Posted by CrazySugarFreakBoy! on January 21, 2001 at 17:44:02:
It hadn't been that long since Izzy had ... gone.
A few months, at the most.
And yet, the loss felt even newer than that.
It felt like a tangible, physical wound, inside of him, where some part of him that he hadn't even known was there before was now ... gone.
He'd never really dealt with loss before.
Even now, some 14-odd years after his father had left, he still thought of his dad as only being away "temporarily", as though he might still come back, any day now.
But with Izzy, he didn't even the luxury of being able to pretend.
There was no coming back, not for her.
And he simply didn't know how to deal with it.
So, it came as no surprise, to anyone who knew him, that he dealt with it about as poorly as a human being could deal with such a thing.
After his initial episode, which had resulted in him being sent to several therapists and being prescribed with a dizzying array of medications, most of which he only pretended to take, he seemed to recover slightly.
But it still hurt just as much.
And he still saw her, even though he didn't tell anyone that he could still see her.
He's learned his lesson in that regard, if in none other.
Admitting something like that would probably result in another round of therapy and medication, and possibly even send him on a one-way trip to the sort of sanitarium that his aunt occasionally visited, as a psychologist.
But other than deciding that it didn't do him any good to express his grief any longer, he still had no idea what he could do to cope with his grief, which was still there, and as strong as ever.
Izzy's absence was causing him to question all sorts of things he had once believed in - all the lessons he'd learned from his comic books, like how the good guys always prevail in the end - because the simple fact of her not being here any longer seemed to fly in the face of all those optimistic beliefs which he'd never even thought to doubt before.
So, if he couldn't deal with his loss by relying upon the lessons he'd already learned, he'd have to try something new.
Which was why Dreamcatcher Kokopelli Foxglove was at the campus pub, trying his level best to get drunk, even though his lack of tolerance for the taste of alcohol had prevented him from taking anything more than small sips of the large mug of beer that sat before him, its foamy head long since dissipated.
Dream had never really spent any time in bars, even the local campus establishments such as this one, and the load, sweaty, testosterone-saturated atmosphere of the place was entirely alien to him.
Shaking his head in defeat, Dream finally realized that this approach to dealing with his problems wasn't working either, and so, after paying the bartender for the beer that had remained largely untouched (prompting a smirk from the bartender), Dream stood up, and headed for the bathroom, to get rid of the beer he HAD consumed, before heading back to his dorm room.
On his way back from the bathroom, he happened to spot a familiar face, surrounded by a crowd that he'd never really had all that much to do with.
Penny Geoffries, the 19-year-old freshman whom Dream knew as a fellow comic book collector and role-playing enthusiast, was twirling a finger through the curly blonde hair of one of her pom-pom ponytails, and batting her blue eyes in a way that betrayed how drunk she was.
Dream had first met Penny through her older brother, who was the same age as Dream himself, and perhaps as a result, the 21-year-old Dream felt a wee bit protective of the perpetually cheerful, squeaky-voiced Penny, who always reminded him of an older version of Inspector Gadget's cartoon niece (especially given her first name).
This latent sense of protectiveness was heightened when Dream saw that most of the crowd that now encircled the intoxicated Penny were guys his own age, jocks by the look of them, and that one of them had Penny sitting on his lap, his arms wrapped around her waist to steady her, as she swayed drunkenly and giggled.
The decision to get involved was far from a conscious one, and truth be told, Dream would have been about the last person in the world who could have told you WHY he chose to step in, but as with most of his decisions, impulse became action, as soon as the idea entered his head, and Dream was soon standing at the edge of the intoxicated jocks' circle.
"Penny?" he said. "What are you doing here?"
As soon as she spotted him, Penny's face lit up. "DREAM! Oh, it's so wonderful to see you! Everybody, this is Dream, who is one of my best friends. Dream, these are my new friends, that I've made just tonight. They're so cool, they even bought me the last few rounds of beer!"
Penny's newfound friends looked less than thrilled to see Dream, especially the one whose lap she was using as a seat-cushion. Their unspoken hostility towards him only intensified as he uttered his next words.
"You know she's not 21, right?" Dream said to the jock who had his arms around Penny's waist.
The jock rolled his eyes. "Jeez, listen to Dudley Do-Right. Dude, she's over 18. That's old enough. She's a big girl now. She knows how to handle her liquor. Don't ya, babe?"
Penny giggled, and finished off the remains of a jello shot that he was holding out for her. "Of course I do, Wade! Come on, Dream. Don't turn into Oscar the Grouch on me. You're all my friends! I want us all to get along!" Her perpetually sunny smile gave way to a squeal of delight, as one of Wade's other friends passed her a long-necked bottle to take a pull off of.
Wade pulled Penny to him a bit closer than before, and murmured in her ear, just loud enough for Dream to hear, "Aw, forget Clark Kent over there. You don't really wanna waste your time hangin' with a loser like him, do ya?" As Penny laughed, in response to Wade's playful tickling of her exposed midriff, Dream looked away, and began to walk off, his shoulders slumped in resignation.
Grinning at his victory, Wade decided to make the next move. "Anyway ... why don't you, and me, and the boys here, all ditch this pop stand, so's we can have a little fun of our own? You know ... a private party. What do you say?"
Penny laughed and shook her head. "Naw, Dream is cool ... even if he is acting like a big stick-in-the-mud. Besides, I like it just fine here. I don't wanna leave."
The slap was, all things considered, relatively light. It barely even stung, as his open hand struck her cheek. But it was enough, because it woke Penny up, and made her realize how much worse the next one could be.
"I'm trying to be a nice guy here," Wade said, the same benign smile still fixed on his face, even as his voice gained the threatening edge of a growl. "So don't MAKE me be a bad guy, okay?"
Penny gaped for a second, then found her voice again, speaking this time in the clear and forceful tone of a fear-sobered person. "Okay, I'm not having fun anymore. I appreciate all the beers, but I'd like to leave now, if that's alright with you all." She began struggling to break free of Wade's grip. "Dammit, Wade! I'm not kidding! Please, let me go."
Wade continued to hold Penny fast in his arms, pressing his groin against her backside as she fought to release herself. "Um, actually, NO, it's not alright." He chuckled at the gall of her resistance. "What ... you thought you were just gonna walk away, without payin' us back for the money we invested in you? You don't fucking DO that. I mean, not to Wade Leslie, anyway. So what say you stop embarrassing yourself like this, you come quietly with your new friends like a good little girl, and you let yourself have some fun tonight?"
Penny began pounding on his chest, hoping that somebody in this noisy, crowded, dimly-lit bar would notice the scene that she was trying to make. "Let me GO, Wade! This isn't funny anymore!"
"Hey!" he exclaimed, grabbing her violently by the arms. "You don't FUCKING hit me, you little skank!" He raised his hand in one swift motion, and in that split second, Penny could already tell how painful the blow would be, when it made contact with her face.
"You're gonna let her go. And then, you're gonna apologize to her for being an unforgivable dick."
Wade whipped his head around, and realized, with no small measure of surprise, that Dream had grabbed his wrist, and prevented him from striking Penny. Wade's surprise was the only reason that Dream had managed to hold back the blow in the first place, and now that Wade saw whom he was up against, he easily prised his arm out of Dream's grip.
"Oh, I'm gonna apologize?" Wade grinned, pushing Penny rudely off of his lap as he stood, causing her to land on her backside with a firm thump. "And who the FUCK, may I ask, is gonna make me apologize? Huh? Not YOU, surely?"
Wade stood a good head or more taller than Dream, and in terms of musculature, he clearly outclassed the comparatively skinny Dream. By this point, the rest of the pub's patrons had finally taken notice of the scene that had developed between Wade, Penny, and Dream, and Wade's next words echoed through the bar with crystal clarity.
"Hey, I know you," he remarked, with amusement. He turned back to his friends. "Hey, you guys remember our friend, don't ya? It's the comic shop guy!" Wade's friends slowly nodded and laughed with recognition.
"Yeah, we all know you. You're, like, the Dungeons & Dragons dork on campus, the geekazoid who's always carryin' around some stupid superhero shit or another, playin' with his little dollies -"
"Action figures," Dream interrupted him. "They're called 'action figures'."
Wade snorted. "Yeah, whatever. Like I said, your little dollies ... and isn't your mom that cheap porno slut, who dances at the Deja Vu?"
Dream's face quickly twisted into a scowl. "My mom is NOT a slut -"
Wade drew closer to Dream, just so that he could loom over him. "Yeah, that's her. She does all those porno movies, doesn't she? Hey, I'll give her props, though ... she's pretty hot, for an old whore."
Dream's next words came out in a terse, clipped tone. "Okay. After you've apologized for saying those things about Penny, you're gonna apologize for saying those things about my mom."
Wade glanced down, and noted that Dream's fists were clenched tight. "And you're just the guy to make me do it, huh? Mister candy-addict, hyper-spaz space-cadet, thinks he's a goddamn comic book superhero ... you wanna take a poke at me?" Wade jutted his jaw out, and pointed to it. "Go ahead, tough guy. Come on, take your best sho. No, really ... I'm BEGGING you, prove to me what what a tough guy you are, mister crazy-ass, sugar-scarfing freakboy. Hit me with all you got."
Wade knew that, as weak as Dream was, any punch that Dream landed on Wade would hurt Dream's hand more than it ever would Wade's face. What was more, Dream knew it, too. But he couldn't let the challenge stand. Deep down, no matter how much the tragedies of his life - and of Izzy's departure - seemed to contradict all that he had learned about life from his comic books, Dreamcatcher Kokopelli Foxglove remained too much of an idealist to let the bad guy score a moral victory.
So, he wound up, and let his fist fly.
"GAAAAAHH!!!" Wade cried out in agony, as Dream's fist collided directly his his crotch, causing him to grip himself between the legs and fall to his knees, as tears flowed from his eyes.
"Dude," Wade gasped, "You are SO fucking dead."
"Says mister collasped testicles," Dream replied, his glib banter flowing so naturally that it surprised even him. "Just think of it this way: now, your distintegrated nads have paved the way for a shining career ahead as a backup member of the Backstreet Boys."
If this really were a comic book, Dream would have been cheered on by the other patrons of the pub, as Penny rushed to his side and showered him with kisses, and Wade and his friends would have slunk out the door, while Dream was hailed as a hero.
But it wasn't a comic book.
And Dream wasn't a superhero.
He was a smartass who had gotten in a lucky shot, and didn't know the first thing about defending himself in actual fight.
Which is why it took Wade's friends all of about five seconds to gang up on Dream, and start beating the living shit out of him.
Even though the bartender and his bouncers managed to break up the fight after a couple of minutes, it was long enough for Dream to look fairly ugly, once Wade's friends had been pulled off of him, and they AND wade had been escorted rather forcefully out the door.
Once Dream was able to stand without aid, the bartender quietly guided him back to the employee washroom, so that Dream could clean the excess blood off of his bruised, battered face.
"You're not gonna kick me out, too?" Dream asked weakly, his palm pressed tenderly against the eyes that had swolled shut.
"Oh, hell no," the bartender replied, handing Dream a moist towel. "Those guys are assholes. Come in here like they OWN the freakin' place, just because they wear U o' Dub letterman's jackets, and treat everyone else like trash ... truth be told, I'm glad somebody finally stood up to 'em. Hell, I'd even buy you a beer, except that you didn't even finish the first one I served you."
Dream chuckled faintly. "I'd settle for a bottled Coke."
"Done and done," the burly man responded, clapping Dream resoundly on the shoulder, as he walked out of the washroom. Dream tried not to wince as the man's congenial pat on the back struck yet another area of his body that was sore.
After a few minutes of cleaning off the swollen, multicolored bruise that was his face, Dream heard a furtive rapping at the washroom door, and turned to see Penny duck her head in. "Alright if I join you?"
Dream nodded awkwardly, and Penny stepped inside, her arms crossed across her chest, and she gripped her own shoulders fiercely, almost as though she was trying to hold herself together.
"Dream," she nearly whispered, her once-chipper voice now a mere whimper. "I ... I want to thank you, for - well, hell, for saving me."
Dream sighed, and continued to wash his bleeding face clean. "I didn't SAVE you, Penny -"
Penny cut him off sharply. "Yes you did! You stepped in, without any thought for your own safety, and like Superman rescuing Lois Lane, you made the bad things go away. And you did it even though ... even though I acted like I total bitch towards you."
Dream turned away from the mirror, and faced Penny directly, feeling incredibly self-conscious because of his less-than-photogenic appearance. "First off, you weren't being a bitch. You were ... you were just drunk. It happens. People aren't necessarily as bright as they usually are, when they've had too much to drink - which, no offense, but I think you probably had."
He paused, as if searching for words, before continuing on. "Secondly, I did NOT save you. If I hadn't stepped in, somebody else would have, and everything would have still turned out okay."
Penny closed the gap between them, and Dream saw the unshed tears that had formed in her eyes. "Somebody else DIDN'T step in. YOU did. And the fact that you didn't HAVE to do it is what makes you a hero."
After staring numbly at Penny for a moment, Dream surprised both her and himself by being the first one to burst into tears. As he broke down into labored sobs, Penny held him tight, tears streaming down her own cheeks as she ran her fingers through his hair and whispered gentle reassurances into his ear.
Dream realized that Penny probably thought he was crying because of how much pain he was in, and while this wasn't necessarily the case, he didn't care.
In truth, he was crying, not because of the beating he had endured, but because Penny's words - her insistence that he had "saved" her - simply served to remind him that he had not been able to save Izzy.
And yet, mixed up in that despair was an almost imperceptible measure of release ... by being there in Penny's moment of need, by "saving" her from the bad things that had threatened her, a small part of him felt slightly less guilty, for the fact that he'd been able to do nothing but watch, when Izzy had gone away, right in front of his eyes.
After the majority of Dream and Penny's sobs had subsided, Penny fetched the wet towel, and gently wiped away Dream's tears, along with the remainder of blood on his face.
"You know," she commented, cleaning his wounds as best she could, "Wade may be a total fuckstick, but if you ever decide to throw on a costume and fight crime, you really should consider using one of the names he called you as your superhero nom de guerre. 'Candy-Addict Hyper-Spaz' would make a GREAT comic book title."
Dream laughed, even as his attempt to have a facial expression made the already sore muscles in his face hurt even more. "I dunno about that ... IF I were to go the Spider-Man route, and IF I had to use one of Wade's nicknames, I think I'd much rather go with 'Crazy-Ass Sugar-Freak Boy'. All that'd be missing from a name like THAT would be the Legion of Superheroes Flight Ring."
Penny giggled, and sniffled away the last of her tears. "Very well. 'Crazy Sugar Freak Boy', it is." And then, without warning, she kissed his cheek. "Thank you for saving me, you crazy sugar freak boy, you."