![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
juushikaGhost and Aaron: Master List | Next Update
Words cannot even express how happy I am with this update. But first:
Let us speak of writing for a moment.
I caved and started scribbling down the many bits of Ghost & Aaron story which have been filling my head—because I was afraid of losing them, because I was afraid of being overwhelmed by them, because it seemed inevitable. And behold, a few days later I'm up to just over 10,000 words. These scenes stretch from pre-game events through their relationship now—and depending on how Plot plays out, I think there's scenes brewing for the future too.
I mentioned before how different Ghost and Aaron are from any other characters I've dealt with: they are remarkably real. This has only increased as I write them. It's not creation so much as discovery. With a little bit of time and thought, whatever I look for I can find, whatever I find I can record. I've never had story flow so smoothly, even when writing fanfic. The boys are writing themselves, and I'm enjoying being a part of it, because I find them fascinating and because, however biased this opinion may be, there's some good stuff there.
Knowing I have a few Ghost and Aaron fans reading, and as it seems silly to let story languish unread, I'll probably start posting a random scene with my G&A updates. I've written and may post explicit sex scenes; most of the snippets make reference to or directly concern the fact that the boys are cousins. If either goes against your taste, I suggest you skip the written bits. If you're![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
vaga42bond, you can break out the horrified emoticons any time now. And of course there's no obligation to read. This is all for my own entertainment. If you do, though? I hope you enjoy. But first: pictures!
Not a shabby start, right?
This may be my favorite ever photo of the boys.
Oh, and they're still gorgeous.
And they're still best friends.
So I switched back to the boys late in the night to find:
Ghost standing, fittingly, at the gates of the cemetery.
(In exercise clothes, god, why must all NPC sims wear exercise clothes?)
And I'd forgotten just how lovely he is.
(I'm playing with higher graphic settings and new skins, so everything looks a teeny bit different.)
And Aaron on his way back home while Cornelius ... went for a drive.
Ghost passes a ghost on the road.
Cornelius went out to the edge of town, got out in the middle of nowhere, and just ... disappeared.
I don't even know what to tell you.
Life continues more or less apace. And they're adorable.
They've stopped barricading themselves in the house—but when ugly rings the doorbell, they still ignore her.
Seriously she is the worst of the townies, mostly because she's supposed to look pretty—and came out EAxis fug. I want to make a really evil sim just so that he or she can invite her over and lock her in a back room to, if slowly, put her out of her misery. And come to think, my town could use more of my own sims ... hm. I shall have to consider it. Anyhow.
Not all is perfect (poor Ghost, he ate it anyway), but it's pretty damn good.
But there's trouble afoot.
The boys have eaten straight through their funds. Neither of them have a job right now, they've just been coasting along on what Ghost saved up from his last bit of work, but now the bills are here and they're 400 short.
Not that they seem to care.
Aaron is back to his old tricks, adding another sink to the treasure trove.
Oh, come on Aaron. The dead guy just wants to play a bit of foosball.
Sadly, it's relief when anything actually works in this house.
Clementine Moreau pays a visit and, after a few minutes of pleasant conversation—yeah, Aaron insults her family.
Ghost is unimpressed but unsurprised.
When Aaron leaves the room, Clementine frets over her humiliation with Ghost and:
Hun, Ghost says, he does that to everyone.
And shortly after, Ghost and Clementine became friends.
Ghost isn't always even-tempered, though.
Sink breaks. Angry Ghost is angry.
(But perhaps not fixing the problem by the most effective means.)
It can be easy to forget—because I love their beat-up house, because Aaron's antics are so amusing—but they do live in something of a shithole and looking after the place is a constant battle for Ghost. Aaron helps with repairs but he doesn't even see the messes—if Ghost wants those cleaned, they're his burden. Combined with Aaron's argumentative, crude personality, it's actually a labor of love to be with him, as a friend or as a boyfriend but especially as a roommate. Ghost has been entirely committed to this relationship since the day Aaron showed up on his doorstep—and as deeply as Aaron loves Ghost, sometimes he takes that for granted.
We'll call this "You're as pretty as a picture."
Rather than "So I was thinking, next time we have sex..."
Just a picture.
It took me a bit to figure out how to get the new skins working for Ghost, but...
Now that I have? I can't stop photoing him.
And then, the next morning: the repo man arrived.
Aaron was watching TV, Ghost was swimming laps, and the guy just let himself in.
He started in the master bath and, yanno, they can spare this tub.
But he continued on to a park bench from the klepto treasure trove—one of the very oldest items.
And there is some shit up with which Aaron will not put.
(Pretend I had the roof up, yah?)
So he immediately went and took out his frustrations on Ghost—and the woman who raised him.
Aaron did some real damage to their relationship that morning.
Each of the boys tried to hug and make up only to be rejected outright. They squabbled, and for once Ghost seemed authentically hurt. Usually, he forgives so easily. Not this time. Instead, they parted on foul terms.
But as Ghost turned his back:
He actually looked a little smug. Aaron, not so much.
So Aaron got dressed and went to do something he's been thinking about for a long time.
(Bigger better, if not necessary.) He started a criminal career. Officially.
I don't think a job will be easy for him—but judging from his expression, it was the right choice.
After that, a quick stop by the cemetery to replace what's been lost. (Bigger better.)
Back at home, the boys discussed Aaron's new job ... vaguely.
Aaron is "moving some goods for some guys." Ghost is looking forward to a steady income.
He's also still in denial about what Aaron does—for a living, for fun, in his free time: he steals shit.
And then they made up for the damage done that morning.
Sex doesn't fix everything—but it helps.
But that's hardly the end of the story.
The events in this update were—incredible. I knew what my user-directed stuff would be (repoman comes, Aaron gets a job) but the park bench? the arguing? the expressions? the fact that as soon as I took him to the cemetery Aaron zeroed in on a new bench? all of that was spontaneous, autonomous, and perfect. I've forgotten, playing Nika's household, that these two have such wonderful chemistry in their relationship, their traits, their plot. I don't even want to know what magic variables create it. I just never, ever want it to go away.
And there's something about Ghost, I think. I've learned from writing him that he's not strictly as passive as he seems—and right now, I think he's playing a tricky game, forcing Aaron to the end of his tether to make the boy do something about it all. And he has. It won't be easy for Aaron, though. He has a grudge against authority figures—and even if he'd never admit it, he's afraid of them, too. I doubt he'll find his job easy, but he definitely has the potential to be damn good at it.
In the world of random, unrelated photos, this time I come bearing pictures of Ghost and Aaron's families. I created their parents in CAS in order to get a grip on how they look (I can't visualize, so this is my best way to see them) and to lock in their personalities. No, I'm not playing them. No, they don't live in town. But I did plop them down in a set piece for some pictures, so you get to meet them all.
Sylvia Richlen, Ghost's mother.
Sylvie's actually a sculptor, but the game only has painting, so...
Not unlike her son, Sylvie is absent-minded and artistic. She sees all the best parts of life as art, and has her hands deep in creative pursuits—and her head in the clouds. She's actually quite personable and well-intended, but she and Ghost are more friends that parent and child, and even then they're not close. Sylvie has never told Ghost anything about his father—not appearance nor name nor the circumstances of Ghost's conception. He's just not in the picture.
Lauren Dar, Aaron's mother.
Jonathan Dar, Aaron's father.
This is how Aaron sees them.
Lauren is brilliant, capable, and cold. Practical and exacting, she holds everyone to a high standard—but no one moreso than her son, who she set out to raise into the best person that he could be (whether he wanted to be or not). Jonathan is powerful, charismatic, and has a short temper. He's a skillful businessman and willing to do anything to get ahead, but he redirects the frustrations which he can't express at work directly into his family life. Most people adore (or at least admire) him, but he works hard to keep it that way. Aaron would say that he can see through his father's bullshit. Together, Jonathan and Lauren are a power couple, both of them smart and driven. They overlook one another's faults (like coldness and infidelity) because they're committed to making the relationship work.
I also played around a bit with genetics, checking to make sure I could recreate Aaron from what I'd put together in Lauren and Jonathan...
Not bad, eh?
But in doing so I also got to see a glimpse of the siblings Aaron never had...
Here's two of them. (These genes tend to work better on men.)
Would having siblings really have changed anything for Aaron? I doubt it. It may may have redirected some of the pressure off him—but I suspect it wouldn't have been much better to be constantly compared to the successes of a brother or sister. But, yes, it was an interesting experiment.
I conclude this massive entry with the first bit of Ghost and Aaron written story—which, fittingly, is one of the longer chunks. Enjoy!
Storybit 01: Aaron on the doorstep.
1700 words
Occurs a two years before the start of gameplay. Aaron is 18, Ghost 20, and they're distant friends.
No romantic or sexual content; some foul language.
* * * * *
After Aaron calls, it takes him only four hours to make the six hour trip to Ghost's house. But Aaron calls at almost ten at night, so he arrives late by any reckoning.
Sylvie, warned, has already gone to bed. Ghost stays up and waits for the sound of the car in the driveway, but as the hours pass he finds he can't concentrate. His thoughts spin out unfocused and untethered and it would be foolish to try to do anything in a mood like this. So he watches TV, latenight shows and the first midnight infomercials, the volume turned way down low, and waits.
Still, when Aaron finally pulls up to the house, Ghost seems as settled and as alert as he ever has, pale-eyed, dark-circled boy that he is. He opens the front door just before Aaron knocks and says, "Hey."
"Thought I wouldn't find the place," Aaron says as Ghost lets him in. In the driveway his car gleams in the moonlight, and Sylvie's wagon parked beside it looks all the older by comparison. "It seemed so fresh in my mind when I called, but when I got to town I remembered just how long it's been since I was here last. God, I don't even know. Years, probably. So that only makes this a little awkward."
Ghost shakes his head as he slides the deadbolt home. "Don't worry about it," he says. His voice is steady, but a whisper; Aaron's wavers with breath and bravado. "You need water or anything?"
Silent in the pauses between his outpours, Aaron just shakes his head. He follows Ghost through the house, down the narrow hallway, into Ghost's room at the far end. Ghost closes the door behind them and folds himself onto his desk chair, one leg propped up that he can rest his chin against it, and lets Aaron take the bed. Aaron sits on the edge, spine straight but limbs heavy with fatigue. They hold their silence for a few moments against the low hum of a dirty beige desk fan cycling lukewarm air, and then Ghost says:
"So can I ask what happened?"
"I don't even know." Aaron looks anywhere but at Ghost. "Registration was today, right? Sending me off alone was my folks's way of saying that I'm a big kid now. All grown up, yeah, just me and all my shit, shoved into a car, driving up the freeway and hoping for the best. Couldn't be bothered to take off work, I don't know. I didn't really mind. I thought I would be fine, I can lug my shit up the dorm stairs myself.
"So driving up the freeway and then I come to the point where it branches off, the Y-turn, you know, right? And I'm thinking, okay, it's exit 13 here on the left, I don't really know the area but I'd driven up before, thought I'd catch it but I just missed my turn. So I went up the road a bit and took the next offramp and then I thought, hell, might as well get food before I started finding my way on backwards. So I got a burger and then after that I sort of felt like there was plenty of time until registration, anytime between noon and four the letter said, so I went driving a bit in the area near the burger joint, a little strip mall and this boring old suburban neighborhood. And all the while I meant to double back around and find the freeway and find my exit and get my ass to the school..."
He trails off, and there's just the sound of the fan. Ghost hugs his raised knee and waits without comment while Aaron scoots back on the bed, swings his legs for a moment, and then clears his throat.
"But I just kept driving. Through this suburban area and then up where it trailed off to backroads, passed an orchard or something, driving towards the sun and listening to music really loud. And when I glanced back down at the dash it was three thirty and I knew there was no way I could make it to registration on time. So I just kept driving. I don't even know where the time went. Stopped at a diner at some point. Got gas and asked at the station how the hell to get back to the freeway. Drove all damn day, probably in circles. Didn't even think about it. Just drove.
"It's not missing registration, you know." Aaron is watching the floor, so he can't see Ghost nod. "It's not like they kick you out of school if you're late to that. It was just the first step down a really long road and I couldn't make myself take it. This—it's—" He coughs, the words tumbled and stuck in his throat, and Ghost unwraps himself and sits back in the chair, chewing his pinky nail.
"If I do this, they own me," Aaron says finally. "They own me for the next four years and they own me through my career and I can't fucking live with it, not now when I'm finally legal and I'm supposed to be free. They're right assholes, you know, and I don't know how to explain it better than that. They can fuck their college and their tuition and their free room and board and they can fuck their rules, too." Aaron's looking up now and his eyes are blue flame, tight and hot. "I won't take their shit anymore."
Ghost holds Aaron's gaze and then slowly, he smiles. "Then I'm proud of you," he says. He tilts his head and smiles straight into Aaron's eyes and suddenly Aaron is throwing back his shoulders, sitting up straighter, grinning like a fool. Aaron closes his eyes and leans his head back and smiles at the ceiling and says, "Yeah, fuck them."
And before he knows it, he's sobbing. His spine shudders and collapses and he digs a hand into his close-cropped black hair, tugging until his knuckles go white. He shakes and gasps in air and mutters a broken litany of, "Fuck, man, I'm sorry. Fuck, I don't know what I'm doing. Fuck," until he's just swearing softly, constantly, like breathing, in between his sobs. It only takes a moment.
Ghost slides from his chair like water, smooth but quick, and not even he can tell if he's surprised. He doesn't pretend he can't see, doesn't pretend it doesn't bother him; he kneels on the floor in front of the bed and wraps his arms around Aaron, hugs him and holds him while he cries. Aaron jumps at his first touch but he doesn't fight it; he leans forward and lets Ghost support him, warm and solid against the shivers that wrack him. Aaron gasps, swallows hard, and begins to calm. Soon Ghost feels it's safe again and releases him, sinking back to his haunches and looking up at Aaron, who remains curled up on himself, his head bowed. It's only been a few minutes.
"You okay, man?" Ghost asks.
"I'm sorry."
But Ghost shakes his head. "No worries. Do you want water now? A beer or something? Do you drink?"
"Water'd be great." Aaron's voice is raw, as if he'd cried for much longer.
Ghost stands, and puts a hand on Aaron's shoulder. Aaron jumps again, a little spasm of fear, but Ghost keeps his hand there for a moment more, squeezes Aaron's shoulder before stepping away. "Can do," he says, and slips out of the room without looking back, slides the door shut behind him. He measures the minutes as he washes a glass and fills it with tap water, trying to give Aaron long enough to pull himself together but not long enough to start feeling awkward about the whole thing. But when he comes back to the room, Aaron's neither composed nor awkward—he's curled up on his side on Ghost's bed, and he's asleep.
Ghost puts the glass down on his dresser, where it can leave another watermark on the pitted wood. Silent on the threadbare carpet, he walks to the bed. Aaron snores softly, and Ghost remembers what it was like to fall asleep after spending days awake in desperate flight from his dreams—the sudden silence of exhaustion. Sinking to his knees again, Ghost takes a close look at Aaron's sleeping face. His color is bad, so pale that his freckles stand out brown, but his skin is smooth over loose muscles. His eyelashes, still tear-soaked, clump dark and thick. Ghost smiles to himself—he hadn't noticed before, so dark are Aaron's lashes, but does now: Aaron wears eyeliner which has smudged with his crying, shadowing his lower lid.
Sitting down on the floor, Ghost leans into the side of the bed and rests his ear against the mattress. Aaron's snores, as gentle as they are, make the bed vibrate. Ghost closes his eyes and thinks that somehow none of this comes a surprise, from what he knew of Aaron's family—and maybe that's why it doesn't feel strange to have his cousin here, crying and sleeping on his bed. He shrugs to himself and doesn't try to recount the hints from Aaron's emails or their last conversation, almost a year ago before Christmas dinner. The whys and wherefores are pointless now; instead, he ought to worry about getting a sheet on the couch because his twin bed is too small for two. Ghost is tired and he doesn't think he'll dream tonight—perhaps like Aaron he can collapse, exhausted and thought-silent.
Careful not to shake the bed, Ghost pushes himself to his feet. Aaron slumbers on undisturbed, even when Ghost presses a fingertip to his hairline, soft as a kiss, even when Ghost drapes a blanket over him. Then Ghost shuffles back out of the room, but he leaves the door ajar behind him. There ought to be at least one spare sheet in the hall closet, he thinks, and wonders if Sylvie will make fried eggs for breakfast. In the dead of night the house is dim and silent but there, quiet as a sigh behind him: Aaron's breathy snore.
Ghost and Aaron: Master List | Next Update
Words cannot even express how happy I am with this update. But first:
Let us speak of writing for a moment.
I caved and started scribbling down the many bits of Ghost & Aaron story which have been filling my head—because I was afraid of losing them, because I was afraid of being overwhelmed by them, because it seemed inevitable. And behold, a few days later I'm up to just over 10,000 words. These scenes stretch from pre-game events through their relationship now—and depending on how Plot plays out, I think there's scenes brewing for the future too.
I mentioned before how different Ghost and Aaron are from any other characters I've dealt with: they are remarkably real. This has only increased as I write them. It's not creation so much as discovery. With a little bit of time and thought, whatever I look for I can find, whatever I find I can record. I've never had story flow so smoothly, even when writing fanfic. The boys are writing themselves, and I'm enjoying being a part of it, because I find them fascinating and because, however biased this opinion may be, there's some good stuff there.
Knowing I have a few Ghost and Aaron fans reading, and as it seems silly to let story languish unread, I'll probably start posting a random scene with my G&A updates. I've written and may post explicit sex scenes; most of the snippets make reference to or directly concern the fact that the boys are cousins. If either goes against your taste, I suggest you skip the written bits. If you're
vaga42bond, you can break out the horrified emoticons any time now. And of course there's no obligation to read. This is all for my own entertainment. If you do, though? I hope you enjoy. But first: pictures!Not a shabby start, right?
This may be my favorite ever photo of the boys.
Oh, and they're still gorgeous.
And they're still best friends.
So I switched back to the boys late in the night to find:
Ghost standing, fittingly, at the gates of the cemetery.
(In exercise clothes, god, why must all NPC sims wear exercise clothes?)
And I'd forgotten just how lovely he is.
(I'm playing with higher graphic settings and new skins, so everything looks a teeny bit different.)
And Aaron on his way back home while Cornelius ... went for a drive.
Ghost passes a ghost on the road.
Cornelius went out to the edge of town, got out in the middle of nowhere, and just ... disappeared.
I don't even know what to tell you.
Life continues more or less apace. And they're adorable.
They've stopped barricading themselves in the house—but when ugly rings the doorbell, they still ignore her.
Seriously she is the worst of the townies, mostly because she's supposed to look pretty—and came out EAxis fug. I want to make a really evil sim just so that he or she can invite her over and lock her in a back room to, if slowly, put her out of her misery. And come to think, my town could use more of my own sims ... hm. I shall have to consider it. Anyhow.
Not all is perfect (poor Ghost, he ate it anyway), but it's pretty damn good.
But there's trouble afoot.
The boys have eaten straight through their funds. Neither of them have a job right now, they've just been coasting along on what Ghost saved up from his last bit of work, but now the bills are here and they're 400 short.
Not that they seem to care.
Aaron is back to his old tricks, adding another sink to the treasure trove.
Oh, come on Aaron. The dead guy just wants to play a bit of foosball.
Sadly, it's relief when anything actually works in this house.
Clementine Moreau pays a visit and, after a few minutes of pleasant conversation—yeah, Aaron insults her family.
Ghost is unimpressed but unsurprised.
When Aaron leaves the room, Clementine frets over her humiliation with Ghost and:
Hun, Ghost says, he does that to everyone.
And shortly after, Ghost and Clementine became friends.
Ghost isn't always even-tempered, though.
Sink breaks. Angry Ghost is angry.
(But perhaps not fixing the problem by the most effective means.)
It can be easy to forget—because I love their beat-up house, because Aaron's antics are so amusing—but they do live in something of a shithole and looking after the place is a constant battle for Ghost. Aaron helps with repairs but he doesn't even see the messes—if Ghost wants those cleaned, they're his burden. Combined with Aaron's argumentative, crude personality, it's actually a labor of love to be with him, as a friend or as a boyfriend but especially as a roommate. Ghost has been entirely committed to this relationship since the day Aaron showed up on his doorstep—and as deeply as Aaron loves Ghost, sometimes he takes that for granted.
We'll call this "You're as pretty as a picture."
Rather than "So I was thinking, next time we have sex..."
Just a picture.
It took me a bit to figure out how to get the new skins working for Ghost, but...
Now that I have? I can't stop photoing him.
And then, the next morning: the repo man arrived.
Aaron was watching TV, Ghost was swimming laps, and the guy just let himself in.
He started in the master bath and, yanno, they can spare this tub.
But he continued on to a park bench from the klepto treasure trove—one of the very oldest items.
And there is some shit up with which Aaron will not put.
(Pretend I had the roof up, yah?)
So he immediately went and took out his frustrations on Ghost—and the woman who raised him.
Aaron did some real damage to their relationship that morning.
Each of the boys tried to hug and make up only to be rejected outright. They squabbled, and for once Ghost seemed authentically hurt. Usually, he forgives so easily. Not this time. Instead, they parted on foul terms.
But as Ghost turned his back:
He actually looked a little smug. Aaron, not so much.
So Aaron got dressed and went to do something he's been thinking about for a long time.
(Bigger better, if not necessary.) He started a criminal career. Officially.
I don't think a job will be easy for him—but judging from his expression, it was the right choice.
After that, a quick stop by the cemetery to replace what's been lost. (Bigger better.)
Back at home, the boys discussed Aaron's new job ... vaguely.
Aaron is "moving some goods for some guys." Ghost is looking forward to a steady income.
He's also still in denial about what Aaron does—for a living, for fun, in his free time: he steals shit.
And then they made up for the damage done that morning.
Sex doesn't fix everything—but it helps.
But that's hardly the end of the story.
The events in this update were—incredible. I knew what my user-directed stuff would be (repoman comes, Aaron gets a job) but the park bench? the arguing? the expressions? the fact that as soon as I took him to the cemetery Aaron zeroed in on a new bench? all of that was spontaneous, autonomous, and perfect. I've forgotten, playing Nika's household, that these two have such wonderful chemistry in their relationship, their traits, their plot. I don't even want to know what magic variables create it. I just never, ever want it to go away.
And there's something about Ghost, I think. I've learned from writing him that he's not strictly as passive as he seems—and right now, I think he's playing a tricky game, forcing Aaron to the end of his tether to make the boy do something about it all. And he has. It won't be easy for Aaron, though. He has a grudge against authority figures—and even if he'd never admit it, he's afraid of them, too. I doubt he'll find his job easy, but he definitely has the potential to be damn good at it.
In the world of random, unrelated photos, this time I come bearing pictures of Ghost and Aaron's families. I created their parents in CAS in order to get a grip on how they look (I can't visualize, so this is my best way to see them) and to lock in their personalities. No, I'm not playing them. No, they don't live in town. But I did plop them down in a set piece for some pictures, so you get to meet them all.
Sylvia Richlen, Ghost's mother.
Sylvie's actually a sculptor, but the game only has painting, so...
Not unlike her son, Sylvie is absent-minded and artistic. She sees all the best parts of life as art, and has her hands deep in creative pursuits—and her head in the clouds. She's actually quite personable and well-intended, but she and Ghost are more friends that parent and child, and even then they're not close. Sylvie has never told Ghost anything about his father—not appearance nor name nor the circumstances of Ghost's conception. He's just not in the picture.
Lauren Dar, Aaron's mother.
Jonathan Dar, Aaron's father.
This is how Aaron sees them.
Lauren is brilliant, capable, and cold. Practical and exacting, she holds everyone to a high standard—but no one moreso than her son, who she set out to raise into the best person that he could be (whether he wanted to be or not). Jonathan is powerful, charismatic, and has a short temper. He's a skillful businessman and willing to do anything to get ahead, but he redirects the frustrations which he can't express at work directly into his family life. Most people adore (or at least admire) him, but he works hard to keep it that way. Aaron would say that he can see through his father's bullshit. Together, Jonathan and Lauren are a power couple, both of them smart and driven. They overlook one another's faults (like coldness and infidelity) because they're committed to making the relationship work.
I also played around a bit with genetics, checking to make sure I could recreate Aaron from what I'd put together in Lauren and Jonathan...
Not bad, eh?
But in doing so I also got to see a glimpse of the siblings Aaron never had...
Here's two of them. (These genes tend to work better on men.)
Would having siblings really have changed anything for Aaron? I doubt it. It may may have redirected some of the pressure off him—but I suspect it wouldn't have been much better to be constantly compared to the successes of a brother or sister. But, yes, it was an interesting experiment.
I conclude this massive entry with the first bit of Ghost and Aaron written story—which, fittingly, is one of the longer chunks. Enjoy!
Storybit 01: Aaron on the doorstep.
1700 words
Occurs a two years before the start of gameplay. Aaron is 18, Ghost 20, and they're distant friends.
No romantic or sexual content; some foul language.
After Aaron calls, it takes him only four hours to make the six hour trip to Ghost's house. But Aaron calls at almost ten at night, so he arrives late by any reckoning.
Sylvie, warned, has already gone to bed. Ghost stays up and waits for the sound of the car in the driveway, but as the hours pass he finds he can't concentrate. His thoughts spin out unfocused and untethered and it would be foolish to try to do anything in a mood like this. So he watches TV, latenight shows and the first midnight infomercials, the volume turned way down low, and waits.
Still, when Aaron finally pulls up to the house, Ghost seems as settled and as alert as he ever has, pale-eyed, dark-circled boy that he is. He opens the front door just before Aaron knocks and says, "Hey."
"Thought I wouldn't find the place," Aaron says as Ghost lets him in. In the driveway his car gleams in the moonlight, and Sylvie's wagon parked beside it looks all the older by comparison. "It seemed so fresh in my mind when I called, but when I got to town I remembered just how long it's been since I was here last. God, I don't even know. Years, probably. So that only makes this a little awkward."
Ghost shakes his head as he slides the deadbolt home. "Don't worry about it," he says. His voice is steady, but a whisper; Aaron's wavers with breath and bravado. "You need water or anything?"
Silent in the pauses between his outpours, Aaron just shakes his head. He follows Ghost through the house, down the narrow hallway, into Ghost's room at the far end. Ghost closes the door behind them and folds himself onto his desk chair, one leg propped up that he can rest his chin against it, and lets Aaron take the bed. Aaron sits on the edge, spine straight but limbs heavy with fatigue. They hold their silence for a few moments against the low hum of a dirty beige desk fan cycling lukewarm air, and then Ghost says:
"So can I ask what happened?"
"I don't even know." Aaron looks anywhere but at Ghost. "Registration was today, right? Sending me off alone was my folks's way of saying that I'm a big kid now. All grown up, yeah, just me and all my shit, shoved into a car, driving up the freeway and hoping for the best. Couldn't be bothered to take off work, I don't know. I didn't really mind. I thought I would be fine, I can lug my shit up the dorm stairs myself.
"So driving up the freeway and then I come to the point where it branches off, the Y-turn, you know, right? And I'm thinking, okay, it's exit 13 here on the left, I don't really know the area but I'd driven up before, thought I'd catch it but I just missed my turn. So I went up the road a bit and took the next offramp and then I thought, hell, might as well get food before I started finding my way on backwards. So I got a burger and then after that I sort of felt like there was plenty of time until registration, anytime between noon and four the letter said, so I went driving a bit in the area near the burger joint, a little strip mall and this boring old suburban neighborhood. And all the while I meant to double back around and find the freeway and find my exit and get my ass to the school..."
He trails off, and there's just the sound of the fan. Ghost hugs his raised knee and waits without comment while Aaron scoots back on the bed, swings his legs for a moment, and then clears his throat.
"But I just kept driving. Through this suburban area and then up where it trailed off to backroads, passed an orchard or something, driving towards the sun and listening to music really loud. And when I glanced back down at the dash it was three thirty and I knew there was no way I could make it to registration on time. So I just kept driving. I don't even know where the time went. Stopped at a diner at some point. Got gas and asked at the station how the hell to get back to the freeway. Drove all damn day, probably in circles. Didn't even think about it. Just drove.
"It's not missing registration, you know." Aaron is watching the floor, so he can't see Ghost nod. "It's not like they kick you out of school if you're late to that. It was just the first step down a really long road and I couldn't make myself take it. This—it's—" He coughs, the words tumbled and stuck in his throat, and Ghost unwraps himself and sits back in the chair, chewing his pinky nail.
"If I do this, they own me," Aaron says finally. "They own me for the next four years and they own me through my career and I can't fucking live with it, not now when I'm finally legal and I'm supposed to be free. They're right assholes, you know, and I don't know how to explain it better than that. They can fuck their college and their tuition and their free room and board and they can fuck their rules, too." Aaron's looking up now and his eyes are blue flame, tight and hot. "I won't take their shit anymore."
Ghost holds Aaron's gaze and then slowly, he smiles. "Then I'm proud of you," he says. He tilts his head and smiles straight into Aaron's eyes and suddenly Aaron is throwing back his shoulders, sitting up straighter, grinning like a fool. Aaron closes his eyes and leans his head back and smiles at the ceiling and says, "Yeah, fuck them."
And before he knows it, he's sobbing. His spine shudders and collapses and he digs a hand into his close-cropped black hair, tugging until his knuckles go white. He shakes and gasps in air and mutters a broken litany of, "Fuck, man, I'm sorry. Fuck, I don't know what I'm doing. Fuck," until he's just swearing softly, constantly, like breathing, in between his sobs. It only takes a moment.
Ghost slides from his chair like water, smooth but quick, and not even he can tell if he's surprised. He doesn't pretend he can't see, doesn't pretend it doesn't bother him; he kneels on the floor in front of the bed and wraps his arms around Aaron, hugs him and holds him while he cries. Aaron jumps at his first touch but he doesn't fight it; he leans forward and lets Ghost support him, warm and solid against the shivers that wrack him. Aaron gasps, swallows hard, and begins to calm. Soon Ghost feels it's safe again and releases him, sinking back to his haunches and looking up at Aaron, who remains curled up on himself, his head bowed. It's only been a few minutes.
"You okay, man?" Ghost asks.
"I'm sorry."
But Ghost shakes his head. "No worries. Do you want water now? A beer or something? Do you drink?"
"Water'd be great." Aaron's voice is raw, as if he'd cried for much longer.
Ghost stands, and puts a hand on Aaron's shoulder. Aaron jumps again, a little spasm of fear, but Ghost keeps his hand there for a moment more, squeezes Aaron's shoulder before stepping away. "Can do," he says, and slips out of the room without looking back, slides the door shut behind him. He measures the minutes as he washes a glass and fills it with tap water, trying to give Aaron long enough to pull himself together but not long enough to start feeling awkward about the whole thing. But when he comes back to the room, Aaron's neither composed nor awkward—he's curled up on his side on Ghost's bed, and he's asleep.
Ghost puts the glass down on his dresser, where it can leave another watermark on the pitted wood. Silent on the threadbare carpet, he walks to the bed. Aaron snores softly, and Ghost remembers what it was like to fall asleep after spending days awake in desperate flight from his dreams—the sudden silence of exhaustion. Sinking to his knees again, Ghost takes a close look at Aaron's sleeping face. His color is bad, so pale that his freckles stand out brown, but his skin is smooth over loose muscles. His eyelashes, still tear-soaked, clump dark and thick. Ghost smiles to himself—he hadn't noticed before, so dark are Aaron's lashes, but does now: Aaron wears eyeliner which has smudged with his crying, shadowing his lower lid.
Sitting down on the floor, Ghost leans into the side of the bed and rests his ear against the mattress. Aaron's snores, as gentle as they are, make the bed vibrate. Ghost closes his eyes and thinks that somehow none of this comes a surprise, from what he knew of Aaron's family—and maybe that's why it doesn't feel strange to have his cousin here, crying and sleeping on his bed. He shrugs to himself and doesn't try to recount the hints from Aaron's emails or their last conversation, almost a year ago before Christmas dinner. The whys and wherefores are pointless now; instead, he ought to worry about getting a sheet on the couch because his twin bed is too small for two. Ghost is tired and he doesn't think he'll dream tonight—perhaps like Aaron he can collapse, exhausted and thought-silent.
Careful not to shake the bed, Ghost pushes himself to his feet. Aaron slumbers on undisturbed, even when Ghost presses a fingertip to his hairline, soft as a kiss, even when Ghost drapes a blanket over him. Then Ghost shuffles back out of the room, but he leaves the door ajar behind him. There ought to be at least one spare sheet in the hall closet, he thinks, and wonders if Sylvie will make fried eggs for breakfast. In the dead of night the house is dim and silent but there, quiet as a sigh behind him: Aaron's breathy snore.
Ghost and Aaron: Master List | Next Update
