#barryallenheadcanons

[retvenkos]

“i just really miss you.”

OKAY, BUT BEING BARRY ALLENS SIBLING AND FINDING OUT HE WAS HIT BY LIGHTNING...

you are two years older than barry

which means that you were 13 when your mother died and your father was wrongfully sent to prison, and it devestated you

you were right in that stage where you are officially a teenager and things are hard, but you still depend on your parents for moral support

and to have them taken away...

and to have seen it...

it hurt you a lot

and sometimes, in your darkest moments, you wished it had been you

and you cried, then, and barry would sit with you until your sobs subsided.

you had a harder time adjusting to life at the west house

you didn’t have the issues that barry did - running away to see your dad

you, really, wanted to try and forget

you had more attitude issues, tbh

you were a moody teenager, although joe understood why

it didn’t make it easier on him, though

when you turned 18, you were quick to go away, find yourself

you didn’t talk to barry during that time, and your relationship deteriorated quite a bit

part of you knew it was unfair to ghost your brother

he had always been there for you

but you had to get away from it all. you had to leave your past behind you for a while

you went to school while you worked and stayed with a friend

you got a degree in psychology

you were going to help kids like you - kids who needed to be heard

you were planning on going home when you got the news from joe

barry was in a coma

barry. your barry.

the barry allen who would sit down with you and ramble about science while you would write in your diary

the barry allen who would always ask you about how you were feeling, and would know when you would lie

the barry allen who texted you every week, without fail, even when you didn’t respond

the barry allen who would leave you voicemails, telling you what your father wanted to say but couldn’t

the barry allen who was the only family you were responsible for

you were crying again, and this time, no one was there to console you

you were at his side the next day

and you made to apologize to iris and joe (who had stayed there for hours, judging by the circles under their eyes) but they just shook their head and held you

and for a moment, things felt like home

and for weeks, it was like that. silence as sat next to iris and joe, waiting on the family you had abandoned.

and one day, it’s just joe, and something compels you to speak

“i should’ve been here. i pushed everyone so far away, and now barry’s here... it’s should’ve been me.”

“no.”

and you are both looking at barry, but you look at his reflection in the glass that separates you from your brother.

“if it had been you, barry would be lost. it had to be barry. to bring you back to him.”

“i--”

“you always wanted to punish yourself.”

and he turns to look at you, and you are stunned into silence.

“whenever anything happened, you always wanted to take the blame. but you can’t. you can only be here to pick up the pieces.”

“i think things are too broken to fix.”

“then you need to think again.”

and from that moment on, you promised to be there for your brother

to let your shadows leave for darkness, because you could harbor them no longer

and the hardest part was mending things with iris

joe could rationalize what you were going through, iris could not

you had left barry when he needed you most

and you had shunned her and joe as well

iris is fiercely loyal, and it was hard to make her see that you had been trying to do what was best

because you  l o v e d  barry

both of you did

you would sit by his side and would answer the questions he used to leave you in voicemails and texts

and you were answering them one day when you came across a mention of your father

barry had loved your father

he visited him all the time, or so he said

and you knew what you had to do

“hey, dad.”

and henry looked at you, and he cried and he tried to apologize for his tears, but you wouldn’t let him

you cried  t o g e t h e r , and there’s something healing in it

and you start to explain why you never came, why you left, but he just nods his head and let’s that talk go away

for now

and instead he asked about you

what you were doing

what you were interested in

if there was anyone significant in your life

if there was anything you needed

nothing but his voice, really

where you were working

what you were passionate about

and you tried to bring up barry, but he wouldn’t have it

“we’re here to talk about you, (y/n).”

and you anxiously waited for the day your brother woke up so you could give him a bone crushing hug and be with him the way you finally could be.

...

[retvenkos]

“there are some things that i don’t want to know”

BEING A META-HUMAN THAT CAN READ MINDS AND BEING FRIENDS WITH BARRY ALLEN WOULD BE A HUGE MESS THAT WOULD HAVE TO GO A LITTLE SOMETHING LIKE THIS...

so when you first get your powers, you have a huge headache

you felt like your brain was splitting, and you woke up to the terrible sound of the apartment below you playing their television  w a y  too loud

scratch that - it had to have been the apartment above you too, because the sound seemed to come from everywhere at once

and whatever sitcom was playing, the narrative was really discombobulated

someone is planning a divorce while the other character is making a to do list? and the music was a lady gaga hit? did tv really have the budget to get the rights for that?

when you get on the bus to go to work, you nearly collapse from pain

so much so, that you get off on the first stop

you can’t go to work like this

and you’re in so much pain, you don’t even realize that no one on the bus is speaking and that the voices you are hearing are disembodied.

you call in sick and don’t leave your apartment for three whole weeks

the first day you stayed home, you got a call from iris, saying that barry was struck by lighting and that he was in the icu

only family could visit

so you’re scared, and three hours into your morning, you realize that you’re hearing things

but how?

and the more scared you are, the worse it gets

and everyone’s thoughts are so loud

nothing is at peace anymore - you feel like you can’t even think because there’s no room for your thoughts in your own head

after the third week, you hear iris knock on your door

and you could hear her the moment she made it to the third floor - one floor beneath you

she was worried about you

she hadn’t heard from you after she told you about barry. and was it her fault? should she not have told you? she knew you hadn’t been to work since she texted you. had she made a mistake?

and you wanted her to leave, but you could hear what she thought and you knew she wouldn’t

and so you opened up the door and let iris into your dirty, dark apartment

you had thought that being in the dark would help center you - maybe get rid of the thoughts running through your head

meditate and become like yoda, y’know?

and iris looks around and does what any good friend would do - starts to clean up

you can hear the list forming in her mind

open the blinds, stack the dishes, get them soaking in soapy water, put the laundry in a pile, get another garbage bag, maybe get some febreeze or something, start the vacuum--

and all of her thoughts are piling up and it’s too loud and too bright and too—

“STOP!”

and iris just looks at you, her mind blank

you can hear your neighbors still trying to find a way to illegally watch titanic, but things are less loud

and tears fill your eyes and iris just gives you a hug

and you can hear her concern and in an odd way, it’s comforting

“i’m sorry, (y/n). i was just worried.”

“it’s okay, you can keep cleaning, i just,,, how’s barry?”

and you can hear in her thoughts that the answer is not going to be good.

“you don’t have to answer that, iris. i can’t imagine how hard this is for you.”

and it scares you just how hard you have to focus on every word in order for you to speak - it’s like pushing back a flood and focusing on a single drop at a time

but you two are able to talk

and your first conversation in weeks is with iris west, and both of you are crying for two very different reasons

and iris, even through her grief, knows something deeper is going on with you

the things you would say sometimes... you had never been that perceptive before

and you could hear this, and it scared you even more

nothing seemed to help

but the headache was less pronounced, and you had bills to pay and you knew you had to go back to work eventually

so you did

and it was so  m u c h 

you would take your break and cry in the bathroom

but even there you couldn’t get away

and you wanted to visit barry, but there’s no way you could enter a hospital where you would hear everyone’s suffering

and what if you heard barry? or worse, what if you didn’t?

but when iris visited your apartment that week and said that barry was moved to s.t.a.r. labs, where it was quiet and peaceful, you figured you’d go

iris goes with you

and you enter the building, and for once, all you hear is you and iris and the sound of a life support machine

it had been two months

and you sit there with barry, and you strain to hear him

and once you think you do - and, in true barry fashion, he was worried about his dad

and it brings tears to your eyes

and suddenly, you hear the thoughts of someone else - a woman talking about... mutated cells?

your scared, and you tell iris you need a moment

but instead, you try to find the source of the thoughts

and you run into caitlin as she gets off the elevator

“oh, i’m sorry. who are you?”

and you hear her correct herself: they’re probably a friend of barry allens.

“yeah. i’m a friend of barrys.”

and if she catches your slip, she doesn’t notice it right then

“are you a biologist?”

and that catches her off-guard. how could you know?

“i’m a bio-engineer.”

“and you’re helping barry?”

and her thoughts and face soften.

“yes.”

and you find that s.t.a.r. labs is the place you need to go when you are overwhelmed

and most of the time you sit and listen

and you know cisco, and you know caitlin, and you know about dr. wells - although you’ve never seen him

and at first, it’s a safe haven, nothing more

but then, it becomes a source of answers

you know that there’s something different with barry’s cells - he’s changed somehow - and you know you are the same

and the more you try to learn from caitlin, or listen to barry, the more you learn to quiet others around you

no longer can you hear cisco thinking about the pokemon theme song at 4 o’clock in the afternoon

and, six months into barry’s coma, you tell caitlin what happened to you

and she is alarmed, but intrigued

and you can hear her thoughts racing about all of the information that you could have heard, all of the memories that she relived while you were here, the secrets that she’s tried to keep

“calm down, caitlin.”

“you...”

“i’m sorry. it’s hard to not hear things. that’s why i want your help.”

and caitlin is interested and excited and you are her new project

and dr. wells’ worst nightmare

not that he will dare to meet you anytime soon

and she asks you so many  q u e s t i o n s :

so do men really think before they speak?

how far away are you able to hear my thoughts?

do people think in different languages?

are you able to hear barry?

and she helps you as best she can, and after two months of different tests and strategies, you are able to go home to your apartment on the public bus, brush elbows with strangers in the elevator, and go to sleep without any one else’s thoughts filling your head

AND FLUFF ENSUES.