Call the Ships to Port

📅 February 2018

[ᴛᴡ ғᴏʀ ɢʀᴀᴘʜɪᴄ sᴜɪᴄɪᴅᴀʟ / sᴇʟғ-ɪɴᴊᴜʀɪᴏᴜs ɪᴅᴇᴀᴛɪᴏɴ, ᴡᴀʀᴘᴇᴅ ᴛʜɪɴᴋɪɴɢ, ᴍᴇɴᴛɪᴏɴ ᴏғ ᴅʀᴜɢ ᴜsᴇ + ᴏғ sᴇx ᴀs sᴇʟғ ʜᴀʀᴍ]

Honestly, stuff was fucked up. It couldn’t not be, after all: Their social circle had gotten splintered apart so thoroughly in October that even everyone who remained couldn’t say “Well, we’re all in the same boat,” because no, they’d all been catastrophically fucking shipwrecked and stayed afloat only by clinging to debris or half-sunk life-rafts. 
So there was drift. How Anarchy worded it. ‘Drift.’ Kato sat moodily at the bar and turned the word over in his head. Sure. They all drift off and leave me to fucking drown, he thought.

“Everyone just needs to lick their wounds and cope, K,” Anarchy had tried to appease him one night when they’d still been “together” in whatever fashion; he’d taken Kato’s hands in his; kept his voice gentle enough to soothe the abandonment that had ached in Kato’s chest, that burned beneath the skin on his forearms and begged him to open them up.
But that had been then and this was now, and there was more distance than ever because Kato had severed that “togetherness” with Anarchy as stupidly fucking brilliantly as he ever did, and so he had no one to take his hands; to look him in the eye and say, “I know it feels like it, but I guarantee no one is trying to hurt you right now. They’re just dealing with the stress in their own ways.”

The words had meant something when they were said closer, when they were louder and more immediate, when they were accompanied by someone right beside him who had waited and never left. As a bittersweet memory they held no weight and Kato cast them all aside in favour of throwing back another shot.
The fact fucking was that his friends were goddamn gone. Athena had moved out and clearly didn't care what happened to him, Seth was focused on doing his best to take himself out of the picture and Aetos was busy with that—not that Kato and Aetos were close, anyway, the kid probably thought he was too un-savable to be worth the effort— and Anarchy had fucked up and fallen in love so Kato had to keep him at an arm’s length to prevent him from hurting himself. Nightshrike was dead to him and everyone else was in their own fucking boat doing their own fucking things. 

The idea of talking to Fawkes again with any real degree of closeness was laughable, and Anjali was obviously more Anarchy’s friend than his own. Jazz was no-one to him and he was no-one to her; Nick seemed suddenly awkward about facilitating further nosedives and that was about all that they did together anyway. Regardless, none of them really knew the crux of it; the despicable truth about his core nature that had come to his realization in 2011 and now seemed to haunt him at a constant. Not that he could come out and talk about it and get it off his chest. Because who the hell could he expect to treat him fucking normally after hearing that, anyway? 
Well, ‘Key...but that was gone, over. 
Anyone else would be glad to be rid of him and his bullshit. Especially now, it seemed.
Kato ordered another shot.

Everyone had cared back in November. Everyone had been around back in November. It didn’t matter how he was even acting toward anyone, if he was stiff-arming them or not, they’d all cared and tried when he was a fucking obvious danger to himself, railing coke like it kept him breathing and not eating and slashing his wrists up every couple days. 
And now? It was like he didn’t exist if he was just normal; just normal and fucking worthless and invisible until he forced them all to look at him. They didn’t even all see one another often enough now to notice if he’d slashed his arms up, or his neck, which he hadn’t tried but was considering: Why not? Follow Seth’s fucking example.

He wanted to scream, or throw something, anything to be fucking looked at but no one in the bar was one of the people so blatantly fucking ignoring him. He seethed silently in his barstool instead of trashing the place and bitterly pondered his options. He could just fucking overdose. Probably wouldn’t kill him, and if he had to go to the hospital then Anarchy would have to tell everyone it happened. They’d have to know, have to give a shit at least as long as it took them to read the message. Maybe he could just do something blatantly crazy; swallow glass, or Drano, or stab himself. They’d have to care, then. They’d have to see if he was okay. 
He stared down at the bar counter and wanted to be sick. Why couldn’t he matter to anyone without pulling a stunt like that? Why was he always slipping back to being nothing?

“So, what brings you to this bar for your mental breakdown tonight?” A familiar voice asked from beside him. Storm had slipped into the adjacent barstool at some point without him noticing and cast him a tired smile. “I come here often, so I know you don’t.”
“Who says I’m having a mental breakdown?” Kato asked, scowling when his voice came out too dry, too close to a croak. He cleared his throat. “Why do you come here often?”
“One, I say you’re having a mental breakdown. No proof, but it makes me feel better about myself. Two, because I know someone who works here and I like to hurt myself with my own expectations. Why don’t you come here often? It’s close to your place.”
Kato raised an eyebrow. “Hurt yourself with your own expectations of people…? Fuck, hah, that’s real shit. Fuckin’ cheers.” He threw back his tequila; Storm tipped their cocktail towards him, then drained a good third of it. He eyed them. “...I don’t come here because it’s close to my place,” he explained. “Don’t wanna accidentally hook up with some motherfucker I might see in the elevator if I can help it. Also it’s not a gay bar and I don’t wanna get beat to death unless it’s on my own terms. Plus, the name ‘The Golden Liquid’ makes me think of piss and I’m only into that if you pay me to be.” 
Storm snorted into their drink. “Mm, fair, fair,” they said; “So why are you here tonight, then?”
Kato made a 'tch' noise behind his teeth and stared at his silent phone, laying on the bar counter beside his empty shot glass. 
“I dunno. Fucking moping,” he sighed, knowing how pathetic the whole thing would seem if said aloud, “I have this unfortunate habit of over-inflating my importance in people's lives and then getting decked by reality.” He half-expected Storm to scoff pityingly at him at the end of his sentence, but they didn't; instead they took another gulp of their drink and tapped their fingers against the glass.
"Been there. Let me finish this, then we can get out of here, yeah?"

Kato stared at them. “Uh. ‘Get out of here?’ I don’t...I don’t think that’s a great idea, I mean, ‘Key is home, and isn’t Athena? If that’s...you know,” he said awkwardly. Storm rolled their eyes as they finished their drink. 
“Yeah, ‘get out of here.’ As in, we could find your sulky ass some fresh air and new scenery. I'm not trying to fuck you. I don’t hate myself that much. Now c'mon." They stood up and offered the bartender their credit card, then glanced over their shoulder and gave Kato a pointed eyebrow-raise that clearly said "Well?"
Kato checked his phone one last time, only to sigh at the emptiness of his notification center. "...Yeah, alright. Let's go."

They wandered to a small city park a short distance from the bar rather than heading back to the apartment complex. They both seemed rather caught up in their own heads, but Kato felt aware of how obvious his agitation was. He checked his phone incessantly, resisting the urge to double-text anyone, hating his friends for not knowing instinctively how much pain he was in. He rubbed the back of his head too vigorously, too often, and Storm glanced over and raised an eyebrow when he finally got fed up with his own internal bullshit and gave himself a few swift hits to the leg.
He sat down on the curb beside them at the park and tried to keep himself in check as they smoked together, but they offered him another glance, a knowing one, and the familiarity seared like fire. With everything going on inside him that night, the last thing he wanted to feel was burned, and a choked, bitter, tearful sound escaped his clenched teeth. He knew better than to hope Storm hadn't heard it, and sure enough, they raised their eyebrows again.
"What's up?" they asked, turning to face him more fully.
"I just—I don't understand why it's so goddamn hard for people to treat me like I fucking exist!" he snapped in response, "Why do I have to fucking—jump through hoops or do tricks like a fucking dog?! I just..." Kato shook his head frustratedly and gestured at his phone, laying on the asphalt next to his boot. "I find people who seem like they—they might fuckin' see me, or hear me, without me having to yell my head off or gut myself—but it always ends! I always end up see-through again!" He felt tears burning his eyes and hated himself for it; hated losing his composure so totally in front of someone he’d only just met a month or so ago, who barely even knew him—but he just couldn't seem to reign his heart back in. He hunched forward and wrapped his arms around his knees to keep himself from impulsively slamming his palms against the concrete, or his fists against his thighs. 
"Maybe I talk too much, Storm," he said, "Maybe that's what it is. I talk so much that now it's too fucking exhausting to acknowledge anything I fucking say."

Storm was looking at him with something that flirted with sympathy but read just on the side of apprehensive—like maybe by now they’d figured out he was an emotional landmine and they ought to tread carefully. He put his forehead to his knees and pretended he wasn't crying. Or having a total meltdown.
"...Yeah, you talk too much," they finally said, "But you don't have to scream yourself hoarse for me to hear you. I walked over to you tonight: You're not invisible."
"Yeah, not yet," Kato said, hating how petulant he sounded, "But just wait. You'll get tired of sitting smoking on the curb with an emotional deadweight eventually."
"Most likely, if you keep the whining up. But how about I'm here for you until then, though, and we don't worry about it?"

Kato let their words sink in, and found them comforting in some strange way. Despite how desperate he was for someone to cling to, he knew his own vice-grip tended to shatter any promised permanence anyway, so the lack of it paradoxically seemed more stable than its presence would have. He knew he could trust an absence of something. Eventually he managed to sit up, and swiped the back of his hand over his eyes. 
"Yeah. Okay. That sounds...That sounds good."
They gave him a shoulder-nudge that reminded him of Athena. "See? There ya go."
“...Why do you try so hard with me, Storm?” he asked after a couple minutes passed in silence, echoing their very first conversation. “Like...you could just go home.”
They looked quietly out over the nearly-still park; the only movement a lone plastic bag scooting around the basketball court in the breeze.
“...I could. But I know what it’s like to feel alone. So.” They offered him another cigarette. He took it.