The Last 24 Hours (Devon/Rave/Juliet)

[NPC]

Spring had sprung and gone riot as the last few days of school ran out for the senior class at the Institute for Troubled Youth. The halls and grounds were filled with unfamiliar faces of family as the 47 students who were graduating showed them around what had been their home for the last year or more.

At breakfast and again at lunch Rave Hamilton was given a white pill he was never given before.

"I don't know, I don't care, and I'm sure you don't want to spend your last twenty four hours in Iso, so just take it without any problems, instead of making a scene in front of all these nice people, OK?" The nurse said with the stand by security officer looking as if maybe there'd be a break in his boredom today.

For seniors there were no classes; just packing, visiting, and putting their room in order to the satisfaction of the RA's so the next student could move in. In Devon and Rave's case that meant the whole room.

Rave Hamilton had a habit of chasing out every roommate placed with him one way or another. Either through his aggressively violent behavior, or his constant nightmares. Combined, living with him was a hell that most of the already unbalanced children placed in the room couldn't handle. If his father hadn't paid in advance and promised a hefty donation at the end of the boy's term the school would have bumped him out and into a mental health ward.

Devon Eckes had been placed with him on accident. In contrast to Rave's outgoing raver rocker persona Devon was almost shy seeming. His profile showed something different however, a pacifist with a background of sexual addiction and self harm rituals after sexual gratification. There had been some media attention over the trial of a teacher whom he had an involvement with.

Somehow the two had bonded, Rave got calmer and there were fewer instances where he had to go into lock-down. Sometimes the soft spoken Devon would appear with a split lip or black eye but would explain it away as having caught a stray blow when rousing his roommate from a nightmare before it got too bad.

There was some speculation about sexual abuse visited on Devon by Rave, since the boy still kept chasing out boys placed in the two empty beds, but there were no evidence to follow up on and both boys denied it.

Now though, in the early afternoon of the day before graduation Adien "Rave" Hamilton was feeling the effects of the pills kicking in as he and Devon worked on packing up and cleaning. As if he was in control of his body, but not emotionally attached to it. In fact, emotionally he was feeling quite numb and if he stopped to review the matter he'd realize that this odd effect had been creeping up on him over the last few hours. Normally now he'd been anxious, riled up, and fearing the loss of his supportive friend.

[Devon Eckes]

Devon moved his bed away from the wall and winced at the amount of crap behind it. Not the least of which were several dirty tissues and a used condom. How the room inspectors had missed that...

"You doing OK? You seem a little down today." He asked as he used a whisk broom to sweep up the mess directly into the trashcan without touching any of it. Seriously, what if that had been laying there since before he'd come? It's not like he'd ever really looked under there before.

Getting a grunt instead of response he continued to chatter, his own excitement overriding his curiosity. "I can't believe we made it out alive. I'm ready to go, but...I'll miss you and Rita and Jules and... And I'm freaked about going back home."

Devon glanced over, "You will keep in touch, right? Like we planned?"

"Hey Fuckwit." A girls voice came from the doorway. "Got anything to eat?"

A beautiful young girl with long hair in a loose French braid stood in the door; impossibly thin she'd make all the anorexics run for the bathroom just by passing them in the halls she also had Devon's sleepy eyes and a long dancers neck.

"Anya!" Devon dropped the dustpan into the bin and ran over to swing the girl around. She squealed and flung her arms around his neck and didn't let go even when he sat her back down on the floor.

"I've missed you so much!" She said, slapping him lightly on the back of the head.

"I've missed you too, hey, this is Rave, my roommate I wrote you about. Rave, this is my irritatingly wonderful little sister Anya. Where are the folks?" He peered over her shoulder.

"Getting the low down on your progress. Boring shit from people who don't know you to people who never understood you." She rolled her eyes as only a fourteen year old can; with utter contempt. "I figured anything I wanted to know, I'd ask, and anything you wanted me to know, you'd tell."

"God I love you." Devon grinned.

[Aiden "Rave" Hamilton]

Rave was packing the last bits of his clothes into one of two bags he'd come with a year ago but he packed slow. Everything seemed so slow, like nothing mattered for some reason. Everything seemed heavy even though he knew he was happy to get out of the damned institute.

Even Devon's chattering and babbling about various stuff seemed like nothing but a background noise he didn't really bother to listen to. He looked up to meet his friend's eyes when he asked about staying in contact.

"suah, no prob... got yoah numbah in my cell now"

He said with a monotone voice and held up his phone for a few seconds before sticking it back into his pocket and resumed what he was doing just as a girl squealed at the door and threw herself in Devon's arms.

Rave didn't really think of it much and barely looked up to see their hug and chatter, no one would come for him though. Everybody were in England as far as he knew and that was basically what he liked. He missed his little sister of course but that was the only one since his Grandfather had passed a year ago but he was still mourning him deep inside. The little good his mother had in her heart had come from him, Rave was sure.

Suddenly he heard his name and blinked before looking up at Devon who now stood facing him and introducing him to his little sister Anya.

"Yo, wha's up gi'l?"

He said with his ringing British while looking at her, but still spoke with a monotone voice while making half an attempt of a salute before he placed the last t-shirt in the bag and rose to get his guitars off the wall. Somehow it felt like he was in someone else's body looking out, pulling strings to move the body the way he wanted it to even though it felt like he moved in slow motion.

[NPC]

The couple who entered were polar opposites and stood with a space between them. She was tall, with a dancers graceful figure, but held stiffly. Anya had obviously got her coloring and stature from her. But the man was easy going in his movements with the sleepy eyes both his children had inherited and Devon's darker tone of skin and thick dark wavy hair, carefully groomed into place. They both wore suits, though her's was stylish and higher quality than his.

With them was Raver's therapist, which would have made him instantly wary if he wasn't feeling so loggy.

"Devon, why don't you show your parents the grounds before they have to leave the property?" Dr. Miller suggested. "All guests have to leave in ninety minutes, and I thought you might like to show them the horses before they have to go."

She turned to Rave. "Adien, will you stay." Although phased like a question, it wasn't, and both boys knew it.

[Devon Eckes]

Devon had none of the warmth for his parents, nor they for him, that he had for his sister.

"Mother, Dad," He nodded from where he stood with his arm around his sisters waist. "This is Rave, my roommate."

They seemed disinterested in the introduction though the father nodded and grinned. He was, apparently, a man who grinned a lot from the wrinkles around the corners of his face.

"Well, let's get this tour on the road," Said Mr. Eckes, clapping his hands together. "Wouldn't want to be locked up here tonight!"

"Yeeeah, like Devvie hasn't been for the last year." Anya said dryly.

Devon gave her a squeeze and a warning look and she sipped a note into his back pocket while looking bland and innocent. "Catch you later, Rave." He said as they left, Mrs. Eckes carefully not touching anything and Mr. Eckes dropping his arm around his daughters shoulders making her stiffen and pull away.

[Aiden "Rave" Hamilton]

Rave glanced back to the door with a glaze on his eyes when he heard someone else enter the room. He started to feel a bit claustrophobic in here even though he was too numb to care.

"Lots of folks in 'ere ain't it..?"

He muttered and took the electric guitar down and placed in its casing just as he realized that his therapist was there and looked up at the door with a slight frown.

"it's Rave.."

He muttered with a roll of his eyes. He just hated when they called him his real name and usually it would have put him in a ticked mood already but somehow he just didn't seem to bother with it.

"yeah... locked up here would be bad now wouldn't it.."

Rave remarked and rose an eyebrow at Mr.Eckes at the door just for the hell of it. Even though he felt numb inside and that he didn't care either or, he could still give sly remarks even though he didn't really have his witty face on.

He sunk down on the bed again and leaned his shoulder blades and head on the wall while his back was half way resting on the bed.

"Yeah... dunn go withou't sayin' "

He said with a sudden spin to his head, making him a bit more clear once it was over but he still felt slow in mind, only more carefree to the world and like nothing could bother him that normally would have him waving fists at anyone who got too close.

[NPC]

Dr. Miller stood in the doorway watching the other family leave. When they were well and gone she crossed the room to Adien.

"How are you feeling with the medication?" She asked, looking at him closely. "Any affects? Dizziness, shortness of breath? You're only going to be on it today, for a special visitor."

She moved back to the doorway and singled someone from the opposite end of the hallway. "He's only here today, he won't be here tomorrow. But he wanted to speak to you privately. I'll be in the hallway, just call if you need anything." She stepped out, spoke quietly to someone about keeping a safe distance and then Richard Hamilton entered the room. He wore a black suit coat over a black shirt. His hair had gotten disheveled by the breeze outside and Rave noticed it had gotten more silver since the last time he'd seen him.

"Adien." Richard said in his gravely accented voice, which was odd that it would sound accented since it was the sound of home, as he sat at the table fifteen feet from where Rave sat on the bed. "I flew over specifically to speak to you, to see you today. So, let's not make this too difficult and it will be over quickly."

The entire time he spoke his eyes flickered up and down his son, weighing him, and always finding him wanting in some way. "I'm not sure if your mother contacted you or not, but, we divorced. She's living in Italy now. On a vineyard. With some Italian." He said distastefully, though it was unsure whom the distaste was for; the woman or the man she was now living with.

"I met someone else, a widow, with two small sons." His eyes looked downward at his hands. "I didn't want to make the same mistakes I made with you, so, I started therapy. It's not easy, digging up the past, Adien. Laying it out. And not just our past, but...the past before you were even born." He looked up and he licked his kips nervously, a touch of fear in his eyes, but again, ambiguous in where it came from or where it was directed.

"It's part of my therapy I be here." He said in the same tone of voice. "The therapist says that I need to tell you that what happened to you, happened to me, by my father. It's a cycle, he started. It's why I left Ireland. But I brought it with me, in my heart, stained into my soul.

"I almost killed you once." He added, conversationally. "I thought I had changed, I worked so hard to be a success. Marry the right woman...then you were born and I was so proud, so proud." He seemed wistful. "But then, about the time you were learning to walk, 18 months or so, I felt..." He made a claw motion to his chest. "I felt bad things rising up in me. I took the pillow and I put it over your face. I didn't want either of us to go through all of that." He sighed heavily. "I didn't want to be my father, I didn't want you to be the betrayed son. I was trying to save both of us...But your mother came in. She never knew."

He adjusted the watch on his wrist, looking away for longer than needed. "I don't know if you remember, but, the...hitting didn't start until you were older. The more you looked like him, the more I wanted to lash out. It wasn't every really you...the therapist says...It was him. You look too much like him, and it didn't help that your mother insisted on naming you after him."

Again the sigh, and he looked up. "So now, I think it's best if we stay away from each other. Forever." He pulled out an envelope. "I've set up a branch of Hamilton here, one employee, you. To scout sites and such. You'll stay in the states on a work visa, get paid, have an expense account. But, I don't ever want to hear about you, or from you again. I don't think it would be good for either one of us."

He stood and turned toward the door, leaving the packet on the table, at the doorway he turned back. "Adien, don't fuck this up. I'm not well enough yet not to hunt you down and make you pay in shit and blood, and enjoy it. So, pushing me, is not an option. Take this chance, and run with it, but don't abuse it."

With that warning he left, leaving only the smell of his aftershave behind. In the hallway he paused by Dr. Miller and reached again into his jacket for a slimmer envelope.

"This is the donation we discussed when I enrolled him here. I trust his records will be 'lost' as requested?"

"Of course." Dr. Miller nodded.

"Good." He said stiffly, glancing back to the open doorway.

[Aiden "Rave" Hamilton]

"Wha' do yoah care about 'ow I feel..."

He muttered but nodded somewhat at the question of the effects but he didn't look at her. He avoided eye contact by looking out the window but he couldn't help but quirk a brow at what she said. Special visitor?

Rave glanced to the door when she went there to talk to someone and to his surprise. his dad walked into the room! The very person that had caused him have nightmares every night due to the abuse he'd been through, the very person that had placed every single scar on his back during his life. Rave's eyes darkened while looking at him with pure disgust. Had this been anywhere else and had he been clear in mind and not doped up on some medication he didn't even know the name of, he'd probably jumped the fucker and hit him 'til he blead... or worse.

"Name's Rave..."

He protested with the same monotone voice as before when his dad spoke his birth name. He didn't like either his grandfather or his father but he just couldn't muster up to actually bitch that much so he remained sitting the way he did, his right hand on his belt he'd just gotten back from confiscation.

"'ow nice of yoah.. dunn care wha' yoah do, just stay away from me.."

He muttered, flew there only for him? Yeah, right. What was the real reason? ... He was getting rid of him the only way he knew how to, by buying him, to silence him and make him stay away.

"...vinyard? ... suits 'er well, she can ge' as drunk as she wants then...tha's yoah fault yoah know.. 'er drinkin'. She 'eard us but nevah did anythin to stop yoah... I 'ate yoah both.."

He said and resumed to look out the window. He blinked and tried to get the haze away from his mind but without luck. Mentally he was beating the man before him into a pulp but his body just wouldn't do what he wanted it to do, nor do it fast enough to have a sporting chance. Richard was quite a big guy in all ways, not only tall.

"well... poor yoah then... guess yoah know 'ow I feel to be fo'sed to sit 'ere with yoah, doped up with some shit so yoah'd dare to come into the room... yoah know I'd beat yoah shitless if I could..."

He said and turned to look directly into the eyes of his father and with nothing but pure disgust and honesty in his eyes. How could this man sit here with as much as remorse if he'd been through this himself? He knew how degrading it was, how disgusted you felt with yourself every single day and yet... he did the same to his own son? No. Rave'd never forgive a monster like this.

"Tch... yeah... wha' evah..."

He spat even though he couldn't move much, he could still show some attitude. Rave looked down on the table and the envelope lying there. So, that's the way it was going to be huh? Buying his own son out of England? When his dad rose, he followed him with his eyes, glaring at his back and wished he could drop dead where he stood but, that was not the case.

"Tha's right.. just buy the shame ou' of the countreh... An' fo' yoah info'mation.. I fuck wha' evah I wanta fuck... you've obviously done the same..."

He said, referring to his own abuse of course. Once his father left, he worked up the strength to be able to sit up and reach for the envelope on the table. It felt like forever before he managed to get it open, things still moved in slow motion.