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[the flinch is a kick in the gut for her, but she understands. not wanting to be touched, looked at, not wanting to even exist in a world with other people because it's their fault you're breaking down. it's a memory that's too sharp and too bitter whenever she digs it up, even after so long. even after she forgave them.

carol doesn't mention that he shouldn't be smoking, she doesn't even think twice about it, because she'll have time to worry about the kid's lungs later when it stops sounding like they've collapsed inside of him.

cigarettes can't fix whatever this is, she knows, and he probably knows it too, but right now she'd give them to him if she could. if there was even a chance of it working.]

Badou.

[she says again. it's not quite gentle -- more grounding, or trying to be.]

What happened.

I'm a f-fucking i-idiot, I --

[he's so excruciatingly angry that he can't squeeze any more words out for a few long minutes, all that black bile constricting his throat, shrinking his belly]

[(he doesn't have the stomach for this)]

I told the wr-wrong person, he f-fucking -- [snorted, like he'd said something amusing, like he hadn't just felt his heart tumble out of his throat and into a stranger's hands] -- he ain't wrong, he ain't fuckin'... I'm suh-such a fucking idiot --

[he's got jackall.]

[he doesn't reach for her. he doesn't cry. he hunches his body over his knees, bandaged hands digging into fresh cuts, and wishes he could stop hating long enough to breathe. he wishes he had a fucking cigarette, but the thought makes his ribs crunch together like a fucking trash compactor (trash belongs in the incinerator; no wonder he's burning)]

[but he doesn't tell her to fuck off. he doesn't tell her to leave]

[it's not weakness or kindness; an animal doesn't care who watches it struggle when it feels like its minutes are running out]

[he's just a kid, she thinks as she watches him, keeping that careful distance even though it's making her ribs ache and her teeth clench pitifully together.

he's just a kid.

why does this have to happen to him?]

Tell me what you need me to do.

[tell her that there's anything she can do. carol doesn't cry, she doesn't ever cry when there's still a way to pick the pieces up again, but she feels now like she could. like she could cry fucking buckets for this dumb kid with this awful life.]

[and for the first time, Badou seems to truly register that it's Carol beside him, not a danger to flinch from or a human to shy from]

[the question is awful. he wants to hit her, give her such a bruise in one eye that it closes up, so she can't see, so she can't think. he wants to yell at her, tell her to leave him the fuck alone because he hates the idea of having a family that isn't up in the light when there's a family that could be dying in the dark]

[but none of this is her fault, it's his (and his, too), and he's too angry to even begin to tell her what to do; if he were able to tell anyone what to do, maybe there wouldn't be so much glass on the floor (he's losing control over it; he always needed someone to ground those too-rough feelings)]

[in the end, he can only shake his head a few times, and then give a crooked, helpless shrug, one side of his mouth curving up into the least comical smile imaginable]

[i have no idea, either]

[she feels helpless here, and it makes her irrationally angry -- anger turned inwards, picking apart her stomach like some carrion bird on a dead thing. if only there was something here to hit, something to blast out of the sky or pitch into the sun, she could do any damn good for him.

but this is something carol doesn't know how to handle. she doesn't know how to fight this kid's despair.

so she scrambles for something, anything, and finds it when her eyes finally fall on the red patch that's bloomed on badou's pyjamas. there's a couch in the corner that's a lot safer than here.

she swallows away the dryness in her throat.]

...Well you can't stay down here. You'll hurt yourself. Come on.

[the reflex kicks in before she can stop it, and carol finds herself reaching out to him -- but no. the hand falters and drops again, and she feels lost.]

[before Carol can retract that hand all the way, Badou's own snaps out, fingers sinking into her forearm like jaws of a dog, too sudden and too hard (like that night on the beach, when the waves had tried to pull him under; but the nothing he's staring down tonight is not the wide, empty sea). the nerves in his hand obey not because he makes them -- young, hot blood has been in control for some time now]

[he is reaching, he is trying, but there's no contact there that doesn't want to be vicious yet. he connects without connecting, he bumps blindly around in the dark (in the fucking dark)]

[it's hard to say if she helps him up, or he uses her like an inanimate object to stand (those sneakers, the ones from Hijikata, they're barely a week old; but they're already stained and cut up, crunching over the glass)]

[her words aren't responded to -- if they're even heard, that is (can't, down, hurt, come on, it's starting to become a broken record)]

[her arm feels like it'll bruise but she finds she doesn't care; she doesn't mind if he hurts her, if that's what he's got to do to hold on. the world breaks into shards (glass shards, she's careful as she guides him over them) and it all falls away. but as long as there's something left to latch onto, you're not gone.

the couch is old and brown and beaten-up, foam poking through gashes that have formed here and there from use. carol helps him to it and crouches down again, too restless to sit. there's too much nervous energy pulsing through her, and no outlet for it anymore.

the muscles in her legs are going to start aching if she keeps this up too long.

good.]

Do you want to tell me who it was?

[if he doesn't she won't push him. as much as she'd like to hurt whoever thought they had a right to hurt him, she'll give him the choice and accept what he chooses. she can do that much for him, at least.]

Edited 2013-07-18 13:20 (UTC)

[claws left only to himself again, Badou sheathes them into the palms of his hands (only feeling the sting in one)]

[forced to remember he is a person, he begins to cagily come back to himself. the assembly from wounded animal to wounded boy-animal again is painfully, terribly obvious; it starts at his spine, which forces itself to unclench out of that ridged hunch, straightening up. the shift travels along up his neck, which brings his face forward instead of snarling to the side, forcing him to use his vision and acknowledge that this moment is being shared (and all the shame and anger that brings). his mouth and eye are the most trouble (windows to the hungry soul and hungrier gut respectively), but bitten, thin lips eventually tighten and conceal (not lose) that open, angry, canine tilt to them. a few blinks, and his eye becomes sharper, focusing itself forcibly on individual shards lining the floor, on Carol's feet, up her legs]

[the last piece snaps jarringly into place with a short, rough snort at the question, because it's so vague in the circumstances (me, him, those old beasts, this new stranger, did it even fucking matter?)]

[in the end the cigarette dispenser's still empty, his blood is still too heavy with hatefearlove, and his brother is still lost to him; he'd been warned]

[finally, words (which rarely suit him at the best of times, and certainly don't now, because he stole them in the first place)]

I gotta... get'a new pair'a -- goddamn pants now...

Edited 2013-07-19 10:14 (UTC)

[carol makes a soft noise that might've been a laugh if it wasn't so miserable and worried and relieved, a startled huff of air. if he can snap his mind back to something so dumb and trivial, then maybe

maybe he can pick himself up from this crisis and be okay.

it aches somewhere deep inside her ribcage that she can't help him do that, has no idea how to even start, but what she can do is be there. just make sure he's not alone.]

We can take care of that later, okay?

[her voice is soft, but it still sounds too-loud to her in the stillness of the empty LEU.]

For now, you think you need the first aid kit?

[carol wants to offer more than that, she wants to hug the stupid kid, or push his hair back from his stupid face, or do something comforting, since she can't find the right words for him. this is gonna have to do, though.]

[he stares a bit uncomprehending at her; then the old pain rushes back to his senses all at once, and he looks down, as if genuinely realising its not just his pants that have been ripped (he's been blunted down, and it's starting to show)]

[he touches the wound (further staining those perfectly wrapped bandages, as he always will) and looks blankly at the blood as his hand comes away wetter]

[the heat of it inspires the thought of its opposite; Badou thinks of the coldness in that man's tone, realises he should have asked what did you lose instead of letting this stupid blood of his take over]

[(he would have asked, would have kept it together long enough to pull the info and even the score; I am such a fucking idiot.)]

[a distracted, affirmative grunt is given to Carol]

[the quiet is a little unsettling coming from him, bristling little king of the comeback, the bullheaded resistance, the sharp fuck you, but she doesn't press it.]

Okay. Back in a sec.

[the first aid kit's in one of the cabinets over the sink on the other end of the room -- next to where carol has installed the jar of her favourite brand of coffee, which is how she knows without thinking where to look.

she opens it up once she's back beside him; disinfectant, rubbing alcohol, bandages. okay. she nods at the leg of his pjs]

Roll that up for me.

[and sets about the task, matching silence for silence.]

[thoughts of that cold-blooded fucker, that fucking reptilian corpse of a person, instead of the way his achingly empty words had made Badou (hate)feel, has temporarily distracted him; he's too busy giving a sharp fuck you to himself to have time to give another to Carol]

[the frantic, hateful energy leaves him like steam off of a hot plate under water. his hand goes back to being numb and dumb accordingly, finding the task she's ordered him difficult; but he works at it mindlessly, forcing fingers to task, until he's cuffed the cotton above his razor-sharp knee]

[Badou's character is summed his joints; jutting stubborn and too sharp, too awkward to make contact with anything]

[it's certain; he's going to make contact with that reptile again]

[he comes to himself.]

I can do it.

I don't doubt it, but I got here first.

[the disinfectant's in the form of little wipes, like towelettes, and she busts open the package without any real care for keeping everything tidy; that can wait.

the wipe is bunched up and dabbed gently along the length of the cut, while carol's other hand hovers by his knee, to steady it in case he flinches.

she's intent on her task, brow furrowed in concentration (frustration, helplessness, worry that he's always trying to convince her is misplaced), but she has to say. she has to try.]

You know you can trust me, right? If you ever decide you want to.

[it's not a successful operation; the boy's put himself together all backwards, must have, because for once his mouth is slower than his mind]

[like that's a option? he thinks, but doesn't say]

[and why the hell would I want to? he thinks, but doesn't say]

[the antiseptic hurts like a too-rough hair ruffle, like a friendly whack on the back (his wires feel all crossed sometimes, even when they're not sparking and overheating)]

[he doesn't flinch as anticipated, but the familiarity made estranged stings so much more than the skin-level sizzle of disinfection]

[what he actually ends up saying, feeling so fucking distant inside, is]

Ya should know ya can't trust me.

[the boy stands up, un-applied bandages and clumsy care non-withstanding, numbly kicking glass aside with each paced step]

[it's not really for Carol, but more like a narration for himself (I am standing, I am walking, I am breathing, I am heading to the door...)]

I'm goin' back up ta sleep.

[and he won't look back for anything (Nails tended to leave scenes of destruction even more easily than they created them)]

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