hidari decided to write some shit too

1. Meeting
”You’re such a fucking failure! Why the hell did I get left with a screw-up for a child?”

Eli’s pretty much used to all of the shit he gets from his mom. Who cares, anyway? Even if he speaks up against her, she’s a million times stronger and infinitely scarier. All he can do is sit back and quietly take the abuse so she won’t suddenly decide to set his ass on fire, suffocate him with his own spit – or draw the air out of his lungs so he can’t even fucking breathe—

It doesn’t matter that much to him.

When she’s finally done yelling, adding a “And you better not screw up this time or God so help me I will kill you—”, he replies with a “Yes, Mother…” secretly envisioning her death, secretly envisioning him killing all of his relatives so he’ll be the only one left in this accursed bloodline.

Fuck the dragons.

By the time he's outside, in the pouring rain with a closed umbrella, it's some time in the morning. He yawns, stretches, and gets his sleeves damp with glistening water droplets. There's a definite disturbance in the force - must be his mother's temper getting the best of the atmosphere. She's the one calling the shots with the weathermen, after all.

He absentmindedly rubs some rain from his cheek, gazing up at the cloudy, thundering sky. It looks like it's at war with itself, the lightning splitting the sky into two sides of a great, blinding chasm.

He decides not to open the umbrella. Fuck the rain. When Eli stops walking, he realizes that he's near a bus stop. Somewhere. Nowhere.

He takes in a deep breath and lowers his hand from his face.

Just great. A cut on his cheek.

It stings. He usually never forgets to stop the bleeding.

By the time he's managed to get his shit together, another person joins him underneath the shelter of the bus stop, shivering, in a giant, over-sized black trench coat. Her long black hair tumbles down like an onyx waterfall.

It makes him mesmerized.

The girl looks resolutely lost. She glances around, sees him, and then averts her gaze.

Eli tilts his head to the side. She inches away from him slightly. He sighs and steps back as well.

Fine. If you want to be that way...

They don't look at each other. After five minutes, Eli walks away.

2. Contact
The next Eli sees her, he's absolutely stoned. He almost doesn't recognize the girl at the bus stop. They're both itching to get out of library, and it's raining again. This time, he was smart enough to get high before he listened to his mother.

The...other influence helps him approach her.

"Hey... you're the girl from last time," he says, trying not to slur his words.

The look in her eyes tells him that she knows that he's high.

"Last time?" she repeats almost sarcastically - and then stops herself.

"Yeah. When you looked at me like I was a rapist at the bus stop," he answers.

The librarian glares daggers at him from across the room. He flips her off and shrugs, sidling over to the transparent double doors.

"My name's Eli," he tells her loudly.

"Artemisa," she replies, only following him so she won't have to yell from the other side of the room.

He chuckles. "Even if you're close to me, I have no sense of volume. I'm still going to speak loud."

"This is a library!" she hisses. "You can't disturb other people!"

Eli glances around. Then he grasps her hand gently and tugs her out the door. For some reason, she doesn't protest, but he can feel her trying to pry his fingers off of her wrist.

"Nice try, Artemisa. But I'm stronger than I look."

"You look like a junkie."

"What are you saying? I am a junkie."

He finally lets go when they're out the door and right in the rain. He isn't sure why he dragged her out here, but the look on her face is puzzled, somewhat frightened, and annoyed.

"What do you want from me?" she asks, her voice holding a faint note of anger. "Wanting to terrorize me because of my ethnicity?"

He shrugs, shakes out his red umbrella, and places it over her head while the rain pours down on him. "Sorry. But honestly, I'm so fucking high right now that I can't tell what ethnicity you are without getting some sort of alien bloodline in there."

He can hear her laugh faintly.

"I've never heard that before. A poor insult, if you ask me."

He can feel her grip his collar and pull his upper body underneath the umbrella.

Their faces are five inches apart. He can see her wrinkle her nose through the leftover rain blurring his sight.

"You smell like cocaine. I think opium suits you more."

Eli laughs. This girl's interesting. "I've been told many things suit me more. Cutting myself, overdosing, getting attacked in a dark alleyway - opium's a first."

"Well. Eli, I didn't take you for the type to get yourself down on what other people say."

"Nah, not other people. There is no other person. No one talks to me," he answers, almost smugly at proving her point wrong. "Just my mother."

She stares up at him with dark eyes, deep enough to fill the hole in his soul. An unfathomable pit of understanding. "She's just another person."

"She's inhuman." Eli chuckles. "I'm not even joking. Dragon blood."

"Don't take what she says to heart. I think you're...decent."

"Decent. That's new." He smiles faintly. "I think you're decent too."

"Gee, thanks."

"Is it safe to assume that you attend the only high school in this town?"

"Very safe."

"I'll see you there then."

3. Fight
"If you don't back off, I'll punch you in the fucking face."

"What, defending your girlfriend? You pussy, you can't even take it when a pencil hits you on the toe."

Eli stares at the guy in front of him. People like him usually only need a single insult to get riled up. So, Eli settles for a "Your dick is small. No wonder your girlfriend always finds a new guy by the end of a party."

"You MOTHERFUCKER - "

Seeing as Eli's already used to his mother hitting him and calling him names, it doesn't matter that much. When the guy hits him in the gut and gives a good clout to his left cheekbone, he doesn't even keel over. He stands there solemnly, placing his fingertips over a foreign wrist.

"You won't even have time to regret this, you piece of shit," he says.

He digs his fingernails in hard enough to draw blood. And that's all he needs. With an impassive facial expression, he scratches the skin off and lets the blood flood out of the guy.

"Any last words?"

"Eli."

Eli turns slightly to look at Artemisa, who shakes her head.

He sighs.

"I'll let you off, you scumbag," he calls to the guy, who's wailing and desperately trying to apply pressure to stop the bleeding. Dumbass. With a snap of the fingers, the blood stops.

A giant puddle gathers at the boy's feet.

Eli walks off with Artemisa.

"You dumba - idiot... I thought you were about to get killed," she grumbles.

"Nah. I just wanted to have some fun before I drained him like a sink, but then you stopped me." He sighs.

"You'll get kicked out of the fucking club."

"I have my own morals. Protecting you is one of them."

She stops first. He keeps walking for about two seconds - then he stops and turns to face her questioningly, head tilted to the side.

"What?" he asks. "Don't tell me that you think I'll drain your blood too?"

"No, it's just... About that girlfriend thing."

"Oh, so you want us to be an item."

Artemisa scowls at him, looking like she'd throw something at him if she had a projectile to aim with. "No, you dick! I mean, talking about how that guy's dick was small and all. How the hell did you even know how big it was?"

Eli winks. Just to get a reaction. "Last night," he replies smoothly.

"What the fuck!"

"I'm kidding!" Eli says, holding his hands up and chuckling. He saunters over to Artemisa. "But about that girlfriend thing."

"What about it?" she asks.

"Will you be mine?"

"...What?"

"Eh, I don't need an immediate answer. But it'd be nice for you to say 'yes' or 'no', you know."

"You said 'no' twice."

"Those were different 'no's! One was 'know' and one was 'no.'"

"You sound like a lunatic."

"Just answer my question, damn it."

Artemisa grins. "What if I told you no? Would you cry?"

"Well, depends. Would you laugh if I cried?"

"Yes."

Eli cheers and throws his hands up in the air. Yeah, he's still on the aftereffects of opium. "You said yes!"

"Wait, wait, wait - not to that question!" she protests, scowling, embarrassed.

"Doesn't matter," he chants in a sing-song voice. "You're my girlfriend now~! Time to rub it in Cattivo's face!"

"Oh lord. He's going to punch you out."

Eli extends his arms expectantly. "Well, let's celebrate our new relationship status with a hug."

Artemisa wrinkles her nose. "No, you weirdo."

4. Chasm
He can't remember half of the words she's already said in this past hour, but all he comprehends is, 'split up', 'time apart from each other', 'you're different from before', 'you scare me sometimes' -

And the last one is enough to make him just choke himself out. He can self-destruct at will with his dark energy, suffocate his internal organs with a single command to stop bloodflow.

But he doesn't. He gazes blankly after Artemisa, who walks away, shoulders stiff and head held high.

Maybe she's crying too. Or she's too disgusted with him.

It's raining, like the day they first met.

They're at their bus stop. He met her with coffee this morning. In the afternoon, they were supposed to hug each other, kiss, and then go their separate ways with another kiss to last them the rest of the day without each other. Artemisa was supposed to kiss him goodbye and tell him not to be such a sentimental idiot and get some sort of a life.

Right now, a life is the last thing he wants.

He wants to cry.

It's raining.

First, he sits down on the wet pavement, gazes up at the sky, and scowls. Then he curls into an upright fetal position, stares across the road, and begins to rock himself back and forth.

The only reason why he can tell that he's actually crying is because his tears are of a different temperature than the cold water pelting him down.

Next are the noises. When he's sure that Artemisa's out of hearing range, he lets a loud sob rip through his chest, leaving his lungs out of breath. It hurts to breathe in, hurts to breathe out.

"Why!" he shouts, his voice uneven in a single syllable. "Why the hell - "

He stops his voice as the rain blurs his sight. Either the rain or his tears. His eyes strain to see past five feet. He gives up hoping on the fact that Artemisa might come back. He gets to his feet.

Then he leaves the bus stop to go home. No doubt his mother will yell at him for coming in late, and no doubt she'll swear at him for staining the carpet with rainwater - but mostly the fact that he's showing any emotion at all.

Monsters like you don't show emotion, Eli. Stop crying, you bastard.