Lost In Our Thoughts

_K.

"No!"

She shouts when I shove him, his white dress shirt wrinkled and his eyes afraid. We're young, we're foolish, and I can't help fighting. He attempts to swing at me, I throw him to the ground, then I'm frozen. I'm held there, unable to move.

"No! Just because I like him more than you doesn't mean you can hit him! If you don't like him leave!"

"I was here first!"

I shout, her eyes gleaming and hands in fists, Artemis still on the floor.

"Well I changed my mind! Now it's Artemis! He's not crazy like you!"

"I'm not crazy!"

I yell back, tears pooling under my eyes. There's only room for one of us and I'll be damned if the pale white boy who's afraid of everything takes my place.

"You don't even look like me, at least Artemis does and he has books written about him!"

"Artemis isn't real I AM!"

I shout, begging for her to realize I'm still the one. I don't need to be replaced I don't need to be hurt like this she used to love how I was different, we used to be perfect. Artemis hides behind her, black pool irises watching me with fear and a self righteous smirk, he knows he's the favorite, and he hates me just as much as I hate him.

"Artemis is just as real as you!"

"No he isn't just look at him he's a fake!"

I say, and Artemis finally joins the three way fight.

"At least if I'm with her instead of you she's going to be more normal Kennith."

He says in his ridiculous accent, sneering at me.

"Don't even use my name she doesn't care if she's normal it doesn't matter, you don't belong here! You just appeared out of thin air and now you think you're in charge but you're not!"

"No you don't belong here! Now I'm the one not you, so if you want to tag along you can but its my turn to be there, so step down."

"Ken..."

She starts, I can barely look at her as she chooses someone over me. I've been there for ever, I've never left her side.

"Artemis is right."

And I'm slowly but surely left behind, ignored and shunned and occasionally included, but mostly forgotten. Now it's 2014. I'm laying, my back hurting from the old mattress on a bed that we used to share, multi colored spotted comforter underneath me as I count the knots in the wooden cathedral ceiling, the familiar light of the smoke detector flashing off and on. To look down on me, if you were God looking down, would you see a bad person? Have I sinned? Is this why I'm lost in translation and ether and the strands of differing dimensions? I feel sick, a cancer eating me from the inside out, color drained from my skin. Tightness forms in my chest when I feel her, she's somewhere close by and I sit up on the bed wildly looking around as her voice fills my ears. The door to a sibling's room opens and I see someone new, someone who's grown up, a teen. Black cat ears poke out of brown waves and small black glasses sit on the end of her nose, eyes crinkled as she laughs. Artemis is still wearing poorly pressed dress shirts, his hair now a cheap bleached blond with the dark roots painfully visible down to the straw like ends. He sees me, and in those blue green eyes I see actual honest remorse. He is real, damn it, he isn't just a fake. He's the first to notice me slumped on the poorly made bed spread, waiting for her to glance my way and see me, but will she? Her eyes scan over me once. Twice. I've given up hope, ready to be lost forever. Artemis looks at me again, and I see that remorse eating him up like a swarm of ravens. I hope he knows what he's done, I hope he feels the sinfully cruel pain I'm trapped in. His long fingers reach to her shoulder and stop her, quickly pulling her back from the stair case and pointing at me. My eyes widen as she looks, Artemis speaks.

"Do you remember him?"

He still has that odd accent to his words, a clarity and enunciation that's born for the rich. Her eyes blink, refocusing, widening, turning away before meeting my own. I see Artemis smile sadly, it's now his turn to step back and I almost feel bad for him, almost.

"Oh my god, Ken. Ken, I remember you."

She says, and I release the air that's been caged in my lungs and force myself to speak, my own voice sounds like a strangers.

"You forgot me for over three years, do you have any idea how much that hurt? Are you even sure you got my name right? Have you and Arti had fun prancing through being thirteen?"

"I'm fourteen, Ken I'm sure it's yo-"

"Are you though?"

I counter, shoving her shoulder and she stumbles backwards, fear and something else in her eyes as I wait, wait to see if she really does remember.

"No one else is an ass like you are, and if you had shown up a day later I'm sure I wouldn't have recognized your face."

Testing, she's testing me to see if I'm the real one now, her faith in Artemis outweighing anything else.

"Is Peter still around?"

I say sarcastically

"A lot has changed Ken, a whole world has evolved underneath your feet."

And I almost die, almost, but there's a new rebellious challenge in her eyes that pulls me back from the brink, red lipstick, challenging eyes, a black jacket.  I pick up my suitcase from the bed, running a hand through my hair that's washed out, pink hues and black roots.  I feel sick. 

"Welcome home"