Smoke And Steel

• Twelve - On Another Note of Crazy •

"It didn't just hurt you Ebony, do you know how much it hurt us?" He pulled away to look me in the eyes, "your mother and I didn't lose just one child that day, we lost you too."

I tried to push away the flood of memories that came rushing back with my father's words, but they came in anyway, crushing me under the assault of emotion. Three years wasn't enough time to get over it. I don't think there would ever be enough time to get over something like that.

"I'm sorry for always ignoring you two,  I just didn't know how to handle it. I thought of I moved schools I wouldn't have to see his pictures in the halls. I thought that if I didn't talk about him then I could just pretend he wasn't ever here. How could I be sad over something that never existed?" I looked at my father with a look of utter sincerity, "by trying to push away the sadness I also pushed away you. I'm sorry."

"Oh sweetie, I'm sorry for giving up on trying to get you to talk. I'm sorry that your mother and I took down all the pictures. I'm sorry that we refused to talk about him, like you, I think we were trying to forget the pain associated with losing him. We've all been walking in tight ropes for a while now, trying not to lose our balance, but now all of us have simultaneously fallen off those ropes."

That was our family. Sweetly broken into a million different pieces that somehow fit together to create us. We had fallen time after time, sometimes we were even pushed, but we always got up again. We were shaped by the elements, and forged by the fires of the hell we'd been through. Four had become two in a few short years,  but we were here in the now. Our family was broken and bent but my father and I were more whole than we'd been in years. Yes, we had fallen, but we would always get back up again.

In a way I was grateful for all of the pain because with out it I would never have felt the bliss of sweet relief.

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Avery

I couldn't stop thinking about her. It was seriously driving me crazy. On another note of crazy, is it normal to speak to yourself in another language? I do it when I'm stressed or emotional and currently rapid fire German was coming out of my mouth. Curse those years of language lessons, I probably looked like an angry Dutchman with all of the muttering that is was doing. It wasn't even relevant, I was having a conversation with myself about my favourite foods. Yup,  I've lost what little sanity I'd had left.

I needed to sort out my emotions so I went to Gun's. God,  'sort out my emotions' sounded like such a fucking girly thing to say. What was that Princess doing to me?

The smell of sweat, blood, and cracked leather was a warm welcome compared to the concrete jungle that existed outside of these walls. I brought my boxing gloves this time, I didn't want a repeat of last time - I normally tried to limit the amount of pain my body went through.

Gun greeted me with a large clap on the back, and Conall ran over as well, ruffling his hands through my hair in an attempt to mess it up. Thankfully, you can't mess with perfection that easily.

"Look who decided to show up," Gun said through a huge grin, "I guess he's not too good for our humble establishment after all."

I smiled, it was good to be back after last time,  generally I'd come here every couple of days but I'd been busy with Princess so I'd been preoccupied.

"Hey, someone's here who wants to see you," Conall said. I had a brief inkling of who it was, considering there was only one person whom I hadn't seen in a while.

"Alex," I said as his mop of white-blonde hair came into view. He was tall, lanky, and pale white with hair to match. Shit, if you looked up the colour white in the dictionary there would probably be a picture of Alex (who ironically had the surname Grey).

"Avery, whoa man, it's been too long," he said as he embraced me with is match stick thin arms.

"Indeed it has." I agreed,  returning the ever popular bro-hug.

"By the way, why were you at home on Friday instead of the pool hall? Tate said you were hanging out with some chick at his."

"She's not just 'some chick', her name's Ebony."

"So you turned down hanging with your two best friends in the entire world for a lay? She better have been good my friend."

"It's not like that, you know I try to limit the chance of my beautiful genes being passed on. God knows that would cause a riot. She's sweet."

"By sweet do you mean that she's a virgin, or do you mean that you have in fact grown a vagina since I last saw you?"

"Oh shut up, you tosser. You're so crude." I didn't bother to mention that on Friday night she actually forced me to sit with her and watch this Australian movie called Red Dog. I totally didn't cry in the end (okay maybe I did, but at least I pretended to be yawning.) I hated movies where animals, especially dogs, died. They were just so innocent!

"Whatever buddy, I only speak the truth. So you keen to hang out tomorrow?"

"After school? Yeah."

"Wait," he said, "you're actually going to go to school?"

I nodded. I had health with Princess and I wasn't going to let her hang out by herself like she does every break.

"You're getting soft, mate. The Avery I know wouldn't hesitate to bunk class for the day."

"Soft? Pssh, I could still kick your ass any day, Grey."

"Whoa guys, watch out," he said with a smirk, "we've got a badass over here."

I punched his arm, not too hard though. I'd probably break his little scarecrow arms.

"So, did you actually want to work out or do you want to hang?" He asked, clutching his bicep.

"I guess I could spare a few hours of my precious time to hang out with a peasant like you. I mean, people always say you should be kind to the less fortunate."

"Keep dreaming, Steel. If anything, you'll owe me for giving you such a good time tonight."

"Do you not realise how sexual that sounded?" I asked, laughing at his unintended innuendo.

"Don't act like you've never though of me that way, Avey Baby. I look like white chocolate and I'm just as sweet too."

Dear god, he did not just call me some childish name like 'Avey'. What did I ever do to deserve friends like this? Picking up my duffle bag I followed the already retreating Alex out of the room.

"Come on slow poke, my granny's in a wheelchair and she can walk faster than you," Alex called over his shoulder as he took long strides out of the office and into the main area.

"Have fun," Gun said as we hurried past him, regarding Alex wearily, "don't get into too much trouble."

Knowing Alex I am going to find it very hard to wake up in the morning, let alone go to school. Oh joy.

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A/N

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