(no subject)
Title: Storms
Author: cerieblue819
Rating: G
Pairings: None. Gen--Chase-centric
Disclaimer: I don't own them.
Summary: Robert Chase hated storms.
Robert Chase hated storms. Not because he was frightened or because the rain and wind made travel difficult or any of a thousand mundane excuses that he gave for hating them, he simply hated them because they reminded him of his mother.
Back home, in Australia, his mother hated storms. Every time the clouds gathered on the horizon she was struck by an inexplicable and crippling fear, frozen and unable to do anything but shake until the moment passed. If a storm actually came up, she took to her bed, listless and useless and leaving Robert to his own devices until the wind died down.
He had to stay strong for her, even when it was in his own nature to be frightened when the wind shook down the trees in their yard and blasted against the glass making it rattle and shake. He crawled into bed with her, not out of needing his own comfort, but to comfort her. He snaked his tiny arms around his mother's waist, murmuring soothing words and trying to take away the fear the best that he could.
His father called him weak, saying he should "be a man," and not retreat to his mother's bed at the appearance of a cloud on the wind but how could he explain that he was there for her? How could he tell his cold and callous father that his mother was scared and needed someone, needed him but he wasn't there and Robert was just a substitute? He couldn't and resigned himself to the idea that he had to be scared and seeking comfort in her bed. That had to be it.
He never "grew out of it," because it wasn't his fear to grow out of. Mother was still struck by the same fear, year after year, but the alcohol exaggerated it, made it worse. Her passions became larger, her sorrows deeper. The fear that was easily calmed by his small voice singing to her during the worst of it was a chasm so big that Robert couldn't possibly bridge, something deeper than the storms that came up from time to time.
Storms took on a metaphorical meaning. Everything was a storm. If Robert brought home a girl, his mother shrieked at him for replacing her, for finding some other woman to fill her role in her house and his heart. He apologized profusely, pale skin flushing on a September afternoon with a storm raging outside and a thin girl in a school uniform inching slowly away from the drunken woman on the floor and, by extension, Robert himself.
He began to think of his mother's tantrums as storms themselves. Sure, they didn't have wind and rain but those were easily replaced with hateful words and the throwing of liquor bottles. His mother drank to make the storms of her life go away, but in the process, created a storm all her own that Robert was swept up in whether he wanted to be or not.
Robert Chase hated storms.
Author: cerieblue819
Rating: G
Pairings: None. Gen--Chase-centric
Disclaimer: I don't own them.
Summary: Robert Chase hated storms.
Robert Chase hated storms. Not because he was frightened or because the rain and wind made travel difficult or any of a thousand mundane excuses that he gave for hating them, he simply hated them because they reminded him of his mother.
Back home, in Australia, his mother hated storms. Every time the clouds gathered on the horizon she was struck by an inexplicable and crippling fear, frozen and unable to do anything but shake until the moment passed. If a storm actually came up, she took to her bed, listless and useless and leaving Robert to his own devices until the wind died down.
He had to stay strong for her, even when it was in his own nature to be frightened when the wind shook down the trees in their yard and blasted against the glass making it rattle and shake. He crawled into bed with her, not out of needing his own comfort, but to comfort her. He snaked his tiny arms around his mother's waist, murmuring soothing words and trying to take away the fear the best that he could.
His father called him weak, saying he should "be a man," and not retreat to his mother's bed at the appearance of a cloud on the wind but how could he explain that he was there for her? How could he tell his cold and callous father that his mother was scared and needed someone, needed him but he wasn't there and Robert was just a substitute? He couldn't and resigned himself to the idea that he had to be scared and seeking comfort in her bed. That had to be it.
He never "grew out of it," because it wasn't his fear to grow out of. Mother was still struck by the same fear, year after year, but the alcohol exaggerated it, made it worse. Her passions became larger, her sorrows deeper. The fear that was easily calmed by his small voice singing to her during the worst of it was a chasm so big that Robert couldn't possibly bridge, something deeper than the storms that came up from time to time.
Storms took on a metaphorical meaning. Everything was a storm. If Robert brought home a girl, his mother shrieked at him for replacing her, for finding some other woman to fill her role in her house and his heart. He apologized profusely, pale skin flushing on a September afternoon with a storm raging outside and a thin girl in a school uniform inching slowly away from the drunken woman on the floor and, by extension, Robert himself.
He began to think of his mother's tantrums as storms themselves. Sure, they didn't have wind and rain but those were easily replaced with hateful words and the throwing of liquor bottles. His mother drank to make the storms of her life go away, but in the process, created a storm all her own that Robert was swept up in whether he wanted to be or not.
Robert Chase hated storms.