[CLOSED] we die young.

[mathieu 'mat' darren blank]

"I like you here, though. Not dead. At least I can hear your voice here. At least I can see you. I can't touch you or hug you but I can see you." He looked down at the picture again, wondering if Dylan had changed at all. All he could see was the Dylan in the picture. Only he looked more sad.

"What? Dylan.." He felt Dylan's hand pass through his leg like a gust of wind when someone runs past, or you open the door in the midst of a storm. "You really haven't coped with this well, have you?" He looked over at him, wishing so bad he could lean over and kiss him, wrap his arms tightly around him and just show him how much he loved him. That time didn't change that.

"Dyl, whoever said 'Time heals all wounds' was a fucking idiot. Because it doesn't.. You change and you have to get used to the new person you've become. But my Dylan would have never purposely hurt his brother.. Do you do it because it's some way to just.. let out everything you bottled up? Or do you do it because you're mad at me for leaving?" He turned the picture over, reading the writing on the back.

[dylan flambyte parker]

"I don't know why I do it," He rasped. No, he hadn't coped well at all. "I just-...I'm so confused Mat... I can't fucking look at him and not want him to feel pain. You know how he was, slow, never understanding anything, innocent... maybe I loathe him for I, I don't know... I almost fucking killed him the other night. I-...I hurt him real bad now...my entire family is afraid of me, Chrystian included." He lifted his hand back up, rubbing at his face warily.

"It comes so easy, too, watching him hurt...I m-make him cut himself. I-I've got to the point of raping him..." He turned away, ashamed of admitting these things. "My-...it haunts me every damned night..."

[mathieu 'mat' darren blank]

"Dylan, there's something wrong with him.. That doesn't mean he-.. He can't help it.. He's like.. a little innocent kid. He doesn't know what being fucked up is.." He couldn't imagine Dylan -his Dylan- raping his little brother. He just couldn't. Probably because the Dylan he saw was still that Dylan who was at the shows, the Dylan who didn't out right hate his brother. He wondered if Devon understood what Dylan did to him, if the boy knew that his brother was forcing on him was something that was supposed to be between two people in love. 'Supposed to be me and Dylan..' He thought, turning the picture back over to see his face.

"I guess I get it.." He mumbled after awhile, still looking down at that picture. It was the only thing that got him by. "I mean, why you would be like, jealous of him. He didn't see his boyfriend go up in flames because some idiot didn't know where a mic went. He probably didn't even understand when you came home early, and I never came back.. He probably never even wondered where I went. 'Hey, Mat's gone.'" He sighed, rubbing the side of his head.

[dylan flambyte parker]

Dylan stared down at the sand brokenly as he listened, sifting sand through his fingers. "He wonders," He rasped. "He asked about you..last time he did I told him to shut the fuck up, struck him across the face and locked him in his room." He swallowed. "He finally ran off, is living with someone else, has a boyfriend in the hospital.." He shrugged. "He tries avoiding coming home now."

Licking at dry feeling lips he sighed shakily. "I hate myself so much now, Mat," He rasped, looking over at him brokenly.

[mathieu 'mat' darren blank]

"Devon has a boyfriend now? Maybe I should go see him.. But I guess I'd see why he'd have a boy and not a girl. You had a boyfriend, and your dad got remarried. I just guess I figured he would like.. All the people on TV and stuff are straight. I thought he'd get a girl, you know? He's not bad looking. Just.. off." He put the picture in his pocket again, a sigh rolling off his lips.

"You might hate you, but I still love you. And that's never going to change." He laid back on the sand, rubbing at his permanently marked eyes. The X's over them always got him weird looks. 'Everyday's fucking Halloween, faggot?' He had been asked more than once. He looked over at Dylan, chewing on his lip ring. "I'll love you until you die. And then I'll continue to love you.." He played with the wedding band on his finger. "You know when you're gay, it goes on the right hand, right? It's stuck all wrong on my left hand."

[dylan flambyte parker]

Dylan bit at his lip, shrugging. "His first kiss was a girl I think, she was trying to show him what it was like. Guess he didn't like it." He bit at his lip some. "You can go, but I won't go with you." He looked away.

He let out a shaky breath at the next words. "Sorry you're stuck loving an idiot like me for eternity," He mumbled bitterly. The ghost of a smile touched his lips at the next comment however. He couldn't help it, that moment replaying over in his mind. "I was nervous," He complained. "I was only sixteen, not my fault..." His seventeenth birthday celebrated on that tour...a month and a few days before the home show...before everything in his life spiraled.

[mathieu 'mat' darren blank]

Mat smiled. "But you were my idiot. I was with you for what? Like, two years? You have always been an idiot. But it never made me stop loving you." He wiggled his hips, back and forth.

"I never took it off. You put it there and I never took it off. I think I still have sharpie on me from the night before the show, when everyone got so fucking wasted, and you were like 'MATY CAKES MATY CAKES' and you drew like, a lopsided penguin or some shit." He pulled up his shirt, laughing a bit. "And I think that's your name. Maybe. Unless Britt did that." He played with his lip ring, looking up at Devon. He couldn't help thinking the same thing he thought every time he saw him- 'that's really mine?' But he wasn't his anymore.

"What about you? Do you have a boy toy?" He asked, blowing his hair out of his face.

[dylan flambyte parker]

Dylan laghed, surprising himself withthe action. The same Mat..but he couldn't touch him... The hurt lingered. "I don't know what the hell it was," He complained. "Too many booze."

He hesitated at the next question, gazing at him. "I...metthis guy. He's like, half deaf, his step mom poisoned him. I..I think I like him...but it's like, the different me liking him, like I can never have him the same I had you. It's confusing..."

[mathieu 'mat' darren blank]

Mat wasn't surprised that he liked someone, but surprised by the fact he hesitated about it. "I'm dead, babe. I want you to be with someone who's alive. Always remember me, but don't let it stop you." He looked up at him, wondering what his mouth tasted like now. 'Coffee? Alcohol? Toothpaste?' He didn't know, and he never would.

"Is he cute? What's he look like?" He asked, smiling up at him. He knew deep down, he would always want Dylan. But he wanted him to be happy now, to find someone who was alive, someone he could kiss and hug and love and that would be there the next day. Someone who didn't go blowing up stages.

"You don't have to like him like me. Like him like him. Like.. him.." He drew his brows together, having obviously confused himself.

[dylan flambyte parker]

Dylan bit his lip. "He has hair about here," He made a gesture, pausing to rub at his nose. "Cute smile when he uses it. He stutters when he talks cos his lungs. But we both know sign language, so it works..." He had picked up on a lot of things about Nash he realized.

Another smile crossed his lips, and he caught himself nearly trying to touch Mat again, dropped his hand. It was rough. "Don't confuse yourself Maty," He huffed playfully.