Ai-less Whumptober; Day Twelve

ai-less whumptober; day twelve

@ailesswhumptober 12 — isolation, sensory deprivation, “Can you feel me? I’m right here.” ↳ the farm, circa 1889 word count; 1.4k

cw; abuse, claustrophobia, mentions of death

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It's cold. So damn cold. Hellishly, endlessly cold.

Oscar is numb. It's dark all around him, pitch blackness, and the cold has sank into his bones to weigh him down like water, stiffened his joints like death does to the animals. He'd long ago lost track of what time it is, and through the stone walls around him has no idea if the sun is still up. If anyone might still be awake.

If anyone still remembers him out here at all.

He'd been asking for it, really. He'd known it was coming. There was nothing else to expect. But Da had started on Mo for something stupid, and Oscar can never stop himself from getting involved when it's his wee brother on the wrong end of Da's anger. Mo's only tiny, and Da is so huge, so cruel.

So Oscar had thrown himself in between them and shouted and protested — and after Da had belted him bloody for his troubles, he'd dragged him out the back door with a big calloused hand around his arm. Kicking and screaming and pleading. Over the hill and to the old shed by the fields; a stout, damp stone structure with no windows and a solid wooden door that bolts on the outside, so small inside that Oscar can just about sit but can't lay down, surrounded on every side with old tools and machinery. Rusted monuments of his father.

And though Oscar had known, had expected, exactly where he'd end up — where he always ends up — he'd still started screaming louder.

"Please!" Oscar had wailed, digging his bare heels desperately into the damp dirt to try and slow the walk. It hadn't worked. His father is a big man. Strong. A farmer. "Please, please, Da, I'll—I swear to God I'll be good, I'll be quiet, you can lock me up inside 'til—'til you need me, I'll clean, I'll look after the babby—"

He knows it's no use to beg Da, not when the man's made his mind up — not ever. But it's an instinct to fight. Perhaps Oscar's only instinct.

All the fight's left him now.

For hours he had screamed, even after the bolt was slid into place with the sickeningly familiar sound of grating metal. He had begged and hammered his fists on the door until his knuckles split, the blood the only warmth available to him, but it's long cooled and gone thick and tacky since. He'd wailed for his father, and then wailed for Ma. Wailed for his grandfather despite every knowledge that he's dead. Pleaded for anyone to come and let him out, come save him, come protect him from the stone walls that seem to be closing in on him from every side despite the fact he can't see them. Can't even feel them with touch, for when he reaches out or moves too far, the metal edges of tools find him first. Too blunt and rusted to be much more than a warning, but what a warning they are.

At least they keep him conscious. Prevent him from tilting too far from either side, even in moments his consciousness tries to leave him, worn thin from exhaustion. Hunger.

On the one hand, it feels as if it would be a blessing to fall asleep, pass the time he's imprisoned here to suffer his penance, but Oscar is all too aware of the risks of not waking up. Perhaps being asleep when Da is finally close enough again for Oscar to make a noise and remind him he's here, and miss his chance entirely. He doesn't want to die in here.

Alone and forgotten. As fitting as it seems for him.

Perhaps half of it is fear for his own mortality, but the rest —

Who would look after Mo?

Da and Ma are both shit at it, probably haven't even fed the kid tonight. Had they put him to bed? Mo ain't good at sleeping on his own, he won't stay in their bedroom unless Oscar is there to keep him there, and then he'll wander off God knows where. He's gone missing countless times before, been found wandering the field or hiding somewhere in the farmhouse or curled up with the animals in one of the barns. Oscar can only wonder where he is now.

He supposes he has the answer to his question when he hears quiet footsteps approaching.

They aren't the heavy stomps of Da's boots, nor the delicate steps of Ma's bare feet. They're bare, but they're clumsy. Young.

"Os?" Morris says.

Oscar swallows hard to stifle a sob.

He'd thought his tears had all dried up with how he'd wailed, but suddenly they've found him again, and they've wound themselves tight around his throat, tighter than even the cold had bound him. He's struck with the desire to hold his little brother, clutch him tight to his chest. For his own comfort or Morris.

"Mo," he chokes out. "You ain't s'pose to be out here."

He wonders what Morris is wearing. Pictures him in his threadbare undershirt and drawers he wears to bed, pictures him freezing in the cold late fall air. Pictures his tiny clumsy feet against the cold, wet dirt.

"Wan'ed you," Morris mumbles. "Can't sleep. M'back hurts, Os."

Oscar's hurts too.

"He hit you?" he asks quietly.

"Uh-huh."

"Fuck. 'm'sorry, Mo."

He hears movement as Morris shuffles closer and must sink down, and the door rattles slightly in its frame.

"Can you feel me?" Morris asks, with all the innocence of a little kid. "'m'right here. Got my—my hand on the door. So 's'almos' like bein' together."

Oscar has to swallow again. Shuffles closer and presses his own palm to the door, where he guesses Morris' might be.

"I can feel you, Mo."

He can't. All he can feel is the door between them and the walls all around him, but it's nice to pretend. For a moment, it almost makes it easier to breathe. But then he thinks a little more, about the fact that Morris is here, and his chest gets tight again. The walls squeeze in.

"Mo," he says, edged with urgency, "You gotta get back inside."

Morris whines. "I don' wanna."

"I know, I know you don't, but you gotta. 'f'Da catches you out here—"

"I don' wanna go inside, Daidí was bein' scary—"

"I know. I know, Mo. But he'll be scarier if he finds you, yeah?"

It's as if he can hear Morris swallow in the beat of silence that follows.

"Yeah," he whispers. "He'll be. Be real mad."

"Yeah. Good. Good kid. So you jus' gotta. Head back inside an' head to bed, alright. Wrap yourself up. 's'cold, ain't it?"

"Are you cold?" Morris asks suddenly, rather than answer.

Oscar can't feel his hands at all anymore. Can't feel his feet, the sensation crawling up his legs like he's sinking into something. His knees are aching like they've been turned to stone, and he feels as if maybe he'll never be able to move them again.

"'m'fine," he lies, and Morris believes him, because what else can the kid do?

"Okay," he says quietly. And then pats his palm in a soft rhythm against the door, a clumsy little game to amuse himself, until Oscar starts patting back. The two of them continue, locked in an out-of-sync sort of rattling of sound, until finally Oscar catches on to Morris' rhythm, and Morris bursts out giggling quietly as they're suddenly tapping in perfect sync to his own made-up music.

Oscar, despite everything, can't help but feel himself smile too.

"Get inside," he tells Morris gently. "Curl up on my side of the bed, 'f you gotta. Okay? Try get some sleep."

"I will," Mo says. Like the good kid he is. "I will. Love you, Os."

God. Oscar swallows hard.

"Love you too, Mo."

Morris' footsteps race away, and the silence that follows is deafening. So all-consuming that Oscar takes to tapping again, just to prove to himself that all sound hasn't emptied from the world, hasn't left him behind like everybody else.

It's cold. It's so fucking cold. And, without Morris, the fear begins to drown him again, but he meets it with a new determination — to stay awake, to survive. Because his baby brother needs him.

And Oscar's not a kid anymore.

thank you?! oh my gosh

I see a man (fictional), I am generally like "okay". I see the same man (fictional) being put in a situation, covered in dirt and blood, perhaps soaking wet, actively sobbing and shaking like a chihuahua, and I am saying "yay" and "yippee" and things of this nature

they're both here. this is lovely. <3

when did you stop loving daisy?

(did you ever?)

POST: LONG ISLAND, NY. AUG 1922

This is an impossible question to answer. You must understand how much of myself I put into her and thus how much of myself I lost the day I realized it wasn't going to happen. Can you imagine that? Building the whole of your world and your vision of yourself on the opinion of the one person on Earth you thought you truly understood, the very first person in your life to want nothing more than to bring you peace—just for that same person to change and withdraw as you, in an effort to retain their attention, concentrated and refined yourself into exactly what you thought they needed?

For once in my life I had someone I could understand, until I didn't. And for a moment I thought for sure that without her I had nothing, that I was nothing and I would die nothing, but—

—well, that's simply not the case. Now, here, anyway. In another life maybe I pursued her until my body gave out and I rotted away to reveal I'd been hollow all along. I still feel that way sometimes, on foggy nights when the green light at the end of her dock cuts through my room.

Only now I don't face it alone. And thank god for that.

I'll always have a fondness for Daisy. I don't think I could fully extract her from myself if I tried, as many times as I've reinvented myself. I don't think that's a bad thing. She's good, you see, old sport. She really is. I don't blame her for my giving up, and you shouldn't either.

I would write more, but I have more letters to answer, a past to put away, a present to appreciate, and I'm already being called to tomorrow.

Sincerely and emphatically,

Jay Gatsby

hey actually where is this ben cook pic from i need to know

I see a man (fictional), I am generally like "okay". I see the same man (fictional) being put in a situation, covered in dirt and blood, perhaps soaking wet, actively sobbing and shaking like a chihuahua, and I am saying "yay" and "yippee" and things of this nature

ai-less whumptober; day thirteen

@ailesswhumptober 13 — using themself as bait, defiance, “Take me instead.” ↳ the refuge, 1896 word count; 1.3k

cw; mentions of death, panic attacks, dissociation

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Oscar only finds out it's his birthday when Snyder tells him.

He's brought into Snyder's office by a guard with a hand tight on his bicep, and he's expecting any of the usual reasons. Most likely that he's in trouble for some reason or another, almost equally likely that Snyder's just a lonely bastard who wanted someone to smoke with and talk to again.

But instead, Snyder smiles. Tight and utterly false.

"Happy birthday, Oscar."

Oh.

Oscar doesn't know what day it is, and had only half-guessed at it being October. But apparently he'd been right.

Not that him knowing what day it is would've helped him much. He doesn't know what day his birthday is. And Snyder must know that, or see it in his face, because he says.

"October 28th. A mere three days before All Hallow's Eve. How fitting for your birth."

Perhaps that should be another sign for Oscar. The fact that Snyder just told him, rather than keeping another gleeful secret, yet another thing he knows that Oscar doesn't. But there must be another secret somewhere, because Snyder is just looking at him then, expectant.

Oscar doesn't know what's being expected. He takes a guess.

"Uh. Thank you, Sir."

Swing and a miss. Snyder looks irritated, as if Oscar is the one fucking with him. He turns his attention to his desk and flips through some papers, not even bothering to look at Oscar when he speaks next.

"Well, your uncle will be here to pick you up soon."

And Oscar's world grinds suddenly to a halt.

For a moment, he's sure he'd imagined the words, or utterly misinterpreted them somehow. Maybe Snyder is just fucking with him still, a part of whatever weird joke this is. Snyder's always had a backwards, sick sense of humour — a consistent reminder he's hardly older than Oscar, when it comes down to it.

Well, less older now.

"Uh," Oscar sort of croaks. "What?"

Snyder glances up from his papers. "Are you stupid?" he asks calmly.

Oscar swallows. Hesitates.

"Your uncle," Snyder repeats. "He'll be here to retrieve you. I would recommend getting yourself organised."

"My—uncle."

"Yes, your uncle. Do you know what an uncle is, Oscar?"

"I—Weasel? Wiesel? My—my da's brother?"

"Correct."

"Why. Why—"

"It's your eighteen birthday, Oscar."

Oh. Oh.

"In fact, he first contacted me weeks ago concerning your release, but I informed him he would incur a fee for your release at that point in time. Bail, to be curt."

Oscar's head is swimming.

"But. But I'm eighteen now," he says, hardly above a whisper.

"Eighteen indeed. Your sentence is over."

Oscar feels. Dazed. Feels like the world has been pulled out from under him and he's floating, falling, spinning. He has to fight down some insane urge to start laughing, almost the same feeling as when Ma died. A tangled mixture of terror and relief and utter overwhelm.

But just as quickly as it had all started, it grinds to a halt.

"What," he says, breathless, "What about Mo?"

And suddenly all of his worst fears are lighting up like a fire when Snyder doesn't respond.

"What about Mo?" he repeats, more urgently this time.

"Your brother isn't even sixteen yet," Snyder answers calmly, gaze on his papers again. "He has a while to go."

"No," Oscar says. His stomach is on the floor, cold terror washing over him even as his gut burns. "No, no, no—"

"Go and gather your things. Eight o' clock, Mr. Wiesel said. He'll be here any minute."

"No! No, no, I don't wanna go, I wanna stay. I want—You can't make me leave Mo—"

Oscar has to be dragged out of Snyder's office. By the same guard who'd dragged him in, hold considerably more brutal now as Oscar kicks and fights and pleads. He can't stomach it. He doesn't want to go, he can't go — but as much as Snyder won't let anyone go if he can help it, he won't let anyone stay once he's no longer being paid to keep them. Oscar is worthless to him now. And won't be kept.

He feels the attention of the bunk room shift to him as he's tossed in, lands on the floor in a brutal skid that has his arm and hip grazed to shit by the filthy floors. He's still shouting.

"Os," Morris says immediately, running to him. Taking his hand. "Os, what happened?"

Oscar's eyes are burning. His chest is tight, lungs won't expand. He can't bring himself to look at his brother, but a larger part of him desperately wants to look at him, to stare at him, to commit every inch of his face to memory lest it be forgotten in two years.

Two years.

Oscar chokes a sob.

He knows everyone is staring. He knows he's much too old to cry. He's eighteen. He's eighteen now.

"Os," Morris repeats, real gentle. "Hey. Hey, it's okay."

"Get your shit," the guard at the door barks.

Morris looks up at him, and without his eyes on Oscar, Oscar finally dares to look at him. Sees the earnest confusion in his little brother's face, the crease in his brow, not understanding what's going on. Even when he does turn to Oscar then, that familiar dependency on his older brother for explanations. Oscar doesn't know how to explain this.

He chokes out another empty, breathless sound.

"Os, you ain't breathin'," Mo tells him quietly. "You gotta breathe. C'mon. Breathe—breathe."

"You don't get your shit, you're leavin' without it," the guard spits, and Morris. Pauses.

"Leavin'," he echoes. "Who's leavin'?"

Oscar wants to die. His stomach is rolling, throat so tight he can't breathe at all anymore. He squeezes Morris' hand so desperately he can feel every bone and tendon, will surely leave bruises behind — but then there's a distant shout and then the guard is moving, coming for him again. Heaves him up with that familiar grasp on his upper arms.

"We ain't got time for this," the guard grits out. "Got your new boss waitin' for you."

"No," Morris protests immediately, rising up to his feet as if to chase his brother as he's dragged away. He doesn't even know what's happening, and it makes Oscar feel sicker to know that it's Morris' instinct to protect him regardless. "No. No! Os ain't do nothin', let him go. Let him go!"

But if Oscar's protests had been utterly ignored, it goes without saying that Morris' will be too. He doesn't cut much of an imposing figure, even as he rises on bare tiptoes in a desperate bid to seem bigger. He trails the guard to the door, shouting all the while, and when the guard only keeps going, Morris starts to hit him. Insubordination that would usually always earn attention, earn the ire being turned to him.

But this time, it doesn't work.

"No!" Morris screams. "No, this ain't fair, where are you sendin' him? He ain't done nothin'! Take me instead! Take me!"

Oscar doesn't see the hit. He just hears the deafening crack and then the familiar thud of his little brother's body hitting the ground. Hears his screaming go quiet as the door is slammed and locked behind them. And Oscar is just forced to keep walking, coughing and retching, down the hall and the stairs to the entrance hall where his uncle is waiting for him.

He's largely unrecognisable. A bigger man than Oscar remembers. Better dressed. He's got a cigar in his mouth and a rough look on his face, one that almost twists to pity when he sees Oscar.

"Lord above," Wiesel mutters. "What they been doin' to you?"

Oscar doesn't speak. Can't. Feels utterly numb, the voices and sensations all washing over him as Snyder speaks to his uncle. Papers are signed. And then he's being exchanged, the hands of the guard swapping for the bigger, careless hands of his father's younger brother, taking that same grip of his upper arm to lead him once again.

"Right. C'mon."

Oscar doesn't have a choice. He never has.

He goes.

Bonus non-whumptober delancey fic bc apparently it’s necessary.

cw. Mention of/allusions to suicide

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Morris wasn’t sure what time it was, but it must’ve been late, or maybe the early hours of the morning; the low hanging moon shining just enough light into the room through the gaps of space between the rotted wood of the roof Oscar hadn’t got round to fixing yet.

His breath was caught in his throat, and he was cold, his thin blanket that had been patched up several times over a tangled mess on the floor. He must’ve kicked it off in his sleep.

Nightmares weren’t unusual, and he couldn’t even remember this one, not really, grasping at smoke as he tried to slot the foggy images back into place, but he felt it in his chest, something hollow that made him aware of what felt like empty space in his ribcage.

It was something about Ma, maybe. When he closed his eyes he pictured her face, her features a little distorted maybe, from so many years without her, but it was easy to piece together when he looked so much like her. He saw her most of the time when he looked in the mirror.

It was the little things he forgot, whether the freckle on her chin was on the right or left of her lip. Whether the scar just below her eye was white or pink.

And she always looked happy, when he imaged her. He doesn’t remember her ever looking happy.

He had an old picture once. When da had told them to pack, Christ, near 10 years ago now, he’d not known what to bring, but shoved the picture of mammy from his bedside table into his pocket before da shoved them out the door and in the back of the cart and abandoned them to Snyder like the shit father he always had been.

Morris remembered being scared, then. Clinging to Oscar’s hand. And in retrospect he realised Oscar must’ve been scared too, a little kid still. He’d held onto Morris’s hand just as tight in return.

It wasn’t long after they were out of the refuge that Oscar had burnt it, the picture.

Morris couldn’t remember what the argument that prompted it was about anymore, he just remembered the flames licking up the side of the crumpled photo, more creases than it was her image anymore with the amount it had been shoved in his pocket and taken out and unfolded and held so tightly he was sure he accidentally tore it.

He thought about the photo (ma sat down next her husband, a bruise shadowing her cheek) as he leant down to grab his blanket from the floor. The rotting wooden frame of the bed creaked. It was loud in the silence of the room, the only noise aside from Oscar’s level breathing, and then that shifted.

“Mo?” His voice was low and rough and so southern that for a moment Morris was sure he was da.

“Go back to sleep, Os.”

A few second of quiet. And then the shitty mattress gurning as Oscar turned over, pushed himself up onto his elbow to stare at him.

Morris couldn’t help the fond twist of his lip despite the circumstance. Even through the dark he could see that Oscar’s curls were a mess, and he was wearing an expression that Morris recognised from the street cat he disturbed the other week while it was napping on a sunny patch of cobble. Disgruntled.

“Wha’s wrong with you?”

Morris pulled his legs up to his chest, ignoring the goosebumps dotting along his skin. “Nothin’.”

“Shit liar.”

“I’m not lyin’.”

“You’re cryin’.”

Morris furrowed his brows and swiped the heel of his palm underneath his eyes. It came away wet.

He hadn’t even realised.

“Seriously Mo.” Oscar shifted and the bed creaked again. “Know I hate it when you lie.”

“Dreamin’ ‘bout ma. I think.”

The admission felt dangerous. There was never any way of knowing Oscar’s reaction to things like this. Whether he’d blow up or ruffle Morris’s hair or ignore him the rest of the night.

Oscar never liked talking about their ma. Morris couldn’t remember the last time Oscar had brought her up first.

He was all too aware of the ways Oscar’s jaw hardened as he swallowed, of the way he flexed his hand.

“I don’t remember what,” he continued, “but I- I don’t think I can remember her face proper.”

Oscar fell back onto his mattress, elbow shifting from under him and Morris noted how he pulled a face at the sound, noted how he didn’t close his eyes but stared up at the ceiling instead.

“You’re right. Should just go back to sleep Mo.”

Morris swallowed hard and pulled the blanket closer around himself. His throat was aching.

“Was she greying when she-“ he couldn’t quite say it, even though it was years ago, and he’s said it before, hundreds of times. “I remember her hair bein’ real dark but sometimes I think about it and-“

“Startin’ to. Grey roots.”

“She was only young though.”

“Stress, Mo.” His voice still sounded all too much like da’s. Low. A quality of gravel to it.

Oscar was starting to grey a little too, in the same spots their da had, only a couple hairs, but Morris was growing more and more aware of it. He’d never thought his brother as old. There was only two years between them.

But ma hadn’t been old either.

“You’re not ever. you’re not ever gonna kill yourself, Os?”

“Jesus-“

“Cause you- ma weren’t even much older than you when she-“

“Morris-“

“-did it and I don’t think I’d be good, at bein’ on my own.” He swiped at his eyes again. “You could. But I couldn’t. I wouldn’t be good at it-“

“Christ Mo.” Oscar pushed himself up again and glared at him from across the room, if it weren’t for the late hour, Morris would swear there was a sheen to his eyes. But he knew better than to mention it. “I ain’t gonna kill myself, okay?”

Morris was afraid that if he spoke, no sound would come out. Instead he studied Oscar’s face as best he could through the darkness. His cheeks looked gaunter with all the shadows, his deep set eyes even darker, high cheekbones like da, a strong jawline, handsome. His hair was still a mess.

He looked tried.

Had looked tired for as long as Morris could remember. And Morris wondered if this was the image of Oscar he would remember, or if he would make him smile like he did with ma when he thought about her.

“I just.” His voice was quiet, but it felt like he was breaking something by talking. “I don’t wanna forget your face too.”