Teen Idols And Happy Meals

Vanilla And Portuguese

Nikki’s POV

“Dormir minha pequena estrela,
Quando você acordar você vai estar um sol brilhando
Dormir meu pequeno príncipe
Quando você acordar você vai ser um rei,”

Jacen was ranting again. This time in Portuguese. When he was in the throws of the drug, like he was now, he would just stare up at the ceiling and murmur softly to himself. Sometimes in English, sometimes not. Sometimes coherently, sometimes not.

“Jacen,” I croaked, my throat as dry as the blood that caked my face like too much foundation. From my spot in the corner, shackled to the radiator, I could do little more than call to him through his haze.

“Dormir até que esteja terminado
Quando você acordar você vai se sentir melhor
Dormir até que a dor termina
Quando você acordar o mundo vai ser bonito,”

His voice, soft and strained, snaked through the dim room, haunting like the remnant of some forgotten dirge. He lay on his back across the haphazardly made bed, his glossy eyes flashing feverishly from beneath his fluttering lashes. Sweat beaded across his forehead, dampening his dark hair.

“Jacen,” I tried again, coughing in an attempt to clear my voice. My throat was scorchingly dry. Eleanor wasn’t generous with the water. She wasn’t generous with anything, at least not towards me. In all honesty though, I was surprised I was even still alive. It had been three days, or what I perceived to be days, since Eleanor had abducted me. In that time, I hadn’t seen much of her.

She visited rarely, coming in only to throw some food in my direction and lavish attention and drugs upon Jacen. We exchanged barbs occasionally, but she’d been rather docile since I decked her with the perfume bottle. I was suspicious, to say the least.

“Talk to me baby,” I urged Jacen, crawling forward and straining against the chain at my ankle. Jacen was unbound, but it didn’t seem to matter. He was too drugged to even walk on his own. “I want to know what you’re saying.”

My rudimentary understanding of Spanish did not assist me in decoding Jacen’s rants. He spoke too swiftly, too lowly. I longed to understand him though, to connect with him, to reach whatever dark dimension the drugs had pulled him into.

“It’s a lullaby,” Jacen said suddenly, clearer than before. It was startlingly to hear him speaking English again, in such a nearly coherent way. “My mother used to sing it to me when I was sick. Am I sick now? I feel like I have a fever.”

“Yes baby,” I sighed sadly, longing to touch him. I wanted to gnaw my own ankle off to free myself. “You’re sick, but you’ll get better soon.”

That answer seemed satisfactory to him. He turned his head so that he was looking right at me. His eyes were fully opened then, the vibrant blue shade of them sparkling with intoxication through the curtain of his dark lashes.

“I remember when I was five and got bronchitis,” he continued, “I couldn’t go to work for a whole week. But my parents weren’t mad. They even let me sleep in their bed with them. Michael stayed home with me and we watched cartoons all day.”

I feel my chest tighten like someone had placed a weight on my heart. “That’s a really nice memory,” I choked, my eyes burning with unshed tears for the little boy Jacen had once been, the one with the terrible life. I thought of what Odette had said to the Sage’s. “He only wanted you to love him.”

“I know,” Jacen said thoughtfully and for an uncanny moment, I thought he was responding to my thoughts. “I don’t have a lot of nice memories, but I like that one. Michael did the best Squidward impression . . .You would’ve loved him.”