Blood Red Ties

Why? He’d managed to shove the memory to the back of his mind for a while now, but it was creeping up to the surface of his mind, and he didn’t know what to do. He didn’t know what to say, either. Instead Roch just sat there on the edge of his bed, his guitar having dissipated half an hour ago, his head held in his hands.

He hadn’t thought of that day in years. It was probably because of the dream--the dream that Xiu had seen, even though it was the one thing he hadn’t--no, he thought. There were lots of things he didn’t want Xiu seeing. He’d been stupid, leaving a sort of open ended invitation to the dream walker. He’d been stupid a lot when it came to the dream walker. He realized it. He wasn’t stupid--or, at least he wasn’t stupid about being stupid. He fully realized when he was being stupid--

Dude, now he was trying to distract himself with present stupidity to ignore past stupidity. That--that was stupid. He snorted, leaning back in his bed and reaching down absently as Clef climbed into his lap. His fingers slid through silky fur, scratching behind the ear of the ball chewing pet, but his mind was going back.

*Almost eight years ago*

He couldn’t sleep in the dark. It was embarrassing, and hard to even admit, so the boil spent his nights curled up in the corner of his room, legs hugged to his chest, waiting for the dawn to come. Sometimes he would fall asleep, only to wake up with silent tears falling down his cheeks, an unspoken scream making his throat sore.

His newly summoned guitar sat on the floor in front of him, glowing faintly. He hadn’t tried playing it yet. Sure, it looked like a guitar, but it wasn’t. It was something dangerous, something he had hacked through a well with, one tumbling rock at a time. Roch was a little scared of it. But it was what had saved him. He didn’t really... y’know, know what to think of it. He just stared at it, hesitantly poking it with a finger. It was beautiful, though. He couldn’t help but want to play it, even if it did scare him.

The door swung open, then closed, followed by the clomping footsteps of his old man. Roch quickly grabbed his guitar, looking for somewhere to hide it. The footsteps were getting closer, so he jumped into his bed, burrowing under the covers, hoping against hope that his dad would find him--but hoping at the same time that he wouldn’t.

“You asleep, kid?” Austin asked softly from the door.

Roch wanted to reply. He forced his mouth to open, but the words wouldn’t come. After a moment of him trying to form the word “yes” his father was already closing the door, walking away. At that moment, Roch had felt the most abandoned he had ever felt, even moreso than when his mother had walked out the door.

He slipped out from under the sheets, fingers wrapped around his guitar, creeping as silently as he could down the hall to where his father was sitting in the Cray-Zee-boy in the middle of the room. “Yeah,” his father said, speaking to someone on the phone. “Jackdammit--yeah. I don’t know. It’s got more of an edge than mine. No, I haven’t seen it. I’ve got people watching. Yeah, dammit, you owe me, you rat b*****d.”

Roch didn’t know what his dad was talking about, but he knew he wasn’t talking to him. He was talking to someone he didn’t even seem to like! The boil turned, slipping down the hall and out the front door. He didn’t even want to try sleeping anymore.

His hand tightened on the neck of his guitar, dragging it along behind him. It drew sparks from the concrete, which he actually enjoyed. In fact, he turned, walking backwards and watching the sparks fly with a little grin. He bumped into something, glancing up worriedly. There was a massive man standing behind him, smoking a cigar.

“That ain’t no way to treat your reaper weapon, son,” the man said. Roch pulled away from him, frowning slightly. The old guy was scary looking. That was strange, actually, since one of his best friends was a werewolf, and he was usually surrounded by monsters and undead, but--

“You’re ruining the edge, too,” the old man said, crouching down next to the guitar. “Fine lookin’ weapon you got there, though. It says a lot about a reaper, their weapon,” he said. “Not many musical type reapers around. What’s your name, boil?”

“Roch,” Roch said.

“Short for... let me guess, Rochester?” the old man asked, a little twitch pulling at his lips. “You need to learn to sharpen this, boil, or you’ll have a dull weapon. Dull weapon means dull mind.”

“Dull mind,” Roch repeated. “You callin’ me an idiot?”

“Not if you got a sharp weapon,” the man said. “Come with me, boil, I’ll show you how to sharpen it.”

“Yeah? Why should I trust you?”

“Cynical little b*****d, aren’t you? Look, we’re going to a friend of yours, he’ll be there the entire time.”

“Fang?”

“No.”

“Bones?”

“No.”

“Who?”

“Steel,” the old man said.

“The crazy guy that lives in that weird basement place?”

“He’s a weapon smith,” the man said. “He works for those lazy bastards that don’t fix their own weapons. But even they need to learn how to sharpen their own blades.”

“So... I gotta sharpen it?” Roch asked, picking up the guitar to keep it from dragging.

“Yeah, and I’m going to show you how.”

“Why?”

“Call it... Reaper family obligations.”
-

“Reaper family obligations,” Roch said with a snort now, running a hand over his face. “For your grandson. What an a**,” he complained as he stood, heading for the bathroom. “I can’t believe I looked up to that guy for a second.”

It’d been more than a second, his mind whispered. He’d actually been inspired by that jackass, to the point he could summon his FEAR properly. So the guy was badass. Even moreso now that Roch was remembering how well he’d taught him how to sharpen his guitar, not to mention stop being afraid of it. Idly Roch summoned the guitar in question, flicking his thumb over the edge and groaning. It needed sharpened again.

It all had to do with his mind, Vegas had explained when he was a kid. Since his guitar was an embodiment of his FEAR, it was directly affected by his mental state. He wasn’t sure he fully bought it, but it made enough sense for him to go with. He did know the process of sharpening the guitar was a b***h and a half, and anything less than complete focus could get him seriously messed up. So he guessed taking care of it did sharpen his mind.

There was a smithy off the side of the dorm, right? He stood, letting his guitar disappear for a moment as he headed out his room. He felt the need to sharpen his edge. Then after he did that, he thought, remembering the traces of blonde in the old man’s hair, he would dye his jackin’ hair blood red.

Because now, every time he saw his face in a mirror, he didn’t just see his dad’s face looking back, he saw that jackin’ old man’s face as well.

Word count: 1,229+