We Faced the Dusk, We Faced the Dawn [1/2] (Moses, Pest, Biggz)inksplotch_edDecember 21 2011, 04:54:01 UTC
It's gonna get easier, it's gonna.
It's gotta.
--
It's not as bad as it could be, but it's still worse than they could have imagined.
Fallout with the feds is minimal; between Sam and Tia, they manage to navigate the legal bullshit and point out that with no witnesses, no evidence, and actually, testimony to the contrary, Moses and Pest couldn't be held for the murder of the officers or of Hi-Hatz's guys. The weed and the joyride couldn't be proven. The explosion and the cut cuffs were harder to handle, but Sam spun an elaborate story about mistaken identity and arson and somehow, magically, they were off the hook.
But not really.
--
Pest and Biggz talk to Jerome's mum and sister. They think between the two of them, they can hold it together long enough to -
They think between the two of them, the agony will be a bit less.
They think wrong.
Jerome’s sister starts yelling, incoherent curses in a high-pitched voice which twine together with the wordless, shrill whine Jerome’s mother emits as she slowly sinks to the ground. She slides down the wall, wrapping her arms around her knees as she roughly lands and continues keening, broken. Jerome’s sister continues to let the threats and profanities fly as she kneels and hugs her mother. She isn’t looking at Pest and Biggz anymore, neither of them are looking at Pest and Biggz. They curl in on each other, sobbing, alone with their grief.
Pest and Biggz let themselves out. They stumble to the stairwell blindly clutching each other’s jacket sleeves.
--
Moses talks to Dennis' dad. It's worse.
He steels himself, sets his jaw and looks at Dennis’ dad’s forehead the entire time they’re talking. He never sees any of his friends’ parents, doesn’t know how adults acts, doesn’t know how to talk to them. He only has his uncle to judge from, and, well - that’s not much.
He expects awkwardness. He expects anger. He expects yelling. He expects tears.
He doesn’t expect silence, a bunched-up fist in a strained pocket and a flexing tendon in Dennis’ dad’s jaw. He finishes saying what he came to say to silence in response, mumbles out his feeble closing ‘young Den was a right hero,’ and gets out of the flat as quickly as possible.
As he hurries down the corridor he hears a plate shatter behind the closed door, and another, and another. The echoes follow him all the way down to the elevator and up to floor 19.
We Faced the Dusk, We Faced the Dawn [2/2] (Moses, Pest, Biggz)inksplotch_edDecember 21 2011, 04:56:39 UTC
Pest gets ready to be alone. He figures it’ll be days, maybe weeks before Biggz’s mom lets him out of the flat; longer before Moses is ready to be around other people. He hunches his shoulders, yanks his cap down, assures Nan that the Feds made a mistake, honest! and the leg’s gonna be fine! before popping in FIFA and settling in for a long, solitary, video-game filled hibernation. He hopes they’ll help him not to think. They usually work pretty perfectly for that.
Biggz and Moses show up within ten minutes of each other, without a word. They plop down on the carpet, Moses leaning against the bed and Biggz rocking slightly near the TV. Pest motions toward the controllers and they play football with their thumbs for hours.
It helps a little, just being together. It helps, but it isn’t the same. Pest can’t stop glancing at the beat-up chair in the corner, can’t stop flinging his arm out to whack somebody who isn’t sitting there. Every time, he hunches his shoulders, dips his head, and concentrates a little harder on the game.
--
Biggz is having trouble accepting everything.
He didn’t see it all, not like Moses or Pest. He didn’t live it. He spent the night in a paper recycling bin, freaking out about just one of those things and leaving frantic voice messages to his cousin and to his mum and to his friend who just happened to already be dead at the time.
He still can’t believe that.
He still can’t believe they came by the dozens, that they were just following some hormone or whatever rubbish Brewis spewed at him, that Moses killed all them things with the gas in his flat and a banger. Of course, he believes it, intellectually, he knows it all really went down. He knows Moses is a hero. But he’s having trouble processing the events.
He’s having trouble processing the fact that he jumped in a bin and when he jumped back out, two of his best friends were dead. Dead, just like that.
He’s in shock. He sits in his room, staring at the wall, refusing food from his mum when she comes in all worried and angry and naggy. He sits and stares waits for it all to sink in.
It has to, eventually.
--
They go out on the bikes three days later.
Feels wrong, without the popping and clunking of Dennis’ motor to the stronger, deeper purr of Moses’ bike; without Jerome pedaling double-time and complaining because Biggz keeps hopping rides instead of just getting his own. Without their jokes, their insults, their comments. Their laughs. Their voices.
They go out again, and again, every day. Trying to act like everything’s normal, trying to get used to it.
It isn’t working, but they don’t stop.
--
Moses has trouble sleeping - resting, anyways - for weeks. Fragments from that night won’t get out of his head.
The chants? The chants were like an angelic melody, harmonies of choirs filling Moses’ head with calming, cooling water. But they faded away quickly enough.
What doesn’t fade away quickly enough is the look on Dennis’ face as glowing blue teeth popped through his helmet, or the sound of Jerome’s voice calling frantically for his friends in a smoky, echoing corridor. They play in technicolor and surround sound while he lies awake at night, waiting to drift off.
It's gotta.
--
It's not as bad as it could be, but it's still worse than they could have imagined.
Fallout with the feds is minimal; between Sam and Tia, they manage to navigate the legal bullshit and point out that with no witnesses, no evidence, and actually, testimony to the contrary, Moses and Pest couldn't be held for the murder of the officers or of Hi-Hatz's guys. The weed and the joyride couldn't be proven. The explosion and the cut cuffs were harder to handle, but Sam spun an elaborate story about mistaken identity and arson and somehow, magically, they were off the hook.
But not really.
--
Pest and Biggz talk to Jerome's mum and sister. They think between the two of them, they can hold it together long enough to -
They think between the two of them, the agony will be a bit less.
They think wrong.
Jerome’s sister starts yelling, incoherent curses in a high-pitched voice which twine together with the wordless, shrill whine Jerome’s mother emits as she slowly sinks to the ground. She slides down the wall, wrapping her arms around her knees as she roughly lands and continues keening, broken. Jerome’s sister continues to let the threats and profanities fly as she kneels and hugs her mother. She isn’t looking at Pest and Biggz anymore, neither of them are looking at Pest and Biggz. They curl in on each other, sobbing, alone with their grief.
Pest and Biggz let themselves out. They stumble to the stairwell blindly clutching each other’s jacket sleeves.
--
Moses talks to Dennis' dad. It's worse.
He steels himself, sets his jaw and looks at Dennis’ dad’s forehead the entire time they’re talking. He never sees any of his friends’ parents, doesn’t know how adults acts, doesn’t know how to talk to them. He only has his uncle to judge from, and, well - that’s not much.
He expects awkwardness. He expects anger. He expects yelling. He expects tears.
He doesn’t expect silence, a bunched-up fist in a strained pocket and a flexing tendon in Dennis’ dad’s jaw. He finishes saying what he came to say to silence in response, mumbles out his feeble closing ‘young Den was a right hero,’ and gets out of the flat as quickly as possible.
As he hurries down the corridor he hears a plate shatter behind the closed door, and another, and another. The echoes follow him all the way down to the elevator and up to floor 19.
Reply
Biggz and Moses show up within ten minutes of each other, without a word. They plop down on the carpet, Moses leaning against the bed and Biggz rocking slightly near the TV. Pest motions toward the controllers and they play football with their thumbs for hours.
It helps a little, just being together. It helps, but it isn’t the same. Pest can’t stop glancing at the beat-up chair in the corner, can’t stop flinging his arm out to whack somebody who isn’t sitting there. Every time, he hunches his shoulders, dips his head, and concentrates a little harder on the game.
--
Biggz is having trouble accepting everything.
He didn’t see it all, not like Moses or Pest. He didn’t live it. He spent the night in a paper recycling bin, freaking out about just one of those things and leaving frantic voice messages to his cousin and to his mum and to his friend who just happened to already be dead at the time.
He still can’t believe that.
He still can’t believe they came by the dozens, that they were just following some hormone or whatever rubbish Brewis spewed at him, that Moses killed all them things with the gas in his flat and a banger. Of course, he believes it, intellectually, he knows it all really went down. He knows Moses is a hero. But he’s having trouble processing the events.
He’s having trouble processing the fact that he jumped in a bin and when he jumped back out, two of his best friends were dead. Dead, just like that.
He’s in shock. He sits in his room, staring at the wall, refusing food from his mum when she comes in all worried and angry and naggy. He sits and stares waits for it all to sink in.
It has to, eventually.
--
They go out on the bikes three days later.
Feels wrong, without the popping and clunking of Dennis’ motor to the stronger, deeper purr of Moses’ bike; without Jerome pedaling double-time and complaining because Biggz keeps hopping rides instead of just getting his own. Without their jokes, their insults, their comments. Their laughs. Their voices.
They go out again, and again, every day. Trying to act like everything’s normal, trying to get used to it.
It isn’t working, but they don’t stop.
--
Moses has trouble sleeping - resting, anyways - for weeks. Fragments from that night won’t get out of his head.
The chants? The chants were like an angelic melody, harmonies of choirs filling Moses’ head with calming, cooling water. But they faded away quickly enough.
What doesn’t fade away quickly enough is the look on Dennis’ face as glowing blue teeth popped through his helmet, or the sound of Jerome’s voice calling frantically for his friends in a smoky, echoing corridor. They play in technicolor and surround sound while he lies awake at night, waiting to drift off.
There is sleep, but there is no rest.
--
It's gonna get easier, it's gonna.
(It's not.)
Reply
(The comment has been removed)
Reply
Reply
Reply
what are you doing to my poor heart?
Reply
Reply
Reply
Reply
Reply
Reply
;~;
Reply
i mean this is gr9 and all but ughhhh my heart
Reply
Leave a comment