Post by Paroxysm on Oct 14, 2014 18:28:10 GMT -5
"I don't know where to go either," Ash responded. "Something fun and exciting."
Aleenya pondered that. "Okay," she said slowly. "I just thought of something I want to do first. It'll be quick."
"I get a sneak into the errands of the Moss," Ash chirped. "This should be awesome."
"Not particularly," Aleenya muttered, surprisingly self-conscious. "I want to... to visit my parents. And not hide in the bushes this time." She glanced at Ash, feeling awkward, to see her reaction.
Ash smiled. Not her usual, mischievous and playful smile, but a smile of pure gentle caring. "I think that's a really good idea."
"No, it's not. I just..." Aleenya shook her head and started the car. "Never mind."
Ash nodded briefly. "I'm here for anything you want to tell me," she said, looking out the window.
"I know." Aleenya pulled out of the driveway and slid open the window. The cool air felt fresh on her face.
Ash smiled again, to herself, thinking as she let the outside flash past her eyes.
Soon they found themselves in a nicer part of town. Aleenya stopped the car a couple of blocks away from her parents' house and stopped the car. "I can't do this alone," she whispered. "I'm scared."
"Do you want me to say anything to them, or just be there?" Ash asked gently.
"I don't know. Just stay there, I guess." Aleenya smiled faintly at her. "Thanks."
Ash nodded and smiled in return. "I'm happy to help you."
Aleenya climbed out of the car and started to walk.
Ash followed close behind.
Aleenya studied the well-shoveled sidewalks as she walked. She had never stopped to wonder why her parents had never left her childhood home. Even now, after Allie.... What if they called the police, just like her sister had so many years ago, and she was once again too lost in a buried childhood love to run away?
Except she wasn't alone anymore.
Ash took her hand for a second to give her encouragement.
It was funny how many memories this place still held. A lawn where she fell off her bike, the yellow home of her childhood friend.
Nobody was outside, now, so it was easy to walk up to the mansion where she had lived out the first half of her life. She knocked on the door.
The door opened slowly, and a man stood there staring at Aleenya
"Hi, dad," she whispered. She was clutching Ash's hand so hard that her fingers were turning white.
Ash dealt with the pain. "Aleenya," Carson responded. Barely in greeting, and more out of shock. He stated her name as a fact.
"I wanted to... to visit you," Aleenya said.
He continued to stare in amazement. "Why?"
Aleenya stared through the doorway, into the house behind him. "I'm done pretending to be upset about all the stupid things when I was a teenager. Dying my hair blue." She sighed and looked him in the eye.
"Why now?" he asked, unmoving.
Aleenya snorted. "After I killed her, you mean?" The words were supposed to sound harsh and bitter but instead they revealed the vulnerable layer she always kept hidden.
His silence confirmed what she had said.
"You think I chose to be who I am?" Aleenya demanded. "Really? Because you don't know half of what happened to me."
"You would never tell me," he rebutted, looking her up and down.
"I wouldn't have then," Aleenya snapped. "BUt I'm here now, you're only daughter, and I could turn around and never talk to you again. It's cold out here."
Carson tried to start a sentence that had not been created several times, until he figured he wouldn't find anything to say. He cautiously stepped aside to let them in.
Aleenya slid through the doorway and looked around. There were lots of pictures of Allie. She felt a sudden illogical wave of remorse. How long ago was that now? She didn't remember.
"What.. what do you expect us to do?" His tone sounded like he still couldn't comprehend that he had a daughter present in his life again.
Aleenya shook her head. "Do you actually care?" she asked skeptically.
"Did-- Do you?" he responded.
Aleenya's laugh was dark. "I don't even know what that word means anymore."
"Then what is the point..?" Carson asked.
Aleenya ignored his question. "Where's mom?" she asked.
"Filming," he answered shortly, beginning to gather his bearings. "Where were you?"
"When I first ran away?"
"When we could have helped," Carson answered.
Aleenya snorted. "So when I first ran away. I made friends who were not so friendly, and my dear family was so ashamed of the horror of their precious child leaving high school that they didn't bother to think what might be going on inside my mind." She looked at him pointedly.
"Whether we wondered about it or not, when did you ever let us know what was on your mind?" Carson answered.
"You never did understand teenagers," Aleenya scoffed.
"Oh, you've changed?" Carson became sarcastic. "Would you care to tell us just how much you're hiding from your dear friend here? You can't expect things from people unless you tell them what you need, Aleenya Anne Mligner. You've never seemed to grasp this concept."
Aleenya's face darkened. "You had your chance to tell me what to do. It's gone now."
"You left," Carson argued. "We couldn't tell you anything when it mattered. Why have you come back now? When things are beyond repair?"
"Do you remember hearing about the first person I ever killed?" Aleenya demanded, an intense look on her face. "I bet you thought I was horrible, my morals had failed, how did you raise someone to become what I was. But he had raped and hurt me enough that I was done with it and that is what happened. And nobody was there, least of all you."
Carson looked pained at the news, but continued strongly. "And how were we supposed to know that? Did you ever actually tell us that? Or did you leave us in the dust to wait for you?" Carson snapped. "Did you ever ask for us to help support you? Did you even tell the police that, or did you just run? You assumed that we would think those things, but we would have helped if you had just come to us and told us what happened!"
Aleenya looked stonily back at him. "I'm so sorry," she drawled.
"This is why things got as bad as they did, Aleenya," Carson said, his voice growing increasingly upset. "You're still stuck in this teenage mindset believing that you're unable to get help from others, because only you have experienced pain like this, believing that your suffering is somehow greater than everyone else's, and that you're justified in hating everyone else for not understanding you, that they're wrong because they just don't 'get' you, when really, you won't let anyone in. People will never understand you if you don't let them!"
"So I should what?" Aleenya yelled. "Love? You know how I ended up in Arkham? I called Allie and told her where I was so that I could talk to her, because I was that alone and I had nobody to go to, and you know what she did? She called the f**king cops."
"You should try! Ask for help once in a while!" Carson stopped and took a deep breath. His voice shook. "The fact is: Allie is gone now. You're one of the most wanted criminals in Gotham. You're still stuck in the past, but there's nothing you can do to change it. You've taken both of my daughters' lives."
"Look at me." Aleenya pointed at herself. "I am here, and I am alive, and I didn't come here for a shouting match." She laughed sardonically. "I've only taken one of your daughters' lives, so far."
"No, you are also what took Aleenya away." Carson answered, his voice still shaking. "You are not alive. I am looking at you, and I see nothing but pain, self-pity, and rage. There is no life in you."
"It's funny," Aleneya said slowly, "because that's exactly what I see when I look at you, too."
Carson was at a loss for words again. He broke down, and finally sat in a chair, violently clutching his face as he was reminded of the truth of her words and of her life. Tears seeped through the cracks of his fingers.
"It's not only my fault," Aleenya whispered, loud enough to be heard clearly. "People always say that, but it isn't true."
"Putting the blame on others again." Carson emitted through his hands and broken body. "Do you ever accept the fault you do have in this whole thing?"
"Oh, I have plenty of blame." Aleenya shook her head. "But I did not make myself into the person I am today, whatever you might think."
"You let it happen," Carson murmured. "Who is that person today? Is she who she wants to be? Is she satisfied? Has she learned her lesson? How to be happy?" He pressed his face harder into his hands. "Are you anything but lost..?"
"I don't know." Aleenya looked at the polished surfaces around her, wondering what kinds of hollow lives her parents were living now. "I just don't know."
"You can't change what happened, or who you were," Carson repeated quietly. He started to rock himself minutely. "There has to be some hope. Somewhere. Somewhere. What can help us?"
Aleenya stared at her crying father and gathered her thoughts together. This wasn't why she was here. Her family was already broken. She didn't want to make it worse.
So she did the hardest thing she'd ever done and said, "I'm so sorry." And she meant it, and she didn't run away.
Every life is incomplete, and every time a person leaves, or dies, or changes, something is left unsaid. It had happened to Aleenya a million times and she was done with it. Gone. Ready to move on.
She'd always hurt people, she still did, and it wasn't going to change. She would always be a murderer, always a ruin of that little girl who thought she wasn't good enough.
But at least she could be strong. So she apologized, and she meant it, and even though there was a gun in her pocket and a knife at her belt, she didn't run away.
Carson didn't speak, shaking his head for a long time. After the silence dragged, he spoke, his voice sounding low and hoarse, it was not accusing anymore. "What did you come here hoping to learn?" He asked the question genuinely.
"I didn't," Aleenya answered. "Come here to learn something, I mean."
"We can't change the past," he responded. "You have a new.. life.. now, how are you going to use today to make tomorrow better for you?"
"I have a live in the moment philosophy," Aleenya answered dryly. "Stemming from the fact that tomorrow I might be dead."
Carson hissed through his fingers. He looked up at Ash fiercely. "You," he snapped.
Ash was genuinely startled and stopped breathing for a second. "What..?"
"You've done this to her, haven't you?" His voice was cold and accusing. "You were oh-so-smug to walk in here on Christmas and pretend to be the good guy. You're the one that destroyed her, and Allie too!"
"What the hella У೦o○೦o○o?" Aleenya snapped. She stomped towards him. "What the hella У೦o○೦o○o, how can you blame her for anything? I got into this mess of who I am long before I knew her, and I've only gotten BETTER now that I know her, okay?" She glared at him fiercely.
"U-um.." Ash bit her lip, really not wanting to become a weapon in this already awkward situation.
Carson stood up angrily, tearstains still present around his red eyes. "Better?" he screeched. "Allie told me everything about her! She was going to kill Allie, and then you met her and instead it's you who killed her! Don't tell me that she's not to blame! She stopped you from ever coming back to us! Ever, ever ever!"
Ash's jaw began to clench subconsciously, and she swallowed nervously.
Aleenya's expression twitched a little. "Part of me already wanted to kill Allie," she said softly. "Nothing could have changed that. Allie condemned me to ten years of hella У೦o○೦o○o."
"You could have come back!" Carson cried. "You could have come back, until you met her!"
Aleenya tilted her head. "Really," she said. "So you expect that I would have believed, after being Arkham for ten years because my dear sister called the cops, that you would NOT do the same? The place I went to was my real home; I went where I lived with my friends once. But not here. Never here."
Ash held her own hands tightly at what Aleenya said. "Real home.." she whispered quietly to herself.
"Look at what she's turned you into!" Carson answered. "You would have had to come home if she hadn't stolen either of you from us!"
"I didn't even know her yet. I was referring to someone else. But that is my real home right now; living with her and that idiot, I belong more than I ever did here. Okay? Yes, I messed up. But I am never going to change. You have go understand that." Aleenya looked at him intently, willing him to understand what was going on in her head.
The pain was evident on his face, it contorted his expression over and over again. He struggled to stop himself. "I-If you belong there, then will you at least make sure.." he couldn't continue for a second.
Aleenya raised her eyebrows. "Make sure of what?" she asked, her voice cool.
She felt a new strength coursing through her as she stared into his eyes.
Carson took a shuddering breath and closed his eyes. "Will you at least make it the best it can be?"
Aleenya sighed. "Yeah, dad," she said. She glanced at Ash. "I'm ready to go."
Ash nodded. Carson was silent as they left.
Aleenya said nothing as she stepped outside. She only watched the ground as her feet crunched across the snow.
Ash followed close behind; close enough for arm's reach, if needed.
Aleenya was too lost in thoughts unknown to the rest of the world to do anything but keep on marching towards their car.
"Should I drive?" Ash asked quietly when they reached the car.
"If you want," Aleenya replied.
"Do you want to think?" Ash answered.
"I want to DO something." Aleenya got into the passenger seat of the car. "I just don't know what."
"How about we go get a shiitake mushroomston of fireworks and do something exciting with them?" Ash suggested.
Aleenya halfsmiled. "That sounds glorious," she said, her voice a little duller than usual.
"We could stop at home and rest for a while, if you'd like," Ash suggested again, concerned.
"Nah, I wanna do stuff," Aleenya replied.
"Okay. Would you like a Crane to pester?" she asked, while driving off.
Aleenya chuckled. "That might help."
Ash smiled a bit and headed home to pick him up.
Aleenya wandered off in her own thoughts until they got there.
Aleenya pondered that. "Okay," she said slowly. "I just thought of something I want to do first. It'll be quick."
"I get a sneak into the errands of the Moss," Ash chirped. "This should be awesome."
"Not particularly," Aleenya muttered, surprisingly self-conscious. "I want to... to visit my parents. And not hide in the bushes this time." She glanced at Ash, feeling awkward, to see her reaction.
Ash smiled. Not her usual, mischievous and playful smile, but a smile of pure gentle caring. "I think that's a really good idea."
"No, it's not. I just..." Aleenya shook her head and started the car. "Never mind."
Ash nodded briefly. "I'm here for anything you want to tell me," she said, looking out the window.
"I know." Aleenya pulled out of the driveway and slid open the window. The cool air felt fresh on her face.
Ash smiled again, to herself, thinking as she let the outside flash past her eyes.
Soon they found themselves in a nicer part of town. Aleenya stopped the car a couple of blocks away from her parents' house and stopped the car. "I can't do this alone," she whispered. "I'm scared."
"Do you want me to say anything to them, or just be there?" Ash asked gently.
"I don't know. Just stay there, I guess." Aleenya smiled faintly at her. "Thanks."
Ash nodded and smiled in return. "I'm happy to help you."
Aleenya climbed out of the car and started to walk.
Ash followed close behind.
Aleenya studied the well-shoveled sidewalks as she walked. She had never stopped to wonder why her parents had never left her childhood home. Even now, after Allie.... What if they called the police, just like her sister had so many years ago, and she was once again too lost in a buried childhood love to run away?
Except she wasn't alone anymore.
Ash took her hand for a second to give her encouragement.
It was funny how many memories this place still held. A lawn where she fell off her bike, the yellow home of her childhood friend.
Nobody was outside, now, so it was easy to walk up to the mansion where she had lived out the first half of her life. She knocked on the door.
The door opened slowly, and a man stood there staring at Aleenya
"Hi, dad," she whispered. She was clutching Ash's hand so hard that her fingers were turning white.
Ash dealt with the pain. "Aleenya," Carson responded. Barely in greeting, and more out of shock. He stated her name as a fact.
"I wanted to... to visit you," Aleenya said.
He continued to stare in amazement. "Why?"
Aleenya stared through the doorway, into the house behind him. "I'm done pretending to be upset about all the stupid things when I was a teenager. Dying my hair blue." She sighed and looked him in the eye.
"Why now?" he asked, unmoving.
Aleenya snorted. "After I killed her, you mean?" The words were supposed to sound harsh and bitter but instead they revealed the vulnerable layer she always kept hidden.
His silence confirmed what she had said.
"You think I chose to be who I am?" Aleenya demanded. "Really? Because you don't know half of what happened to me."
"You would never tell me," he rebutted, looking her up and down.
"I wouldn't have then," Aleenya snapped. "BUt I'm here now, you're only daughter, and I could turn around and never talk to you again. It's cold out here."
Carson tried to start a sentence that had not been created several times, until he figured he wouldn't find anything to say. He cautiously stepped aside to let them in.
Aleenya slid through the doorway and looked around. There were lots of pictures of Allie. She felt a sudden illogical wave of remorse. How long ago was that now? She didn't remember.
"What.. what do you expect us to do?" His tone sounded like he still couldn't comprehend that he had a daughter present in his life again.
Aleenya shook her head. "Do you actually care?" she asked skeptically.
"Did-- Do you?" he responded.
Aleenya's laugh was dark. "I don't even know what that word means anymore."
"Then what is the point..?" Carson asked.
Aleenya ignored his question. "Where's mom?" she asked.
"Filming," he answered shortly, beginning to gather his bearings. "Where were you?"
"When I first ran away?"
"When we could have helped," Carson answered.
Aleenya snorted. "So when I first ran away. I made friends who were not so friendly, and my dear family was so ashamed of the horror of their precious child leaving high school that they didn't bother to think what might be going on inside my mind." She looked at him pointedly.
"Whether we wondered about it or not, when did you ever let us know what was on your mind?" Carson answered.
"You never did understand teenagers," Aleenya scoffed.
"Oh, you've changed?" Carson became sarcastic. "Would you care to tell us just how much you're hiding from your dear friend here? You can't expect things from people unless you tell them what you need, Aleenya Anne Mligner. You've never seemed to grasp this concept."
Aleenya's face darkened. "You had your chance to tell me what to do. It's gone now."
"You left," Carson argued. "We couldn't tell you anything when it mattered. Why have you come back now? When things are beyond repair?"
"Do you remember hearing about the first person I ever killed?" Aleenya demanded, an intense look on her face. "I bet you thought I was horrible, my morals had failed, how did you raise someone to become what I was. But he had raped and hurt me enough that I was done with it and that is what happened. And nobody was there, least of all you."
Carson looked pained at the news, but continued strongly. "And how were we supposed to know that? Did you ever actually tell us that? Or did you leave us in the dust to wait for you?" Carson snapped. "Did you ever ask for us to help support you? Did you even tell the police that, or did you just run? You assumed that we would think those things, but we would have helped if you had just come to us and told us what happened!"
Aleenya looked stonily back at him. "I'm so sorry," she drawled.
"This is why things got as bad as they did, Aleenya," Carson said, his voice growing increasingly upset. "You're still stuck in this teenage mindset believing that you're unable to get help from others, because only you have experienced pain like this, believing that your suffering is somehow greater than everyone else's, and that you're justified in hating everyone else for not understanding you, that they're wrong because they just don't 'get' you, when really, you won't let anyone in. People will never understand you if you don't let them!"
"So I should what?" Aleenya yelled. "Love? You know how I ended up in Arkham? I called Allie and told her where I was so that I could talk to her, because I was that alone and I had nobody to go to, and you know what she did? She called the f**king cops."
"You should try! Ask for help once in a while!" Carson stopped and took a deep breath. His voice shook. "The fact is: Allie is gone now. You're one of the most wanted criminals in Gotham. You're still stuck in the past, but there's nothing you can do to change it. You've taken both of my daughters' lives."
"Look at me." Aleenya pointed at herself. "I am here, and I am alive, and I didn't come here for a shouting match." She laughed sardonically. "I've only taken one of your daughters' lives, so far."
"No, you are also what took Aleenya away." Carson answered, his voice still shaking. "You are not alive. I am looking at you, and I see nothing but pain, self-pity, and rage. There is no life in you."
"It's funny," Aleneya said slowly, "because that's exactly what I see when I look at you, too."
Carson was at a loss for words again. He broke down, and finally sat in a chair, violently clutching his face as he was reminded of the truth of her words and of her life. Tears seeped through the cracks of his fingers.
"It's not only my fault," Aleenya whispered, loud enough to be heard clearly. "People always say that, but it isn't true."
"Putting the blame on others again." Carson emitted through his hands and broken body. "Do you ever accept the fault you do have in this whole thing?"
"Oh, I have plenty of blame." Aleenya shook her head. "But I did not make myself into the person I am today, whatever you might think."
"You let it happen," Carson murmured. "Who is that person today? Is she who she wants to be? Is she satisfied? Has she learned her lesson? How to be happy?" He pressed his face harder into his hands. "Are you anything but lost..?"
"I don't know." Aleenya looked at the polished surfaces around her, wondering what kinds of hollow lives her parents were living now. "I just don't know."
"You can't change what happened, or who you were," Carson repeated quietly. He started to rock himself minutely. "There has to be some hope. Somewhere. Somewhere. What can help us?"
Aleenya stared at her crying father and gathered her thoughts together. This wasn't why she was here. Her family was already broken. She didn't want to make it worse.
So she did the hardest thing she'd ever done and said, "I'm so sorry." And she meant it, and she didn't run away.
Every life is incomplete, and every time a person leaves, or dies, or changes, something is left unsaid. It had happened to Aleenya a million times and she was done with it. Gone. Ready to move on.
She'd always hurt people, she still did, and it wasn't going to change. She would always be a murderer, always a ruin of that little girl who thought she wasn't good enough.
But at least she could be strong. So she apologized, and she meant it, and even though there was a gun in her pocket and a knife at her belt, she didn't run away.
Carson didn't speak, shaking his head for a long time. After the silence dragged, he spoke, his voice sounding low and hoarse, it was not accusing anymore. "What did you come here hoping to learn?" He asked the question genuinely.
"I didn't," Aleenya answered. "Come here to learn something, I mean."
"We can't change the past," he responded. "You have a new.. life.. now, how are you going to use today to make tomorrow better for you?"
"I have a live in the moment philosophy," Aleenya answered dryly. "Stemming from the fact that tomorrow I might be dead."
Carson hissed through his fingers. He looked up at Ash fiercely. "You," he snapped.
Ash was genuinely startled and stopped breathing for a second. "What..?"
"You've done this to her, haven't you?" His voice was cold and accusing. "You were oh-so-smug to walk in here on Christmas and pretend to be the good guy. You're the one that destroyed her, and Allie too!"
"What the hella У೦o○೦o○o?" Aleenya snapped. She stomped towards him. "What the hella У೦o○೦o○o, how can you blame her for anything? I got into this mess of who I am long before I knew her, and I've only gotten BETTER now that I know her, okay?" She glared at him fiercely.
"U-um.." Ash bit her lip, really not wanting to become a weapon in this already awkward situation.
Carson stood up angrily, tearstains still present around his red eyes. "Better?" he screeched. "Allie told me everything about her! She was going to kill Allie, and then you met her and instead it's you who killed her! Don't tell me that she's not to blame! She stopped you from ever coming back to us! Ever, ever ever!"
Ash's jaw began to clench subconsciously, and she swallowed nervously.
Aleenya's expression twitched a little. "Part of me already wanted to kill Allie," she said softly. "Nothing could have changed that. Allie condemned me to ten years of hella У೦o○೦o○o."
"You could have come back!" Carson cried. "You could have come back, until you met her!"
Aleenya tilted her head. "Really," she said. "So you expect that I would have believed, after being Arkham for ten years because my dear sister called the cops, that you would NOT do the same? The place I went to was my real home; I went where I lived with my friends once. But not here. Never here."
Ash held her own hands tightly at what Aleenya said. "Real home.." she whispered quietly to herself.
"Look at what she's turned you into!" Carson answered. "You would have had to come home if she hadn't stolen either of you from us!"
"I didn't even know her yet. I was referring to someone else. But that is my real home right now; living with her and that idiot, I belong more than I ever did here. Okay? Yes, I messed up. But I am never going to change. You have go understand that." Aleenya looked at him intently, willing him to understand what was going on in her head.
The pain was evident on his face, it contorted his expression over and over again. He struggled to stop himself. "I-If you belong there, then will you at least make sure.." he couldn't continue for a second.
Aleenya raised her eyebrows. "Make sure of what?" she asked, her voice cool.
She felt a new strength coursing through her as she stared into his eyes.
Carson took a shuddering breath and closed his eyes. "Will you at least make it the best it can be?"
Aleenya sighed. "Yeah, dad," she said. She glanced at Ash. "I'm ready to go."
Ash nodded. Carson was silent as they left.
Aleenya said nothing as she stepped outside. She only watched the ground as her feet crunched across the snow.
Ash followed close behind; close enough for arm's reach, if needed.
Aleenya was too lost in thoughts unknown to the rest of the world to do anything but keep on marching towards their car.
"Should I drive?" Ash asked quietly when they reached the car.
"If you want," Aleenya replied.
"Do you want to think?" Ash answered.
"I want to DO something." Aleenya got into the passenger seat of the car. "I just don't know what."
"How about we go get a shiitake mushroomston of fireworks and do something exciting with them?" Ash suggested.
Aleenya halfsmiled. "That sounds glorious," she said, her voice a little duller than usual.
"We could stop at home and rest for a while, if you'd like," Ash suggested again, concerned.
"Nah, I wanna do stuff," Aleenya replied.
"Okay. Would you like a Crane to pester?" she asked, while driving off.
Aleenya chuckled. "That might help."
Ash smiled a bit and headed home to pick him up.
Aleenya wandered off in her own thoughts until they got there.