Tragos (![[info]](https://www.insanejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} tragos) wrote in ![[info]](https://www.insanejournal.com/img/community.gif){kind=small} nevermore_logs,@ 2021-01-20 01:03:00 |
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WHEN: Tuesday afternoon - while Ares is visiting Marcie
WHERE: Hospital and hole
WHAT: Kaden's in trouble
WARNINGS: None
I'm in deep shit, T
The message came through a little while after Marcie’s painkillers had been topped up, and she was pretty out of it. He’d crawled into the bed with her and she had her head pillowed on his chest, and though the bed was uncomfortably narrow he wasn’t moving for anything. Not even attention seeking messages from his brother. Elaborate, dickhead he thought angrily. He didn’t need the extra stress and if Kaden was just being dramatic then Tragos was going to be mad at him. Kaden didn’t reply for a while and Tragos put way too much energy into convincing himself Kaden was just being a little shit, dropping messages like that to rile him up.
thought I knew how to fix it but hahahahahahahaha
Fuck. Tragos closed his eyes and pressed his mouth against the top of Marcie’s head. Why now, Kaden, what the fuck have you done? And what did he expect Tragos to do about it? How could he leave Marcie? Her specialist said she was going to die any day now. That if another tumour ruptured she wouldn’t survive it. That there were a number of other complications that could occur and any one of them could finish her off. Or maybe she’d just get tired. She and the cancer, she and the curse, they were running a marathon, and cancers and curses didn’t get tired. She was falling behind, too. He was watching her fall further and further behind with every hour that passed. And with ever hour that passed Tragos understand, more and more, exactly why Ares had placed him at Aphrodite’s. It was a warning. Watch her die slowly and remember. Ares was handing him wisdom: this is what happens when you try and take on a god. Marcie will be nothing soon. She’ll be gone in a few days. But Ares and Apollo will continue, forever. Even the children of gods die. Even the children of gods suffer on and on and die. This would be hard earned wisdom, one day. One day soon. When she no longer had the energy to even wince in pain. When she no longer had the energy to speak. To breathe. Soon. This time with Marcie wasn’t some generous act on Ares’ part. This was Ares’ attempt to harden him. Tragos held on to Marcie and told himself that this would make him stronger. In the end, he’d be stronger. (It wasn’t worth it.) (This kind of strength wasn’t worth the sacrifice.) But he didn’t get a choice in what he sacrificed. The deed was already done, he just had to survive it. What had Melpomene told him? You are a study in survival. You make an art of it. He’d still have her, after it was done. (It wasn’t worth it.) He’d find a way to survive. He had to. And it would carve him into a new man, maybe. Harder, colder, less easy to hurt. (That happiness you found in Hana? Those best moments of your life? That’s why it hurts. That’s the cost of happiness.) Tragos ignored Kaden’s messages. He wasn’t moving. He could be strong later. She’d die, and he would figure out how to be the strongest he’d ever been. But for now Marcie was sleeping in his arms and he was gonna bury his face in her hair and think about Hana and not let a single soul know he was crying. She’d woken up a little more by the time her mother arrived again. Celeste, who was older than Marcie would ever be and hateable for that fact alone, asked if she could have some time alone with her daughter, and it was only for Marcie’s sake that Tragos didn’t tell her to get fucked. So he stepped out into the hallway to give them some time, and stopped short when he saw Hecate. She was sitting cross legged on a chair directly opposite Marcie’s doorway, her black skirt making a crescent that almost touched the hospital floor. She was fingerknitting, a long string of her creation pooling in a bag on the chair behind her, but she was watching him as her fingers moved. She had appeared on Sunday night, not long after Marcie had arrived in the hospital, and she hadn’t left since. From time to time she made herself scarce, but she was always there. Marcie took some comfort in her but Tragos was waiting for the axe to fall. He’d killed her; what was she going to do to him? Apparently: just watch him, her gaze still and her eyes clear. Tragos didn’t like it at all. He understood Ares’ power, Apollo’s power. Hecate’s power was a language he did not speak. He stared at her for a long moment, till his skin crawled, and then he pretended she wasn’t there at all and turned his back on her. Kaden’s last message, sent about an hour ago.
please come home
Oh Jesus fucking shitting Christ. “Go,” said Hecate, the first words she’d spoken to him since Sunday night. “She has a little while yet. Go." Tragos didn’t know what to say to that. He stared at her over his shoulder, but her eyes were on the wool twisting between her fingers. He watched her for a long moment, and then turned heel, and left. Kaden wasn’t home. “KADEN?” Tragos stood in the middle of the living room, carrying his own bad news and bracing for Kaden’s. The whole house was empty and dark and cold, till Tragos slapped a lightstwitch. Then it was just empty and cold. Where are you? Tragos messaged him, and began to shove open every door in the house on his search. Even Cy’s room, though Kaden had more sense than to be in there. Even Barak’s room, which neither had stopped foot in since Barak left. It was a pointless search, Kaden obviously wasn’t here. “KADEN!” Tragos kicked the bathroom door open hard enough to leave a crack in it. The searching might be pointless but the yelling and kicking things was doing something for him. Out in the yard, he picked up the crowbar, scraping metal on concrete as he dragged it into his hand. He swung, and left a deep and satisfying scar in the rotten weatherboards below his bedroom window. Fuck, this house should show its scars. Tragos sneered at it, and stormed off in the dark, toward the nearest vacant lot where he knew at least one gutted old heap of a car wreck remained. The ring of the crowbar against the already dented and rusted metal was more satisfying than his foot against the door. He hit the metal so hard he felt it in his teeth. He certainly felt it reverberate through his cracked ribs, wounds from his last - badly lost – fight before Ares reassigned him. No more winning streak for Tragos. By the time Kaden messaged back the car was thoroughly dented, every remaining bit of glass smashed, and Tragos had even hooked the crowbar into the soft (rotten, already torn) fabric of the seats and had tried his best to rip them to shreds. Kaden’s message was one word bus. Tragos knew the one he meant. It sat almost in the shadow of the enormous rubble pile. There were plenty of things to hit with a crowbar between here and there. Tragos started moving, swinging it dangerously at streetlights and (highly satisfyingly) at the back windscreen of one parked car. Everything spiderwebbed and shattered. Good. Fuck it. Fuck everything. The bus creaked as he climbed up. It had no wheels, and there was a hole in the roof that used to be a window. Most side windows were shattered, but some remained as solid canvases for graffiti. It was fucking freezing. Kaden sat on the floor at the other end of the aisle. Tragos put his crowbar on the drivers seat and approached. “Explain,” he said, as Kaden watched him draw nearer. “What sort of shit are you in.” “Auuuhm. A social worker came into school today,” Kaden squirmed where he sat. He was flipping his new phone against the side of his foot, in the shoe Marcie had bought him. Tragos edged a crushed beer can out of the way with his foot and joined him on the floor of the bus. A social worker was never good news. “Had a meeting with me and the school counselor,” Kaden continued, not looking at him. “Um. Barak can’t be my legal guardian anymore. Because his brain’s meat soup. And she said. Either Cy steps in, or they’re gonna send me to a foster family. Or more likely a home.” Kaden had sunk so low, hiding behind the wall of his long legs, arms around them. Face turned away from Tragos and voice mumbling and low. “No, fuck that,” Tragos said. “Fuck that, I’ll make Cy step up. He doesn’t have to do anything, it’s just a fucking signature, right?” “He has to-” Kaden hiccuped, a direct result of forcing himself not to cry. “Submit a bunch of forms. Prove he has income. That sort of thing. He’s not gonna bother. I asked. He laughed, said, ‘why the fuck would I do that?’ told me to piss off.” “Why’d you do that without me?” Tragos asked. “You should’a waited till I was home.” “You’re NEVER home!” Kaden snapped back, kicking a foot out toward him. “What was I supposed to DO?” “Don’t talk to Cy about your future! What the fuck did you think he was gonna say!?” “This ISN’T MY FAULT!” Kaden’s voice echoed through the bus. “School needed to know! And now I’m fucked!” “No you’re NOT,” Tragos insisted, grabbing him by his sleeve. “You are NOT going to some shit home. I’ll sort it out. I’ll do it.” “How? You’re nineteen, YOU can’t sign anything.” “Twenty in June,” Tragos muttered under his breath, some automatic defense instinct from childhood kicking in. Not that twenty meant anything. He’d have to make it to twenty one before he could legally look after Kaden which was the most bullshit piece of law he ever heard. He’d been looking after Kaden pretty much since the kid was born. Just proved that laws were made by people who didn’t know a thing about how real people lived, didn’t it? He sighed and sat back on his heels, releasing Kaden’s arm. “I’ll talk to Cy. He can be… reasoned with.” Bribed, maybe, though the only thing Tragos had to offer was the money he was saving, and if he lost that – there was Kaden’s escape route, gone, but if he lost Kaden now, then what was the point of it? But he couldn’t lose Kaden and Marcie. Not all at once. “There’s another thing,” Kaden’s head hung so low against his knees, neck up toward the sky like he was waiting for the executioners axe to fall. “Social worker said. Barak’s hospital bills. All in Cy’s name. Cy can’t pay them. Sooner or later, they’re gonna come for the house. She said. Was gonna be better if I wasn’t there. Anything in the house is fair game, when they come. Anything they find’ll go toward paying those bills.” Right. Move Kaden’s escape money somewhere safe, NOW. Tragos ran a hand over his head and looked toward the sky, which could be seen through the ripped open roof of the bus. He’d have to bury it somewhere. Then plan for the loss of the house. Fuck – those savings would be eaten up if he had to find somewhere for him and Kaden to live. It wasn’t like selling the house quickly and making off with the cash was an option. The house down the road had had a for sale sign on it for more than a year. Who’d buy this shithole? People had learned by now that there was no future in this neighbourhood. The car he was working on was almost finished. He could sacrifice some more time, more sleep, and get it up to scratch, that’d bring in a bit of money. It still wouldn’t last, though, and to be real, Tragos was hoping to give that car to Kaden and get him out of here. And how much more sleep could he lose, anyway? Before Aphrodite hired him, he’d been using speed to get him through some days. Not a lost. Just on the worst days. Just for a boost. He could work on the car after Marcie was dead, he thought, feeling the whole earth open to swallow him up in misery. He was losing everything, all at once, the world pulling him and Marcie and Kaden in different directions, and his reach wasn’t long enough to grab onto them all. Maybe it wasn’t long enough to grab onto any of them. He didn’t know how to do this. “I’ll figure it out,” he said, promising out loud. “I’m not letting them take you away. We’re not going to be homeless. I’ll figure it out.” “How?” Kaden asked. Demanded. Pleaded. “I said, I’ll figure this out,” Tragos repeated, trying to keep his voice from shaking, but the only way he knew how to really fortifying it against that kind of weakness was through anger. “I can help,” Kaden offered, pushing his hand into the pocket of the jacket Marcie had given him for Christmas. It had been late last night when he’d found what she’d hidden there for him, sewn into one of the inside pockets. He’d been home alone, which he’d been grateful for, because he’d burst into tears. “Where did you get that?” Tragos demanded, looking at the folded cash in his hand and failing to think of anything but atrocious possibilities. He didn’t like how close Aphrodite had been to Kaden the other day – still thought of her as a madam, whatever else she was. “Marcie,” Kaden said, his voice dropping to a whisper, and Tragos closed his mouth and looked away. “There’s a lot here,” Kaden’s voice crept into the awkward silence that had fallen in the broken bus. “A… a lot a lot. And I could sell my new phone, could get more than a grand for it, and I could -” “Stop it,” Tragos snapped at him. “Put it away. That money’s yours.” Kaden, usually up for an argument with Tragos when he was being bullheaded, thought differently of it this time, and pushed the money back into his pocket. “Stop worrying about it,” Tragos snapped at him, hauling himself to his feet. “You’re going to be fucking fine. I am going to come up with a plan. You are going to be alright. If it’s the last thing I fucking do, you’re gonna be alright. So stop looking like you’re about to shit your pants before I bash ya.” Kaden stared at him, trying to summon the same kind of angry defiance to carry him through, only the thing was, with Tragos carrying the world like that, it meant Kaden didn’t have to. He didn’t know how to say that though, or explain how he felt about it, so he threw a snickers bar at him. It was a mark of Tragos’ state of mind that his reactions weren’t fast enough to catch it. Tragos picked it up off the bus floor, his body suddenly remembering the concept of food, and that it was long past lunchtime and he hadn’t been able to eat anything at the hospital. He couldn’t just skip lunch and make it up with snickers, though. He shook his head, and tried to pass it back to Kaden. “Oh, eat the goddamn chocolate, jackass.” |