skaterbrain | ☆18 [voice

The house was too quiet. He woke up after the craziness of the past two weeks wanting to reconnect with his sister, but when he'd gone looking the house was too quiet. There was the chicken still, sure, but otherwise the usual sounds were missing. Beat had never been a very observant person, but it was hard to miss silence. He searched the house room by room, went to All Passions, checked the school, then came back to the house and stared at the vacant room. There were drawings, a letter, a personal item or two and a familiar necklace.

It only meant one thing.

After he finished screaming and punching holes in walls that would inevitably fix themselves, Beat found himself sitting in the middle of a trashed living room, looking at raw knuckles and realized other people needed to know. Someone had to remember her in case he ever disappeared.

Someone had to know she existed.

[Audio]
Rhyme's gone.

...She-- She's gone.

All Passions's closed 'til...I dunno. Sometime.

Rainbow kid, it's jus' you an' me now.

... [He tightens bruised fists around a bell charm and it rings dully.]

Beat out.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Yes, thank you for the reminder.

Not everyone starts off on the right foot, you realize. As I recall, you and Neku weren't the best of buddies to begin with, either. Perhaps you simply need more practice dealing with those you have a negative opinion of. [ And not in a way that involves bruising their cheeks! ]

[Goddammit, he knew that was the wrong thing to say. Beat grits his teeth over the microphone, biting his tongue.]

Yeah, but I ain't Phones. He's better'n me at forgivin' stuff and I dunno how I'm supposed to practice negative opinions. You might've noticed but I don't have the best temper.

...I ain't really sorry for punchin' you though. So I can't say I'm sorry 'cause I don't wanna lie.

There's something to be said for honesty. [ Even if it does leave Joshua still wanting one good whack at Beat in return, petty as it may be. ]

You can try interacting with said people without making attempts to punch them, for one. Work a little on that temper of yours.

[Sadly, Beat would be up for a grudgematch if only because punching people gave him a distraction. He sighs and shrugs.]

She used t'say that, too. Look, since it's just you an' me now, I'll work on it. But I ain't making no promises.

Well, I suppose it's the best I can really ask for, isn't it?

[ There's a pause, then, ]

Have you thought about what you're going to do with the house?

...I dunno. I mean, leavin' here don't seem right, but stayin' here's kinda hard, too.

...Ribbons left her stuff here an' there's some stuff from Shiki n' Phones, too. Do I gotta leave though? I mean, it's jus' me, so it's kinda weird livin' in a house.

I've been living alone in a house for longer than you've been here. If there's an angry mob demanding the real estate, I've never heard from it.

[ Then again Joshua's house does have one of the bedrooms ripped open to make for a more open downstairs and murals on three of the four outside walls, so it's possible that his just has terrible property value or something. ]

It's all in what you make of your own lifestyle, really. They may come back or they may not, so at this point anything they left behind is yours.

Yeah, but I seen yo' house.

[No offense, Josh, but not a lot of people want to live in a canvas - even if Beat thinks (secretly) it's kind of cool.]

No, s'their stuff. Even if they don't come back, it's their stuff.

[Because as long as it's theirs, then there's a chance they'll come back to claim it. A slim, almost non-existent chance, but a chance nonetheless.]

...Donchu want them to come back?

[ Selfishly, yes. But only as long as he's here, and only as a connection to back home. ]

No. This isn't where any of us are meant to be. Wanting them to come back would mean once again pulling them out of the worlds they belong in.

[ Clearly painting on his house was Joshua's equivalent of licking a cookie and saying "it's mine, no one else can eat it now". ]

Why? Do you?

[Such maturity, Josh. What if Beat licked you. 8( ...not that he would.]

I dunno. I wanna say no? But it sucks. I can't do nothin' to help 'em stuck here, but even if I don't like you, I ain't gonna leave you here neither. No one deserves gettin' left behind.

[ He'd take licking over punching, certainly. ]

You say that as if we have a choice in the matter. If we did, I would have been gone long ago.

[ He had a ride back home and everything. ]

[Does he really want Beat to lick him....]

Hey, if I can survive gettin' blinked out, then we can at least try to do somethin' here, right?

[ If it would guarantee no more punches for the rest of forever. ]

That's a false equivalence. Your erasure is a problem limited only to yourself. Drawing people out of their worlds is a much larger issue.

☆18 [voice | action]

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