Dragons, Dystopians, and Denial

She wasn't really sure what she was supposed to learn from it. That she was a danger to everyone she was around if she wasn't actively making sure that she didn't hurt someone? That even as a child, her instincts were to kill people instead of letting something hurt her? That she'd already been a killer for more than half her life?

She took a deep breath, briefly considering pretending to be asleep, before she decided to turn the conversation back on him. "What do you want to forget?"

Elias's gaze turned towards the flickering fire in the short silence that followed, watching the embers burn up into the air and listening to the cackling as it ate into the wood. It was peaceful watching it burn under the starry night sky. It was ignorantly bliss being able to slip away from his usual mask of self-pity and disdain for life.

But then Jerica asked him the same question, and he didn't have an answer. Not an immediate answer like she did, anyways. Because, to be honest, he tried to forget everything in his life. There wasn't anything really worth remembering.

"I guess, everything," he said softly after a pause, still gazing at the fire.

That was a cop-out answer.

She cracked an eye open to look at him irritably. He was the one that started this line of questioning. She was minding her own business, enjoying her perfectly good buzz when he brought the topic up. And now she wasn't going to drop it.

"Such as?"

Elias didn't let the irritation in Jerica's voice get to him. He still looked ahead in a daze, old memories swirling in his head. Normally, he pushed those memories and thoughts down, but his usual walls were down, and nothing stopped him from letting it out.

"I used to think that if one was going to live a life full of suffering, they should at least be given the chance to be happy," he said slowly, trying to enunciate his words well to come out serious. "I thought wrong. It's better to not be happy at all, because then you'd forever miss what you once had."

Jerica's metaphorical hackles instantly went up. She set her jaw, body tense as he chose to go there. He could have just answered her question, but no, now he wanted to get into the philosophy of suffering. Of pretending that her life hadn't been as bad as his, since she'd never known anything else.

She tried, and failed, to keep the harshness out of her voice when she asked, "What did you once have?"

It barely registered to Elias that Jerica sounded annoyed. At the back of his mind, he knew this was a sign to step back and backpedal, maybe apologize if he came out too brash. But he was too far deep to care, and too far deep into intoxication to do anything about it.

"Love," he said longingly. "Friendship. Family. Peace."

He paused.

"Freedom," he finished more quietly.

“Must be nice.”

"It was," he replied, again somewhat conscious enough to realize that he was ignoring the sarcasm and irritation in her voice. "And I wish I can forget it. It would be a lot easier if I did."

“No, it wouldn’t,” she sighed, some of the frustration leaving as she was just filled with sadness instead. “Then you’d just spend your entire life wondering what you’d done so wrong that the gods didn’t see you fit of even starting life with good things in your life that could be taken.”

"If you never had those things, how would you be able to know they were good? How would you know you did something wrong?" he challenged. "If all your life you were in an environment without those things, then you could be blissfully ignorant."

Blissfully ignorant—

Rage surged through her and she was on her feet before she had a chance to think about what she was doing. She stormed further into the woods. “FUCK. YOU.”

Jerica's cursed screech rattled Elias's bones and almost slapped the liquor out of his kidneys. He looked up at her with wide eyes as birds seemed to fly out of the nearby trees. She was storming away, and before she could get too far, he quickly stumbled to his feet and clumsily chased after her.

"Jerica!" he called, feeling the vulnerability slip away and his walls returning. "Wait, don't leave. Did I do something wrong?"

"You really think it's easier, Elias? Really?" she snarled, whirling around back towards him. She'd been trying to put some space between them so that she could cool off, but if he wanted to push her just then, she'd bite.

"You think it's bliss to not have even a single memory of your parents? To never once hear your father say he's proud of you, or ever feel your mother's embrace?"

She couldn't have named the emotion she was feeling just then if she'd tried, but it felt bad.

"To not remember a single day in your childhood when you didn't have to fight just to survive? To try to convince yourself that you didn't even want friends to start with, just to try and numb the sting of the reality that not even a single other child wanted to be anywhere near you?" She took a shaky breath, trying to push all of the memories and emotions out of her head. She finished bitterly, "If that's bliss, then you can have it."

Elias stopped running when he was only a few steps away from Jerica, and at that time, she had already whirled around and unleashed her fury on him. It just occurred to him that maybe she took his words personally. But he was never talking about her. He was talking about himself.

He knew he should try consoling her. Help her feel better. Not make this about himself.

But this had been about himself. This was not about her. He felt like he had to defend his words. It was never his intention to call her blissfully ignorant.

He didn't know what to say, and too long of a silence passed for it to be comfortable. Even he could recognize that through this half-drunken state.

"I'm sorry," he finally said still with concern in his eyes, trying to sound sincere. "I didn't mean it that way."

He sighed, knowing she was going to give him a raged rebuttal. He quickly added on before she could.

"I never met my parents either," he said softly and calmly. "And I wished I did, to see what they would be like. But I had my siblings, and I always looked at the bright side of things. I guess I sometimes still do, and that's why I..."

He looked at her with sadness swirling in his eyes. "I didn't realize you wished you had a friend and that you wished you had a normal childhood. I'm sorry. I'm not saying you don't deserve that. Just... if you did have that, like I did, and it got taken away, it hurts just as much. Maybe just as much as not having it. Or maybe more. I don't know."

"Yeah." Jerica crossed her arms with a sigh, mourning the slight buzz that she used to have. "That would suck too."