Observe

You suppose you've always enjoyed observing your surroundings, however, these days you tend to observe a lot more than you usually would. You wouldn't really call it an interest, more like a habit really. You take in as much detail as you can when observing stuff, especially people. More specifically the people you hang around.

You're standing in your room, eyes scanning along as you look around. Your bed is unmade which isn't much of a surprise really, you are a teenager after all.

There are a few shirts scattered around, Bro hasn't bothered to check your room for laundry, not that you blame him. You really should start learning how to do your own laundry sometime.

Your collection of dead stuff has remained untouched for a shit ton of time now, you're not sure if you're really that interested in them anymore, maybe it's time to throw them out.

Your turntables are collecting dust in the corner, you don't use your turntables anymore. You miss it a lot.

God this room needs to be cleaned.

– – –

You observe Bro a lot.

You prefer observing rather than talking, it's much easier to find out things about someone by observing instead of asking questions they most likely won't even respond in the first place. So you don't mind staying silent.

You notice a lot of details about bro that you never noticed before. Like the way he always uses the left side of the stove when cooking, or how he tends to whistle whenever he's nervous. It's kind of funny.

Bro sighs a lot. You're not sure if it's something he's always done without you noticing or if he recently picked up that habit.

He doesn't eat breakfast despite constantly nagging you if you dare to even think of skipping breakfast, that hypocritical bastard. Instead, he spends his mornings preparing his lunch before heading outside to his part time job.

You don't really see the point with an extra job considering how much he earns on the goddamn puppet site of his.

You suppose he just wants something to put his mind off of things.

– – –

You don't find it as amusing to observe school. School is as boring as it ever has been and it doesn't seem like it's going to change anytime soon. You don't pay much attention in class, it's not like it really matters anyway.

You decided to lay out some sick beats in English class using your hands as your drumsticks and your table as the drum set. Miss Calfrey however, didn't pay you any attention so you eventually stopped out of boredom. What's the point of sharing your sick fires if nobody pays enough attention to appreciate them anyway?

Your music teacher is finally back from his sudden vacation, thank fucking heavens for that. He's the only reasonable teacher around here and you honestly don't see how you could survive this place without him keeping you somewhat sane.

You've always enjoyed talking to your music teacher. You would stay after class and just chat with him about anything that would cross your mind at the moment. On some rare occasions you might even lay out some of your raps for him. He'd share his honest opinion on your choice of words before trying it out himself and failing so miserably not even you could hold yourself from laughing.

God you love that teacher.

You don't stay after class to talk to him though. It's been a long time since the two of you last spoke after class. If you remember correctly, the last thing you spoke about was the importance of always having a secret stack of Mac n' Cheese around in case of any sort of emergency. He didn't quite see how Mac n' Cheese would help in a life threatening situation but he agreed when you threatened to rap about it. In the end he respected your opinion and promised he'd stop by the store to buy some Mac n' Cheese to your much appreciated delight.

He's been in a really shitty mood lately, you're starting to think that maybe his vacation wasn't long enough.

– – –

Jade seems to have gained some sudden adventure kink of some shit like that. She's hardly ever online on pesterchum anymore and when she is she talks nonstop about the great adventures shes been having asking everyone to join her sometime.

You suppose she's either trying to follow her grandfather's footsteps or she's using it as some form of distraction to keep her thoughts in order. You've considered messaging her about it but you have a strong feeling she wouldn't reply anyway.

You're worried she's going to end up being too careless and hurt herself really bad. But then again it's Jade fucking Harley we're talking about. She usually knows what she's doing so she should be fine. Right?

Sometimes you join her on her adventures, mostly just to see what exactly she's doing. It's also kind of a way for you to assure yourself that she's doing okay. You observe the way she swings around, you try not to laugh or make a remark whenever she makes that godawful impression of a Tarzan yell. You observe the way she climbs trees, the fearless way she acts in any sort of danger. She sure does have all her shit together in combat and it does make you feel a bit safer around her.

It doesn't stop you from worrying though.

When she does go online she either never use smileys or she uses far too many to be healthy. It worries you a lot sometimes but you already know she won't talk about it. John and Rose have already asked her about it several times and she waves it off each time.

As long as she stays safe you don't see her adventure kink too bad though. She seems to be having fun and damn if she didn't deserve that.

So you try not to worry about it too much.

– – –

John have been spending a lot of time with his dad lately. They go to the movie theater at least once a week, he follows him whenever he's going to the grocery store, they go for random car rides every now and then, hell, he even bake cakes together with him.

It's quite surprising but you're glad he seems to be getting a lot closer with his dad. Besides, you always enjoyed Mr Egbert's company, he's an okay dude. Not a cool dude, but an okay dude. You've always respected him and tried your hardest to watch your language when you're at John's place.

John isn't as talkative as he used to be anymore, it does worry you a bit but his dad seems to notice and tries engaging him in all kind of social stuff. Sometimes in public, sometimes just the two of them. Besides, it's not like he locks himself in his room and refuse to talk to anyone.

Mr Egbert will occasionally prank him in various ways as an attempt to put his son into a better mood whenever he notices his soon being down.

John responds with angry shouts most of the times but you swear you can always hint the smile that he tries so hard not to show.

Most of the time John will however seek revenge and prank him back even harder. You've never really understood their love for pranks.

You guess it's an Egbert thing.

– – –

Second to Bro, you think you enjoy observing Rose the most. It's probably because of the whole deal she has with psychoanalyzing people. You feel as if you're secretly giving her the same treatment somehow.

You don't talk when you observe people. So you don't talk now either. Instead you sit on her bed while observing her movements.

She spends most of her time alone in her room engaging herself into her various interests as she always have. It's surprisingly nice to just watch her write her creepy wizard fanfiction, or playing on her violin.

She often plays these sad tunes, you think they're beautiful. You really enjoy listening to her play.

You bet the two of you could combine her violin with your turntable to create the sickest music to ever face this place called earth. Hell, maybe even Harley and Egbert could join, you could form a band and all that shit you see in those teenage movies all the time.

Shit would be hella awesome.

You quietly observe her as she sits in her chair, she's knitting a new scarf. A red one. You smirk and resist the urge to call her out on her choice of color, maybe even spit out some made up bullshit theory about how it must mean she has the hots for her gorgeous brother. But in the end you don't. She'd probably find a way to twist your words around and get even more reasons to psychoanalyze you further while trying to get you to talk about these, clearly non existing, daddy issues of yours.

You have to admit you kinda miss it though.

– – –

Bro barely talk anymore. Not that he wasn't a kind of quiet person before though. It's just that dude's never been this quiet before. And it's very unnerving for you.

He doesn't touch his dj equipment anymore, he doesn't bring home dates, he doesn't even bring home a one night stand or two. He only ever leave the apartment to work or get his takeaway unless they happen to deliver.

He's sitting by the kitchen table in complete silence. His phone is in his hands but he's not using it. It unnerves you a lot when he does that.

It's far too quiet, and all you can hear is the ticking noise from the clock in the hallway.

You don't like it.

– – –

You don't observe the driver.

– – –

One time you thought Rose caught you observing her. She was playing a certain tune on her violin. You only hear her play this particular tune very rarely, it makes you suspect she might have written it herself, you are almost certain she has.

But then she stopped just like that and looked at your direction and you swear your heart almost stopped when she did.

She didn't say anything, she just stood there, watching you. Shit, she noticed. She noticed you staring at her, she wasn't supposed to notice it.

You raised your arms defensively and prepared a mental speech to use as an apology. But then she turned back to her violin again and continued to play from where she had stopped earlier.

You can't say for sure you were happy she didn't notice or not.

But you were always extra careful when observing her after that.

– – –

Bro is getting worse.

He's getting so much worse and you don't know how to help him and you hate yourself for it.

He doesn't bring lunch with him to work and you hardly doubt he buys himself any once he gets there either.

He doesn't talk anymore. At all.

He hasn't showered in what must be several weeks by now.

You hate seeing him like this.

He's currently laying down on the futon in the living room not really paying much attention to whatever show he decided to channelsurf his way to. His eyes seems kind of empty really. He doesn't wear his shades anymore. It makes him seem even more vulnerable.

You hate this so much.

You hate Bro for being like this. You hate yourself for not being able to do anything about it.

You want to yell at him to get a grip. To get over himself and start taking care of himself.

But you don't.

Instead, you retreat to your room where you stay for the rest of the day.

You don't like observing Bro anymore.

– – –

Your music teacher quit his job.

– – –

John tends to skip school a lot these days. You've skipped a few classes yourself so you can't really complain, but you can't really say you approve either.

You still follow him whenever he decides to skip though. As if you'd stay in this shithole while he gets out, hell no.

You don't tell him to go back. You don't threaten to tell Mr Egbert. You just calmly join him to whatever place he decides to go to this time just for the hell of it.

Sometimes he goes to the mall, sometimes when he knows his dad isn't home yet he goes back home and relax.

Today he went to the park. He and you have a secret hideout there where you used to go all the time when you were younger. As you grew older you realized a bigger space between some bushes wasn't much of a secret. But it was still you super cool and super secret hideout nonetheless.

He sits down in the space between the bushes, it's a really nice space though. The sun can't reach in there so it's nice and cool in the summer.

The two of you sat there in silence, none of you spoke. You figured he'd speak if he felt like speaking.

You figure this is where he goes when he needs some time alone to sort his thoughts out.

You put an arm around his shoulder, he didn't really respond to it but you didn't care. You sat there for what felt like hours in silence as you listened to the sound of your surroundings.

It's a nice silence.

You like it.

– – –

Rose picked up drinking.

– – –

Jade broke her leg when she went adventuring recently. She wasn't paying attention and fell from a tree. So now she can't move around without crutches and she's bed bound most of the time. It clearly sucks a lot for her.

She hates it.

You suppose it's because she no longer have something to distract her thoughts with anymore, especially when she's bed bound and can't even move around her own room.

She throws her pillow across the room and it almost hits you right in the face, luckily you move away just in time. You observe her as she lets out a loud and frustrated groan from her spot in her bed.

You want to tell her you told her so. That she had this coming all along.

But that would piss her off even further and you wouldn't really want to have her kick you with that block of chalk or whatever around her leg. You'd imagine it'd be a lot more painful that it needed to be.

Besides, it's not like she'd be able to actually hear you anyway.

– – –

Bro doesn't leave his bed anymore.

– – –

The first time you actually started observing your surroundings like this was scary. And it started with yourself.

You've never seen yourself so pale before. You were hooked up to all kind of machines but you couldn't hear anything. For a moment you thought you might had gone deaf. It kinda felt like time had stopped and you were the only one moving, and when you did it felt like you moved in slow motion.

To be honest you looked like a mess, it couldn't possibly have been from a strife but your memory was faltering you and you weren't entirely sure how exactly you ended up this way at the moment. But judging by your injuries you guessed it was very very bad.

What really scared you wasn't the injuries though. It was how peaceful you looked. You didn't look like you were in pain, you looked like you were sleeping.

And that scared you.

But then time started moving again and you could hear. And you wish you couldn't. Because all you could hear was the constant beep from one of the machines. And then you understood.

– – –

You observed a lot of things after that.

You observed Bro as he sat down by the kitchen table to pick up his phone when the hospital called after checking your phone for his phone number. You also observed him as he dropped it upon hearing what they had to inform him and rushed out the door without a word and you observed him as he broke down before he even finished walking down the stairs towards his car.

You observed your principal as he gathered all the students to deliver the news while you sat in the front row listening to the entire speech, right next to your music teacher.

You observed Jade as she screamed into Bec's white soft fur constantly yelling why over and over while Bec did anything he could to comfort the poor girl, nuzzling into her face or neck, or desperately trying to lick away her tears.

You observed John as he shook his head in disbelief, choking back on his tears while whispering accusations of his dad lying to him after receiving the news by phone before his whisperings slowly rose louder and louder until he was screaming into his dad's chest desperately telling him over and over what a horrible liar he was, that this prank wasn't funny. Mr Egbert in return apologized over and over letting the tears through as well.

You observed Rose as she tore her room upside down and inside out in anger, throwing anything she got her hands on against the walls while screaming both incomprehensible sentences and just screaming out in general. She almost broke her violin in the process before her mom stopped her and held her shaking arms in place telling her calming words and slowly stroke her hair until she broke down completely and cried her heart out as her mom held her tightly.

You observed Bro trying to hold himself together while handling with the paperwork but eventually breaking down in the middle of planning out your funeral. You observed this several times.

You observed your own body laying in the coffin at your funeral.

You observed everyone in church as they walked up to place a rose each on your coffin and you were angry. You were so angry because this was the first time all four of you were under the same roof.

It shouldn't have been this way.

This shouldn't have happened.

You suppose observing is the only thing you can do for now.

You just hope it won't always be this painful.

A/N: Alright! This was officially my first Homestuck fanfic I ever put online. I hope I did a good job and you all enjoyed it C: