sortinghat_logs | Illusion never changed into something real

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Illusion never changed into something real

WHO: Eridan and Feferi
TONE: This might break a couple of hearts. ~~like Eridan's~~
RATING: PG
WHEN: 15/1/12 (After dinner but before curfew)
WHERE: Astronomy tower
WHAT: Eridan commented on Feferi's entry. Feferi told him they needed to talk. Rampant miscommunication, and oh Eridan baby you're babbling. This will be close to a conversation that they have in canon. They will both need snuggles after this.
STATUS: ONGOING!

Feferi drew her robe around herself a little tighter to ward off the chill of the castle (although if she was entirely honest with herself, she wasn't just shivering because of the cold), glancing around as she made her way through the hallways up to the Astronomy tower. She stared up the stairs for a moment before drumming up her courage and ascending. She gnawed on her lower lip worriedly, thinking about how best to start this conversation.

Her heart was pounding and her mouth was dry by the time that she came to the door at the top of the stairs, and she took a deep breath before pushing it open, expecting that Eridan was probably already up there.

"Eridan?" she called.

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Eridan had missed Feferi. He wasn't stupid, he could tell that things were getting awkward in a way that he didn't quite understand but never exactly suspected that meant ill for him. When she'd asked to meet him privately his heart had leapt eagerly into his throat, and he'd have skipped up the fucking steps if he wasn't absolutely sure that would look 1) completely dorky even if it felt good, and 2) if somebody caught him he might expire of embarrassment. He adopted a dignified stalk-swagger hybrid that really just looked like his pants were too tight or his underwear was chafing, but it didn't matter.

Because Feferi wanted to see him. And he had things he wanted to tell her too. Not just the possibility of Gamzee's interest in him, but the way he'd been feeling about her for a long time, maybe start sounding her out, see if they could get something going...maybe. He paced the top of the tower waiting for her, and debating with himself over whether or not he should just tell her, or keep waiting for the right moment. What would the right moment even look like? Maybe it would be tonight?

Her voice brought an unconscious smile to his face, which he didn't quite manage to cover up with an aristocratic look.

"Here, Fef," he said. "I wwas beginnin to think you wweren't goin to showw, wwhat took you so long?" Or had that just been his nerves, making it seem like forever?

Despite herself, Feferi really had missed Eridan. She wasn't lying about that. He was her longest and first and dearest friend, and she still cared about him and fretted over him, but...

They were growing apart. And she was starting to see that clinging onto their relationship just so that she could keep Eridan out of trouble was really not healthy for her. In fact, it was downright exhausting.

Nonetheless, she put on a little smile when she saw him, closing the door quietly behind her.
"Silly, I'm not that late," she replied.

He had no idea. He never had, really, either that he worried her as much as he did or the toll it was taking on her. Sure sometimes he'd acted out, talked a big game to get her attention, but if he'd really intended to do it he would have done it, not gotten talked out of it.

"I dunno, maybe you weren't, but I've been waitin for awhile," he said, trying for lofty but really just sounding happy. "So what's up with you? You don't usually go askin me to meet you all of a sudden, like you got somethin secret to tell me."

Feferi had always known that Eridan didn't truly want to hurt anyone. That was why she kept fighting for so long, was because she was hoping that one day she could help him see that he didn't need to act out to get her attention, and then they could just go back to how they were when they were little. But she couldn't keep sacrificing herself to help him.

Still, she started to have second thoughts when she heard how happy he was to see her. It broke the mask of a smile on her face, and she bit her lip. "Let's, um... can we sit down and talk for a while?"

That wasn't good. A nervous Feferi made Eridan nervous, and his smile dropped in an instant. His mouth got soft and wobbly, uncertain of what expression it was supposed to make, and almost instinctively his hands reached for his scarf to fiddle with it. He would not stick it in his mouth, damn it! ...but it was close.

"Guess so," he said, tugging on the end of his scarf, but he sat carefully down on the cold stone. "Wwhat's goin on, Fef?"

Feferi sat down close to him, close enough that their knees were almost touching. She glanced around the room and then quickly back at the door as if she'd heard something. ...But no.

"Eridan, I did a lot of thinking over break," she started, because she had to start somewhere. "We've been friends for a really long time..." Almost half their lives, in fact.

"For fuckin evver, it seems like," Eridan cut in. Because it was true; he could hardly remember a time where he didn't know Feferi, and she hadn't been his best friend. And he hadn't secretly wanted something more. Ever since that more or less formal proposal on the part of their parents...he'd been so thrilled, even as a kid, to hear about that. He couldn't imagine wanting to be with anybody but Feferi, even if he did try to get Vriska Serket's attention and felt a little warm to think how Gamzee had commented on his ass.

"Yeah," Feferi agreed quietly.

The non-subtle efforts on the part of their parents (mostly Eridan's father, actually) to push them together were part of what made Feferi so uncomfortable. She didn't exactly have anyone whose name she doodled in all of her notebooks, but she knew that she didn't want to marry Eridan. That would be like marrying her own brother!

"And, I have something that I wanted to talk to you about," she said.

It was rare that they sat and talked and didn't talk about him. Not always because he needed to talk about himself; she was maddeningly persistent at pestering him for details on stuff she didn't even want to give.

"Wwhat?" he said, before he'd managed to recover from the slight stab of surprise and managed the slightly more articulate: "Wwhat's that?"

Feferi idly played with the hem of her robe-sleeve. Her next words were catching around the lump that was in her throat. She felt like...like she was saying goodbye. She felt like she was doing something wrong, like she was betraying everything that they had, like she was abandoning Eridan. Which couldn't be farther from the truth! She still cared about him a lot!

"I just...I think that maybe we should try to make other friends, Eridan."

He almost didn't understand what she meant.

No, scratch that- the part of him that looked at things shallowly didn't get what she meant at all, and couldn't understand why his heart had suddenly dropped into his stomach with growing fear.

"We have other friends." His mouth felt dry. "What are you sayin', I've got a ton a' friends."

Feferi's posture fell, and if she wasn't meeting Eridan's eyes before then she definitely wasn't doing so now.

"Eridan...you know what I mean." Her voice was small and faint. "Don't make this harder than it already is. Please."

"No I don't know what you mean." He was starting to get panicked now, feeling distinctly like he couldn't breathe. Something was stuck in his throat and he couldn't get it out, and the words came out all choked. "Fef, what are you sayin', what are you tryin' to get out here because I don't have a fuckin' clue, what are you sayin' to me-"

She looked up at him, startled and hurt, when he started making all sorts of panicky sounds. She reached out and put her hand on his knee.

"I'm sorry, Eridan..."

He'd never jerked away from her before like he did then, the movement panicky and uncertain. "I don't understand-" And he didn't, because what the hell was she talking about, needed other friends, he had plenty of other friends-

-he thought-

-maybe?

"Are you sayin'-" He swallowed, tried again, his voice cracking embarrassingly on the words. "What, are you sayin' we can't be friends anymore? Is that what you're tellin' me?"

She recoiled like he'd stung her when he jerked away. And -- there we go, that did it. Tears spilled down her cheeks, even though she tried to wipe them away with the sleeve of her robe.

"I-it's not that..." she tried to explain. "I still really want to be your friend! It's just...maybe not..." She stopped, took a deep breath, looked him in the eyes and tried again.

"I can't keep just taking care of you, Eridan. I...I need to take care of myself, too."

"I didn't need you to take care of me!"

The words were out before he could think about them, convince himself that maybe that wasn't the right thing to say. And then she was crying, oh fuck, oh fuck, he never meant to make Feferi cry, never ever and he'd never been good at making her stop, either. She could have punched him right in the face and a broken nose would have made him feel less terrible than he did right now, but he couldn't just stop.

"Who ever fuckin' asked you to take care of me, you think that's what this is about?" And then, stupidly- "That's what you've thought a' me this whole time? You're just my fuckin' NANNY?"

Feferi just sat there, feeling his words cut into her, one after the other, until finally she couldn't take it anymore.

"NO! That's what friends do, Eridan, they take care of each other! They try to make each other happy, they make sure that they don't get into trouble, they pay attention, Eridan!" Her shoulders were shaking, and she was up on her knees now. "The whole time we've been at school, I have given you everything! I don't even know if there's anything left of me anymore!"

Oh no, no no no, he was not about to take that lying down.

"You didn't give me anythin'!" he shouted back. "You think I don't care about you- that I wouldn't do ANYTHIN' to make you happy, and you're layin' this on me! You never even realized, did you, you don't fuckin' understand ANYTHIN' about me!"

Feferi shrank back like he'd physically struck her. "You never listen to me, Eridan! If you really want to make me happy, then stop trying to tell me what is and is not proper for me to do!" She collapsed, sitting on her heels.

"All you ever do is belittle my friends! And when you do that, you're belittling me, Eridan! I just... I'm DONE! I've had it!"

"I do not!" he shouted, ignoring the fact that he exactly did. Well, and weren't they not good enough for her? And didn't they take her attention away from him? "When have I ever- I've always been there, done anythin' you wanted me to do, anythin' you needed me to do and now it's goodbye Eridan, thanks but I'm done with you? You can't just- you can't just walk away from me!"

"You do so!" And oh, my god Eridan, so you were allowed to have other friends but she wasn't?

She stopped yelling.

"I know, Eridan. I'm not saying we can't be friends again - or even anymore! I just...I need a break. Please, try to understand..."

"I don't understand."

He got up suddenly, pacing because if he didn't he was going to scream, or cry, running his hands through his hair. The hair that he spent so much time trying to keep straight and back from his face, leaving the curls coming down in a mess.

"I don't understand a damn thing, where is this comin' from Fef, you ain't said two words to me about bein' unhappy or anythin'-"

Feferi jumped to her feet when Eridan did, not because she felt threatened or anything but because it was the only thing she could think of to do. Watching Eridan was breaking her heart. Why did he have to make this so hard?

But the worst part was that she knew he was right. He was right, she should have tried to talk to him before it just got to be too much, but she was just...tired, now. She pressed the heels of her hands against her eyes. "I'm sorry, Eridan."

"What are you sorry for?" He was starting to get really crazy, now, and he reached out without thinking to try and pull her hands away from his face. "What did I do? Whatever it is I'll fuckin' fix it, I swear, you don't have to do somethin' like this."

Feferi stiffened when Eridan reached out and grabbed her wrists, and she resisted his grip for a moment before letting her hands fall and looking up at him. "Eridan, stop! This isn't the end of the world! I'm not saying we can never be friends again, or even that we're not friends anymore!"

"You're tellin' me to go away!" He was not going to cry, and he was not going to shout, but his voice cracked awkwardly nonetheless. "You're tellin' me you don't want me to be part of your life anymore."

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Illusion never changed into something real

Oh right I have to post this in a journal that belongs to this comm to actually post it

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Glass why am I laughing this is sad

I don't know this is a terribly tragic post

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backtagging like a boss

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