Guava 6 & Peanut Butter 8
Author: Casey
Story: Nothing is Ever Easy (NIEE) universe, Before, During and After NIEE
Challenges: Guava 6 (all the live-long day) & Peanut Butter 8 (dark)
Toppings & Extras: Whipped Cream (she’s a kid in all but the last one), Sprinkles, Pocky Chain, Cherry (present, little dialogue, no contractions), Malt (Summer Challenge Bunnies 139: Sometimes I'm terrified to realize how many options other people have)
Word Count: 700
Rating: PG-13 (implications of child abuse and rape)
Summary: Sage can’t catch a break, until something (someone!) finally changes her luck.
Notes: I pick on Sage too much, really. But it ends up happy! I swear! Since I have so few Guava, French Vanilla and Trail Mix left, I'm picking up Peanut Butter to help me through the Snowflake Milkshakes and last Trail Mix :)
One of Sage’s first memories is of sitting on a stool, stirring a huge pot of soup. Her mother’s in the background, chopping something. She’s maybe four. She never remembers how but she drops the spoon. It clangs against the side, bounces out of the pot and lands in the fire.
Her mom looks over. “Get it.”
“S’in the fire, Mama.”
“Get it,” she says coldly.
Swallowing, Sage pucks the charred spoon from the flames, blinking back tears as her hand burns. Her fingers are red by the time she gets them to her mouth, but she silently resumes stirring.
**
Things just get worse from there. Whatever warmth there had been when she was little is long gone. She and her mother exist, she cannot even consider it coexisting. Sage does not need to screw up to get punished. As she gets older, she takes over most of the daily operations of the orphanage.
When she turns six, the parade of boyfriends starts. At first, she does her best to stay out of their way and they are barely aware she exists. Her escape is early in the mornings, she climbs the trees out back. It works for a while.
**
Then the boyfriends start to notice. Not all of them, but a few, which is too many. Her mother is not present the first time one of them hits her for not getting out of the way quick enough, but she has no comment about the bruise afterwards.
If she did not know better, she would think the boyfriends discussed it, because it does not take long until there is more than one who just shoves her out of the way or worse. She tries to ignore that even the orphans treat her as an unnecessary member of the house.
**
She is ten when she meets The Boyfriend. He gains the capitals almost immediately when he steps beyond violence to touching that Sage instinctively knows is very wrong. She says nothing, but goes about avoiding him even more than the others.
She is thankful it never seems to go any further, and although she cannot exactly like it, she finds herself becoming immune. Her mind goes elsewhere, just as it does when her mom lights into her. Sage expects the others to begin, but they continue to either ignore her or beat her out of the way to her relief.
**
When he vanishes and the time stretches to a year, she hopes it is the last of him. Then, one day, he is there and, despite the late night with her mother, he has more than just touching in mind. He shoves her into the nearest room and she discovers she is far too small to do anything.
It is then that she realizes that she can no longer say nothing. She acts, like her father might have, and locks the bastard in the room, confronts her mother and is gone, without looking back, within the hour. She is thirteen.
**
Two years feels like a lifetime and yet no time at all, but a personal promise to never let something like that happen to her again has worked so far. She has found her father, Vlad, who is distant but keeps her safe from the world, and that has to be enough.
Each day is a struggle to find some sort of normalcy and to keep shut down, keep her troubles inside, to try and ‘fix’ the unstable mess Vladimir Opalin has become. When he finally issues his orders, a part of her realizes that something is going to give.
**
And it does, but in the most unexpected way: blue eyes, an honest smile, and his insane urge to protect her despite the fact she helped kidnap him. No one has ever done that for her and this little upstart, who does not even know they are related, does it so automatically, so effortlessly that, at first, it scares her, and she pushes him away.
But there is a part of her that knows this is how a real family treats each other. Dean accidentally teaches her that loving her is possible. It is a lesson she will never forget.
Story: Nothing is Ever Easy (NIEE) universe, Before, During and After NIEE
Challenges: Guava 6 (all the live-long day) & Peanut Butter 8 (dark)
Toppings & Extras: Whipped Cream (she’s a kid in all but the last one), Sprinkles, Pocky Chain, Cherry (present, little dialogue, no contractions), Malt (Summer Challenge Bunnies 139: Sometimes I'm terrified to realize how many options other people have)
Word Count: 700
Rating: PG-13 (implications of child abuse and rape)
Summary: Sage can’t catch a break, until something (someone!) finally changes her luck.
Notes: I pick on Sage too much, really. But it ends up happy! I swear! Since I have so few Guava, French Vanilla and Trail Mix left, I'm picking up Peanut Butter to help me through the Snowflake Milkshakes and last Trail Mix :)
One of Sage’s first memories is of sitting on a stool, stirring a huge pot of soup. Her mother’s in the background, chopping something. She’s maybe four. She never remembers how but she drops the spoon. It clangs against the side, bounces out of the pot and lands in the fire.
Her mom looks over. “Get it.”
“S’in the fire, Mama.”
“Get it,” she says coldly.
Swallowing, Sage pucks the charred spoon from the flames, blinking back tears as her hand burns. Her fingers are red by the time she gets them to her mouth, but she silently resumes stirring.
**
Things just get worse from there. Whatever warmth there had been when she was little is long gone. She and her mother exist, she cannot even consider it coexisting. Sage does not need to screw up to get punished. As she gets older, she takes over most of the daily operations of the orphanage.
When she turns six, the parade of boyfriends starts. At first, she does her best to stay out of their way and they are barely aware she exists. Her escape is early in the mornings, she climbs the trees out back. It works for a while.
**
Then the boyfriends start to notice. Not all of them, but a few, which is too many. Her mother is not present the first time one of them hits her for not getting out of the way quick enough, but she has no comment about the bruise afterwards.
If she did not know better, she would think the boyfriends discussed it, because it does not take long until there is more than one who just shoves her out of the way or worse. She tries to ignore that even the orphans treat her as an unnecessary member of the house.
**
She is ten when she meets The Boyfriend. He gains the capitals almost immediately when he steps beyond violence to touching that Sage instinctively knows is very wrong. She says nothing, but goes about avoiding him even more than the others.
She is thankful it never seems to go any further, and although she cannot exactly like it, she finds herself becoming immune. Her mind goes elsewhere, just as it does when her mom lights into her. Sage expects the others to begin, but they continue to either ignore her or beat her out of the way to her relief.
**
When he vanishes and the time stretches to a year, she hopes it is the last of him. Then, one day, he is there and, despite the late night with her mother, he has more than just touching in mind. He shoves her into the nearest room and she discovers she is far too small to do anything.
It is then that she realizes that she can no longer say nothing. She acts, like her father might have, and locks the bastard in the room, confronts her mother and is gone, without looking back, within the hour. She is thirteen.
**
Two years feels like a lifetime and yet no time at all, but a personal promise to never let something like that happen to her again has worked so far. She has found her father, Vlad, who is distant but keeps her safe from the world, and that has to be enough.
Each day is a struggle to find some sort of normalcy and to keep shut down, keep her troubles inside, to try and ‘fix’ the unstable mess Vladimir Opalin has become. When he finally issues his orders, a part of her realizes that something is going to give.
**
And it does, but in the most unexpected way: blue eyes, an honest smile, and his insane urge to protect her despite the fact she helped kidnap him. No one has ever done that for her and this little upstart, who does not even know they are related, does it so automatically, so effortlessly that, at first, it scares her, and she pushes him away.
But there is a part of her that knows this is how a real family treats each other. Dean accidentally teaches her that loving her is possible. It is a lesson she will never forget.