Colorful Brother Chapter 6
Title: Colorful Brother
Author: 2he_re (Heather and Reena)
Fandom: Jonas Brothers
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction, the real people in it are used without their permission and we do not own them or have any copyright to any part of any of them. We do not believe any of this happened, is likely to happen, or will happen. It is simply a story created around known facts about those involved.
Summary: He doesn’t remember anything before the white flash. He needs to stand the colors, to fix everything. So his brother can be happy again. So that Kevin and Danielle can be happy. So the boy before the white can come back, and make everything right.
Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 10 Chapter 11 Chapter 12 Chapter 13
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They let him keep the piano. He had to yell at them, and scream at them, but they finally let him keep the piano.
His brother hadn’t looked at him when his brother first saw what he had done to the piano. He could tell his brother was disappointed, and a small part of him wished he could take back what he had done. But he didn’t really want to, his brother didn’t like who he was, his brother just wanted the boy before the flash back.
The piano sat on the floor without its legs.
Black piano.
There was no bench anymore.
White keys.
He didn’t need a bench to play. He could sit on the floor and feel vibrations crawl up his body, like the shivers that he got with every note. He would sit for hours with his pants rolled up so his thighs could rest on the cool tile floor.
White floor.
He played the songs that he remembered hearing from the videos, and despite everything, he tried to remember. Despite hating his brother for only giving him the piano to remember, he wanted so badly to remember, so he played. He played and created beautiful sounds that he hoped would be something he hadn’t heard, but the boy before the flash had known.
He didn’t let his brother listen to him play; he always stopped when his brother knocked. Now he was happy his brother knocked, so his brother wouldn’t walk in when he was playing. For some reason he didn’t want that, just the thought of someone else hearing him play made him feel violated.
Violation: like it had been for any color into his pure white; like it was for any other color besides his white and black.
Kevin came in when he was playing. He was playing just something pretty he had made, and Kevin just walked in.
“Nick,” Kevin said breathlessly, and he slammed his fingers down on the keys, pulling from the piano a harsh sound. It hurt his ears, and he spun around to stare up at Kevin. “You remember.”
Remember? His heart slammed into his throat, did he really?
“You can play.”
He looked at Kevin.
White shoes. White shirt. White tie. White pants.
He looked quickly away, too much white, too scary. Like the white room, how it would be without the piano. How lifeless and dull, and isolated.
“What’s the song called?”
He got angry for some reason he didn’t understand. He didn’t want Kevin quizzing him on stupid stuff. He didn’t know anything that matter. All he knew was how to make the piano make beautiful sounds. “I don’t know.”
“It’s your favorite. You wrote it right before…” Kevin trailed off, and he rose up to his feet, glaring. “It’s been so long since I’ve seen you.”
He straightened up at the words as they cut into him. Kevin had seen him everyday. Kevin had visited him for the past three years! Kevin had just been to seen him yesterday. Yesterday wasn’t a long time. Kevin was talking about the boy before the flash, how Kevin had lost the boy before the flash for three years. Kevin thought the boy before the flash was back.
White wall.
“Do you remember the accident?”
He screamed at the words. He couldn’t remember! Did Kevin not understand? What was he even saying?
Kevin’s eyes widened at his outburst. Kevin knew the boy before the flash wouldn’t do that, the reaction was unexpected. It made him yell more.
White. Wall.
“I don’t remember!” he shouted, taking steps forward. Kevin took steps back.
“What do you mean? You were playing the song.”
“I don’t know what song,” he hissed, voice low and dangerous. Not like the boy before the flash, he knew. The boy before the flash was always nice and sweet. The boy before the flash always smiled, and the boy before the flash always submitted, always agreed and never argued. He wasn’t the boy before the flash.
“You played it, you remember it. Subconsciously, I don’t know how, but you do. You remember,” Kevin shot back, but he noticed how Kevin didn’t try to get away from the wall he had backed Kevin up against.
“I was just making music, pretty sounds. I don’t remember the notes, I couldn’t play it again.”
“You’re lying.”
“How do you know that?” he demanded, eyes locked on the wall.
White wall.
“Because you lie. You lie all the time. I barely know when to trust you.”
“When have I lied?!” his voice cracked in the center. “I don’t know when I’ve lied here. Why can’t you believe me? I don’t remember! Can’t you understand that?”
“No, I can’t. I can’t understand how you remember nothing until three years ago. You know all your basic actions, you could dress yourself and walk when you woke up, but you don’t know anything that matters.”
He swallowed and stepped back, the words slicing deep. He wanted Kevin to accept him, to love him for whom he was, but no matter how hard he had tried for three years, it was all falling apart in one. It all started because he didn’t like Danielle. No, it started when his brother first visited him out of the blue, in his colorful clothes, as his colorful brother. That was when everything started falling apart.
“It took me three years,” he whispered, moving back to the dresser.
White dresser.
“No it-“
“Three!” he interrupted. “You don’t understand. I had to watch, I had to listen, I had to practice when no one was looking, so you wouldn’t think I was stupid. You are Kevin. You are family, and every time you came in here, you looked at me like a freak.” Kevin didn’t say anything, and he liked it that way. He liked that Kevin seemed to be listening for once. “I had to work.”
“The nurses didn’t say-“
“They don’t know all. They don’t say all.”
Kevin looked away from him. His eyes weren’t even on Kevin anyway. They were on the wall.
White wall.
“I can’t trust you.”
He winced; then shook himself. Why should he be surprised about this? Why did this come as a shock when he always had to work to please, and even then it never seemed enough, but he wanted to know so badly.
“Why can’t you trust me?” He stared at the piano as he spoke.
Black piano.
He loved the piano, with its coal color and belly on the ground. He loved the beautiful sounds it made, and the calmness it brought to him when the walls seemed to get too close.
White walls.
“Last time you asked me to trust you, you ended up here.”
He swallowed, eyes starting to harden. Did no one understand that he was not the boy before the flash? No matter how much he wished he was the boy before the flash that was not him. They were different. “Well I don’t remember that. I haven’t lied to you, the boy before the flash might’ve, but not me. I’ve never lied!”
Kevin moved to him, quick steps so they were eye to eye, and he could feel Kevin’s breath on his face. “You are not two people. Your name is Nick. You are my brother, you will always be my brother, and there is nothing you can do to get away from that. Who are you?”
He couldn’t answer. He didn’t know, he was confused, he was hurt. “I don’t remember,” he said helplessly.
“Yes you do! You’re my brother, you’re Nick.”
He shrunk from Kevin. He didn’t know. He didn’t know.
White wall.
He couldn’t breathe. He just saw white. Pressing in on him, too much.
“Who are you!?” Kevin roared.
“I don’t know!” he shouted back. “I don’t remember anything. There is nothing to remember. Do you think I like not knowing anything? Do you think I liked having to take years to learn everything again, things that you thought I already knew? Do you think I like hating Danielle? Do you think it’s a choice? I would give anything to be the boy before the flash! Anything at all to make you and my brother happy again. Anything to be the boy who had everything,” he finished in a whisper.
“You don’t wish that.”
“How do you know?” he demanded. He hated how Kevin pretended he knew who he was. Kevin pretended he knew everything about him, why he wanted something, what he wanted, and it made him mad. He hated it.
“Nick doesn’t do that! Nick would never say he hates someone, if he didn’t like who my fiancé was, he would just suck it up, and get over it. He would never say a thing against her, he would put on one of those masks he’s good at and get over it.”
“Well I’m not the boy before the flash! I can’t do that, I don’t know how to put on masks, how to be nice when I don’t want to. I don’t know how to do that!”
“You’re right.” He froze, his heart stopping in a good way; he couldn’t believe Kevin was agreeing with him. Kevin understood. He smiled, looking at Kevin.
Brown eyes.
Hard brown eyes.
“You’re not Nick.”
He doubled over, the smile gone. He only saw the floor with Kevin’s shoes.
White floor. White shoes.
He hated it.
“You’re not Nick, and I don’t know who you are. You did something, you took my brother away, and I want him back.”
White floor.
“Look at me!” Kevin roared.
White floor.
He winced as Kevin’s hand came across his cheek, hard and sharp. It hurt. He hurt. All over, inside, outside.
Low moan, Kevin’s hands came down faster and faster, and then feet, harder and harder. He screamed and curled in.
“Get up! Get up!”
He curled smaller. There were screams from Kevin, but he didn’t understand the words. Then there was the low moan again. He rolled tighter. Eyes clenched shut. The kicking stopped, but his screaming didn’t. He heard a pattern of feet he didn’t know. He knew more people were here, but he didn’t know them. And he couldn’t look.
“Nick?” came a soft voice over his voice; it must go with the feet. It didn’t matter, he wasn’t Nick. He wasn’t anything.
Black world.
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