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last online May 5, 2024 19:02:09 GMT -7
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Jul 12, 2017 11:32:25 GMT -7
Post by Deleted on Jul 12, 2017 11:32:25 GMT -7
Magdalena's brother handed her the leash of the larger dog. For the first few moments she questioned his judgement. Being a cat person meant she had little experience with dogs. But as they walked she realized why he'd done it. The dog matched their pace without any problem, staying right on its path. It was very well trained. For the first bit she shifted the leash from hand to hand, trying to decide how to handle this conversation. Even after he responded she hesitated.
While her brother had never outright told her how he would feel about this situation if it ever came up there was still a nervousness. Her family was on the more conservative side. So how might he react? Would he be upset? Angry? That thought could have kept her mouth shut about the whole thing. to come up with something else to tell him. But her next thought gave her the courage to speak. Regardless of how he might react he would always be her brother. And this wouldn't change that. She didn't stop walking but she did slow down a bit as she looked up at her brother. "Im pregnant." Talk about putting it bluntly.
@aras
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last online May 5, 2024 19:02:09 GMT -7
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Jul 12, 2017 11:50:38 GMT -7
Post by Deleted on Jul 12, 2017 11:50:38 GMT -7
Most of the time, people weren’t aware of how fast the earth was spinning. They weren’t aware that it was hurtling hundreds of miles an hour through space as it revolved around the sun, and spinning on its axis at an equally breakneck pace. But in that moment, when those two words pierced the air, Aras swore he could feel the motion. He could feel how he was nothing more than a speck clinging to a rock that had been forged in fire millions of years before he was born, and would be around millions of years after he died. That was a weight on his shoulders like nothing he had ever experienced, and he couldn’t breathe. He was so small and so insignificant, and his sister was having a baby. His sister, whom he had rocked to sleep and chased around the house and taught how to play piano… was soon going to be rocking a different child to sleep and chasing a different child around the house, and maybe teaching a different child how to play piano, too. The longer he thought about it, the smaller Aras felt, and he wished that he could just run away from Magda until he felt normal again. But that wasn’t an option. Running away from his problems had never been an option for Aras, and it never would be. He sucked in a breath, just to remind himself that he could breathe, and then let it out slowly. The sickening sensation of spinning wasn’t easing, but Aras didn’t stop walking. If anything, he walked faster, to try to counteract all of the sensations that were whirling around him. “Okay.” He said. He didn’t even try to stop the shaking in his voice, because there was no way to hide how shaken he was. Aras sounded just as nauseous as he felt. He wanted to ask questions – who, what, when, where, why? – but he was smart enough to know that he didn’t want to know the answers. “That’s why you came back.” He said flatly. Once again, his voice betrayed him – Aras’s disappointment and sadness might as well have been written on his face. Aras had held out some hope that Magda had come back because of him, but that wasn’t the truth. She had come back because, like her parents, she couldn’t raise her own child… and he was expected to help. But Aras couldn’t help. He didn’t belong around children. He didn’t belong around people, because he was still nothing more than a storm that would destroy anything that got too close. Madgalena’s child didn’t deserve that. But he couldn’t well tell her that… which meant that Aras was going to have to find a way to get his sister out of the way of harm without letting her know that was what he was doing. No matter how long it had been, his first job was still to protect her.
@magdalena
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last online May 5, 2024 19:02:09 GMT -7
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Jul 12, 2017 12:08:28 GMT -7
Post by Deleted on Jul 12, 2017 12:08:28 GMT -7
Magdalena didn't have a clue what her brother might be thinking or feeling. She'd never seen that expression before and it almost scared her simply because she didn't know what it meant. None of his other body language, aside from walking a little faster, gave anything away either. She was completely in th dark, her own eyes almost desperately pleading for some sort of reaction she could understand. Even when he spoke it didn't help... until he spoke again.
That was why she came back. Finally his emotions started to come through. And Magdalena wished they'd stayed hidden. Magdalena actually stopped walking when he said those words, her stomach sinking and making her feel nauseous. It wasn't from the baby though. The idea that her brother would think she'd come back for that was understandably upsetting. She deserved it though. She'd left. Finally her feet moved again and she caught back up to him, reaching out to catch the sleeve of his robes in between her fingers. "No! Aras, please." please don't think that was why she cams. "I came because I miss my big brother."
@aras
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last online May 5, 2024 19:02:09 GMT -7
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Jul 12, 2017 12:23:17 GMT -7
Post by Deleted on Jul 12, 2017 12:23:17 GMT -7
Aras hadn’t realized that Magda had fallen behind him until she caught up, catching his robe in her hand. Part of him was tempted to pull away from her. He knew that he could overpower Magdalena; he was, after all, an entire foot taller than her, not that he often chose to show it. But he wasn’t going to do that. He needed to be subtler in the ways that he pushed her away, so that she never got the idea in her head that she could come back. She couldn’t come back, because then he’d hurt her, and her baby. Aras had to keep repeating that in his head, as if somehow that would justify how much pain he was going to cause both of them by pushing her away. “And you just so happened to realize that you missed me when you had a baby on the way?” He asked her. He wasn’t angry, really. He was just… sad wasn’t right either. The sadness and disappointment had already disappeared, as had the mild stomach-turning sensations of spinning too fast. Aras felt empty. His sister was the piece of him that he was missing, and now he was only getting her back because she needed something – like he had originally expected – and something that he couldn’t give, to boot. “It’s been nine months, Magda.” Aras told her, as if they hadn’t both been counting up the minutes since their mother died. “If you really did miss me, you would have realized it before now.” Maybe Magdalena really did think that she had just come back because she missed him, but no matter how much she thought that, it wasn’t the truth. Sure, Aras was partly putting on the gruff act so that Magdalena would get the hell away from him before she could get hurt, but he also couldn’t deny that his sister was trying to use him. Aras wished that this conversation could have ended any other way, but he felt like his hand was being forced. Maybe this made him the bad guy, but he didn’t know what else he could do.
@magdalena
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last online May 5, 2024 19:02:09 GMT -7
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Jul 12, 2017 19:28:40 GMT -7
Post by Deleted on Jul 12, 2017 19:28:40 GMT -7
Madgalena felt her throat practically close up as her brother began to speak, her voice locked deep in her chest and refusing to release. How could her brother say that? Think that? She knew she'd made a bad decision leaving like the way she did. She'd made a mistake. A big mistake. But he was her brother! Magi's fingers slowly went numb and the fabric of his robe sleeve slipped free as her hand dropped to her side.
The silence that followed his words was brief. But to her? It felt suffocatingly long. As if eternity. A million emotions all crammed into a few short moments and it made her feel like her head was exploding. She wished she could blame it on the hormones but she knew it wasn't that. Her moods hadn't been swinging that much during her pregnancy so far. Only after those moments ended did she find her voice once more, though she couldn't manage to look at her brother. Her gaze focused down on the leash in her hands, unable to focus on anything else. "Is that really what you think, Aras..?"
@aras
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last online May 5, 2024 19:02:09 GMT -7
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Jul 12, 2017 19:43:21 GMT -7
Post by Deleted on Jul 12, 2017 19:43:21 GMT -7
Aras knew that he had a mistake, and that he had gone too far. What else was new? Magda looked absolutely shattered as her hand slipped away from his robes, and Aras wanted to take his words and shove them all back inside his mouth, where he was the only one that they could hurt. But they had been true. Edged with more malice than necessary to get her to stay away, but still, at their core, true. When his sister asked him if that was what he really thought, Aras wasted no time in nodding. It was a slow nod, but a firm one. He was certain. "Every day since you left I've thought about you, Magdalena. Every day I wondered where you were, and how you were doing." Even when he was at his lowest lows, Magda had always been on his mind. She was part of the reason he was able to fight his way out of the addiction that had sucked him in so deeply. "But you left, Magda." Aras told her, once again not bothering to hide his feelings. Maybe with other people he would, but this was important. He had promised himself that he wasn't going to make a big deal of her leaving, but Aras couldn't keep that promise. "And when people leave like that, it's generally not because they want to be chased after." If she had made a big spectacle of her departure, maybe Aras would have considered that Magdalena had only run away for attention. But she hadn't, and she had stayed away. She had genuinely wanted to go. "I can't spend my life chasing after people who don't want to be followed. And I can't spend my life loving people who find it so easy to leave me behind." There. That was the easiest way to explain everything that had happened in the past months: why he hadn't tried to find her and why, now, Aras couldn't just believe that she would just walk right back in for now reason... and why he wouldn't let her back in (beyond the danger he posed).
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last online May 5, 2024 19:02:09 GMT -7
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Jul 15, 2017 15:54:13 GMT -7
Post by Deleted on Jul 15, 2017 15:54:13 GMT -7
Aras was nodding. He truly thought she'd only come back because she wanted him to help her. That she was only here because she wanted something. She did though, but not what he thought... She couldn't believe this conversation was going this way though. That things weren't..... working. Magdalena hadn't expected him to forgive her. But this? This was more then 'not working'.
He was right now. She'd left. For months. Never visiting. Never writing. Never letting him know she was okay. Didn't even try, actually. "I... I know I've messed up, Aras. I'm a bloody screw up, and all I seem to be good at it just screwing up more." She pleaded, still not looking up at her brother. "I don't expect you to forgive me..." Magdalena stopped speaking, her thoughts a jumbled mess that couldn't form any more sentences. She wanted to fix this. So bad, but she had this sickening feeling like she couldn't. Especially when her brother said he can't spend his life loving people that left. him. She swallowed hard at those words, trying to swallowing the overwhelming and suffocating feelings in the pit of her stomach. "Please, don't be like this." Please don't push her away...
@aras
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last online May 5, 2024 19:02:09 GMT -7
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Jul 15, 2017 16:01:49 GMT -7
Post by Deleted on Jul 15, 2017 16:01:49 GMT -7
Magdalena said that she knew that she had messed up, and Aras made a soft scoffing noise. Messing up was a way of putting it lightly. She had run away from home and never let him know how she was for months and months, only to return when she was knocked up. And then she had the gall to say that she was a screw up! Magdalena was not the screw up of the family, because even though she had done a lot of awful things, she hadn’t been the one that had caused their mother to die and their father to be sent to prison. That was all on him. But now was not the time to have a competition about which of them was better at being worse. “Good, because I’m not going to.” Aras snapped when Magda said that she didn’t expect his forgiveness. He wasn’t sure if he could ever give her that, so it was good that she didn’t need it. “Don’t be like what, Magda?” Aras challenged, glaring down at his sister. “Don’t be like a normal human being who’s upset when his sister leaves and he’s left all alone? At least you chose to be miserable by yourself. I never got that choice.” Aras didn’t know if Magdalena had actually been miserable, but he did know that it had been a choice to run away, because he had always waited for her to come back. He had waited until he couldn’t anymore, and that’s how they had gotten to where they were now.
@magdalena
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last online May 5, 2024 19:02:09 GMT -7
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Jul 15, 2017 17:27:38 GMT -7
Post by Deleted on Jul 15, 2017 17:27:38 GMT -7
Aras was so quick to respond. To agree that he wouldn't forgive her. The way he snapped it out made her flinch. This whole conversation made her feel as if she didn't even know her brother anymore. Like a stranger was before her, and she was grasping for something that she'd completely destroyed. Not him. Her. She'd done this to them. By leaving. She'd burned all the bridges and they'd been ashed away by the rapids, never to be found again. With no chance of rebuilding. That realization was what made the first tear fall, though with her head turned away it would hopefully be overlooked.
"I wasn't miserable, Aras. I felt like I was drowning and all I wanted was to disappear." She whispered, pausing only for a moment to hold the leash out to him to take. She certainly knew what drowning felt like, so she didn't use that phrase lightly. "Everything was happening all at once and I didn't know what I was supposed to do but everything just made it worse until I just didn't want to exist anymore." Magdalena had never faced huge trials in her life. She hadn't been sheltered, but she'd been free of the worse problems. But in the space of a month she'd lost both her parents (one by death and one to Azkaban), the school had been invaded and attacked, students, some her closest friends in this world, had been kidnapped, held hostage and tortured mentally and physically, other students had been murdered. Everything had just... broken her. "I always missed you, Aras. But I didn't.... I didn't want you to see what I'd become. What I did to just.... not feel anything anymore because I couldn't handle feeling anything at all. All I would have been is a huge disappointment..." And that was all Magi seemed to be able to say on the subject. The way she spoke... It sounded broken, and passionless. You could actually hear in her voice her losing the will to keep talking, losing the will to fight for this. Giving up. Whether he'd taken the leash or not by this point (if he hadn't taken it she just let go of it.) she stepped away from her brother, and finally looked back at him. She couldn't hide the fact that she'd been crying anymore, those tear stained cheeks visible even in the dimming light of night. "I'm sorry, Aras. I... I won't bother you again..." With that, she disappeared, leaving her brother for the second time. But at least this time it wasn't her choice.
Magdalena hadn't thought her heart could break anymore. Guess she'd been proven wrong.
@aras (You should post once more just for fun. Or end. either or)
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last online May 5, 2024 19:02:09 GMT -7
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Jul 15, 2017 17:49:13 GMT -7
Post by Deleted on Jul 15, 2017 17:49:13 GMT -7
Aras knew what it was like to drown. To drown in debt, to drown in guilty, to drown in despair. He knew what it was like to fight the waters, and what it was like to succumb to them. For some reason, that didn’t make him any more sympathetic towards Magda. It just made him angrier, because he knew that when people were drowning, they eventually chose to swim. They swam, or they suffocated. And Magdalena hadn’t suffocated, because she was alive now. He didn’t know how to explain that the problem wasn’t the leaving so much as the staying gone. Of course he was angry about the leaving, too, but Aras would have been able to forgive her if she had come back sooner. If she hadn’t come back when she was pregnant, because someone who was pregnant obviously wasn’t drowning any more. He would have been able to forgive her if she had at least tried to say something. Even a scrap of paper with nothing other than her name would have been enough, because when he was alone, Aras had worried. He had worried, because it wasn’t just like Magi had disappeared. It was like she had never existed at all. The door to her bedroom was permanently closed and her seat at the table was never set, and it was like the little girl who he had loved had just… evaporated.
What she had become. Oh, if only Madgalena knew. There was nothing that she could have become that would have been half as bad as what he had been. She thought that she would have been a disappointment, but Aras hadn’t ever had any room in his heart for disappointment for anyone other than himself. They were both screw-ups, but he had the advantage of age and experience in hiding how badly he had broken their family. He didn’t know what to say, because there was no way, on their first meeting, that he was going to admit that it was his fault that they were in this situation in the first place. She apologized, and said that she wouldn’t bother him again, and Aras was frustrated, because even though he didn’t want to forgive Magda, he didn’t want her to go, either. And it didn’t have to be a one or the other type thing. Why couldn’t she just wait until he was ready? Why did she always choose to leave just because he wasn’t strong enough to ask her to stay? Aras tried to open his mouth to say something, but it was too late.
She left. Again. And he was walking home alone. Again. He was going to have to face the monster in the mirror. Again.
Things were going to fall apart.
Again.
@magdalena (le end)
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