"Why are you bothering with a glass? You're going to drink all of it anyway."

They were sitting on the floor of Von's living room, just the two of them; Cata was with Zyn in the bedroom, attempting to get him to calm down after his most recent fit of hysterics. Ari'i watched dispassionately as Von carefully filled another glass and knocked it back. She was very good at dispassionate. Years of practice had made her very good at dispassionate, indeed. He refused to look at her, and did not answer.

So she tried again. "You shouldn't have touched him."

Another glass, this one not so careful, spilling cheap vodka on the expensive carpeting. "I didn't touch him." His voice was rough. "Didn't even go near him."

"Then explain why he can't look at you without breaking down, Von." She was good at being icy, too. She knew he was telling the truth, she always knew when they told the truth, but she was angry enough to push further. She had no business, but she would do it anyway. "Explain why it took two of us to restrain him and keep him from setting the whole building on fire."

He set the glass next to the bottle, out of the way, and tilted his head back against the couch. "He remembered something. We were talking about- about chess, how he used to play in school, how I won that tournament four years ago. He was laughing, he was happy, he was fucking smiling, and he only ever smiles at Cata. I thought that maybe for a minute he might have actually started to trust me a little, that we could start figuring out what the hell went wrong with Neisha and the others. And then he just- broke. Snapped in half and started screaming about Aleks and Gavin and Sable." His jaw clenched; an involuntary spasm of pain. Ari'i could see a bruise, half formed, across his cheekbone. Strange how she hadn't noticed it before.

"He hit you." She inched closer, examining the bruise with careful fingers. "He didn't mean it, Von."

"I'm fine, and yes, he did." His voice had gone from rough to weary, so very weary. "You remember who I was then, who he was. Who he was to me. And now he remembers, and it disgusts him so much that he can't stand to be in the same room with me anymore."

She knew very well what Gavin had felt for Aleks; that conversation had been one of the first memories she'd recovered. But then, Giselle had married Aleks anyway, despite what any of them had felt. That had been her first mistake, and by far, the worst. She was determined now to not let another one happen- she just wasn't sure how.

Her hand was still on his face, but now his fingers had crept up to interlace with hers. "Von, don't do this to yourself. It won't do any good- not when he can barely remember who he is in this life, let alone the other one." There was something in his eyes that she didn't like; something desperate and frightening. Their faces were very close, now; only inches away.

"Would you forgive me if I kissed you?"

Centimeters, now, and she had to close her eyes to keep them from crossing. "No."

He kissed her anyway, and she knew that it didn't matter anymore, not here on the livingroom floor with shades lurking in the darkness of their minds and souls. Mothing mattered anymore; they were both damned.
-------------

That took forever to finish, and it isn't finished properly, anyway. Couldn't get that image out of my head, though; "Would you forgive me?" kept running through my head and I couldn't let it run away without due consideration.

Von has many issues. Large, screaming issues, with teeth. And he sleeps around. Ari'i has a guilt complex or twelve, but it's her own fault for manipulating every. single. person. she's. ever. met. She used to sleep around, but is currently going through one of those "Oh god please no don't touch me" phases. Cata is severely depressed and cycles through various eating disorders as the mood takes her. Her parents were abusive, too, and she has problems with people. You know, people in general. Zyn doesn't know who he is; can't remember his own name or his background. He doesn't know where to even begin looking for the truth; all he has are nasty flashbacks to his current past and Aleks' life that tend to leave him in a hysterical heap of angst. Add all their issues to the fact that they're carrying around parasitic shadow creatures in their souls, and you've got one severely fucked up bunch of people.

I blame them all on the fact that I watch too much Law and Order and have been subjected to too much Oprah recently. Everything else comes from personal experience or various aspects of my self. I think they disturb me too much to write them properly, actually...but it's fun to do occasional vignettey things like this occasionally.