Don't Tell Me I'm Not Alone PV E. Reeves Ended

Interacting with @Anastasia Beckett

Everything felt utterly and completely wrong.

He hadn't slept all night long, as what he'd received in the mail the night before effectively shook his entire existence and made it impossible for him to get rest. His parents and sisters couldn't know that he knew. He wondered which one of them was responsible for it, as it couldn't possibly be someone who was outside of his family circle. That person, Eyre decided, he could never forgive. To tell him via anonymous post the night before school that he was adopted was outright cruel, if not also malicious.

His family had shown up that year, all ready to see him off. Eyre had pretended that he was feeling sick, so that was why he was unsociable and looked like shit today, with his hair a bit wild and his eyes dark and brooding. He stood by his luggage, his family making friendly conversation and gabbing incessantly in the back of his head. It was the equivalent of nails on a chalkboard, twisting and turning in his ears. Eventually, he turned around. He needed that to stop.

"I think that I'd rather say my goodbyes now." Eyre told them. His arms were crossed off to them, and in that moment he felt like it was the only way that he felt like he could soothe himself. He felt like he didn't know his own family anymore. These people.. who even were they? How could they keep him from his true self for so long while simultaneously ostracizing him, making him feel like an "other" in his own house. It made sense, now. He truly was an outsider, even in blood.

His mother, Camilla, wrapped his arms around her son, cooing about how independent he was and how proud she was of him. It was sick, this sudden change of heart in them. They'd been lovely all summer long to him, and now he couldn't help but read into every little action they had. As he shook hands with his father, he could feel the anger crawling up his entire body when he looked down at him with pride, as if he was his own. As if he was his own. His grip tightened into a vice grip that he hadn't noticed until Ivan acknowledged it with a little chuckle.

"Your grip is getting a little tight, son. Seems like the nerves are getting to you!"

Eyre snapped out of it, dropping their hands. He tried his best not to cry, his throat feeling dry.

"Yeah... something like that." He said, a fake smile on his lips. He mumbled some sort of goodbye to his sisters before they left him on the platform, alone. He felt utterly hopeless, and tears threatened to spill from his eyes as he watched the happy families pass by. He had to have a moment to himself before he got on the train.

He took his cart and started to push it, looking for a place where he could have a sufficient breakdown. It was in that moment when he saw Ana. He had worried about her all summer long. This created an even bigger lump in his throat. She looked different. He'd never seen her wear such dark clothes before. It wasn't a surprise, as he had heard his fair share of rumors as to what happened to her mother. Although he wanted to escape, he needed to see her. As two kids forced into the pureblood world, she'd understand.

He made a beeline in her direction, putting his cart off to the side. He approached her, and his heart started to pound.

"Ana... Ana?" Eyre spoke to her softly, his voice hoarse. When their eyes met, he could barely contain himself, his eyes brimming with tears. "I-I've been trying to get a hold of you. How are you doing?! It's been so long... I have so much to tell you." He spoke transparently to her, his voice trembling.

Outfit:

Reducio

@Eyre Reeves

Ana's focus on the ant intensified as it continued its journey up the wall. The ant's journey and really the ant meant nothing to anyone in the grand scheme of things. Much like Ana and her current mess of a life. Neither would make an empire fall or rise, make kings or queens care. Neither did anything that mattered at all to anyone else really. Was she really this insignificant? She couldn't be. She was Anastasia Beckett for God's sake! That meant nothing to death or life. Death didn't care if you were a Beckett, a pauper, or a prince. It didn't care if you were a good person or not. It would just take and take and take from you. And somehow, you were expected to keep living.

The ant reached the top of the pillar it was climbing and disappeared from Ana's view. She wished she could disappear like that. Disappear from the view of prying purebloods, well-meaning but useless friends, overly sweet and supportive aunts and cousins, just disappear completely. Her mother had disappeared and nobody had actually done anything. If anyone truly cared, they would have investigated, found answers. Instead, they sent stupid fruit baskets and fancy bottles of Scotch. What the fuck did they expect a 13-year-old to do with a bottle of scotch? Would the same happen if Ana disappeared? She was sure it would. People would express their deepest condolences to her aunt and uncle, send them some gift baskets, and forget about her. Her entire life, that had been her worst nightmare, and somehow, that was the only thing she wanted right now.

If she ran away from the station, how far would she get? She had made it a week on her own when she'd been disowned, so she knew she could survive. If she darted through the crowds now, her aunt and uncle wouldn't be able to do anything to stop her, given how crowded it was. She had money of her own, she could leave, go to New York or France or anywhere that wasn't London. Except, she was 13 and her aunt and uncle were her legal guardians. Surely they would have a way to track her money. Maybe she would steal from someone at school and go from there. Start completely over.

She was violently interrupted from her thoughts by someone repeating her name. Glancing up she saw Eyre. God, she didn't feel like speaking to him or anyone right now. Her arms tightened protectively around her body, and her hands clasped into tight fists.

"Leave me alone, Eyre," Ana said quietly. Normally, when she spoke that quietly, there was a dangerous edge to her voice, but now she just sounded defeated and crushed. He didn't look much better than she imagined she looked, which inraged her for some reason. Who was he to cry like a little bitch? With all his privilege and family? He had the world before him and all he could do was whine about how his sisters were mean and he had responsibilities that he didn't like. Either he was a Pureblood heir or he wasn't. If he was, he ought to just get it together and stop his whining.

"I'm really not in the mood, Eyre," she said, her voice rising slightly as she interrupted his launch into whatever it was he was about to babble about. If she hadn't been feeling so defeated, she would have laughed when he said it had been so long. It had been what, a month since they'd last written one another, two since they had seen each other. That wasn't anything in the grand scheme of things. Ana's thoughts on some grand plan had occupied much of her waking hours. And even if it had been so long, it was had been Ana's bloody choice and Eyre ought to respect that.

Interacting with @Anastasia Beckett

Ana's reaction was one that he was not expecting. He blinked away his tears, his overwhelming sorrow being replaced by being confused. Maybe he'd been too forward with how much he missed his friend. "M'sorry..." Eyre apologized, wiping his eyes with the edge of his sleeve. "I didn't sleep very well last night, 'cause of some stuff. I saw you, and couldn't help but say hi."

This was a gross underplay of what he was going through. Everything was hurting a whole lot. But, even if he wanted to be fully transparent, there was something about Ana's general ambiance that was throwing him off. They'd been friends since he was a kid, and he'd seen her in multiple different stages of her life, some more brutal than the last. He'd never felt intimidated by her, regardless of what his friends would say. But, in this instance, he was starting to understand what they meant by that.

He subconsciously took a step back, turning a bit away from her before deciding to turn back. He couldn't just leave her without coming up with some sort of follow up plan.

"...Let's catch up sometime, yeah? When we're both feeling more settled in?" He proposed to her. His voice was still raspy, but he tried his best to show her that he wasn't needy or upset. Maybe that wasn't what she needed right now. "You could always send me an owl-"

@Eyre Reeves

She knew she was being unfair. There was no question about it. Eyre of all people didn't deserve to have her snap at him when he was just trying to talk to her. Still, the last thing she could handle at this moment was hearing him talk about how hard it was for him to deal with his older sisters or his dad or whoever it was he was coming to whine about. He either needed to grow a spine and confront them about the issues he had with how they were behaving or decide that he was going to suck it up. The boy had been dealing with variations of the same issues the entire time Ana had known him. Granted, she had as well, but she had decided to do something about it. Not necessarily the best choice, but she was done hearing him complain about it.

There was another thing that Ana wasn't ready to confront. Eyre was a reminder of all the things she had said about her mother and her father and their life. How she'd complained and talked about the threats she had made to her parents. He was a reminder of how much all of this was her fault. Maybe she didn't know how or why her mother had died, but she knew for a fact it was her fault.

Eyre's body language and tone sent waves of guilt through her. Her friend, one of the people she had known the longest and trusted the most, had just pretty much shriveled in front of her. If she had been a good friend, she would have apologized. Told him she was having a bad day and it wasn't his fault. Maybe asked what was wrong because there was clearly something. At least smiled at him instead of refusing to look at him.

But

She wasn't a good friend. Not right then. She couldn't just nod and let him leave. "God, take a hint for once," she snapped, her words full of venom that she usually reserved for her enemies or victims. This was nothing like her playful sarcasm or even her childish anger from when she and Eyre disagreed about a toy or game when they were younger. This was something else. As she spoke, she met his eyes for the first time in the conversation. "I'm not going to send you an owl, which I think you would have figured out by now because I am so fucking sick of hearing you bemoan how your life isn't perfect. You're a son of a wealthy Pureblood family, dipshit. Your life is as good as it gets and people have bigger things to deal with."

Interacting with @Anastasia Beckett

"God, take a hint for once."

He did a double take, akin to a muggle meme that he'd seen at his half-blood friend Elias' house over the summer.

"...I'm sorry... what?" He said in response, his tone hindering on the side of confusion and also deep offense.

"I'm not going to send you an owl, which I think you would have figured out by now because I am so fucking sick of hearing you bemoan how your life isn't perfect. You're a son of a wealthy Pureblood family, dipshit. Your life is as good as it gets and people have bigger things to deal with."

Ouch. His face was frozen in an almost half smile of disbelief, his mouth partially open and waiting for the punchline, but it never came. He let out an awkward chuckle, his mouth almost going dry.

"...Ana... What the fuck?" He spat, bitterness encapsulating his tone. He tried his best to swallow down his anger, but, if he knew anything about himself, getting heated in the middle of arguments was a curse that he was not proud of. "I.. I wasn't even suggesting that. I..." He started, taking a puff of breath through his nose. "You went MIA! For the entire summer! Why in the hell do you think I'd be focusing on me? I've been worried sick about you."

He tried to keep his voice down, but the pain of her accusation was starting to wear thin on his patience. It's true, he did complain a lot. But Ana wasn't without her own complaints. They'd both been confidants to each other all throughout their childhood. Hell, they'd even cried on each other's shoulders when things got particularly hard. He couldn't help but call her out on it, lowering the volume of his voice so he couldn't turn the heads of anyone else in close proximity.

"...And you know that it's a lot more serious than that. Don't pretend like you haven't seen it for yourself." Ana had been there. She had seen firsthand how much he was neglected as a child, how his parents allowed his sisters to push him around and had outright left him places. It was a low blow that was enough to make him seethe with anger.

@Eyre Reeves

The hurt and confusion in her friend's voice should have stopped her then and there. It didn't, but it most certainly should have. He looked stunned as if she had reached out and slapped him. Actually, she had slapped people before and they looked less shocked and hurt. The way he was looking at her, like he didn't believe she could have or ever even would have said anything like that, just made her feel angry. Deep down, she was more than aware that she was being an asshole, that Eyre wasn't the person she was angry at or even a proper representative of what she was angry at.

Eyre's language caught her by surprise. She cursed in a manner that would make a sailor's ears bleed, and anyone who knew her knew that it was part of her charm. Eyre wasn't like that at all. His tone hurt more than it should have, even though it was far less biting and vicious than her own. They had bickered all throughout their childhoods, as was bound to happen when two people had known each other for a while. He had never sounded like this. In her hypocritical thirteen-year-old mind, that made what she had said and done okay. If he was lashing out to her like that, then it excused her. "Yeah, well, as you can clearly see, I'm perfectly fine," Ana hissed. That was bullshit, she was not fine and that was more than obvious to anyone who had met her ever.

Gritting her teeth, she glanced away when he said it was worse and she knew it. It was true, which made her feel even angrier. At herself, at Eyre, at his family, at her own parents, at Purebloods in general. His parents and family were terrible to him, and Ana had managed to sneak more than one toad down the backs of his sisters' shirts. They were just as bad as Ana's parents, if in a totally different way. She had confided in Eyre all through her adolescence. About how her father was emotionally manipulative and distant if Ana was feeling generous in her descriptions, about how her mother was weak and didn't do anything to shield her daughter from Oliver's harsh nature, about how everything Ana did was insignificant, about how nothing she ever did was good enough and how she couldn't be free to do anything she wanted to. Eyre would never have twisted her words and thrown them in her face the way she just did. "Oh for fuck's sake, then do something about it," she said, her eyes meeting his again. "Or don't but just stop talking about how your charmed life isn't as great as it seems. It can get far worse."

Interacting with @Anastasia Beckett

Eyre could see that his friend was truly spiraling. It wasn't just because of her clothes, but also the way that she looked totally dejected and broken down. He scoffed when she said that she was doing okay, even though he felt bad about it afterwards. He knew her little mannerisms that she did when she was hurting, only this was much deeper than that. It was almost like she was vibrating with ferocity, like a caged animal that'd been beat down far too many times. He'd remembered when they were kids, how she peered down at him like that trying to look tough during their silly games. Now, it felt almost too real. Like he was the prey.

"Anastasia." He growled, like a parent that'd heard too much. He never, ever called her by her first name in conversation. He could probably count on his fingers the amount of times that he did. This was about the only way of showing that he was serious. "Please. I know you're not fine. I'm not stupid!" He lashed out, his tone more worried than angry. If only he could get through to her.

Then, she had to interject again to get her point across to him. If he knew anything about her, she needed the last word. She mentioned how his charmed life could get worse. Eyre couldn't help but laugh at that. A pained laugh that ripped through his chest. His eyes filled with tears, inhaling sharply through his nose again. Was he going to actually break down now?

"...Oh, fuck off! You know it's not that easy." He snapped. His anger was really reaching its limit, and at this point, he was starting to get nasty. "What do you suggest, Queen Beckett? How's about I go get myself a spooky leather jacket and an arsehole Russian boyfriend and maybe my problems will be solved, too!" He mocked her. "Oh wait. Wearing eyeliner doesn't exactly erase the trauma of finding out your parent's lies, now does it?"

The last bit crushed him, having blurted it out before his brain could even process it. It was more specific to Eyre's situation, not Ana's, but it was enough for him to break. A few tears fell down his cheeks. He felt horrible being cruel to her, but also horrible that he'd pulled the bandage off of his own wounds too soon. What an absolute shamble of a conversation this was.

@Eyre Reeves

His scoff served only to fuel her rage. She didn't care that it was obvious she wasn't okay to anyone who had ever met her, much less someone who had known her as long as Eyre had. She didn't care that she was so far from okay that she didn't even know where she was. She had bottled so much emotion about her mother and her parents and her life and it was all exploding out. Even though part of her knew this was wrong and that she would regret it later, she couldn't stop herself. The visual that sprung to mind was a cork popping off a champagne bottle at one of her parents' parties, only far less festive.

Him calling her Anastasia stung too, for similar reasons. They had been so young when they had met that neither of them could actually pronounce her name, so the number of times he had called her Anastasia in any context other than something in front of their parents was next to zero. His worried tone made her somehow feel worse. She was being bitter and nastier to him than she had been to anyone possibly ever, and he was still worried about her. She wanted to vomit. He had always ben the nicer one and she had been the spirited one. It was one of the reasons they had got along so well. She had cursed at him repeatedly, pulled his hair, and called him stupid within about five minutes of meeting him, and he had still chosen to be her friend after that.

That was why she was so unprepared for what came next. Her comments set him off and he was angrier than she had ever seen him. That worried her and hurt more than it should have. Ana had always been something of a spitfire, and she was sure Eyre had probably lost count of the number of people that he had seen her angry at. She couldn't remember ever seeing him angry, much less this livid, much less directed towards her. His words cut more than just about anything she had experienced in her life, barring what had occurred over the summer. His tone hurt just as much. He had always been the one who had seen the best in people, the best in her. People had called her a Queen, a bitch, a mean girl, you name it, in the past. Ana was well aware she was a bitch at times. But never to her friends. Even when she'd been angry and hurt by Rafael's actions at the Blossom Ball, she had never unleashed quite the torrent of anger that Eyre was subject too, and thus never been subject to words like these coming from a friend.

"Oh for God's sake, can everyone just mind their own business about who I am or am not dating," she exclaimed, latching on to Eyre's mention of a boyfriend as opposed to actually acknowledging any of the other things he said since there was really far too much truth in them for her to dispute any of it. Why was everyone else so invested in Ana's love life? Could she not just be a stupid teenage girl? That was what had started all of this and she wasn't about to let Eyre babble and judge her for it. What Russian boyfriend was he even talking about? Maybe Alexei? Ana would be lying if she said she didn't find the boy stunningly attractive, but nothing had actually happened between them. They had almost kissed once, but that was it. How would Eyre even know about that?

"God, you're just like our parents. For all your talk of wanting to be different and how you disagree with them, you're exactly like them," she retorted after his comment about all her problems being solved. He was crying now, and she felt tears springing in her eyes. Still, she wouldn't give him the satisfaction, and once he made that stupid comment about eyeliner, more rage sprung forth. She would have thought there was a limit to her anger, but so far, there was no sign of it. She couldn't ever remember being this angry at anyone. "Oh, fuck you, Reeves. You have no idea what you're even talking about. And frankly, yes, it's better than doing nothing and bitching to everyone about them for my entire fucking life."

Interacting with @Anastasia Beckett

"...I'm exactly like them? Our parents?" Eyre was truly insulted, laughing in her face. Before he was able to filter himself, he blurted out the information that he'd desperately wanted to withhold from her in the first place. "My parents aren't even mine. I learned last night." He confessed to her, breaking eye contact. He was completely unable to look at her. If he did, he'd surely start crying again. "I'm not even a pureblood. My dad is a muggle, and everything I've ever known about myself and my family is a lie." His voice was dry and unmoving, croaking like a tired husk. He wasn't even 13 yet, but in the past 24 hours he'd had enough turmoil to last him for the rest of his life.

As soon as he processed what he'd said, he realized that it was not the time for him to have talked about this for everyone. He stared at her directly in the eye, his lips trembling as he snarled. "Do you think I have any semblance of an idea now? What it's like to have your entire life turned around and ruined in a fucking instant?" He replied coldly, the tears running down his face. He was feeling remorseful for what he'd said, for making it about him and bitching about his parents. His heart was fighting between being furiously angry at her and also seeing her in a vulnerable spot. She needed help, and he felt like he'd provoked her. It was the absolute last thing she was needing.

"...This is so, so stupid..." He muttered to himself, looking up at her and starting to plead with his eyes. "...For Christ's sake, Ana. You're not alone! Please, you're scaring me.. Just tell me how I can help you." He reached out, as if to touch her arm. It was so subconscious that he hadn't even noticed it himself, but it was still slow as if he was about to touch a flickering flame.