@cravesfreedom on pre - established relationships: "you might think your characters going to act one way but instead they get hooked on opiates"

RP starters: Miscellaneous angst

yourmusings:

_{“ i shouldn’t have left you. ”
“ i’m here for you. ”
“ i’ll kill that son of a bitch who did this to you. ”
“ please let me help you. ”
“ oh my god, are you okay? ”
“ don’t you dare to leave me, not now. ”
“ you didn’t deserve any of this. ”
“ please tell me this is a nightmare. ”
“ shh, it’s okay.. you’re safe now. ”
“ why are you crying? ”
“ i can’t believe i did this to you. ”
“ i won’t let anyone hurt you again. ”
“ i don’t want you to die. ”
“ talk to me. ”
“ i fucked up, alright? i’m sorry. ”
“ where were you? i was so worried! ”
“ stop saying you’re fine when you’re obviously not. ”
“ seeing you like this hurts me. ”
“ i don’t want to live anymore. ”
“ can you please just.. go away? ”
“ i’m worthless. ”
“ i’m sorry, please don’t be mad at me. ”
“ i’m going to die. ”
“ it’s nothing, i swear. ”
“ i don’t want to talk about it so just drop it. ”
“ please don’t leave me alone. ”
“ nobody would care if i’d just.. disappear. ”}

_{ORIGINALGRILLA.}

_{‘     whatever.     ’       that’s one door he isn’t opening again,   not even for bullet.    no sense in  beating a dead horse.    skinner is six feet under,   joe mills is behind bars,   and the culmination of that shitstorm was the farthest possible thing from justice served.}

_{he  knows  it’s bullshit.}

_{that she found out about angie gower’s cause of death doesn’t come as a surprise :   word gets around.    these kids talk.    all it would take is for one person to hear one shred of gossip and it spreads like fucking gospel.}

_{‘     what details ?    tox came back negative the first time,   but my CI cried  arsenic  so i had ‘em run it again.    you think one of his girls had  that  up her skirt ?     ’}

_{he doesn’t  have to,  because she would’ve been more than willing to break it down with a battering ram.    but she isn’t  looking  for a fight.    doesn’t imagine he’d entertain it even if she were.}

_{(    she heard about angie through the grapevine.    nothing is  sacred  on the streets.    your business is everyone’s business if the wrong person finds out about it,  and there’s a lot of kids  hoeing for attention  on skid row who mingle fact with fiction.    but the fact he didn’t  deny it  speaks volumes.    her gut cartwheels.    )}

_{❛     dunno.    maybe ?    ain’t gonna drop t’ my knees ‘n find out.    but if you wanna take a swing at it   –––   …     ❜}

_SEPIOL.

            ‘ the same goes for you. ’  he lights up and makes a note to give her one from his bag later, tit for tat.  ‘ just for the pain. they were doping me on fentanyl at first. ’  morphine’s bigger, badder cousin. synthetic crap. as for the rest? antibiotics, solidly, every day for a while. then elliot was out of the woods and elliot was finally allowed to go a day without nausea blocking the world out. he still struggles, though, falling between empty and angry like there’s nothing else. today is empty-er. 

            he doesn’t mean to stare at the scar when she brings it up. but it’s an ugly scar. i take a long drag on the cigarette until it starts to hurt, sternum stretching, and then lets it go slowly, looking off to the side. she could’ve been another shayla. you’re not supposed to feel guilty about the things you can’t control but control is all i have. i need it. i’m afraid of losing it. fear like that is a rat infestation in the walls of elliot’s brain and knowing bullet could have died and i would have never known and never tried to stop it is one of those rats biting through an important electrical wire.

             what’s the point of trying to save the world if you can’t protect the people you care about? i just have to remember this isn’t something that happened to me. this was something that was done to bullet. i have to remember that: i don’t get to make this about me.  ‘ didn’t say anything about being your therapist. just your friend. ’

_{she almost  did  reach the morgue.    cold and dead on that slab with a sheet pulled over her eyes    (    so she couldn’t stare them in the  face.    they wouldn’t have been able to look at her otherwise.    )    she pockets the lighter while taking a pull.     ❛     don’t know what that is    ––––    but i’m guessin’ it’s a substitute ?     ❜     never dabbled in the drug scene until recently.    claimed her  body  was a temple and  treated it  like one,  but isn’t so sure anymore.}

_{after everything that’s  happened  to it,  she feels more like ruin.    she’s hoping that’ll change,  because this  isn’t  who she is and this  isn’t  what she  stands for  and this just isn’t  bullet.    she catches him  staring  and might have socked him in the gut if it weren’t for the fact that she’s used to him.    but that doesn’t mean she has to like it,  and it doesn’t mean she’s  comfortable  with it.    more uncomfortable than anything.    like she’s been put under a microscope.    the scar is still  fresh,  pink and tender and raised from the surface of her skin.}

_{she’s  conscious  of it every day.    (    not because she thinks it somehow makes her  less,  but because of what it means.    )    maybe one day she’ll wear it proud.    a testament to survival.    but today,  she wears it with shame and a light dusting of  anger.    it’s all she has.}

_{❛     y’ know the questions they  ask  me ?     ❜     smoke filters out through her mouth between every word.    didn’t have the chance to properly exhale.     ❛     the kinda shit they say ?    you got  any idea  what it’s like t’ be that kid on the street that everyone thinks is  weak ?    it ain’t what  happened  that’s th’  problem.    it’s how these punk - asses are  actin’  ‘bout it.    treatin’ me different.     ❜}

_{ORIGINALGRILLA.}

_{maybe it  wouldn’t  have changed anything :   kallie was dead from the moment she stepped foot outside beacon that night,   her fate sealed in blood and lake water.    but it would have spared bullet all that waiting.    the  not knowing,   the long,   dark void of uncertainty,   the what - ifs,   the remnants of  hope  as fragile and breakable as the bones of a fifteen - year - old girl.}

_{sooner  would have meant danette leeds had something to say goodbye to.    that her child’s body still had a face,   instead of    —    and she wouldn’t have  wanted  to see that,   right ?    wouldn’t have wanted to remember her daughter like that,   rotting,   desiccated,   unrecognizable.}

_{(   and  bullet  doesn’t need to remember her  best friend  like that,   either.    needs to remember kallie how she looked in that photo she showed him at the station that first time.    full of light.    smiling.    alive.   )}

_{‘     i know.     ’       she looks  exhausted.    wrung out,   like she’s seen the world die and live and die all over again.    it’s one of those times where she looks a hell of a lot older than she is,   and it makes him heartsick.    the scar on her neck is more visible when she leans back but he doesn’t look at it,   doesn’t let his eyes wander.    can only begin to  imagine  the kind of bullshit questions she probably gets asked about it every day.}

_{there’s no shame,   none at all,   in  survival.    but the mark of a  private hell  is no one else’s business.}

_{no one’s to wear but hers.}

_{‘     —    take ‘em.     ’       despite the twenty dollars he’d just given her,   he passes over what’s left of his pack of cigarettes.    more than half - full.    the car’s still idling outside a café,   colorless in the rain.       ‘     you want somethin’ hot to drink ?    they got good coffee ‘n whatnot in there.    you already  know  i’m payin’.     ’}

_{she thinks back to when she was  eight  years old,  visiting home from boarding school.    there was an incident with a knife and  inexperienced hands  that left an open gash down the inside of her middle finger.    the  skin  was angry,  split and raw.    she never thought it would bleed so much.    was fascinated by it.    until she wasn’t.}    

_{until the  pain  set in and the  wound  began to feel more like it should to a young girl.    her mother had ushered her into the washroom,  demanded she  wait  while she gets hydrogen peroxide and a second opinion.    (    stitches,  or no stitches.    )    the anticipation,  being left  to sit and think about much  worse  this is going to get,  hurt more than the injury itself.}    

_{she was child then,  with a childlike frame of mind.    not as desensitised to pain as she is at present.    and while she’d like to imagine the situation  similar  to how it was seven years ago,  there was  nothing  similar about it.    no correlation.    prolonging the  inevitable  didn’t  hurt more  than finding out the truth.    there are days where she wishes he hadn’t told her,  so she could live in peaceful oblivion.    days where she wishes this kind of  pain  was as easy of a fix as a numbing injection on site and threading sutures through the  gaping wound  in her chest.}

_{but it isn’t.    and she’s grappling to accept it.}

_{exhaustion,  on the other hand     –––––     she could sleep if she  wanted  to,  but she doesn’t.    terrors plague her dreams to the point where it’s  impossible  to rest without something knocking her out  cold.    the bottom of a bottle.    two or more tablets of morphine.    a joint or three or however many she can roll up before she passes out.}

_{she fights a yawn,  cutting a glance outside.    remembers hustling these  hippies  out of at least fifty bucks,  cash money,  several months ago.    his proposal draws back her attention    (    and she doesn’t  hesitate  to take the pack off his hands.    slides one behind her ear,  the remainder in the front pocket of her knapsack.    )    sniffs,  wiping at the nose with her sleeve.}

_{❛     coffee ?    fuck off.    they got hot chocolate ?     ❜}

_{ORIGINALGRILLA.}

_{‘     man,   everybody  plays dirty in this damn town,   no doubt.    ain’t nobody ever teach this fool to keep it in his khakis ?     ’       not that someone deserves to die for sleeping around,   but if the girl,   or  girls,   happened to be underage    —    needless to say,   too few of these perverts get what’s coming to them.}

_{he mulls that over for a minute,   because there’s more than a grain of truth to what she’s saying but the pieces still don’t quite fit.    poison doesn’t add up,   isn’t the usual M.O. in cases like these.    women  like to use poison.}

_{‘     debt or no debt,   he pissed somebody off bad enough to kill him.    don’t make  sense,   though,   doin’ him like that.    i mean,   pimps ‘n gangbangers,   you know,   they do it execution - style.   shot to the head    —    boom.    end of story.    this one’s different.     ’}

_{❛     yeah,  so ?    whole damn  system’s  corrupt.    ain’t no surprise that a couple skanks got aces up their skimpy - ass lingerie pieces when the  pigs  are coverin’ up murders for each other.     ❜     still bitter about joe mills,  but knows to keep the  brazen accusations  at a minimum in public.}

_{even if she thinks it’s complete  bullshit.}

_{❛     –––––     then what’s it like ?    don’t  skimp me  on the details,  yo !    can’t be  half as bad  as findin’ angie charbroiled to a fuckin’ crisp.     ❜}

_{nonchalant.    as if it didn’t bother her that skinner caught up to that girl before she even had the  chance  to start a new life outside of seattle.    she blames herself for that,  too.}

BULLET: MINI FACT SHEET

• _{has a scar across her throat ( from being attacked and having her throat cut open ) that sticks out like a sore thumb the second you see her. it’s not something you should gawk at or ask about.}
• _{hates! being! touched! do  not  touch her without her permission. just don’t do it. even if you think you have her permission, ask to be sure or wait for her to initiate ( i.e. hugging. )}
  
• _{has her own strong set of morals but acknowledges the difference between right and wrong in the eye of the law. doesn’t mean she  adheres  to it.}
• _{isn’t quiet about her opinions. will tell you what’s what and how she feels about what you’re doing.} 
• _{dishes out  tough love  with her friends but will never abandon them for mistakes they’ve made unless it directly affects her.}
• _{will literally kick anybody’s ass. won’t hesitate to get right the fuck up in your face where her friends are concerned and never backs down from a fight unless her gut instinct is telling her to.}
• _{can be  reckless  at times but is not stupid or careless.}
• _{doesn’t like being treated like a kid, even if she is one. also doesn’t like being told what to do.} 
• _{… ever, by anyone, let alone a man.}
• _{speaking of men. feels uncomfortable around them and has a negative response when approached by one. doesn’t  hate  men but has never really had good experiences with them.}
• _{won’t rat you out to the cops despite her affiliation with two detectives in the seattle pd homicide unit.}

_{ORIGINALGRILLA.}

_{faith and religion,   in his book if not  the  book,   are two different things.    (    j.c.,   buddha,   lacto - ovo vegetarianism,   whatever.   )    people believe what they want to believe    —    or what they  don’t.   the whole  higher power  debate is inconclusive,   and irrelevant :   it’s all a matter of perception.}

_{his job seldom allows  breathing  room,   let alone time off.   he’d eked out whatever he could,   scattered few hours here and there,   in the midst of shifts that could go from sixteen hours to seventy - two in a heartbeat,   just to sit with her in that hospital.   listen to the whirr of machinery that monitored vitals,   measured brain waves,   kept some dormant part of her anchored in reality.    sometimes he was quiet.    other times,   he’d talk.    studies done on coma patients showed responses to certain outside stimuli,   like the sound of a familiar voice ;   so he’d sit there beside her and he’d talk,   because he didn’t know what else to do.}

_{maybe she heard him.    maybe she didn’t.}

_{but she was  somewhere,   wandering some other plane,   chasing ghosts.    no one except skinner had known kallie was in that lake.    holder didn’t know it himself,   not until he saw her at the  morgue  with the others.    saw that little earring in the shape of a star,   all tangled up in filthy,   waterlogged strands of strawberry blonde.}

_{and somewhere in bullet’s subconscious,   kallie  knew.}

_{‘     ––––––    like she’d been in the  rain,   or like she’d been underwater ?     ’       he sucks in a quick,   contained breath,   voice low ;   almost a rasp.    barely registers pulling the car over and dropping it into park.}

_{‘     we looked for her.    i know it don’t seem like anybody gave a shit,   like she was just a statistic,   but we never stopped lookin’.    just wish we could’a got there sooner.     ’}

_{she  failed  to mention the times where she looked out over the parapet and caught a glimpse of  kallie  beneath the water.    how she looked peaceful.    floating,  hair  fanned out  around her,  staring up at the world.    like she was just waiting for someone to  join  her.    remembers wading in to pull her out,  and how the water clung to her clothes and skin.    it was lukewarm.    a comfort to gooseflesh.    she hadn’t  realised  she was  cold  until that moment.}

_{fresh out of the hospital,  bullet did a little research on the care of coma patients out of morbid  curiosity,  and came to the conclusion that maybe some of what she experienced had outside influence.    (    for example,  someone she isn’t familiar with  touching her body  without explicit permission.    realistically,  she knows the alternative might have  killed  her,  or at the very least,  would have let all that bacteria fester until it caused  infection.    semantics notwithstanding,  she could chalk up the warmth of the water to being  bathed  regularly.    but,  she couldn’t rationalise seeing kallie like that.    knowing without  knowing.    )}

_{❛     …  underwater,  i guess.     ❜}

_{she closes her eyes.    takes a breath.    envisions kallie with her long hair in loose curls,  a light  tint  on her lips and that bright gaze,  crystalline blue.}    

_{kallie made her  delete  the photo from her camera roll because she didn’t like the  angle  it was taken.    but she couldn’t delete the memory.    picturing her like that instead of a decomposed mass of bone and sinew might have been the only thing keeping bullet from shattering.    (    why does this always happen ?    when will it stop ?    and how can she move forward when everything she  sees  is kallie ?    )}

_{she takes another drag off the cigarette before flicking it out of the window.     ❛     it wouldn’t’ve mattered.     ❜     head leant back against the seat,  turning to level a gaze with the detective’s.    hollow,  tired.     ❛     she was already dead ‘n findin’ her sooner wasn’t gonna  change  nothin’    ––––     ❜}