Out of Darkness

Tori and Alex had been going strong for three weeks, and slowly she began spending most of her time at his side. Brandon wasn’t very happy that nearly every waking moment of her life was now spent with the blonde bassist, but at the same time he understood. Twelve years of being the family’s broken little girl, and now she has found someone who sees her for what she is: a woman.

He tried to hide how disgusted he was when Alex’s hand would rest on her hip, or inner thigh, or when he would talk about wanting to “rail that body”. He loved his friend to death, but he wasn’t very happy about their relationship anymore. He couldn’t tell if he was jealous that his sister was spending so much time with someone else, or if he was still in his over protective brother mode, or if he was actually sensing some danger to her.

Alex was a very sweet hearted, kind-by-nature kind of boy, but he was also a very horny drunk, and he liked to drink. A lot.

“You have no idea how pretty you are.” Alex smirked as he and Tori sat together under a tree in the part with a book. It was printed in brail, but she was reading it to him.

“You’re not listening to the story.” She giggled as he kissed her neck lightly.

“Sure I am, Alice fell down the rabbit hole, right?”

“Three chapters ago!”

“She’s chasing the white rabbit?”

“Alex!” she laughed, closing the book and resting her head on his shoulder as he held her and Achilles slept with his head in her lap. He just laughed and pulled her closer, letting her book fall into the dirt.

With a quick gasp she started feeling around for it until it was safely returned to her hands, quickly brushing the dirt from its cover and pages. “You okay?” he asked, watching her with an odd stare as she tended to her book, “I don’t think it got hurt; it’s just a book, and it only fell a few inches into some dirt.”

“This was a gift, though! When I could see, I would read Alice In Wonderland ten thousand times over! I wasn’t able to read it after I lost my sight, and listening to someone else read it to me just wasn’t the same. To have this book in brail, in my hands, with the words now below my fingertips, so that I can read it again? This is very special!”

“Where did you get it?”

“Shinya gave it to me a few months ago. He sent it with his letter.” She smiled, putting the book safely in her bag before snuggling up to him again; “Every month I get a letter from either him, or a member of his band. They got a brail typewriter from Amagawa-sama’s shop, and have been taking turns writing to me so that we can stay in touch.”

“That’s some pretty hardcore dedication to staying in contact.”

“Well we can’t exactly text.” She laughed as her phone began to ring.

“Do you have to answer that?” he groaned as she flipped the phone open. She just frowned and placed her fingers over his mouth to silence him as her father began speaking with her.

“Victoria, where are you?” he demanded sternly, making her sigh.

“I’m in a park. Don’t worry, I’m not alone, Alex is with me.”

“I don’t trust him.”

“Dad don’t do this.” She pleaded; she could hear that he was already half drunk. He had been drinking more and more after getting caught cheating, and was doing everything he could to keep her mother from leaving him. In short it was like a soap opera in her house, which never seemed to end.

“I don’t want you out much longer. Start making your way home.”

“Dad,”

“Victoria, no. Get Home. We have things we have to talk about as a family.”

Tori’s heart sank as she closed the phone and leaned her head on Alex’s shoulder again. “I have to go home.” She explained, making him sigh before standing up and helping her to her feet.

The ride home was silent, and she knew that he wasn’t happy with things, but there wasn’t anything she could do. She wasn’t happy with her situation either. Being honest with herself, she knew that Toshiya, Shinya, Die, Kaoru, and Kyo weren’t happy with it either. Amagawa didn’t like it, they didn’t like it, Alex didn’t like it, and she hated it, but there was nothing that could be done. That was just how her life was.

“I’ll call you later.” She smiled after getting Achilles out of the car.

“Yeah, talk to you later.” He nodded and drove off, leaving her alone in the drive to make her way to this important family talk her father was so demanding to have.

As she walked through the door she heard Brandon’s newest Dir En Grey CD blasting from his bedroom, which wasn’t a good sign to her ears. Her mother put Achilles outside after calling her into the kitchen and sitting her down across from her father. Brandon’s music stopped as he was called down to sit beside her.

“I know that your dad and I have been fighting a lot lately, and you two haven’t really been doing well with it, and we just felt that it would be best that we put all of our cards out on the table.” Their mother began.

“What cards? Dad got busted fucking around, you went off on him, he’s been banging this chick for half a year, but says he loves you more than the world and doesn’t want to lose you. Now you two have been fighting for months, and mom, you want a divorce. What cards aren’t out?” Brandon demanded.

“How did you know about that?!” she snapped.

“Well, you two are constantly screaming at each other. It’s kinda hard to miss.” Tori sighed.

Her father made a comment that set her mother off, and within minutes the two were arguing again. Brandon muttered something along the lines of “fuck this” and went back to his room, and Tori followed soon after, hiding in her bedroom until they were called back down.

“Bottom line is we are going into family counseling.” Her father snapped after the argument ended, began again, and went on for twenty more minutes while Tori and Brandon sat in the room listening.

“Family counseling?” Brandon and Tori repeated.

“Yes. We need to come together as a family again.” Their mother nodded.

“No problem! You two let me know how that goes for you; I already know what’s wrong with this family.” Tori frowned.

“Yeah, same here. You two need MARRIAGE counseling.” Brandon agreed.

“And the problems between you two?” she demanded.

“Are resolved.” They answered together.

“Years of fighting, and suddenly it’s all better?” Their father scoffed.

“Oh hell no! We still fight, but we talk and always have. You just only see us fighting, because that’s all you think about. He’s even been teaching me to play guitar.” Tori explained.

“I thought you didn’t want to play guitar?”

“No, I wanted to play but YOU said no. YOU said I wanted the piano because it was more feminine. I love the guitar! I wanted to play drums, and guitar, and you said I should play piano and that is what I got.” She snapped.

“Don’t speak to me that way!”

She just sighed and rolled her eyes behind her glasses and waited out the arguments between her family members until she was dismissed for bed.

While Tori was being lectured about the Death family going to counseling, Dir En Grey was trying to finish their recordings in the studio, but having rare difficulties.

“What is bothering you? This is the fifth time you have been off tempo, Shinya!” Kaoru demanded as they took a break from trying to record. All they needed to finish that song was his drumming track, and he just couldn’t keep with it.

“Its fine. I’m just having an off day.” He answered, adjusting his jacket as they stood outside for some air. Though summer was coming and they had been having several warm days, today was oddly chilled, and had a threat of rain that they all could smell.

“It’s Tori-san, isn’t it?”

“No.”

“Then it’s the boy.”

“Kaoru, it’s fine, there is nothing for you to be concerned with.”

“Shinya, we tried to tell you that this would happen. You and I both know that she is a beautiful woman, inside and out, and women like that are not easily found; men everywhere search for women like her. Someone was sure to ask her if you didn’t act.”

“That doesn’t make it any easier! This is more than a ‘little crush’ as Die has grown so fond of calling it! I love her!”

“Love is a strong thing, and easily confused with lust.” Kaoru warned seriously.

“I haven’t thought of having her in bed with me. When I think of her, that hardly crosses my mind! What I think of is her smile, and the sound of her laughter. The way her eyebrows jump above the lenses of her dark glasses when she is surprised by something, and the way she seems to adore any living creature. When Miyu is around her she is in her arms more than she is mine!”

Kaoru couldn’t keep himself from chuckling as Shinya lost himself in his thoughts of her, continuing to ramble without realizing until he heard his friend’s deep laughter, and silenced himself mid-sentence, blushing and looking away quickly.

“So you have fallen for the blind girl,” he nodded.

“And she is in love with someone else. She wouldn’t have returned my feelings, I don’t know why I am so hurt.”

“Because you wanted, and want desperately, to be the one to have her, and because she is with another man, it is breaking your heart. Many men feel this pain; we have all felt it, Shinya.”

“And did it hurt you this much?”

“They say that the first wound is always the deepest.”

“It has been weeks, should the pain have become less by now?”

“When a man is stabbed, does the wound heal in a few weeks? Shinya, if you truly are in love with her, you will never fully heal. All you can do is focus on other things until you are able to live without dwelling on it. I still think of my first love from time to time, but her memory does not control my life.

“May I suggest you try drumming on tempo to get your mind off of her?”

“I honestly don’t want my mind off of her.”

Kaoru sighed and turned for the door, “You are lovesick, Shinya.” He teased while holding it open for his friend to join him inside before they both got soaked.

After another four hours they finally had the track they needed, and went home. They would be back in the studio next week to work out kinks in the other songs, and record a few demos, but he was happy to have this time to just relax and think.

As the rain fell outside his bedroom window, all he could do was lie awake with Miyu curled up on his stomach and stare at the ceiling, listening. She said that she loved rain, he wondered if she was listening to it fall outside her window as well. He thought of the times they had spent together, and the drawer in his desk where he kept every letter that she sent him. A small stack of black envelopes had begun to form there, each one holding a small part of her that he held onto. He would never wish unhappiness on her, but a small and guilty part of him hoped that Alex would hurt her. The small part of him wanted her to leave him, so that he could ask her to that dinner that Kaoru suggested, or to walk their dogs together, as Kyo came up with for a date. He had been joking, but that turned out to be the best suggestion of the evening.

With a pained sigh he closed his eyes and ran his hand over Miyu’s fur, trying to get some sleep but only dreaming of the blind woman that held his heart in her unknowing hands.