InsaneJournal

Who: Peter Vincent, Marguerite Blakeney
What: Regaining some equilibrium
Where: A small park down the street from Greaves’ Complex
When: mid-afternoon, Thursday June 27, 2013
Warnings: Peter’s foul mouth, tbd
Status: Closed, Ongoing



He hated this flat. The one at Epiphany’s complex, where Spike had brought him a week ago. He hadn’t left since then, and the sparsely furnished rooms and empty walls were starting to close in on him. So he ran. Peter always had been good at running, until Charley stepped in and made him stop. But this... he just couldn’t handle it. He kept feeling eaten up by the memories, by phantom sensations of teeth and claws and cold. So, ignoring the fact that he’d hardly slept or eaten and could barely walk steadily, he’d wandered outside and away from the building. There was a tiny little park just down the street, not much more than a playground, patch of grass, and a picnic table under a tree. It was enough for him; quiet, empty of people, and full of sun. He’d laid down in the grass in the sunniest spot he could find, letting the light and heat beat down on him. He didn’t mind; the late June sun helped to burn away some of the bad things plaguing his mind.

He wanted to go home, to be in his own rooms and his own bed, the flat he’d shared with Andrew. He longed for the comfort of those familiar surroundings, but, as he’d told Cas, he didn’t think he would be welcome at the complex. He was afraid to ask. He struggled just talking to people that he’d been close to, let alone offering himself up for the entire complex’s judgment.

The other night when he’d texted some of his closest friends... by and large he couldn’t say it had gone well. Amy, Ginger, Cas... he’d hurt all of them so horribly. Apologizing wouldn’t ever change that no matter how sincerely he meant it. And the things Charley had said, they had blindsided him. It had never even occurred to him until Charley’s apology for not being there just how much Peter had put the kid up on a pedestal. He was only 18, for fuck’s sake, and here Peter had somehow made the kid into this icon of strength, this ideal of doing what needed to be done no matter how hard, because it was the right thing to do. That was beyond unfair, to place that level of expectation on anyone, let alone a teenage boy.

But some of the things that Cas and especially Rose had said had gotten through to him. Peter had a bad habit of letting his fears and regrets take control, keeping him locked into his miserable existence. Their gentle scolding, acknowledging that he’d done wrong rather than brushing it aside... their encouragement, to accept what he’d done, but to not give up... he’d needed to hear that. He still didn’t understand why he was even alive after all the things he’d done, or why anyone was willing to so much as talk to him, let alone forgive or help him. But Cas was right, he really didn’t need to understand why. And Rose was right, everyone had fought so hard to save him from what he’d become. If he let himself get swallowed up now, he was only letting them down even more.

So he laid there in the sun, squinting against the bright light and feeling his skin burn, but it was slow, and gentle, and only a skin deep human weakness. Not a vampire’s flesh burning away and crumbling to ash. He listened to the sounds of the city around him, human senses dull compared to vampire ones, but that too was only a comfort. He was hungry, but it wasn’t that same, disturbing, whole-being hunger that he’d felt. He wasn’t ready to face the whole world again yet, and he still couldn't drive all the pain and darkness out of his thoughts. But this, concentrating on his own humanity, this he could do. It was perhaps the only thing he could do right now.