times and an awkward air immediately forms around them. "Yeah, uh... What- What is it? Um, Chemistry right?"
April smiles. "Yeah, thankfully I had my backpack with me when Mikey grabbed me." She chuckles. "Otherwise this would've been all for nothing." Donnie's heart twinges. "Yeah, heh heh..." He mumbles. They walk into the living-room to go through the books, but stop, staring at Raph fast asleep on one of the couches.
"Oh um..." Donnie mumbles, thinking of a quick solution. "Let's just go to the kitchen, we can just sit at the table." April shrugs and they move to the kitchen, spreading out three large books. "Believe it or not, Chemistry is pretty interesting." Donnie says as he pulls one of the books closer to him.
April nods. "Yeah, I feel like I'd like it if I could understand it. Like, I totally get trig, I even tutor Casey in it, that's why it's interesting to me." Donnie stares down at the books instead of answering right away. "You and Casey study together a lot?" April shrugs and starts flipping through her notebook. "Maybe once a week."
Donnie swallows the lump in his throat. "Ah... Okay then... So um, Chemistry..." They awkwardly transition into the work, going from not talking unless necessary to getting way off topic as teens do. They talked about chemistry for a grand total of twenty minutes until they were talking about other things, like food and families.
It was nice for a while, talking like they were friends, that is until... "So did you know your real parents?" April asks casually. Donnie frowns and tenses up a little. "Uh... N-No, not really." He says almost embarrassed. April picks up on his feelings and she covers her mouth. "Oh! Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to-" Donnie cuts her off mid sentence. "It's okay, really. I've just never really thought to talk about that."
"Don't worry about it." He adds with a smile. after a few moments of silence they start back up on the work, both silently agreeing to forget any of that had just happened.
You fall to your knees
You beg, you plead
Can I be somebody else
For all the times I hate myself?
Your failures devour your heart
In every hour, you're drowning
In your imperfection
Imperfection
Skillet
Well, you know how I thought I was gonna update twice before halloween? Hahahaha, yeah we all know that was never gonna happen. Guys, Donnie is the living embodiment of *Tries not to be awkward* *Fails* Just thought I'd share that with you haha! Anyways, the next chapter is going to be a way late but important to the plot halloween chapter, so get ready for halloween all year long. XD
Anyways, sorry for not updating for a while and I hope you enjoyed this pretty choppy chapter!