Title: Rose
Author:Revolution
Rating:PG
SUmmary: Just the thoughts of Shalimar.
Spoilers: Just random thoughts, with references to Gabriel of A breed apart and Season 2
Don't disturb the beast, the temperamental goat, the snail,
While he's feeding on the rose --
Stay frozen, compromise what I will I am
Bend around the wind, silently thrown about again
I'm treading so soft and lightly,
Compromising my will I am
Emma, Adam, Jesse and Brennan, that’s my family now, They’re all that matter.
The family I would die to protect.
*************************************************************
I had another family once, a happy and surprisingly supportive family.
My father worked as an electrician and my mother was a nurse.
I hear the horror stories from other New Mutants on how the changes in them brought fear into the eyes of their parents and loved ones and in the end were abandoned by the very people who were supposed to protect them; but not my parents. Now, I’m not saying that life in the Fox household was all sunshine and fairy tales. Some times as my powers changed and evolved, I saw it. The fear and the guilt in their eyes, one parent placing the blame on the other, creating a very tense atmosphere; but not once did I feel unloved.
You might say my childhood was the ideal, until the night of my twelfth birthday.
I remember it like it was yesterday…
It had been storming all week, thunder, lightning and rain that shattered from the skies.
I was coming home from the store with my older brother Noah, when we saw our beautiful old home in flames. “A fixer upper” my father had called it, big enough for the four of us.
Noah…Noah being the person he was, raced in without a word to get our parents out. I knew though that he wouldn’t be able too, he was only a boy, and the combined weight of our parents would on weigh him down.
From where I was standing, I could hear them…Father’s curses, Mother’s tears and Noah’s cries. I stood there my legs heavy and unable to move…I could feel the searing heat of the flames as they licked the threads of our home. And yet, I stood there and watched it happen. Watched my home and family burn to the ground.
My father, My mother, My brother, My home, My Life…
Then I fled.
Hitchhiked my way across the country, where days turned into weeks , weeks into months , months to years .
I remember the day I met the man who would save my life. I was living in New York City, sleeping on the streets with the stars staring down at me, constantly reminding me of my crimes. Working as a thief allowed my certain luxuries that many of the other street kids didn’t have such as food and shelter but After a job went bad, Adam visited me in jail and offered me an opportunity to start over.
Adam gave me something back that day. Gave me back the missing pieces to rebuild my life. He gave me another chance at family.
We live a very dangerous life, but we are here by choice. There is nothing that we wouldn’t suggest to others if we weren’t willing to do ourselves. We have come dangerously close to losing each other, because the things we do and the way we brave the world. People seek us out and try to destroy us and the bonds we have created. Passion, death, fear and betrayal at the hands of strangers all threaten the slippery feeling of safety we have created for ourselves. I don’t know if I could survive losing any of them.
And I continuously come close to losing myself to Gabriel
Even now, I can hear him. As I sit on the couch of the rec room, listening to Brennan and Jesse joke over something. He whispers soft and endless words to me. Some thoughts, some lies, some secrets… These words pierce the deepest part of my sub conscious and I begin to think I’m going to fall again.
Emma sits down next to me and smiles.
“You feel all right? Shalimar?” she asks.
I smiled, a smile that borders on reassuring.
I am, I will,
So no longer will I lay down
Play dead
Play your doe in the headlights, locked down and terrified
Your deer in the headlights, shot down and horrified
When push comes to pull, comes to shove, comes to step around
This self-destructive dance that never would have ended
'Till I rose, I roared aloud,
Here, I will I am
Brennan loops his arm through Emma and shakes her gently.
“Of course she’s okay!” He laughs.
Emma looked at me, obviously she hadn’t told anyone about my visions.
“Of course,” she replies laughingly “I’m just a worrier.”
Relief washes over me as I silently thank Emma for her silence. Inside me though, I scream out everything I’ve been longing to say to the people who love me most. I want to tell them everything, the nights I stay up until morning to keep my mind free of him, the dreams of a Shalimar I don’t recognize. Most of all, I want to tell them to keep them safe. What if one day Gabriel switches his attentions to one of them? I can handle him but I wouldn’t be able to handle them going through that. I have to stop this…
“NOW!” I taunt.
“Now what?” Jesse asks looking at me oddly.
I stand up ready to escape the questions in their eyes.
“ Its nothing.” I reply, “I gotta talk to Adam.”
I am, I will,
So no longer will I lay down
Play dead
Play this..
Beat down, gun-shy, martyr, pitiful
I rose, I roared,
I will I am
I smile when I see him. Sitting at his desk, slumped down, looking as tired as we all felt.
“Adam?” I ask carefully.
“Yes?”
“Can I talk to you?”
Thinking quietly to myself, Adam will help me, no matter how silly I’ve acted. I know he’ll help me stop this. But if not, I’ll stop it myself.
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