Normal school is a lot slower and calmer than magic school. Toriel has you and Asriel working on math, which has never been your strong suit, but it’s not too difficult. You still write your sevens and threes backwards, and sometimes you’ll add the numbers instead of subtracting them, but overall you don’t think that you do too terribly. Asriel seems to be having trouble, so Toriel lets you draw on some extra sheets of paper while she helps him. You only have pencils at the moment, so you make an outline; you draw the buttercups in the garden (your buttercups!), and you try to draw you and Asriel standing next to them. It’s a lot harder than the math problems were. You can’t quite get his shape down; it always comes out wrong somehow. You …show more content…
“Chara, what’s –?” “Nothing,” you say, voice flat. You’ve smiled so much since you came here. It’s not like you ever actively avoided it on the surface; it served as a nifty trick for frightening away would-be harassers. It stopped teachers from calling on you, and adults from talking to you. You’ve never smiled at your family before. Why did none of the Dreemurrs say anything? “Chara,” Asriel says in a tone that he obviously adopted from his father. You look him in the eye. “What’s wrong?” You pull at the edge of your hair. “I.” Fuck it. Honesty seems to be working so far. “I look creepy when I smile.” Creepier than usual, that is. Asriel sighs softly. He grabs your hand. “Chara, you look pretty when you smile,” he argues. You freeze. You wrench your hand out of Asriel’s grip. He looks at you, bemused. “Wh–” “I,” you start, voice low, “am not pretty.” You spit out the word. “I am not pretty, I am not cute, and I am not a fucking girl!” You’re shaking. You want to hit him – no, you don’t! You back away and run into his room, but get in your bed. Why would you want to hit him? But he keeps betraying you and saying the wrong thing and of course he thinks you’re girly! This is all your fault, anyway; first, you trusted him again; second, you act like a fucking wimp and then expect – what? For everyone to act like gender doesn’t exist?! The world won’t cater to your childish whims so you’d better man up and act like a boy otherwise people will keep saying …show more content…
What was that thought earlier – “lying to make you feel good about yourself”? Or maybe he prefers the term “bluffing”? You squeeze your eyes shut and drag your left hand’s nails across your right arm, over and over and over. It feels like you’re letting everything bad out with each rake. It burns and you know it will be as red as your eyes when you’re done. Your motions get slower but harder until you finally take a deep breath. You lean your head back against the wall and let your hand rest over the raised skin. Why did you have to trust these people? It will just hurt so much more when you have to leave. But didn’t they say that you could stay as long as you wanted? And look at how that’s working out. At this rate, you’ll be out of here before you know it. You lie down, under the covers, facing the wall, and let your fingers run up and down the raised, red skin on your arm. Your breathing evens out as you feel the uneven