SIN - betrayal [9/10]
title : sin [9/10]
pairing/fandom : alo x mini, major alo x rich friendship, franky x angst
rating : m for the series, pg-13 for this part
word count : 2400
summary : Mini and Alo find themselves dealing with sin in a way they never have before.
This one is set during 6x09.
betrayal - breaking or violation of a presumptive contract, trust, or confidence
lust
greed
envy
blame
lie
pride
revenge
cowardice
betrayal
Betrayal
Alo grips the ends of his hair in frustration as he stomps out of Mini’s house.
White hot rage burns the inside of his chest as he stalks down the street, maneuvering his way through the winding streets of Bristol towards Rich’s neighbourhood.
Alo knows the only thing he needs right now, in this horrible fucking moment, is his best mate. Rich would take his side with this. He certainly wouldn’t blame Alo for being upset with Mini, being mad at her for lying to him. A surge of hatred towards Franky bubbles up in Alo as he spares a thought for Mini’s partner in deception.
By weaving through the spattering of people, not bothering to apologise to those he bumps into on his desperate mission, Alo makes it to Rich’s house in record time.
Alo prays Rich is home for once instead of locked away doing God knows what in the library as he barges into the house.
“Alo!” Kevin says, shock evident in his tone. Though the ginger boy always had a quick temper, it was rare to see him in such a state. “How are you, my lad?”
“Fine, Kevin,” Alo snaps out in reply. “Is Rich here?” He asks, not bothering with the niceties.
“He’s in his room,” Kevin answers, furrowing his brows. “Are you all right, Alo?” He asks kindly.
Alo sighs and walks up the stairs towards Rich’s bedroom, not bothering to answer Rich’s father. After all, how do you explain that your entire life has been fucked over? It wasn’t easy.
Turning the knob, Alo walks into Rich’s room without knocking.
Rich is clearly taken aback by Alo’s presence. Books are littered around him on the bed, balls of scrunched up notebook paper littering the floor.
“Hey mate,” Rich says softly. He only really speaks softly these days, a sharp departure from his usual sharp tones. “Look, I’m really busy here,” he explains, gesturing to the books around him.
“Mini’s pregnant.” Alo says bluntly, shutting the door to the room.
Rich gapes at Alo for a moment.
“What?” Rich asks after a long minute of silence. “What the fuck do you mean Mini’s pregnant?” Some of the old sharpness layers into Rich’s tone and a small part of Alo is thankful for, even just in that moment, having his old friend back.
Alo shrugs and sits on a clear spot on Rich’s bed before burying his head in his hands. “Franky told me she was in the hospital so I went. When I could sneak in to go see her, she was there... all pregnant.”
“Oh,” Rich says, not quite knowing how to reply. “Is she... like, really pregnant?”
“She was pretty fucking pregnant,” Alo snaps in response. Glancing up at Rich’s shocked face, Alo feels a wave of regret for his behaviour. “Sorry, mate,” he adds softly.
“It’s fine, I understand,” Rich replies, shock still lacing his voice. “Are you sure it’s yours?”
Rage grips Alo again, this time directed towards Rich. “Yes I’m fucking sure it’s mine, Richard. She’s not a slag!” Alo exclaims, his protectiveness towards Mini blinding the rationality of Rich’s question. “Don’t talk about her like that,” he grumbles.
Rich sighs and throws his hands up. “Fine, whatever, it was just a fucking question. You remember her reputation, right?”
Alo glares at Rich. “Those were just lies she started,” Alo explains, not wanting to get into Mini’s fucked up perception of what creates popularity. “It’s just me and Nick.”
The two fall into silence for a moment before Rich snaps back to reality. “So what are you going to do? Are you going to... keep it?”
Alo shrugs. “She didn’t even tell me she was pregnant, I doubt she gives a fuck whether I want to keep it or not.” Alo pauses and looks back at Rich. “I think it’s too late for an abortion.”
“What about adoption?” Rich asks softly as he picks at his corduroy pants.
The question rocks Alo.
Truthfully, he never really thought about it. The suggestion gnaws at him.
He didn’t want to have a baby. That much he knew. After all, how could they look after a kid together? They don’t have any money. They have no where to stay. He loves her, that much he knows for sure, but her feelings are still a mystery. He pretends she loves him back, but that may just all be a fantasy.
The last thing he wants is her to be stuck to him just because the condom broke and she was so sure of her ovulation schedule that it didn’t matter. They could spend that Plan B money on something useful, like gin and cigarettes.
Alo never lamented not being a virgin as much as he did in this moment.
Still, a heavy feeling settled over his heart at the prospect of giving their baby up for adoption. It could have a happy life, sure, but Franky didn’t. Franky was the only basis he had for this sort of situation and she was miserable. No matter how much love and affection her dads laid on her, those thirteen years she spent alone, going from foster home to foster home, fucked her up beyond repair.
He couldn’t think of his child ending up like her. He loved Franky to death and would always be grateful that he tried to reach out to the small, quite girl that day in the cafeteria, but over his dead body would his child end up like her.
“It doesn’t have to turn out like Franky,” Alo says firmly, trying to convince himself of the smarter option.
Rich shrugs and leans against his headboard. He fumbles around for a cigarette, offering the pack to Alo after fishing one out for himself. Though Alo was never one to smoke cigarettes, at least while sober. Shortly after his break up with Mini, he took it up until he couldn’t stand smelling like her anymore. Still, he took one, digging his lighter out of his pocket and tossing it to Rich.
“That’s one of those things you never know,” Rich says thoughtfully. “It doesn’t have to turn out like Franky, but it could.”
“Could you just agree with me, Richard?” Alo says exasperatedly.
“I’m just being realistic, Als. You have to think of every possibility. It’s not like it’s just you, right? It isn’t even just you and Mini. It’s you, Mini and a fucking baby,” Rich explains before taking a long drag of his cigarette. “You should probably ring her.”
Alo sits in silence, smoking his cigarette and ignoring Rich’s piercing stare for as long as he can. He stubs out the cigarette and throws his arms up in a defeated fashion. “Fine, whatever!”
He pulls his phone out of his pocket and angrily dials Mini’s mobile number, which he memorized on one lonely, pathetic, drunken night, in testament to true love.
It feels like it rings forever and before long, he hears her voice mail message. Pathetically, he clings to the sound of her melodic voice and even in all his anger, he can still feel his heart jump. By the time of the beep, Alo resolves himself, falling back into the feeling of betrayal that swirls around his mind in that instance.
“It’s me, Mini,” he says firmly into the receiver. “We need to talk about this immediately. Call me back.” He hangs up without saying goodbye and looks back at Rich.
The look on Rich’s face is surprising to say the least. His brows are furrowed, in much the same manner as his father, though he’d hate to hear that statement. His shoulders are rounded and slouched as he angles his body away from Alo. His knees are drawn up to his chest, his arms wrapped so tightly around him that the cigarette dangling between his fingers is dangerously close to singeing his hair.
All of that is nothing compared to his eyes.
Rich’s eyes are filled with disappointment, not a look Alo was used to having directed at him. At least not through those familiar brown eyes. Anger, yes. Frustration, usually. Never disappointment.
“What?” Alo asks sharply.
Rich merely shakes his head sadly and tosses his cigarette in a nearby glass of water, which is already half full of abandoned butts and ash.
“It’s nothing, Alo,” he says, his soft tone returning. He reaches under his bed and pulls out the sleeping bag Alo once associated with home, back when his own house was too stifling and too strict to bother with. When his only problem was the best way to get out of his chores.
The sleeping bag smells musty now, as it had been months since Alo last took up residence on Rich’s floor. He spares a thought for that simpler time. When he would tease Rich for crushing on Grace. When they would giggle at night about their newfound “friends”. When their biggest obstacle was finding a new strain of weed to mix with their tried and tested varieties.
A part of him would give anything to go back there. Back when it was easy.
Only a small part, though.
Back then, things were easy, but he didn’t have Mini.
No matter how betrayed he feels or how angry he is, he’d still trade just about anything in the world for her.
-
Guilt rushes through Franky as she sets the Mini’s phone back on the windowsill.
Franky always thought of herself as a perceptive person. Years of being alone taught her how to read people, to decipher between what they said and what they meant.
She knows what Mini thinks she needs. Mini thinks she needs Alo.
She could tell Mini has far deeper feelings for Alo than she cares to admit. She pretends to be indifferent to the ginger because he doesn’t fit in with her preoccupation with qualities she assumes the “perfect” boyfriend would have.
Franky knows better, though. Sure, Mini knew the sting of an absent father, but she didn’t know the pain of full abandonment. Franky’s dad bailed before she could even comprehend that he existed. Mini’s father was a coward, but Franky’s was a bastard.
Franky can justify her actions because she knows Alo. She knows every one of his faults. He wears them on his sleeve, as if proud to be an underachieving party animal with no direction and no sense of responsibility.
As much as he could promise over the phone that he’d be there for Mini, that they could do this whole child raising schtick if only they work together, that he loves her no matter what, Franky knew better.
No one changes in twenty-four hours. It was easy when the baby was still tucked away in Mini’s uterus, but in a month or so? When the baby pops out and isn’t taken care of by the female reproductive system and all it’s twisted wonders? That’s when they leave.
For everything Alo is and was, he’s still just a boy. Just an irresponsible, impulsive boy who fancies himself in love with this poor pregnant girl.
Mini is better off with Franky. They may be homeless and poor, but Franky knows she’s never going to walk out. She’ll help her best friend, no matter what it takes.
It’s better this way.
-
Mini’s mind and her body have never existed in sync, in Mini’s opinion.
All the times she desperately tried to starve herself, aiming for a smaller size or a smaller number on the scale. She would gear herself up, repeating mantra’s Kate Moss and Karl Lagerfeld would be proud of to herself. Repeating them, writing them out, posting them to her mirror on bright pink notes.
All that work, but she’d still end up fainting. Her mother or Liv would force her to eat, effectively canceling out all that she tried to do.
She remembered being with Nick. How much she wanted to be good for him and how much she wanted to enjoy whatever he was fumbling around with. How if she could only enjoy the sex, if she could only be good at it, certainly their relationship would follow.
And then Alo. All she wanted was one shag. Just to get whatever weird feelings she was starting to develop out of her system. After all, being around someone that much generally led to unjust feelings being developed. It wasn’t weird.
She remembers her body reacting with way more fervor than expected. Certainly far more than she wanted. If she could have only controlled her reaction to him, at least been able to hide it more, he would have never been able to hold it over her. He would have never been able to convince her to keep up their little secret.
That’s probably the only mistake she’ll be grateful to her body for.
She would have taken any of that a million times over this, though.
”So you’re saying my body’s fucking with the baby?”
“Well, yeah, I suppose it is.”
Mini’s mind briefly flits to that devastating statement as she extracts her hand from under her skirt.
”And I thought, ‘She’s dead. She’s dead’.”
Alo’s at her side in a second, just before the sobs begin to wrack Mini’s body. He’s begging her to calm down as he fumbles for his phone. He yanks off his flannel shirt and lays it over her legs, doing anything he can to prohibit her from seeing the rapidly expanding crimson puddle.
“It’ll be okay, Mins,” Alo promises, his steady voice juxtaposing with the fearful gleam in his eyes. “I’m not going to let anything happen to you. To either of you,” he says firmly, one hand grasping her’s as he slips his other arm around her shoulder. “It’ll be okay.”
Mini wants nothing more in this world than to believe him, so she lets herself pretend he’s right. Just this one time.
pairing/fandom : alo x mini, major alo x rich friendship, franky x angst
rating : m for the series, pg-13 for this part
word count : 2400
summary : Mini and Alo find themselves dealing with sin in a way they never have before.
This one is set during 6x09.
betrayal - breaking or violation of a presumptive contract, trust, or confidence
lust
greed
envy
blame
lie
pride
revenge
cowardice
betrayal
Betrayal
Alo grips the ends of his hair in frustration as he stomps out of Mini’s house.
White hot rage burns the inside of his chest as he stalks down the street, maneuvering his way through the winding streets of Bristol towards Rich’s neighbourhood.
Alo knows the only thing he needs right now, in this horrible fucking moment, is his best mate. Rich would take his side with this. He certainly wouldn’t blame Alo for being upset with Mini, being mad at her for lying to him. A surge of hatred towards Franky bubbles up in Alo as he spares a thought for Mini’s partner in deception.
By weaving through the spattering of people, not bothering to apologise to those he bumps into on his desperate mission, Alo makes it to Rich’s house in record time.
Alo prays Rich is home for once instead of locked away doing God knows what in the library as he barges into the house.
“Alo!” Kevin says, shock evident in his tone. Though the ginger boy always had a quick temper, it was rare to see him in such a state. “How are you, my lad?”
“Fine, Kevin,” Alo snaps out in reply. “Is Rich here?” He asks, not bothering with the niceties.
“He’s in his room,” Kevin answers, furrowing his brows. “Are you all right, Alo?” He asks kindly.
Alo sighs and walks up the stairs towards Rich’s bedroom, not bothering to answer Rich’s father. After all, how do you explain that your entire life has been fucked over? It wasn’t easy.
Turning the knob, Alo walks into Rich’s room without knocking.
Rich is clearly taken aback by Alo’s presence. Books are littered around him on the bed, balls of scrunched up notebook paper littering the floor.
“Hey mate,” Rich says softly. He only really speaks softly these days, a sharp departure from his usual sharp tones. “Look, I’m really busy here,” he explains, gesturing to the books around him.
“Mini’s pregnant.” Alo says bluntly, shutting the door to the room.
Rich gapes at Alo for a moment.
“What?” Rich asks after a long minute of silence. “What the fuck do you mean Mini’s pregnant?” Some of the old sharpness layers into Rich’s tone and a small part of Alo is thankful for, even just in that moment, having his old friend back.
Alo shrugs and sits on a clear spot on Rich’s bed before burying his head in his hands. “Franky told me she was in the hospital so I went. When I could sneak in to go see her, she was there... all pregnant.”
“Oh,” Rich says, not quite knowing how to reply. “Is she... like, really pregnant?”
“She was pretty fucking pregnant,” Alo snaps in response. Glancing up at Rich’s shocked face, Alo feels a wave of regret for his behaviour. “Sorry, mate,” he adds softly.
“It’s fine, I understand,” Rich replies, shock still lacing his voice. “Are you sure it’s yours?”
Rage grips Alo again, this time directed towards Rich. “Yes I’m fucking sure it’s mine, Richard. She’s not a slag!” Alo exclaims, his protectiveness towards Mini blinding the rationality of Rich’s question. “Don’t talk about her like that,” he grumbles.
Rich sighs and throws his hands up. “Fine, whatever, it was just a fucking question. You remember her reputation, right?”
Alo glares at Rich. “Those were just lies she started,” Alo explains, not wanting to get into Mini’s fucked up perception of what creates popularity. “It’s just me and Nick.”
The two fall into silence for a moment before Rich snaps back to reality. “So what are you going to do? Are you going to... keep it?”
Alo shrugs. “She didn’t even tell me she was pregnant, I doubt she gives a fuck whether I want to keep it or not.” Alo pauses and looks back at Rich. “I think it’s too late for an abortion.”
“What about adoption?” Rich asks softly as he picks at his corduroy pants.
The question rocks Alo.
Truthfully, he never really thought about it. The suggestion gnaws at him.
He didn’t want to have a baby. That much he knew. After all, how could they look after a kid together? They don’t have any money. They have no where to stay. He loves her, that much he knows for sure, but her feelings are still a mystery. He pretends she loves him back, but that may just all be a fantasy.
The last thing he wants is her to be stuck to him just because the condom broke and she was so sure of her ovulation schedule that it didn’t matter. They could spend that Plan B money on something useful, like gin and cigarettes.
Alo never lamented not being a virgin as much as he did in this moment.
Still, a heavy feeling settled over his heart at the prospect of giving their baby up for adoption. It could have a happy life, sure, but Franky didn’t. Franky was the only basis he had for this sort of situation and she was miserable. No matter how much love and affection her dads laid on her, those thirteen years she spent alone, going from foster home to foster home, fucked her up beyond repair.
He couldn’t think of his child ending up like her. He loved Franky to death and would always be grateful that he tried to reach out to the small, quite girl that day in the cafeteria, but over his dead body would his child end up like her.
“It doesn’t have to turn out like Franky,” Alo says firmly, trying to convince himself of the smarter option.
Rich shrugs and leans against his headboard. He fumbles around for a cigarette, offering the pack to Alo after fishing one out for himself. Though Alo was never one to smoke cigarettes, at least while sober. Shortly after his break up with Mini, he took it up until he couldn’t stand smelling like her anymore. Still, he took one, digging his lighter out of his pocket and tossing it to Rich.
“That’s one of those things you never know,” Rich says thoughtfully. “It doesn’t have to turn out like Franky, but it could.”
“Could you just agree with me, Richard?” Alo says exasperatedly.
“I’m just being realistic, Als. You have to think of every possibility. It’s not like it’s just you, right? It isn’t even just you and Mini. It’s you, Mini and a fucking baby,” Rich explains before taking a long drag of his cigarette. “You should probably ring her.”
Alo sits in silence, smoking his cigarette and ignoring Rich’s piercing stare for as long as he can. He stubs out the cigarette and throws his arms up in a defeated fashion. “Fine, whatever!”
He pulls his phone out of his pocket and angrily dials Mini’s mobile number, which he memorized on one lonely, pathetic, drunken night, in testament to true love.
It feels like it rings forever and before long, he hears her voice mail message. Pathetically, he clings to the sound of her melodic voice and even in all his anger, he can still feel his heart jump. By the time of the beep, Alo resolves himself, falling back into the feeling of betrayal that swirls around his mind in that instance.
“It’s me, Mini,” he says firmly into the receiver. “We need to talk about this immediately. Call me back.” He hangs up without saying goodbye and looks back at Rich.
The look on Rich’s face is surprising to say the least. His brows are furrowed, in much the same manner as his father, though he’d hate to hear that statement. His shoulders are rounded and slouched as he angles his body away from Alo. His knees are drawn up to his chest, his arms wrapped so tightly around him that the cigarette dangling between his fingers is dangerously close to singeing his hair.
All of that is nothing compared to his eyes.
Rich’s eyes are filled with disappointment, not a look Alo was used to having directed at him. At least not through those familiar brown eyes. Anger, yes. Frustration, usually. Never disappointment.
“What?” Alo asks sharply.
Rich merely shakes his head sadly and tosses his cigarette in a nearby glass of water, which is already half full of abandoned butts and ash.
“It’s nothing, Alo,” he says, his soft tone returning. He reaches under his bed and pulls out the sleeping bag Alo once associated with home, back when his own house was too stifling and too strict to bother with. When his only problem was the best way to get out of his chores.
The sleeping bag smells musty now, as it had been months since Alo last took up residence on Rich’s floor. He spares a thought for that simpler time. When he would tease Rich for crushing on Grace. When they would giggle at night about their newfound “friends”. When their biggest obstacle was finding a new strain of weed to mix with their tried and tested varieties.
A part of him would give anything to go back there. Back when it was easy.
Only a small part, though.
Back then, things were easy, but he didn’t have Mini.
No matter how betrayed he feels or how angry he is, he’d still trade just about anything in the world for her.
-
Guilt rushes through Franky as she sets the Mini’s phone back on the windowsill.
Franky always thought of herself as a perceptive person. Years of being alone taught her how to read people, to decipher between what they said and what they meant.
She knows what Mini thinks she needs. Mini thinks she needs Alo.
She could tell Mini has far deeper feelings for Alo than she cares to admit. She pretends to be indifferent to the ginger because he doesn’t fit in with her preoccupation with qualities she assumes the “perfect” boyfriend would have.
Franky knows better, though. Sure, Mini knew the sting of an absent father, but she didn’t know the pain of full abandonment. Franky’s dad bailed before she could even comprehend that he existed. Mini’s father was a coward, but Franky’s was a bastard.
Franky can justify her actions because she knows Alo. She knows every one of his faults. He wears them on his sleeve, as if proud to be an underachieving party animal with no direction and no sense of responsibility.
As much as he could promise over the phone that he’d be there for Mini, that they could do this whole child raising schtick if only they work together, that he loves her no matter what, Franky knew better.
No one changes in twenty-four hours. It was easy when the baby was still tucked away in Mini’s uterus, but in a month or so? When the baby pops out and isn’t taken care of by the female reproductive system and all it’s twisted wonders? That’s when they leave.
For everything Alo is and was, he’s still just a boy. Just an irresponsible, impulsive boy who fancies himself in love with this poor pregnant girl.
Mini is better off with Franky. They may be homeless and poor, but Franky knows she’s never going to walk out. She’ll help her best friend, no matter what it takes.
It’s better this way.
-
Mini’s mind and her body have never existed in sync, in Mini’s opinion.
All the times she desperately tried to starve herself, aiming for a smaller size or a smaller number on the scale. She would gear herself up, repeating mantra’s Kate Moss and Karl Lagerfeld would be proud of to herself. Repeating them, writing them out, posting them to her mirror on bright pink notes.
All that work, but she’d still end up fainting. Her mother or Liv would force her to eat, effectively canceling out all that she tried to do.
She remembered being with Nick. How much she wanted to be good for him and how much she wanted to enjoy whatever he was fumbling around with. How if she could only enjoy the sex, if she could only be good at it, certainly their relationship would follow.
And then Alo. All she wanted was one shag. Just to get whatever weird feelings she was starting to develop out of her system. After all, being around someone that much generally led to unjust feelings being developed. It wasn’t weird.
She remembers her body reacting with way more fervor than expected. Certainly far more than she wanted. If she could have only controlled her reaction to him, at least been able to hide it more, he would have never been able to hold it over her. He would have never been able to convince her to keep up their little secret.
That’s probably the only mistake she’ll be grateful to her body for.
She would have taken any of that a million times over this, though.
”So you’re saying my body’s fucking with the baby?”
“Well, yeah, I suppose it is.”
Mini’s mind briefly flits to that devastating statement as she extracts her hand from under her skirt.
”And I thought, ‘She’s dead. She’s dead’.”
Alo’s at her side in a second, just before the sobs begin to wrack Mini’s body. He’s begging her to calm down as he fumbles for his phone. He yanks off his flannel shirt and lays it over her legs, doing anything he can to prohibit her from seeing the rapidly expanding crimson puddle.
“It’ll be okay, Mins,” Alo promises, his steady voice juxtaposing with the fearful gleam in his eyes. “I’m not going to let anything happen to you. To either of you,” he says firmly, one hand grasping her’s as he slips his other arm around her shoulder. “It’ll be okay.”
Mini wants nothing more in this world than to believe him, so she lets herself pretend he’s right. Just this one time.