what did you give me to make my heart bleed out my chest?
summary *. ⋆ ⋆·˚ cait 'visits' vi on her emo era
warnings *. ⋆ ⋆·˚ not proofread!!! mentions of alcohol, being drunk, and fighting as a way of punishment?? i think that's it lol
author notes *. ⋆ ⋆·˚ sorry if this is out of character. i tried my best!! really enjoyed writing this one.
OH AND HUGEEEE CREDITS TO WHOEVER DID THE FANART OF CAITLYN MEETING WITH VI WHEN SHE WAS EMO😭😭 and i think caitlyn said something like "this is what you're up to?".
i can't find the fanart ANYWHERE. if someone has it, tag the account pleaseeeeeee🙏🙏 it's the whole reason i wrote this!!!
with that being said, i hope y'all enjoy :))
As she’s curled up on her so very cold bed, around bottles of alcohol, she realizes her knuckles never hurt because she never really pays attention to them. Never has a reason to, either—she always focuses more on the rage than on the pain, too angry to focus on how her joints feel when she moves them. But lately they never stop hurting and, and her body never stops aching. Especially on that one spot; the one that was left bruised and bloody. The one where Caitlyn had hit her—the worst part is that she’s had worse. She was on fucking prison, for fuck's sake.
Vi never liked showing weakness, but lately is all she knows, all she is. Weak. Her mind is plagued with it. Every time she’s alone with her thoughts, she just goes: weak weak weak weak weak weakweakweakweakweakweakweak—until she’s too drunk to think. Too drunk to stay steady on her feet that she has to lay down, and then falls asleep until she has a nightmare.
She lies on her back, her head heavy. Pain creeps up behind her eyes. She blinks. Lifts her hand and opens her palm, then closes it. It hurts. She ignores it and sits up, drinking up of the alcohol left in the bottle that she almost finished yesterday. She thanks God she didn’t, or else she doesn’t know what she would’ve done to wake up.
She sighs when someone knocks on her door.
Great, she thinks, sarcastically. Another fight. Right what I needed.
Okay, maybe not what she needs, but what she deserves. She deserves to hurt. To be thrown around like some kind of trash bag and punched until she's coughing up blood. And she fights back. She fights back because that's what the people like, the people who come to see her want her to win, and she wins and wins and wins. And she likes it. Some sick twisted part of her likes to win, to hear the praise, to know she's not letting people down but making them cheer.
Maybe another fight wasn’t what she needed. She wins, but at what cost? Her limbs are sore as fuck. But, still, today is a good day. Today is better than other days. Sometimes she wakes up with her chest burning in grief after a nightmare, and all she wants to do is fight. All she wants to do is put her fists to work. All of her anxiety and pain focused on anger. But she won the fight and people cheered for her more than they booed her. She’s at the bar, already a couple of drinks in. She didn’t have a nightmare today. Today is a good day.
Deep into her bones, she knows today wasn’t a good day. Or—well, she hasn’t had a good day for a long time, really. She can't catch a fucking break, can she? All her life has been followed by a tragedy on top of another tragedy on top of another and so on. Her parent's death, Vanders death, the little trip to prison, her sister turning Jinx, knowing what she thought was the love of her life hit her. And god, it hurts. This isn't the hurting that heals. This isn't a "good" type of hurting. This is the hurting that poisons, the one that makes you want to kneel on the floor and scream until you pass out. The one that makes you feel dizzy when you think about it. The one that makes you want to drink. The want that makes you think: stop. Stops stop stop. Because it hurts. And once you do, you won't stop hurting.
Yeah. She probably should stop drinking.
Who's there to stop her, anyway? Well—there was Loris. Until she got too angry one night and lashed out on him. And Vi? Fuck, she's good at making people angry. She was an older sister once, she knows a thing or two about choosing the right words to hurt people, to make them mad. To make them go quiet.
When she wakes up to a hand on her cheek, she thinks she's hallucinating.
It's not the first time. It's been happening a lot, the hallucinations. It's usually when she's drunk. It makes her feel crazy every time she catches a glimpse of Caitlyn, just looking at her with that look she though was love. What she thought was love, care, belonging. And every time it happens, she's reminded of all the things it wasn't. Was it even love, in the first place? Where the secret glances, soft touches, words spoken… nothing?
Vi blinks. Caitlyn is still there. She looks so… different. That's not her Caitlyn, Vi realizes. She looks hot, like always, but she has a weird look on her face that Vi has never seen. Is she confused? Sad? It looks very tender, though. It still has that touch of intimacy Caitlyn's eyes always reflected.
"I shouldn't be here," the Caitlyn speaks, standing up. Her hand leaves Vi's face, a sense of warmth leaving her cheek. Vi head is hurting. She blinks again. Shit. The hallucination is taking its time to leave. Vi mumbles something against her pillow. er mind still foggy with sleep. "Ambessa sent me on a mission, if she finds out I'm missing she'll kill me."
The Caitlyn brings a cloth near Vi's face, but she quickly pushes it away as she sits up. That's not her Caitlyn. That can't be. But she looks so different and real and Vi just pushed her hand away and Caitlyn looks surprised. It's not a hallucination, that she knows.
Vi's first reaction is to stare at her, just wide-eyed, lips slightly parted.
Caitlyn's shoulders slump as she reaches one more time to wipe Vi's face. There's a bucket next to the bed, and the white cloth she's holding looks clean. Vi has no idea where this all came from. She lets Caitlyn, who is avoiding her gaze, wipe her face.
"So, this is what you've been up to?" Caitlyn asks, dumping the cloth now black into the water, trying to clean it. "Getting yourself killed?"
"As if you're doing so much better," VI retorts.
Caitlyn reaches out to clean Vi's face again. Her hand drops to her side after. A beat. Then, "I'm done being angry."
Vi's quick to speak, "Well, I'm not."
"Of course you're not. I'm just letting you know. I don't—" Caitlyn stops talking. She takes a deep breath, still not meeting Vi's eyes. "Look, I'm sorry, okay? For everything—"
"Sorry isn't going to cut it."
"Would you let me speak." She looks up, now eye to eye with her, finally. The cloth drops to the water. "Please, Vi."
"You don't need to apologize. What are you doing here, anyway?"
"I told you, Ambessa sent me."
"So you just follow her around and do what she says?"
"Then what is it?!" She raises her voice. "You're completely different, Caitlyn. I'm not going to treat you the same just because you came here to… what? Check up on me? I don't even know what you're doing here. I thought I'd never—"
I thought I'd never see you again.
The words hang unspoken on the air. Vi really though she was never going to see Caitlyn again, and now she's here. Caitlyn is here, and she's taking care of Vi for some reason.
"I'm not even mad at you," Vi continues. She has the painful urge to touch Caitlyn, touch her face, put her hands on her hips, kiss her. This so she can convince herself Caitlyn is here and she's real and she hasn't left. She's glad more than she's mad, and it's pissing her off. She sits closer to Caitlyn. She doesn't deserve apologies, doesn't deserve anything that's close to good.
When Vi gets close enough to Caitlyn, when she can feel her soft breath against her face—when she thinks that another chance is so close she can feel it against her fingertips, that there can be another chance to mend amends, Caitlyn twists the knife.
"I'm seeing someone else."
Vi pulls away, breath slightly panted. She can't speak, there are no words left to say. She's completely, utterly alone. She's so stupid for thinking she wasn't. But, again, it's always been like this. She should've seen it coming.
Caitlyn stops looking at her once more.
"Who?" It is what she manages to speak.
Vi looks away from Caitlyn. She doesn't know if she wants to cry or laugh. "You said Ambessa would kill you if she finds you here, you should leave."
"You're right." Caitlyn clears her throat, standing up.
And before Caitlyn walks away, Vi decides to say one last thing.
"She's not going to love you like I do."
"What?" Caitlyn turns around, eyes on Vi like she's hoping for something that won't come—doesn't exist.
"She's not going to love you like I did. But good luck out there, cupcake."
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