── .✦ PUDDLES.
a/n: dmc brain rot settled in again, i wrote this awhile ago so,,, it might not be super duper polished...i just wanted to post it because i held it hostage for a month (cough cough like what i did with another v fic.) and because its v day!!! cw: angst--reader is going through the motions of grief. word count; 3.8k. 1/2/?
i. ‘and i just hate your head, and the clothes you wear.’
Maybe it’s a curse, you see V everywhere you go.
Humans cling to ration like driftwood among a wreck — you find you’re no different. What else would explain these past few months? V appears everywhere you go— the market, the library, the park, on your path home and even in your home; on the off chance you change courses and he isn’t there one day, he’ll be there the next.
Like all small-minds, you drift towards the supernatural.
A curse is a little too much, though, isn’t it?
Synonymous in superstitious minds with resentment, and V didn’t resent you, did he? No, he didn’t, what you had with V was special, no room for animosity in between shared breaths and entwined limbs.
Perhaps there’s a simpler explanation, one you’ve yet to find.
At first you hoped maybe it was delusion, your mind playing tricks on you. Some sort of mania brought on by nights of restless sleep or no sleep at all when the static was too loud. You'd prefer it if you’d simply gone mad, it’d be easier to fix if you had. A pill, a therapist, alcohol.
Anything but ruminating, rolling questions around like marbles and staring at drywall. ‘Why didn’t you tell me,’ ‘Was it real?’ ‘What did it mean to you?’ ‘Did you—‘
Grief is a funny thing to be feeling for this man, who feels more real now that he’s dead than he was alive. You keep the memories close to your chest, tucked besides your heart in prayers it’ll be enough to beat for two.
It feels silly to grieve, to mourn for a man who didn’t live for long and due to that fact, one you didn’t even know for long either. You barely knew V, truthfully. But you knew enough to know V was different. He had a way of worming under your skin, instilling himself as a necessity rather than a burden, parasitic in his own way.
And that is what this was, V was parasitic in nature.
He used you, he used Nero, he used Dante.
The only difference is while they are able to move forward; you’re the only one getting held back, dragged back into a tarpit of misery by ink laden arms tightly wrapped around your torso, weighing you down and leaving you to move through the world at a shuffling lame pace.
For whatever reason, V clung to you, sunk his teeth in deep and refused to let go, even in death. It doesn’t help that you're all too happy to let him drown you. The only reason you haven’t let him is because Nero won’t let you.
It got easier to ignore the specter that lives in the corner of your periphery; you found maybe V really did decide to simply haunt you. He’s too real looking to be fake, warm blooded and smooth skinned. Fresh faced and just as sly.
V leaned towards skittishness early on, you miss when all you’d see was an inky mop of hair standing out in the crowds of a bookstore you found yourself frequenting; he would’ve liked it, the optimist in you presumed, though considering its steady supply of visitors — a thought gnaws in the back of your mind he might’ve hated it.
Might’ve. You can’t remember if V liked socializing, there was no other place he’d spend his time besides your home or Devil May Cry, no time to have observed his social skills. It’s why V ensnared your heart so completely; he was like you, in a way. Outcast and odd.
The bell rings and announces your arrival. You wince. Off-rip you can tell it’s slow, the tables aren’t full, the little couches are empty and slow means;
“Oh! You’re back!”
The librarian. You bite your tongue and force a smile, hide your wince with a shy wave. You aren’t here to check your book back in. Nor are you here for conversation, but, she speed-walks over anyways and you mentally prepare for conversation.
She’s bright and bubbly and everything you aren’t right now, but she’s nice and you can’t bring yourself to shut her down rudely. Penance for being a regular you suppose, librarians become difficult to shake off when you become a familiar face.
The librarian spouts prose you feign interest in for a few minutes, nodding and smiling, grateful for the distraction from the chill that settles in at the base of your own spine, it skitters up along the ridges and that’s how you know he’s here.
Adrenaline drips through your veins as if being fed through an IV. You glance off to the side and excuse yourself awkwardly, pointing in some vague direction before dipping into the aisles you came to expect V to haunt.
It’s a form of self-harm, a phantom-blade you press against your forearm and use to saw back and forth along skin, through tendons to bone. You shouldn’t be coming back here, shouldn’t want to whisper “V? Griffon? Are you there?” just to see if Griffon’ll materialize out of thin air with some crude greeting.
Yet, you do. Like clockwork. V does too.
He’s there at the midsection, your tentative steps come to a halt. “V?” You hate the way your voice sounds. Small.
Like always, he’s the picture of a scholar in academic ease, inked fingers brushing along the spines, and like always, he pays you no mind.
“V.” You say his name firmly. Still whispered. But firmer than before. Your fingers curl inwards, nails digging into the fat of your palm. The last thing you want is the librarian to round the corner and find you, presumably, talking to nothing at all.
Is he real? Actually? You can’t tell from where you’re standing, hesitantly, you take a step forward.
And jolt when V reacts.
V stops his inspection of the book's spine and flows along the shelves until he rounds the corner and disappears further into the eight hundred twenties of the dewey decimal system.
You follow him for around an hour, until that very same librarian finds you again with her cart and traps you in another conversation about dead poets you can’t, for the life of you, care about, not unless it was your very own telling you about them.
But again, when you try to catch one more glimpse, he’d already vanished into thin air.
— x-x-x-x-x-x —
If grief were a tangible thing, something you could burn or bury or tuck away into a box and shove it into some corner to be forgotten, you would’ve done so by now.
As the days passed by and June bled into July, and then into August, and then all the way back to April, some semblance of normality returned in muted colors; it became easier to breathe and live in your own skin again, — as best as one could while still grieving.
You did try to move on, avoided spending too much time in the library like the plague, stopped talking about him to the walls, got rid of the books he thumbed through despite them being yours and not his. Treated them as if they’d been infected with Scarlet Fever, would’ve burned them if you could.
It didn’t work much, if anything, it only made him more aggressive. But for a time he was gone, and it felt like limbo.
You didn’t necessarily believe you needed therapy. Therapy was for people who were losing their minds due to their grief. You weren’t doing that. (were you?) No. You weren’t. You were still functional by all accounts, capable of doing your laundry, your groceries and working Devil May Cry with Nero.
You’d slowed down, yes, anyone would after loss, but you weren’t incapable of caring for yourself to the point of needing a therapist to gently guide you back onto the right path.
Greedily however, you still ate through the books you finally decided to check out on, the type that dissected grief and offered some semblance of relief in knowing you aren’t going through the motions incorrectly.
For a while things were fine. V (or whatever it was that was wearing his face, walking in his body, smelling like him) had stayed away.
There were smaller signs at first, these you did write off as delusions.
A murder of Crows whose caws sounded too much like Griffon's boisterous laughter, a black cat much smaller than Shadow, but with amber eyes far too reminiscent and knowing, suddenly making your front door its home.
You’d brought it in eventually after it failed to get the message delivered via broomstick and batting. The collar at its throat reads Shadow now. And you feel far too guilty for having landed a swipe in all those weeks ago when it kneads biscuits against your stomach.
However, relative peace lasted for a mere few weeks.
V found you time and time again. Stood still and stared at you through the leaves in the park, gauging whether you’d listen to your senses telling you to run or if you’d fall into old habits again. He was always at the end of the trails, always gone before you could follow him deeper through brush.
It’s like he was testing you, curious to see how long your loyalty would last. Was the hourglass full or down to its last few grains?
You hated him for it, you went on these walks to reconnect with nature, not with the lover you lost. It got to the point where you’d stopped searching for snakes in the grass and kept your eyes peeled for a man in black until you’d simply decided to stop going out at all.
‘Healing isn’t linear, and that’s okay!’ rung in your head over and over through the crunch of gravel, repeating it over and over in hopes of drowning out the second pair of steps following closely behind you. ‘..doesn’t mean you failed, you’re just human.’
‘Just human. Just human. Just human.’
It never worked. Your lover is cruel.
You’re beginning to think V knows what you’ll do should he leave you alone for too long, it’s the conclusion everyone’s come to presume you’d come to. You aren’t stupid. Nero’s too eager to spend time with you, too worried when you forget to tell him you’re running late.
That begs the question; Is V driving you to it? If he is, as you think he is, haunting you, then surely he can see the decline you’re in denial about and surely, if he loves you, he’d stop tormenting you.
You’ve considered it, joining him in death. You never were that strong when it came to surviving matters of the heart.
Is he trying to save you from it? Lingering just to let you know that he’s still here? Is he just unaware he’s going about it the wrong way? Or perhaps he really does know what he’s doing and is simply goading you into it?
Was he capable of being that cruel? (No, he couldn’t be. V was apathetic and selfish, but he wasn’t cruel. He was human, softly so.)
But if that wasn’t his end goal, if he truly was here just to be here, then what were you supposed to do with these feelings? These thoughts? He’s here, within arms reach, but not really. Because he refuses to acknowledge you in any meaningful way, he refuses to give you a simple nod, a yes, a no.
You’ve asked him; “Can you talk?” Silence.
You’ve asked him; “Why are you here?” Silence.
You’ve asked him; “Do you hate me?” Silence.
V is just there. He always is.
What are you supposed to do with that?
Before your breaking point, no one ever really said anything. Nero saw the signs, of course, he visited constantly. He’d seen the cat and the collar and gave you a look that said everything you already knew; you were hurting yourself further, needlessly scratching the wound open, leaving it red and raw.
But he didn’t know about the man who still visits you, who started to make himself at home and as comfortable as the cat did. You couldn’t tell him, how could you? Nero wouldn’t believe you, you hardly believed yourself nowadays.
V was just a shape you projected on now, it felt like you were building him up, filling in the gaps he refused to fill for you. If he won’t give you anything, you’ll delude yourself.
Behind your eyes, you hear his voice late at night, silky and seductive, chastising you should you find yourself in need of relief. The only thing he left behind, a shirt you’d lent him when he stayed the night, pressed against your nose, hand tucked and working sloppily between your legs.
Most times when you dream of V, it’s pleasant. He’s alive, sitting across from you in the van, watching you with those knowing eyes of his, he hardly ever says anything. Yet caught in between respite and consciousness, you hear him all the same and it’s a relief that you do.
“You’re suffering,” He's amused, it glints in his eyes and shows in his demeanor, cocking his head sparrow-like. “...do you miss me so?”
You hate him, you do.
The dreams never last long, you’re always left in this limbo. Going somewhere and never reaching your destination, always moving towards him when it’s too late then waking up to find yourself clinging to that same sad shirt and reeking of desperation.
Lemon zest and poppy clung to him most, you’ve no idea when he found the time to swipe it from your cabinet, nor why it’s the scent that reminds you of him most when he often smelled like puddles after a rain shower. Or wet dog as Griffon put it so very nicely once.
You wondered what he thought about when he spritzed it on himself. It should’ve been your first sign he was something else if the way he ate wasn’t. (What man doesn’t know the difference between parfums and room spray?)
All you’d seen was someone in need, there’s a reason Nero insisted you return to Fortuna the instant he got an inkling you were getting in over your head, your naivety would get you killed some way or another.
Nonetheless, the air freshener still remains where he’d last left it.
There's one problem with shutting yourself in, there’s no other place for him to find you other than your home. If you squint hard enough, you’ll see him a little better, it doesn't matter if your vision is blurred from sleep or the strain; you can pin-point the exact moment those pouty, copper-rose lips twitch into that smirk you ‘hated’ so much.
Though, you can never see his face fully in time, he leaves the second your hand fumbles against the wall in the dark and the light comes on, disperses into dust like you’d been told he had all those months ago.
It all piled up and came toppling over when you saw him for the last time. Then, all he’d do was linger around corners, let himself be seen in the edges of your mirror or the darkest corners of your room.
That night he’d been sitting in the dark on your couch, leg propped up on one knee, book in hand. The plastic grocery bags you’d carried in had fallen from your hands, crinkling and spilling their contents, neither of you flinched.
Tears had blurred the edges of your vision, stung and slipped out as quickly as they’d formed. “Talk to me.” You’d asked. “Please.”
He’d just sat there. You’d stopped going out after that. If V wanted to see you, he could find you rotting in your bedroom.
V haunts you; there’s no dancing around it. It’s a secret you keep close to your chest, if only to keep him there. As much as it hurts you to.
You hate remembering V as he was when he ‘passed’, all crackled skin and no energy. Fearful. Reduced to a mouse aboard a sinking ship. Any confidence he’d ever had, feigned. The hours you used to get with him reduced down to mere minutes, if you were lucky to see him at all.
Towards the end V smelled cloyingly sweet, the way an old book smells when it’s been abandoned and begun to fray at the seams, left for bookworms to get at it and render it incomprehensible. The bells tolled, June 15th.
‘V returned to himself’, Dante had put it, you’d heard through Nero. A vague explanation you understood in the abstract. It sounds much better than the funerary terms you’ve associated with Vergil’s return.
This must be what a swan feels should its partner pass, this heart wrenching void that spans from behind your sternum and slithers through your body, leaving you numb and cold most mornings. If you were a swan, you’d tuck yourself away under your wing, wait for a coyote or wolf to come along and accept the inevitable.
But, you aren’t one. You’re human. Blood, flesh and bone.
All you have to drown the world out is a blanket to hide beneath, people will notice you’re gone, they already have. Nero isn’t letting you waste away anymore and Kyrie’s been piling food up on your nightstand.
You wish they would’ve just left you to your devices, taken over your lease and sent you off back to Fortuna to heal in familiar places. Instead you’ve been forced to recover in their home — Dante’s home, you suppose. The loft has enough room for three small bedrooms — surrounded by laughter and warmth you can’t be coaxed into feeling. Rendered down to the ghost that haunts the upstairs.
You understand now to some degree, that this was never meant to be. V did too, he knew more than anyone else that he was living on borrowed time, slipping away further and further with each passing day.
He knew what he was doing with each kiss, every stolen moment, all of them piling up into a debt he had no intention of paying back. So why did he let it go on this long? Was he truly so selfish?
You hate him, you want to hate him. You do.
You think about how selfish he was to use your kindness, you think about his stupid hooked nose and his stupid jade green eyes, you think about how soft the skin of his face felt beneath your finger tips, how warm his arms were, you think about the weight of them wrapped around your waist at night, and you think most about how you wish you could feel them again.
You hate him. And he isn’t here for you to hate him, and your heart shakes at the thought, you can’t hate him. You can’t. Your nose gets stuffy at the thought, trails of saliva splutter out with each sob lost against your pillowcase. The stupid shirt is slid over it, contraband no one bothers to scold you about anymore.
You love him, oh. You love him. Enough to tug your hair at the roots and curl in tighter on yourself.
Past tense is impossible to think about; there’s only the present and the memories you’ll drag with you to your grave. You’d rip your heart out, tear it free from flesh and viscera if it meant he could take it for himself and live again.
He would, eagerly. Maybe he’d grieve you as much as you grieve him.
The days since Nero tore you from your home have been monotonous. You hate this room. You hate it more knowing who’s in the room besides yours. Vergil isn’t at fault, you know this. He’s innocent of what his human half had done with the few breaths he had.
But hearing him move around in the room over irks you. Still. Nero won’t let you leave, and you can’t find it in yourself to fight, they wear your defenses down day by day. Or try to.
“You have to move on,” Kyrie is the one who tries the most. Everyone else besides Nero and Nico avoid you like the plague. “It’s been months…”
It falls on deaf ears, the concept of moving on is for people with strong hearts like Dante. Not you.
“Hey, you um,” Nero’s long since gotten over the fact you had something with his fathers alter-ego now that he’s seen how much of a toll it’s taken on you. It’s not like you knew. “You want anything? I can get you those little candies you like from the corner store.”
“…whatever you want.” He’d muttered, his hand squeezed your shoulder from atop the cover. “Just don’t die on me. Please.”
Nico doesn’t quite get what you saw in V, to her, he was just the weird guy with the loud bird. She tries for something light and always finds herself falling flat.
“Tough crowd.” You’d heard her mutter beneath her breath once. That got a small chuff out of you.
But you can’t stand seeing Vergil. You’ve only seen him a handful of times. He looks like Dante, yet a little less worn. His skin is a pale smooth canvas, his hair slicked back and snow white. His eyes, deep-set and pale silvery blue, inhuman. His nose, straight. He’s sharp where V was soft, and Vergil’s seen you more times than you’d ever know.
Once, late at night, you’d stalked down the stairs in hopes of swiping a bottle of water with no one noticing you. And there he was, sitting on the same couch V once had, reading the same book V used to hold against his heart, the embossed V stared back at you mockingly.
Your throat had closed up, eyes stung at the corners. You thought you’d gotten better at this. Hadn’t you cried it all out already? God. What was he even doing up this late? You’d stood at the bottom of the stairs for maybe a minute, didn’t want to stay for long, couldn’t afford to let him of all people see you like this. But your legs refused to cooperate.
Did some part of V remain inside him? Did he know just how deep this particular root ran? Would he pull it out if you’d asked?
Vergil noticed you. Of course he had. His senses were honed far more than yours ever would be.
“Does it help you to grieve in such a way?” He’d asked before you could scurry back up.
You’d stilled on the third step. Your fingers curled around the railing tightly, knuckles blanched. “No.”
“Good.” That caught you off guard, you swallowed the lump in your throat, ignored the offense and rage that nearly blinded you. Good?
Good?
What did that mean? How was this any good?
You’ve lost weight, your hair has long lost its shine, your skin is dull, the bags underneath your eyes are more pronounced than they’d ever been before, with each swipe of your tongue, you can feel the plaque on your teeth. Everything you do for yourself can be considered below bare minimum, and this is somehow good?
“It means he truly meant something to you.”
You've yet to speak to Vergil since.
