When he was fifteen, his family fell apart.
There were cracks, there were always cracks, spiders legs under the surface, hairline fissures in a seemingly perfect facade. And when he was a child he had believed it, never looked deeper, never known to look deeper, but that only lasts so long.
His Dad got angry, too angry, too loud, spitting words with an acid tongue that seemed to corrode his mother's very resolve. She grew quieter, withdrew from him and his sister while his Dad only seemed to get angrier.
His Mum died just after his fifteenth birthday. He'd lost her far before then.
But, for the most part, they were happy, they were okay, and they were whole. His Dad would take him out to hunt, teach him how to build traps, and how to blow stuff up, and he would laugh, and crack stupid dumb jokes that made the whole family groan.
His Mum would always know when to hold him, even though he didn't need to tell her. She would fix him up after he fell out out of trees, or sprained his ankles, or accidentally stood too close to the blast zone when he and his dad would explode clay pots.
And his Dad would apologise when he yelled too loud, and his Mum would kiss him goodnight, and cook his favourite dinner when she hadn't come out of her room day before. And even though they weren't perfect, and even though it could have been better, he looks back and wishes he could have kept it.
It was slipping, when his Mum got sick, and she stopped cooking, stopped coming out of her room, and his Dad stopped laughing, replaced with silent dinner tables and harsh words, and a loneliness he'd never felt before.
The one thing, the one person who withstood all of this, was his baby sister.
She was eleven when they lost each other, starry eyed and round cheeks, miniature med kit that their Mum had made for them by her side wherever they went. She had their Mum's need to help people, the talent of putting someone back together. She also had their Dad's stubbornness, the fire within to keep going.
But then he lost her too, and his Dad took them far away, outskirt colonies and remote villages, back breaking work for barely enough to survive on, and the life he once lived, the family he once had, faded away, distant dreams and the faintest imprints on his skin.
It was gone, and he learned to move on.
And that was it, they had left, only a waning memory to hold them by.
But now, now there was a person standing in front of him, someone that shouldn't be, someone that should be dead, someone that should be gone, someone that he was never meant to see again.
She's taller, features a little more pronounced with the layer of soft baby fat melted away, dressed in a fancy gown that they'd never been able to afford, scars that should have never been on her skin.
But the thing that strikes him the most, is how much of his mother is missing from her. The kindness, the gentleness, everything he'd seen when she was a kid, was not with her anymore.
She'd grown up.
And more importantly, she was alive.
And no, he knows that this shouldn't be real, this shouldn't be happening, and the person that he thinks it is should not be standing in front of him, but when the word falls out of his mouth without permission, he knows. He just knows.
"Rosie?"
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"Sam?"
It isn't supposed to be, it shouldn't be, but the person standing in front of me looks so much like the brother I've lived my life knowing I wouldn't see again.
I take an involuntary step backwards, because he's looking at me like he's surgically dissecting me with his eyes, and he- my brother was always so good at understanding exactly what I'm thinking, somehow he always knew what was going on in my head.
I'm afraid of what he'll find.
"You're not- you're- you're supposed to be dead." He stutters out aimlessly, and even though he's too tall, too solidly built, and the scruffy beard he has is a far cry from the baby faced fifteen year old I remember, that scar across his nose bridge from the tree branch I flicked into his face is there, and the spiderwebbed burn sprawled across his forearm from a particular red-stone bomb incident are the same.
There's no way that it could be him, and there's no way it could be anyone else.
"You weren't supposed to come back." I find the words tumbling out of my open mouth, shaking my head. "You're supposed to be gone."
"Dad said you died." He says, eyes locked on mine. Neither of us have moved a muscle.
"He left me in the forest." I respond, voice ringing with horror I didn't even know I could muster. "Both of you left me."
"Rosie what's going on?" Dream asks, completely confused. His voice is a little far off, and all I can feel is the way the four walls are too fucking close, closing in too fucking tightly, how the roof seems to be caving in as we speak, and there's too many people staring at me right now, and if I don't get the fuck out of this room, I'm going to kill someone.
I push past him, through the doors, sliding through the crowd. Punz catches me just as I reach the doors to get outside.
"Rosie what are you doing?" He asks, slamming his hand down against he door to keep it shut. I don't answer, my eyes glued on my trembling hand clutched tightly around the door knob.
"Hey." He says urgently, grabbing one side of my face and wrenching it to look at him. "Hey, are you okay?"
"He's here. He's alive." Is all I can say
"What?"
"Sam. Sam's here."
"Who's Sa- Your brother's here?" His eyes flash in realisation, and he looks up, spotting Dream and Sam pushing through the crowd towards me. "That's good, isn't it?"
"I don't know-" I clutch my stomach, because I can't stop shaking and I think it's going to shatter me apart. "I don't know Punz."
"Shit, did something happen?"
"No. I just-" I cut myself off. I should be happy, should be throwing myself into his arms for a crazy family reunion, but nothing feels right.
Good things like this don't happen to me. There's always a catch, always a fucking condition, something that has to go horribly wrong. And what if Punz told Dream, and this was all Dream's idea, and he's working for Dream? I don't know him anymore, not like I used to, how can I trust a stranger?
It's too much of a coincidence, too convenient, and I don't get happy endings like this. I gave up the silly, stupid, naive hope that I would months ago. The world around me has taught me this lesson tenfold.
"Hey, hey come back to me." Punz's gentle voice whispers in my ear. "It's okay, come on, you should talk to him."
And that's exactly what he would say.
I jerk back, freeing myself from his grasp, eyes flicking between him and Dream, who's almost reached us, Sam not far behind.
"No." I shake my head. "No, you don't get to do this to me."
Dream stops before us. "Who is that Rosie?"
"Stop." My voice wobbles, and I can't stand the way it shakes, ripples in the facade of uncrumbling resolve. "Stop doing this shit with me Dream. I can't fucking take it, it makes me feel like I'm going fucking crazy."
"I'm not doing anything." Dream says, still in the same confused voice. Sam reaches us.
"How?" Is all he says, in a deathly quiet voice, and its a miracle I even heard it at all. "How are you alive?"
"What the fuck is going on? How do you know Rosie?" Dream interrupts, before turning his attention from Sam to me. "Rosie?"
"She's my little sister." Sam snaps. "What the hell are you doing with her?"
"Sister?" Dream repeats, stunned. "Rosie is he your brother?"
It's a convincing charade, and if I hadn't been playing this game as long as I have, I'd have probably fallen from it. I've learned though, scars on my cheeks and arms, the internal ones that seem to have made home in my fucking brain, they're reminders enough.
The bruises underneath Dream's mask should be a reminder enough for him. Guess not.
"Obviously." I snap, diving for the door handle and wrenching it open before anyone has a chance to stop me, slamming it in all three of their faces, and marching determinedly towards the inn room.
I got about three metres before Punz grabs my arm.
"Rosemary, can you please stop for a second? Can we just talk?"
"I don't want to talk." I feel like screaming. "I want people to stop fucking touching me. I want to go home."
Punz lets go instantly. "I'll take you to your room, and I'll try and sort those two out okay? Do you want me to do that?"
"I want you to leave me alone." I really thought he was different. On Dream's payroll of course, but at least he was different. Apparently not.
Apparently Dream's always two fucking steps ahead, always plotting, always something up his sleeve, always got me corned no matter where I turn.
Punz just nods. "I'll stay here with them."
When I reach my room, I just sit down on the bed, eyes trained on the threadbare carpet, arms wrapped securely around myself. It could have been hours, or minutes, or seconds, I couldn't tell tell you, before Sapnap walks into the room.
He doesn't even say anything, just sits down on the bed next to me, and pulls me into a bone-crushing hug that seems to squeeze all the sadness straight out of me. I lean my head against his shoulder, letting him drop his head on mine.
"Punz told me what happened."
The hysteria starts bubbling up before I can stop it. "I don't- I-"
"You don't have to explain anything to me. I don't need to know." He reassures me. "Just want to make sure you're not alone."
"Thanks Sap." I mumble.
"I'm always here." He mutters back.
I nod against him. "I know, I can always trust you."
"Yeah you can."
"It's just that I thought I was finally ahead of him, you know? I thought I'd finally beaten his stupid fucking games." I admit
I can feel Sapnap's brows crease. "Wait what?"
I sit up to look at him. "Punz knew I had a brother." I begin to explain. "It's not a fucking coincidence that he knows, and all of the sudden the brother I haven't seen in nine years shows up in a meeting Dream set up."
He grabs my hand. "Rosie, I can promise you that this wasn't a set up. No one had any idea that you had a brother, let alone it being Awesamdude. We've known Awesam for years, he's an arms dealer that supplies us."
"But how- how?"
He shrugs. "Crazy ass coincidence. I promise, no one knew, no one could have."
I bury my face in my hands, squeezing the hair on top of my head, rocking back and forth in little motions, trying to calm the storm that feels like is raging within in. "Oh fuck." I whisper.
He's like black mould, toxic spores corroding every inch of my brain, rotting it from the inside, impossible to pry out of my head. No matter what I try, no matter how far I get away, it's always in there, clinging into the crevices, polluting every thought I have.
"Jesus fucking Christ." I hiss, rocking slightly back and forth, back and forth, because if I stop, even for a second, I'm going to have to face everything, an impossible tidal wave that threatens to crash down on my head.
"Rosie-"
"He's in my head Sapnap." I mutter, wide eyes glued to the floor. "He's in my fucking head and I can't get him out."
"He's holding you captive in his house Rosie, it's not crazy to think that he could affect your thinking too." Sapnap tries to reason. "You just have to hold on for me okay? I'm so close to getting you out, and I know you're strong enough to make it."
"I can't." I shake my head, clinging onto my hair. "I can't get him out, he's driving me fucking insane."
He doesn't get another word out, because the door flies open with a resounding crack, revealing my older brother.
Fuck. That's a sentence I never thought I'd think.
"What the fuck are you doing?" Sapnap rises to wedge his body in between us.
"Talking to my little sister, who I thought was dead for nine years." Sam snaps. It's meaner, harsher, undercurrent of unspoken threats that he could back up. But underneath all of that, there's still the annoying stubbornness we both picked up from Dad, the know-it-all teenager that used to boss me around because I was younger and shorter than him.
"Sap." I put my hand on his shoulder. "It's okay, I want to talk to him."
Sapnap leaves the room without further protest, but his eyes acted glued on Sam's the entire time, before he heads out the the now empty door frame.
Then it's just us. Left to silence.
"How are you alive?" His voice is thick, cracking slightly on the last word.
"I never died?"
"Dad said you were dead, that you caught the same shit Mum did."
"Dad abandoned me in the fucking woods, and left with you. I never got sick."
"That's not-"
"Please, don't tell me you still believe all his shit." I roll me eyes. "Took me a minute, but when he threw me out of the house at eleven and then dumped me in the middle of the forest, I started to see though it."
"How did you survive that?"
"Wilbur found me."
His face changes into a mixture of confusion and downright horror. "Wilbur? As in Wilbur Soot?"
"Yeah." I fold my arms protectively.
"You're apart of Manburg? You fought in the war?" He hisses. "What the fuck were you doing in a war?"
"Fighting? Not like I had an exhaustive amount of options."
"So why are you with Dream? He's the one that declared war!"
"It's a long story." I snap. Sam throws his arms up in the air.
"We have't seen each other in nine years, and you pull that? I've got time, what the hell are you doing with that psycho?"
"Nine years and you haven't changed one fucking bit." I spit. "You actually think you can tell me off for living my life? Mind your own fucking business. Arms dealer. Nice. Mum would be real proud of that one."
"Well she's dead, so I'm sure she won't mind."
"Good one." I sneer. "I've been staying with Dream because of Schlatt, you happy?"
Sam freezes on the spot. "Please tell me you're joking."
I scoff. "Believe me, I wish I was."
"You're with him!?"
"Whoa-"
"You could have picked literally anyone else, and they would have been a better option!" He yells.
"We're not together!" I scream back. "Why the fuck would you think that?"
"Our surveillance reports-"
"Clearly, they're not that great at their job, are they?"
"What are you doing with him?" He asks again, through clamped jaws.
"Our first fucking conversation after how long, and you want to start lecturing me for my relationship choices? Jesus you don't waste time."
"I don't give a shit about you dating someone, I just care that it's him."
"Believe me, I'm fully fucking aware of how much of a piece of shit Dream is."
"Then why are you with him?'
"Do you think this is my choice? Do you actually think I want to be here with him? He's holding me fucking captive."
"What?"
I sink down on the bed, rubbing above my eyebrow tiredly. "I killed the Vice President, got arrested, and released into Dream's custody to serve the rest of my sentence."
"You killed the Vice President?"
"Why does everyone care about that piece of shit so much!" I scream, flying back to my feet. "He deserved it, he deserved everything he got and I'm tired of people pretending like I'm some monster for finally ending his miserable fucking life!"
"I don't even know who the Vice President is!" He yells back, holding his hands out in front of him, with the palms facing the ceiling, the exact same way he used to when we were kids, arguing over the best weapons, and the best bowls, and the best toys.
"Yeah, well you're kind of fucking behind!"
"No shit!"
If it were any other time, I would have laughed, laughed at how quickly we made it back into childish squabbling, the snarky bickering that used to fill up the verbal sparring matches we held at every given opportunity. First time I've seen him in nine years, and we're already arguing like we're kids again.
My legs wobble again, and I sit back down onto the bed, hiding my face in hands propped up by elbows on my knees. My throat feels all clogged up, like the tears I know that are inevitable are trying to suffocate me.
"It's been a fucking mess." I admit honestly, in a raspy voice. Sam sighs.
"Yeah it has."
A stinging tear slips down my cheek, and I wipe it off quickly. Even though he knows. He always knows, no matter how good I think I am at hiding it.
"I needed you." I say, so quietly I almost hope he does't hear it, an admission I hate to make, because I sound like a scared little girl, like I'm eleven again, calling out his name in the middle of the nights, echoing through pitch black, empty woods.
"I'm so sorry." He whispers, and I can tell he's crying too. "I should have been there."
I lift my head up, not even bothering to catch the hot tears that hug the underside of my chin and jaw, sliding over the valleys of my cheekbones. "I really needed you."
He sits down, arm sliding over my shoulders, pulling me into his side. "I'm sorry."
"Everyone's sorry." I say miserably. "Everyone's alway fucking sorry."
"I missed you so much." He kisses me on the side of my head. "So fucking much."
"I tried to forget about you." I tell him. "I couldn't, but it hurt too much."
"You did what you had to do."
"Yeah well, Dad always said I was too soft. Had to learn somehow."
"Fuck Dad."
"He was right."
"He also left his daughter to die in the forest, so fuck him." Sam shakes his head in disbelief. "I can't believe I get to see you again."
"Its not me anymore Sam, I'm not the person you love." I say, even though it hurts me, even though it makes more tears spill out over my lashes. He needs to know. Better found out know than be disappointed later.
"I don't fucking care." He almost laughs. "We've both grown up, we've both lived different lives, of course we're going to be different."
"This isn't good different, this isn't grown up different, I am not the person you used to love." I try and explain, but as it always was, it's like talking to a brick wall.
"You know I'm always going to love you Rosie." He grabs me for a proper hug, which I squirm out of. I'll tolerate the reunion kiss on the head, but we're not the physically affection type of siblings.
At least I'm not.
But we're both grinning, and the little girl, the somehow is still apart of me, despite everything, believes him. "Love you too."
"Seriously? I can't even hug you?"
"No sappy reunions."
"You're definitely the same."
"Just you wait, I'm like hundred times more of a pain in the ass." I cackle gleefully. He mirrors my smile.
"I'm definitely worse."
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A/N Okay so massive apologies for how long this took, I'm on new medication right now that is absolutely kicking my ass and I have no idea whether this is even cohesive or not. Also we got hit by an earthquake this morning?? What the fuck was that?? It woke me up and I straight up thought the day of reckoning had come upon us.
Anywho straight up NOONE guessed that Sam was her brother (ik the ages don't match up, sue me) which I'm pretty proud of. Idk why, that's just always been my plan.
I think there's a lot of little interesting insights into Rosie's mental state and vulnerabilities in this chapter. First, we see how much Dream's manipulation has truly affected her, causing her to be paranoid and unable to trust anything. We also see the little kid within her, that was never given a chance to heal, or be a kid int he first place since she's had to grow up, when she shows that vulnerability with her brother. Also, the fact that she shows that to him shows how close their relationship is, even though they've spent so long apart.
I hope you guys enjoyed!
Oopsies x