Scars we don't want to stitch~
He seemed, older. More worn out than the last time I’d seen him. His curly golden locks were longer than I’d ever seen them before, and I made a mental note to do something about that tomorrow. There were also white streaks appearing amongst the gold, and lines on his face that were new.
From my cross legged position on the floor, I scrutinized the man, who for the past 15 years had acted as my father. He avoided my gaze. Sitting on the couch with Pixie squished on one side, he seemed relaxed, almost peaceful.
“Dinner was great, thanks Key.” Lion spoke, his eyes still shut.
“Unh.” I muttered, not in the mood for chit chatting. The only thing I wanted to discuss was about his ‘sojourn in the wilderness’, so to speak, which he had yet to mention the first thing about. Meaning whatever he’d discovered, if anything, was nothing positive.
Lion cracked an eye open, and surveyed me from across the room. I guess he was catching onto my mood. He closed it again, and leaned his head back.
A flash of anger raced through me. Fine, if he was going to be that way, I wasn’t going to pry, and he could just play dumb for all I cared. But I wasn’t about to sit here, and pretend like he hadn’t been gone for the past month, while he refused to even bother with an excuse.
Pushing myself up against the wall, I headed for the door.
“Key?” Lion’s voice stopped me in the doorway.
“What?” I growled, not bothering to turn around.
“Come sit back down.”
I turned sharply, glaring at Lion.
“And why exactly would I want to do that?”
Lion sighed.
“Hmm?” I prodded, when he said nothing.
“I get it, ok.” Looking up, Lion met my eyes. “You want to know where, and what I’ve been up to.”
“Ya, think?” I countered, ignoring the three pairs of eyes, intently watching me from the sidelines. Chickens.
“Honestly? I just wish I could forget the last few weeks ever happened.” Lion admitted, finally lowering his gaze.
“Well guess what, they did happen and you need to tell us what you’ve been up to. We’ve been worried sick.”
Lion stayed silent, his jaw clenched and the muscles in his face strained. I could tell he was trying very hard to control his temper, but I wasn’t about to back down now.
Finally he spoke. “Nothing.”
I looked blankly at him, and he refused to meet my gaze.
“Nothing?” I echoed, trying to contain the emotions that raged inside of me.
I was furious. He’d been gone for way too long, with absolutely no explanation, only to come home and tell us he’d been up to ‘nothing’? That wasn’t ok with me, and I didn’t get how Who, Pixie, and Chess could just sit there and not care. Just go on like everything was fine and dandy. Screw them.
Turning away from my traitorous family, I returned to my previous escape, slightly altering my course to head for the front door. I couldn’t stand being in this horrible place one second longer and I didn’t care where I was going, as long as it was anywhere but here.
A hand grabbed my wrist, stalling my departure. Spinning around, I found Lion standing there. I could have killed him, I was so mad.
“Key, you can’t just run away every time something upsets you. You need to face your problems.”
“Wanna bet?” I growled, as I Shifted and Lion’s hand slipped through my arm.
“Key, please don’t spoil this time we have together. I only came back for the day, I’m leaving again tomorrow.” Lion pleaded.
“What?” I choked, trying to grasp this new turn of events.
“Don’t you know what today is?” Lion asked, looking around at the others, when I didn’t reply. “No one?”
Everyone shook there heads.
“Today is, as close as I could approximate it, your guy’s birthdays.” Lion’s statement was met with silence, as his news hit us like a bomb, and numbness replaced my anger.
I couldn’t believe I’d forgotten, but the last few months didn’t feel like reality, more of a dream. To me, my life had stopped progressing the day we’d crashed.
Looking around me at everyone else, I found that they seemed to be taking the news as well as I had.
Pixie stood in middle of the room with her arms crossed, and her eyes screwed tightly shut, as she slowly rocked back and forth shaking her head and muttering to herself.
Chess was leaning against the wall a hard expression on his face, oblivious to everything around him
Who sat brooding in his wheel chair not far off, and Lion stood motionlessly watching us all.
Strangely enough my brain didn’t let me linger on the fact that I was now 16, for long, but pushed the unresolved matter of Lion’s whereabouts for the last month, to the fore front.
I didn’t know why, but I desperately needed to know where he’d been. Biting my tongue, I held back from saying anything. Who was I, to ruin the calmed mood? I’d been the one to rile him up in the first place, and I hadn’t really gotten anywhere either. No, I would just have to be patient and hope that he would tell us eventually.
“Well, now that, that’s established I think it’s time we celebrate.” Lion finally spoke up, giving us a hesitant smile. Pixie finally opened her eyes, and Who and Chess looked up, all of our gazes resting on Lion.
“Celebrate?” Who asked, like he couldn’t grasp the meaning of the word. “It feels more like we should be mourning.”
“Guys, come on we always do stuff on you’re birthday, I see no reason to stop now.” Lion sighed in exasperation.
“Oh really?” I asked, my voice full of contempt.
“I’ll be in my room.” Chess interjected, pushing off of the wall he was leaning against and heading out of the room.
An ache entered my heart as I realized, he was sick of my complaining and whining, and it struck me that, as of late, I was never satisfied with anything.
Once again anger welled up inside of me. At Lion, at earth, at the stupid predicament we’d gotten ourselves into. I hated it all, because of everything that had happened we were changed. Who was irreversibly broken, Chess a bitter recluse, Lion a distant shadow, Pixie, well she was just Pixie and probably always would be, and I was an angry disagreeable person.
This wasn’t us, we weren’t these people. Wasn’t there someway, anyway to go back to the way things had been. If we kept heading in this downward spiral, we would soon be strangers in our own family, and if we lost each other, we would have nothing left.
I felt hollow inside, and I knew there was no way I could let that happen, but if I wanted things to go back to the way they’d been, I was going to have to start somewhere, and celebrating our birthday together seemed like a step in the right direction.
“I’ll be right back.” I stated, brushing past Lion and heading towards the boys room, hoping that my attempt to redeem myself would be successful.
Reaching the door, I lifted my hand to knock, but hesitated before letting it touch the wood. For some reason a feeling of nervousness washed over me. Strange. Shrugging the feeling aside, I went once again to knock, and was startled as at that very second the door swung open and my fist came into contact with Chess’s sternum rather then the door.
I squeaked in dismay and jumped back. Chess’s expression changed from one of surprise to amusement as he registered what had happened, and something inside of me warmed as he actually smiled.
“Geez Key, I never thought of you as a wait in ambush kind of girl, and sorry to be the one to have to tell you this, but you make a lousy assassin, you didn’t even leave a bruise.” Chess teased, as he inspected the skin under his shirt where I’d struck him.
“Please, if I’d wanted to hurt you, you wouldn’t be conscious right now, and you’d have no idea what hit you, besides I passed the assassin test with flying colors.” I reminded Chess, as he finished exiting his room, and joined me in the hall.
“What are you doing in this neck of the woods anyhow?” Chess asked, finally getting to the point of my being there.
“I was just coming to apologize for upsetting you.” I explained. “I realize that I’ve become a real nag as of late.
A confused look crossed his face.
“I didn’t leave because of you Key, I was just upset with our whole situation.”
“Oh.” This revelation made me feel slightly better, and less alone. “Well, also I came to get you, because I think we should do something for our birthday like we always do.” I added, meeting Chess’s gaze.
Chess gave me a weary smile, and nodded. “I guess it wouldn’t be such a bad idea, it’s just a hard concept to grasp.”
“I know.” I returned the smile, and jumped as I heard raised voices coming from down the hall. Shock raced through me, Lion never yelled at us, and it was defiantly Lion shouting. Chess and I glanced at each other in worry, then turning the way we’d come, hastily made our way back to the living room.
Turning the corner, I halted, as I took in Who and Pixie, the sound of the front door slamming hard as Lion made his exit. The sight that met me was not one that I’d expected. Who was sitting in the middle of the room where he’d been when I’d left, but Pixie was now curled up at his feet with her face buried in her arms on his lap.
She was obviously crying, as her shoulders shook, and Who seemed awkward as he stroked her yellow hair, and tried to comfort her.
What had happened in the short time I’d been gone? Why was Pixie who never cried, bawling, and Lion who was always even tempered raging out of the house?
“Who what happened?” Chess asked from behind me, voicing my thoughts.
Pixie stiffened, as she realized we were back, and lifting her face from Who’s lap, scrubbed her eyes furiously with the back of her sleeve.
“I’m sorry.” Pixie whispered, as she took a deep breathe and hiccuped.
“For what?” I questioned, kneeling beside her.
She looked at me, her purple eyes strangely contrasted with the red from her crying.
“I shouldn’t have pushed him.” Pixie’s face crumpled, and she once again hide it in Who’s lap as silent sobs over took her.
“Who?” I asked, knowing I wasn’t going to get anything out of Pixie anytime soon.
Who sighed and looked up from Pixie to meet my gaze. He glanced from me to Chess, and seemed unsure of himself. Finally he looked back down at Pixie and spoke.
“Pixie asked Lion about . . .”
“About what?” I prodded, when he didn’t continue.
Pixie sniffed, and she glanced back up at me. “I asked Lion, about Mauve.”
Go where we haven't been~
I stared at Pixie in utter shock. Mauve. Why in the world had she brought up her? From the time we were little, The Order had warned us never to mention that name around Lion.
The Order had been the one to shed light on our and Lion’s past when we’d had questions, and not once had we ever talked to Lion about his ex-wife. We all knew that she had almost destroyed Lion, and we’d respected his right to silence. Well at least until now we had.
No wonder Lion had disappeared so quick. What was Pixie thinking? I voiced my thoughts, and Pixie’s face flushed.
She looked up at Who, and then back at me.
“Lion is supposed to be like our father, right?” she asked, her voice calmer then it had been earlier.
I nodded, not sure where she was going with this.
“So when we have questions about certain things, we should be able to go to him for answers, right?”
“Like what?” I was getting an uneasy feeling about where this conversation was going, Mauve, ‘questions about certain things’, just what exactly had she wanted to ask Lion?
“Pixie, what did you ask about Mauve?”
Pixie looked back down at her hands. Geez, why couldn’t she just answer my question?
“She asked, how I knew that I loved her.”
I practically jumped out of my skin, as Lion’s voice issued from behind me. Turning around, I found a disheveled Lion standing in the doorway.
“Lion.” Pixie mumbled, not looking up.
“I’m sorry Pixie, I shouldn’t have gotten upset like that and you’re right, I should be able to answer you’re questions. It’s just not a subject I’ve ever talked about.” Lion apologized, going to kneel beside her.
“Besides, love is not something you can explain, it’s something you feel. In here.” Lion continued, indicating his heart.
Pixie still did not look up.
Not really knowing what was going on, I took a seat on the couch, where Chess opted to join me. How awesome was this, front row seat to the newest drama of our life. Sweet. Not. The last thing we needed in our lives was more drama.
“Pixie.”
Finally Pixie looked up to meet Lion’s eyes, as he said her name. Her eyes were even puffier then before.
“Why did you ask me that question?”
Pixie slowly looked around the room, and in turn met our curious gazes, meeting Who’s last. A strange look past between them, and Pixie took a deep breath. What she said next, was met with dead silence as we tried to comprehend just exactly what her words meant.
“I think I’m in love. . . in love with Who.”
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