Raphael Gotham // D7 // FIN
Apr 16, 2019 4:02:28 GMT -5
Post by Gryphon on Apr 16, 2019 4:02:28 GMT -5
. raphael gotham ♔ 17 ♔ district 7 .
what is your identity?
the blood name fastened to your soul as it descends into this earth; tell me yours, for i don't have one assigned to mine. i want to know what it's like, the ownership.
what is the most despicable thing you could do to one's identity: severe the connections within or transform it into a grave marker?how about being stripped of it and left to start from scratch?
gotham is adopted and gotham adopted me--it was a long road traveled, a distant sight for sore eyes after an endless stretch of adventure where i couldn't even fall back on ghosts. the message was a loud replay from the moment a bundle of gold was brought into foreign doors with other tagless children.
you gotta fend for yourself.
and i kept listening.
what a luxury it is to have pieces of love in a completed, whole puzzle. if you lacked that, then it's the work of a miracle to find out your part has another half. or even if you place it into the right hands.
i just wasn't one of the lucky ones.
i tried the latter before, but the fingers i entrusted with mine turned out to be made of dynamite.
we were fresh to the reaper's bowl when i had met him, joined the broken wasteland that was its own family and we began talking from behind adjacent desks with laughter as our background noise."we should run away," he had told me.
blue eyes widened with wonder as i listened to his vision of a happy ending, castle in the sky where we had everything we could ever want, the bad unable to reach us and the truly good allowed to bear witness.
i was a zombie.
i lacked the power to think such ideas and just wandered aimlessly until he came along, my meandering now with purpose. we left the comfort we did have and so i let him take the lead. my guide, someone to finally help me stay on this path.
we both knew what he taught me wasn't right but he made me believe it was necessary, and that wasn't completely wrong. hands dipping in the pockets of unsuspecting innocents, snagging an apple or two off shelves when there was a moment to seize, fleeing to a forest where we makeshifted a cardboard home at day's end, what wouldn't be missed became a lifestyle.
it was the security i envied and longed for, the present couldn't be anymore of a gift and i cherished it deep within this now steel-lined heart of mine. but it was then that i still left it in the open.
the sun and the moon pass each other in a numerous amount and we progressively got more dangerous. waiting to break into homes when they were left vulnerable for the picking, to late night heists while their residents were sound asleep. he was more skilled a shadow than i, but there were always more branches to climb and i had yet to take a tumble.
how ironic it was that the fateful day came because he was the one who fell.
it was a nearly-botched effort, fumbling for a switch in the darkness and plucking from closets and cupboards. he was overcome with greed against my wishes, and so i'm left to wait under a second-story window for the rest of our findings.
instead, after it slides i hear commotion, forced to hide until he emerges and pulls me away with scarlet on his face and a stained-blade axe.why did you kill him?
the question gnawed at my head, i couldn't sleep that night.why did you kill him?
daybreak and he rises, i lift the weight off of me.why did you kill him?
the minutes that followed were a blur, my brain struggles to keep up with my mouth and he was a stranger and all of a sudden i--why did you kill him?
he had promised me when we first started that we would never let it go to such a length. we would search and we would take but that was all, that was all we were supposed to do and it was going to be done. we were no saints but we were no sinners, we were just trying to survive.
so even if that was necessary, why did he make the mistake of staying behind?why did you kill him?
i'd never seen such rage in his face before until i fell onto a bed of leaves, him atop me with his hands clasped around my neck like he himself was the wielder of the scythe.
gaze darts around in horror, to the clouds and to the rows of trees, i couldn't look into his own when he revealed himself to be a bomb that i needed to defuse and there had to be something to stop him because we weren't supposed to go this far, never this far, hand trying to feel for a way out of this hell i had made for myself--why did you kill him?
it wraps around a branch.
i jab it into his eye, scrambling back up like a deer on ice then bring his murder weapon to his neck.
the last thing i let myself steal was a shovel to bury the two together.
it all haunts me, but it was a chapter i forced to a finish for the same reason it started.because it was necessary.
my name is raphael gotham.
yesterday was my 17th birthday.
i was adopted by a lone man who possessed those six letters awhile after returning to the shelter of the lost, an owner of a sawmill that i began working at.
though i am thankful for him and repaying him this way, the message never stopped being relayed from the head to the heart.
you gotta fend for yourself.
crimson bandages to swinging sacks with dark strands over my vision, it's how i remind myself to when days of thought turn rougher than others.you were abandoned.
you were betrayed.
brows furrow and i hurl another punch, the hardest i could manage.you never truly had anyone to give your heart to,
so there's no sense in letting it be open for the taking.
chest heaving deep, i halt, throwing an arm over forehead beads and sharper features.keep it under lock and key.
stay cold. stay tough.
i go to rinse my fitter body, welcoming the heat with open arms.you're here to merely survive,
and it's been proven that there's no better way for you to than this.
i lay in bed, slowly blinking my eyes to a close.just survive.
and i kept listening.
