~{Make} Plans to {Break} Plans~ Damien ~Deathpost~
Apr 14, 2013 1:01:18 GMT -5
Post by Ally is tentatively back on Apr 14, 2013 1:01:18 GMT -5
{OOC}: If you want musical accompaniment, listen to "Bleeding Out" by Imagine Dragons, would be my reccomendation. Also, bring tissues?
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-"Damien!" My eyes snap back open, and I didn't realize I'd even closed them. "Stay awake, stay with us." I'm not going anywhere. I'm trying really hard to listen but my eyelids are so heavy and it's fine, I made it home, everything's fine now.
The world fades out around me, and I sink into unconsciousness, black and fluid like a pool of ink, and I let it swallow me up and take the pain away.
~
I wake up to too-bright lights and the smell of antiseptic. I'm alone, lying on a gurney, and I feel better, if a little out of it. I sit up and swing my legs over the side cautiously, but I don't even feel a twinge. It feels a little suspicious, but I'm too tired to question it. I'm not hooked up to anything, so I can probably go home, I think. And if not, tough shit, I hate hospitals. The floor doesn't feel as cold as it usually does, barely feels there, but I attribute that to the fuzzy feeling. I feel all wrapped up in something soft and disconnected from everything around me.
I stagger around a bit, find my way to the lobby. I almost immediately spot Ambrose and Todd, the latter sitting, the former pacing, and I walk over hesitantly. "Guys?" My voice is faint and whispery, and I'm getting dizzier by the second. They both ignore me, and I sigh, "Look, I know you're both pissed off at me, but the silent treatment can wait, right? I just wanna go home. I don't... I'm not feeling great." Still no answer, and now I'm getting upset. "Please. I can't get home by myself, I don't think. I'm really tired. I don't want to stay here."
I put my hand out to grab Ambrose's shoulder, wanting to be acknowledged, and my hand goes right through him.
A strangled sound escapes me, and I stagger back, this isn't happening I'm dreaming this isn't real except I've never had vivid dreams like this, never, but I can't face what's happening this can't be real please don't let it be real-
I'm dead.
"Family of Damien Dempsey?" A nurse calls out hesitantly, and the bottom drops out of my stomach. Don't tell them yet, let them not know for a few minutes, please. But then they're headed over to her, worried and upset but that's so, so much better than grieving, and I just want them to not know yet.
Ambrose looks like he might have an idea of what's going on, already, but Todd's impatient, asking to see me, and it hurts. "The doctors did everything they could-" And then my brothers fall apart.
Todd rushes out of the hospital, running from the facts, and I follow anxiously. It turns out I didn't need to (What could I have done if something had happened, anyway?) because he just smacks a hand into the wall, breathing hard, and then turns his back to the wall and sits on the ground. He's not quite crying, but he's shaking and quiet and bleak and everything he never is. Toddy. I sit next to him helplessly, wait for Ambrose to come out. He does, after a minute, comes straight over and puts a hand on Todd's shoulder, sighing. He looks like he's barely keeping it together, too, and I have to take a deep breath, because neither of them should ever look this broken. "Toddy, come on, we should go home." Ambrose whispers, and there's no argument.
I trail after them the entire way back home, and I spend the rest of the night curled up on the couch so I don't have to face their reactions anymore.
~
Kendra cries when she finds out.
It's not a full-on breakdown, no wild sobbing, but she puts her hands over her mouth and her eyes start dripping, and one muffled sob escapes her. I wasn't expecting anything more, she's too reserved a person, emotionally. And it's not like she didn't see it coming. (She showed up crying one night and spilled the story- she'd had a miscarriage, she wasn't going to tell Todd, she was scared -and then we sat in the living room and talked for about two hours and it got to where I told her, "Y'know I'm gonna die, right? I'm not going to make it- I can't stay out of trouble because I'll lose my mind but... The situation's getting bad. I'm just..."[/color])
Kendra Lightwood is obviously a saint, because she gets a handle on herself and the first words out of her mouth are, "Are you going to be okay?"
Todd shakes his head, and I swallow, wrapping my arms around myself. Kendra hauls him into a hug and tangles her fingers in his hair. He starts crying like he's never going to stop, and I mumble, "I'm so so sorry, Toddy, please, I'm so sorry." And every atom of whatever's left of me wants to come back and wants to make my brothers be okay and the fact that I can't just makes me so angry but there's nothing I can do.
~
My funeral's the next day, and Ambrose has to physically hold Todd back from killing Luke, who looks like he's just spoiling for a fight, which I get, but go find and whale on the bitch that did this, stupid!
Everyone clears out, except Ambrose, and I have such a bad feeling about this, but I perch on the headstone as he starts talking, puts a hand on the tombstone next to where I'm sitting. "Confound it all Damien. It wasn't supposed to be like this." His other hand places itself next to the first, and shit, he's crying again, so I get up and try to just hover my own hand over his back or something, I can't do anything to help and it's driving me nuts. "You weren't supposed to be the first one of us to go. It was supposed to be me. It should've been me. It should've been me, older than the president and passing away in a bed surrounded by my children and my children's children, you and Todd with families of your own and gathered around because none of us grew up to be like our parents."
My eyes are stinging, and I bite my lip, wrapping my arms around myself for about the millionth time since I died. (I'm so used to just being able to get a hug or a pat on the shoulder or a hand ruffling my hair when I'm upset.) "It was always going to be me. You have to... You have to know it was always going to be me first." The idea that neither of them figured it out, that this is totally out of the blue, is both completely unsurprising and utterly incomprehensible. (I had whole conversations about this with my friends, and the consensus was always that even out of the four of us, it was going to be me. I'm a firecracker in a field of candles- I burnt myself out fast, but man was it a spectacle.)
"You were supposed to grow up. You were supposed to find love. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry." Why are you apologizing, this wasn't your fault, what are you doing? "I was proud of you. I... I am proud of you. I love you. I was so concerned with holding the family together that I never stopped to think about your feelings. I never told you... I never told you how I felt, how you lit up my day or inspired me to paint, I can't... I c-c...." And then he's just crying, kneeling in front of my headstone, and I stumble back, upset and shaking and No no no don't cry please don't be upset I'm so sorry.[/i]
He puts himself back together after a while. "I- Goodbye." He gets up hurriedly, scrubbing at his face with his sleeves, taking deep breaths, and I follow him home like we're tied together and if I don't follow I'll lose my way entirely and just float off.
When we get back, Todd is drunk and sitting on the couch, hugging his knees to his chest. Ambrose takes a deep breath and goes and sits next to him. "Toddy." He doesn't seem to know what else to say, and this is why I was in charge of emotional shit.
"The last thing I said to him was that he was an idiot. That's the last thing." Todd whispers, and I suddenly realize, that's the problem. That's why he's falling apart more, we were fighting. "I... What if he went out and did something stupid because he was pissed off at me? What if..." He breaks off with a choked sound that could've been a sob, and I shake my head, no no no I didn't that's not it I promise.
Ambrose sucks in a breath, looking dangerously close to some kind of edge for a second, and then puts an arm around Todd's shoulders. "It's alright. He wouldn't have. And, even if that's what happened, he wouldn't blame you. And neither do I."
I settle in on what little space is left on the couch and watch my brothers try to put themselves back together, and realize that this? Watching everyone react to me leaving- by myself, no less-, seeing how devastated they are because of me? This is my personal Hell.
But it'll get better. It has to.
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| [bg=FAFFD7][atrb=border,0,true][atrb=cellSpacing,0,true][atrb=cellPadding,0,true][atrb=width,520,true][atrb=style,width: 520px;] DAMIEN TYSON DEMPSEY // 17  |
| [bg=FAFFD7][atrb=border,0,true][atrb=cellSpacing,0,true][atrb=cellPadding,0,true][atrb=width,520,true][atrb=style,width: 520px; padding: 10px; border:10px solid #EF5D02;] I will reach inside, Just to find my heart is beating. You tell me to hold on. Oh, you tell me to hold on. But innocence is gone. And what was right is wrong. My second-oldest brother is, in a word, infuriating. (In four words, an infuriating overprotective asshole, but that's neither here nor there.) We've been fighting for weeks, over me getting myself in trouble, which he hasn't seemed to grasp yet is absolutely none of his business. "You need to lay the hell off, Todd! I'm not a child!" I can feel my nails digging into my palms, I'm so furious I'm trembling, but I'm not going to turn this into a fistfight- I can feasibly win a shouting match, but he'd kick my ass if it got physical. (Not that he wouldn't grudgingly make sure I was okay later, because I'm apparently that fucking breakable.) He's about as pissed off as I am, which I would be satisfied about if I was yelling at somebody I didn't give a damn about, but this is family and I hate having to do this. "You're seventeen, you're sure as hell not an adult!" The same old argument, like not being an adult has ever stopped him or Ambrose from making decisions. (My big brothers are hypocrites.) "It's my life, these are my decisions to make!" "Well you apparently can't make good decisions, so no, they aren't!" Ambrose steps in at this point, as per usual, hands up. "Would you two just stop-" I interrupt, rage boiling over, I'm so tired of this, the fighting and the overprotectiveness and being smothered and crushed and stifled and they won't give me any space, so why is it so wrong that I made room for myself elsewhere? "MAYBE IF YOU TWO WOULD LISTEN TO ME FOR ONCE-" "DON'T ACT LIKE THIS IS ANYTHING OTHER THAN YOU BEING RECKLESS! YOU AREN'T INVINCIBLE, DAMIEN!" And there's the kicker, because I know I'm not, and I've never said I was, I've made it perfectly clear that I know what I'm doing, and they still pretend they know what's going through my head. All my rage just crystallizes, all at once, and I clench my jaw and shake my head. "Whatever. I'm out of here." I growl, and I can practically hear the ice coating my words. I'm just so done with this bullshit, they're never going to get it. "Oh, so you're just going to go out and do something stupid again, great fucking plan!" For whatever reason, he's decided to lower his volume, probably just doesn't want to wake up the neighborhood with our problems, but there's a biting edge to his tone that wasn't there a minute ago. He's trying to start this up again, so I won't leave. I don't respond, just heading for the door, indignation and frustration flooding my veins more than usual. (I'm nothing more than scraps of dissatisfaction laced together with pretty lies that claim I'm not drowning.) "When are you going to grow up! You're just such an idiot!" "I'll be back in a few hours." My voice sounds dead, numb to anything anyone throws back at me, I just really can't give a fuck at this point. I'm going to get drunk and then sleep for a few hours and when I wake up I'll be able to pretend. (The fact of the matter is that the waters closed over my head a long time ago, and every hand trying to pull me out is just pushing me deeper.) The door slamming behind me sounds like finality, but I barely hear it. ~ Just this side of too much of a bottle of whiskey later, I'm staggering out of a rundown bar by myself, the world swimming in front of me, but honestly I just couldn't care less. I'm not that far from home, I'll be back in like ten minutes. Except then there're hands on my shirt, (Didn't even bother to bring a jacket, Ambrose'll chew me out.) tugging me between two buildings and shoving me up against a dumpster. (Maybe he won't have the chance to give that lecture.) There's a hot breath of air across my ear, and I don't recognize the voice, couldn't see a face, but that doesn't much matter, really. "You're a troublesome one, little Dempsey." The voice purrs, "Let's make sure you don't cause no more trouble, huh?" And then there's a pain in my chest and I can't breathe and my knees give out. "Au revoir." The voice trills, sounding absolutely giddy. There's the sound of hurried footsteps, and I'm alone. I'm gasping, trying to get my breath back, and I put my hand to the center of the pain in my chest, just slightly to the right of my heart. It comes away bloody. Oh, shit. A cough tears it's way out of me, and it HURTS, like nothing I've ever felt, and I taste blood. To be sure, I put the back of my wrist against my mouth, and my hand's shaking. Shit, this can't be happening. Sure enough, there's a red smudge. I stagger to my feet as well as I can, using the dumpster and the wall to steady myself against wave after wave of dizziness, almost throwing up. I need to get home. I need help. I keep repeating the thoughts to myself, not paying attention to anything around me, just focusing on putting one foot in front of the other. Step. My chest hurts. Step. I'm tired. Step. I'm cold, shit. Step. I need to get home. Step. Before I know it I look up and the faded wood of the front door that's always meant safety is just in front of my face. I lean on the doorframe and turn the knob, watching the door open but not being able to muster the energy to step inside. I'm exhausted, shit, this is so bad. All of a sudden, my brothers are both in my line of sight, looking angry at first but quickly turning worried, and I quirk a smile out of habit, gasping out "I'm fine. It's fine." And then realizing that that's obviously not the truth, and I need help is still pounding in my brain, so I close my eyes and shake my head, sluggishly, "...No, I'm not, shit, help." And it hurts it hurts ithurtshurtshurts! And my legs give out on me again, and I'm coughing and choking and gasping on my hands and knees. There's suddenly an arm circling my chest, tugging me back into a sitting position- (An arm around my shoulders walking home and "Why do you always need to start fights, he was like twice your size!" "He was making fun of me and he wouldn't back off, so I socked him." I mumble, shrugging, and what I don't say, won't say, is I kinda lost it some time between "How long since that mom of your's 's been sober, Dempsey?" and, in a passable imitation of Ambrose -if it had been half an octave lower- "Back away, take the high road, don't want to get into trouble.") -and paint-speckled hands patting my cheek, lightly, "Come on, stay awake..."- (Hands fluttering quietly from the back of my neck to my wrist, quiet voice, "It's alright, you'll be fine, just stay home today. Promise you'll get some rest." And I can't help a sigh, but my throat is aching and he's worrying at his lip with his teeth, so I just curl deeper into my blanket, sneeze, mumble, "Yeah, okay, I promise." Which, grudging as it was, earns me a cool hand on my forehead and a little smile. "Go to sleep. School's out in a few hours, we'll be home before you know it." |
-"Damien!" My eyes snap back open, and I didn't realize I'd even closed them. "Stay awake, stay with us." I'm not going anywhere. I'm trying really hard to listen but my eyelids are so heavy and it's fine, I made it home, everything's fine now.
The world fades out around me, and I sink into unconsciousness, black and fluid like a pool of ink, and I let it swallow me up and take the pain away.
~
I wake up to too-bright lights and the smell of antiseptic. I'm alone, lying on a gurney, and I feel better, if a little out of it. I sit up and swing my legs over the side cautiously, but I don't even feel a twinge. It feels a little suspicious, but I'm too tired to question it. I'm not hooked up to anything, so I can probably go home, I think. And if not, tough shit, I hate hospitals. The floor doesn't feel as cold as it usually does, barely feels there, but I attribute that to the fuzzy feeling. I feel all wrapped up in something soft and disconnected from everything around me.
I stagger around a bit, find my way to the lobby. I almost immediately spot Ambrose and Todd, the latter sitting, the former pacing, and I walk over hesitantly. "Guys?" My voice is faint and whispery, and I'm getting dizzier by the second. They both ignore me, and I sigh, "Look, I know you're both pissed off at me, but the silent treatment can wait, right? I just wanna go home. I don't... I'm not feeling great." Still no answer, and now I'm getting upset. "Please. I can't get home by myself, I don't think. I'm really tired. I don't want to stay here."
I put my hand out to grab Ambrose's shoulder, wanting to be acknowledged, and my hand goes right through him.
A strangled sound escapes me, and I stagger back, this isn't happening I'm dreaming this isn't real except I've never had vivid dreams like this, never, but I can't face what's happening this can't be real please don't let it be real-
I'm dead.
"Family of Damien Dempsey?" A nurse calls out hesitantly, and the bottom drops out of my stomach. Don't tell them yet, let them not know for a few minutes, please. But then they're headed over to her, worried and upset but that's so, so much better than grieving, and I just want them to not know yet.
Ambrose looks like he might have an idea of what's going on, already, but Todd's impatient, asking to see me, and it hurts. "The doctors did everything they could-" And then my brothers fall apart.
Todd rushes out of the hospital, running from the facts, and I follow anxiously. It turns out I didn't need to (What could I have done if something had happened, anyway?) because he just smacks a hand into the wall, breathing hard, and then turns his back to the wall and sits on the ground. He's not quite crying, but he's shaking and quiet and bleak and everything he never is. Toddy. I sit next to him helplessly, wait for Ambrose to come out. He does, after a minute, comes straight over and puts a hand on Todd's shoulder, sighing. He looks like he's barely keeping it together, too, and I have to take a deep breath, because neither of them should ever look this broken. "Toddy, come on, we should go home." Ambrose whispers, and there's no argument.
I trail after them the entire way back home, and I spend the rest of the night curled up on the couch so I don't have to face their reactions anymore.
~
Kendra cries when she finds out.
It's not a full-on breakdown, no wild sobbing, but she puts her hands over her mouth and her eyes start dripping, and one muffled sob escapes her. I wasn't expecting anything more, she's too reserved a person, emotionally. And it's not like she didn't see it coming. (She showed up crying one night and spilled the story- she'd had a miscarriage, she wasn't going to tell Todd, she was scared -and then we sat in the living room and talked for about two hours and it got to where I told her, "Y'know I'm gonna die, right? I'm not going to make it- I can't stay out of trouble because I'll lose my mind but... The situation's getting bad. I'm just..."[/color])
Kendra Lightwood is obviously a saint, because she gets a handle on herself and the first words out of her mouth are, "Are you going to be okay?"
Todd shakes his head, and I swallow, wrapping my arms around myself. Kendra hauls him into a hug and tangles her fingers in his hair. He starts crying like he's never going to stop, and I mumble, "I'm so so sorry, Toddy, please, I'm so sorry." And every atom of whatever's left of me wants to come back and wants to make my brothers be okay and the fact that I can't just makes me so angry but there's nothing I can do.
~
My funeral's the next day, and Ambrose has to physically hold Todd back from killing Luke, who looks like he's just spoiling for a fight, which I get, but go find and whale on the bitch that did this, stupid!
Everyone clears out, except Ambrose, and I have such a bad feeling about this, but I perch on the headstone as he starts talking, puts a hand on the tombstone next to where I'm sitting. "Confound it all Damien. It wasn't supposed to be like this." His other hand places itself next to the first, and shit, he's crying again, so I get up and try to just hover my own hand over his back or something, I can't do anything to help and it's driving me nuts. "You weren't supposed to be the first one of us to go. It was supposed to be me. It should've been me. It should've been me, older than the president and passing away in a bed surrounded by my children and my children's children, you and Todd with families of your own and gathered around because none of us grew up to be like our parents."
My eyes are stinging, and I bite my lip, wrapping my arms around myself for about the millionth time since I died. (I'm so used to just being able to get a hug or a pat on the shoulder or a hand ruffling my hair when I'm upset.) "It was always going to be me. You have to... You have to know it was always going to be me first." The idea that neither of them figured it out, that this is totally out of the blue, is both completely unsurprising and utterly incomprehensible. (I had whole conversations about this with my friends, and the consensus was always that even out of the four of us, it was going to be me. I'm a firecracker in a field of candles- I burnt myself out fast, but man was it a spectacle.)
"You were supposed to grow up. You were supposed to find love. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry." Why are you apologizing, this wasn't your fault, what are you doing? "I was proud of you. I... I am proud of you. I love you. I was so concerned with holding the family together that I never stopped to think about your feelings. I never told you... I never told you how I felt, how you lit up my day or inspired me to paint, I can't... I c-c...." And then he's just crying, kneeling in front of my headstone, and I stumble back, upset and shaking and No no no don't cry please don't be upset I'm so sorry.[/i]
He puts himself back together after a while. "I- Goodbye." He gets up hurriedly, scrubbing at his face with his sleeves, taking deep breaths, and I follow him home like we're tied together and if I don't follow I'll lose my way entirely and just float off.
When we get back, Todd is drunk and sitting on the couch, hugging his knees to his chest. Ambrose takes a deep breath and goes and sits next to him. "Toddy." He doesn't seem to know what else to say, and this is why I was in charge of emotional shit.
"The last thing I said to him was that he was an idiot. That's the last thing." Todd whispers, and I suddenly realize, that's the problem. That's why he's falling apart more, we were fighting. "I... What if he went out and did something stupid because he was pissed off at me? What if..." He breaks off with a choked sound that could've been a sob, and I shake my head, no no no I didn't that's not it I promise.
Ambrose sucks in a breath, looking dangerously close to some kind of edge for a second, and then puts an arm around Todd's shoulders. "It's alright. He wouldn't have. And, even if that's what happened, he wouldn't blame you. And neither do I."
I settle in on what little space is left on the couch and watch my brothers try to put themselves back together, and realize that this? Watching everyone react to me leaving- by myself, no less-, seeing how devastated they are because of me? This is my personal Hell.
But it'll get better. It has to.
So I bear my skin.
And I count my sins.
And I close my eyes.
And I take it in.
And I'm bleeding out.
I'm bleeding out for you.
[/color][/size][/td][/tr][/table]And I count my sins.
And I close my eyes.
And I take it in.
And I'm bleeding out.
I'm bleeding out for you.
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