raven's song {chris motionless}

four • broken glass

Chris's POV; 2002

I hear a pebble hit my window. I knew it was Raven. Her parents were probably going at it again. I hurriedly opened my window and pulled her into my room.

"You know, it still surprises me that you can climb up an old fence post leaning against my house," I joke.

She laughs, but I can hear the pain laced in it. My room was dark, and I couldn't see anything but her silhouette.

"What's wrong?" I questioned.

I heard her sniffle and shuffle over to my lamp. She flicked it on and I saw broken glass sticking out of her arm, and a couple of scratches on her face. I gasped and commanded, "stay here, I'll be back with a first aid kit."

I ran into my bathroom and opened the medicine cabinet, grabbing the little box with a red cross on it, and the tweezers and rubbing alcohol. This wasn't the first time Raven had snuck into my house at midnight.

She was on my bed, now without a coat or shoes. She was in shorts and a tank top, shivering. It was winter time, and she was so skinny I could see her ribs, so she was almost always cold.

I began to clean the wounds, pulling the glass out of her skin. She winced but stayed quiet, scared to make a noise. Raven was a pretty paranoid person, which was understandable, under her circumstances. I placed bandages upon her skin and tossed her one of the shirts she kept here. Two of my dresser drawers belonged to her. My mom also let her keep her makeup in the bathroom. This was her second home.

She shrugged herself into the shirt and smiled at me. "Thanks for this, Chris."

"Of course, birdy. What happened?"

She shook her head. "The usual. Mom and dad got mad and tossed around their alcohal bottles."

I didn't give her a sympathetic look, or apologize, like most people would. I knew from experience that she hated that. Instead, I said, "stay here as long as you like. Mom won't mind."

She was quiet for a few seconds and then her face lit up. She had an idea, and it probably wasn't going to end well. "Let's shave our eyebrows."

That night, we shaved our eyebrows out of impulse and learned how to draw them on. Mom wasn't going to appreciate her fifteen year old son or fourteen year old "daughter" without eyebrows. We didn't care, though.

We never cared.

The next day at school, people laughed at us. They teased us, but we didn't care. We were always going to be ourselves, and push through the crowds of people we didn't like.

The next few chapters are going to be flashbacks to show what Raven's and Chris's relationship was like.
     - salem ♡