[NOTE: This is a reposting of the original chapter 6 to correct a spelling error that actually bothered the hell out of me for nearly 24 hours before I had time to actually fix it. Sorry for getting all your hopes up for another update!]
AN: I owe you guys such an apology! I should have actually had this up on Thursday but I've been so swamped with University exams that it wasn't possible to sit down and edit which, unfortunately, this chapter needed quite a bit of. I have a bit of housekeeping and some questions that I'll answer but I'll post those at the end of the chapter.
Picks from the playlist this week: Girl Like Me by Miranda Lambert, Samson by Regina Spektor, and Rock and Daggers by Noah and the Whale.
Her being sick raises what can only be considered her own personal hell in the kitchen: suddenly there's too many hands fussing over her, too many voices speaking into her ear in soothing tones and one set of warm hands trying to flick her hair over her shoulder so it doesn't pool in her sick. She vomits twice more and registers Wally yelling, actually yelling at M'gann when she insists that he shouldn't try to carry her to her bedroom, and she hears cabinets being slammed and the sound of someone storming as violently as they can out of the kitchen.
She's been around them five minutes and she's already making their lives worse.
She jerks back violently when the Martian wraps an arm around her shoulders and tries to pull her from the sink, stumbling so hard onto her injured leg that she feels the spike of pain run up her heel and all the way to the base of her skull. She feels as if she's some sort of disgusting sight they're all trying to hide, the dirt on the floor they're all trying desperately to hide under the carpet, and she's going to hurt them all, she is she is she is. "Don't touch me." She snarls, sounding like a wounded animal and looking almost feral before she chokes on what's left of the bitter saliva in her throat, leaning forward to spit into the sink again.
There's a moment of silence in which she can feel M'gann looking at her, probably too afraid now to touch her; she can feel brown eyes boring into her with concern as she stares at her own vomit as it sits caked against the sink... It's not even real vomit, it's the same blackened bile she's been coughing up for weeks, yet another reminder at the end of her rope, that she's not eating, she's hardly existing anymore...
She winces but doesn't have the strength to jerk away when M'gann finally gets the courage to touch her, green palm pressing against the cold sweat on her forehead and pushing stay hairs back towards the crown of her head. "... You don't talk to me anymore." She says quietly, gently, as if not wanting to prod her too much for conversation. "About the stuff that's bothering you... You don't talk to any of us anymore."
She can't think of much to say and instead glares harder at her sick, listening as M'gann voice increase with pitch as she starts getting emotional. "... That's fine, though. I mean, I understand... Some things you can't put in to words. But I want you to know... We were all there, Artemis. We all know what you're going through. And if you think talking will help... We want to help, okay? We're your Team. We're supposed to... You know. Take care of each other. We're a family."
"You're not your family. You're one of us." Dick's voice is at the front of her mind so suddenly she can hardly stand it, and too quickly she's blinking rapidly, trying to force back tears.
(... Because she wasn't her family in that moment; she wasn't all bad like she is now, she was one of them; she had still managed to make things right in a way that she can't now, she can't, she can't fix herself, she can't fix what her father made her into...)
She doesn't know why but she closes her eyes (she's not sure if she's trying to block out the happy memory out of her own self hatred or simply drown in it for a moment, to leave the kitchen and remember better, easier times, before they were all so broken) and before she can allow herself a second thought she presses her cheek into M'gann's palm when it passes over her face again. She doesn't know what she means by it, all she knows it that she's still nauseas and doesn't trust herself to open up her mouth, not yet, not when she's so trapped in her own head; the Martian seems to take it as a good sign though, and keeps speaking to her in quiet, soothing tones. "... I know what you've been feeling, Artemis." She whispers, tucking a piece of hair behind her ear. "I know you think you're alone, I know you've been doing it on purpose but... I've felt everything you've been feeling, I can't help it, all the sadness, the guilt... Connor says that I shouldn't pry. But I hate that you've been putting yourself through that. I hate that you're trying to carry this burden alone, I hate that you feel like-" For some reason M'gann's voice breaks and she withdraws her hand, clamping it tightly over her mouth as her breath starts coming out in pathetic little pants. "I hate that you won't let us help you, Artemis. We want to help you."
She registers the sudden stuttering in breath, and when she finally wrenches open her eyes she realizes that the other girl is crying; there's two trails of thick, wet tears pouring over the green in her cheeks, her fingers still pressing against her mouth and struggling to keep the tiny sobs that are raking through her chest inside her. She can hardly stand to look at her, because there it is right there, more evidence of another person she's hurt, and even though her own eyes are suddenly stinging with unshed tears again she forces herself to glare back at the sink, as if showing emotion is something indecent.
"... I'm sorry, M'gann." She croaks out,, and she's not sure what she's sorry for. She just wishes the words were enough to actually do something, enough to actually fix things...
They stand in silence for a few minutes, M'gann's sobs finally escaping her mouth and echoing in the dim of the kitchen. She doesn't know what to do, doesn't know how to say what the Martian wants to hear; how is she supposed to sort out everything inside her head to form enough to have a conversation? How is she supposed to sift through guilt and depression and her own self-hatred and even find a starting point? How is she supposed to explain that the thing she's feeling most guilty about didn't even happen, Wally didn't even die, he's up and slamming cabinets and she's too much of an idiot to run after him and tell him how she feels because she's disgusting-
She opens and closes her mouth several times, trying to speak. Then Wally's voice slaps her across the front of her mind.
Don't overthink.
"I almost killed him, M'gann." She forces the words out of her throat, voice raspy and broken. She hears the sound of tears as they dribble off the edge of M'gann's jaw and onto the tiled floor.
She turns her head almost defiantly towards the Martian, as if waiting for her to make excuses for her or analyze her actions like every other person has done so far; this is how it always goes, with everyone who manages to talk about it with her... They'll tell her how she hit her target, how she killed a man, how Wally lived anyway so why does it matter? She glares as M'gann drops her fingers, hands intertwining under her chin, one green thumb pressing against her lower lip as she bites it. "... It wasn't your fault, Artemis." She whispers back, voice shaking. "You weren't the one who shot him."
It wasn't her fault.
She actually hears the puff of breath she releases as she processes what's just been said; it's the first time anyone has told her this in so many words, the first time in the past few weeks that someone, anyone, has bothered to counter all the raging words inside her head. She didn't shoot him. She failed in half a dozen ways, she put his life at risk, but if M'gann, sweet M'gann, can look at the situation, can look at all her mistakes as still see the good in her, can still look at her and realize she wasn't the one who dealt the almost deadly blow, can still love her so much that she's stupid enough to think she's not at fault...
The tightness in her throat seems to bubble up and burst inside her, and before she can stop herself she sobs.
At least it feels like a sob; it sounds more like some sort of unearthly, guttural scream, less human and more the sound a dying animal would make. But there are tears running down her cheeks and her muscles are aching out in protest as she bangs her fists against the counter and for some reason M'gann, sweet M'gann who she's always thought of as weak and naïve for looking at her and seeing a sister, one of her best friends, someone worthwhile...
M'gann takes it all in stride; she doesn't hesitate the way anyone else would, doesn't bother looking horrified as she wraps her fingers around her forearms when she starts looking around for things to throw. Suddenly there are arms winding around her shoulders and another body that she's not strong enough to fight off and before she can remind herself that she's supposed to be keeping everyone at a distance she's pulled flush against the other girl, limbs intertwining and tears dribbling down their cheeks and her face is being pressed against a neck until her screams are less screams and more the cries for help that she needs to get out...
She feels ridiculous, like an idiot, but for the first time in so long she no longer feels like she's worthless.
Because she's not worthless, not to M'gann.
"It wasn't your fault." The Martian repeats, pulling back and cupping her cheeks. There's an odd sort of feeling washing over her, a inorganic calm that she knows isn't real but doesn't fight, not when the only other alternative is to be trapped inside her own head again. "It wasn't, Artemis." She insists, cool lips reaching out to press against her forehead.
She doesn't agree, doesn't disagree either; instead of speaking she unwinds one of her hands from where it's tangled in auburn hair and fiddles for a moment with the tap, running the water until she's sure that all her vomit is washed away.
They cry together for far too long, all the trauma and pain from the past few weeks seeming to pour out of them in waves as they cling to each other, and when they pull apart her leg is aching and her lungs seem to burn from all her screaming and sobbing. For nearly twenty seconds after M'gann simply holds her at an arm's length, smiling weakly and sniffling. Then, as if it's been decided, she drags an arm around her shoulders and helps her limp to her bedroom.
She gets the impression that M'gann is attempting to put the pieces of her back together; for a few minutes they sit in silence on the edge of her bed, the Martian scrubbing the vomit from her chin with a cool cloth and wiping hopefully at the dark circles under her eyes, as if politely asking the mascara that's stained her cheeks to remove itself. As if it's some sort of ritual they've long since established M'gann yanks the pony tail from her hair and attempts to retie it, fingers combing her locks from where they're sticking to the sweat on her face until they're back to sitting at the base of her neck, albeit lopsidedly.
She no longer tries to hide the fact that she's crying, no longer bothering to pretend she's not broken.
She feels fingers dividing her pony tail into three sections, feels hands as they start to twist her hair into the beginnings of a braid. "... Can I make a suggestion?" M'gann asks, so quietly that she could pretend not to hear.
In answer she hiccups, one knuckle dragging across her lashes like a child. "What?"
M'gann hesitates, fingers actually pausing their process in her hair for a moment as she thinks. "... I think you need to talk to Wally."
"Meg." She says warningly.
"This hasn't been easy on him either, Artemis." The other girl's fingers start working again, her voice caught between imploring and being stern. "... Don't you think it's kind of... You know. Selfish? Don't you think he deserves an explanation?"
Almost immediately she can feel her temper flaring up, can feel all the craziness being kept caged by M'gann's powers suddenly surging to life inside her again. "Selfish?" She repeats, voice breaking. "You don't- Selfish? You think I'm-you think I'm being selfish?" She's actually so angry she can't speak; Selfish. Driving herself crazy to protect everyone else? On what planet is self sacrifice selfish?
"Artemis, no, I didn't mean it like that!" M'gann bursts out, looking hurt when she jerks away, fingers ripping through her hair and undoing the Martian's process with the braid. "I just- Artemis, he's been worried sick about you. And none of us have been able to tell him anything other than that you've been in your room constantly and won't speak to us! Don't you think he at least deserves to know that you're, you know." She glares when M'gann hesitates again, biting her lip. "Okay?"
She knows immediately what M'gann wants to happen: she wants her to go and talk about her feelings, wants things to work out exactly like they do in her television shows. She's supposed to find Wally and they're supposed to kiss and make up, they're supposed to fall all over each other and everything is supposed to magically work out on it's own... It's a stupid idea, it won't work for her... She's not programmed for it.
After a few seconds of silence she scowls, untying her pony tail and redoing it so it's no longer crooked. "No, M'gann. I wouldn't know what to say. I'm not... You know." She sighs. "Stuff like that doesn't work out for me."
"It doesn't have to be that kind of conversation." M'gann prods. "I just think... I think it would be good for both of you. To get some closure."
She glares. "No, M'gann."
M'gann gets tired of her bad attitude shortly after and leaves, taking the inorganic calm with her; suddenly her anxiety is clawing back at her with almost tripled strength, so overwhelming that she can hardly think of much else.
She can't talk to Wally, she can't talk to Wally because if she talks to him she'll lose her mind completely. She can't be around him because she knows she'll hurt him again, she'll say the wrong thing or she'll do something stupid and he'll end up hurt, he'll end up in the hospital and he'll almost die again... But he was safe in the hospital, he was safe and away from her, so maybe she should hurt him... But she can't, she can't, that's bad, she doesn't do stuff like that anymore...
She lies in bed for what feels like hours, wrinkling her school uniform with her tossing and turning but not caring enough to get up and change. She's thinking herself in circles, quietly working herself into a full blown panic the likes of which she hasn't been in in years— It doesn't matter what M'gann thinks, doesn't matter what the rest of the Team knows... She knows herself, she knows that if Wally's back that means he'll get hurt again, it means that he's in danger again, she's going to get him hurt again, she has to protect him, has to find a way— Her breath alternates between coming out in pants and stopping all together, her lungs unwilling to allow her to take in the oxygen she needs; in the same way she switches between attempting to rock herself and attempting to stay so still she could pass for dead. She doesn't know what to do, she doesn't know what to do— He had been safe in the hospital, he's not safe—
... She screams into her pillow, screams so loud she swears her lungs are bursting, and then she's back to thinking about Wally and his burst lung and it was all her fault, no matter what M'gann says it was all her fault...
Finally, outstandingly, her resolution to avoid him and keep him at arm's length falls; sock clad in her rumpled and untucked uniform, she decides to listen to M'gann.
She needs to talk to Wally.
She just has to talk to him. Just the once, just to get it over with, and then maybe she'll stop being so afraid...
She can hear his voice when she arrives outside his bedroom. It sounds as it always does, light and friendly to her ear, his words muffled through the door but still sounding happy, safe, comfortable; it sounds as if he's talking to someone, or maybe to himself, and for a moment she actually debates leaving him, turning on her heel and going back to the intensity of the silence in her room (he's happy without her, he's doing fine, this is stupid, M'gann was wrong.) Then before she can backtrack on the decision she curls her toes into the carpet, inhaling and exhaling hard though her nose, the extra air forcing her pupils to dilate and pull her vision into a sharp focus, knuckles rapping against the painted oak once.
Fuck. Fuck. This was a mistake. Fuck.
She can hear his voice falter on the other side of the door, and there are two seconds of absolute silence in which she can hear her own heart beating loudly inside her head, her knock seeming to echo in the hallway. Ridiculously she stumbles backwards and forwards on her own feet, trying to decide if it's too late to take off at a break neck speed down the hallway (she can't run, not yet, she'd get maybe as far as three paces away, Fuck Fuck Fuck...) The door opens just as she's turned back to face it, her mouth for some reason stretching into an obviously fake smile.
Then she makes direct eye contact with a bullet hole and her heart seems to crash through her ribs and splatter against the floor.
... Oh god. Oh god. Oh god oh god oh god...
It's the scar of a bullet hole, actually, sitting on the right side of Wally's bare chest; a mess of warbled skin sitting almost exactly one inch below and one inch to the right of where his heart would be, and even as she stares at it she can see a line of freckles trailing a wobbly line from his nipple to where the metal left his body. It looks years old, not weeks, hardly a blemish any worse than the rest of his freckles. She stares at it for a good half second, cheeks turning a deep maroon and thoughts exploding inside her head (Wally is shirtless, Wally is shirtless and she is literally looking at the exit point for all the blood that was on the ground, all the blood that she was lying in, and even as she thinks it she half convinces herself that she can still feel all the wet beneath her finger nails, and suddenly she's clawing at her cuticles and wishing she could skin herself alive rather than imagine this sensation, oh god, oh god oh god) before she blinks, watching Wally's head emerge from the neck hole of a sweater, shoulder hunched awkwardly as he pins his cellphone to his ear.
... Breathe breathe breathe breathe.
Don't be a baby.
Keep it together.
She lets out some sort of stupid sounding gagging noise, eyes watering and cheeks blushing as she coughs a mixture of bile and air into her lungs. Wally's pupils blow out and quickly pop back in, mouth opening and closing quickly as he reads the fake smile she's still trying to wear and figures out what she saw and why she's suddenly looking less like a human and more like a shrunken wax model of herself, throat tight as she swallows down sick. "Mom," He says into the phone, and she can hear the scrambled voice through the speaker stop speaking as he moves aside, letting her into his bedroom and shutting the door quickly behind her. "Mom—"
She forces her lungs to work, forces herself to take breaths so deep they make her ribs ache, forces herself to absorb his walnut scent, so familiar and comforting and exactly what she needs after seeing the scar—it bites that nauseous sensation down the back of her mouth, convinces her to remain calm, convinces her that she can do this. She listens to the voice on the other end of his line continue speaking as she advances to the center of his room, and in the quick glance she sends over her shoulder at him she can see him struggling to keep his phone pinned to his hear as he forces his arms through their respective holes in his sweater.
She can do this. She just needs to act like everything is normal and that she's not half crazy, not hating herself, not like she's going to puke at any given moment-
"I'm fine here Mom, I swear." He says, gesturing for her to sit down. In some sort of weird act of restraint she decides on his desk chair rather than the edge of his bed, her fingers winding together before she pinches them between her knees to keep her from tugging anxiously at her hair or clawing her own skin off; he's been working on missed homework, the surface of the desk covered in dozens of loose papers and textbooks, and (she looks twice, her stomach twisting) her tie, her school tie that she had dropped on the floor of the kitchen (and she hates herself, hates that she can actually hear Wally's voice, can actually picture him smirking at her and saying "souvenir.") "I will. Mom I have to go—Tell Dad I said hi, okay? … No. No. Okay. Yes." He pauses, sending her an uneasy smile as if she hasn't just seen evidence of him almost dying and rolling his eyes as if she too can relate to having an over bearing mother. She can't. "Love you too. Bye."
She hears the sound of a button being clicked, hears the thud his phone makes when he tosses it absently in the direction towards the bed beside her—Wally's been through the most phones of anyone on the Team, her memory tells her, he always drops them or breaks them or misplaces them and then has to sheepishly ask Bats for a replacement—and then there's silence, the kind of silence so loud that it scares her, forcing her to break it so she can hear something other than the thudding of her own heartbeat in her ears. "Your mom's worried?" She asks his chemistry textbook, wincing slightly when her voice sounds squeaky rather than casual.
"No more than usual." He says, and she's not sure what that means.
She swivels the desk chair to face him, eyes watching him carefully and forcing herself to unwind her muscles, the same fake smile on her face. Predictably his hand falls from where it's been scrubbing the back of his neck, fingers musing his hair once before he contains them in his jeans pocket. "How are you feeling?" He asks her, looking wary of getting close to her should she be sick again.
"Fine." She lies. "... I've had a nervous stomach the last few weeks. You don't have to worry about, you know. Catching anything." She forces herself to unclench her hands and rest them almost too causally on the arms of his chair; unthinkingly she crosses her legs and is immediately rewarded with a painful twinge of the muscles in her legs, forcing the fake smile from her lips as she lets out a low hiss of pain, nails suddenly digging so hard into that wood that she wouldn't be surprised if she left little crescent moon shaped indents.
Wally watches her adjust her posture with wary brows; most of her bandages are hidden in plain sight beneath the height of her school stockings but she suspects her sudden movement has just show a little too much of her thigh, just enough for him to see the white gauze that's there, holding pieces of her together. He clears his throat, ears reddening as if he's a child who's just been caught peeking between his fingers during a game of hide and seek. "Ah." He coughs, and in his usual fashion he sudden switches pace, mouth bursting into a warm smile and seeming to take the cue she's been trying to send her with her fake one. "You know, I think that's the first time I've actually made a girl puke with just my presence alone."
She knows immediately that he's intentionally setting himself up, as if her teasing him will somehow make things better, more normal. Less horrible. "Don't flatter yourself. I'm sure there were other times." She says mechanically, trying to grin back.
He's making it too easy to pretend she's okay, too easy to get lost in their banter and the comfort of the walnut smell. And for a moment she almost convinces herself that she can do easy, she can do this, she can allow it to be easy; at least until the grin on his face falters slightly and he starts speaking again, voice suddenly too gentle for her to handle. "… Are you going to tell me why you're here?"
The way he says it causes something in her stomach to settle, all the pain and terror and panic that she's been hiding in the tightness of her throat suddenly dropping somewhere about her knees. In a last ditch effort she blinks, trying to force herself to grin manically and somehow tell him without speaking that this is just a obligatory visit: all business, no feelings. "What makes you think I have a reason?"
Whatever she's trying to do is lost on him, and almost immediately he's back to the same pensive look he was wearing when she walked in the room, heels rocking backwards and forwards as he looks away, mind no doubt buzzing. "Well, if I was one for forming a hypothesis and testing it against data, which, incidentally, I am…" He pauses, flashing her that stupid smile and almost fooling her into thinking what he's about to say will be easy to hear. "I would say there is definitely a reason. And if I compare old data to what I see in front of me right now… I'd say that you only come to my room if you're upset or I'm upset or if we're both upset... And I'm not upset, Artemis."
He pauses, looking at her full on the face, so calculating that she blushes and glares at the floor, lower lip quivering; He knows her too well, can see through to many of her tricks that that scares the shit out of her. "I'd also say that I've been up and about in the hospital for a little less than a week, and you didn't come visit me with everybody else even once, which means in the—" He pauses, checking his watch. "—eight or so hours I've been here I've already done something that would make you upset. I'd also say that I can tell, for sure, that it's the kind of upset that kind of scares me because your eyes are red, which if I had to guess would mean you've been crying which—obviously—I don't like. And you have that look on your face that you always get just before you get really spacey and freak out at me. So…" He trails off at the end of his rant and she ignores the look he sends her until he speaks again. "I took, like, a dozen bullets for you, Artemis, the least you can do is talk me—"
"Don't." She cuts him off, eyes shutting and fingers clenching against the arms of his desk chair again, muscles all tensing and trying to force her into remaining seated and not getting up with the purpose of ripping his throat out. She can't believe he has the audacity, the gall to stand in front of her after everything and throw that in her face so casually, as if it means nothing to him when it means the world to her. "Don't bring that up like that. Like it's easy for me to hear. You don't get to use that against me."
"I'm not using anything against you!" He says, exasperated at the fact that out of all the words he's uttered at her these are the only ones she's responding to. "I'm not trying to- Artemis, we haven't spoken in weeks, the last thing I remember is you being shot and suddenly I'm the one waking up in the hospital without you, nobody can tell me anything about where you are or how you've been doing, and then-" He pauses for breath, earing flaming and seeming to inflate. "And then, I see you for less than a second and suddenly you're puking everywhere, like just being around me makes you sick, like I'm intolerable now and I don't know why or what I did or how to make it better, and then I'm being thrown out of the kitchen and M'gann won't let me help and..." He hesitates, fingers ruffling his hair. "I'm just trying to figure this out, okay? Can you just talk to me?"
"Not if you're going to be like this." She hisses, all the anger she's been feeling at herself switching targets faster than she can and suddenly all she feels for the boy in front of her is contempt; she can't believe him, can't believe that she thought she could just look at him and have a regular conversation, can't believe she expected the both of them to be able to handle this like adults. "Look, I know I screwed up, okay? I know this is my fault. But I don't need your stupid little comments, I don't need you being an asshole to me-"
"What?" Wally shakes his head, looking a mixture of annoyed and confused. "What the hell are you talking about?"
"'I took, like, a dozen bullets for you'." She repeats, her voice high pitched and mocking and sounding nothing like him. "I know, Wally, I know you got shot, and I know it was my fault! I get it, I shouldn't have told you to slow down!" She bursts out, palms pressing against her forehead and scrubbing angrily at her face, as if to block him out and keep her from feeling guilt. "I know, okay? I know that's why you got hit, I know that's why you almost died... I think about it every second, I'm already feeling guilty enough. I don't need some condescending little comment on top of everything else, got it Baywatch?"
"I didn't mean it like that!" He snarls back, getting properly annoyed at her temper. "What's your problem, anyway? I'm fine!"
She can feel the wrinkle on her nose popping up as she stands, losing the last of her control; she doesn't care how badly her muscles ache from all the standing, how sore her ribs are from sobbing so loudly before, suddenly she's flinging his chair so hard behind her that it collides with his desk, sending stacks of well-organized papers scattering to the floor. "You didn't before!" She snarls at him, so off put by her own outburst that she's slightly stunned into silence, nails digging into her palms as she clenches her fists. "You didn't- in the hospital, you don't know..." She can feel some of her nerve failing her, and suddenly she's blushing crimson, looking anywhere but at his face.
Wally inhales and she can't help but narrow her eyes at his chest as it stutters slightly, as if trying to provoke her into sympathy or ashamed again; she ignores his eyes as rake over her face, scowling. "When didn't I look fine?" He asks, sounding a little out of breath as he forces his voice into steadiness.
At once her cheeks go almost maroon, eyes moving to scowl at his door."Just—" She begins, all her resolve to engage in this conversation cracking as she lets out a pathetic sounding half sob, making her wish she was still alone and afraid in her bedroom and that she'd never listened to M'gann at all. "… Never mind. This was a dumb idea."
Wally is in front of her as she turns towards his door, wincing slightly at the too-fast movement but not letting her continue towards her exit point. "Artemis, talk to me." He sighs, still looking confused as he grips her by the shoulders, almost shaking her. "You can't come in here screaming and half crying after not talking to me for weeks and then not explain anything to me, that's... That's not okay."
"I—" She cuts herself off, hissing in frustration when her voice cracks, her head too busy whirring about with emotion to help her pull a sentence together and not being helped by the fact that he's suddenly close to her, breathing the sharp scent of walnuts against her cheeks. "I don't know how to say it, okay? This was M'gann's idea, I shouldn't have listened. I don't... I don't know how to do this stuff without blowing up in your face, just-" She cuts herself off, jerking back from his grasp until he's forced to let go.
"Then blow up at me." He looks at her insistently, face hard and jaw popping a thick line against his neck. "Let's fight, if that's what it takes." He pauses, and as if trying to make a point he actually raises his fists, as if they were two boxers set to face each other in a ring, grinning slightly when she looks confused. "I'm serious. Let's just... You know. Like the bridge."
The words send a rush of memories to the front of her mind: egging him on, the feeling of his fingers on her hip bones, how warm he felt on her lips—the crash landing, the machines, the cannons, the bullets—bullets in his back, blood and vomit, blood and vomit—
He reaches out to punch her lightly in the shoulder, and whether from the memory or from her own weight rocking back a little too heavily onto her leg she hisses, shaking her head at him. Suddenly it's all she can do to keep herself from gagging, to keep herself from breaking down completely, and before Wally can do much more than look a little off put by her reaction her eyes are screwing shut to block him out, nose wrinkling. "... I can't do this." She chokes out, and she hates herself so fully in that moment, hates that her voice is squeaky and pathetic like how it was when she cried as a child, hates that suddenly she can't breathe and that she's sobbing again, looking as pathetic as she feels.
"A-Artemis?" Wally's voices sounds stunned as she suddenly starts dragging her knuckles across her cheeks, trying desperately to stop her tears at the source. "Artemis? Whoa, hey, look at me."
She's shaking, panting, and the full blown panic she's been scarcely keeping at bay is bursting out of her in rattling breaths; she can feel her eyes slipping out of focus, and even though she knows it's all inside her head she feels as if she's shrinking, shriveling up, all the anxiety and self-hatred consuming her inside out, clawing out of her eye sockets and peeling back the skin on her face, exposing her skeleton to the world and leaving her vulnerable-
She can hardly feel Wally when he starts grabbing at her, arms digging at her sides and trying to get her to come out of her own head; somewhere she thinks she registers the sensation of his thumb as it rubs anxious circles into her biceps and suddenly it's another memory and they're alone in her kitchen and her mother is missing and she's scared she's so scared... "Artemis? Artemis, calm down. It's okay, Babe, it's okay, just... Artemis, you have to breathe. You can't not breathe, okay?" She feels him grab her hand and drag it towards the pulse point in his neck, his fingers on hers forcing her to feel the anxious pounding of his blood against his veins. "Artemis, just focus on my heart beat, okay? Can you do that?"
It's hot and fast underneath her fingers; he's scared for her, she's hurting him.
She opens her eyes just in time to see him reaching for her face; in an instant he's dragging her lips to hers, trying to shock herself out of her panic attack. It kills her, it kills her that he doesn't know that she tried to do this when he was dying, tried to shock him back into his body the same way he's trying to shock her out of her head right now; suddenly all she can taste again is blood and vomit and dirt and sweat on his lips, and with a gasp she's pushing him back, but she's breathing she's breathing she's breathing-
"… I'm sorry." She pulls the words out of herself, teeth grinding together as she forces herself to stop hyper-ventilating and pull oxygen into her system. Wally looks half panicked, fingers trying to push her hair off her face as it clings to her tear soaked cheeks. "I made a mistake and it got you hurt and—" She pauses, gasping for breath and sobbing and refusing to speak until she has it under control. "I can't stop seeing it, Wally. I keep remembering seeing you lying there, and seeing all your blood—I had to watch you cry, had to watch you think you were dying, and—"
This time she doesn't fight him when he gets close to her but he doesn't try to kiss her again; this time he wraps his arms around her, tugging her flush against him even though she's sobbing and pathetic and sweating and probably gross looking. "I'm so confused." She practically screams into his shoulder, almost pounding on his back with a fist before she remembers that she should try to be gentle. "I don't know what to do. I—I just always thought it would be easier, not getting close to people. And then you came along, and I don't know how but it's like—if you're not here I don't know how to be me anymore. And that scares me, almost as much as it scared me when I thought you were dead." Her voice is beginning to pick up speed, increasing in pitch as her breath comes out in gasps, pulling back enough to bury her face in his chest, the heel of her palm digging into her eyelids. "I just know it, either way I'll lose, either way I'll lose you; either way I'm going to spend the rest of my life feeling the way I do now and I can't do it. I'm not strong enough."
"Artemis." Wally says quietly, pulling her tighter. "You have to calm down, okay? Please?" He asks her, and without asking her permission he drags her hand back up to his neck until she can feel his pulse again. "Just try to breathe when I do, okay? In and out together? Okay? Artemis?"
She doesn't know why she listens to him, doesn't know why she keeps her hand pressed against his neck, doesn't know why she lets him hold her as tightly as he does. In and out together, in and out together... Because that's how it's always been with them. They were allies before they even knew each other, best friends before they even stopped their arguments long enough to have a conversation; the fact of the matter is that whether or not she wants to be she's been bound to this boy for far too long, they've been attached at the hip long before they awoke beneath the Bialyan sky. He is her greatest comfort, her greatest weakness, and wherever she goes, in or out, he'll follow whether she wants him to or not.
She's going to be the death of him.
Wally's trying to get her to breath in time with him, trying to get her to stop hyperventilating, one hand ducking under her chin and forcing her face up to his so he can better look her in the eye.
In and out together.
Wally won't let her leave to get a glass of water, even though she's desperately dehydrated from all the crying. He won't let her do much of anything, actually, even though it's been nearly a half hour since she's come down from her panic. He doesn't let her pull back, doesn't allow her fix her own hair, doesn't allow her to do anything other than remove her hand from his neck and snake her arms around his middle to better balance her weight on her good leg.
"... I'm sorry." She says after a while, pulling back just enough so she can look him in the eye. "I don't really... I didn't come here, expecting to, you know. Be crazy."
Wally shrugs. "I don't mind a little crazy." Then for some reason he hesitates, as if trying to figure out what to say. "... Do you... Do you want to talk about some stuff?"
"With you?" She blurts out, immediately back tracking when she sees the slightly offended look on his face. "I mean- you know. Wouldn't that be weird?"
Wally surveys her for a moment before immediately unwrapping his arms from around her waist, swallowing thickly as he takes a step back. "Maybe. But I just... You're upset, Artemis, and it's kind of because of me. And I want to help. Just... Just tell me the problem. And I'll try to be as neutral as possible about it as I can."
She sighs. "Wally-"
"Artemis." For a moment they glare at each other, Wally taking another firm pace backwards as if his distance from her as if this somehow settles something. "Come on."
She hesitates before dropping his eyes, hand unconsciously smoothing her skirt over her legs as she struggles to find the right words. She's never been very good at emotional confrontation, at sorting out her feelings, and this is the very thing Wally is asking her to do... To look him in the eye and tell him that he's making her miserable, either being in her life or not, and she doesn't know what to do, she's so tired of fighting with herself and with him... Swallowing thickly, she addresses her toes. "... I guess I... I kind of developed feelings for a teammate." She blurts out badly. "And I allowed that to blur my judgment, and he ended up getting hurt because of me. And I thought it would be easier to cut him out, to eliminate the vulnerability... But not having him in my life is kind of killing me."
She's expecting him to be mocking her when she glances up, expects him to be pretending to be writing on a therapist's clip board or another one of his stupid expressions; she's a little caught off guard by the fact that he's looking at her stonily, jaw clenched tight as he struggles to keep his face neutral. "Did it ever occur to you that he got hurt because of the situation, not because of you?"
She sighs. "Regardless. I was too distracted and I didn't do everything I could-"
"And did it ever occur to you how much that would hurt him, if you just cut him out?" He asks her raggedly, tone almost accusing.
"Wally." She says his name plainly, eyes narrowing. "What happened to being neutral?"
He's already waving his hand dismissively, scowling. "Yeah, yeah."
There's another silence between them, this one thicker and more tense than the others before, and suddenly she's sighing, a frustrated hand rubbing at her face. "I don't know what to do anymore. No matter what I do someone gets hurts, no matter what I do I end up unhappy, and I just-"
"… Tell me the options."
"What?"
"Tell me the options." He repeats, over pronouncing his words as he always does whenever she asks him to say things twice, an old nerve she thought she had given up on suddenly popping up the surface, irritated as she narrows her eyes at him. "Tell me everything that you've worked out as the be-all end-all, and I'll—I'll narrow it down for you."
It's a ridiculous request, so ridiculous that she actually feels her chin drop, a wry smirk crossing her face. "You're kidding." She snarls.
"No." He shrugs. "Hey, neutral observer here, remember?"
"Yeah, because we've already established you're great at that." She sighs, glaring around the room and caught between not wanting to tell him anything and wanting to say something to scare him out of her head, out of this weird analytical façade he's donning for her benefit. "… I could kill you." She hears herself say wryly, voicing the worst suggestion that's only popped up in the more vile parts of her mind. "It would be like swatting a fly... It would be awful, and I would hate it. But then at least I could move on."
She half expects Wally to be looking horrified when she glances back at him; instead he's looking at her dryly, brows raised and sending her a look at clearly says he expected something better of her should she be trying to scare him out of talking to her about her feelings. "No go, Blondie. You'd be booted from the Team, thrown in jail if you were sloppy enough and, if you couldn't tell from the phone call earlier, my mom would miss me way too much. Next." He shrugs, crossing his arms.
She shifts her weight, glancing around the room aimlessly a she takes her weight off her bad leg, now truly beginning to hurt; he's sending her some sort of cocky look, as if he thinks he has her all figured out. "... I could kill myself." She suggest half heartedly.
For a fraction of a moment Wally is quiet, and in that half second the air in the room seems to grow thicker, harder to breath in. "No." He says plainly without offering an explanation, cutting her off as she opens her mouth again. "For future reference, let's just cut any scenarios that involve either of us killing ourselves or each other or anyone else, okay? Come on, serious suggestions only please."
It's odd but it makes the corner of her mouth twitch upwards, as if she hasn't just spent the last hour in his bedroom crying her eyes out. "Fine." She tells him, forcing her face to settle back into the blank slate she's keeping it in as she falls back into simply voicing all her thoughts, not over thinking. "… You could quit the Team. Or I could."
This is by far the most serious suggestion she's made so far yet it's the one Wally laughs at; she jerks her head around to stare at him wide eyed as he chuckles, low and sharp. "Absolutely not."
"Why?"
"Because." He shrugs, shaking his head as if it's obvious. "Artemis, what we do isn't a hobby. It's saving people, it's making a difference, it's..." He trails off suddenly, shaking his head again, cutting off a speech that sounds almost rehearsed, as if he's said it dozens of times before. "Okay, fuck neutrality. I'm offended that before being with me you're rather commit suicide, homicide, and take yourself off the Team." He sighs, and even though his tone is teasing his eyes are suddenly hard, saddened. "That's what it comes down to, right? You don't want me."
"Wally-" She starts, hands surging forward and heart breaking when he jerks away from her, side stepping her touch. "No, Wally, god, I'm not explaining this right..."
Because how is she supposed to put something like this into words; being with him, really being with him isn't an option for girls like her, no matter how badly she wants it... She's not the girl he can take home to meet his parents, not the girl he can slow dance to at his prom, not the girl he'll be able to fall in love with without consequences. That kind of dream isn't meant for girls like her, not ones with so much blood on their hands, who have been tortured and beaten and broken in since birth to become the wreck of a human she is now... Her only prerogative is to make it though life without damaging the people around her, without allowing the flood gates to break and drown the people she cares about... And she's failed at that already, she's failed at so much...Her only option left is one that put her far away from him, from everyone...
"God, Artemis, just be honest with me, please?" He sighs, scrubbing at the back of his neck. "Just... Just stop telling me the same bullshit about you being messed up, about being worried about hurting me, and all the other crap I've believed before; just tell me, Artemis, just tell me whether or not you want me and then just... Do something about it!"
When she doesn't say anything his ears redden, the hand on the back of his neck seeming to yank on his hair in frustration. "We both know... Look, whatever you're going through is because of me, or us, or... Whatever. And I'm tired of being the only one who actually wants this to happen."
The way he says it, how heartbroken he sounds, undoes her slightly; suddenly her lower lip is trembling, the exposed skin of her legs prickling. "Wally—"
"Don't, Artemis." He stops abruptly, cutting off her begging. "Can you just... Make up your mind? Please?" He sighs, and to her surprise he suddenly steps away from the door, freeing up an exit point and walking around behind her, standing with his back facing the door and her. "If you leave right now I won't bother you about it anymore, I won't pretend to think you want me, I won't be anything to you other than a friend okay? If you stay... You stay. No more running away from me."
Artemis is a born runner.
"But—"
"Just pick, Artemis. In or out."
There it is, all the cards on the table: there's no more secrets between the two of them. She can decide right now what she wants, what she's willing to risk—her happiness, his safety, both of their necks if she's not careful. For a moment she stays rooted into the carpet, head swiveling back and forth once to glance at her options: Wally, back straight and not looking at her. Door, smooth and pristine and waiting to be opened, leaving this whole mess behind her.
Inhale.
Exhale.
In and out together.
She's always been a bit of a quiet walker, always had a lighter tread than most people she knows—now is no exception, especially when clad in only her socks against carpet. She may as well be a ghost, save for the gentle swish of her shirt as it fans between her thighs.
She takes one step towards the door before stopping all together, heart pounding. Then she turns on her heel, not moving.
He has his hands shoved in his pockets, chin lowered and listening hard for the sound of the door closing. She can see the redness of his ears from here, can practically hear the sound of his blood as it pumps violently against his skin, waiting for an answer.
Out of pure curiosity she takes a step closer to him, wondering if he'll turn around and look back at her, wondering if he'll suddenly grab her, embrace her; but no. He says resolutely still, all the muscles in his back tense and popping beneath his sweater, elbows half bent and looking so stiff they might snap should she touch them.
She knows what she should do.
Still, it's just like how it felt when he was in the hospital, just like how it felt when she saw him hooked up to all those tubes; she knows what she should do, knows what is the right thing to do, but it doesn't stop her from being human; it doesn't stop her from wanting to look at him one last time, from wanting to memorize his face they way she did in the supply closest. With a last glance at the door, as if checking it's still there, she walks until she's a pace in front of him.
It strikes her for the first time, oddly, how handsome he is, how handsome he's become in just the few months she's known him. He's no longer that scrawny kid tripping over his own feet in front of her; he's a man now, or close to, and even as she thinks it she spots a few patches of reddened stubble erupting on his chin that she's never seen before, never felt. His face has already changed so much from how it looked even on New Years Eve; she can see the new skin that's blossomed on his cheek after it was dragged through the dirt, can see the new freckles sprouting in new patterns there, new territory that she's never mapped. She studies the furrow in his brow, the auburn ends of his lashes, the sharp line of his jaw on his neck.
She once told herself that she could have loved him, if things were different.
And she could have, and maybe a small part of her does now; maybe this is what love is, walking away because you know it's the right thing. Maybe it's about recognizing that he's better off without her, recognizing that as long as she's around him she'll be putting both of them at risk... And maybe she would forget. Maybe one day she'll be able to look at him and not feel it, this tiny part inside her that longs for him, yearns for his touch and listens for the sound of his voice through closed doors, the part that can't help smiling when he laughs, that part that studies and memorizes everything from the way he holds his pen to the way his voice changes when he talks to small children. Maybe she can just end the chapter here, close the book and not bother with the ending, maybe she can look back and only wonder what would have happened without longing for it; maybe one day she'll recognize that if things were different and their respective histories were different and if they just met on the street or in a high school Spanish classroom, things could have worked out.
She takes a step back, calves brushing against his bed and heart suddenly thumping in her ears when Wally flinches, as if he knows she's right there in front of him.
If things were different she could have, one day, fallen in love with this boy.
But things aren't different, they're never going to be different; she's always going to Artemis Crock and he's always going to be Wally West. They're still going to fight, they're still going to be teammates and despite everything he's said to her tonight she knows neither of them are going to give up on each other, not really. Because they're both stubborn, they're both optimists even if he's to brazen about it and she hides it deep inside herself. They are each other's greatest weakness, they are each other's greatest hope, the biggest, most ridiculous wish they both have despite all the bad they see in the world...
The only difference is that she's been groomed to fight it in a way that he hasn't; she's been spending too long playing her father's game, too long pretending to believe all the hatred and lies she's been spoon fed as a child. Because this is what it means, Artemis is a born runner, it means she's always running back into her father's arms, running back to her old habits and her loneliness and everything about her that's awful and still owned by the man behind the mask... And she's tired, she's so tired of hating herself, so tired of running away from the things that scare her, she wants to run but she wants it to be beside Wally West, she wants to feel the speed and feel her lungs burning and feel the kind of pain that only someone like that can bring her, the best kind of pain...
Wally's done nothing but double back for her since he met her. He may lap her, her may run circles around her at times but he always comes back. Her father would call her weak for even considering it, Jade would say she was being naïve... So that means she should do it, right? Because when people like Wally, people who are stupid and stubborn enough to come back for someone like her... That's special right? It's special just because she was raised to think it wasn't?
She hesitates, lower lip actually trembling when Wally's eyelid flutters, milliseconds from opening.
The ugly part inside her tells her it's not too late to turn around, but the better part of her extends both her hands.
There's half a second where she has time to see his eyes fully pop open—now that she's looking close she can see they aren't a pure apple green, there's some flecks of hazel that she sees around his pupils before they blow out, wide eyed and stunned—but it's not enough time for him to do anything more than look surprised before her palms fit around his jaw, pulling her lips to his.
It's clumsy; perhaps she's out of practice, perhaps she's just slightly afraid of the incredible size of her rash decision, regardless of whatever it is she's feeling she feels it so much so that she actually bumps teeth with him in her excitement. It doesn't matter though- Wally makes this noise, the same noise he made all those months ago in his bedroom when she kissed him for the first time, the low and surprised growl in the back of his throat that shoots into her mouth and pools in her belly, seeming to warm the deepest part of her. There's a half second where his mouth stretches into a smile beneath hers, her hands ripping through his hair so feverishly that she nearly jerks his mouth of hers before he's responding, hands wrapping around her waist and lifting her from her feet. She feels so young, so unburdened, especially when Wally rocks backwards and makes a half attempt at spinning her before he stumbles; there's a mess of limbs and hair and teeth bumping again before they crash on the bed.
Wally jolts beneath her when the air is forced from his lungs, breath flowing from his throat and into her mouth; for a half second she jerks back, afraid, terrified that she's hurt him before she realizes he's laughing. "You just scared the absolute shit out of me. I thought... Oh god." He gasps out, caught between relief and mirth as he hums beneath her. "Alright, the real question though." He chuckles, and as if he's been planning this joke he reaches out for her, trying to pull her down for another kiss. "Did that one count? Or should we try again?"
She shoves his hands away, pretending to scowl. "You're such an idiot."
AN: Once again, sorry about the late update. Midterms are slowly killing me. On another note, here's a quick Q&A for some of the most common questions I've gotten via reviews or PM.
Q: How often do you update this story?
-The short hand answer is about once a week, sometimes more.
Because I like have a stock pile of chapters archived (so I can still update should writer's block hit) and my schedule allows me to write for about an hour every day, this usually means I have about 1-2 "story months" ahead of the most recent posted chapter in my word file (so if the date is January 1st in the story, I have somewhere between the 1st of February and the 1st of March written.) I usually try to have one chapter ready to go and edited at the start of the week, so I can upload it absolute earliest two days after posting the last, should an influx of reviewers (I'm talking 50+) demand an update quicker. In other news that means almost immediately after I post I organize what will be included in the next chapter, upload it into the docs section, and start editing. Sometimes the updates slow down if I have to heavily edit or change a sub-plot to better work with what I have planned for later chapters but hey, I bet you'd all have a well written but slowly updated story than an unplanned mess.
Q: What days do you update?
-This is a bit trickier because it all depends on my schedule and demands of University. Right now I usually try to post an update around the later half of the week (Wednesday, Thursday, Friday) and if a response is demanded immediately I post another chapter in the earlier part of the week (Monday, Tuesday.) Almost all these posting occur in the evenings.
Q: Can I contribute to the playlist selections at the beginning of the chapter?
-Sure! Simply PM me or leave a not to me in the reviews. If I can find a way to work in a song with a chapter or use it as writing inspiration I will and you will receive credit in the opening Author's Note.
On a brighter note I am now on my Fall break, which means round the clock writing & that I'm already working on the next chapter. Let me know what you think and I'll try to post sooner!