[Fanfiction] - Smoking
The promised fic is finally up! It might be a little bit different from what some of you might have been expecting, but I hope you like it all the same!
Title: Smoking
Fandom: Saiyuki
Pairings: none, but slight 58 hintings
Warnings: swearing and references to Gojoy's past. Kinda dark, but otherwise worksafe.
Notes: Gojyo isn't generally introspective, but when he does think, he just prefers to do it alone. It's safer that way. Set near the beginning of the journey, though you might think of this as slightly AU or OC.
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SMOKING
I suck in more smoke. The butt of the cigarette clings sullenly to the very end of the filter. The heat on my fingers from the glowing end feels shallow and unreal. For some reason, I’m thinking suddenly of Mom, and I push the thought away before it gets too close.
I hate smoking.
It reminds me of her. Of Jien. Of her and Jien and all the stuff that even then bounced off the insides of my head and came ringing back at me as clear as fucking life. She hates me. Jien makes her happy. I want to make her happy, but her and Jien are - and if I make her happy, will she - I don’t want to make her happy. Idon’tIdon’tIdon’t; I can’t and she can’t make me because would the smiles be worth it if I let her? Stop it. The only way to stop it was to take another drag and hold it until survival instincts took over and forced me to think only of how good it felt to be breathing and the nicotine stopped me from feeling too much like dying.
Really, that was what it came down to. The cigarettes gave me hope that one day, if Mom didn’t get there first, I could end it by learning how not to breathe. Staring at the burning end I know that more than a decade later I still haven’t managed to learn that trick. Somehow my survival instincts always win out in the end, and over time they got harder to push back down until I more or less stopped trying. Like survival is in my blood. But rebellion is in my blood too, and this is it. I smoke, still hoping to learn how not to breathe. To let go. My blood swims with a lot of stuff; survival, rebellion, anger, guilt and many other things I don’t want to name. The colours I bear and the scars I wear on my face say it better than I ever could. They seem to speak to the world for me. So I shut myself away, like I have today. The cigarette dies, and I crush it out with a bit more spite than is probably necessary. Bastard. Even he goes out before I do. That’s why I hate them - they always remind me how I can’t follow.
I realise then that it’s dark now without the light of my cigarette; the sun set ages ago whilst I sat in the dark, smoking. The others are in their own rooms, away from me and the seething get-the-fuck-away-from-me aura I must have writ large over my head. Good. I don’t think they’d like me like this; poor confused little kappa all jumbled up inside smoking his way to an early grave because… because I can’t do this in front of you. You all have the rain, I have my cigarettes and the darkness, and you’re all better off just thinking I’m out carousing with random bar staff or chasing girls in small dresses because that’s Sha Gojyo and you’re all comfortable with that and you wouldn’t understand.
I’m starting to listen. I’m starting to listen to the stir in my blood, the voice in my head telling me to hope. You guys, you had stuff happen to you. For me, I am what happened. There wasn’t room for dreams, for hope. I learned that long ago. But things are starting to change and I can’t fight this with my fists like I used to. I can’t scream at it and tell it to go away and leave me alone. I can’t even run away. And I’m scared of this. I don’t know this change. I don’t know this voice that sounds like my own but isn’t. I need the dark and the cigarettes, my lifeline to death, the chance of a way out that I’ve clung to for so long, just to turn around and face it. Dammit, I’m fighting myself and losing.
A dirt rag. A dirt rag is a dirt rag is a dirt rag but I’m actually here thinking that I may be getting the chance to be something else. I can’t shake the feeling that a hand somewhere is being extended that I can take and leave behind the kid in the bedroom smoking to drown out the emptiness in his head that echoes of Jien and Mom in the next room doing something that even now my mind shies away from. I poke that demon with a stick every time I spent the night at some girl’s house.
I don’t know how to accept help. Only how to survive… if I take this hand, am I saying I can’t win, or am I going to set up a dream that will get knocked down later, or am I actually taking a step towards filling the empty space I’ve carried with me since Mom first raised her fist?
The darkness doesn’t answer. It never answers my questions. Tomorrow I will have to smile again, because this hole in me is mine, my Mom gave it to me, and if I lose it then all I have left is two scars and memories I would claw out if I could. I still only plan a week ahead at best, and life taught me not to expect a future I don’t deserve.
I light up again, using the practised flick to snap shut my Zippo lighter like I’ve done since I was in my teens. Back when I had nowhere to go and no-one to trust. Alone with nothing but my fists between me and everybody else. Acceptance was rare. Kindness more so.
Those years were hell.
Bitter ash assaults my senses, and it strikes me that I’m still alone, even now. Perhaps this is a hell of my own making? I guess in all these years I’ve moved a step or two forwards. Curling from my lips, the smoke drifts upwards lazily and for a moment I see nothing. This is nice, though it might just be the nicotine talking. Nothingness isn’t always so nice.
The sharp echo of knuckles on wood makes me jump and reach to the place in my mind where my shakujo is before I realise it’s just a harmless knock. I almost laugh at my own paranoia, but use the humour to fuel a smile to wear instead, before answering the door.
“Gojyo? I thought you were out?” Worry, sincere and comforting. Suddenly I feel kind of stupid.
“Nah, town’s too quiet for it.” I reply by way of an answer. It’s true, but I’d rather be alone right now.
“Oh. Perhaps we could play Mahjong? The others aren’t asleep yet.” He extends a hand in a gesture of fellowship, and suddenly clarity snaps up on me like a break of blue sky on a cloudy day. Maybe some hands out there are safe to take? Hakkai’s sincere expression barely masks his concern, and I realise that maybe he can see through my masks as easily as I see through his.
Somehow, my hand has anchored onto his shoulder, slinging my arm around with it. This is solid. This is real. I look down briefly at my cigarette, the long disentigrating ashen end the only memory of the paper and tobacco that was there, the burning ring racing towards extinction. I stub it out. “Yeah,” I hear myself say, sounding surprisingly soft. “I wanna join you.”
I guess I’m smiling as I close the door behind me, but if Hakkai notices he doesn’t say a word, just smiles back.
crossposted to saiyukiyaoi and 1000_miles_west
Title: Smoking
Fandom: Saiyuki
Pairings: none, but slight 58 hintings
Warnings: swearing and references to Gojoy's past. Kinda dark, but otherwise worksafe.
Notes: Gojyo isn't generally introspective, but when he does think, he just prefers to do it alone. It's safer that way. Set near the beginning of the journey, though you might think of this as slightly AU or OC.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________
SMOKING
I suck in more smoke. The butt of the cigarette clings sullenly to the very end of the filter. The heat on my fingers from the glowing end feels shallow and unreal. For some reason, I’m thinking suddenly of Mom, and I push the thought away before it gets too close.
I hate smoking.
It reminds me of her. Of Jien. Of her and Jien and all the stuff that even then bounced off the insides of my head and came ringing back at me as clear as fucking life. She hates me. Jien makes her happy. I want to make her happy, but her and Jien are - and if I make her happy, will she - I don’t want to make her happy. Idon’tIdon’tIdon’t; I can’t and she can’t make me because would the smiles be worth it if I let her? Stop it. The only way to stop it was to take another drag and hold it until survival instincts took over and forced me to think only of how good it felt to be breathing and the nicotine stopped me from feeling too much like dying.
Really, that was what it came down to. The cigarettes gave me hope that one day, if Mom didn’t get there first, I could end it by learning how not to breathe. Staring at the burning end I know that more than a decade later I still haven’t managed to learn that trick. Somehow my survival instincts always win out in the end, and over time they got harder to push back down until I more or less stopped trying. Like survival is in my blood. But rebellion is in my blood too, and this is it. I smoke, still hoping to learn how not to breathe. To let go. My blood swims with a lot of stuff; survival, rebellion, anger, guilt and many other things I don’t want to name. The colours I bear and the scars I wear on my face say it better than I ever could. They seem to speak to the world for me. So I shut myself away, like I have today. The cigarette dies, and I crush it out with a bit more spite than is probably necessary. Bastard. Even he goes out before I do. That’s why I hate them - they always remind me how I can’t follow.
I realise then that it’s dark now without the light of my cigarette; the sun set ages ago whilst I sat in the dark, smoking. The others are in their own rooms, away from me and the seething get-the-fuck-away-from-me aura I must have writ large over my head. Good. I don’t think they’d like me like this; poor confused little kappa all jumbled up inside smoking his way to an early grave because… because I can’t do this in front of you. You all have the rain, I have my cigarettes and the darkness, and you’re all better off just thinking I’m out carousing with random bar staff or chasing girls in small dresses because that’s Sha Gojyo and you’re all comfortable with that and you wouldn’t understand.
I’m starting to listen. I’m starting to listen to the stir in my blood, the voice in my head telling me to hope. You guys, you had stuff happen to you. For me, I am what happened. There wasn’t room for dreams, for hope. I learned that long ago. But things are starting to change and I can’t fight this with my fists like I used to. I can’t scream at it and tell it to go away and leave me alone. I can’t even run away. And I’m scared of this. I don’t know this change. I don’t know this voice that sounds like my own but isn’t. I need the dark and the cigarettes, my lifeline to death, the chance of a way out that I’ve clung to for so long, just to turn around and face it. Dammit, I’m fighting myself and losing.
A dirt rag. A dirt rag is a dirt rag is a dirt rag but I’m actually here thinking that I may be getting the chance to be something else. I can’t shake the feeling that a hand somewhere is being extended that I can take and leave behind the kid in the bedroom smoking to drown out the emptiness in his head that echoes of Jien and Mom in the next room doing something that even now my mind shies away from. I poke that demon with a stick every time I spent the night at some girl’s house.
I don’t know how to accept help. Only how to survive… if I take this hand, am I saying I can’t win, or am I going to set up a dream that will get knocked down later, or am I actually taking a step towards filling the empty space I’ve carried with me since Mom first raised her fist?
The darkness doesn’t answer. It never answers my questions. Tomorrow I will have to smile again, because this hole in me is mine, my Mom gave it to me, and if I lose it then all I have left is two scars and memories I would claw out if I could. I still only plan a week ahead at best, and life taught me not to expect a future I don’t deserve.
I light up again, using the practised flick to snap shut my Zippo lighter like I’ve done since I was in my teens. Back when I had nowhere to go and no-one to trust. Alone with nothing but my fists between me and everybody else. Acceptance was rare. Kindness more so.
Those years were hell.
Bitter ash assaults my senses, and it strikes me that I’m still alone, even now. Perhaps this is a hell of my own making? I guess in all these years I’ve moved a step or two forwards. Curling from my lips, the smoke drifts upwards lazily and for a moment I see nothing. This is nice, though it might just be the nicotine talking. Nothingness isn’t always so nice.
The sharp echo of knuckles on wood makes me jump and reach to the place in my mind where my shakujo is before I realise it’s just a harmless knock. I almost laugh at my own paranoia, but use the humour to fuel a smile to wear instead, before answering the door.
“Gojyo? I thought you were out?” Worry, sincere and comforting. Suddenly I feel kind of stupid.
“Nah, town’s too quiet for it.” I reply by way of an answer. It’s true, but I’d rather be alone right now.
“Oh. Perhaps we could play Mahjong? The others aren’t asleep yet.” He extends a hand in a gesture of fellowship, and suddenly clarity snaps up on me like a break of blue sky on a cloudy day. Maybe some hands out there are safe to take? Hakkai’s sincere expression barely masks his concern, and I realise that maybe he can see through my masks as easily as I see through his.
Somehow, my hand has anchored onto his shoulder, slinging my arm around with it. This is solid. This is real. I look down briefly at my cigarette, the long disentigrating ashen end the only memory of the paper and tobacco that was there, the burning ring racing towards extinction. I stub it out. “Yeah,” I hear myself say, sounding surprisingly soft. “I wanna join you.”
I guess I’m smiling as I close the door behind me, but if Hakkai notices he doesn’t say a word, just smiles back.
crossposted to saiyukiyaoi and 1000_miles_west