Saint Patrick ☘ (shamrocked_) wrote in nevermore_logs, @ 2011-01-21 11:36:00 |
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Entry tags: | clio, saint patrick |
Who: Clio and Patrick
When: After this
Where: Clio's apartment
What: My Muse is broken (Originally posted by Clio)
Warning: Angsty Muse, Mentions of torture and death, Probably Language, Crazy Clio
The small part of her that was still logical knew she should have gone to Jakob's. Or not have left Hermes. However, right now logic didn't really compute. It had seemed perfectly reasonable to go home. But then she'd had another breakdown, when just about everything reminded her of either pain or loss. The memory of what Ate had done to her, the still lingering whispers of Mad Rage spinning in her head, and just the thought of March had made her crumble.
She'd been making some progress, baby steps really, but upon coming home it had gone absolutely nowhere. At the end she'd managed to post on the boards, how she wasn't sure seeing she wasn't even thinking straight, and she wondered now if she had imagined Patrick offering to come over. She wasn't even sure of anything right now. Her head was cloudy and the bright splinters made everything very unfocused.
She'd managed to curl up on her couch, her fingers toying over the wounds of her hands. They had stopped bleeding now,and she knew it should hurt but everything was eclipsed by the bright, sharp, splinters she kept feeling.
Patrick worried about a great many things. He worried about his family and about the people he loved. He worried about himself, and how he would come through this dark time in his life. He was a champion worrywart and when he had read the things Clio had said, he could think of nothing else but going to help her.
Armed with a bag of cupcakes, cookies and some actual food from a takeout place near his apartment, Patrick made his way to Clio's. He knocked on her door, wondering if she could even answer. All he wanted to do was hug her and make everything better, if that were even possible.
He wished it was.
There was a knock on her door. She realized this, even in this fog. Or maybe she was actually so far gone she was imagining that too. She felt her body get up, even if she didn't make the conscious decision of actually doing so, and walk to the door.
She hadn't even locked it.
Worrying about that was not something she'd do right now so when she opened it and Patrick was on the other end she did the only thing that seemed logical and right.
She practically mauled him by near jumping on him and setting her arms around him, burying her face in his shirt and crying once more. Once she got her mind back from where it had gone she'd apologize for trying to hug him to death but now he was a source of comfort and real and she needed to know he was or she'd go even more mad.
Patrick let out a soft "oof" as Clio jumped on him, but he wrapped his arms around her, quite happy to give affection a support. That was something that came as easily to him as breathing.
"Clio," he said softly, trying to decide if he should just pick her up and carry her back into her home. "I'm here, Clio."
He may have to because all she could do was cling to him and cry. She didn't mean to, but coming back and having been reminded of everything she had tried to run away from had only made the pain brighter.
Right now she didn't feel like the decades old Muse she was. She felt like a bunch of fragmented splinters and had felt like drowning. And right now, she was using him as a lifeline.
"Just a moment, Clio," Patrick set down the bag of food he had brought her and he closed the door before he scooped the tiny Muse up into his arms. Patrick wasn't overly strong, but Clio weighed practically nothing.
He carried her to the closest sofa and then he set her down, before sitting beside her and pulling her back into an embrace.
"Clio," he said, petting her hair. "What's been going on?" She looked hurt and he worried that he should see to her wounds.
She had not really felt it when he picked her up. Right now there was a source of comfort and she didn't care she was letting the cold air into her home.
When he sat her down she near curled into him, telling him what she could. The first time she spoke she said everything in Ancient Greece, but at least she was talking. She spoke between her crying until she finally calmed down, if only a little. Enough to realize she was speaking in a long dead language at least.
Her tears didn't stop, but her grip relaxed. "She came back." She shifted and set her hand on her collarbone, like it would explain everything. But he was asking and she should tell someone.
Even if it hurt. "A while ago, there was a fight. Greeks being Greeks." she was surprised how detached she sounded. "Muses, we stand outside thing. Observe, inspire, record. Never interact. Be not seen, only felt. Neutral ground. They...they did not agree. There was a day of darkness." to that she broke and cried, her hands trembling. "And I was taken. Before that. Mad Ragehad grabbed me. Still there. But Ruin. Ruin she took me and strung me up, and Gods why won't it go away."
Patrick held her close as he listened, stroking her hair as calmly as he could. When Clio said she had been strung up, he winced in sympathy. "I'm so sorry," Patrick whispered, turning so he could plant a soft kiss on her hair.
Everything felt bright still, but talking was dulling things a little. "Gods and it hurt. I can hear her still, laughing when it's quiet or dark and it won't go away. And Apollo, he couldn't stop it I know that but he slept with her. And when everything was quiet and he came back he didn't turn her away." She looked up at Patrick like he could explain. "I don't understand Patrick. He is Mousagetes and I love him. He took away my baby and I still loved him. And now he says he'll fix it while Ruin keeps finding me, like it means nothing, like he can sleep with her too and I don't understand what's wrong with me that he can't love me too." She was probably overreacting, but in this case she couldn't help it. She felt betrayed.
"I supposed to be his History. I don't understand why I'm not, I don't see what's so wrong with me that I can't be loved." She closed her eyes, wishing the tears would stop. "And then that thing with a human mask pinned me to a cross and Gods he kept laughing and singing and he whipped me and I don't know why."
She opened her hands. She had scratched open the wounds of the nails Lucifer had driven down her palms, "and I can't forget. Gods each time I close my eyes I see it and it won't go away." Her arms wrapped around his neck, clinging to him again. "Make it go away. Please."
Patrick continued to hold her, thinking that her desire to shut out the world sounded a lot like the desire he had which had sent him to Lucifer and Satan in the first place, looking to sell his soul in exchange for some peace.
If he had learned anything in the months since then, he knew you couldn't make pain go away. You had to work through it.
"I wish I could," Patrick whispered into her hair. "I can't make it go away because it's a part of your history. You can't re-write your own history, no matter how painful it is. It's hard, and it hurts, but there are things that make it better. I'm here and I will do anything I can to help you through it. You can be loved, Clio. I love you."
Patrick took her poor injured hands into one of his, gently. "I can't make it go away, but I can dull the pain. You should let me see to these."
She knew he meant it, but it wasn't the kind of love she was looking for. She knew she was loved, that her friends loved her. But she ached for something different. But she couldn't find the words for it.
She hated feeling alone, left out. At times she even hated being Muse. She'd long stopped being truly neutral, for he wouldn't know her if she still was that, but she still wanted to have a part in a life she was only really allowed to look at.
And she wanted more then to simply look at things. She wanted to re-write history, for the mortals were already doing so. But she couldn't find the way to explain that.
When he took her hand she uncurled it The wounds looked bad, but only because she'd been unable leave them alone. Had she been able to reach the marks on her back she would have done the same there. She nodded, no longer crying but feeling dull. "I hurt them." Even though it was the obvious. "But I don't feel it. All I feel is inside splinters, nothing outside."
Patrick leaned in to kiss her cheek and he nodded gravely. "Okay. I should patch them up. Do you have a first aid kit anywhere?" He almost always carried bandages with him, and those he had. He didn't have any thing that would sterilise wounds, however.
She shrugged, pulling her legs up and curling her arms around it. It still hurt, and she still felt on the edge of something dark but at least someone was here. "I don't know. Maybe. Bathroom I think." She had no idea where anything was anymore. She should know, she knew that. This was her home.
It just didn't feel like it right now.
"I'll be right back," Patrick promised, pressing another kiss to her hair. He went to the bathroom and fossiced around until he located something he could use to disinfect her hands and he grabbed two bandages as well.
When Patrick returned to Clio, he took one of her hands into his and he started working on patching it up. "This might sting a little," Patrick whispered. "Clio, what do you mean by splinters inside?"
She had nodded to his first statement, and while she had heard him the words hadn't really made any sense. She felt him get up and knew he was somewhere in her home. When he returned she let him take her hand, barely feeling the sting of the disinfectant.
The question made her look up and she set her free hand on her chest. "It's like a mirror shattered here. All fragments and it hurts like splinters. I'm not whole. I'm on the edge of something dark and it's just splinters. It's bright, and painful."
Patrick gave her a worried look as he continued to bandage her hand. "I'm so sorry." He remembered when he felt like that, at least a little. She had been there for him in the capacity he had needed. But Clio probably didn't need a leprechaun-looking saint right now. At least that wasn't all she needed.
"Is there a place you feel safe I can take you, Clio?"
She watched him, feeling oddly detached as he fixed up her hand. She wondered if she'd try to hurt it again, just to feel something beyond the pain she felt inside. "So people keep telling me."
She withdrew her hand once he was finished, fingers toying with her bandage. "I don't know where safe is anymore." She paused and shrugged. "Jakob, maybe."
Patrick took her other hand and he started patching it up as well. "Jakob," he said with a nod. "I can take you there if you want. Or I could find someone to stay with you. You shouldn't be alone right now. You can't change your past, but we can do something about tomorrow okay? And then the day after that. And so on."
"I don't want to be a bother to anyone." And she tended to feel that way. She knew Jakob was getting to know his daughter, and her sisters had their own lives. She felt she was a burden. "I just want it to go away. I want to forget. I don't want to keep remembering."
"Clio, you are not a bother. You are a wonderful, funny, kind woman who cares enough about people to go out on a limb for them. Hell, you didn't even know me and you helped me figure out who I am. You can't forget, Clio. You can't change who you are any more than I can. I'm an alcoholic saint who wouldn't know how to actually be a saint any more if God smacked me in the face. And...I really think He has on several occasions. But you helped show me how to handle that. I owe you so much Clio. All of that happened because of who you are. You are precious."
"I don't feel very precious. I don't feel like anything. I can help people but I can't help myself. And I'm so tired Patrick." She looked at him, "You don't know what it's like. I'm not even supposed to talk to you. Muses, we stand outside of things." She set her hand on his arm, "see but don't touch. Speak, but do not be seen. And I don't want it anymore. I don't want to be it anymore. I want to be normal. I want to touch, to feel. I want life, and love. And each time I try I get burned. Even you don't see me. You see Clio, the Muse. And for once I want someone to see me. And now...all I feel is broken. Shattered. And I'm falling, I know I am. And no one will catch me and the ground is coming up." Releasing him she sighed, almost laughing. "God. I don't even know what I am saying."
Patrick turned to face her and he spoke gently. "You do. And I hear you, Clio. I know how it is to feel like you're doing everything you're not supposed to be doing, but... I honestly don't believe you would be here if you weren't meant to be. You don't stand outside of things any more, because times have changed and things work differently. I should be dead, but I am not. And wishing I could be still didn't do me any good.
"You are meant to be here, Clio. If something is, then it should be. If you want life and love, you can have it. You have to find it. It won't materialise, but it's out there somewhere. I never thought that was in the cards for me, and look what's happened. I found John. You can find someone too."
She heard him, but logically it did not make sense to her. She knew he was telling the truth, but she felt tired. She felt to lost to see things that may be there.
She set her head on her knees, fingers playing with the edges of her jeans. "Everything is wrong, and I am tired. I had it, once. I lost everything." She closed her eyes still feeling endlessly lost. "I wish someone would find me, and I know nothing makes sense right now. I don't know if I could trust." she shook her head, "My Mousagetes...well. Gods I just don't know. Everything hurts so bad."
"Sometimes things do," Patrick said, even though he was talking to the Mus of History who was well older than he was. It was still true. "And it sucks. I'm sorry your Mousagetes hurt you. You deserve so much better. I believe someone will find you. I can have faith in that and in you." Patrick reached out and he gently touched her back, hoping he wouldn't cause her panic. He just wanted her to know she was safe here with him.
She knew she wasn't being the age old Muse right now. She was just being herself, a woman who had seen too much, experienced more and couldn't forget any of it. "He didn't. He just didn't stop it." She sighed, "you have more faith then me then." She flinched as he touched her but didn't pull back.
I was a while before she spoke again, "I'm glad you had fun though."
"He should have stopped it," Patrick said softly. He left his hand on her back. "Do you mean while I was gone? So much happened I just wasn't around for."
She shrugged, curling in on herself, "I wasn't his primary focus of attention." Yet she knew how that sounded, "and there are circumstances. I just want to be important." She nodded, then gave a small smile, "you're allowed, you know. To go away. Not for you to look after me."
She glanced at him, "don't tell Apollo where I am. I don't...I can't deal with that right now. Not so close to March."
"I enjoyed my time away, but I'm glad that I can be here for you now. That's what friends do. You're important to me. I don't know Apollo, but even if I did, I wouldn't tell him where you were. I promise."
Clio reminded Patrick that March was coming and he winced then. March. He hoped he made it through the month.
With a small smile she set her fingers on his cheek. She was still a mess but having someone to talk to was helping. "Okay. Thank you. I'm sorry I didn't finish your book yet."
She noticed the wince and frowned as she remembered. "Oh. Bad month for you too huh? At least you got someone. And I know I have my sisters, but they don't get it I think."
"You don't have to apologise for that! Take your time; it's fine. And yes, March isn't-" Patrick sighed. "The support helps, yes. Is there someone who would better understand than your sisters?"
She withdrew her touch and let her fingers play with the bandages. It was probably not a good thing. "I don't know. Jakob offered. I don't know if anyone truly understands."
Patrick watched her fingers carefully to make sure she didn't scratch through her bandages.
"Jakob offered what?"
It was odd. She was perfectly aware of what she was doing, but felt like she was observing things. It was probably not a good frame of mind to be in, but despite being ancient she barely had any answers for herself.
The question made her look up, "oh. A place to stay during March. But Euterpe will be here, and I don't know."
If Euterpe would be there, then at the very least someone would be with Clio to look after her. "Then either way, you won't be alone which is a good thing. That's what has helped me the most. Having someone to turn to when things are getting bad means they don't usually get worse."