Author: Kiki (Hey-Diddle-Diddle)

Genre: Tragedy/Drama

Rating: PG-13

Summary: Abusive!Vaan, Nagging!Penelo, Abound!Cliches. Love doesn't necessarily mean never having to say you're sorry. Vague!Vaan/Penelo, EvenVaguer!Larsa/Penelo. TooMany!ExclamationMarks. Oh, the angst.

Breaking Glass



The first time they'd fought, it'd been over something particularly small. Vaan had bought too many elixirs, or maybe Penelo had spent too much on a trinket. They couldn't remember which, afterwards, but then, it was hard to remember anything from before the fight.


"You're such a child!" Penelo screamed at Vaan, and Vaan grabbed a bauble, some gift or another Larsa had sent to Penelo with regards, and threw it. It shattered magnificently, glass and crystal, scattering light about the room.


"I," Vaan said, feeling breathless. The shards were tinkling on the floor, and Penelo's face was white, her lips shut tight.


"Maybe, Vaan," Penelo said, "you should learn to grow up."


The second fight wasn't half so loud, but the third was far louder than both previous combined. The fourth had Penelo walking out in a fury, a half-filled purse and a letter from Balthier and Fran in hand. The fifth fight was in the streets, Vaan and Penelo screaming at each other over something gone wrong with the ship.


The fights were easy to start, nothing much to it. Penelo would forget to buy flour for bread, or Vaan would leave the door open. They'd both forget to meet at the fountain, or they'd be a minute or two late.


"It's fine," Penelo said sharply when Fran looked at her with tired eyes. "We're just tired."


"Perhaps," Balthier began, leaning against the doorway, and Vaan kicked at a chairleg.


"There's nothing wrong," Vaan said firmly. "We're family. We fight sometimes, that's it."


Larsa's letters slowed to a trickle and Penelo's temper grew shorter. Vaan's temper grew worse, and Fran's eyes became a little more tired.


"Will you," Vaan screamed one night, maybe the first, or the last, or the one in between, that no one ever quite remember, "just shut up for once?" There were fingerprints on Penelo's arm, red then blue then a sickly green, fading away beneath the paints she traced on each morning.


"Stop nagging me," Vaan snapped, and Penelo wrenched her arm away, rising up on her toes.


"Then grow up, Vaan. You're not a little boy anymore."


He hit her once, and she hit him back, and that time he was the one to go out the door at a dead run, taking off for west. He sent back a letter a few days letter, and trinkets he found in kings' tombs and queens' bowers.


"There's nothing wrong," Penelo said, cold-eyed. "We're fine. We're just tired, there's a lot going on."


"Penelo," Larsa said, rubbing his eyes tiredly, "perhaps--"


"You have Archadia," Penelo said, and she kissed Larsa's cheek. "Vaan and I can take care of ourselves. Worry about Archadia, not us."


"But," Larsa began, and Penelo pressed her fingers against his mouth, stilling him.


"We're fine, Larsa."


Vaan came back one night, and Penelo came back one morning, and they fought one afternoon, arguing over the table as Penelo cut the fruit and Vaan tore his flatbread to pieces.


"You're killing me, Penelo," Vaan said, and there were lines at the corners of his eyes, lines where his mouth turned always downwards. "I can't do this anymore."


"Why," Penelo asked, "is it always my fault?" She stared at the table where her plate sat, chipped on one side. "How is it my fault?"


"No one's good enough for you, Penelo," Vaan said bitterly. "Not me, not Larsa, not no one."


"Vaan," Penelo began, and Vaan stood up, knocking his chair over.


"Will you," he asked quietly, hands in fists on the table, "shut up for once?"


They both walked out the front door once, Penelo a half mark before Vaan. She left for the east, and Vaan took to the west, and they spread baubles and trinkets in the land between, dropping gold and diamonds like so many scraps of paper, floating down.


Fran's arms were open, like they always were, but Penelo didn't cry, because somehow in the past few years, her tears had dried up, and shattered like crystal.


"I'm fine," Penelo said, and Fran kissed Penelo's forehead like Penelo's mother used to, when Penelo and Vaan were little, and Vaan's parents were gone, then Penelo's brothers, then Vaan's brother, and then everyone was gone except Vaan, and now Vaan was gone, too.


"I'm fine."