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Nada: Look! An update! Ahah! It's a bit short than my usual length, sorry about that. And I didn't edit it either so if there are any spelling and/or grammar mistakes, don't hesitate to point it out. Only two chapters left until the story ends so everything is going to crap out right about now. I'm also aware that "blaringly" is not a word, but I used it anyway. (Sheer laziness on my part.)
Warning(s): OOC-ness, Swearing, Monster Rage, Crap Quality
Chapter Thirteen
School the following day was awkward. Hayner had split from our corner in favor for the desk on the opposite side of the room. Pence had chosen to remain at his side, despite his neutrality. Namine found it was easier to pretend nothing was wrong, that yesterday had never happened even when the aftermath was so blaringly obvious. Denial had a knack of giving you a false sense of security like that. Kairi and Olette tried to rectify the problem, but Namine was almost as stubborn as I; she refused to see reason. She refused to acknowledge that Hayner was no longer our friend; that her family was a dysfunctional mess; that everything in the world was spiraling out of control and no one had the power to stop it or to make it better again.
It broke my heart that my sister was suffering and there was nothing I could do to change it.
Sora took the dwindling friendship much better than I expected him to. He reacted like he always did, with happy smiles and melodious laughter, but I knew it ate at him on the inside. He might not have been friends with Hayner for as long as he was friends with Riku and Kairi, but Hayner and Pence were still his friends and to have lost them within a matter of a day must have pained him more than I could understand. And the fact he was hurt by Hayner's decision hurt me too.
I released a heavy sigh.
"Talk to him."
Sora tore his eyes away from the distant blonde towards me, the sadness that had shadowed his eyes no longer present. "Huh?" was his eloquent reply.
I gestured toward Pence and Hayner; the latter did everything within his power to ignore our watchful gazes. "Talk to him. He's angry at me, not you. You're still his friend."
Sora shook his head, a small trace of anger flashed through his eyes. "He's not my friend if he won't be yours."
I rolled my eyes. "Sora—"
"It's my decision." He stated, his voice stern. "Not yours."
"It's stupid!" I snapped, making sure to keep my voice low so that the others didn't hear us. "You're going to sacrifice a friendship just like that?"
"You're worth the cause even if you don't think so."
The rest of my words died in my throat, leaving me stunned to the core. I shouldn't have been so surprised, it was such a Sora thing to say, but the weight of his words was heavy in my heart.
You don't even realize what I've done to you…
-x-X-x-
It was infectious, corruption. Taint. It was like a poison, devouring and destructive. Sanctuary had been beautiful, liberating, tranquil, and yet I destroyed it with my disgrace—with my envy and hate.
I ruined you and you can't even see it.
What have I done?
-x-X-x-
Where did time go?
It was question I asked myself repeatedly in hopes of finding an answer I could be happy with. Yet, I had no answer.
Somehow, the day had gone by without my notice. Somehow, I was no longer sitting in homeroom waiting for the first class of the day. Somehow, I wasn't in gym with Kairi or Riku or texting Sora or doing class work. I was no longer in the cafeteria eating lunch with Kairi or Riku or in Anatomy listening to Riku and Sora talk about the day's events. I was suddenly home again with Cloud serving dinner while Mom applied make up upstairs for another night shift at work.
"Do you really have to go?" Namine asked my mother for the fourth time that day. "We haven't had dinner together in the longest."
"I know sweetie, but we're understaffed right now so the hospital needs all the nurses they can get." She kissed my sister on the head then planted a kiss on mine. "I'll be back soon, OK?" she turned to my brother and planted a kiss on his cheek. "If anything happens call Laguna, he'll know what to do. Good bye babies!" And with that, she was gone.
Cloud sighed as he served dinner to the rest of us. He sat across from me at the table, his expression just as sullen as Namine's. Olette's words from the previous day replayed through my mind.
"She doesn't care, does she?"
Cloud and Namine tore their eyes away from their untouched meals to refocus on me. I twirled the fork through the spaghetti mound, watching the noodles swirl between the throngs of the utensil into a knot. I glanced toward them, eyes as cold as ice.
"She doesn't care."
It was no longer a question but a statement of fact. A fact my siblings refused to acknowledge.
"She's been busy," said Cloud, his brows furrowing. "The hospital is low on nurses this year. They need all the help they can get."
"Yeah," Namine agreed. "Mama still cares."
I shook my head, denying their claims and angry they believed it in the first place. "She doesn't, not anymore." Rage began to surge through me, devouring my hunger and silencing my hurt. "All she does is work, work, work, work. She doesn't have time for us! She will never have time for us."
"That's not true," Namine said, her eyes already glassy with tears. "She's just—"
"Busy," I finished darkly, my eyes blazing into hers. "Face it Namine, we have no mother."
"That's enough!" my brother commanded. He was already on his feet, his eyes staring daggers into mine. "Enough is enough Roxas. We're sick of this. It's time to wake up and grow up!"
The monster within stirred awake. It fed off my fury and clawed through the layers of my skin, closer and closer to the surface it went. Through layers and layers until my restraints grew weak and I could no longer hold back.
"Wake up? Wake up?!" disgust coiled inside me, the monster displeased. "News flash, I can't fucking wake up you moron!" The words spilled out of my mouth before I could restrain them. "You think I want to stay in this fucked up nightmare?! You think I want to stay in this house with an absent workaholic mother, a jerk off brother and a weak ass sister? No, I don't want to be here, Cloud. I wish I could wake up!" Rage rolled through me in powerful, uncontrollable waves. "I WISH I COULD GO TO SLEEP AND NEVER HAVE TO WAKE UP IN THIS FUCKING HELL HOLE AGAIN!"
The last of my screams left me breathless, yet I still had more to give. My body felt like fire and my lungs burned with every breath I took. The monster inside me was still dissatisfied. It gnawed at my insides, urging me to go on. More anger, more pain, more hate, more, moremoremore…
Namine stared at me with eyes lost in a sea of tears, her mouth agape and her body frozen with shock. Despair poured from her very being, but it was nothing compared to the fury that surged through my brother, whose body shook from head to toe with the dangerous emotion.
"Fine," he seethed, barely in control of himself. "Fine. Fine. Go. GO!" He gripped the edge of the table so tight his knuckles grew white under the light. "GO AHEAD AND DIE!" he screamed. He shoved the plates aside, ignoring the deafening clatter of glass as it shattered against the wall. "SEE IF WE CARE! You'll be doing us a favor once you're dead!"
Namine's front shattered at that moment. She burst into tears; the wail that escaped her was enough to pull on anyone's heart strings. She stormed past Cloud and up the stairs, her footsteps a flurry of noise. Her sobs could be heard all the way to her room and only fell silent when her door sealed her off from the rest of us.
Cloud tore his murderous gaze away from mine, his fury now mixed with frustration, sadness and regret. He turned away from me and, without a word, left me alone in the kitchen with nothing but the echoes of our screams playing through my head.
I waited until he was gone; until he was no longer within earshot of my footsteps or too far to bother to stop me. I left the house without regret, without tears in my eyes or guilt in my heart. The truth had been plain as day: no one cared.
And I didn't either.
Nada: On a random note, I got a new computer and the new Word Document didn't like to keep the accent over Namine's "E" so I left it like that. I'm also aware that "blaringly" isn't a word, but considering this whole story is in Roxas's point of view, I felt that he should be able to get away with making up words.
Will this kid ever get better?
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