call out my name [2gether]

CH 30

It seemed that Phukong's childish acts did not stop at just stealing Sarawat's motorbike but also stupidly getting a strange tattoo on the back of his shoulder. A tattoo that set him up with the evil spirit that they had been trying to get rid of during these past weeks.

Well, as they said, it was the still waters that ran the deepest. And his brother was a little shit, quite obviously since he never really had the felt the burn of his mistakes, his fall always cushioned by their mother. Sarawat sighed, nevertheless, Phukong was still his brother and Sarawat stifled a surprising urge to ruffle his hair to cheer the younger guy up.

The medium bit her lower lip, sticking one slim hand into the tiny back pocket of her skirt while leaning back on her heels a little, trying to get her chaotic thoughts in order. She was not known for always making sense but this time maybe she should at least try.

"Natty has just been checking the pattern inside the sigil of my tattoo, but I'm not sure why though," Phukong filled in, glancing briefly at his brother from under his lashes, when the woman took her sweet time to reply.

Sarawat nodded his head, soft locks bouncing around his handsome face, accepting the quiet explanation. The brothers were still working things out, trying to find a tentative, common ground after years of passive aggressive fights.

Once they had sat down and talked, really talked, Phukong had reluctantly agreed to go along with their purification scheme. Fuck if that had not been weird, not to mention awkward, seeing his usually stoic brother waddle his cringing way trough the explanation, trying to convince Phukong to let Natty take him to a temple because an evil spirit had latched onto him. What the hell even? He suppressed a shudder. Just imagining that something had been following and watching him all this time gave him the creeps. If Sarawat had not been the one to tell him any of this then Phukong would have just written Natty off as plain crazy.

Except, once the cat was out of the bag something did finally slot into place, like a missing piece of puzzle, things instantly clicked into place. Suddenly Phukong had an explanation for the strange, unlucky mess that he had been waddling through for the past year. The therapy sessions might have helped him cope with the nasty accident but the eerie out of body experience kept lingering around, slowly suffocating him, paving a slow way into madness.

So Phukong had let himself be dragged around by Natty to burn incense sticks and do hundreds of bows at temples for several days straight while trying to get rid of the so called evil spirit that was apparently bringing him all this misfortune. And honestly, he was feeling better now that he was thoroughly cleansed, as Natty had called it. A foggy, gray filter had instantly lifted off the world around him and for the first time in however long all colors seemed so much more vibrant and saturated, his vision no longer tinted with smoky, foreboding shadows at the edges. He could finally breathe freely after months of suffocating panic attacks. But with that came also the heavy guilt.

Even if Phukong had been possessed at that precise moment when the bike crashed, he was still the one to get that shamanic tattoo, he was also the one to make the irrational decision of sneaking away on his brother's motorcycle. The teenage rebellion that had coursed through his veins had obviously made him blind, sending spikes of illogical jealousy through him over his brother being the obvious favorite in their family. And then Sarawat had just walked away so easily from everything that Phukong, on the other hand, had to fight nail and tooth for to gain. That had been the main catalyst for his rash behavior, his childish jealousy and frustration over always being the second best. The grass seemed so much greener on Sarawat's side.

Shit, Phukong felt so fucking awful, still uncomfortable to look his older brother fully in the eyes. Especially after Sarawat had disclosed all details from the accident, eyes dark and heavy, telling him in a round about way how both Phukong and their mother had been involved in driving Tine to his deathbed. Phukong felt nauseous with the thought that he had almost killed someone, bile burning at his throat as the toxic guilt bubbled violently inside of him. Furious with his mother for withholding things from him, Phukong decided to get away from that poisonous house and stay with his brother for now.