Mythicals Galore

5. Corner Time

    Slowly, Rue's head starts to droop downwards but before it can get too low it jerks up again. His senses rush back to him as he stares at the plain white corner in front of him. Exhaustion tugs at his eyelids, encouraging him to close them. His body complies with the orders once again falling forward. He's awoken by his body jolting upright again.

    Rue groans in frustration as tears prick his blue eyes. He wants to get out of the corner already.

    He knows what he has to do to gain his freedom from the corner but he doesn't want to. He tries to be discreet as he slowly turns his head toward his captor as she watches his siblings eat cookies.

    As if she can feel the eyes on her Mommy turns her head in Rue's direction. She watches as Rue's eyes quickly divert down to his fingers.

    Rue's body tenses as he hears her shuffle on the couch behind him and then her soft footsteps. His lungs expand with a harsh inhale as she picks Rue up by his armpits.

    "Did you want to say something, baby?" Mommy's calm voice asks him as she settles him on her hip.

    Rue turns his face away from hers refusing to look at her as he gives an irritated and stiff nod. "I'm sorry."

    Mommy gently pulls Rue's face back towards her and smiles softly at him. "That's so sweet, but Mommy isn't the one you should be apologizing to."

Rue looks away again as he grits his teeth and furrows his brows. His body tenses as his second captor's face flashes through his mind.

"I'm not apologizing to him," he mutters grabbing her shoulder and starting to push away from her slender body.

"Well, it sounds like you want to go back in timeout," Mommy sighs, squatting down to set Rue back down into the corner.

Instead of objecting Rue's eyes burn holes into the wall as he glares at the white paint. The metallic taste of blood assaults his tongue as he bites down on it to stop himself from saying anything he'll regret later.

Daddy walks out of the kitchen and into the room brushing cookie crumbs off of his hands and face. His eyes follow Mommy's form as she moves over to the couch, away from Rue.

"How is he?" Daddy asks as he lays a quick kiss to Mommy's temple and sits down beside her.

"He apologized while you were in the kitchen. You should've heard it he had the cutest little voice as he apologized, but then I told him I wasn't the one he needed to be apologizing to. He got upset after that and decided that he wanted to go back to the corner."

    Daddy looks back at Rue to see him rubbing his blue eyes. Rue's leaning forward, his back bent, and one hand gently keeping him from falling forward as it rests on the ground.

Daddy finally can't stand watching his baby sit in the corner and suffer any longer as Rue lets out a small, tired whine of frustration. He stands and walks over to his pouting baby.

Rue, who is contemplating on whether he should just give up on being stubborn, replaces his pouting face with a neutral one as he listens to Daddy approach him.

"I don't want to apologize," Rue mumbles, wrapping his arms around his legs and resting his chin on his knees.

"Well why not, Little Prince?" Daddy lowers himself to the ground behind Rue, pulling the boy into his lap. His large arm wiggles between Rue's torso and thighs so he can hug Rue from behind forcing him out of his protective position.

Rue's muscles tense at the unexpected touch of Daddy's body. With wide eyes, he stares at the ground hoping that his surprise is hidden from the man behind him.

"You touched me, I had every right to react the way I did," Rue states confidently, raising his head a bit.

    "What are you talking about? Daddy's touching you right now and you don't seem bothered by it." Daddy's large hand caresses Rue's pale cheek.

    Rue grits his teeth at the man's cluelessness. "That's not what I meant, idiot. What you did earlier... it made me uncomfortable."

    Daddy let the insult slide knowing Rue was unhappy and bothered.

    "Tell me what's wrong, baby. What did Daddy do?" Daddy lightly grabbed Rue's chin and turned his face towards his own.

    "You slapped my ass!"

    Every sound in the room seemed to quiet down into a stop. Even Rue stopped talking after he noticed everyone's eyes on him.

    "What?" Daddy says eyes a bit wider than usual. He couldn't suppress his shocked face at the accusation.

    Rue couldn't even answer. His embarrassment seemed to expel air out of his lungs to the point where he couldn't form words. Why did he only attract everyone's attention when it came to something embarrassing?

    "Are you talking about when Daddy hit your bottom earlier?"

    Rue grits his teeth and snatches his chin from Daddy's grip. His dark blue eyes glare holes into the soft carpeted floor. The soft red of his knuckles drains away as his hands clench into firm fists.

    "Rue, Daddy would never do something like that to his Little Prince to make him uncomfortable on purpose."

"Just shut up." Rue's voice comes out in a low growl, a warning that he was being pushed to the edge.

"Baby-"

"Leave me alone! I'm done with you crazy fucking idiots!" Rue's voice was harsh with the intent to hurt.

    Daddy understood his anger and with a sigh decided it would be best to leave the boy alone for a while.

Glittering tears are wiped away by soft hands as Rue sniffles. He wipes his tears on his sleeveless onesie and scooches closer to the wall.

As a large hand rests gently on his shoulder, he's ready to go off thinking that it was Daddy but as his ocean blue eyes meet Blaze's lava orange ones he calms back down.

"What?" he questions the dragon.

"Sit with you?"

Rue contemplates before nodding.

Blaze doesn't hesitate and plops his bottom down right next to the sulking boy.

"Is Wue awight?"

"What do you think?" Rue snaps, hands clenching on nothing and teeth gritting together harshly.

Blaze's slit pupils shrink at the harsh tone of Rue's words.

"Sowwy," he mumbles, picking at his well cared for claws.

    "No. Don't apologize. I shouldn't snap at you like that. I'm sorry." Rue huffs as he let the apology roll off his tongue.

    "Awe you sweepy?"

    Rue chuckles at how easily the boy next to him could read him.

    "Very."

    Blaze takes the tired boy's head in his right hand and slowly lowers it to his lap.

    In a moment of panic Rue grabs onto Blaze's hand. His skin is tough and warm as Rue tries to pull himself away from the dragon.

    "What are you doing?!"

    "Shhh. Wue go night night." Blaze pets Rue's brown hair-covered head as the boy lays tensely in his lap.

    Soon enough, Rue can feel the tug of sleep on his eyelids as Blaze continues to pet him. His tiredness carries away the tenseness that once had a hold on his muscles.

    His eyelids meet and the last thing he sees is the white paint on the wall.