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Post by ROWENA AUDREY BENNETT on Sept 17, 2011 22:06:46 GMT -5
  The hot water scalded her back as if it could burn away all of the other issues in the Thunder elemental's life. She and her siblings were still living in this stupid, shitty apartment with the hole in the door and the window that had been so poorly set into the shabby wall that there was a draft through it day and night and it rattled whenever there were high winds. It was a bottom dollar shit hole, that was for sure. She was just making a point to ask Altair when they were going to replace the broken light fixture in the kitchen (Rowena had gotten angry and a surge of electricity had shattered it) when the shower head sputtered and suddenly she was no longer standing in a shower but in an empty tub full of air. She turned to glare at it and even whacked it a few times, but it was of no use. "Fuckin' thing," she complained irritably. She gave it another hard whack and that only managed to bend it so that it was now lopsided. Great. Another problem on the tons that they already had. She couldn't handle this. Rowena was absolutely sick of this shit apartment and this shit life that she had on top of it. She uttered a long string of cuss words and only just managed to resist breaking the mirror as she passed it, still very much unclothed, and headed toward the bedroom. She caught sight of her skinny, malnourished frame in it and just wanted to get away from it--Rowena didn't even bother with a towel, she just needed to get away.
Her cellphone rang from amidst the bundle of clothes on the floor but Ro pointedly ignored it as she pulled on a fresh shirt and a pair of jeans, not even giving a shit that she was still rather soaked and so her clothes stuck to her. She ignored the phone further in order to brush her hair, figuring that whoever the fuck was trying to call could wait a little longer before they got an answer. She might call back if they just gave the fuck up already. She was in the kitchen and about to start rummaging through cupboards for something to eat when it rang for what must have been the fourth time. "Oh for fucks sakes!" she snarled, slamming the cupboard door shut so hard that it bounced back out a little before settling in. Rowena was usually the calm and mellow one of the three, never really reacting to anything, but today was different. She didn't have any drugs and she didn't have any money to get a hold of drugs so there really wasn't anything she could do. There was the always present option of sleeping with someone for cash but she really didn't know if she could do that sober. Storming into the room, she picked up the phone and rather loudly demanded, "The fuck do you want?"
The person on the other line was silent for a moment, likely affronted by the aggressive manner in which she had answered. "Is this Rowena Bennett?" Well, they were asked for her at least. "What the fuck do you want?" she repeated, not in the mood. She hadn't confirmed her name but the person apparently inferred that it was Rowena they were speaking to, for they said, "This is the Academy. We recieved a call from the hospital pertaining to your sister?" She rolled her eyes. "Which one?" She was willing to bet it would be Altair. The Fire sibling sure as hell caused a lot of trouble at school. Rowena still loved her sister dearly though, so if anyone tried to point out that Altair wasn't the nicest person she might just have something to say about it. "Syria. Syria Ryelle. They want to see you in the hospital; your sister had an overdose and--" Her brain blanked out at this point. Overdose? No, it couldn't--that wasn't--Syria? No. Syria couldn't get into that sort of trouble. It was she and Altair that were the fuck-ups. Syria was the sweet one, the Water elemental of the terrible trio. "--so sorry for your loss." The man finished and Rowena didn't bother saying anything. She hung up and was possessed by the strong desire to throw the phone out of the window, but instead she knew there was a call she needed to make.
"Altair," she said, and her tone was even more flat and expressionless than usual. She was shutting down. She went into the kitchen/living room to try and get away from the room where her sister had slept and only caught sight of the door. "You need to come to the apartment. It's Syria... she... she's gone." Though the words were voiced with difficulty, she still sounded every bit as flat and expressionless as she always had. The Thunder elemental slid down the wall into a sitting position. "She overdosed, Altair. She's dead." She hung up the phone and let it slip from her hand, staring blankly at the hole in the door. Syria had kicked that there. She'd been solid and alive and normal and now she was just... gone.
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Post by ALTAIR SABINA BENNETT on Sept 18, 2011 1:06:34 GMT -5
  The lights in the changing room were bright and harsh, as if to point out the imperfections of the girls changing in there. But Altair didn’t have imperfections, and so she was not nearly as concerned when she heard the other women complaining about stretch marks and the such. She was confident in herself, and didn’t need a mirror to tell her what she already knew. As she changed into her clothes, she didn’t converse with the other girls and they didn’t converse with her. By now they knew that you didn’t go to the Bennett bitch for conversation—she could crack a few snarky jokes, but that was just to hear herself talk and she didn’t need anyone to respond to her. She was just pulling up her jeans when she heard her phone ringing and saw that it was Rowena. What did she want? There was something odd about the tone of the other girl’s voice, different. It wasn’t like she was usually energetic and chipper, but Rowena sounded even more hollow than usual. The words spoken next made Altair’s gut clench immediately, even though she refused to acknowledge them for what they really were. Stage one, denial. She honestly refused to believe what her pessimistic mind told her.
”The fuck do you mean she’s gone? Altair asked with exasperation. It didn’t occur to her at first because she was pushing the thought away, but then the meaning of those words dawned on her with clarity. Gone was just a prettier word for dead. Her hand clenched on the phone as Rowena went on, and if she were any stronger it might have been possible for her to break it. It wasn’t very expensive after all. Overdosed? Overdosed on what? What drugs was she taking? Altair couldn’t comprehend this right now, it hadn’t yet occurred to her what was going on—her sister was gone, dead, passed. The rock that held them down, the stable one, just disappeared. It was too much of a shock to take in: when something that had always been a constant vanishes, there’s only so much one could do. And she responded with her default emotion—anger. Anger that she couldn’t go home to Syria and bitch to her about whatever was on her mind and have the three girls be together on some level. Because as of late, they were hardly together, just held by the bond of siblinghood. They stuck together in this new place, and now…now there was two. And Altair still couldn’t understand that, it didn’t make sense. It just made her angry. Her voice was rough. ”I’ll be there in a few minutes.” And she hung up.
She hurried out of the club, her eyes were even more vicious than usual when she was forced to look at people. Because even though she didn’t undestand what Rowena had just spoken to her completely, she knew that a very important part of her life was no longer there. And as she drove to the apartment, she knew that Syria wouldn’t be there to greet her. Even so, when she walked through the door, she expected to see her in the living room or the kitchen or somewhere. Then she allowed her mind to trick her into imagining she was just somewhere else—maybe she was working, or out with friends, and she’d call soon to tell the sisters she’d be out late. Even as she invited stories to cope, she felt the almost tangible emptiness when she saw Rowena against the wall. Just Rowena. Alone. ”What happened?” she asked curtly, not knowing what to do with herself. The Fire sister just stood there. ”What did Syria overdose on? How did you find out?” She couldn’t let herself admit it. Syria was not dead. She was out somewhere else in the world, and she’d come back. Then why are you so mad? Because she knew the truth. Syria had left them. She was gone. The glue that stuck them together was… ”This is fucking bullshit,” she muttered, shaking a little. No, she was not scared. Altair Sabina Bennett did not get fucking scared.
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Post by ROWENA AUDREY BENNETT on Sept 18, 2011 1:28:42 GMT -5
Unlike, Altair, Rowena wasn't exactly in denial. It was more like she existed in a state of limbo between one thing and the next. She didn't want to believe that her sister could really be dead, that she'd never again see the Water triplet walk through that door and into their lives. At the same time, pessimism would not allow her to believe anything else. She couldn't be the optimist that so desperately clung to the last threads of hope, that tried to convince themselves that everything was alright even when it wasn't. That just wasn't in her personality, in her nature. She couldn't. Blank eyes that weren't the least bit wet with tears seemed to focus slightly when the door she'd been staring at opened. Maybe it would have been better to cry and to scream, to get it all out of her system and deal with the grief early on, but Rowena didn't want to deal with it. It was stubborn, even childish to pretend that by ignoring the grief she could make it go away, but no one had ever taught Ro how to deal with things like this.
The Thunder triplet shook her head softly when Altair asked her what had happened, not really sure how to respond to that. "I don't know," she said flatly. She hadn't known about the fact that her sister was taking any sort of drugs but with the heap of problems that Syria's death presented to them, this seemed to be the least of their worries. Her head was pounding and her arms were itching incredibly but she ignored all sensations as she pursued the deadness that saturated her mind. It was as if the news had spread a toxic brain wave through her system, effectively choking the life out of any and all feeling--grief included. Nothing mattered, except maybe Altair. Listless blue eyes stared up at her sister as if she was hoping that this might all be some fabrication of her own mind. Even as she hoped, the Thunder elemental knew that this was all too real. She'd had hallucinations enough before to understand when she was not experiencing them. Unaffected by drugs, she was being forced into the cruel grip of reality.
Rowena shook her head once more. "I don't know," she was forced to repeat. She really wished that she could give Altair a little more information about what was going on but unfortunately this was all that she had to go on. She'd hung up before she could get any specifics. She'd understood only the most important parts--Syria, her perfect, irreplaceable sister... Syria was gone. They were on their own now. It was enough to bring anyone to tears and yet those tears would not come. She could not deal with this. "The hospital called the school." She let the words hang in the air, guessing that Altair could infer the rest about the school getting into contact with her. She shook her head yet again, but this wasn't in response to a question. This was a slow gesture accompanied by the clouding of her expression. "I never knew..." But they could have guessed, couldn't they have? All of the sisters weren't kidding one another. They'd known on the inside that there was something wrong in their previously perfect dynamic, they'd just chosen to ignore it. She got to her feet with the aid of the windowsill above her, ignoring how the paint seemed to flake awake under her fingernails. She groped inside of her pockets, cussing as she realised that she didn't have any of her own drugs to sustain her. "Course I'd be out," she muttered under her breath, not seeming to notice Altair. "The one time I really fuckin' need it and I'm out..."
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Post by ALTAIR SABINA BENNETT on Sept 18, 2011 17:09:59 GMT -5
Altair was doing her best to keep calm, which was such a ludicrous notion when it came to her. She didn’t do calm. And why was she so mad? Because her instincts were built on anger. The girl didn’t know how to deal with this—it was sudden, it was abrupt, and it didn’t make sense to her. She didn’t understand death, and perhaps that’s why it terrified her so much, right into denial. Altair didn’t understand the concept of not existing anymore, that once the last breath escapes your lips, it’s over. It didn’t make sense. How can someone so alive—Syria, for instance, the chipper one with so much energy—fade so quickly. It was…unnatural. No, it’s very natural. It’s life. Her thoughts were scaring her. She’d never had to face this problem before. Life might have been one big fight to her, but the idea of death was one she’d never confronted—in a way, she believed herself to be invincible. Death wasn’t an option. Her sisters, too, they were just as invincible as her. They were the two people who remained steady in her life, stable even when she felt as if she weren’t. They were boulders that she was chained to.
She’s not dead.
Rowena was helping, oh god, the vagueness was like relief. Because without answers, the Fire triplet (they’re still triplets, Syria is still with them) wouldn’t have to face the horrendous truth. It was almost as if a barrier surrounded her brain, not letting the information Rowena was telling her to permeate the protective layer. Her mind wouldn’t accept what had happened. And when would it? After days of not seeing the girl, would it sink in then? When she calls Syria’s phone and never gets an answer, will she come to terms? How will it be in the future? She couldn’t imagine that now, because there is no future without Syria. She can’t picture it, can’t possibly know how it would be like not to dick around with the girl, ignoring each other’s problems. I knew. I fucking knew. Of course she knew, they all knew, and they all played ignorance well. Overdosed. The word felt like a punch to the gut whenever Altair thought of it. It was what she feared, why she purged when she knew it was a possibility. Syria didn’t purge. She succumbed.
Altair felt every part of her body coil up, clench, brace itself for impact like she’d just been physically assaulted. She didn’t know what to do with all this anger, this rage. She was mad at Syria, at Rowena, at life, at death, and the world. And there was nothing to take her anger out on. Suddenly, she grabbed a bottle that had been sitting on a nearby table, one that she left the day before, and with a growl ripping from her throat, she threw it across at the wall. It shattered on impact. ”Fuck this shit,” the girl practically shrieked, a note of panic apparent in her voice. Her eyes stung. Wetness. She never cried. What was this? Tears fueled by anger and grief and slow acceptance of the fact that Syria’s not coming back. Her breaths came hard and laborous as she raked her fingers through her hair, hands clenching at the white-blond waves. She heard Rowena’s voice. Frustration. Anger. Hollowness. She took her hands away from her head. ”Out of what?” Her voice was rough. She was angry. Not at her sister. Or maybe she was. She didn’t know anymore. She didn’t understand. ”What are you talking about?” Altair could already tell, though. Just how she knew what Rowena meant by ‘gone’, but wouldn’t accept it.
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Post by ROWENA AUDREY BENNETT on Sept 19, 2011 2:04:48 GMT -5
It was silent for a while and that silence was deafening. Never had Rowena known grief. Just as Altair feared death, Ro feared emotion and the strength of it all. She didn't understand these feelings of raw grief that twisted her gut and made her feel hollow, empty. Not the sort of emptiness that the drugs provided--she yearned for that emptiness now. She couldn't feel when she was high, it was like nothing mattered but the drugs and the way that they were slowly destroying the life she didn't want to have. It was the raw emotions that cut across this emptiness that scared her. Though her eyes were glassy and unfocused as they stared at that hole in the door caused by her dear sister whom she'd never see again, there was something behind them now. They were no longer a dull, listless blue with nothing but deadness in their depths. There was something there, something so pure and real that she just didn't want to have to acknowledge it. She wanted to hide away from reality as she'd always been doing, but for that she needed the two girls that had helped her remain stable in her denial of reality. One of whom that had just ceased to exist.
She hadn't really been aware that she was shaking until her eyes flicked away from the door and to her trembling fingers. Even if she did have the drugs Rowena doubted that she'd be able to take them in this state. She barely even flinched as Altair furiously threw the bottle at the wall, only turned her head to watch it shatter impressively against the wall, leaving scratches in the pain thanks to the sharp glass. It had broken apart immediately and Rowena strangely reflected on how that bottle seemed to represent the state of her existence right now. You could try to tape something together if it broke but it was those small shards that couldn't be retrieved which made it whole again. With Syria gone it was as if a large chunk of her existence had been ripped out of her. What was the point of living with one of them gone? The blonde brought her eyes to Altair. We've only got each other. There was not a thought more heartbreaking. She didn't know what to do with her feelings, either. The Thunder triplet saw the shimmering in her sisters eyes and knew at once that they were tears, but it didn't connect right away that Altair was about to cry. She didn't cry. She'd always been the strongest and the fiercest of the three. Feeling as if she was intruding on some sort of moment, she turned her attention to her shaking hands for a moment. She could see the needlemarks in her arms, as well, and for the first time she realised what that meant.
It could have been me. The thought terrified her. What if she'd been the one to go too far? Ro didn't want to think about that, but she had no way of stopping the thoughts. Not without her fix. The irony was unbearable. For so long Rowena had denied her addiction from her sisters, but she looked back at Altair and said quite plainly, "Drugs. What else?" It was almost ironic that the Thunder girl would be the one to become frank and straightforward in this situation. She'd always hidden before. There was nowhere to hide now, no point in hiding. "We were fuckin' kidding ourselves, Altair," she said, and colour started to flood into her tone. It was something that hadn't been heard in her voice for years. She couldn't suppress the emotion any longer, that dam was breaking now that it didn't have Syria to help keep it in place. "We knew. We both fuckin' knew and we never did anything about it." She pushed away from the wall and started pacing slightly, shaking her head as if she couldn't grasp the situation. "We were all a fuckin' mess." Altair and Rowena still were, but she left that part out. She was ashamed to admit that she hadn't done anything to help Syria. They denied that they'd known anything, but really they had. It had been obvious, the siblings had just chose to go their separate ways.
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Post by ALTAIR SABINA BENNETT on Sept 19, 2011 20:47:00 GMT -5
The realization was slowly coming around each second that she waited for a phone call, a text message. Each second she waited for a blond mirror to come bouncing through that door, wondering why her two sisters were so upset and why she had a new mess to clean up, it became all the more real. Tangible. Ironically, she could feel Syria’s absence as something physical. And something lost. A part of her was gone, a part of her and Rowena—they were all just a puzzle, and you couldn’t have a puzzle when a piece was lost. The way she could feel the girl’s absence was distressing Altair. She was lucid. Too lucid. She needed a beer. A cigarette. Vicodin. Coffee. She needed to feel good. Nothing would ever feel good again if she didn’t have something to influence her feelings, if she couldn’t get something to lift her up from the horrid abyss of everything she’d ever ignored.
And yet somehow, even as it became all too surreal, she couldn’t believe Rowena. ”Syria just OD’ed,” she said, her voice shaking as she jabbed a finger in the direction of the ground as if proving a point. She didn’t know what to do. She needed Syria to tell her what to do. She needed Rowena to be okay and not to be like she always knew she was. ”She just OD’ed and—“ Altair cut herself off, throwing her bag on the couch and rooting through it, tossing whatever she found that she didn’t need to the floor. Her movements were rushed, harried, disorganized—hair was falling out of her bun. She didn’t notice. The bottle in her grasp, she headed over to the bathroom and threw open the door, and standing before the toilet she struggled with the child-proof cap of her Vicodin. Ripping it off and flinging the lid to the floor, she dumped the rest of her drugs into the toilet and flushed. Was it satisfying? In a way. It was as if she were making the thing that took Syria’s life suffer in reutrn for it. She would need it. Oh god, she would need it.
But as she reentered the living room and remembered what Rowena had said, she knew something she needed more. Rowena. One of them was gone, and she’d be damned if she let another one slip through her fingers. That’s all she knew right now. She may have been ignoring what she should have been facing with her current emotion, but she couldn’t. ”We were a fucking mess, Ro,” she said, voice heavy. ”Were. Things were supposed to be better after we left. Or I don’t know, we were kidding ourselves, yes. But it’s going to change.” Altair continued her pointing as if to emphasize every word she spoke. ”I’m not going to let you die, and I’m not going to die. This is when we get our shit together, okay?” Her words were laced with determined conviction, and yet it was still a cover up so she wouldn’t cry, so she wouldn’t have to pay attention to the shaking. She’s gone. No, she’d been gone for a while, she just hadn’t seen it. She’d ignored it. But she wasn’t going to ignore Rowena. The girl was the only one she had left, and she wasn’t going to let the same thing that took away Syria take the Thunder girl either. As for herself? She was not going to break and shatter, no. She couldn’t. Altair was going to see to it that Rowena got better, even if it cost her everything that she believed to be important.
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Post by ROWENA AUDREY BENNETT on Sept 21, 2011 4:30:55 GMT -5
It was hard to watch Altair's composure shatter like this. Rowena had never really seen her sister like this in a long time. She's supposed to be the strongest one out all of us. Only there wasn't an 'all of us' to be strong for any more. They had been left on their own by their dear departed sister. Thinking about Syria and the fact that she was never going to be around again was hard. Ro didn't really know what to do with the information even though she knew it was the truth. Instead, she just watched Altair with an almost distressed expression as her sister threw things pell-mell out of her bag. She wanted to say something to comfort Altair or at least to calm her down a little, but even when she opened her mouth the words would not come. Giving up, Rowena pressed her lips together and swallowed hard just as the Fire triplet extracted something from her bag--a pill bottle. "What is that?" she asked, though a part of her knew. Had always known. They had all been aware of the others' self destruction and they had simply chose to pay it no mind. They had paid for that with the life of their third, their youngest. Blue eyes followed her sister to the bathroom, though she herself remained in place. The flush of the toilet was enough to guess what Altair had done, and Rowena was still in the same place where she'd been when her sister emerged.
There was almost a relief as Altair spoke with conviction, like she was taking charge of the situation as she always did. Only this time, Ro was alive enough to hear her words and heed them. She didn't respond with a listless nod or an incoherent mumble, so far under the haze of her addiction that she couldn't care less what was going on around her. "We'll make this change," she replied, and though the words were spoken softly there was something like a determination that could be found within them. There was colour in her voice, at least, and that was more than usual. "We need each other, Altair," she said, and she shook her head as a sadness rose in her throat. "We all needed each other and now--" Rowena broke off with a choked sort of sound, but she quickly bit it back and took a shuddering breath. No. She wasn't going to cry. Like Altair, Rowena had long since given up tears, though for a different reason. She usually just didn't give enough of a damn to cry about anything. "We won't make the same mistakes again." It was too hard to say her name at present, to include her in conversation as someone that was gone and that had died due to the neglect of her sisters and the lack of their support. Perhaps with time it would become easy, but she just couldn't do it now.
However, there was a bigger weight pressing on her at the moment. She could feel the need for her fix driving at the edge of her mind, present even in her grief. She knew that she was too weak to do it on her own. "I think--" she said, and she was biting her lip as she forced herself to admit something that she'd never said aloud before, "I need help, Altair. I can't just--it's too hard on my own." She was not strong enough to beat the heroin, the bulimia, not on her own. She'd cave, especially now in her times of grief when she was feeling more isolated and in need of her addiction than ever. Rowena was finding it very hard to stand up with her current dizziness and grief, so she sat back down against the wall and used it like a brace. With her back against it she didn't have to hold herself up any more. Glancing up at her sister, she said, "What are you going to do?" She was not asking how Altair was going to help her. No, Rowena knew that it would likely take both her sisters support and some sort of counselling and intervention to reverse the years of issues. She was weak, she wasn't stupid. She was asking about Altair herself. She knew her sister had her own set of problems (addiction included) and that they couldn't just pretend that it would go away on its own.
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Post by ALTAIR SABINA BENNETT on Sept 21, 2011 21:24:50 GMT -5
Only when Altair exited the bathroom was she able to answer. ”Vicodin.” She breathed in deep. Always hated how the air tasted here, and now it was even more oppressive. ”Remember my accident? Yeah…” She didn’t need to elaborate. Didn’t want to. She had become so dependent on something during her rehabilitation, that she didn’t even realize that she didn’t need it after her leg healed. Her mind was telling her that she needed it, the feeling it gave her. Why were we all the same? Her sisters were supposed to be okay, and these were the lies that tucked her in at night and helped her sleep well. The thought that maybe they hadn’t screwed up like she had. Lies. Syria was cold, unmoving proof of that. Overdosed. Altair realized all-too fully how that fate could have been open for the three of them. God just turned his giant wheel and it landed on the youngest—he struck out blindly and cruelly. God is dead. Just like her sister, that they would have to bury and attend a funeral for. There would be no denying then. There would be no turning their backs away from the coffin. ”I don’t need it anymore,” she said sternly, as if it could make the addiction go away, a non-reality. But it couldn’t. And she didn’t know how.
In a strange moment of affection, Altair wanted to wrap her arms around the girl, pull her to her chest and kiss her forehead and say that she wanted things to be back the way they were. Before it all went wrong, before they ruined their own lives. And she did pull Rowena into a fierce hug when the girl cut herself off, resting her forehead against her shoulder. She hated weakness, hated it. But she had a major one, her sisters. Sister. The only one she had left. It tore at her, thinking that—like each time she though of that missing piece, it was like someone taking a hot poker to her chest. Ro and the feeling of her warm body in Altair’s arms was the only thing keeping her there. She lifted her head, and wanted to say so many things that wouldn’t begin to describe how she felt. I want you to be the way you were, I want you to be smilng like in the pictures we didn’t keep. I want your eyes to glow again, I want your skin to flush with life so that I know you’re still alive. So that you can be alive. And it wasn’t even enough, so she didn’t say it out loud. Suddenly, there was something like hope. No, rather the idea of hope, somewhere in the back of her head telling her may be possible to survive without Syria. Maybe not now. But soon. Eventually. ”Never again.” And for once, Altair’s voice was flush, not the all-powerful thing it used to be. ”I’m not going to ignore you ever.” Not like they did before. They left each other to their fates, thinging that they were invincible. Death didn’t happen to them, even though they’d brushed so close to it like they were in a constant dance.
But something hadn’t changed—they were going to stick together. Upon entering the Academy, it was the three of them against the world. Now it was the two. And that suited her fine. She would do whatever was in her power to assist Rowena, a selflessness reserved only for the girl. Help? Rowena would get help, she’ll get all the fucking help Altair could get for her. No matter what, the conviction that burned through the emptiness and swept up shattered remains spurred her into action. ”Just tell me what you want me to do,” she said, and even though her voic wasn’t as quite before, it was different. Smoother. ”And even the things you don’t want me to do, I’ll do it.” Anything, anything to stop this from happening again, anything to keep them together. Watching Rowena collapse against the wall, Altair breathed in deep, closing her eyes. And she saw Syria behind her lids, so she stayed like that for a few moments, keeping the last glimpse she’ll ever have with her. There will be no more memories, and she somewhat accepted that. Enough to open her eyes and say, ”I don’t even know where to begin.” Her laugh was rough. ”But I’ll figure it out. You know I will.” And maybe helping her sister was the best thing for her. She needed to focus, and not be such a goddamn lunatic. She needed to survive.
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Post by ROWENA AUDREY BENNETT on Sept 24, 2011 11:37:51 GMT -5
Rowena understood with sickening clarity what must have happened after the accident and after the injury had healed. Her sister, her wonderful, beautiful sister... she'd been just as broken as Syria or Rowena, she'd just been so much better at hiding it than they were. Ro had known that Altair was not as perfect as she acted like she was but she wouldn't have guessed that it was the Vicodin that had been her drug of choice. Of course, she thought. After all, why not? Even though it might not have been as heavy a drug as some of the ones that Rowena had experimented with, it was still bad. It was still an addiction, and she worried about Altair's health now. Syria had overdosed--probably on her anti-depressants or something. Rowena could overdose any day now, or she could hit the wrong vein, or she could inject some bad drugs... and Altair was the same. She was in danger, too. "No," she agreed encouragingly, latching on to Altair's stubborn determination as if it were a life line that could fix them both. "No, you don't." They both knew that it wouldn't be that easy. Though the drugs had dulled her, they had not turned her into an absolute idiot. She was a shadow of her former self but she had some sort of intelligence. She wasn't academically skilled but she had her street smarts. Smarts that told her addictions weren't cold turkey things most of the time. "Do you have any more?" Again from personal experience, Ro knew that some people kept 'back up' stocks, and she was hoping that Altair wasn't hiding anything from her. She trusted her sister but she was just making sure.
There was a rush of affection for Altair in Rowena's chest when the girl pulled her into a hug. She knew her triplet well, knew that hugging wasn't usually her 'thing'. So she took it for all that it was worth, returning the gesture as fiercely as possible. Her weak frame didn't have as tight of a grip as she might have liked but the silent message was the same. 'Thank you.' She needed her sister, needed her just as much as the oxygen that she sucked into her lungs as she drew breath. She gave a soft nod when Altair affirmed that they would not make mistakes, then said that she would not ignore her. "I believe you," said Ro, and it was filled with the genuine truth. "I won't ignore you, either." They needed this promise, this conviction, this drive. They were in this together no matter whether they liked it or not. Of course they were not going to like it. Being in it together meant one significant thing--Syria was not here with them. Syr, who had been a part of their lives since birth, was no longer a part of their lives. And it was going to hurt, but it was going to get better. Rowena had to believe that. She had to. If she didn't cling to this hope of hopes, she was going to waste away and leave this Earth forever. Would she be reunited with Syria if she passed on? She didn't think so. She didn't have enough faith in the world to believe in something as beautiful as an afterlife. Her sister was gone, gone for good.
But her other sister was not. She was here and they were going to help one another. "Stop me, Altair," she said. "Don't let me break myself further. Even if you've got to tie me down and tape my mouth shut so I don't bitch at you." She gave a sort of shaky, strangled laugh. It was a very weak sound but it was something that had not been heard from her lips in several years. She'd always been the serious triplet ever since she'd faded away. She never laughed, never smiled, never showed any sign of positive emotion. Of any emotion, really. And even though the laughter was humourless, it was something. She had to concentrate on whatever she could in order to ignore the fact that Syr wouldn't be here to see her get better. Because she would get better. They both would. We have to. For Syria, for ourselves. "Yeah," she agreed softly. She did know that Altair could do this. She had confidence in the other girl, her triplet. She wouldn't, couldn't refer to her as a twin. They were not twins. They would never be. "I'll need to look into some sort of outside help, too," she said, wanting to get this out of the way. Rowena was very proud and didn't like to admit that she might need it, but she knew that she did and so she would relent this pride. "Drugs... aren't my only problems, and you can't do everything. You need to look out for yourself, too." She brushed her hand against Altair's in a sign of comfort. She was not saying that Altair was not strong enough to help her all alone, but that she had no plans of making her bear the brunt of the burden.
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Post by ALTAIR SABINA BENNETT on Sept 24, 2011 18:34:15 GMT -5
Altair sighed, ran her shaking hands through her hair again, bracelets jangling as she did so. ”No,” she said. ”No, I don’t.” If it was with anyone else at any other time, she may have gotten snippy at the doubt. But she understood Rowena. Too well, as a matter of fact. And it hurt, all this coming out in the open. It really felt like she was fighting in the ring—except she wasn’t stricking back, just trying desperately to defend herself from the blows. She was telling the Rowena the truth about that. She only really got one perscription at a time. At least she was responsible in that area. Doesn’t count for much, does it, you bloody idiot. More than she hated death at the moment for taking Syria away, and even the girl for leaving her, she hated herself for not being able to stop it. She was an enabler. And it didn’t even matter that they were all doing the same thing, didn’t matter that Rowena felt the guilt too. Because Altair felt like a mother to them, a very horrible, screwed up mother. Better than Mum, anyway, she thought bitterly. Didn’t even matter though. Nothing mattered in this moment except the fact that there was two of them in this apartment when there was supposed to be three.
When Rowena laughed—it wasn’t really a laugh, but it was close enough to be considered one—Altair had to laugh too. Bitterly, in a close-to-tears kind of way. She wasn’t going to break into hysterics though. She was strong. She was going to be strong because if she didn’t, it would only get worse. If she broke, it would only be more self-destruction, it would be a similar death to Syria. ”Oh don’t worry, I will. Hog-tie and all.” The joking fell a bit flat, but it was getting better. All she had to think of was that it was the dark before dawn, and there had to be the light at the end of the tunnel. ”Outside help,” Altair said, her voice soft. Would she do that? Should she do that? She didn’t want outside help, she didn’t want anyone to see that there was anything wrong with her. I’m perfect. She’d spent years inflating her ego and believing herself to be the best of the best. She couldn’t consider that there was something else, something wrong with her. But here she was, sister dead, other sister broken but hopefully not beyond repair, and her trying to pick everything up. She was far from perfect. No one else needed to know. Therapy. She hated thinking of it, but she would…she’d try. For Rowena’s sake, so this wouldn’t happen again. ”You can tell me anything,” Altair said, resting her palm on her forehead, brushing the blond hair back. The same hair as Rowena. The same hair as Syria. Hair keeps growing after you die. She didn’t want to think about that. ”If you want to, you can tell me what’s going on.” Altair felt like she should know these things, know what’s happening with her sister. Maybe long ago, she should have asked how her day was. Maybe if they’d communicated more… But maybes couldn’t ressurect Syria, and they were pointless.
”I’ll handle all the funeral stuff, and…” She stopped short. Her throat tightened. Eyes grew wider by a centimeter. ”Tomorrow.” She didn’t want to face it all right now. She didn’t want to have to pick out a coffin or decide whether or not she wanted her goddamn sister cremated. Everything felt tight, constricted, suffocating. ”I need some sleep.” But she wouldn’t sleep, not tonight. And it felt like she would never sleep again. How could she sleep knowing that she won’t wake up to Syria and Syria’s voice and Syria’s smile? But she has Rowena, and she needed the girl. As long as Altair knew she was all right, she could sleep well enough. ”Night, Ro.” Her smile was small and it was one of those Altair-smiles that didn’t really show much happiness. But it was enough. For now, at least.
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