stupid games; stupid prizes.

    “ guess some things really never change. ”  that should be a comforting thought,  but it overwhelms her just as everything else is.  “ i didn’t know you were a sex hotline now. ”  it’s a joke,  a surprisingly easy one  ;  probably because she makes it in the aid of deflection.  shirking off the comfort of resting in the ‘  it’s what i’ve been taught  ’  blanket for probably the last time in her life.  (  it used to be warm,  it probably still would be if she pulled it tight enough around herself,  but she doesn’t like how it feels anymore.  )  “ you have a good heart. ”  she tells him,  because she believes it.  but she also believes it clouds her judgement.  (  really,  she still doesn’t understand why he chooses to help lost souls.  she might be lost,  but that doesn’t mean she didn’t think her path was the best when she set down it.  )  “ unfortunately,  i don’t. ”  she’s not so self-hating that she believes she never did.  she just believes it was far too early to make any difference to who she is now.  (  or ever again.  )  “ there are a few. ”  she could give them names  (  michael,  faith,  even evan  ).      “ do you ever feel so tired of yourself? ”  she doesn’t name them,  because she doesn’t want to.  not yet,  at least.  “ like there’s nothing you like about yourself when you look in the mirror? ”  even she has to admit,  by his standards,  all her self hatred is essentially moral by textbook.  “ i’ve never felt that way. ”  she gives a deflated laugh,  shoulders shrugging before she falls back onto her bed.  she’s tired,  she is,  and she wants to lie down.   (  she can recognise,  now,  that she’s only avoid the crippling tightness in her chest because she convinced herself she was right.  she can also recognise that emotional maturity blows.  )  “ i mean,  until now. ”   this is the part where everything becomes more honest,  she knows.  “ because there are some people i love so much. ”  people as in plural and love is definitely something she’s going to have to unpack later.  “ and i think they’d pretty tired of me if they knew me too. ”  evan does,  but they’ve always been ... jacks of the same trade.  if she can possibly call what she used to do that.  “ yeah,  well, ”  as one of her hands falls to spread out over her comforter,  she exhales,  “  i think i’d like a hug.  a lot. ”  but this,  in the middle of the night,  with someone she used to lean on,  makes her feel just a little better. 

    “ michael. ”  michael,  royal pain in her ass,  possessor of the only person she’s ever truly loved,  archangel who didn’t seem to know how to function.  and yet ...  she does feel better with him there.  she felt better when he showed up after faith’s unfortunate accident,  and it had been cloaked in animosity (  and grief and later genuine frustration  ),  but she was still scared at the end of the day.  (  she’d seen two people she loves drop that day,  and frankly,  she thinks she’s still surviving.  )  “ i don’t know. ”  she does,  but she’s tired.  “ i think that he’s smart. ”  that’s not an emotion,  but it is the first drop of blood from a stone.  “ and that humanity,  on balance,  is probably better off with him. ”  without reference to the exceptional cases (  faith  ).  “ i don’t know why he hasn’t left yet,  actually.  i guess that makes him dumb. ”  not only is he forfeiting his home amongst god knows what,  he’s staying around her.  “ so ...  what do i know? ”  that whatever she feels towards michael is probably pretty close to what she feels towards faith.  shockingly,  she doesn’t deserve him either.  and that’s fine with her.  she’s a human debt.  nothing more,  nothing less.  perhaps one day,  she’ll atone for her sins enough to make them look her way. (  she doubts it.  she doesn’t know if her redemption is counted when she committed all of her acts entirely willingly.  )  “ at the end of the day,  whatever his reason is for not running for the hills,  i hope it lasts.  ”    she hopes she doesn’t do something to drive him away for good.  (  oh,  if faith could see her now.  without a plan,  without a personality.  any flicker of fondness she felt for the girl tough on the outside would surely die.  )      @heavenswar​

    “ you’re still greeting me twice. ”  it implies more than she says.  that night had been marked as a milestone in her mind for longer than she realised.  it was far from the first time she’d been arrested, and far from the last time, but it’s the first instance of care she can trace her memories back to.  she thinks, even in her drunken stupor, that she told the truth that night.  that her friends were assholes, that she wasn’t trying to be arrested.  when the sun set on her inhibitions, she failed to deal with the ramifications of those truths.  she simply lived side by side with them, and watched as she forgot them the next day. ( willingly, of course.  she had a job to do. )  “ because you’re hoping to get calls in the middle of the night? ”  because he has the same constitution he always has. “ what are you? a sadist? ”  a worthy joke for the state she’s in, she’d like to think.  “ yeah, me too. ”  that sounds too self-pitying in the same tone, and she hates herself for that.  this was a bed she made for herself. “ but i guess i deserve it. ”  cosmic retribution for being an utterly morally depraved human being for such a long time.      “ wanna start with how i’m a terrible person? ”  she doesn’t want him to think she’s over-dramatic.  that she’s a girl going through a break up or dealing with being fired and measuring herself against an impossible standard.  “ and before you tell me i’m not, because you’re here listening to me, ”  which she doesn’t anticipate he will after this, “ i have done terrible things without blinking for a really long time. ”  so long she doesn’t remember a time killing wasn’t on the agenda.  “ and i should’ve known that eventually they’d catch up to me. i just didn’t think it would happen like this. ”  her gaze is still fixed on the wall opposite her bed.  “ i was okay with being a terrible person before, ”  before she met good people, “ because it didn’t matter. ”  she wishes she could recall how that felt. ( like this, she thinks, with a bandaid and a bottle of whiskey over it. ) “ but it’s started to really matter. ”  a tight breath out.  “ you must think i sound on the verge. ”  it’s not something she’s happy to joke about. 

    if he were to ask, she’d say he was her first viable choice. ( probably not as articulately as that, considering she was currently consumed with warmth that she rarely feels. )  he’s the choice that mattered, and really, she thinks that’s as good a reason as any.  “ hey, you are greeting me twice. ”  she holds up two fingers, and suddenly feels far more intoxicated than she thought she was. ( that may have something to do with the fact she hadn’t eaten since six o’clock that evening. )  he brushes her off when she thanks him, and she wonders, briefly, what his constitution must be in order to choose this. “ yeah, well, my friends are assholes. ”  really, none of the morons she goes to school with are responsible for her current situation.  sure, they cheer in wonder at how much, and how fast, she can drink.  but she’s still the one enjoying the applause.  “ do i look like i need help walking? ”  spoken as though the officers are the precinct are currently plotting a conspiracy against her because she can’t walk in a straight line.      regardless of how ridiculous her rationality is aware that theory is, she wraps her arms somewhat clumsily around his waist.  it steadies her ( or at least centres her ) enough to realise that no one has ever offered before. “ thanks for this, ”  she tells him again, because he’s warm and she’s drunk. ( and because, for once, warm and drunk isn’t going to equate to obscene and regrettable one night stand. ) “ you can tell everyone i’m your hot younger girlfriend when you tell this story if you want. ”  as though that sweetens the deal. “ probably make you the talk of the town. ”

    she hears ringing, and ringing, and ringing until ... he speaks.  when the line went briefly silent, she was almost certain he’d chosen to ignore her call. ( apparently, while she’d changed irreversibly, he was just as needlessly caring as when they last met. )   “ hey. ”  she similarly can’t believe that he wants to speak to her, that he didn’t simply answer the call to tell her to lose his number.  he wouldn’t be the first person to back away from her issues and he definitely wouldn’t be the last. “ you didn’t change your number. ”  it sounds as grateful as she is, laced with the sadness closing her throat.  “ i know i’m probably the last person you expected to hear from but uh ... ”  but the last time they met she was a girl, and now she was a woman.  and she feels no more stable than she did then. “ my life has kind of gone to hell. ”  ironic.      “ and i still don’t really have anyone to talk to. ”  not that she spoke to him when they were last in contact.  he helped her, and asked for little in return ( never probed as to where she was or how she was ), but she never really spoke to him.  “ i mean i did but, ”  that person is currently in a coma because she was chosen by an angel to help spread peace on earth, “ but that’s a mess. ”  it wasn’t as though she told faith everything either.  sniffling as she exhales by the phone, a smile of utter desperation spreading across her features.  “ are you busy? ”  he probably has a life now. ( he probably always did, and her good luck and his care have probably just about run out. ) “ i mean, do you have something better to be doing? ”

    underage drinking seemed like far too minor a charge to warrant arrest, in her opinion. (  it was the disorderly conduct in public that had sealed her fate, the cop had explained, as sirens blared in her ears and metal cut into her wrists.  she stands by drama. )  she was told she was allowed one phone call, and her options were already limited.  her parents would come, would bail her out, but they would be sure to lecture her about the consequences of her actions at their earliest convenience. ( as though they’d ever cared enough to be parents before. )  there were her friends, but she realised that most of them were probably as drunk as she was and would just get thrown in with her. ( as though she had any real friends. )  that left her calling the one person who’s job description she was fairly certain this was. henrik mikaelson.  she had explained, albeit briefly on the phone as she was hurried by a particularly agile officer, that she had been arrested and needed bail and if he could please come and get her, she would appreciate it.  ( she’s certain her speech was slurred, which didn’t help her case with the guards, but she hoped he would come anyway. )      when her name is called, she stands despite the fact it makes her feel dizzy.  lo and behold, there he stands.  ( people showing up is new for her. ) “ hey. ”  the smile on her features, skewed at the side, betrays the evidence of the alcohol still swimming through her system. “ thanks for coming. ”  she hadn’t noticed how cold the station was until she’d stepped back outside into the foyer with him,  the guard having unlocked her cell.  “ between you and me, ”  she leans closer to him, “ i am drunk. ” yes, that was the problem. 

    “ of course not. you’re just overly passionate. ”  sarcasm feels heavy on her tongue, but she supposes most of her body is following it’s lead.  it’s at moments like these her mind betrays her and calls out to michael of all people. wishes she’d see rise from the narrow hole in heaven ( or lost in forty fifth street ) the angel has crawled into for the first act of the great escape.  she and michael weren’t friends, she has to remind herself, when she thinks her longing is a simple side effect of the confusion induced by the fact that michael looked like faith for a long time. ( it helps, to a degree.  until she realises she knows how she feels about faith and michael is still escaping her. ) and then, just like that ... “ michael? ”  relief and disbelief flood her in equal measure. someone must be watching her. “ you, ” literally became a different person, “ got a makeover. ”  the miraculous nature of michael rushing to her aid, to faith’s aid, in a different body under difference circumstances distracts her long enough to let the optimism in. “ she’s faith, right? survived worse than this before. ”  michael stands up, and in the light, she notices the slightly grey tint his skin has taken on. “ you don’t look like you’re, ” in any state to fix this.  she keeps the optimism close to her chest, tries to remember michael is an angel, and tries to clutch it when he crashes to the floor.      what she does next makes no sense to her.  instead of screaming at the sky, as she’s become prone to when she wants to have a conversation with him ( she’s still sincerely sorry to the dog walker who witnessed her, in a fit of rage, screaming ‘ fucking asshole ‘ at the sky ), or cursing the fact she’s here in the first place, she makes her way over to him.  he’s passed out, of that much she’s certain, and it takes her a shining moment of grace to wonder if michael and faith are both suffering from the same thing. (  she’s not sure how long it is before the emts realise he probably hasn’t passed out from shock, but she’s using however long she has to her advantage. )  “ if you leave me too, i swear to god, ”  that seems a little on the nose all things considered, “ i will make sure he kicks your ass in heaven. ”  it might be the most genuinely affectionate thing she’s ever said.  all of that said, “ which is not where i’m going after this. ”  she can apologise for this later. plead that it was necessary and act of crisis taken to wake him up before emts were swarming around him in concern.  in short, she slaps him. 

      reaching for her phone is truly her last resort.  she doesn’t want to be accused of being one of the herd addicted to social media, but she’s tried everything.  she’s tried reading to make herself tired, crying to make herself calm, she’s even tried running in the hopes she’ll mercifully pass out. ( it wouldn’t be the first time she’s seen someone’s limbs fail under them this week. ) nothing works. it frustrates her to the point of cursing at the sky until the neighbours throw something hard enough at their floorboards ( her ceiling ) that it makes them shake. she takes it as a warning shot. if you don’t stop yelling, the next one will be on your head. ( her automatic assumption is still violence, even if she knows there’s a nice couple living upstairs working nine to five jobs and craving sleep. she’s always found a way to turn the innocent ugly. ) she’s scrolling through her contacts, more lonely than bored, when her gaze falls upon his name and fixes. ‘ henrik ( get out of jail free card ) ’.      it’s been four years since she called him. not that she’s been counting. not that she wants to start but if she were to be honest, it’s been four years. any sane person would have recognised that he’d probably changed his number, or simply wouldn’t want to talk to her, or was asleep. you know, as most normal people would be at this hour. and that for all of those reasons,  she shouldn’t be hovering over his name. but she isn’t a sane person. she’s a tired, broken one, on the verge of tears with the sun ironically on the horizon. so, she calls him. and listens to the tiresome ringing that for the first time, she’s grateful to hear.    @ofisolaticn​

    it might be the first time she’s being trained for tasks that aren’t violent. she’s doing organisational work and getting coffee for people she’s working aside, but it keeps her occupied. ( she doesn’t dare say she likes it, because that feels too close to admitting something about a person she doesn’t know if she is, but it makes her feel productive. at the very least. ) she’s preoccupied with counting how many files she still has to organise, when she catches sight of someone walking up to her makeshift desk at the front of the room. “ how can i help you? ” she plasters on a smile she doesn’t feel, and supposes at least there’s a good reason this time.

    “ which one? ”  an awfully personal question that she didn’t particularly care to avoid. she was spoilt for choice, after all. “ morally corrupt, legally deplorable, ”  listing what she once thought of as ambitions does provide a welcome distraction from relapse, “ kinky. ”  she’s done them all and wracked up a significant amount of bruises on her conscience as souvenirs. “ be specific. ”

    she doesn’t know what happened.  she keeps telling everyone that. i don’t know and she was like this when i got here.  what she does know is she’s wearing her nails down until they bleed, that ( ultimately ) this is unlikely to be a simple medical mishap.  her gratitude has made her intuition sluggish and she wants to find herself responsible for overlooking the most important factor. faith is human.  that makes her vulnerable, especially because michael’s recent departure is still possession by any other name.  but consequences of angelic departure isn’t exactly something she can cite in front of emts and men in blue. she’s standing, being prepped to give what feels like her eighty fifth explanation ( her eighty fifth half truth ) when he comes through.  “ we meet again, stalker. ”  she tries to hold the sarcasm on her tongue, but it barely sounds certain. let alone venomous ( as she usually portrays ). reaching up to dry her face ( she doesn’t think she’s cried this much in years ), “ you got here late, though. ”  -- “ looks like we have that in common. ”   she’d rather be human than fragile.  right now, she knows she’s both. 

    “ you must be popular. ”  the other girl does have a point. she didn’t exactly want to be alive when she woke up, but she supposes it is a good alternative to dying when the sky quite literally fell. ( it had crushed her shoulders first, phantom pain. ) “ in an existential debate setting of middle aged men but ... popularity is popularity. ” 

    she’s woken by the fact there’s a horn blaring outside her window. grasping onto the covers, her throat dry and staring up at her ceiling with ragged breathing. it only takes her a few moments to realise where she is, and then, “ you have got to be kidding me. ” she’s ready to wallow in her frustration ( and perhaps a small part of self pity ) when the horn outside her window persists. “ seriously? ” she raps on her window a few times with her knuckle, but it has no effect, and that’s how she ends up begrudgingly ends up putting on her robe and her boots to step outside. low and behold, there’s a man laying in the middle of her street. ( her life is starting to look a little too much like a sit com. ) “ hey, hangover harry, ” one of her feet coming to dig into his side, her boot nudging his ribs, “ this isn’t a bed and breakfast. ”

    she’s never had a naturally sunny disposition but waking up, alone and without faith, after the sky fell in some horrible lucid dream, has soured her predicament. ( as well as her ... confusing reaction to michael’s departure. which, she’s totally using the weird lucid dream excuse for so she doesn’t have to spend too long examining it. ) the only thing she wants, barring the impossibility that she won’t have to leave her apartment today, is for the world to co-operate with her for once. of course, the world has never been that kind. she catches sight of him first when she’s idly looking around, and then again when her eyes fall back again. she sighs with everything in her. “ hey, creep! ” yelled across to where he is, starting to advance to where he is. “ didn’t you read the pervert handbook? ” she’s not perturbed as much as she is aggravated. “ because it is a sad day in your world when the woman you’re stalking has to tell you you’re doing it wrong. ”

    “ i think it’s adorable. ” just like the laugh she manages to pull out of faith. after all, they might not get to sell the trademark to marvel, but independent distributors are all the rage. “ i know you are, ” she forgives her too. because faith deserves forgiveness, because faith puts up with her. ( which doesn’t, on any spectrum, deserve. )  it occurs to her that faith, religion, is a comfort.  the only thing she’s ever truly had faith in is what her parents taught her. she’s had faith in her abilities, to a certain extent. faith in the idea that what she’s doing is right. moral. and even that, recently, has seemed paper thin. “ i know how that feels. ” unlike faith, she’s still searching. ( turning up questions instead of rewards. ) “ i’m happy you got your reward. ” and she is. as her friend, as a spectator. she’s happy that what faith holds dear is rooted. the confession that she’d do it again ... isn’t much of a confession. ( it still stings. ) “ i can’t say i’m surprised, recycle girl. ” heroes all too often live with the weight of the world on their shoulders. “ and i’m not naive enough to believe i can stop you. ” coming from someone stubborn. “ just ... say goodbye next time? ”  just for, you know, the sake of movie night.