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splendidlyimperfect · 5 years

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Sting's entire life changed when he was eleven years old and his best friend Rogue told a secret that he'd promised to keep. Taken away from the father who abused him and the best friend who'd tried to save him, Sting tried to start a new life with his uncle. But the trauma wasn't easy to escape, and eventually Sting turned to drinking to forget the things that hurt.

Now he's an adult, and he hasn't been sober in years. But when drinking nearly kills him and a near-stranger saves his life, Sting has a chance to turn his life around, and maybe become the man that Rogue deserves to love.

Chapter Summary: Sting's trying to move on with his life, but he can't stop wondering why his dad hurt him.

Chapters (8/?): 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 Rating: Mature Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Relationships: Rogue Cheney/Sting Eucliffe, Natsu Dragneel/Gray Fullbuster, Natsu Dragneel & Sting Eucliffe, Sting Eucliffe & Weisslogia Characters: Sting Eucliffe, Natsu Dragneel, Rogue Cheney, Gray Fullbuster, Weisslogia (Fairy Tail) Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Past Child Abuse, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Trans Character, Trans Sting, Friendship, Childhood Friends, Sting-focused story, Sting is a disaster, Natsu's a great friend, Rogue tries to do what's right, Tumblr: FTLGBTales Series: Part 2 of i'm still standing

**TW for flashback to physical abuse

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frac·ture | \ ˈfrak-chər noun :  the act or process of breaking or the state of being broken

vi spring age thirteen

A few weeks into the summer after grade eight, Sting wakes up to shouting.

He yawns, sitting up and rubbing his face as he tries to pick out who is saying what. It sounds like Uncle Wes, but Sting’s never heard him yell before, so it seems unlikely. Sting quickly pulls on a sweater, then cracks the door open and peeks down the stairs.

It is Uncle Wes. He’s standing in the front entrance, talking who whoever is outside. He’s not yelling anymore, but Sting can still make out what he’s saying.

“Get out,” Uncle Wes says. His voice is hard and fierce in a way Sting’s never heard before. “I don’t know what the hell you think you’re doing.” There’s a pause, and he adds, “I don’t care if you’re my brother.”

Sting freezes, fingers wrapped around the banister as the words slowly sink in. He’s about to take a step forward when the voice on the other side of the door gets louder.

“Just lemme see her.”

Sting’s heart stops and he can’t breathe because the last time he heard that voice everything was broken, and his head hurt and he couldn’t stop crying and—

“You lost that right a long time ago,” Uncle Wes growls. “You know you’re not allowed to be here. Get out.”

Everything’s going blurry and Sting sits down hard on the top step, shaking as the world falls away around him. He tries to ground himself – that’s what his therapist keeps saying, but every single thing she’s ever told him slips away as he struggles to keep breathing.

“I’m her fath—”

“You are nothing,” Uncle Wes says. There’s a loud bang and the sound of splintered wood, and Sting bites back a terrified scream, wrapping his arms around his legs and pressing his forehead to his knees.

Go away, he thinks desperately, wishing he were brave enough to open his eyes. Please don’t hurt me. I’ll be good. I’ll be quiet. Please.

“Just let me—”

“I told you to get out.” Uncle Wes’ voice is the quiet kind of angry that leaves Sting with a low, thrumming panic in his chest. His arms ache where he’s digging his fingernails into the skin, and the pain is the only real thing right now. “I will never let you hurt him again. Ever.”

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“Him? I didn’t—”

“Save your bullshit for your parole officer,” Uncle Wes growls. “You might have some people fooled, but I was the one who picked him up from the hospital. I know what you did, and don’t you dare think for one goddamned second that I’m ever going to let you anywhere near my nephew.”

When the other voice start shouting, the tiny part of Sting that’s been holding onto reality snaps, and he’s eleven again, terrified and hiding.

Please, he thinks desperately as tears slip down his cheeks. He wants Kelly to find him and hug him and tell him it’s going to be okay.

Sting’s not sure how much time passes – the shouting stops and the door slams, and after that he doesn’t listen. Eventually, he hears someone coming up the stairs and he presses himself against the wall, heart slamming against his chest so hard that he can’t breathe. Something touches his arm and he flinches, bringing his hand up to cover his face.

“It’s just me,” a gentle voice says, and Sting hears the stair creak as Uncle Wes settles down next to him. “I’m so sorry, he’s gone now. Are you okay? ”

Sting shakes his head, trying to stop shaking – it’s like every piece of him is trying to escape in different directions. He holds his breath and grinds his teeth and bites the inside of his lip, but none of it works. Eventually he peeks up at Uncle Wes, who gives Sting a sad smile and opens his arms.

Sting hesitates for only a second before accepting the hug. “You’re safe now,” Uncle Wes murmurs as Sting cries against his shoulder, curling up against his chest. “I’m so sorry. He’s not allowed to be here.”

“Wh-why…” Sting can’t make words yet, just focuses on the gentle weight of Uncle Wes’ hand on his arm. “He’s… I…”

“I’m sorry,” Uncle Wes says again, kissing the top of Sting’s head. “He’s not in jail anymore, but he has someone called a probation officer that makes sure he follows the rules. One of those rules is that he’s not allowed to come near you, and he’s going to get in trouble for being here.”

Sting rubs his face with the back of his hand as the pounding in his chest starts to come back to normal. He lets out a shaky breath, then asks, “why was he here?”

It’s not the question he expected to ask, but the fear in his chest is slowly shifting into a barbed, burning anger.

“I’m not sure,” Uncle Wes admits, pulling back and brushing Sting’s hair out of his eyes. “But that doesn’t matter, he can’t come here, and he can’t see you.”

Sting rubs his face and pulls away from Uncle Wes. His skin feels raw, stretched over the wrong body, everything sharp and aching.

“I wanna be alone,” he says quietly. Uncle Wes nods, standing up and reaching out to help Sting up. Sting stares at the outstretched hand, then shakes his head and pushes himself to his feet.

“I’ll come check on you in a little bit,” Uncle Wes says, taking a step back down the stairs. “Maybe we can get pizza tonight?”

Sting doesn’t say anything, just rubs his arms and heads back down the hallway to his room. His mind is a jumbled mess, fear warring with a sudden, dangerous fury that sparks and burns through him.

He spends the rest of the weekend hiding in his bedroom. Uncle Wes tries to coax him out a few times with offers of pizza and movies, but Sting just shakes his head, curling up on the bed and staring at the wallpaper.

His dad isn’t in jail anymore.

Uncle Wes had talked to him about it a few weeks ago. He’d tried to explain things like plea bargains and sentencing, but it had all gone over Sting’s head. In the end, all that had mattered was that Sting’s dad knew the right kind of people, and even the scar on Sting’s forehead wasn’t enough to keep him away.

Let me talk to my daughter.

Sting can’t remember the last thing his dad said to him. Everything about that day is hazy – whenever his therapist asks about it, all Sting can feel is pain and nausea and a low, thrumming sense of terror. He knows that his dad yelled and swore when the police came, but before, when he’d hurt Sting, he’d been quiet.

The silence had been cold and terrifying, and when Sting closes his eyes and forces himself to try and remember, he nearly throws up. It’s not like a memory in movies – there’s no timeline to it, no clear image of what happened. Instead it’s pieces. Bits of things he’s pushed away for so long.

The front door clicking shut. Dad’s cold, dark eyes. Sunlight glinting off the broken glass. Trying so hard to be quiet. Dad’s hand in his hair. His head hitting the coffee table. Bright sparks of pain. The TV screen shattering. Fingers tight around his wrist. Heart rabbit-thumping as he hid in the closet, trying to be small, trying to be quiet, trying to be good.

Sting growls in frustration and sits up, throwing his pillow across the room. It knocks his pile of books to the floor, and Sting stares at them, picturing tearing out all the pages and ripping the covers to pieces.

He wants to break something like his dad broke him.

Instead he grabs his other pillow, pressing it against his face while he screams. The anger burns through him, hot and jagged, and no matter how many tears soak the fabric, it won’t go away.

Why? The word circles through his head, repeating over and over until it overwhelms him and he punches the mattress. Why did you hurt me, why didn’t you love me, why wasn’t I enough, why, why, why?

Sting tosses the pillow aside and flops back onto the mattress, staring up at the ceiling as something determined settles into his chest. His dad is terrifying, but he’s the only one with answers, and Sting finally has a chance to find out.

When Uncle Wes goes to sleep, Sting slips out of his room and creeps down to the kitchen. Uncle Wes’ phone is sitting on the counter charging, and Sting stares at it for a long time before picking it up and opening Uncle Wes’ contact list. He scrolls through it, searching for his dad’s name. He doesn’t expect to find it – Uncle Wes hasn’t talked to Sting’s dad since he went to jail, and even before that. But his number is saved there, and Sting clicks on it before he can change his mind.

He doesn’t have time to feel afraid because his dad picks up after the first ring and growls, “thought you told me to fuck off.”

It feels like being slapped. Everything in Sting tenses and he nearly hangs up.

“What do you want, Wes?” his dad asks.

Sting sucks in a shaky breath, then whispers, “dad?”

There’s a long silence on the other end of the phone. Sting’s convinced that his dad can hear his heart pounding – it’s slamming against his chest so hard he can barely breathe. He sinks down to the ground, pulling his knees to his chest and pinching the back of his arm to keep himself from crying.

“Abbey?” his dad says eventually.

“Yeah,” Sting says quietly, even though he hasn’t heard that name in over a year. He looks over at the stairs, listening carefully for any movement from Uncle Wes, but the only sound in the house is the dishwasher running.

“Does Wes know you’re calling me?”

Sting shakes his head. “No,” he says. “He said you weren’t allowed to see me.”

His dad sighs, and Sting can picture him rubbing the bridge of his nose and staring at the ground with his jaw tense and lines on his forehead. “I’m not,” his dad says eventually. “But I want to.”

The nausea comes back immediately, filling Sting’s stomach with bile that he can taste at the back of his throat. He forces himself to say, “me too.”

“Can you come to the park?” his dad asks, and it takes Sting a second to realize that he’s talking about the park next to their old home. Crocus is over two hours away by bus, but Sting knows where Uncle Wes’ wallet is, and he can walk to the stop from their house.

“Yeah,” he says. He presses his forehead against his knees. Part of him thinks he should just ask his dad now, on the phone, but Sting needs to see his face when he answers the question. Sting just needs to know. If he hurries, he can make it there and back to the house before Uncle Wes wakes up.

“Okay,” his dad says. His voice is soft, suddenly, and Sting clutches the phone tighter to keep his hand from trembling.

“I’ll be there in a couple hours,” he says, staring out the window at the cloudy, moonless sky. “See you soon.”

As soon as he hangs up the phone, Sting runs to the bathroom and throws up. He shivers, spitting the taste out of his mouth and wiping away the sweat on his face with the sleeve of his hoodie. He can’t stop shaking, can’t stop thinking about being eleven and throwing up in the closet because his head hurt so badly he could barely see.

Eventually he picks himself up off the floor and runs the tap, splashing his face and rinsing out his mouth. Then he stares at himself in the mirror for a long time. Eventually he combs his hair to cover his scar, then takes a deep breath and leaves for the bus stop.

Sting makes it to the park without throwing up again. He shoves his hands deep in his pockets to keep them from shaking, and every time he closes his eyes and opens them again, the lights around him blur. It’s like he’s floating behind everything; a ghost of someone who isn’t afraid.

He drags the terrified, furious pieces of himself over the sidewalk cracks, across the dirty asphalt and the plants growing through the concrete. When he sees the bench where he used to meet Rogue in the mornings on the way to school, something cracks in Sting’s chest and he starts to cry, desperately wiping at his eyes with the sleeves of his sweater.

He can’t cry. Not now. Right now, he needs to be brave, because he needs to know why.

A hand drops onto Sting’s shoulder and he pulls away quickly, spinning around and stumbling backward as his heart pounds against his ribs. It takes him a second to realize that the hand is attached to a person, and that the person is his father.

“Abbey?”

His dad looks the same. Nothing’s changed in the last three years except the graying stubble on his chin. Sting stares at him, a rush of anger flooding through him as all the moments he’s been trying to avoid catch up to him.

“I…” Sting tries to say something, but he can’t quite breathe around the mix of fury and fear. When his dad takes a step toward him, Sting scrambles backward, nearly tripping over a crack in the sidewalk, and catches himself on the arm of the park bench. His dad’s movements are uncoordinated, and it takes Sting a second to realize that he smells like beer.

Everything Sting had planned to say is instantly gone, determined resentment replaced by terror, and instead he whispers, “I’m sorry,” because that’s all he’s ever said to his father. I’m sorry, I’ll be good, I’ll be quiet, I promise.

“His nephew,” Sting’s dad says softly, and his eyes widen as he finally puts the pieces together. “You’re a…”

“Please,” Sting begs, digging his fingernails into his palms as he takes short, shallow breaths. All he wants to know is why. “I won’t… I didn’t do anything wr-wrong, I was trying to be quiet and I don’t understand why you…”

“You think you’re a boy,” his dad says, ignoring the way Sting’s stumbling over his words. He reaches out for Sting’s arm and Sting pushes himself further back toward the bench, but his father’s fingers close around his wrist. Suddenly Sting is six and crying, eight and hiding, nine and begging, eleven and not knowing what he did wrong.

“I…”

“What the hell has he been doing with you?”

“Nothing,” Sting says, trying to keep his voice steady as he tugs at his dad’s grip. “Let go of me.”

His father’s face is cold, and he tightens his grip on Sting’s wrist. Shadows play across his cheeks from the dim light of the streetlamps, making him look sharp and dangerous. Now that he’s closer, it’s clear that he’s been drinking – his eyes are red and the look he’s giving Sting makes the scar on his forehead hurt.

“Why?” Sting asks, every muscle in his body tense as he tries not to pull away. If he fights back, it’ll just be worse.

“Why what?” his dad mutters, and Sting can’t stop crying.

“You…” Sting swallows, then rubs at his face with the sleeve of his hoodie, trying to keep the tears from spilling down his cheeks. “I jus —”

“Stop it,” his dad snaps, tightening his grip on Sting’s wrist until it hurts. It always hurts. “You’re so goddamn emotional. Always crying about stupid shit.”

grow up

stop crying

don’t be such a baby

“I’m n-not—” Sting starts, but his dad interrupts, yanking him forward and hissing, “Shut up.”

Sting squeezes his eyes shut and turns his head, but the blow he’s expecting never comes. Instead, the grip on his wrist loosens and he stumbles, hitting the back of his legs against the park bench. When he looks up, a police officer is standing there, one hand on his dad’s shoulder.

“Is everything okay here?” she asks, and for a second Sting thinks it’s Kelly. A desperate part of him wants to hide behind her, but then he realizes that it’s not her, and he’s not supposed to be here, and his dad looks like he’s going to run.

Sting’s breath catches as he stares at his dad, and the realization settles in his chest, cold and sharp – there is no reason. There is no why. His dad didn’t hurt him because he was too loud, or because he didn’t do the dishes, or because he didn’t come home on time.

There is no why, and it’s never going to change.

“We’re fine,” his dad growls at the same time that Sting whispers, “Help.”

#fairy tail #ftlgbtales #ftlgbtfics #nbm2019 #stingue #sting eucliffe #rogue cheney #trans character #fanfic #new chapter #update #tw: abuse #my fic

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