Capital R (lonely_perverse) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2016-12-14 23:16:00 |
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Entry tags: | grantaire |
Who: Grantaire
What: Even a cynic sometimes manages to find hope - or, R finds a little holiday spirit
Where: Grantaire and Kurt’s apartment
When: Backdated to start of plot
Warnings: None
Status: Complete when posted
It had been a while since Grantaire had seen the earlier side of 9am, and usually when he did it wasn’t sober. So when he raised his head and saw the time - 8:45 - glowing back at him in an angry red, he automatically reached for the handle of vodka he kept on his nightstand.
It was empty.
Oh, right, he’d woken in the middle of the night a few days ago, a nightmare full of his father’s disapproving eyes and, even worse, his aunt and cousin turning their backs on him, lingering at the edge of his consciousness. The vodka left in the bottle had been made short work of...as well as the whiskey he kept under the bathroom sink, now that he thought about it, which was where he’d have gone next. He was pretty sure there was some wine in the kitchen, at the very least, so he rolled out of bed and wandered out into the apartment. Kurt was gone by this time - he usually was when R woke up, which suited R just fine - no one around to make Noises about his Excessive Alcohol Consumption, or to care about him or look at him with those eyes so full of sympathy and pity, things which left him feeling even lower than he had before...which just led to him drinking more, actually, because if he was going to be a disappointment then he was going to commit. Or something. It usually made sense.
This morning, however, it didn’t. Not that many things made sense this early, in all honesty, but as he began to search the cabinets it just felt like a whole lot of work...for what? A few hours of respite from his emotions? Was he really so messed up that he needed that?
Well, yes. But he normally didn’t acknowledge that, and the fact that he was was a little strange. He closed the cabinet he’d been rooting through and began to consider himself - something that he didn’t usually do for what he felt were quite obvious reasons (see also: he was a fuckup, he couldn’t do anything right, his appearance had been known to scare small children, he was an awful person who didn’t deserve the people in his life who cared about him because he would only disappoint them and drag them down with him and ruin their lives). And today, he felt that a little, a little of that neverending self-hatred and the crushing knowledge of the lack of importance he had to the world. But it was tolerable, even as sober as he was.
He got like this, sometimes, as did his mother - when he’d mentioned it to his therapist she had said that it was part of their disease, a period of near manic-energy - what she’d called an “up” or a “high”. R wasn’t sure that he felt high, necessarily, or particularly energetic as all he could think about was going back to bed, but he felt...normal, or what others described as normal. He wasn’t sure what had triggered it, as only a few hours ago he’d felt the same generalized discontent with himself, his life, and generally everything that existed, but he wasn’t one to go against the flow. Too much work. So he abandoned his quest for alcohol and instead went to take a shower, since he couldn’t remember the last time that he’d actually washed his hair.
As he toweled off, he couldn't help but look around and think that the apartment could do with something. Perhaps it was the snow outside or the holiday displays that he passed in the streets, or just whatever weird sense of normality that had overtaken him, but he was feeling strangely festive. He knew that Tama was probably enthusiastic about the holidays (he was enthusiastic about everything, a refreshing break from the family’s demons, in all honesty), so he dressed himself to keep the chilly air off his skin and, after a moment of contemplation, picked up the phone and texted his cousin.
Would you like to go Christmas shopping with me today when you are done with school? I think that Kurt would like it if we decorated. Then we can to yours and Tata’s.
While he waited for a reply, he went to go make himself some breakfast. After all, that was how normal people started their day and, anyway, he was hungry.