3 posts tagged “brother”

Okay, so I have absolutely no idea what the hell the colors are doing with this or why the colors will only color one line of my writing every time I try to change the color, but it's pissing me off, and if anyone knows how to fix it, PLEASE TELL ME!  That is all.

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The shadows of the room shifted, gathering together on the wall opposite the bed.  They grew dense momentarily before two tall men stepped from inside of them and out into the dark room. 

The first man strode towards the frail figure in the bed, his companion falling into step behind him.  He stopped at the edge of the bed.  The boy was sweating, pale, and sickly thin.  He reached down, placing his hand against the boy's forehead as his face took on a far-away look.  After a moment, he came back to himself.

"He's in shock.  The loss of his brother..."  The man shook his head.  "They were too close, I should have realized sooner..."

"Sir?"

"When Trevor was born, he showed all the properties of being a damn fine mage, but he was small and physically weak.  Aaron was bigger, older, and stronger, but with no magical talent to speak of.  But they were brothers, and so I widened the link between them, so that Aaron felt honor-bound to protect his brother.  Like twins would."

"But they weren't twins, what link was there between them?"

"Blood calls to blood, Comfrey.  With twins, the blood was shared for nine months before, and so the link is very strong.  With other siblings, the link is there, but it's weaker, and most people ignore it.  When I was young, I would feel queasy every time my younger sister got hurt, it took me years to figure out that I could feel her if I concentrated enough.  And so I used that knowledge, and opened the link more between the boys.  They could feel each other much the same way twins do.  Sometimes their mother was sure they were speaking to each other silently."  The man shook his head.  "I should have realized..."

"Realized what, sir?" 

"Aaron was not magic.  His body wasn't set up to handle the backlash of his brother dying, and with the link as wide as it was..."

"He felt the spirit leave," Comfrey finished.

"And probably felt the agony of dying every step of the way as well.  I'm more than a little surprised that he didn't die right along with Trevor."  The man sighed, looking down at the prone, miserable body under the blankets.  "Go to the healers.  Tell them the boy is in shock.  Have them mix some Chysanthemum for his fever and add some Betony.  With luck, the Betony will start healing up the raw link."

"And if not?"

"Then he will feel that loss every day for the rest of his life and may wish that we'd just left him to die."

Comfrey stared at the other man.  "Sir..."

"Go, Comfrey.  The sooner we break the fever, the better."

"Yes, Sir."

The man exited the room through the door.  As soon as it was closed, the tall man lowered himself to sit beside the boy on the bed.  "I've made a damn fine mess of your life, haven't I, boy?  I never thought... Well, I never thought of a lot of things.  I'm going to do the best I can for you.  If I can, I'll close up that link again, I just wish I'd thought to do it sooner."

The man spotted something out of the corner of his eye.  He was on his feet in an instant, his shields up around himself and his son.

Trevor quirked a brow at him.  "Would you kill me again, Father?"

The shields collapsed.  "Trevor..."

"Don't close the link.  Aaron is my responsibility now.  I'm going to protect him, the way he protected me."

"You died..."

"And he did his damnedest to save me."  Trevor looked sadly at his older brother.  "I did something horrible."

The man looked confused.  "What?"

There were tears sparkling on the transparent boy's cheeks.  "I gave Them to him."

A silence stretched between man and ghost.  "You... That isn't possible."

"No?  Check him, Father.  Check him like you did at birth."  Trevor turned angry eyes on the older man.

The man frowned, then turned back to his living son.  He placed his hand against the boy's forehead, his eyes unfocused.  When he shook himself free of the daze, his eyes widened and he turned back to Trevor.  "No.  No wonder he's in shock... you could have killed him!"

"My dying nearly killed him anyway!"  Trevor shot back.  His very being trembled in anger.  "I gave him a gift.  A part of me that we couldn't share--the only part we couldn't share!  I loved him and he loved me.  Even if you hadn't opened the link, he would have died to protect me."

"He can't handle it!  He--"

"He can!  He's the strongest person I've met in my life!  He should have had them to begin with, not me!"

"That's not for you to decide!"

"No."  Trevor calmed slightly.  "No, it wasn't.  But I did anyway."  He looked past his father at Aaron.  "And now I'll make it right.  I'll help him, and he'll be ten times the mage I would have ever been."

"He'll die, Trevor.  Some bodies can't handle it.  His body is rejecting it."

"It's not.  It's adjusting.  I lost a little control... at the very end... I was going slow... and then... then Death was there, and I had to stop, and so I ended up doing all that was left in a fast spurt.  It would have been fine."

"Why are you here?"

"To tell you not to close the link," Trevor looked up at the man again.  "I need it open to help him.  I can't stay by his side all the time, and so I'll need the link so we can work together at a distance."

"He'll be miserable with it open."

"He won't.  He'll feel me there, like he always did."

"You don't know that."

The boy's face twisted into a look of disgust at his father.  "And you do?  You don't know anything about us..." He paused and spared another look at his brother, his face softening.  "I have to go.  Here."  He reached into the pocket of his jeans and pulled out a woven bracelet dotted with pink coral.  His hand solidified long enough to hand it to his father.  "Give this to him when he wakes.  It won't make everything better, but.."

"The coral will help the emotional healing," his father finished, looking at it.

Trevor nodded.  "If you stay long enough to see him awake... tell him I love him, and that I'm watching him.  I promise, Father, I will guard him with every fiber of my being.  Don't close the link."

And then, the man was alone with the shocked body of his living son.  He collapsed back down on the edge of the bed and looked at the boy.  "Yeah, Aaron, I made a real mess of your life."

What can I say?  I like brother stories. 

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Trevor's back hit the wall hard.  The back of his head struck against the rough bricks and the world danced in front of him.  His hands were pinioned to the wall above his head by one larger one.  He fought to focus on his attacker, pulling at his arms.

A fist crashed into his side, and the other wouldn't let him double over as he gasped.

Off to his left, he could hear a scuffle.

"Let him go!  DON'T TOUCH HIM!"
 
Trevor tried to look at his brother, to see what was happening, but his own captor kneed him in the groin.  He gave a yell of pain and his knees buckled, but the man held him upright.

"STOP!  I swear I will kill EVERY LAST ONE OF YOU!"

He could feel his brother's anger and hate just as well as he could feel those calloused hands grabbing his upper arms.  The wall and his back collided again and a whimper left his throat.

The fierce brown eyes stared at him, willing him to focus past his pain.

The sounds of the struggle came again.  Louder, with more cursing.

His eyes started to drift.  The man shook him, hard.

"Boy, you look at me," the deep voice said.

Trevor focused on the grizzled face in front of him.

"I want you ta know, this ain't nothin' personal.  We're doin' God's work, ya understand?"

"Let go of him!  DON'T!"

Trevor's voice was weak.  "No god orders the slaughter of children," he told the man quietly.

"Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live."

"Thou shalt not kill," Trevor replied.

"TREVOR!"

There was a flash of light from the blade and then nothing but pain.  His whole torso was aflame in agony and he couldn't bring himself to scream as he collapsed to his knees, staring down at the hilt of the blade.

Hands on his shoulders, his jaw; turning his face towards the anxiety ridden face of his brother.

"Trevor.  Trevor, hold on, I'll get you to the hospital."

Trevor swayed, the edges of his vision darkening.

Gentler hands pulled him to his feet, draping his arm across his brother's shoulders, an arm supporting him around the waist.  Trevor's stomach lurched and he felt ill.  The front of his shirt was soaked.

They were on the main road now, under the streetlights.  His brother was attempting to flag down a cab.

Trev smiled a little.  "They aren't... going to stop... for someone.... who's bleeding to death..."

His brother shot him a look, then led him out of the streetlight and leaned him on the wall.  "Don't say anything and don't move.  As soon as I get a cab, I'll get you."

Trevor nodded, leaning heavily against the wall and resting his head against it.

When his brother went back to the side of the road, he closed his eyes.  He felt so tired and so cold.

Dying isn't so bad, he thought, if I just fall asleep...

So, these are three different ones.  The first one is about a character that still has no name, and I think I'm going to call that finished.  The second two are about two VERY old charries of mine.  The first is Michael, my pretty surfer boy.  And the second one is about Scottie, who I can't give any details about because it would ruin the dribbly.  I'll pull a Tem and separate them by colors.  Wee. 

Do you love me?

It was the question that lurked at the forefront of his mind.  Every person that would meet his eyes: the cashier at the gas station, the waiter at his favorite restaurant, the librarian.

Could they read it in his eyes?  Pleading with them even as he smiled at them?

He collapsed onto the sofa in his apartment, giving a weary sigh.

"Hard day?"

"Same as usual, I suppose," he shut his eyes and draped an arm across them.

"I worry about you, bro.  Maybe you should consider the dorms--or a roommate."

"We'd end up killing each other.  I can't live with anyone anymore.  Plus, I don't want to."

"You're stubborn."

"You're dead."

"Inconsequencial."

"Says you.  Go away.  I want to be alone."

"That's the last thing you want," even as he said it, he faded from view.

The boy opened his eyes and looked grumpily out the window at the descending darkness.  The room sank into shadows around him and he found himself watching a family in the adjacent building.

"It's times like this when I actually miss them..."

"It's times like this you forget what they did to you."

"I thought I told you to leave?"

"I promised you that you'd never be alone.  If I left, I'd break that promise."

"If I had a time machine, I'd tell the eight year old me to add a clause for personal space into that promise."

"It's not good for you to dwell."

The boy sighed.  "I know.  But... it's hard.  Sometimes, all I can remember are the good times."

"Would you like me to remind you?"

"Only if I start to call them."

"Fair enough."

"Hey?"

"Yeah?"

"Do you love me?"

The room got a little warmer, wrapping itself around the boy.  "Always."

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It was the only thing vivid in his mind anymore.

The dark blues and purples, bursts of red, streaks of golden yellow.  Orange mingled with pink, making a seamless symphony of color draping its way across the horizon above the waves.

Every instant before had become a blur of half-forgotten, faded memory.  The figures indistinct-the places, the objects-all mixed and abstracted.

The hours after passed in his memory in an instant--fast forwarded with brief snatches of dialog and saltwater.  And pain.

He remembered the pain.  But it was disjointed--as if the cause was interjecting his memory at random--a sting here, a stab there.

Time escaped him now.  His memories were unable to be filed in order.  They were shuffled.  In the hospital, he tried to reorganize; to sort and order; while he was in the medicated haze.

Third grade: dressed as Thomas Edison, report on light bulbs.

Summer camp, age 12: Maddy kissed him by the campfire.

His first steps.  Soccer practice.  Uncle Mike's funeral.

Chronology became impossible.

His bandages were wet.  The drugs were wearing off.  He was terrified of the world without them.

A hand slid into his.

"Michael, are you awake?"

"Would you hate me if I said I'd rather not be?"

She laughed softly, then added, "Have you heard the diagnosis?"

"No.  They had me on really good drugs."

"Yeah.  It was a morphine drip."

"How bad?" he asked, trying to sound like his stomach wasn't in knots.

"Bad.  Do you want to hear it from me, the doctor, or mom?"

He took a shaky breath.  "Tell me so that I don't break down when mom is here."

She squeezed his hand tightly.  "The rock cut deep--straight across your eyes.  They saved your eyes, but... not your sight."

He let it sink in, clutching her hand.  "I'm blind."

She nodded, then spoke.  "Yeah."

"Well, on the up side, my tear ducts still work."  His bandages were wet again.

"Michael..."

He felt the bed shift beside him and pressed his face into her shoulder, crying quietly against her.

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Scottie would be throwing things or screaming out his frustration if he thought it wouldn't attract the unwanted attention of his mother or brother.  He paced the room in sharp, measured steps.

One.  Two.  Three.  Turn.  One.  Two.  Three.  Turn.

He caught his reflection in the family photo on the wall.  The shine of his scalp brought bile into his throat.  He took the photo down and threw it onto the bed.

"In one of your hateful moods again, are we?"

He glared at the taller boy leaning idly on his door frame.  "What do you want?"

"To talk.  And, mom's worried you're going to pace right through the ceiling."

Scottie's eyes softened and he looked down at the well-worn path on his floor with a faint blush.

"Sit down, Scottie.  Let's talk."

He obediently moved to his bed and collapsed onto it.  The fatigue that'd been held off by his anger latched onto him as his brother took a seat on the edge of the bed and he propped himself up against the headboard.

"Keep anything down tonight?"

"For about a half hour," Scottie said.

"You look pale."

"I'm tired.  And sick.  And sick of being sick..."  he would have kept going, but a lump was forming in his throat.

"Scottie..."

"Chase, this is stupid!  I'm dying and I'm going to die sick and bedridden like an invalid!"  A wave of sickness washed over him and his face burned.

Chase picked up a bucket off the floor and offered it to him, but Scottie waved it off, putting a hand to his stomach.

"Calm down, Scott.  It's okay."

Scottie covered his face and took a few deep breaths.  "It's not.  The chemo is making it worse and I'm miserable and I don't want to die like this..."

"Don't talk like that.  If you really hate it that much, stop going."

"Mom would never let me..."

"It's your body, Scottie.  Nobody can make that decision for you.  If you honestly think it's not helping and don't want to do it, I'll sit down with you and we'll talk to mom together about it, okay?"

"Really?" he relaxed a little, his stomach unknotting itself.

"Yes.  Scottie, having cancer does not mean that you forfeit all rights to make decisions on your own.  It's still your life, even if it is a bit shorter than we originally thought."

He smiled lightly to him.  "Thanks, Chase."

"No problem.  Now, before you pass out on me, I have a present for you."

"What?"

Chase smiled and stood, leaving the room and coming back a moment later with a golden retriever puppy.  "He was the runt of the litter and reminded me of you..."

Scottie's eyes got wide as he accepted the wriggling animal from his brother.  "Oh my god, he's awesome.  I can't believe it..." he giggled as the puppy licked his face.

"He's all yours, so you gotta walk him and feed him and everything.  I'll walk with you until you get your energy back... deal?"

"Absolutely.  Thank you so much, Chase."

"Don't thank me till after he's house broken," he said with a laugh.  "Here.  I'm going to take him out for you tonight.  I'll bring him back in a few.  Think about the chemo thing.  If you want, we'll talk to mom tomorrow."  He ruffled his little brother's hair with a grin.  "Sleep well, kid."