⌜ waves eclipse the sun ☼ letos ⌟

[eulalie blake 1a 🍒 tris]

► ► ►

There's a voice in the back of her skull that tells her to turn back — but she's always been reckless when it comes to her family. A girl dancing on the edge of a blade, don't believe her when she tells you that she doesn't like to dance. She's just a hypocrite with kerosene on her fingers and a lighter in her hand; Ripred knows that she's burnt her fair share of bridges. And while the one that stretches between herself and her siblings has been charred beyond repair, she still presses her feet to its embers and makes her way across no man's land.

( She doesn't breathe as she walks.
The ghosts only come to steal away the living. )

Even if Brentley had been home to warn her against being foolish that morning, she would have ignored him in the way that only she could. ( Silence has never been louder when coming from such a trembling pair of lips. ) Perdita knows that she needs this. All three of the Leto children need closure to mend the rift between them. And while she'll never forgive Calypso for the things that she did, or be able to regain a relationship with Artemus after so many years of having put herself before him, she's aware that she's not innocent. She had been a poor excuse of an older sister; selfish and far too independent. She forgot the true meaning of 'family.'

( Each of them has a knife in the others' backs.
It's the only game they ever learned to play. )

The first bullet splits her chest when she knocks on their door with a shaking fist. She prays that she got the directions right, pulling the wrinkled piece of paper out of her coat pocket and reading it over for good measure. She checks the number on display above the threshold, confirming her destination, but that only gives her eyes reason to begin stinging with anxious tears. She blinks them away and rubs her face, always having preferred flushed cheeks to crying when given the chance. She's learned that life is easier when there's no risk of drowning. Not that it stops her from wading out at sea — but even a phoenix can be wise when it steps out of the flames.

The door opens, and she's not able to force a smile. She had practised it in her mirror just an hour ago, but as her brother blinks at her with a tilt of his head, she's only able to stare at him with an agape mouth. Seconds pass that feel like minutes, before she shakes her head and looks down at her boots. "Hey, Artemus," she starts, and this isn't how it was supposed to go. She was supposed to hug him; to hold him close and make up for all the times she left him to patch up his skinned knees on his own. Instead, she only runs a hand through her hair and refuses to meet his gaze. "Everyone home?"

She looks over his shoulder and takes in the interior of the house. Familiar, but foreign. This isn't her home anymore. When the tsunami came to take away her birthplace, she went and found a new shelter with the family she chose — and the family that she had been forced into had to pick up the pieces with only half of their once former whole. Not that it had truly ever been, but she can pretend. Just for their sake. One bandage over the wound she had spent so long ignoring. "Can I come in?" It tastes like acid to ask permission to visit her kin, but it's necessary. She's the one who severed all the ties. No reason to mourn what she let herself lose.

Perdita finally lets herself look at Artemus, but this time it's more than just an awkward expression of shock. "I'm sorry it's taken me so long to visit," she goes on, voice lost somewhere between hoarseness and a tired whisper. "I don't have an excuse. I didn't want to come back." She steps forward, closing her eyes and urging herself to just push through the self-made tension, and then she pulls her brother into a hug. At first there's distance, pitched breathing on her end and panicked thoughts, but it melts away into a steady warmth. She nuzzles his shoulder with her forehead and laughs; hollow, but hopeful. He's gotten taller.

"I want to see you and Calypso again, though.
I'm ready to try and fix things."

Ready as she'll ever be.

table: fox

[umber vivuus 12b 🥀 [dars]]

"broken legs, but i chase perfection. these walls are my blank expression. my mind is a home i'm trapped in, and it's lonely inside this mansion"

Summer came to a close over a cup of iced coffee.

Artemus Leto watched his sister as she finished up the last few pages of some file that was probably filled with pictures of bloody, murdered people and head shots of the potential murderers and whatever else peacekeepers needed to prove someone was guilty. She looked at it like it was nothing more than homework. Summer reading.

Blue eyes flicked to the refrigerator, where all of last years report cards were still being proudly displayed until the final moments of last year faded away. He could see the annoyingly perfect row of A+ marks from where he sat, as well as the number one scribbled in at the bottom of each by that new hotshot professor.

Maybe if Artemus had gotten the opportunity to learn how to shoot guns instead of how to do chemistry experiments, his grades would have been amazing, too.

To be fair, he highly doubted it. He knew his abilities with weapons faded to a dull roar the moment a trigger was involved in any sense. He had his spears and his swords and knives and that was enough. That would have to be enough.

He took a sip of his iced coffee.

"So," he offered, wishing his mother and father were there to make small talk with each other so he didn't feel so hopelessly awkward, "What is the case, again?"

He didn't know why he was asking. He would probably got the same answer he always got, which was something along the lines of "I'm not allowed to discuss it with civilians, which always made him roll his eyes.

As if she was already an accomplished peacekeeper, or something, and not just a student with a long way to go before she was even allowed to call herself one.

This time, though, a knock against the door cut her off before she could reject him.

"I'll get it," he offered. As he got up from the table, he found himself missing how things had been before, where he and Calypso would raid Perdita's room as children, squirting her with water guns, or chasing each other down on the beach. As he passed the refrigerator, he saw a picture of the three Leto children standing down by the shore amid others of the them growing up.

Simpler times, that was for sure.

As he opened the door, his jaw dropped, and a ghost walked inside.

"Per— ?" He managed before his tongue grew too thick for him to finish the word.

"Hey Artemus. Everyone home?"

He cleared his throat. How long had it been since he had seen his older sister? He tried counting on his fingers as he held his hands together behind his back. A year? Two? Maybe Perdita would know, since she was only choosing now to return.

"Just Calypso and I," he said, looking over his shoulder at Calypso, who gave him a who is it? look. He widened his eyes in return.

"Can I come in?" She asked, and Artemus felt a strange feeling brew inside him. Of course she could come in; no one had ever forced her to get out in the first place. She left on her own accord, and she stayed gone on her own accord.

He stepped to the side so she could walk in. He pulled her coat off of her shoulders and hung it on the rack, closing the door after she had cleared it. His eyes found Calypso's again. He hoped she didn't say anything. He hoped she didn't ruin this. She hoped Perdita didn't say anything, either. The two of them were fire and gasoline, a sailboat on dangerous waters. He couldn't remember a single conversation between the two of them that hadn't been dripping in sarcasm and annoyance, and the last thing he wanted was for Perdita to leave just as soon as she found her way back.

"I'm sorry it's taken me so long to visit. I don't have an excuse. I didn't want to come back." He bit his tongue, because there were a million things he wanted to say to that, and most of them weren't pleasant and a good bit of them contained at least one curse word. His memories on the beach were shaky, like the person holding the camera inside his brain had been running after it started recording. He didn't like that his earliest memories were fading away, but he didn't like that Perdita was not around to make new ones even more.

"You're here now," he said, pressing his lips together, "that means something, right?"

She replied with a hug, and at first he didn't want it. A red hot iron had been pressed against his spine when life as he had always known it disappeared, and every day it had gotten harder to pull around with him, and the wound got a little deeper. He had lost his home, and then his sister shortly after, and neither of them had been returned until now. And that was why he didn't want to hug her, but as her arms wrapped around him, he could feel her pulling the iron away from him, so he wrapped his arms around her, rested his chin on her shoulder.

It was a relief, actually.

He had forgotten what she smelled like.

"I missed you, Sis," he said, before letting her go and stepping back to look at her.

She cleared her throat, eyes glancing at Calypso for the first time. Oh god, he thought, not already.

"I want to see you and Calypso again," she explained, "I'm ready to fix things."

He kept finding himself at a loss for words, which was an issue, since Calypso wouldn't be at a loss for words, and he had a feeling she wouldn't have any quarrels speaking her mind. He smiled to fill the silence.

"Coffee?"

[✨ zozo.]

CALYPSO.

when the time comes on the last day

when they start to come down

will you just

will you run away?

This case is about a backstabber.

Knife lodged in-between a victims shoulder blades, and by the looks of the post-mortem photographs it wasn't amateur work. No, this was a well-trained murderer. Someone skilled in the art of deception. Red ink from her pen dances across the pages like a culprits blade across skin and it leaks the truth, undoing stitches bound with a thread of lies. Someone-

Fucksakes, Arty's slurping his coffee again.

"What is the case, again?"

She grits her teeth and shuffles the papers closer towards her chest, thinking him stupid - or that he thinks she is. I didn't tell you bubbles from her vocal chords but she swallows the words back down again at the knock of the front door. 

"I'll get it" Artemus offers, but the girls dark eyes don't leave her work. She thinks him sweet, her brother, if not irritating at times. He needs company in the form of people his own age. Friends, perhaps. Or some enemies. Someone to keep him busy. If the latter, someone to keep Calypso busier. She hasn't punched anyone in a while and her knuckles groan, hungry. 

Who is it? she mouths, quizzical, annoyed that her train of thought was disturbed.

Her brother steps aside and the figure at the door answers Artemus' question, as it does her own.

"Oh," she scoffs, tilting her head to scowl at her sister. "The traitor returns."

Almost instinctively her fingers flex from a fist, dancing in the air, closing up again - a warriors lament, for her fists missed the satisfying crack that would more often than not follow their every swing. 

She catches at the words exchanged between her siblings. Foolish Arty, always waltzing back into Perdita's arms. He did when they were children, too - bringing her a towel after they dumped buckets of water on her sleeping frame and soaked her to the core. He didn't know Caly was watching from around the corner, fuming, plotting her revenge for his double-crossing.

Some people never change.

"I didn't want to come back."

"We didn't want you to either."

Calypso can feel the pained gaze from her brother on her skin but it barely brushes past the heat radiating beneath her bones. They come like sparks, her words - erratic and fueled by fire. 

"I'm ready to fix things."

Artemus looks as if he may pass out - and in his adorable, blustering way, tries so desperately to smooth things over with consumables.

"Coffee?"

And she laughs, cynical and manic, thinking that she may collapse from dizziness. In a huff her folder closes, blood-red pen clattering down on the table surface, catching her breath and her ironic joy.

"So now you're ready? After you leave us all, after we lose our home and everything in it? After Mom and Dad finally started to talk again? After we just found a new house to live in? After we picked up photographs from the flooded hallways, after I begged you to talk to me, after I lost-"

A ghost catches at her throat and she lets him drift away, lost in the currents of her past and her pride.

"You're so damn lucky. You think you can waltz in here and act like nothing happened? Like we didn't try to make you feel welcome?"

Truth spills from her in a tidal wave, it tastes like the ocean, like tears, though she daren't let them flood their living room. Calypso can't swim, after all. Especially not in her own grief.

"Dad went and spoke to the Head of the Academy to get your criminal boyfriend exempt. That's right Per, don't look so shocked. Bet you didn't know that he convinced them to give him a second chance that he didn't deserve, putting his reputation on the line? My reputation?"

She's livid now, a hurricane, ripping apart her home once again. Tearing down the walls of her family, brick by crumbling brick, until they're rubble and saw wood and need her trembling hands to piece them together again.

"You know why? Because he loves you."

More than he might love Calypso - that's the tremour in the earth, the fault lines in her hands shaking like something furious.

"And the second they paid his rat-ass out, he steals you away from your home and leaves Mom and Dad broken."

It's at this point that she would like to be finished now, would like to sit on her crashing hands and drink up the ocean than spills from the clouds in her head and her heart, chase out the dull greys that hang heavy in her chest. But you don't calm a storm - you wait for it to pass.

"Who had to hold Mom's hand every night before she went to bed? Had to help her pack up your room again that she'd spent hours making? Arty. Who had to tell Dad that you were living a few miles away? That you didn't want to stay with us anymore? That Dita's boyfriend wasn't joining us for breakfast, or lunch, or tea? Me."

Her finger is a knife and the throws it towards her sister, her brother, plunges it back into her own heart. She tears herself apart and bleeds across the carpet, all red ink and months of distrust.

"We were ready to fix things, Dita. But you..."

She inhales, but it's more of a gasp if anything. A desperate, painful gasp as she drowns in her anger.

"You're just too little, too late."

And at last, she sits back down in her wreckage and heaves a sigh. The storm lingers, a rumbling in her chest to kill the stunned silence between the three of them.

As if nothing had happened, she straightens her papers and clears her throat, flicking her vision toward her brother and the kitchen countertop. 

"How's about that coffee, Arty?"

let it all rain down

from the blood stained clouds

come out, come out, to the sea my love

and just drown with me

[eulalie blake 1a 🍒 tris]

P E R D I T A L E T O ;

"You're here now — that means something, right?"

She prays it does; feels the urge to land on her knees and to skin them raw. But she's never been a faithful woman, so she leaves it all to chance. That's all they've ever had. Children of law enforcers are born with survival instincts buzzing through the stretch of their veins. Some to fight, others to freeze, and the rest to fly. The hug begins awkward for the both of them, a distance pushing them apart even as they embrace, but eventually they overcome the force between them. Resting against one another, one could almost pretend that everything after their childhood hadn't been torn to pieces. That there are no storms here to be afraid of.

"I missed you, Sis," Artemus says, and that's when she looks at Calypso for the first time. Nothing prepares her for the sight. Arty had said Caly was home, and Perdita had claimed to be ready to close the rift between the two of them, but she still takes a step back as if she's in shock. The door is close enough that she could turn and run and no one would be able to stop her; not even Caly. Not even after all her training. It's true that a flight risk is hated by many and loved by few, but none can catch them. Safety is so much different than security. Perdita knows that after all this time; lessons are learned after tragedies.

Feet dig themselves into the carpet as if she's about to bolt, but it's just to ground herself. She stands firm and tall. Her eyes never leave Caly's, and try as Arty might to diffuse the tension that's starting to rise, she knows it's pointless. He can't stop what's coming, and neither can she. It's not fair that he'll have to see this, but she has to learn to let others share in her burdens, to stop bottling them until they fester in the chambers of her heart. She's tired of wiping blood off of her chin. If Arty wants to endure this with her, she won't send him away. He's a part of this as much as his sisters are. She regrets how long it's taken her to realize how wrong it was to push them all away.

The remark about being a traitor doesn't reach her ears, but Caly makes sure that her sister hears the next part. "We didn't want you to, either." It stings, sends her rocking on her heels as if she's been blown away, but she lets Calypso speak. She owes her this much. Someone can take everything from you, and you can still be in their debt. That's an irony that causes perdita to feel pressure building in her skull, flooding her vision and flushing blood into her cheeks. She made the choice to walk into the lion's den, so it's on her if the pride chooses to make her their feast. At least she'll accept death with dignity. She wipes away her tears.

Caly laughs, and she almost does, too. A storm has come; the one she could never escape. She's weathered it before, though. She's risen from the ashes where the lightning struck, and she's learned not to flinch when the thunder screams in her face. Her sister stands and she braces herself for the impact. "So, now you're ready?" She wants to fight back, to insist that she needed time, but it's not her place. She has to let Calypso have control in this moment — let her leak out the same poison Perdita's been trying to drain from her own system all these years.

"So now you're ready? After you leave us all, after we lose our home and everything in it? After Mom and Dad finally started to talk again? After we just found a new house to live in? After we picked up photographs from the flooded hallways, after I begged you to talk to me, after I lost-" Caly continues, and the way her voice trails off at the end is like a mirror shard has been stabbed into Perdita's stomach. She's lived the same torture; she's felt the same agony. Both sisters know the secret of kissing ghosts. Both should have been there for the other, but isolation is a family trait. They are islands.

"You're so damn lucky. You think you can waltz in here and act like nothing happened? Like we didn't try to make you feel welcome?" She bites the inside of her cheek until the taste of rust builds in her mouth. Salt sticks to her teeth, so she licks it off and clenches her jaw. It's not her turn. Not yet. There's more to be heard, more to withstand, but the revelation that comes next leaves Perdita with an expression of genuine surprise and confusion.

"Dad went and spoke to the Head of the Academy to get your criminal boyfriend exempt. That's right Per, don't look so shocked. Bet you didn't know that he convinced them to give him a second chance that he didn't deserve, putting his reputation on the line? My reputation?" She looks down to her feet, trying to process the information. Her father did that? He gave Brentley his dream back just for the sake of his daughter? There's bile in her throat, disgust for herself and all the walls she built, but she represses it. She has to. "You know why? Because he loves you." She loves him, too. She loves all of them. She just can't stay here.

There's still more to be said. "And the second they paid his rat-ass out, he steals you away from your home and leaves Mom and Dad broken." She lifts her gaze, learning enough from her parents to know contact is necessary, no matter the strain of the conversation. Brentley did not steal her. He never forced her into his arms. He opened them wide — and she came running. She won't let him take the fall for her. She accepts her mistakes. The same can't be said for the one with actual blood on her hands. She waits as the winds reach their crescendo.

"Who had to hold Mom's hand every night before she went to bed? Had to help her pack up your room again that she'd spent hours making? Arty. Who had to tell Dad that you were living a few miles away? That you didn't want to stay with us anymore? That Dita's boyfriend wasn't joining us for breakfast, or lunch, or tea? Me." A finger is pointed at her, at Arty, at everyone who played a role in letting this mess ruin their family — and Perdita is shaking. It's just a room. Just a few days spent reeling from a daughter moving out. It still hurts, though. She wants to find those boxes and build everything back to what it used to be, was supposed to be, but she can't. Not yet.

"We were ready to fix things, Dita. But you..." There's an inhale that comes in the form of a gasp, and Perdita has heard it before. She hates that seeing her sister explode is showing her all the things they have in common. In another life, they could have been friends. Best friends. Things would have been kinder. She'd have invited her boyfriend over for dinner and she'd laugh with her siblings as her father would interrogate him. Maybe she wouldn't have lost the first. Maybe she would never have met Brentley. She's not sure which reality scares her more, so she accepts the one she has. "You're just too little, too late."

Her sister sits back down, going back to her studies and acting as if she hadn't just flayed Perdita alive. She asks her brother about the coffee, and Perdita hates that Arty has to stand between this, but it has to happen. It does. She can't let the rot spread anymore. She has to sever it, or she has to cauterise it. She's doesn't want to burn everything to the ground, but if that's what it takes, at least she knows they'll survive. That's what they are; each of them. Survivors.

"No. It's not time for coffee, Caly. You're going to listen to me just like I listened to you." She enters the room further, a hurricane in her own right, and she hasn't used this tone of voice in so long.
The scolding kind an older sister uses when she needs to make a point. She hates being the first; the eldest. She was meant to protect them, to keep them safe and to nurture them. She hates that she didn't do more. That she ran when it all started to crash. She's here now, though, and she's tired of carrying this weight.

"I made mistakes. I admit that. I ran when I should have stayed. I should have faced everything that was bothering me, but I couldn't do it. I wanted out. I just couldn't stand being around you guys; all the memories, everything I fucked up. Everything you fucked up." She's looking at Calypso now, fists curled at her sides. "I messed up. I really did. You're not innocent, though. I left because I was pushed out. I don't care if you were begging me to talk, if Mom and Dad wanted me to stay. I couldn't." She points a finger at Caly just the same as she had done to her, and it's the first time she's let herself be angry.

"I was an awful sister. I pushed you away when I should have been there for you, and I am sorry. I am so sorry I didn't love you the way you needed to be loved, but you ruined everything. You ruined me." Her hand falls limp at her side, head shaking and lips trembling. "I loved him. The boy you took from me. It was just bread, Caly. Just a loaf for him and his family. I gave it to him, but you wanted a reason to keep him from me. To stop someone from getting the love you wanted. I should have shared it with both of you, but I messed up. And you did, too."

Perdita's crying now, hand in her hair and sobs ricocheting in the empty space of her chest. "I shouldn't have broke him out. I shouldn't have tried to be a hero; to run like always. It's on me that you hunted us down, that you shot him. That they drug him to the Town Square and they beat him to death. Why didn't you let them take me, too? Why did he have to die for my crimes? I killed him. You gave the death sentence, but it was me. I hate that you made me a murderer. I hate how you made me feel about myself. Every time I looked at you, I saw who I never wanted to become. Who I didn't want to admit I already was. Because if I had just been better, you wouldn't have destroyed everything. I wouldn't have."

She sighs, breathing in through her nose and trying to catch her breath. "I don't know how to say sorry. I don't know how to make up for what I did. I was selfish. I looked out for myself, learned to be content with only myself, and I should have been better. I should have held you tight and let you know that I loved you. That you were my sister and no one would ever replace you in my life. I shouldn't have let it go as far as it went, and instead of sticking through it, I ran. I set a fire and got out of the house when it was too hot for me to handle. And I'm sorry. I am."

A step is taken forward, and she feels her legs creaking as if Calypso is expelling a force that is trying to push her further and further away. She refuses to trip; to be swept up by the wind and thrown out the door. Not this time. She's just as strong as her sister, and she finally realizes that as she comes right to Caly's face, grabbing her sister by the shoulders and pulling her up to look at her. In the face; no lies between them. "I am a coward, but so are you. You were a scared little girl who just wanted someone to love her. Everything I did wrong, you'd hold over my head and threaten to tell our parents. You can't handle not being in control. The first time someone stands up to you, you lash out and you try to take them out. You have your own way of running away. Don't stand here and act like you're perfect. Because that's your flaw. You've always wanted to be the best, but there's no such thing. We're all awful people."

The howls become a whisper. All is quiet. She can hear her heartbeat in her ears; feel her sister's breath like they're both sucking the life out of each other. She's never felt so drained. "But I don't live here anymore, Caly. You can't control me. You can't scare me. You can't take anything from me, and for so long, that's what I was scared of. How could I face her, if I and everyone I loved was at risk? Because you can't handle being confronted? I'm ready because you're powerless. Brentley can handle you; he has for years. I can, too. I want you to look at yourself and admit how horrible you are. Because I am, too. I really am. I can't forgive you if you don't forgive yourself, Caly. And you..."

Flames are rising higher, but she remains. She's willing to burn. "And you can't forgive me if you don't know that I do love you. I really do. You're my sister; you're a part of me. I'm sorry. I'm sorry I wasn't there for you, and I'm sorry I didn't stand my ground sooner. I was supposed to be there, to guide you, to see you become someone great. Who you were meant to be. But I focused on myself and I lost you. I don't want this between us anymore. I just want to heal. Because I can find a million reasons to hate you, and you can do the same when it comes to me. I'd rather find the one reason to keep you. To try and fix things." She forces a smile as best she can, laughing with a choked sound.

"I know you can't swim, Caly, 

but we don't have to sink."

[umber vivuus 12b 🥀 [dars]]

now all the birds have fled

the hurt just leaves me scared

losing everything I've ever known

it's all become too much

A call to arms, and sister swords clashed against the the dying of the light. His pulse began to quicken as hungry eyes met with clenched fists— this was not a family. Or, it did not feel like one to him.

From the moment Calypso opened her mouth, he could see the storms of Atlantis gathering in her eyes, lightning crackling through her teeth. Don't, Artemus hoped, Don't tear apart another home.

"So now you're ready? After you leave us all, after we lose our home and everything in it?"

He still remembered watching Perdita disappear, her form consumed with the wavy horizon, her existence drowned like the walls of their old house, not to be seen again. He remembered pulling his knees into his sweater, leaning his head against the window. "Turn around.
Turn around. Turn around."

She didn't.

"After Mom and Dad finally started to talk again? After we just found a new house to live in? After we picked up photographs from the flooded hallways, after I begged you to talk to me, after I lost-" Though fueled by anger, Artemus couldn't help hearing the pain in Calypso's voice. Perhaps even the bravest of knights in their shining armor had fears and hearts that could be broken. He bit his bottom lip, gaze falling to Perdita, who must have known Calypso was just being honest, and then to the floor, his coffee, his hands, anything except the hurricane that had formed in the kitchen his mother had just remodeled.

"You're so damn lucky. You think you can waltz in here and act like nothing happened? Like we didn't try to make you feel welcome?" He wished it could have been that easy, though. He wished his parents were there to make them hold hands until they worked through their problems. He wished he had been able to see his sister on her birthday. He wished his fucking grades were better. He wished for a lot of things, and none of them were just going to happily unfold in his lap; he hadn't ever been that lucky.

Calypso didn't seem anywhere near being finished. She stood, her palms pressed down on the counter. He thought he should have moved her things before she got the urge to swat them out of the way, but he didn't. "Dad went and spoke to the Head of the Academy to get your criminal boyfriend exempt. That's right Per, don't look so shocked. Bet you didn't know that he convinced them to give him a second chance that he didn't deserve, putting his reputation on the line? My reputation? You know why? Because he loves you."

His head snapped up at Calypso. A line of wrong and right wasn't exactly there to guide them along the way, and the entire situation was gray matter. Everything ended in a question mark, as far as Artemus was concerned, and both of his sisters always viewed him as too fragile to handle the truths of whatever mess they had been cooking up for the past five or so years.

Still, he eyed Calypso, reminding her not to go too far. Don't say anything you'll never be able to take back, he willed to her.

She wasn't finished, though.

"And the second they paid his rat-ass out, he steals you away from your home and leaves Mom and Dad broken."

He ran both of his hands through his hair, shaking his head. Again, she was right, but he worried that her words were getting too pointed. He waited for her to sprint toward Perdita once her temper finally hit its peak. He knew it was only a matter of time, after all. Calypso had never been as good at dealing with storms as she had been at joining them.

"Who had to hold Mom's hand every night before she went to bed? Had to help her pack up your room again that she'd spent hours making? Arty."

His mother stopped speaking for weeks after Perdita left. Never more than a nod of the head, a forced smile, a pat on the back of the head. Rarely, he could pull a few one-worded replies out of her:

("Do you want seconds, Mom?"
"No.")

And for reasons unknown, she had decided this was all her husband's fault, and was especially lost to him. When he walked into a room, it was never long before she walked out of it. At night, she slept in the living room, and it seemed like the moment she closed her eyes, all she could see was Perdita slamming the door in her face as she pleaded for her to stay. Tears would start falling, her breathing would hitch, and, like Calypso said, it was always Artemus to hold her hands and keep them from trembling until she fell asleep.

"Caly, it's n—" he tried, praying it would have been enough to stop this. To stop Calypso before she took it any further, to stop Perdita before she even started.

It did not phase his sister in the slightest.

" Who had to tell Dad that you were living a few miles away? That you didn't want to stay with us anymore? That Dita's boyfriend wasn't joining us for breakfast, or lunch, or tea? Me."

Their family had been on the verge of extinction back then. His mom stopped wearing her ring and his dad came home later and later every night. Maybe it had always been clear that their home system was peculiar, but Artemus didn't think anyone had ever realized how co-dependent they all were. Especially not Calypso, who was proud to a fault, a star by her own right, who was burning too brightly to last. Maybe she had already begun to fade. Maybe that was why she fought so hard.

And Perdita, well, she hadn't ever given herself a chance to shine.

"We were ready to fix things, Dita, but you... You're too little too late." Calypso decided at last, taking her seat again and looking at Artemus for the first time since she had laid her gaze on Perdita.

"How's about that coffee, Arty?" she spat. He slid her cup over to her, waiting for round two to begin.

"I think—" he tried. Again, he was interrupted. This time, it was Perdita who spoke.

"No. It's not time for coffee, Caly. You're going to listen to me just like I listened to you."

He sighed. "Can w—" A third time, he was interrupted.

"I made mistakes. I admit that. I ran when I should have stayed. I should have faced everything that was bothering me, but I couldn't do it. I wanted out. I just couldn't stand being around you guys; all the memories, everything I fucked up. Everything you fucked up."

What had she meant by that? Everything you fucked up? What had Calypso done? He looked between his sisters, confused. It had been his understanding that Perdita just wanted to live with her boyfriend instead of them, and then she never came back.

"What is she—" A fourth time. He gritted his teeth.

"I messed up. I really did. You're not innocent, though. I left because I was pushed out. I don't care if you were begging me to talk, if Mom and Dad wanted me to stay. I couldn't."

That made no sense to him. How was it their fault she left if they were begging her not to? How had things gotten so confused in her mind that, like always, Perdita was the victim? How had— why was it happening? She had more to say still, and before he even bothering trying to speak again, he let her finish: "I loved him. The boy you took from me. It was just bread, Caly. Just a loaf for him and his family."

His eyes widened with shock as things that had not always quite made sense began to click into place. His eyes twitched up to Calypso, hoping Perdita was just being dramatic. He hoped she was just saying stuff out of anger. But he saw it in her face, the way her usually steely gaze broke for a moment, they way she licked her lips but couldn't find anything to say just yet.

His eyes began to tear up, and he willed himself to suck it up. He refused to be weak right then, to pity people when it was all they could do for themselves. They were being strong, and he would too. For now. At least for now.

"Why didn't you let them take me, too? Why did he have to die for my crimes? I killed him. You gave the death sentence, but it was me. I hate that you made me a murderer. I hate how you made me feel about myself."

"Stop." he whispered. The tears were coming back just as quickly as he was blinking them away. He took in a deep breath through his nose, annoyed when Perdita only got louder, "Don't stand here and act like you're perfect. Because that's your flaw. You've always wanted to be the best, but there's no such thing. We're all awful people."

He could feel his heart beat in his throat, and he worried he might vomit.

"Shut up." He said, again, being ignored as Perdita carried on.

His pulse hammered against his temple. He started sweating, and his vision became clouded. One. Two. Three. Count. Count. Calm down. One. Two. Th—

"I can find a million reasons to hate you, and you can do the same when it comes to me. I'd rather find the one reason to keep you. To try and fix things."

"Shut the fuck up! Shut up! Both of you!" He no longer cared, but this time, neither of them tried to speak over him.

"Oh, so now I can speak? Now you guys are done spouting off all of your bullshit?" He stood, pacing the kitchen floor, hands shaking like his mothers had when Perdita left.

Breathe, he thought, Count. One, two... No, fuck that.

"Great! Because I have something to say! You're both being fucking ridiculous. People make mistakes. Horrible ones. People do dumb shit all of the time, and then they forgive each other. Do you know why? Because they care about each other. Like a family is supposed to. But you two—" He wagged his finger at them, laughing and shaking his head— "You're both too entitled and spoiled to just get over things. Yes, some of the shit that you have done to each other is... is... well, it's bat shit crazy, actually. But you've both done it. You have both drawn this gigantic line in the sand, and the rest of us are just trying not to choose a side because we know there'll be hell to pay if we do! Family isn't supposed to have sides!

Stop crying. Stop crying. Stop crying. They'll think you're weak.

He wasn't crying because of the heartbreak, though. He was crying because of the embers igniting his bones, the steam hissing through his veins and the fires filling his vision. He was crying out of pure, untapped rage. And he had done his listening. He had heard all he needed to hear.

Now, they would listen to his every single word. He was going to make sure of it.

"Grow the fuck up! Perdita, get over yourself, sweetie. I promise you, the world doesn't revolve around you as much as you think it does. I promise. You left on your own accord, so don't sit here and act like we pushed you out of the fucking door. I still remember what clothes you were wearing the night you left, Dita, because I watched you through my window until you were too far away for me to see! We didn't want you to leave. Things were hard. We lost our house. We needed to stick together, and you tucked tail and split the moment things got hard, which is a hell of a character trait to have, isn't it? You're weak. Weaker than everyone seems to think I always was, that's for damn sure." Labored breathing, I wiped away a bit of spit on the arm of my jacket, blue eyes turned red falling on Calypso.

"And you. Do you see how I'm acting right now? How I'm being a damn fool? I bet you're over there thinking I'm crazy, right? Well, this is how you make everyone feel all the goddamn time! You're such an angry person, Caly. Why? What made you like this? What made you so cold? Why can't you just fucking feel something besides anger for once?" I grabbed the file from in front of her.

"This! You love your school. You love the things you learn. I have never seen somebody be so stupidly passionate about something. But even with this, you have to act like you're too high and mighty to care. Like it's beneath you. We're all beneath you, right Caly? All walking on eggshells, hoping you aren't in a bad mood because if you are, someone is going to get hurt. I'm done trying. Hate me if you want, both of you, because it is too exhausting trying on my own!" His eyes wide, hands running themselves through his hair to a point that it was probably comical.

"Now, can we please just act like a normal fucking family for ten minutes?!"

He took his seat back, chest rising and falling against the silence that threatened to swallow them all whole. Expressing himself, it turned out, was not his strongest quality. He realized that now, but he had meant almost everything he said, and if they wanted to attack him, fine. But enough was enough, and at some point, he had decided it was better to lay on the grenade himself if everyone else could get out unscathed.

He took a sip of his coffee, spat it back out.

"And of course I forgot to put fucking sugar in my coffee!"

I can't save us, my Atlantis

we built this town on shaky ground

I can't save us, my Atlantis

we built it up to pull it down