mirage

“i thought i met them once but then everything changed,” he answers vaguely, even he doesn’t know if it’s the truth or a lie. mx’s experience of romantic love has been so abstract from him that the years that have passed cloud every feeling he ever had. the people he loved changed or he changed without them, there is no in between. in this life, he is neither versions of himself that he has been to everyone most recently. he’s alive and breathing despite the strange noose he feels around his neck, the organs that struggle to fight against self-inflicted wounds that haven’t even happened yet. maybe this is his karma for leaving the world behind but in all honestly, it was never too much better with him in it. 

he doesn’t question her, he just listens to the words that leave her lips and fall upon the cool summer air with the same dark eyes that never change. there’s nothing that concerns him about her narrative, he doesn’t recoil or flinch over the warning signs of a train wreck that might make others move out of the way. he isn’t scared by the fact that she says it should of been her, he isn’t even nervous when she goes on to say it shouldn’t of been him. they had never known each other well but mx had never once wanted to trade his life for another until the accident, after that… even now… he wished for nothing more than to trade places with one single person who would of made more use of what time he had left. he had thrown it all away and fuck, he’d do it all over again. he knew that already. 

“more like a scribble than an ink blot,” he corrects, a hint of humour in his voice that doesn’t meet his eyes. maybe this is the real him. so tired, so drained by the cards dealt to him and unable to find a way to scramble back to the surface and find something to hold onto that will keep him afloat in the vast ocean that has become his mind by now, “i could never figure out where it started or where it ended, every time i thought i had a grip on this whole living thing… i was wrong.”

...

“You really like having that air of mysteriousness about you, huh?” It was a light tease. Brooklyn had no one to be friendly with anymore, the only person she had left was Lillian and their relationship was... different. She was more of her crutch than anything, a reminder that she had to hold on to at least some of her sanity. It had been so long since she’d had someone to joke around with, have conversations with that didn’t revolve around David and her son --- not that this one wouldn’t inevitably end up there, they always did. She studied Mx now, unsure what she was looking for. Depth, maybe. A reason for him to be the way that he was. People always had their reasons.

She hummed in response. “Well, you can turn a scribble into something,” after a moment of thought, “but an ink blot is just a stain. You can’t do anything with an ink blot. If you try to use the paper, it just ruins the whole picture. But a scribble, you can change a scribble. You can even erase a scribble.” She wasn’t sure what she was getting at, she rarely was, but the metaphor made sense to her. It wasn’t supposed to be some inspirational speech or anything. She was really just thinking aloud.

“Me too,” she admitted, though that probably wasn’t much of a secret. Those who looked at Brooklyn, she knew what they seen. She wasn’t stupid. She wasn’t in denial. They saw a young girl who had lost her mind --- even when she was sure she still had it in her grip. When she spoke, she knew she wasn’t making much sense. She knew that she was distant, that people only saw a daze when they looked in her eyes, she knew she was never seeing what was right in front of her because she was too focused now on the past, or the undecided future, never what was in-between. “Every time I thought it must have a reason...” Trailing off, she ended the sentence with a shake of her head. There was no reason to finish it. He knew. “I really thought he was it. My son. I really thought he was the reason for everything that I went through, I thought that everything in my life led me to the moment he was born. And then... he was gone.” She snapped her fingers, gaze resting on something (nothing) in the distance. “Just like that.”

Zeki felt like he was just watching the events of Darkwood come and go. Easter rolled around and then rolled right back away in the blink of an eye. All he could ever think about was what was yet to come while everything passed by so quickly. Too quickly. The more normal Darkwood events that happened, they were accompanied by things he didn’t remember happening the first time, and closer they came to the fires. He watched as the flea market was packed up and taken out of town, a coffee in his hand. A familiar face appeared in front of his eyes, seemingly watching the same thing. “Hey. Get anything good before they shut down?”

Her feelings towards all of her ‘friends’ were... different. For Storm she felt a burning hatred --- was there more to unpack underneath that? Sure, but it was under layers of anger. For Andi, confusion was the simplest way to put it. And Zeki... it almost didn’t feel like anything had changed with Zeki. Seeing him again, speaking to him again, was enough of a reminder that he was a genuine person. He’d done a horrible thing, but he had gotten wrapped up in someone else’s plan. He’d apologized for it. That didn’t make it better, he’d been one of the people to steal her child’s father away from them; the only thing that would make it better was if he would work with her this time around. They weren’t okay. But for now, Brooklyn didn’t feel like snapping at him. Instead, she just shrugged a shoulder, eyeing him cautiously. “Nope,” she popped the ‘p’ sound, “I don’t get the point of it.”

On top of not having the overwhelming need to spend all day staring at the wall, she’d even gotten dressed up and gone out. Nothing fancy, but she’d done her makeup for the first time in a long time; depending on which timeline you associated her with, anyway. It was all about distractions, and an all you can eat Asian buffet sounded like a good one, so she sat alone in a booth, people watching as she shoveled an immense amount of food in her mouth. (Could you blame her? It was the first time she’d had a real appetite in years.) “Psst,” she leaned slightly closer to the girl sitting in the chair closest to her, “Lydia, isn’t it? Hot guy by the lo mein is checking you out.”

at times their conversations seemed like little more than a time filling paradox that distracted them from the greater picture. why was it that mx felt so drawn to brooklyn? both of them were selfish, motivated mainly by what they felt was right and how they think things should work out. neither of them dreamed or aspired to much, the darkness of the lives they had already lived all consuming but he was attracted to it all the same.

why would he be looking for david? there was something about rachel’s ominous text that he didn’t quite understand but pieces of the puzzle slid together to make an unpleasant picture. who the fuck was he to say what was right or wrong? he felt there should be some moral outrage, even anger… if he knew who had been responsible for all that DEATH shouldn’t he HATE them too? he didn’t feel hatred… he didn’t feel anything. he just wondered more and more what the sense in it was… why that specific person would cause so much carnage? yet brooklyn seemed to love him… or the idea of him. he was sure he could identify with that because ever since he had been back in the presence of george and nina, he was wondering if his memory really did them justice. was his pain created by the ideal life he wanted for them rather than who they really were? 

“me?” he asks, surprise but nothing like shock. “nah, he’s not really my type,” he interjects. although, maybe a psychotic arsonist might have been his type in another lifetime, now he was just feeling the same emptiness… underwhelmed by everything. searching for some inspiration beyond fighting fate. god, it had always been this way. “i’ve mainly just been walking around town reflecting on the meaning of life… you know, why we’re all here… why we’re not allowed to just die or whatever.”

...

“So what is your type?” She asked, curiosity getting the better of her. Maybe she was desperate to have a lighthearted conversation for once. Every topic since the very day that Zeki’s father’s garage burned down had been coated in angst, or she was only half paying attention to the words that came out of her mouth; she’d lived in a cloud since then. Nothing had made sense. She used to be such a sweet, innocent young girl, normal. Maybe too eccentric to be normal, but normal in the way that mattered. Something had snapped in her mind, and as out of it as she may seem, she knew it. She knew that she wasn’t okay. She knew that people looked at her strangely in public, she knew they had every reason to. How she craved to joke and talk like the average human being. How she craved to be who she used to be.

“That would be nice, wouldn’t it?” It wasn’t that Brooklyn wanted to die, not really; she had a chance with David again, after all, and she had to make sure he made it through this time, even if he wanted nothing to do with her. But her son was gone. Mathis was the only purpose she’d even found, the only reason she’d ever had to why, maybe, she had ever existed in the first place. And even if David survived, even if he fell in love with her all over again, there was no guarantee her child would be the same. And then why, then what? What was the reason? “It should’ve been me,” she added after a short pause, looking at Mx with a strangely serious expression. “Instead of David. Instead of Zeki, Andi. George or Nina. You, even. It should’ve been me.”

She wasn’t saying so in a self pitied way, at the moment she felt nothing at all. Her hurt had dulled down to a slightly aching numbness. She was saying it as the truth. She was her parents’ least successful child. She was the friend that she was sure would be edged out of the group, if Storm, Andi and Zeki had decided they needed to cut their losses. David was the only person that had made her feel like she mattered, and Mathis was the only one that had given her purpose. Without them, she was nothing. “I think that I would do it. Not even because I want to, or to be a good person. I would just take one of those spots because it makes the most sense.” Only if she knew or was sure Mathis truly would cease to exist; to end her life was to end his. “Do you ever feel like you were just a blip on the paper? Like you weren’t meant to be in the plans at all, but by some sort of confusion, you just ended up here?”

So much for lighthearted conversation.

“of course not, I’m always completely serious and kind,” mx points out. it was pretty much the truth and yet his finger drops and the gesture ends as his gaze travels over the other assorted items. he felt that he was as one with the trash items, he’d never been much more than that himself. one mans rubbish could be another mans treasure, couldn’t it? he’d never found a way to polish himself up for a mantelpiece but he was sure he could do a good job with a few candlesticks. up-cycling was a trend when he died, right? they were still ahead of the curve. 

he looks at brooklyn again, the edges of his lips that same familiar smile that he always wears. god, he could of had his head spinning completely off, he could have had a stab wound right in the guts but he’d still be wearing the same old expression. it wasn’t just a mask. it wasn’t a disguise… it was just him. it was the way he had been built, manufactured, engineered. the two of them seemed to talk for hours and get nowhere, a runaway train. he was attracted to her because she was different… he didn’t know everything about her. in the story they had lived already, he had never got a chance to be indulged in so many aspects. his days were numbered and so were those of so many others but hers were infinitely limitless… ongoing… “so, have you seen mr love man again yet?”

...

I don’t get you, she’d texted him, she ached to repeat the sentence now. It was like every word out of this man’s mouth, she couldn’t wrap her mind around. He wasn’t even saying anything bizarre at the moment and she still stared at him with knitted eyebrows, trying to read him. Was he being truthful with her? She didn’t know Mx very well, she didn’t know anyone well outside of the famous five and it turned out she didn’t know them the way she’d thought she did either. If she was being entirely honest, she didn’t even know herself. “Then thanks, I guess,” she finally said, figuring she would be the rude one if he wasn’t poking fun at her, and Brooklyn had never gone out of her way to be rude.

Her gaze drifted back to the junk before them, that he was so insistent wasn’t junk. It still looked like junk to her. “No. I haven’t been looking.” A lie. She hadn’t been actively seeking him out, as in going to his sister and demanding to know where he was, but her eyes wandered in every crowd. Every time the bell chimed in a store she looked, hoping David would be standing in the doorway. Every time she heard a footstep behind her, every time she saw a passing shadow. He seemed to vanish the same way he’d popped up, but surely he would again. And maybe this time he would remember. Maybe this time, he would be looking for her. “Why, have you?”

𝙷𝙴  𝙼𝙸𝙶𝙷𝚃  𝙰𝚂  𝚆𝙴𝙻𝙻  𝙱𝙴  𝚆𝙴𝙰𝚁𝙸𝙽𝙶  𝙰  𝚃𝙸𝙽  𝙵𝙾𝙸𝙻  𝙷𝙰𝚃  𝚁𝙸𝙶𝙷𝚃  𝙽𝙾𝚆  ,  the  thoughts  embedded  on  his  mind  too  bizarre  and  maybe  even  leaning  towards  sacrilege  .   to  DEFINE  WEIRD  wasn’t  exactly  an  easy  feat  in  this  case  ,   with  too  many  things  going  on  ,  too  much  incomprehensible  to  him  that  he  didn’t  know  where  to  begin  .  or  maybe  there  was  an  easy  explanation  —  that  people  were  simply  changing  ,   even  if  it  was  too  fast  ,  too  sudden  .  and  they  didn’t  owe  him  to  be  part  of  that  at  all  no  matter  how  much  he  wanted  to  be  there  for  them  ,  to  care  for  them  every  step  of  the  way  . 

and  maybe  ,  now  more  than  ever  ,  he  wanted  to  be  there  for  them  because  he  wanted  someone  to  be  there  for  him  ,  too  .  to  ask  him  how  he  was  doing  ,  even  if  he’d  answer  with  the  same  old  smile  and  tell  them  EVERYTHING’S  FINE (  even  if  he  was  scared  as  hell  ,  but  at  least  someone  cared  enough  to  ask  )  .   ❛   forget  it  ,  it’s  kind  of  stupid  ,    ❜   he  chuckled  ,  trying  to  laugh  and  shrug  the  more  peculiar  thoughts  away  .   ❛  i  think  i  was  just  blind  to  it  before  but  now  ,  i  see  that  people  are  finally   becoming  who  they’re  meant  to  be  .  a  lot  of  people  seem  more  mature  ,   enlightened  even  .  i  guess  it  just  makes  me  feel  unneeded  ,  not  that  they  needed  me  in  the  first  place  anyway  .    ❜   it  was  the  more  logical  thought  ,   unlike  ash’s  whole  body  snatchers  personality  transplant  theory  .     ❛   you  know  how  much  i  LOVE  this  town  ,   so  it’s  always  a  weird  feeling  to  see  someone  grow  into  someone  meant  for  bigger  things  than  this  town  because  of  course  ,   i  want  to  support  them  but  it  sucks  knowing  i’ll  lose  them  soon  .  ❜  he  took  a  moment  to  breathe  ,  an  apologetic  look  gracing  his  features  as  he  looked  at  brooklyn  after  making  her  an  impromptu  confessional  .  he  always  did  talk  too  much  .   ❛  you’re  not  leaving  us  too ,  right  ?  one  blink  and  next  thing  you  know  ,  georgie  is  gonna  find  out  who  he  wants  to  be  in  the  world  and  leave  us  ,  too  .  ❜ 

...

He didn’t know, she decided. While he could be hinting at all of the differences around them, he didn’t have the same look in his eyes as everyone else; he didn’t seem like he’d changed. It made her wish she hadn’t a memory of living out the next seven years. He would be talking to an entirely different person right now; she would be shy and quiet, but she would be bright. Positive. Bubbly. Quirky. She wouldn’t have lost her innocence to a man she shouldn’t have yet met, to the loss of him. She would be making an entirely different picture. 

“When you’re right, you’re right,” she murmured, it wasn’t funny, but she had to hold back a laugh; Reggie was partially on the mark to be in the dark, if things played out the same he would be leaving them after all. Just not in the way one would expect. “No, I’m not going anywhere.” Brooklyn wasn’t sure of much in life, where it would take her this time, but she was sure of one thing: she was stuck here. There was a time when she dreamed of Paris. A big house out of town with a yard for her future children and puppy to play in, staring out at them from a nice kitchen window, partner by her side. Running her index finger over the blunt pencil, leaving a trail of charcoal down her finger, she took the moment to try to imagine what it would be like now, truly imagine it. No David. No Mathis. Her entire world was built around her child and before that, her boyfriend. She had lost the person she was, all of her interests fizzled out, she was nothing but an empty vessel now if she did not have her boys. How pathetic was that? How sad was that? What was she even supposed to do now? “It wouldn’t make a difference if I were to leave, Reggie,” she realized aloud, “only maybe three people would even notice I was gone.”

“Are you mad? Of course I want to tell him, but how the hell do you tell a man about the child you had with him when he doesn’t remember you in the first place? Please, do let me know, I would love some pointers.”

“My greatest weakness is my weakness. I am not a strong person. I break so easily. I was not built for a world this cruel.” Brooklyn let out a small sigh, took a deep breath. “But it doesn’t matter, because my strength is my determination to keep going, even when I’m not aware of it. Most times I want to curl into a ball and waste away to nothing but for whatever reason... I get up every morning and see where the day takes me.”

brooklyn ruiz ft. mathis walker.

brooklyn ruiz moodbard.

“first of all, i’m offended on behalf of the whole town,” a look of disbelief. “secondly, this isn’t garbage… some of this stuff is pure gold, i saw an original westlife cd over there and i bought a 6ft green trench coat… last… next… well, whenever the fuck i was here before,” he stretches. the imagination isn’t needed when you’re living on multiple timelines. what exactly are you meant to say about the future past future?

he looks at the stall, the awe of chaotic clutter. it was to be appreciated. one mans junk was mx’s next… never to be completed… upcycling project. the garage wasn’t full yet and now he was back in time he had the perfect opportunity for new ideas to fill up his brains until his shitty ideas started coming out of his ears. he extends an index, pointing upwards at a handmade shirt with butterflies embodied all over it and sequins, “now that,” he’s sure, he’s certain, “totally you. 100% your style. iconic. you could become the new trendsetter of the future, people don’t know what’s in store for them yet.”

...

“Mm,” was all she said, neatly folding the shirt she’d been looking at to place back in the pile. If she could find a stand of comic books or trading cards, maybe she would have been intrigued --- at least, the version of her that was into things that didn’t start with ‘D’ and end with ‘avid’ --- but everything she passed so far just looked like... junk. Maybe she was too judgmental. She couldn’t imagine actually working for money and spending half a paycheck on some of the stuff that was being sold.

“That?” She repeated, double checking his finger was pointed in the direction she thought it was. Then glancing down at her attire, Brooklyn wondered what she was wearing that could give him that idea. A white tee, gray cardigan and denim shorts. Where in that did this man find a comparison to shirt she would’ve swore came out of the preteen section of Walmart? She wasn’t sure if she was amused or offended --- perhaps a little of both. “Is that supposed to be an insult?” 

Kyra, not being the type to party or drink as much as she did, but with all that has happened.. can you blame her? Her eyes were fixated on the bubbles inside her drink; all she could see was the fire. Breaking away from her drink, she heard her friend say something. “Oh, thank you!” She replied sweetly, her smile tugging at her lips. “You’re very pretty too, Brooklyn.” She realized her friend was drunk and went along with it. 

She turned her attention back to the bubbles. 

“You’re welcome,” she replied, the remainder of liquid in her glass tossed down her throat. “You know, some boy told me that once? Sometime in middle school. You’re pretty, Brooklyn, but you’re fucking weird.” She laughed now --- it was funny, the things that had mattered back then. The way she’d cried her eyes out in the school bathroom over feeling left out, over being different. Now it could not matter less, could it?

Doing a quick sweep around them, making sure David hadn’t somehow wandered into the crowd, she let her attention fall back to the other. “How are you doing tonight, Kyra?”

Andi needed some space, to clear her head and take some space. Being at home with her parents felt weird, foreign even as she spent hours and hours watching them at her gravesite what seemed to be mere moments ago. But here she was, back to the time before, horrifying enough to be a dream; except it wasn’t. When the dark haired woman closed her eyes from the sheer exhaustion, all she could remember was fire, the smoke, everything from that night, David. And the screaming. It was so much then, that she was stuck within the foggy memory between what was then and what was now. So here she was, buried in her thoughts, in the moments that felt both in the past and in the now, distracted. Her thoughts continued to cycle until she and another body collided, her small frame meeting concrete. Pain. That was a sensation she didn’t miss. “Oh, shit. I’m so sorry. Are you–I’m such a klutz…are you okay?” Andi sat up, pulling her knees in; wincing at her freshly skinned right one. 

...

If Brooklyn was paying attention, she would’ve noticed there was someone directly in front of her. If she was paying even more attention, she would’ve realized who was in front of her. The moment they bumped into each other, her first reaction was to be annoyed at the impact, then to check on them when she realized they’d fallen, and then... then, she wasn’t even sure what she felt. Since the day Andi died, Brooklyn had not even looked at a picture of her. Her phone was erased from any and all memories of her friends, and she hadn’t opened her photo gallery to find happy snapshots of the past this time around, either. She’d seen Storm, she’d seen Zeki, she’d even seen David, but she’d avoided the other girl because it was the easiest thing to do. She didn’t have to face reality if she didn’t succumb to it. She knew how she felt about Storm, she was pissed. She knew how she felt about Zeki, she was still pissed but to a lesser degree. She of course knew how she felt about David. Andi, though? While she was pissed at her too, she was also hurt, she was even more betrayed than with the other half of their original friend group, she was devastated, she was, in a way, relieved... she was heartbroken. It wasn’t unusual for her emotions to go 100 mph, but from the moment the familiarity sunk in, the moment she saw the other’s features, they became a rollercoaster that would not slow. Her heart beating against her ribcage, she kept her tone as cool ( and bitter ) as she could, not offering a hand. “I haven’t been okay in seven years, Andi.”