and screaming

hey, y’all! i’ve made the decision to move tunny over to my multimuse; i still have a ton of muse for him but i’m struggling with keeping up with all my blogs, so i’ll be able to write as him more consistently over there! if you’re not following me over there, i really hope you do, i’m a hell of a lot more active!

      he can’t help but think about what would have happened if he had just stayed or if they hadn’t even left jingletown. in hindsight, it could have been the better option. an unfortunate thought to think their suburban hellhole would somehow be better.  ❝ i— ❞ he cuts himself off, taking a moment to chew on his lip. out of everything that’s happened; the drugs, the abandonment issues, the dull job that made him want to blow out his god damn brains—he can’t remember being this nervous. everything’s changed. 

        ❝ i missed you too man. ❞ that may be a bit of an understatement. once he left, everything spiraled out of control, he got out of control. ending up alone wasn’t part of the plan. it was supposed to be them and will against the world, not an ending where they all separate. a sharp inhale before he continues, ❝ i didn’t know if i’d see you again, really. ❞

        they’ll never be able to go back to who they were before he and johnny left jingletown. that’s just a fact; will has a baby, johnny got addicted to drugs, tunny went to war and lost a leg. they’re not the same people, and though it feels like he’s come full circle --- back home, back to having no purpose or direction, just a hundred times more fucked up in the process --- he doesn’t know if they’ll ever be as close as they were. there’s this distance between him and johnny, now, and it cuts sharp as any shrapnel; cuts into his chest when he breathes, into his hands when he tries to push his way through it.

       johnny’s his best friend. but johnny no longer knows who he is. tunny’s not sure he knows who he is himself. should he have just stayed away?

     he’s played out the scenario in his head a thousand times before and it’s always ended in giving him a nice sucker punch. he’s held onto so much resentment for him leaving, there wasn’t really much to leave to the imagination. except now that he’s standing in front of him, he realizes things aren’t so fucking black and white. anger, betrayal, bitterness—all emotions still prominent but he wasn’t quite expecting the worry or the relief.  fists clench and he turns his gaze for a moment as if not seeing him would somehow make this decision easier. it doesn’t. ❝ i’m not gonna hit you. ❞

        how many different ways has he played this out? anything from the goddamn silent treatment, a single punch, to beating him bloody. he’d take it all, ‘cause yeah, he probably deserves it. (maybe johnny deserves it, too; tunny was drowning, in that fucking tiny room, and johnny didn’t throw him a lifejacket. the army did that.) it’s not like there’s anything johnny could do to him that’d hurt more than what he’s been through --- that could make tunny wish he was dead any more than he already does. and yet the restraint...it makes his eyes sting.  ❝ alright. ❞ his gaze drops to his boots, one filled with metal instead of flesh.  ❝ missed you, man. i wanted to call, but--- ❞

The bigger picture sounds suffocating. As much as he wants to be a part of something and as much as he wants his life to have more meaning than sleeping in and weekend partying, it’s not the same as having a general desire to change the world or even have an impact on something so massive. Declan doesn’t want much. He’s not looking for rank and promotion. He’s not looking to be some kind of decorated hero. There are guys that align closer to that than he does. Guys that enlist with some unwavering patriotism (that probably don’t even know what the hell it means to critically look at a country), that think that they’re apart of some sort of change. He knows it’s not all of them. People join for a thousand different reasons. And a lot, like him, are looking for some sort of career and a stable paycheck. That’s what the military has. Stability in pay and having a legit job. Of course, the job is also one that runs the risk of getting blown up. But, Declan still doesn’t regret it. He hasn’t seen fighting yet either, so he knows that the reality is, he can’t be sure how he’ll react, what he’ll feel, or how the fuck he’s going to be when it’s all over.

Maybe his reasons for being here are ultimately selfish. But, he doesn’t think that he’s one of the few. Declan think that if anyone enlists on pure selflessness that they have to be lying somewhere along the line. What about this is selfless? As far as he’s concerned, pure selflessness might come from those in jobs that directly help people. Emergency work, medical, fire — shit like that. Not soldiers. Declan snorts while he listens to him, shaking his head. “Those ads make it look like you’re gonna have the time of your life. Now look, check out the adventure we’re on now.” Though, he’s sure that this lull isn’t forever, just that the excitement might not be the good kind either. “Write a complaint, I’m sure that’ll help,” he jokes.

        tunny looks at some of these guys and he just knows they’re gonna get promoted soon; the leaders, the ones calm and in control, the ones who’ll probably be sergeant majors in two years flat. good for them, sure, if this is what they like, but it’s not tunny. he and declan, they’re more the here ‘cause they’ve got nothing else type. the ones who found themselves at the edge of a cliff, the army the only thing keeping them from falling off into the darkness beneath. it would have swallowed tunny whole, if he’d not enlisted as a way to get out. it would have chewed him up and left him as nothing. nothing. at least here, he’s got a chance to be something. to be better. maybe it’s not much, but it’s the only thing tunny has left. no friends, no job, no future. just this, or disappearing forever. maybe he’s not as ready for that as he’d thought.

Declan doesn’t want to think that the friends he made were military specific. Sure, there are some guys that he probably won’t see or hear from again. People he didn’t grow all that close to, but will remember as far as that one guy he once laughed with or talked to briefly. But, then there are others. Others that he felt at least somewhat of a friendship building between them. Where he thought that he could see himself hanging out with them outside of work, outside of Iraq. Tunny was someone he counts as a friend. And if this were him, he thinks that he’d want his friends or family to be around. And fuck, it’s not easy to so much as consider that, he knows he can’t really imagine what it’s like. He can make assumptions, he can figure it as far as an empathetic person could, but he’ll never know what it’s like. Declan doesn’t thrive on his own though. And even though he knows that there are people that crave solitude to some extent, he thinks that there’s still some kind of need for human contact, whatever form that takes. People tend to need other people.

And he feels like he’d be some kind of fucked up person if he didn’t think about his friends when they’re stuck in some military hospital, lucky to even be alive and so not lucky in any other way.

He just hopes that he’s not making it worse somehow, by not knowing what to say or how to say much of anything. He’s not the type that loses words easily. It takes a lot to dry up his throat. And he thinks that it’s normal, that no one in this situation really knows what to say. And if there’s a correct way to address what happened, he doesn’t have some kind of guideline in front of him. How disingenuous would that be anyway? It’s not that he sees anyone different when he looks at Tunny. He’s still the same guy to him. But, when someone’s been through shit, there’s that natural pause in what to say or do. “Yeah, sure,” he says, nodding before he moves from his place to sit down. Honestly, there was never really much question as to whether or not he should show up. No decision to make about how to spend his time. “Figured there were more important things than sitting on my ass and readjusting.”

        tunny talks a lot of shit; he always has, for as long as he can remember, making noise for the sake of it, saying bullshit he doesn’t really believe, anything that’ll bury his true feelings, his real heart. he’s always wished he didn’t have one of those, after all. he’s always wished he was really as callous as he tries to seem to be, ‘cause the only thing caring does is hurt. it hurts him. so when he says he doesn’t care that nobody’s come to visit him, it’s bullshit. sure, it’s of his own doing --- he could have gotten over his fear or pride or whatever it is that has put up a giant wall between himself and jingletown, and called will --- but he’s still lonely. sometimes the tears he cries at night aren’t just due to the pain. sometimes it seems as though he’s gonna be alone forever, and it makes any future beyond the next day seem impossible, all the lights switched off. some people can see ahead forever, can’t they, can see themselves being ninety. tunny’s surprised he made it past nineteen. most days, he wishes he hadn’t. especially now. what the fuck has he got going for him now?

        he’s alone, and he’s broken, and what was already a fucked up life has gotten worse.

( @decentsoul / dear dad, or god, or whatever / always accepting! )

        ❝ nah, man, it’s cool. ❞ he cuts a strange figure, curled into the corner of the farthest booth, where the light grows dim, fresh bruise a badge of honour on his cheek, twisting an unlit cigarette between his fingers. his companion is the guitar case sitting on the bench opposite, a more reliable friend than anyone else, backpack kicked under the table. maybe he just looks like a sullen teenager — maybe that’s what he wants — but tunny is deflated. for the first time in a long time, things have gotten to him. for the first time in a long time, there has been a knife stuck in his side and all the air has been let out. he’s had enough. that’s what the bag is for: he’s had enough.