Awake (Pokémon: Jesse/James)

[eeveee]

I know that you're awake - you weren't squeezing my hand like that when you were sleeping. That, and you breathed like a normal sleeping person when you actually were. And I saw you open your eyes. It's no use pretending you're not awake, because I know that you are, you know that I know, and it's too late now, anyway.



Too late to leave, too late to pretend that nothing happened, too late to turn back.



I stare into the ceiling.



I slept with my brother last night.



Technically not, but that was the closest word I had when we were eight, and I've always thought of you like that since – or at the very least, something equally close. And this does feel strange. I won't even try to imagine what it must be like for you – I mean, you're... well, you. You're just to go around sleeping with others. Though I suppose all of us are, at core, you never struck me as – never seemed to be interested in – and I just couldn't imagine you doing -



You were drunk, of course, which for years was just another thing I never imagined you being. That might have been the answer, and even then you were afraid. It was weird; I'll never know what possessed me to do it. Is it an excuse that I was drunk, too? People do all sorts of things when they are drunk. They do... they...



Nobody sleeps with their brother when they're drunk. It's just gross; and this doesn't feel gross. Even if you were my brother, which you aren't, but I always thought of you as that and when I do, you are, I mean -



Confusing myself isn't going to help anything, and you are not my brother.



But shouldn't it feel gross, still?



Maybe it shouldn't.



I couldn't left. I've been awake for a long time. And if I did leave, there would be not problem. Maybe you would tell yourself it was a dream. Maybe you wouldn't even remember; you certainly wouldn't be mentioning it to me, either way. Maybe you wouldn't want to mention it. But if I left, it wouldn't have happened. We would have drunken cheap whisky and been tipsy and laughed over that dumb movie, and then we would have gone to our separate rooms and I would never have woken up in this bed. If this is what success actually leads to, I'm not sure it's worth it. It's confusing me too much.



It's your fault, of course. One of us will have to take the blame, and that sure as hell isn't going to be me. You weren't as drunk as I was, so you could have stopped me. When I jumped on you, although you did struggle for a bit. But the point is, you gave in. You gave in when you shouldn't have done it, and it ended with this. You're the man. The man is the one seducing the woman, always, in all the trashy novels we read, in all the movies we always cry at. Even if the woman might be the one practically tearing his clothes of. Maybe I can understand you, at that – but still: I won't take any responsibility for this, and you know it.



And now you're awake, and I am awake, and we can't pretend that last night wasn't anything out of the usual. We can't stay like this forever. One of us is going to have to speak sooner or later. That, or Meowth comes in, which he will soon enough if you don't go out there and make him breakfast.
I was going to leave. Really. But my head hurts and I thought I was going to be sick, and I didn't start to think clearly before I suddenly was staring into your eyes, and it was all too late. And now I can't do anything but look away from you and pretend I didn't see what we both knew I saw.
Do you know how strange it is to see you asleep? It makes so much of you go away, and leaves only the core. When the masks you wear during the day are gone, the sweet and vulnerable part of your soul is the only part that is left. I wonder if I'm the same, and somehow, I doubt it.



I don't know what time it is, but it has to be early if Meowth is still asleep. I want to slumber off again, but I don't dare, because even if I do, you won't, and I know that you are going to be looking at me, and think about me. You probably already are. Not that you're looking, but thinking. What else? How could you possibly be thinking about anything else after this?



So I'm still lying here, in your bed, staring into the ceiling of your room as you are clutching my hand like it's the only thing keeping you alive and trying to pretend that you are still sleeping as peacefully as you were minutes ago.



Jesse?



Drat. You're talking, and I can't pretend any more.



What?



I’m not going to take the blame for this.



Do you care about me?



What kind of question is that?!



Would I stick up to you all the time if I didn’t?



Please don’t take this any further. Please. I can’t go there. Not now.



I didn’t mean it that way.



No such luck.



Why do you bother?



Don’t look so hurt. Don't you know what it does to me? How it makes something inside of me jerk in discomfort, or pain, or – and why?



Because I care about you.



Where did that come from?! Please, for God's sake, don’t say anything, I don't want to hear it.



And it's not going to be the same.



Like I don’t know. Can we please talk about something else? Like if this will get us problems, or what to tell Meowth, or how this was your fault, or…



And you are kissing me.



That shuts my mind up. Because nobody ever kissed me that way. It's not like the kisses from last night, the ones I forced on you, the ones you later accepted, the ones you returned to me at last. It's almost as though we're not kissing at all, because your lips are barely touching mine, and the only other part of our bodies touching are our hands, and I feel like crying for some reason. Maybe, it is because I realized that I want you to kiss me.



And please, don't tell me that you are crying. I open my eyes again, and you're looking at me as if there you were just told that the only thing you ever wanted can never be yours. Do I really that much to you?



Are you really sure you don’t care about me?



Please, James…



I do love you, Jesse. Even if this weren’t the way I’d want you to know.



Damn it, but for all the things you weren't supposed to say, not ever, and especially not now! Well thank you so much, Mister “I can't keep my stupid feelings for myself even when that's for the best for all”. What do you expect me to say? And what could I possibly say to that?



What do you think Meowth will say?



Why didn’t you answer my question?



Do you have to?! That -



That's it. This is too stupid. You are too stupid. These aren't things we talk about!



I want to scream it at you, but Meowth will hear. So I glare instead.



And you cry.



Do you have to look that way when you are crying? Don’t you know that it makes me want to cry myself because I can do these things to you?



You let go of my hand then, as you are turning away, for some ridiculous reason trying to hide your tears from me. What is the use? You know that I know that you are crying anyway. So why do this? Why are you lying down again like that, pulling up you sheets so cold air slips in against the bare skin of my back and hiding your face under it?



I didn’t mean it! Don’t you know that I didn’t mean it?



You're such an idiot. The fact that you are pressing your nose into that pillow isn’t keeping me from knowing how weak you are.



So why does it make me touch your like that? Why does it make me tell you not to cry? Why does it make me unable of being who I always am around you?



Why does it make me kiss you?



I don’t know that. I don’t know anything, it seems, today. All I know is that when I kiss you it makes you stop crying, and that somehow we end up with arms and legs tangled, and you are with me again, and I don’t care about knowing at all, because I suddenly realize that I need this closeness, that I need you to touch me like that, that I need to feel your kisses which are not at all like mine were…



And I forget it all. The bed, the room, the confusion, the anxiousness, it all fades away and leaves only you and me and this, and I don’t care, I don’t want to care, because all of sudden all that matters are you, and what you are doing to my me, to my body, my mind, my soul, my very existence.
And I when it is over I am falling again, landing softly in the bed, in your arms, pressing my body close to yours, and I think I’m crying. I didn’t know for sure, but I think that I am. I don’t want it to be gone. I want to stay this way forever, when my eyes are closed and you don’t speak and make me think about things I don’t want to think about, and when all the world can go to hell for what I care, because you're here.



And I don’t know what makes me feel that way, but something does, and this something is scaring me. I’m not supposed to be like this. I am supposed to walk out of here like I did with everybody else, leaving you alone and not give a damn about what you feel, but I don’t, I can’t make myself do it.



I am loosing control.



It is that simple. I can’t control myself any longer; I can’t resist the temptation of staying here, in this safe bubble of the world that is you and me and the blankets of your bed. I am pushing reality away, I don’t ever want it to come back, not as long as you are holding me like this…



Meowth comes in. Of course he does. He bursts through the door and wants to know if you are going to sleep for long, because he wants his breakfast, and then he yells, and I tell him to get the hell out, and when he at last is gone I look back at you, and I know that it is broken, that what was is gone now, and you are only you again, looking scared and sad and fragile at me, and I turn away from you, move too fast for your arms to slip around me again as I step out from the warmth under the sheets and out into the cold draft from the window.



I can almost hear you crying when I do, but I ignore it. I’m me again, and I can do this to you, because… because, I think, Meowth knows. When Meowth knows this isn’t just something between you and me any more, a dream too good to be true. It is something that happened for real, something we have to face, and live with, and be able to explain to the rest of the world.



And it was your fault.

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Fun Fact: What inspired this was the story of a classmate in middle school who got smashed on a party and spent the night making out with her brother. I'd also like to note I wrote this at sixteen. I went over it and got rid of the worst cliches before posting it here, but the age, it shows.