"Mommy never told me how to love. Daddy never taught me how to feel. Mommy never told me how to touch, daddy never showed me how to heal!" - How Do You Love Someone

Walking away again.

No. Not again. Last time he had been running.

Running away from them.

The time before had been the same, but before that he'd been running to someone.

Now he was walking, letting them choose to follow or to leave. Anyone else would have thought the other's choice obvious, but to Kyoya it could be different at any moment.

To kyoya, for whom answers were never repeated twice for a long as he could remember.

The heavy footsteps behind reassure him that the other's answer hadn't changed, and, rather than being comforted by this, it left him uneasy.

How much longer before these regular responses changed again?

-.-

He felt the rough hand shove him into his room and slam the door. He hesitates for just a second in the middle of his floor before tiptoeing into his closet. Mommy wasn't in the mood to see his face. She rarely was. Normally it was only when daddy was around that he could come out, as long as he was quiet. Mommy was always tired, or busy, or sick, or upset, so Kyoya couldn't even come out if he was just going to grab Mr. Fuzzy and run back.

So he sits quietly in his closet, rocking back and forth, until he hears daddy's car pull up.

The door opens very slowly, so not to make too much noise, and daddy's soft footsteps travel to his door. "Hey kyoya," he whispers.

Quiet. This was the quiet house.

Kyoya knew, because just once he had been to his friend's house full of screaming and crying and laughing from satoshi and his three little brothers. Satoshi had said all houses were like that, and satoshi was a whole year older (as he frequently reminded kyoya) and that meant he was smarter.

But when kyoya had tried to bring some of that colorful noise into his house, he had gotten very hurt and mommy made him swear never to speak to satoshi again. He had stuttered out that promise, and daddy had taught him to both never disobey mommy and to never break your promises, so he never uttered a sound to his friend again. Maybe satoshi had gotten angry and stopped being his friend, but at least mommy stopped hitting him every time she remembered how he disturbed the silence of the house. At least his ankle wasn't as swollen.

So neither him, nor daddy dared break mommy's quiet.

Kyoya softly rubs his nail across the door, letting daddy know he heard. He didn't feel like talking.

Daddy gets up and goes to where mommy is. Kyoya knows he'll slink around in the background till he knows how mommy wants him to act. Daddy was a good boy. He never made mommy angry. Not unless he tried to help kyoya. He had stopped trying though, so he didn't get hurt much anymore.

Kyoya couldn't figure out how to be good enough for mommy to see without getting mad, so he kept getting hurt. He wasn't very good at fixing hurts.

Daddy never taught him.

-.-