My eyes flicked open and I had the sudden urge to get myself a drink. Getting up, I couldn't remember where I'd fallen asleep, but this certainly wasn't my room. I didn't stand around and think about it long, my throat was literally burning from thirst. I made haste in opening the door and walking down the strange hallway to find a bathroom. This place was filled with door after door, each opened to only reveal a large king sized bed with purple sheets.
Finally I came to a well lit bathroom, a toilet faced me and a sink was on my left. I turned grabbed a purple cup that sat on the back of the toilet and quickly ran cold water into it. I brought it to my lips and greedily drank. The burn in my throat cooled, a nice warm feeling washed over me, well mostly down my front. Bringing the cup down, my eyes meet the mirror and I found it was not just a feeling of warmth, but my own hot blood was coating the front of me. My neck was bleeding, my throat was slit ear to ear and I was bleeding, down in long tendrils. Suddenly water burst from the wound, only diluting the thick blood as it washed further down my body.
In the mirror behind me then, I noticed a pair of eyes, red with spinning tomes, I did the only thing I could think to do, scream.
Terror gripped me as my eyes flashed open, I was still screaming. Adrenaline rushed though my veins and my brain was literally too numb to think to stop. A pair of pale arms wrapped around me, pulling me into a sitting position and I realized Deidara was pulling me to his chest. Fear again wracked me as I let out yet another scream, I couldn't stop myself.
"Stop it May! Its okay, I've got you, your safe!" He slowly rocked me as he squeezed my frame. My wide eyes watched the door fly open, light flooded the room, my father standing there with my mother behind him.
"He had me, oh my god, he had me, oh my god," I repeated over and over, the words spilling out of my mouth. My body started to shake wildly, Deidara only squeezed harder.
"No he didn't May, I've been here the entire time and he never had you hm, its okay, calm down," my boyfriend soothed.
"Sweet heart, I'm here," my dad crossed the room and sat near me on the edge of the bed. Deidara pulled the blanket up to cover my still exposed chest. He'd probably be hearing abut that tomorrow. I was still wide eyed and gasping for air when finally I regained myself. As the oxygen got to my brain, I felt sort of light headed, what had I just been doing?
"Better now un?" he asked very softly, nuzzling me. I swallowed the lump in my throat.
"Yes," I croaked, my throat a bit sore from the shrieking. I thought I heard him whisper 'good' but I couldn't be sure.
"Sam, come on, I think she's okay," My mother called from the doorway, using a very soft voice. My dad gave me a concerned look and got up. He kissed the top of my head before he left. Deidara never let go of me, not for several more minutes when finally I thought I could move. The terror had worked its way out of my system. I wiggled out of his arms and turned on a nearby lamp.
"That was so.."I trailed off. So many words rushed to my lips, scary, terrifying, horrendous, real, but I did not speak any of them. Dei held on to my hand. As I looked back at him, I noticed the bags under his eyes.
"Have you been up all night?" I asked, touching his face lightly with my free hand.
"Yeah," he smiled weekly. That was all, yeah.
"Why?" I asked simply.
" I can't sleep," he responded in the same way. That was clear. I figured he must have been used to sleeping with one eye open, but I wondered now in the sort of relaxed feel of my world how he was fairing. I'd never noticed until now that he never slept well.
"Is it like insomnia?" I asked, pausing before the I word came out of my mouth like bad news.
"Its not like I don't sleep at all, just not always so well," He explained. I hugged him and then pulled him back down to the bed so we faced each other laying on our sides.
"Lets stay up all night," I suggested. At this point I was so awake and so uninterested in going back to sleep, it sounded like a plan. He was up for a moment, grabbing the rum from under the bed and sat back down, leaning on the headboard. I joined him and we took turns taking long swigs off of the bottle. I loved the way rum tasted. I refused to touch anything else. It was almost sweet in the way it bit back at you when you swallowed.
"Dei, do you ever think about," I paused to take a swig, "That guy," I passed him the bottle, feeling more than little buzzed now.
"No, and you probably shouldn't either," he responded after swallowing his drink and thinking for a moment. I shouldn't think about it. I shouldn't let it bother me, but sometimes it plagued my mind like nothing else.
What I didn't know then is that Deidara lied to me far more often than he told the truth, he did sort of miss home, and he did think about that homeless man sometimes, though his thoughts were much more concerned with keeping the facade up and memories from wartime. Sure, he loved to bomb and kill people, but you can only see so many dead bodies and feel warm blood spill on your hands so many times.
We continued to chat idly about simple, stupid things until my mother rousted us around nine. She came into the room, opened my shade and left commanding us to get up as she left the room and the door open. The empty rum bottle had found its way under the pillows somehow and a shirt found its way over my bare chest, so we avoided a lecture there. Who cared if the sun was warm, I had a head ache and a hangover.
"Dei," I groaned, moving my head from his chest.
"Hmm?" he responded in much the same tone.
"That wasn't such a good idea," I comments, frowning and getting up to grab a jacket. I knew if I had to get up I wasn't going to be warm for so much longer. Fall was upon us. The leaves would begin to change and my birthday was just around the corner. I mused on eighteen as Deidara got up, bringing the blanket with him.
We made our way silently down the stairs and seated ourselves at the dinning room table. My father was reading the paper across from me, Deidara to my left on the same side. My mom came from the kitchen after a few moment with a plan and passed out simple omelets out on starched white plates that were already set out. She sat down next to my dad.
Cooking is what my mother did best. Everything was quick but extravagant, reminiscent of her collage years where she went to become a chef before marrying my father. She was a home maker now. Hash browns joined the omelets on the plate.
"Thanks mom," I said sort of flatly as she finally sat down. I wasn't sure how long she'd been awake for to make this, but I didn't . She didn't answer, we all just sort of dig in.
"So, May," my mother started half way though the meal. I looked up, of course she was going to start into an argument already this morning, "Have you been thinking about what your gonna sign up for collage for? Maybe just your basics at the community collage, you don't have to go off to a university right away,"
I narrowed my eyes at her. I supposed with Deidara's papers finally here, it was time to start thinking about it, but truth be told, I didn't want to. I didn't want to go to collage and that was a simple fact.
"May what in the world is wrong with you? Why all of a sudden you don't care whats gong on, you don't care about your future?" My mother accused, "Ever since he started hanging around, your absorbed into all of his shit? Ever since you got back, you've become a different person!"
I was about to turn around and snap at her, but there was no need.
"You know what Karen," Deidara started, a fire behind his grey irises, "I can't understand why you have such a problem with me. We've been though more in three weeks than you have in three months. We saved each others lives and all you can think about is how she changed? Can't you understand what happened to your daughter?"
Mom mother looked flabbergasted, but Deidara continued to tear into her, his voice getting louder and his tone angrier.
"You can't push her so hard!"
"Don't you talk to me like that! You live in my house!" My mother cut him off, but stopped as Deidara beat his hand down on the table.
"Don't you talk to me like a nuisance!" Suddenly the table was flying over, plates clattered and shattered, the left over food splattering on the floor and a broken table leg lay about four feet away from the mess. Deidara stood a shaking wreck over it all. We all stood frozen, he was ridged, it was as if I was watching this all happen from third person. The four of us still in our spots, three of us still sitting down. Deidara's muscles tensed and then relaxed as he took a single deep breathe.
"You useless rat, I bet your mother was a whore and you made up all that shit you told to the cops, my god, this is a civil house hold," My mother continued. I cringed, she shouldn't have done that. I averted my eyes, litterally covering my eyes, but I didn't hear anything for a long time and then I heard another crash. I looked up then, and around the room only to find the blond bomber with his fist though a window. Considering his super ninja strength, he had no problem busting it into a million peaces.
My mother stormed off and Deidara mocked her, shortly after she was out of our sight walking out the front door and slamming it behind him. My mother climbed the stairs and I didn't hear another thing.
"You've got to tell her to leave him alone!" I insisted, "Dei is helping me so much, and she treats him like trash! Its not his fault I-" my father held up his hand to silence me.
"I'll talk to your mother, but you should have a talk with him too...Tell him i'll be out in a minute to see about his hand," My father said collecting the broken table leg and then throwing it on the pile with a shrug. He climbed the stairs shortly after, I assume to comfort my mother. I went to look for Deidara.
It wasn't hard. The blonde haired ex con was sitting on the front steps, a void look on his face. He was sort of hunched over, watching the cars pass by. I sat down next to him. I didn't say anything and I didn't touch him. I just let us be.
"I didn't used to be like this," he said after a few minutes, "before I left the village, I guess I used to be normal, it was all about my art, they didn't appreciate it at all there, my mother didn't understand, the Akasuki didn't appreciate it either, and after I...you know, I didn't matter anymore."
I reached over and put my hand on his knee. We made eye contact, and I think that was all the encouragement he needed, because he continued talking.
"Like I said, nothing mattered anymore, except surviving. And then you came, and everything changed. I feel so much, I was taught not to feel, and now, now, my head is a mess."
I tried to evaluate what he was telling me. The only thing in his life worth meaning had been lost, and I assumed he felt sort of numb until I showed up to confuse him. I brought him to this new work. I didn't know it yet but any stability he had regained from his younger years was leaving him again.
"Lets go for a ride," I suggested, but he just shook his head no. We sat for a while longer until my father came out with some rubbing alcohol, tweezers, and a few packs of gauze. When your dads a doctor, it comes with more props than money. Deidara didn't flinch as my dad worked. Because of his tolerance, it only lasted a few minutes.
"Tomorrow I want you guys to go down to the collage and sign up," My father instructed, and left us. I didn't see either of them the rest of the night as I helped Deidara clean up the glass and what was left of our table. I figured out a way to keep it standing with a hot glue gun, but it wouldn't support any weight.
I went to bed that night and had my nightmares, as usual, Deidara didn't sleep, as usual, and our lives continued. It was our normal.
Sorry about the long wait you guys, I' m graduating in less than nine days and I'm a little jittery and busy. Sorry if this isn't all up to par.