"Hm." Alba knew she didn't want to trouble him, but he ignored it. Filling a cup with water from the tap, he set it on the edge of the tub next to her, along with two bright orange tablets. "It'll help at least." Taking the rest of the makeshift first aid and laying it on the lid of the toilet, he leaned over her, grasping the bottom of her dress. "Here, arms up." Pulling it up over her head, he tightened his lips, looking over the damage. Her arm was the worst, the huge gash rather obvious, but she had some minor cuts around too. Unlacing her boots and pulling them off, he rolled off the shredded leggings, careful to avoid most of her scrapes as he went.
He shifted next to the tub, on his own knees, and turned on the water, letting it get lukewarm. Not too hot, but not ice-cold, either. Once it was the right temperature, he held a washcloth underneath the stream, then leaned up to Jinx's face, gently cleaning away the blood from her cheeks and neck, and a little into her hair where it had drained. He dabbed around her eyes, careful to not actually get in them as he cleaned her up. He then gave her another reassuring smile and rinsed out the cloth, before taking her arm in his hands and moving around the cut. It wasn't as deep as it looked, but it had cut a lot of blood vessels, which still made it look nasty. He gently washed the blood away, then dabbed at the wound, stimulating circulation enough to help get any debris out of the gash.
"Jesus, Jinx. You did a number on yourself." He tried to keep the conversation light, keeping her in the now by talking to her. "I thought you always made sure to have protection." He offered a joking smile this time, hoping to lift her spirits even a fraction. He moved to rinse the cloth out again, then moved it across her legs, washing out the grit, dirt, and blood. "At least most of this is superficial. You feel anything in pain?" He touched her chest and stomach where he saw the worst bruising, applying gentle pressure to make sure everything was intact. "Bones broken, muscles torn, anything?" He set the cloth aside, then turned to grab the bottle of antiseptic, a gauze pad in his opposite hand. Opening the lid, he pressed the pad against the top of the bottle, inverting it briefly to get some on the pad before dabbing it across the large wound on her arm. "This might sting a little." Patting it over the cut, he used a second gauze pad to apply more before moving to the scrapes.
Now that she could take in what was going on at the proper speed, now that she could understand what he was saying and comprehend the situation, she tried to shirt back to herself. She tried to be cynical about what was going on, tried to act like she was not bothered, like she could handle herself. When the water and pills was sat down next to her, she picked up the cup, splashing some around from how badly her hands were shaking. Reaching for the pills, she accidentally knocked one into the tub and it took her more than one try to be able to pick it back up. Finally, she was able to swing them back, taking a long drink of the water. Though not able to control her breathing all that well, she began to cough and sputter. The action made her head pound and she cringed, dropping the cup onto herself as she put her arms over her head, once more feeling the need to try and keep her skull together.
When she felt Alba near again, she moved her arms away to reach out to him, but he had other ideas. Trembling, she drew her knees back up as he grabbed the bottom of her dress, but slowly she relaxed enough to let him remove it from her. Her arms wrapped around her knees as she buried her face in them, her shoulders shaking with the sobs that came again all too suddenly. Although she shrank back when he tried to remove her boots, she finally gave in to whatever he did next until she was undressed and left chilled in the bottom of the tub. When he came back to her, she looked up and him, the tears flowing a steady, hot stream down her cheeks. They were no longer bloody. Instinctively, she followed the warmth of the washcloth and he ran it over her face, pressing her cheek into his hand, her eyes big, sorrowful and bloodshot.
When he took her arm, she began to feel the need to back away from him once more, but she was already shrank back to the far corner of the tub as tightly as she could. Shutting her eyes tightly, she turned her head away from him and felt more sobs choke in her throat. As he dabbed at the gash, she whined, not from the pain but from something much, much different. When he spoke to her, she tried to relax, reminding herself over and over again that it was just Alba, her Alba, her brother, her best friend, someone she was completely safe with. Yet when he offered out his joke, she felt it to be more of a jab to her. "I-I can't... I can't protect myself... f-f-from my... from myself..."
As he moved across her legs, she tried her best to uncurl herself, but her muscles wanted to stay tight, keep every body part as close to her as possible. When he asked her about the pain, she looked away again, the most prominent one being inside of her head. But as he touched her stomach, she winced, still not completely healed from her last endeavor fighting Sebastian. There had been some tissue damage along her ribs and a fracture from being beaten in the stomach with a lamppost, and most of it was healed with little to no pain until today. It was easily ignored, though. All the physical pain was easily ignorable, having built up a tolerance from surgeries with no anesthetic. She was strong enough to not be bothered by--
"Fuck..." she whimpered as he dabbed the antiseptic over the gash on her arm. Even the smaller scrapes stun and she shied away from him, the tears starting back into sobs just as they had began to calm. And now she began to cough, dehydrated from all of this, the screaming, the sobs that clotted in her throat. And finally she realized something, opened her eyes just enough to see his blurred figure through her burning tears. If she was injured... then he... "Al... Alba... are you hurt? Are you o-okay?"
Taking the water cup from her, he stood from dabbing at her legs, and turned to refill it in the same motion. Her timing was impeccable, as his side flashed with pain as she asked the question, aggravated by the twist he'd just made. Slowly, he finished turning to the sink, filling the cup only to empty it himself, popping a couple of pills of his own. "Yeah..." he muttered out of the grunt he gave beforehand. "...just got hit with something." His hand gently pressed on his ribs, and he sucked in another breath, grimacing. "...think I broke a rib." He sighed, refilling the cup again and bringing it back to Jinx. "Here, drink up. You've lost enough blood to worry about."
He knelt down next to the tub, reaching to stroke Jinx's shoulders. "Hang on..." he reached down, touching the clasps on her back. "I'm not trying anything, don't worry." He kissed her cheek again as he unhooked her bra, sliding it gently off her shoulders and down her arms. Once it was free, he set it aside, away from the trashed clothes she was previously wearing. Then, his hands touched her sides, just under her arms, and stroked down, until they hooked in the elastic of her waistband. "Lift for a second?" When he had clearance, he pulled the panties down, carefully avoiding the still open scrapes on her legs. Once they were free, they joined the separate pile with the bra, and Alba gave an assuring smile. He then turned the heat of the water up, just enough to be comfortably warm, and dropped the stopper.
"It's not much... I mean, I don't know if it will help... but I dunno, it can't hurt, right?" As the water began to fill the tub, rising around Jinx's nude, huddled form, Alba unzipped the leather top he was wearing, shedding it for a plain tanktop underneath. He dipped his hand in the water surrounding Jinx, making sure the temperature was all right, and cupped some of it, bringing it up and dripping it over her legs, letting the water ease the pain, either from the wounds or the antiseptic. He then reached over and touched Jinx's shoulders again, stroking them gently. "It's not too hot, is it?" He smiled, shifting into a more comfortable position next to the tub. "I mean, if it is, tell me now... unless it's too cold or something."
As much as she could through the burning of her tears, she watched him move, seeing the pain when he twisted. Worried, she moved a bit away from her corner of safety and brought a shaking hand to the edge of the tub. "You... you got hurt... you got hurt be-because of me." Hearing what had happened, she began to shrink back. "I did that. I hurt you... I'm sorry... I'm sorry... that's bad... I'm sorry..." But he came back to her anyway, handing her something, the cup of water again. Her hands, normally steady as a surgeon's, could barely hold the cup at a level where it would not spill. Luckily, water was nothing new to this bathtub. And despite spilling some of it down the front of her, coughing at every swallow since her breathing would still not keep on time, she managed to actually get down a good half of the cup. It was emptied now, either into her mouth or over it, and as she attempted to set it back down on the edge of the bathtub, she ended up knocking it onto the floor.
Her muscles jumped with her mistake, especially when she saw Alba's hand come toward her. But instead of trying to make sure that mistake was never made again, he simply touched her shoulder. Feeling the warm touch, loving, she moved into his hand, the tears rolling softer over her cheeks. It was comfortable when his hand moved over her spine, yet it was not the same situation when she felt his hand on the clasp of her bra. Looking away from him, she crossed her arms over her chest, tightly grabbing to her opposite shoulders and drawing her knees up as if to reinforce that. Though when he kissed her cheek, he reassured her of something she continued to let slip. It did not make her feel better that he was not trying anything with her, but every time he kissed her face, each time he spoke, he continued to remind her that he was Alba, he was her brother, and she was safe.
Without another protest, she let him removed her bra. Though she jumped just a bit when he stroked down her body, she let him, helped him remove the rest of her clothing. And there, nude in the bathtub, curling back into her tight ball, cold against the offwhite porcelain around her, she was not the deadly assassin. She was not a weapon, not someone with confidence, not a young woman who would challenge anything and fight it to the death just to prove a point. She was the nameless child, regressing to her youth to escape the decisions she had to make in her adult life, to try and hide from the pain and only finding a deeper hurt, only coming to see fear. When she felt the water begin to rise around her, an unexpected heat she put her arms back over her head and buried herself in her knees as if protecting herself from the entire room exploding around her. And there she stayed with no reaction to his touch, to his questions, to any outside influences, blocking it all out as she tightened her grip to her skull that could very well break apart at any instant.
Her concept of time was horribly askew. Every moment in the courtyard felt like an eternity, and the car ride home had taken a mere five minutes to her. So she did not know now whether she was curled into an unreceptive ball for a matter of minutes or nearly an hour. Yet when she finally began to pull away from herself, uncurl from her shell shocked state, let her skull stay together on its own and opened her eyes... Alba was still there. That was when she began to rationalize. Timidly, she reached out a hand toward him, using small whines as an easier form of communication than Italian, and begged to hold his hand. When she could finally grasp it, she pulled it to her face and cupped her cheek in his palm, the size difference very relative. "You... you're not leaving me..." she more observed than anything else.
Now as she looked at him, she was still frightened, still half crying, but her big eyes were no longer as feral as they were. She could focus on his face now, lock onto his eyes. "You're going to stay with me... and Soiree doesn't have a choice." She chocked on a mixture of a sob and slight laughter, which just ended in her coughing. And as the couch faded, she began to cry again, closing her eyes, holding his hand tightly to her chest. "But Papa... Papa's gonna hate me... I did something stupid and he's gonna hate me. And then Shunsui... then ShuShu's gonna hate me... because he'd pick Papa over me... and they're not gonna let me come home... and they're not gonna love me... they're not gonna... they're gonna leave... I love them and they'll leave me because I did a bad thing..." Harshly, she bit her bottom lip, trying her best to contain anything that may have caused problems.
She was walling herself up, trying to protect herself from being hurt, by any forces, outside or within. But it didn't dissuade Alba. He tried not to worry, tried to just keep doing what he was doing, touching her, talking to her, making sure she knew he was still there. Eventually, he saw her unclench, begin to unfurl from herself, and finally saw her eyes again, and smiled at her, responding to her gestures and sounds by giving her his hand.
"Nope, not leaving you, kid. Not now, not ever." He brushed his thumb over her cheekbone gently, pressing his hand up against her cheek warmly. He almost laughed with her next words. "No choice whatsoever. Not that he'd have a problem with it. You mean almost as much to him as you mean to me, even if he can be a dick about it." His smile pulled back almost imperceptibly as she continued, his hand moving to her chest as she began lamenting, began blaming herself for losing people that haven't been lost yet. He let her get it out, let her condemn her circumstances a little more before his other hand came up, placing a finger against her bitten lip.
"That's enough of that crap," he smiled again. "Not everyone is those fucks that hurt you, and not everyone is Gin." He all but spat the name. He had never liked Gin, not even for a moment. The man reeked of lies and sadism, and anyone who hurt his big sister deserved a painful, long death in his eyes. "You're only human, Jinx, and humans make mistakes. The best of us knows that... understand and accept it. And from what you've said, those are two of the best of us." He leaned closer to her, his forehead coming to rest against hers. "Yeah, they might be upset... but if they're even half of what you said they are, they'll get over it. They'll get over it, and worry about you, and want to help you." He kissed the end of her nose. "They love you too... and I don't think they'll leave you, any more than I'd leave you. You're special to them now."
He pulled away for only a moment to turn the water off, then came back to her, never actually leaving her grasp. "You have people now, Jinx; people who love you and care for you and only want to see you smile. It took a long time, sure, but you've got them now, and they're not going anywhere. Me, Soiree, Jushiro, Shunsui... I'm sure there's more, too. None of us will let you go." He cupped her cheek in his hand once more. "Ever."
And suddenly Jinx was hushed, a finger to her lips. Under normal circumstance, that would have been a very stupid thing to do, hushing the assassin, but this was not the average situation. Instantaneously she quieted herself to nothing above a soft whimpering that came naturally with this state of being. And there, right in his second sentence, he hit the nail right on the head. Her twin brother had left her, but not intentionally. He had died. But Gin, the man she worshiped, the man she followed around like a sick puppy, who she did anything for no matter what it was, who she convinced herself she loved... he went back to Japan without a single word to her. She nearly killed herself trying to find him in the city, trying to track him down anyway possible, and part of her did die when she finally found out his location. Because he had intentionally left her without a single care and nothing she could have done, no matter how much she told herself otherwise, would have changed that.
When he almost seemed to scold her, she could not bring herself to look at him. The thing about Alba when he did not have his sunglasses on (which was a rare phenomenon,) was that she could see his every emotion in his deep, emerald eyes. Right now, she did not want to see him angry with her. Things became much more difficult to block out when he put his forehead against hers. Opening her eyes, she found herself barely over a centimeter away from his gaze... and he was not angry. He even kissed the tip of her nose, and when something like that occurred, she knew he had to be telling the truth. Regaining her sanity bit by bit, she believed the words that he was saying. And finally, she broke at the root of the problem. "I always thought I was special to Gin, but he lied to me... he used me. I... I thought I loved him, I did love him, and he threw me away when he found something better to play with..." Nothing less than pathetic, she took to hugging his entire arm, sobbing against his tattoo.
Her voice became squeaky again in her hoarseness, but now she could formulate sentences and actually finish them. Her mind was coming back to her. "He left me! I tracked him down and he went back to fucking Japan with his goddamn fucking boyfriend and he's forgotten about me! He never loved me... he lied! He told me I was special and he was just lying so I would do his dirty work, so I would follow his every order... and I could have killed him... I could have snapped his neck but I was too afraid... I was too fucking afraid of him! I trusted his every word. I loved him without question. And every time I needed him, every time I couldn't handle what I was doing, every time I came to him for just a bit of comfort, he was disgusted with me! But every time... every time I did something good, he would smile. He would tell me I was special, he would tell me I was worth more than how others treated me and I fell for it, that sonuvabitch! He was leading me on... he didn't care what happened to me as long as it benefited him!" She was more telling this to herself than anything, for these were things Alba already knew, things he resented, things he had tried to tell Jinx over and over again and she had only yelled at him to shut up each time. She had been blinded by the need for acceptance, completely jaded, and now she felt guilty, actual real guilt, for shoving Alba aside on this matter.
Shaking, she let go of Alba and put her head in her freshly bloodied arms, letting them rest on the edge of the tub, crying until no more tears would come and she was just making noise. The water in the tub rolled around her body in small, erratic waves covered in signatures of pink. Her abilities, which decimated the courtyard of the Di Luca compound, could now barely splash her sides. That was not a bad thing. And finally, terribly dehydrated, her voice so shot that she could barely speak, she lifted up her head and asked with all the sanity Jinx had left in her, "Can you get me something... to blow my nose on, fratello?" And clenching her fists, closing her stinging eyes, she told him, "I'm so sorry."
His eyes never left hers as the realization dawned, hit her like a sack of bricks, even. He watched as the betrayal, the sadness, and the anger that he'd tried to warn her about all rose to the top at once. Part of him, a part that he never let out himself, grinned at her reaction, because if Gin ever returned to Reggio Calabria, he would be a dead man ten times over. He deserved no less, treating a tormented girl like a servant. But he'd never say so to Jinx. He'd never say so to anyone. It was one of those thoughts that some people just couldn't let out; it would color the view of them, both in other people's eyes, and in their own. Alba was the quiet one, the least likely to fight. Strong, silent, and a rock of support for his family and friends. What would happen if the rock showed some chips in it? Would they begin to wonder what it would take to bring him toppling down? No, he had to keep to himself. He was kind, compassionate, and while given to anger once in a while, was never overtaken by it.
Watching her get this way was almost enough to break his resolve, to fly out to Japan himself just to find the man and give him what he'd earned. But as she left go of his arm, burying her face in her own, he shook his head at himself. He couldn't go anywhere... and he wouldn't want to. His place was here, with those closest to him, giving them the strength behind them to face their own demons readily. He leaned forward, kissing Jinx's cheek as she asked her question. "Of course, schwester, of course." He stood, turning carefully this time so as not to aggravate his ribs, to get the tissue box on the counter. "And please don't apologize to me. I'm just doing what brothers do for their sisters." He chuckled as he returned to the tub with the box in his hand. "Well, at least what they do here. I'm sure, somewhere else, I'd probably be consoling you over a bad break-up or something superficial like that."
Resettling himself, he leaned back, his head gently resting against the same tile wall as hers, and titled towards her. His arm looped behind her back, settling over her shoulder, as his other hand touched her arm softly, reassuringly. He continued to smile that same Alba smile, slight but reassuring, and pulled her as close as the tub would allow, touching her head with his own. "Just... thank you for not being dead, Jinx. Thank you for having the strength to keep going. If anything happened to you... I don't know. I'm not ready to deal with that." His eyes moved to her. "Believe it or not, you keep me sane around here. You and Soiree. If it weren't for you guys, I'd probably be dead in a gutter, or worse, dead from work stress. You remind me of what I have to live for."
When his lips pressed tenderly against her cheek, she gave a small, sad smile, knowing the salty warmth of her tears were now on his kiss. And when he called her his sister in German, a language she knew next to nothing about, she knew that everything was going to be all right for now. Gin was gone, and he was never coming back to hurt her. Now was a time to move on, for she had people who loved her and were never going to use her. They were not going to hurt her. "Right, so all little brothers strip down their sisters and give them baths when they have mental breakdowns. I never knew." With that bit of cynical sarcasm, Jinx was now thinking straight... or as rational as she could be after what she just put herself through. Gratefully, she took several tissues from the box with her hands incredibly erratic in their shaking, and she spend the new few moments blowing her nose until she could finally breathe through it again. The hot steam from the bathtub helped clear things up.
"God, I wish I was an American," she told him, leaning into his arm as it wrapped around her back. "I have all these fucking stupid little fantasies... they're so fucking stupid... like that I was an American teenager, who only worried about stupid, trivial things. That I actually went to school. That I had parents and they were too strict. That I wasn't a skinny little punk. Maybe that I was lazy, maybe even overweight, and I wore wool sweaters and had a crush on a football player." When she laughed, she felt herself choking on a few more sobs and had to grab another tissue, making a neat pile of used ones on the floor by the tub. "But instead I'm... I'm this... I'm a scrawny piece of killing machine who's dating a retired cop and worried about whether or not I'm going to be shot down every time I walk outside."
Talking helped, it really did even though her voice was incredibly hoarse, even though it hurt her throat. Forming complete sentences, focusing on her Italian instead of the pain that was now seeping from her nerves. Now that she could feel again, she did not know what was worse, her headache or that damn gash. "Hey," she began softly, nuzzling her head to his, "it's not me you should be thanking. I could be saying the exact same words to you. I can't count how many times you and Soiree have covered my ass. I can't trust myself, so I'm glad I have to the two of you. Now, if we were all Americans, and you were the boys from down the street, I'd probably call you my best friends but not act that way around the popular kids and we'd have little feel good moments every so often, but all and I'll you'd be the token nerds." Jinx watched too much TV Land. "And we'd get into wacky situations and I might even be a blond."
With a morbid sort of chuckle, she pulled away from Alba and slipped down into the tub, the water having an interesting tint from blood and dirt. Closing her eyes, she sank down to the bottom of the tub, letting it engulf her head, wash the blood out of her ears, her nose, the tears off her face. When she emerged, taking a slow breath, her hair laid flat and slick against her head, dripping the hot water. Just for comfort this time, she drew her knees loosely to her chest and rested her cheek against them, looking toward Alba. Weakly, her wet hand reached out and took his, needing that contact. "But... I really am sorry... I never wanted you to see that. I... I never intended you to find out that way. But... you deserve to know. You deserve to be told this. This shouldn't be a secret to you... but, but I'd like Soiree not to know. Soiree wouldn't understand."
She squeezed his hand, looking at him with her big eyes, giving the most sorrowful smile that had ever cross her face. "I wasn't meant to be anything more than an experiment. They knew they were going to eventually end up terminating me since I wasn't compatible with the experiment. So they did a lot of shit to me... stuff that people... stuff that people aren't supposed to live through. Alba," she said his name softly, a comforting attempt for both him and herself, "I have lesions on my brain. I... I haven't seen them on a CAT scan in a few years, but... I've been told I may not even live to be thirty. ...I'm sorry."
A chuckle escaped him as she likened the possibility of their would-be lives to that of an old sitcom. Mostly, he was glad to hear her starting to come back to herself, her sense of humor the most reassuring thing at that moment. When she dove under the surface of the water, he watched her pink strands float apart from each other, and he found himself wondering what life could have been like somewhere else... with his parents alive, with no Monacello or Vescovo... But Alba wasn't a fan of 'could have been' situations. Reality had enough problems as it was without adding the depression that came with a 'what could have happened' line of thinking. Still, he did see what some people could find appealing about the fantasy.
When she came back up and grasped his hand, his eyes met hers again, and he listened to her slight request. He nodded in response, wondering why she thought Soiree wouldn't understand. Granted, he wasn't quite as close to Jinx as he was, but they were still close. What could be so secret? Was he supposed to not know she was prone to having explosions of power like that? Silently, he listened, waiting to hear an answer... but not the one he got.
"Lesions?" His eyes were wider now, in shock and surprise, and perhaps just a little bit of fearful sadness to boot. She couldn't... couldn't... "Are you... oh, Jinx..." It was a little too much. Dealing with her having a breakdown? Not a problem. Cleaning the blood and grime from her wounds? Piece of cake. Talking her back into a semblance of sanity? Easy. Finding out she was on a ticking mortality clock? ...not so much. Reflexively, he squeezed back, holding her hand to his cheek. Those green oceans looked strangely calm, the prelude to a storm that would probably never make it past his own mind. Jinx was his big sister. She could be hurt, she could be broken, but she could never be killed! She was invincible! Immortal! There was no way the girl who kept the nightmares away, who held him and soothed his injuries, who was always there for him... No way... None.
"They... can anything be done about them? I mean, we could get you some help, right? Some real medical help, not a hired Family medic or something, I mean specialists, a clinic, something..." He knew he was just grasping at straws, and she probably knew, too. He looked away from her eyes for the first time since he came to get her, for once honestly not wanting to face the truth. "Or... you know, outside of Italy, there's all sorts of places that are still advancing medicine. Maybe we could find someplace that could help. I don't mean cure it, that's a long shot... but maybe some place to ease it, give you some extra years..." His voice was calm, collected as always... which made it more obvious it was covering up something. Alba wasn't a creature of extreme emotion, but he was only human, prone to the same stimuli as any person. When the right buttons were pushed, even he couldn't be as impassive as he'd normally portray.
Quietly, he kissed her hand, finally looking at her again. This time, he wasn't able to mask his tears as easily as before, his eyes shining with fresh moisture. He took a deep breath, trying to calm himself down, and offered his smile again, sad as it may have been at that moment. "So... I guess the possibility of getting cut down when you step outside isn't so scary after all, is it?"
And now came almost exactly what she was expecting. Alba had always been the more emotional of the two boys, but not on the outside... not in front of other people. But Jinx knew him, and she knew him well. Every time he had cried at her embrace, every time she stayed awake until sunrise and held him through his nightmares. That was back when he was younger, before he became the man who handled delicate operations for the Monacello, who's job was to be calm and collected. A man who drove fast cars, wore his sunglasses at night and could occasionally kill a man. And now he was quickly reverting back to the young boy who had lost his parents. She knew something like this would hit Alba harder, deeper, but Soiree would not understand like his brother would. Soiree was not as close to Jinx, he was not the one who needed her comfort, and he was not one to give it, clean up her wounds, and hug her until she fell asleep.
Calmly, she let him rant, only moving to lift her head from her knees when he looked away from her. Softly, she cupped his cheek in her hand and caressed along the frame of his face with her thumb. No matter how hard she tried, they would not stop shaking. All of Alba's options, all the things he tried to think of to help his big sister... they were not going to work. The lesions were a painfully slow cancer embedded deep within her brain tissue, and not surgery, not the special AMC doctors or Jushirou's voodoo tea were going to help anything. And using her abilities only sped things upon, only destroyed her further. That was something she would keep from him, though. She wanted him to continue looking at her abilities like they were fun, like they made things more interesting, not that they killed her faster.
When he kissed her hand, she leaned more toward the edge of the bathtub and caught his eyes as he stared back. Tears... when she had been crying for hours now, she felt as if it were going to start all over again seeing that moisture in his beautiful green eyes. "No... I guess it's not. I've found that ultimatums ease you after you've gotten past the initial shock. I also find them very motivational." With a heavy sigh, she let her legs stretch out in front of her and unstopped the drain with her foot. The water was growing colder, anyway. And slowly, she stood, shaking, barely able to hold herself up. As she attempted to stop her head from spinning, pounding, she leaned against the tile wall and brushed the tips of her fingers against his face.
"I've never left Reggio Calabria and that's not going to change anytime soon. I've made my place in this city and I'm not going to let you give up your dreams to help a lost cause. Alba, someday you're going to save the world and I'm not getting in the way of that... I'm helping. I... I want to make good. I'm bad luck... but I want to help carry on the dream that Fate put in your head. I... I don't want to die... but everyone has to eventually. I just know my time is a bit more limited than anyone else... so I'm not going to waste it on stupid shit until someone comes along and kills me before the lesions do." She ignored it, blamed it on her previous state, but the tears once again poured from her stinging eyes and streaked her cheeks. "Now come on, Diavolo dell'Alba. Why don't we get me a towel before I freeze and you help me bandage up this arm, eh?"
Her knees giving up on her, she came as gracefully as she could in the half fall to sit on the edge of the tub, her feet in the draining water. "I'm not looking for extra years," she said so softly that her voice did not even echo in the small bathroom. "I'm looking to make the best of the years I have left." Today was a day of realization, a day where new things were discovered and older ones were dug up. One of the new things Jinx came to know was the exact reason why Alba always wore his sunglasses. It was because his eyes were too heartbreaking with sad, too impactful when serious, too endearing when happy... and she felt herself falling in love with another man every time she looked deeply into his emerald irises.
The sound of water beginning to drain preluded her standing, and Alba rose with her, his hand still over hers, feeling the shaking under his fingers, wishing he could steady her just for a moment. When her fingers brushed his face, he closed his eyes, blinking a single set of tears down his cheeks before looking into those pink feline eyes, red-ringed as they were but much less feral than before. Her words came through, hitting him deep - he was a hopeless idealist, true enough, and everything Fate had planted in his head was a crapshoot at best when it came to the likeliness of it actually happening, but to hear someone other than Soiree or himself affirm a commitment to it... it touched him deeply. It gave him a minor spark of hope that they could make a difference here. Even when she brought reality back when she mentioned her time running out, he still felt a certain warmth knowing that, even then, she'd still be there for them, still supporting them when they needed her most. He smiled in response, reaching up to wipe her tears away. "...thank you, sis."
He let out a faint chuckle. "Sorry. Yeah, let me get that for you." He turned away, grabbing one of the dark red towels from the shelf on the opposite wall. He stopped before turning back, listening to her words, his eyes locking on the towel as another sad smile touched his lips. While he didn't want to think about it, the fact of the matter was that she was going to die before either of the Meira twins, and though it wasn't the best of news to hear, she had a point. Better to use the time left to its fullest than to squander it, wishing for more time. Nodding silently, he turned to face her again, opening the towel up and draping it across her shoulders. He gathered a few first aid supplies in one hand, and offered her the other. The bathroom was getting too cold, and besides, he needed to find her something to wear once she was fixed up.
Leading her out into the hall, he opened the door to his room, keeping his hand on hers until she was settled on the bed. He dropped the supplies on his dresser before squatting in front of it, looking through his clothes for something that wouldn't look terribly stupid on the much smaller girl. Eventually, he came back up with a couple of oversized (on her) T-shirts and set them on the bed, waiting for her to finish drying. He reached for the supplies he'd brought from the bathroom, taking a few gauze pads and spreading some Neosporin on them before asking Jinx to hold out her arm. Gently, he patted the gauze onto the gash, then reached around for the medical tape, rolling off a few strips to wrap around her arm, holding the gauze in place.
"There we go..." He held her arm in his hands, looking up into her eyes. "I think that should hold it together for now." As he set the supplies back down, he sighed inaudibly, trying to keep his composure. He still had the urge to cry behind his eyes, burning, but he wanted desperately to be stronger than that. He was stronger than that. He just had to throw in a little of his professionalism. Easily done, right? Not as easily as one would think, when it was his sister in question. Something about her brought out parts of him that never grew up, parts of him that still needed her to be the guardian angel in striped tights and black vinyl. And it showed. Again, his eyes watered as he looked at her, wishing there was something more he could do for her...
As she sat there on the edge of the tub, her cheeks still tingled from where Alba had reached down to dry her tears. And when she closed her stinging eyes, she could only see his green irises looking at her sadly, saline rolling down his cheekbones. Jinx wanted to kiss it away, wanted to make him smile once again... but in the end, it was her who had made him that way. It was her fault he was sad, that he was crying and that he had gotten hurt. Sighing, she wrapped her arms around herself, grasping onto her opposite shoulders, and found herself shivering against the porcelain tub. And as always, Alba was there for her. Through her sorrow, her stress, the pounding headache and her wounds... she managed to give a small sort of smile as she felt the warm towel hug her body. When he offered her a hand, she stood on trembling knees, grabbed the towel together in front of her, then took his help to get her out of the tub.
With him, she traveled down the familiar hallway to his comfortable bedroom. The last time she had seen it was under much different circumstance with completely opposite emotions. Slowly, a bit painfully as well, she came to rest upon his bed. Her lids almost as heavy as her head, she fought with herself to keep from laying down and falling asleep forever in his safe scent of leather. Instead, she focused as much as she could on drying herself off. Luckily, the towel was just as red as her blood, so she did not cause too much damage to it. At steady as she could manage, she held out her arm to Alba, like a child who had just fallen off their bike and needed the places that hurt kissed to be able to get back on. When he put the gauze over her gash, she winced and closed her eyes, waiting for him to finish. But the next time she opened her eyes, she almost had to jerk herself to make sure her body had not fallen asleep.
"Thank you, Alba..." she told him softly, looking at his handiwork and giving another sad smile. Then she took the wet towel away from her body, replacing it with the first thing she grabbed beside her. After pulling the shirt over her body, she felt much more comfortable, a bit better about this most of this situation. The cotton neckline dipped low on her body, circling over her thin collarbones. The sleeves came to her elbows, and the bottom of the shirt hit her mid thigh longer than the dress she had been previously wearing. In this state, she felt as if she was allowed to be small and weak, just for this once, in front of Alba and only Alba. At that moment, she may not have been his superhero, but she felt human, and that feeling was enough for her.
"Now, stop it," she told him, giving a weak smile. "You were never this worried when I was off fighting entire gangs by myself, or on dangerous missions. Just because you now know that something else may kill me if I manage to survive this city shouldn't change anything unless you were planning on marrying me or something. Now come on, come here." Seeing the moisture in his eyes, she knew it was time to play older sister. Trying her best to keep her hand steady, though it continued to shake terribly, she leaned up and weakly took his wrist. "Come here, kiddo," she coaxed him down onto the bed with her, to sit next to her. "I'm not going anywhere right now. You're the kind of guy who likes to live in the present, don't change that. Now come on, baby. Lay down with me, hold me for a while."
Clumsily, slowly, she adjusted herself on the bed to where she could lay down, putting him along with her. And then she laid on her side, cuddling close to him, putting her head against his warm chest. Her body was spent and it was hard now to keep her eyes open. She knew very well she had to have a concussion after all she had put herself through, but she was too tired to care about the risk of putting herself in a coma. Jinx was too stubborn to remain in a coma for more than a day. She would get too restless being bedridden. "I'm not gonna leave you anytime soon. I love you too much for that. And you still owe me too much to get off that easily." And then she leaned head head up to him. To comfort him she had always kissed his forehead, maybe his cheek, as he had been doing to her that night. But softly, she laid her lips down to his.
It was only meant to last a moment, but her trembling hands came to him, one resting at the top of his head, the other at his cheek. For a moment she pulled back, barely a centimeter, and let out a gentle breath, her eyes half lidded, as she looked at him. Then, she came back down into a kiss to tell him everything was going to be all right, that she was there, tender, affectionate, and so delicate that it was not the Jinx the rest of the world knew. This was the girl that Alba had known since he was young, who had comforted him many times as he cried... and who could not entirely understand why she felt the need to do this. Kissing in her mind was only meant for pleasure, only leading into lust... but this was different... especially as she could feel her eyes hot once more, the saline rolling from her cheekbone to his. "I'm not going to leave you, Alba. I promise," she whispered to him, her lips brushing his as she spoke so softly. It was reassurance for him... and she needed it for herself. She needed to tell him that out of her own disbelief. And again, she gently kissed him, weaving her fingers into his hair.
He sighed when he felt her fingers at his wrist, disappointed at himself for letting it get to him so badly. "When you went on missions though, you were making the choice... and I don't know, I didn't feel helpless about it back then." As he settled down next to her, he closed his eyes, hit with the fact that he couldn't help her, either with his brain or with his fists; it really was as inevitable as it seemed. Eventually, he'd come to accept that, but right now, nothing in the world could break him from the sadness that had grabbed the base of his brain. Right now, reality had confronted him hard, and the last time that had happened, he and Soiree were orphans without a home. He could normally deal with anything life threw at him; that was one of the things he was proud of, when compared to how he was as a child. But nothing hit him close to home, ever. This was different.
The funny thing was, as he lay down, Jinx closing to his chest, he felt safe again, like this was all going to blow over, and he would be okay. Something about her had always done that to him, made him feel protected, and it was strange that it was still true, even though he was now much bigger, much more in control of himself. Strange, but comfortable. He wasn't going to argue with comfort at that point. His lips curved at her words, especially the part about owing her, and he started to respond... only to feel her lips against his.
They'd kissed many times previous that week, all in one night really. They'd kissed a few times before, when they were children, for a variety of reason: to see what it felt like, dares, games, that sort of thing. But this kiss she laid on him, it was different from every other kiss they had shared. It was warm, soft, tender; like the ones he'd been placing on her forehead and cheek all night. It wasn't at all what he expected. When she broke away, her eyes meeting his, he felt something melt away. It was a moment where the world stopped, and all that existed was the two of them, him almost trying to curl into her the way he would, long ago. This was a safe place, a place with nothing but love and comfort. When she kissed him again, he kissed back, telling her that he would be all right, that he knew she'd be there for him, and that he would do the same, never leaving her.
"I know, Jinx." He whispered softly, meaning it only for her to hear. "I'm not leaving you, either." He smiled slightly against her lips; not his usual smile, not the one of the adult Alba Meira, consigliere to the Monacello family. It was the smile of little Alba, the smile he gave whenever his big sister Jinx was around to hold his hand. "Cross my heart." Another kiss, still warm, still comforting. His hands spread across her back, holding on to her like she held him earlier, like she was the only thing real right there. He wouldn't let her go that easily; even in the face of death, he would still hold onto her hand.
That smile was enough for her. Seeing it cross his lips, she felt something clench in her heart that made her feel like it was a promise she would always keep. Of course she did not wish to leave him, but times always changed and her promises were always broken with the dramatic shifts of her emotion. But this was so much different. This was Alba, her Alba, the little boy she needed to make happy, the one she needed to protect more than anything else in this world. Even though he was so much bigger now, even though her Alba was strong, responsible and could take care of himself... there was still that little part of her who needed him to need her. That little boy she knew years ago; the one who she immediately attached to because he reminded her so dearly of her own brother. Maybe that was why she was feeling this way, why her head swam with emotions that swelled in every beat of her heart. Maybe it was just what had happened tonight, her mental breakdown and the emotional trauma peeking through. That was what she told herself, what she believed to be true tonight.
His hands spread across her back, his fingertips reaching the entire span between her shoulder blades. As he held here there against him, she felt a Soiree level of corny. It was as if... as if everything was going to be all right as long as Alba was there. As if she was really human, just a girl, and there was no need to be sad about the things she could not control. She kissed him as if it were the last time she would ever be able to feel him close to her. Tears flowed freely from her eyes because of this emotion, because she felt safe, because she was frightened, alone, terrified of losing him, not wanting to lose herself, because a choking came in her chest this time, not from her throat. Or maybe it was just being with him... and nothing more...
The whole night could have been dreamt away in his kiss. The sun was setting now, its deep light shining penetrating his window and shining through between the slits in his blinds. Sunsets were always thought of as endings, where the burning star vanquished itself upon the horizon, leaving the earth in the black of night. Yet night to Jinx was just a prelude to a new beginning, a new morning that would dawn so brightly she had to squint toward the east. The night was nothing to be afraid of, for it was simply a transition into a new day, a time for the sun to take a rest from the Hell of Reggio Calabria. And when the new morning came, it would bathe even the darkest of corners in an ethereal light that only had good intentions... much like Alba's heart. But to realize these things, someone had to look past the night and forward to the morning, and be willing to take in that light in all its good graces.
The children embraced, the two adults kept their lips together in all their warmth, and there was something tonight between the devil and the damned that was not going to be soon forgotten. When she pulled from his lips, she inhaled a whisper of a breath and wiped the tears away from his cheeks, not entirely sure if there were hers or his and not caring in the least. For the moment in time they were allowed to freeze and be the only people existing, he was all the things, everything, she ever needed to care about. Without a doubt, there was nowhere else in this world she would rather be. "Can I... can we stay together until morning?" she asked him, her voice low, breathless. "I'd like that...I'd like you to hold me... stay with me..." Her head came back to rest on his chest, her eyelids falling heavy as she cuddled near and listened to the sounds of his heartbeat. "If it's okay... I want to stay with you, here, for a while. I want to be able to fall asleep with you... il mio amore."
He shifted next to the tub, on his own knees, and turned on the water, letting it get lukewarm. Not too hot, but not ice-cold, either. Once it was the right temperature, he held a washcloth underneath the stream, then leaned up to Jinx's face, gently cleaning away the blood from her cheeks and neck, and a little into her hair where it had drained. He dabbed around her eyes, careful to not actually get in them as he cleaned her up. He then gave her another reassuring smile and rinsed out the cloth, before taking her arm in his hands and moving around the cut. It wasn't as deep as it looked, but it had cut a lot of blood vessels, which still made it look nasty. He gently washed the blood away, then dabbed at the wound, stimulating circulation enough to help get any debris out of the gash.
"Jesus, Jinx. You did a number on yourself." He tried to keep the conversation light, keeping her in the now by talking to her. "I thought you always made sure to have protection." He offered a joking smile this time, hoping to lift her spirits even a fraction. He moved to rinse the cloth out again, then moved it across her legs, washing out the grit, dirt, and blood. "At least most of this is superficial. You feel anything in pain?" He touched her chest and stomach where he saw the worst bruising, applying gentle pressure to make sure everything was intact. "Bones broken, muscles torn, anything?" He set the cloth aside, then turned to grab the bottle of antiseptic, a gauze pad in his opposite hand. Opening the lid, he pressed the pad against the top of the bottle, inverting it briefly to get some on the pad before dabbing it across the large wound on her arm. "This might sting a little." Patting it over the cut, he used a second gauze pad to apply more before moving to the scrapes.
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When she felt Alba near again, she moved her arms away to reach out to him, but he had other ideas. Trembling, she drew her knees back up as he grabbed the bottom of her dress, but slowly she relaxed enough to let him remove it from her. Her arms wrapped around her knees as she buried her face in them, her shoulders shaking with the sobs that came again all too suddenly. Although she shrank back when he tried to remove her boots, she finally gave in to whatever he did next until she was undressed and left chilled in the bottom of the tub. When he came back to her, she looked up and him, the tears flowing a steady, hot stream down her cheeks. They were no longer bloody. Instinctively, she followed the warmth of the washcloth and he ran it over her face, pressing her cheek into his hand, her eyes big, sorrowful and bloodshot.
When he took her arm, she began to feel the need to back away from him once more, but she was already shrank back to the far corner of the tub as tightly as she could. Shutting her eyes tightly, she turned her head away from him and felt more sobs choke in her throat. As he dabbed at the gash, she whined, not from the pain but from something much, much different. When he spoke to her, she tried to relax, reminding herself over and over again that it was just Alba, her Alba, her brother, her best friend, someone she was completely safe with. Yet when he offered out his joke, she felt it to be more of a jab to her. "I-I can't... I can't protect myself... f-f-from my... from myself..."
As he moved across her legs, she tried her best to uncurl herself, but her muscles wanted to stay tight, keep every body part as close to her as possible. When he asked her about the pain, she looked away again, the most prominent one being inside of her head. But as he touched her stomach, she winced, still not completely healed from her last endeavor fighting Sebastian. There had been some tissue damage along her ribs and a fracture from being beaten in the stomach with a lamppost, and most of it was healed with little to no pain until today. It was easily ignored, though. All the physical pain was easily ignorable, having built up a tolerance from surgeries with no anesthetic. She was strong enough to not be bothered by--
"Fuck..." she whimpered as he dabbed the antiseptic over the gash on her arm. Even the smaller scrapes stun and she shied away from him, the tears starting back into sobs just as they had began to calm. And now she began to cough, dehydrated from all of this, the screaming, the sobs that clotted in her throat. And finally she realized something, opened her eyes just enough to see his blurred figure through her burning tears. If she was injured... then he... "Al... Alba... are you hurt? Are you o-okay?"
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He knelt down next to the tub, reaching to stroke Jinx's shoulders. "Hang on..." he reached down, touching the clasps on her back. "I'm not trying anything, don't worry." He kissed her cheek again as he unhooked her bra, sliding it gently off her shoulders and down her arms. Once it was free, he set it aside, away from the trashed clothes she was previously wearing. Then, his hands touched her sides, just under her arms, and stroked down, until they hooked in the elastic of her waistband. "Lift for a second?" When he had clearance, he pulled the panties down, carefully avoiding the still open scrapes on her legs. Once they were free, they joined the separate pile with the bra, and Alba gave an assuring smile. He then turned the heat of the water up, just enough to be comfortably warm, and dropped the stopper.
"It's not much... I mean, I don't know if it will help... but I dunno, it can't hurt, right?" As the water began to fill the tub, rising around Jinx's nude, huddled form, Alba unzipped the leather top he was wearing, shedding it for a plain tanktop underneath. He dipped his hand in the water surrounding Jinx, making sure the temperature was all right, and cupped some of it, bringing it up and dripping it over her legs, letting the water ease the pain, either from the wounds or the antiseptic. He then reached over and touched Jinx's shoulders again, stroking them gently. "It's not too hot, is it?" He smiled, shifting into a more comfortable position next to the tub. "I mean, if it is, tell me now... unless it's too cold or something."
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Her muscles jumped with her mistake, especially when she saw Alba's hand come toward her. But instead of trying to make sure that mistake was never made again, he simply touched her shoulder. Feeling the warm touch, loving, she moved into his hand, the tears rolling softer over her cheeks. It was comfortable when his hand moved over her spine, yet it was not the same situation when she felt his hand on the clasp of her bra. Looking away from him, she crossed her arms over her chest, tightly grabbing to her opposite shoulders and drawing her knees up as if to reinforce that. Though when he kissed her cheek, he reassured her of something she continued to let slip. It did not make her feel better that he was not trying anything with her, but every time he kissed her face, each time he spoke, he continued to remind her that he was Alba, he was her brother, and she was safe.
Without another protest, she let him removed her bra. Though she jumped just a bit when he stroked down her body, she let him, helped him remove the rest of her clothing. And there, nude in the bathtub, curling back into her tight ball, cold against the offwhite porcelain around her, she was not the deadly assassin. She was not a weapon, not someone with confidence, not a young woman who would challenge anything and fight it to the death just to prove a point. She was the nameless child, regressing to her youth to escape the decisions she had to make in her adult life, to try and hide from the pain and only finding a deeper hurt, only coming to see fear. When she felt the water begin to rise around her, an unexpected heat she put her arms back over her head and buried herself in her knees as if protecting herself from the entire room exploding around her. And there she stayed with no reaction to his touch, to his questions, to any outside influences, blocking it all out as she tightened her grip to her skull that could very well break apart at any instant.
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Her concept of time was horribly askew. Every moment in the courtyard felt like an eternity, and the car ride home had taken a mere five minutes to her. So she did not know now whether she was curled into an unreceptive ball for a matter of minutes or nearly an hour. Yet when she finally began to pull away from herself, uncurl from her shell shocked state, let her skull stay together on its own and opened her eyes... Alba was still there. That was when she began to rationalize. Timidly, she reached out a hand toward him, using small whines as an easier form of communication than Italian, and begged to hold his hand. When she could finally grasp it, she pulled it to her face and cupped her cheek in his palm, the size difference very relative. "You... you're not leaving me..." she more observed than anything else.
Now as she looked at him, she was still frightened, still half crying, but her big eyes were no longer as feral as they were. She could focus on his face now, lock onto his eyes. "You're going to stay with me... and Soiree doesn't have a choice." She chocked on a mixture of a sob and slight laughter, which just ended in her coughing. And as the couch faded, she began to cry again, closing her eyes, holding his hand tightly to her chest. "But Papa... Papa's gonna hate me... I did something stupid and he's gonna hate me. And then Shunsui... then ShuShu's gonna hate me... because he'd pick Papa over me... and they're not gonna let me come home... and they're not gonna love me... they're not gonna... they're gonna leave... I love them and they'll leave me because I did a bad thing..." Harshly, she bit her bottom lip, trying her best to contain anything that may have caused problems.
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"Nope, not leaving you, kid. Not now, not ever." He brushed his thumb over her cheekbone gently, pressing his hand up against her cheek warmly. He almost laughed with her next words. "No choice whatsoever. Not that he'd have a problem with it. You mean almost as much to him as you mean to me, even if he can be a dick about it." His smile pulled back almost imperceptibly as she continued, his hand moving to her chest as she began lamenting, began blaming herself for losing people that haven't been lost yet. He let her get it out, let her condemn her circumstances a little more before his other hand came up, placing a finger against her bitten lip.
"That's enough of that crap," he smiled again. "Not everyone is those fucks that hurt you, and not everyone is Gin." He all but spat the name. He had never liked Gin, not even for a moment. The man reeked of lies and sadism, and anyone who hurt his big sister deserved a painful, long death in his eyes. "You're only human, Jinx, and humans make mistakes. The best of us knows that... understand and accept it. And from what you've said, those are two of the best of us." He leaned closer to her, his forehead coming to rest against hers. "Yeah, they might be upset... but if they're even half of what you said they are, they'll get over it. They'll get over it, and worry about you, and want to help you." He kissed the end of her nose. "They love you too... and I don't think they'll leave you, any more than I'd leave you. You're special to them now."
He pulled away for only a moment to turn the water off, then came back to her, never actually leaving her grasp. "You have people now, Jinx; people who love you and care for you and only want to see you smile. It took a long time, sure, but you've got them now, and they're not going anywhere. Me, Soiree, Jushiro, Shunsui... I'm sure there's more, too. None of us will let you go." He cupped her cheek in his hand once more. "Ever."
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When he almost seemed to scold her, she could not bring herself to look at him. The thing about Alba when he did not have his sunglasses on (which was a rare phenomenon,) was that she could see his every emotion in his deep, emerald eyes. Right now, she did not want to see him angry with her. Things became much more difficult to block out when he put his forehead against hers. Opening her eyes, she found herself barely over a centimeter away from his gaze... and he was not angry. He even kissed the tip of her nose, and when something like that occurred, she knew he had to be telling the truth. Regaining her sanity bit by bit, she believed the words that he was saying. And finally, she broke at the root of the problem. "I always thought I was special to Gin, but he lied to me... he used me. I... I thought I loved him, I did love him, and he threw me away when he found something better to play with..." Nothing less than pathetic, she took to hugging his entire arm, sobbing against his tattoo.
Her voice became squeaky again in her hoarseness, but now she could formulate sentences and actually finish them. Her mind was coming back to her. "He left me! I tracked him down and he went back to fucking Japan with his goddamn fucking boyfriend and he's forgotten about me! He never loved me... he lied! He told me I was special and he was just lying so I would do his dirty work, so I would follow his every order... and I could have killed him... I could have snapped his neck but I was too afraid... I was too fucking afraid of him! I trusted his every word. I loved him without question. And every time I needed him, every time I couldn't handle what I was doing, every time I came to him for just a bit of comfort, he was disgusted with me! But every time... every time I did something good, he would smile. He would tell me I was special, he would tell me I was worth more than how others treated me and I fell for it, that sonuvabitch! He was leading me on... he didn't care what happened to me as long as it benefited him!" She was more telling this to herself than anything, for these were things Alba already knew, things he resented, things he had tried to tell Jinx over and over again and she had only yelled at him to shut up each time. She had been blinded by the need for acceptance, completely jaded, and now she felt guilty, actual real guilt, for shoving Alba aside on this matter.
Shaking, she let go of Alba and put her head in her freshly bloodied arms, letting them rest on the edge of the tub, crying until no more tears would come and she was just making noise. The water in the tub rolled around her body in small, erratic waves covered in signatures of pink. Her abilities, which decimated the courtyard of the Di Luca compound, could now barely splash her sides. That was not a bad thing. And finally, terribly dehydrated, her voice so shot that she could barely speak, she lifted up her head and asked with all the sanity Jinx had left in her, "Can you get me something... to blow my nose on, fratello?" And clenching her fists, closing her stinging eyes, she told him, "I'm so sorry."
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Watching her get this way was almost enough to break his resolve, to fly out to Japan himself just to find the man and give him what he'd earned. But as she left go of his arm, burying her face in her own, he shook his head at himself. He couldn't go anywhere... and he wouldn't want to. His place was here, with those closest to him, giving them the strength behind them to face their own demons readily. He leaned forward, kissing Jinx's cheek as she asked her question. "Of course, schwester, of course." He stood, turning carefully this time so as not to aggravate his ribs, to get the tissue box on the counter. "And please don't apologize to me. I'm just doing what brothers do for their sisters." He chuckled as he returned to the tub with the box in his hand. "Well, at least what they do here. I'm sure, somewhere else, I'd probably be consoling you over a bad break-up or something superficial like that."
Resettling himself, he leaned back, his head gently resting against the same tile wall as hers, and titled towards her. His arm looped behind her back, settling over her shoulder, as his other hand touched her arm softly, reassuringly. He continued to smile that same Alba smile, slight but reassuring, and pulled her as close as the tub would allow, touching her head with his own. "Just... thank you for not being dead, Jinx. Thank you for having the strength to keep going. If anything happened to you... I don't know. I'm not ready to deal with that." His eyes moved to her. "Believe it or not, you keep me sane around here. You and Soiree. If it weren't for you guys, I'd probably be dead in a gutter, or worse, dead from work stress. You remind me of what I have to live for."
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"God, I wish I was an American," she told him, leaning into his arm as it wrapped around her back. "I have all these fucking stupid little fantasies... they're so fucking stupid... like that I was an American teenager, who only worried about stupid, trivial things. That I actually went to school. That I had parents and they were too strict. That I wasn't a skinny little punk. Maybe that I was lazy, maybe even overweight, and I wore wool sweaters and had a crush on a football player." When she laughed, she felt herself choking on a few more sobs and had to grab another tissue, making a neat pile of used ones on the floor by the tub. "But instead I'm... I'm this... I'm a scrawny piece of killing machine who's dating a retired cop and worried about whether or not I'm going to be shot down every time I walk outside."
Talking helped, it really did even though her voice was incredibly hoarse, even though it hurt her throat. Forming complete sentences, focusing on her Italian instead of the pain that was now seeping from her nerves. Now that she could feel again, she did not know what was worse, her headache or that damn gash. "Hey," she began softly, nuzzling her head to his, "it's not me you should be thanking. I could be saying the exact same words to you. I can't count how many times you and Soiree have covered my ass. I can't trust myself, so I'm glad I have to the two of you. Now, if we were all Americans, and you were the boys from down the street, I'd probably call you my best friends but not act that way around the popular kids and we'd have little feel good moments every so often, but all and I'll you'd be the token nerds." Jinx watched too much TV Land. "And we'd get into wacky situations and I might even be a blond."
With a morbid sort of chuckle, she pulled away from Alba and slipped down into the tub, the water having an interesting tint from blood and dirt. Closing her eyes, she sank down to the bottom of the tub, letting it engulf her head, wash the blood out of her ears, her nose, the tears off her face. When she emerged, taking a slow breath, her hair laid flat and slick against her head, dripping the hot water. Just for comfort this time, she drew her knees loosely to her chest and rested her cheek against them, looking toward Alba. Weakly, her wet hand reached out and took his, needing that contact. "But... I really am sorry... I never wanted you to see that. I... I never intended you to find out that way. But... you deserve to know. You deserve to be told this. This shouldn't be a secret to you... but, but I'd like Soiree not to know. Soiree wouldn't understand."
She squeezed his hand, looking at him with her big eyes, giving the most sorrowful smile that had ever cross her face. "I wasn't meant to be anything more than an experiment. They knew they were going to eventually end up terminating me since I wasn't compatible with the experiment. So they did a lot of shit to me... stuff that people... stuff that people aren't supposed to live through. Alba," she said his name softly, a comforting attempt for both him and herself, "I have lesions on my brain. I... I haven't seen them on a CAT scan in a few years, but... I've been told I may not even live to be thirty. ...I'm sorry."
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When she came back up and grasped his hand, his eyes met hers again, and he listened to her slight request. He nodded in response, wondering why she thought Soiree wouldn't understand. Granted, he wasn't quite as close to Jinx as he was, but they were still close. What could be so secret? Was he supposed to not know she was prone to having explosions of power like that? Silently, he listened, waiting to hear an answer... but not the one he got.
"Lesions?" His eyes were wider now, in shock and surprise, and perhaps just a little bit of fearful sadness to boot. She couldn't... couldn't... "Are you... oh, Jinx..." It was a little too much. Dealing with her having a breakdown? Not a problem. Cleaning the blood and grime from her wounds? Piece of cake. Talking her back into a semblance of sanity? Easy. Finding out she was on a ticking mortality clock? ...not so much. Reflexively, he squeezed back, holding her hand to his cheek. Those green oceans looked strangely calm, the prelude to a storm that would probably never make it past his own mind. Jinx was his big sister. She could be hurt, she could be broken, but she could never be killed! She was invincible! Immortal! There was no way the girl who kept the nightmares away, who held him and soothed his injuries, who was always there for him... No way... None.
"They... can anything be done about them? I mean, we could get you some help, right? Some real medical help, not a hired Family medic or something, I mean specialists, a clinic, something..." He knew he was just grasping at straws, and she probably knew, too. He looked away from her eyes for the first time since he came to get her, for once honestly not wanting to face the truth. "Or... you know, outside of Italy, there's all sorts of places that are still advancing medicine. Maybe we could find someplace that could help. I don't mean cure it, that's a long shot... but maybe some place to ease it, give you some extra years..." His voice was calm, collected as always... which made it more obvious it was covering up something. Alba wasn't a creature of extreme emotion, but he was only human, prone to the same stimuli as any person. When the right buttons were pushed, even he couldn't be as impassive as he'd normally portray.
Quietly, he kissed her hand, finally looking at her again. This time, he wasn't able to mask his tears as easily as before, his eyes shining with fresh moisture. He took a deep breath, trying to calm himself down, and offered his smile again, sad as it may have been at that moment. "So... I guess the possibility of getting cut down when you step outside isn't so scary after all, is it?"
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Calmly, she let him rant, only moving to lift her head from her knees when he looked away from her. Softly, she cupped his cheek in her hand and caressed along the frame of his face with her thumb. No matter how hard she tried, they would not stop shaking. All of Alba's options, all the things he tried to think of to help his big sister... they were not going to work. The lesions were a painfully slow cancer embedded deep within her brain tissue, and not surgery, not the special AMC doctors or Jushirou's voodoo tea were going to help anything. And using her abilities only sped things upon, only destroyed her further. That was something she would keep from him, though. She wanted him to continue looking at her abilities like they were fun, like they made things more interesting, not that they killed her faster.
When he kissed her hand, she leaned more toward the edge of the bathtub and caught his eyes as he stared back. Tears... when she had been crying for hours now, she felt as if it were going to start all over again seeing that moisture in his beautiful green eyes. "No... I guess it's not. I've found that ultimatums ease you after you've gotten past the initial shock. I also find them very motivational." With a heavy sigh, she let her legs stretch out in front of her and unstopped the drain with her foot. The water was growing colder, anyway. And slowly, she stood, shaking, barely able to hold herself up. As she attempted to stop her head from spinning, pounding, she leaned against the tile wall and brushed the tips of her fingers against his face.
"I've never left Reggio Calabria and that's not going to change anytime soon. I've made my place in this city and I'm not going to let you give up your dreams to help a lost cause. Alba, someday you're going to save the world and I'm not getting in the way of that... I'm helping. I... I want to make good. I'm bad luck... but I want to help carry on the dream that Fate put in your head. I... I don't want to die... but everyone has to eventually. I just know my time is a bit more limited than anyone else... so I'm not going to waste it on stupid shit until someone comes along and kills me before the lesions do." She ignored it, blamed it on her previous state, but the tears once again poured from her stinging eyes and streaked her cheeks. "Now come on, Diavolo dell'Alba. Why don't we get me a towel before I freeze and you help me bandage up this arm, eh?"
Her knees giving up on her, she came as gracefully as she could in the half fall to sit on the edge of the tub, her feet in the draining water. "I'm not looking for extra years," she said so softly that her voice did not even echo in the small bathroom. "I'm looking to make the best of the years I have left." Today was a day of realization, a day where new things were discovered and older ones were dug up. One of the new things Jinx came to know was the exact reason why Alba always wore his sunglasses. It was because his eyes were too heartbreaking with sad, too impactful when serious, too endearing when happy... and she felt herself falling in love with another man every time she looked deeply into his emerald irises.
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He let out a faint chuckle. "Sorry. Yeah, let me get that for you." He turned away, grabbing one of the dark red towels from the shelf on the opposite wall. He stopped before turning back, listening to her words, his eyes locking on the towel as another sad smile touched his lips. While he didn't want to think about it, the fact of the matter was that she was going to die before either of the Meira twins, and though it wasn't the best of news to hear, she had a point. Better to use the time left to its fullest than to squander it, wishing for more time. Nodding silently, he turned to face her again, opening the towel up and draping it across her shoulders. He gathered a few first aid supplies in one hand, and offered her the other. The bathroom was getting too cold, and besides, he needed to find her something to wear once she was fixed up.
Leading her out into the hall, he opened the door to his room, keeping his hand on hers until she was settled on the bed. He dropped the supplies on his dresser before squatting in front of it, looking through his clothes for something that wouldn't look terribly stupid on the much smaller girl. Eventually, he came back up with a couple of oversized (on her) T-shirts and set them on the bed, waiting for her to finish drying. He reached for the supplies he'd brought from the bathroom, taking a few gauze pads and spreading some Neosporin on them before asking Jinx to hold out her arm. Gently, he patted the gauze onto the gash, then reached around for the medical tape, rolling off a few strips to wrap around her arm, holding the gauze in place.
"There we go..." He held her arm in his hands, looking up into her eyes. "I think that should hold it together for now." As he set the supplies back down, he sighed inaudibly, trying to keep his composure. He still had the urge to cry behind his eyes, burning, but he wanted desperately to be stronger than that. He was stronger than that. He just had to throw in a little of his professionalism. Easily done, right? Not as easily as one would think, when it was his sister in question. Something about her brought out parts of him that never grew up, parts of him that still needed her to be the guardian angel in striped tights and black vinyl. And it showed. Again, his eyes watered as he looked at her, wishing there was something more he could do for her...
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With him, she traveled down the familiar hallway to his comfortable bedroom. The last time she had seen it was under much different circumstance with completely opposite emotions. Slowly, a bit painfully as well, she came to rest upon his bed. Her lids almost as heavy as her head, she fought with herself to keep from laying down and falling asleep forever in his safe scent of leather. Instead, she focused as much as she could on drying herself off. Luckily, the towel was just as red as her blood, so she did not cause too much damage to it. At steady as she could manage, she held out her arm to Alba, like a child who had just fallen off their bike and needed the places that hurt kissed to be able to get back on. When he put the gauze over her gash, she winced and closed her eyes, waiting for him to finish. But the next time she opened her eyes, she almost had to jerk herself to make sure her body had not fallen asleep.
"Thank you, Alba..." she told him softly, looking at his handiwork and giving another sad smile. Then she took the wet towel away from her body, replacing it with the first thing she grabbed beside her. After pulling the shirt over her body, she felt much more comfortable, a bit better about this most of this situation. The cotton neckline dipped low on her body, circling over her thin collarbones. The sleeves came to her elbows, and the bottom of the shirt hit her mid thigh longer than the dress she had been previously wearing. In this state, she felt as if she was allowed to be small and weak, just for this once, in front of Alba and only Alba. At that moment, she may not have been his superhero, but she felt human, and that feeling was enough for her.
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Clumsily, slowly, she adjusted herself on the bed to where she could lay down, putting him along with her. And then she laid on her side, cuddling close to him, putting her head against his warm chest. Her body was spent and it was hard now to keep her eyes open. She knew very well she had to have a concussion after all she had put herself through, but she was too tired to care about the risk of putting herself in a coma. Jinx was too stubborn to remain in a coma for more than a day. She would get too restless being bedridden. "I'm not gonna leave you anytime soon. I love you too much for that. And you still owe me too much to get off that easily." And then she leaned head head up to him. To comfort him she had always kissed his forehead, maybe his cheek, as he had been doing to her that night. But softly, she laid her lips down to his.
It was only meant to last a moment, but her trembling hands came to him, one resting at the top of his head, the other at his cheek. For a moment she pulled back, barely a centimeter, and let out a gentle breath, her eyes half lidded, as she looked at him. Then, she came back down into a kiss to tell him everything was going to be all right, that she was there, tender, affectionate, and so delicate that it was not the Jinx the rest of the world knew. This was the girl that Alba had known since he was young, who had comforted him many times as he cried... and who could not entirely understand why she felt the need to do this. Kissing in her mind was only meant for pleasure, only leading into lust... but this was different... especially as she could feel her eyes hot once more, the saline rolling from her cheekbone to his. "I'm not going to leave you, Alba. I promise," she whispered to him, her lips brushing his as she spoke so softly. It was reassurance for him... and she needed it for herself. She needed to tell him that out of her own disbelief. And again, she gently kissed him, weaving her fingers into his hair.
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The funny thing was, as he lay down, Jinx closing to his chest, he felt safe again, like this was all going to blow over, and he would be okay. Something about her had always done that to him, made him feel protected, and it was strange that it was still true, even though he was now much bigger, much more in control of himself. Strange, but comfortable. He wasn't going to argue with comfort at that point. His lips curved at her words, especially the part about owing her, and he started to respond... only to feel her lips against his.
They'd kissed many times previous that week, all in one night really. They'd kissed a few times before, when they were children, for a variety of reason: to see what it felt like, dares, games, that sort of thing. But this kiss she laid on him, it was different from every other kiss they had shared. It was warm, soft, tender; like the ones he'd been placing on her forehead and cheek all night. It wasn't at all what he expected. When she broke away, her eyes meeting his, he felt something melt away. It was a moment where the world stopped, and all that existed was the two of them, him almost trying to curl into her the way he would, long ago. This was a safe place, a place with nothing but love and comfort. When she kissed him again, he kissed back, telling her that he would be all right, that he knew she'd be there for him, and that he would do the same, never leaving her.
"I know, Jinx." He whispered softly, meaning it only for her to hear. "I'm not leaving you, either." He smiled slightly against her lips; not his usual smile, not the one of the adult Alba Meira, consigliere to the Monacello family. It was the smile of little Alba, the smile he gave whenever his big sister Jinx was around to hold his hand. "Cross my heart." Another kiss, still warm, still comforting. His hands spread across her back, holding on to her like she held him earlier, like she was the only thing real right there. He wouldn't let her go that easily; even in the face of death, he would still hold onto her hand.
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His hands spread across her back, his fingertips reaching the entire span between her shoulder blades. As he held here there against him, she felt a Soiree level of corny. It was as if... as if everything was going to be all right as long as Alba was there. As if she was really human, just a girl, and there was no need to be sad about the things she could not control. She kissed him as if it were the last time she would ever be able to feel him close to her. Tears flowed freely from her eyes because of this emotion, because she felt safe, because she was frightened, alone, terrified of losing him, not wanting to lose herself, because a choking came in her chest this time, not from her throat. Or maybe it was just being with him... and nothing more...
The whole night could have been dreamt away in his kiss. The sun was setting now, its deep light shining penetrating his window and shining through between the slits in his blinds. Sunsets were always thought of as endings, where the burning star vanquished itself upon the horizon, leaving the earth in the black of night. Yet night to Jinx was just a prelude to a new beginning, a new morning that would dawn so brightly she had to squint toward the east. The night was nothing to be afraid of, for it was simply a transition into a new day, a time for the sun to take a rest from the Hell of Reggio Calabria. And when the new morning came, it would bathe even the darkest of corners in an ethereal light that only had good intentions... much like Alba's heart. But to realize these things, someone had to look past the night and forward to the morning, and be willing to take in that light in all its good graces.
The children embraced, the two adults kept their lips together in all their warmth, and there was something tonight between the devil and the damned that was not going to be soon forgotten. When she pulled from his lips, she inhaled a whisper of a breath and wiped the tears away from his cheeks, not entirely sure if there were hers or his and not caring in the least. For the moment in time they were allowed to freeze and be the only people existing, he was all the things, everything, she ever needed to care about. Without a doubt, there was nowhere else in this world she would rather be. "Can I... can we stay together until morning?" she asked him, her voice low, breathless. "I'd like that...I'd like you to hold me... stay with me..." Her head came back to rest on his chest, her eyelids falling heavy as she cuddled near and listened to the sounds of his heartbeat. "If it's okay... I want to stay with you, here, for a while. I want to be able to fall asleep with you... il mio amore."
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