a lack of color {SEYSEY}

[Brennan Gallagher XVII]

Brennan stepped from the castle and into sunshine, feeling the cool air tickle his face. He felt free--free from hunching over parchment, free from burning himself on wet wax seals, free from the gloating stares of the other servants.

They all knew who he was. They saw his pretty clothes and his perfect blonde hair and assumed he was a Gallagher. It was in his deep blue eyes, in the way his serene smile slid onto his face--too practiced, too perfect. And all the servants could wonder was why. Why was this rich pompous kid among them, working so diligently at a job he didn't need, when his mommy and daddy were so damn rich?

He wondered that too as he walked into the marketplace, trying so hard to distance himself from the cramped little room he was holed up in at the castle. They called him a secretary, because he slaved over parchment and sent out petty thank yous to the Zelda fanboys. The other servants delighted in asking him "favors": "Oh Brennan, could you help me carry these linens upstairs?" or "Brennan, you aren't busy are you? Could you run to the market?" As if they loved to boss him around, just because they could now. If he were on the street, he knew in his hearts of hearts, that they wouldn't dare talk to him that way.

Now he walked among the rush of the market. He skillfully ignored the stares of the commoners. Those that stared at him so intently, drinking in his handsome face and his rich scarlet jacket trimmed in gold thread. If he had his way he would dress as simply as any other commoner--in comfortable leather shoes and bland tunics. Right now his feet ached in the dazzling black shoes he wore, so shiny some could not even look at them. It was all priceless, every stitch he wore. And he only wore it because his mother made him.

"Just because you leave this house, don't look like a filthy rat out there! I demand that you wear your finest, you useless boy! All you have is your good looks to get you by! The only asset you have to your name!"

He could see her steel gray eyes even now as he hovered in the middle of the street. He could see her disgusted sneer as she threw him out, looking satisfied to get rid of her only child.

And still he couldn't escape. No out here in the middle of the market, staring off into space, imagining her mocking him even now. Even now, when he was supposed to be free.

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[Ayameru]

It took a moment or two for Aya to get used to just walking through the busy streets of Hyrule Castle town. Adorning her long black overcoat to conceal her fairy wings, she wanted to blend into her environment, trying to get on by from point 'A' to point 'B'. She only came into this bustling town in order to do some shopping. When you were in a large city such as this one, how could you not try and gather things for yourself?

For the first time in her life, she felt the girlish side of her personality bubbling up, and she didn't mind it. Aya was used to being treated as nothing more than a silhouette reflecting the beauty of her identical elder sisters. That is until Ani came to save the day, and argued otherwise that she too was special.

Being that she grew up within the most secluded parts of the forest in Faron, this came to be quite a culture shock. Cobblestone streets, shoppers crowding near the venders with large colorful signs up, selling goods from all over Hyrule, and perhaps even things from out of the country. The whole city was practically an oyster for the redhead as she looked up at the cramped buildings, and cemented walls that protected the castle town all around. She knew nothing of the extreme divide that plagued the people of the castle town: the rich, and the poor. There was no middle class in these times, but fortuitously Aya was ignorant to such things.

"Whoops," she staggered, trying to catch her balance as she suddenly ran into someone. It was a bit crowded today so it wasn't surprising that she'd eventually run into someone along the way. She looked up, and immediately took notice of the stranger she ran into. Vibrant blonde hair, and eyes the color of the ocean. Her firelight eyes widened softly as she took a few steps back. "Sorry about that," she replied casually, scratching the back of her head.

It wasn't until she got a better glance at the stranger she ran into that she noticed something off about him. He wasn't entirely comfortable in his own skin - then again most people weren't to a certain degree. Even Aya wasn't entirely accepting of herself, and wanted to change for the better, but that was another story we're digressing. She smiled softly trying not to giggle at the poor look on the boy's face. He looked absolutely miserable. "Don't you think you're a little overdressed for the outdoors?" she asked bluntly.

[Brennan Gallagher XVII]

He might have stood there forever, dreaming while awake, seeing his mother's cold face looming just before his blue eyes. He might have stood there forever in the rushing crowd, as people passed him and watched him curiously. He might have turned to stone and stayed there forever.

But then a girl bumped into him.

He stumbled slightly and was ripped from his nightmares and dumped back into reality. It was so sudden that he blinked back the sunlight and the swirl of people flooding the streets. He turned around and saw the girl who had so easily broke his dreams. She looked so casual, her streaming red hair blinding against the white of Castle Town. For a moment he was just Brennan: a little shocked, his eyes wide with his mouth parted, words on the tip of his tongue.

Then he remembered his mother and her brutal hands and her rules tacked up on the walls. "Don't be a fool, boy. Wearing your emotions so obviously will only gain you fake sympathy. No one cares about your feelings--in this world it's only about what you can gain and from who."

Thus, Brennan slid into his proper skin, the rich boy that had the world in his hands. The one that knew how to handle any situation, simply because he was blessed with money and a high social standing. His surprised look melted abruptly and a smile bubbled to the surface. He smiled, smiled, smiled, but he couldn't feel anything. He felt numb and confused.

...And then she pointed out his clothes.

He stared at her stupidly, as if he didn't hear her. She had no idea who he was. She couldn't even guess his family owned one of the largest fortunes in Hyrule. She stood there so casually, laughing at him in his stuffy coat and painful shiny shoes.

He laughed out loud then, shaking his head slightly before considering the girl with fiery eyes. He knew she wasn't putting on an act to impress the world around her. She really was this blunt. And he liked that.

But no matter how hard he tried he couldn't shake off his thick fake skin. He couldn't just be himself, even now.

"Perhaps it's all a matter of perspective," he said airily with that same fake smile on his face. "I happen to like this particular jacket quite a lot. I believe it really brings out my eyes."

He grinned while his eyes slid over her little body, fiery and pale and not the least bit dainty. Not like the girls his mother forced him to court, the ones that were scared of everything and wore frilly dresses. No, she wasn't like that at all. And though he knew he should walk away and leave this oddly blunt girl behind, he couldn't. His feet remained planted on the cobbles beneath them.

"I'm Brennan Gallagher and you're not from around here are you?"

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[Ayameru]

Well, for the record, it wasn't smart to be lollygagging in the middle of busy section of the city. You were bound to either run into people or get shoved out of someone's way, followed by a strings of unpleasant words. Nonetheless, Aya was quite grateful to be mild mannered at the moment, not needing to raise her voice for the circumstances brought before her. No one was mean to her or gave her much of a passing glance which was a good thing. People were meant to go on their own business while in the city. There was no time to stop and make small talk with some random strangers.

Yeah right~

The only thing Aya had on her at the moment was time. Time to spare wasting it away doing things she couldn't fathom doing the next time she came around these parts. Even then, she had high doubts that she'd be spending any bit of time here a second time around, if there ever was going to be such a thing. Who could be so sure? Aya wasn't. Nonetheless, she was rather amused with this young man. Right off the bat, she noticed how naturally fake that smile was the minute he allowed to grace his features. An eyebrow quirked up in a mild curiosity sparking her interest on why he forced such a thing on his face.

She wasn't sure what it was that she said but it quickly melted away the facade of that plastic smile he had on. In return, he began to show his true colors, a laugh she could not mistake for a false sense of security. It brought relief to the redhead that he didn't look like a porcelain doll. He really was a human being~

Unfortunately, it didn't stop him from putting back on that smile again, it was starting to become a little annoying. She wasn't quite sure how to take his response, but he wasn't afraid to raise a word to match Aya's blunt nature. Not in any negative way, that is. In fact, she was quite positive that this encounter was quite a pleasant one, if only by accident. "It does, but it also looks stuffy," she added followed by a snicker.

Despite being a fairy whose suppose to be the epitome of elegant, Aya possessed no graces whatsoever. She was unruly, and rambunctious, but free and rebellious. Upon receiving his name, she returned a smile back. Only that her smile was more relaxed, and casual like the way she's kept herself for the most part. "You're right. I'm not." she answered simply. "Ayameru Crossfire. Aya for short. You wouldn't happen to know these parts, would ya?"

Might as well get comfortable because it would appear they weren't going anywhere for a bit~

[Brennan Gallagher XVII]

Brennan looked at the pretty Ayameru closely. He stared at her red hair and her red eyes and her striking pale skin. She wasn’t from around here, just as he suspected, and he wondered where she came from. He stared at her intently, smiling to himself when she wouldn’t drop the jacket thing. He never met anyone like Aya before—never someone so confident and blunt with each word honest and true. She wasn’t hiding herself from him like he so cruelly did to her. She seemed to notice it too, but was just too nice to say it.

He sighed to himself dramatically suddenly feeling free. Ayameru didn’t care if he was polite or generous or smiled just right. She was just a commoner (that much he could see easily), but suddenly it didn’t matter. Being with someone like her made him wonder why he tried so hard.

He knew why then. He knew why she touched him like no else did.

Because he wanted to be just like her.

“You know, I’m starting to suspect you want me to take this jacket off or something and then I’ll have to run around half-bare in my flimsy white shirt,” he said loudly with a mischievous glint in his blue eyes. “Are you some kind of pervert Ayameru Crossfire?”

He stepped up to her and tilted his handsome face toward her (reveling in how short she was—like some kind of fiery little doll) and closed what little space was between them in the market. He smiled then, a real one, slow and steady and just the slightest bit sensual. He was doing it on purpose, just to see her shiver or get angry or anything. He never messed with girls like this before—he never flirted or teased and was always the little gentleman his mother told him to be. And right then, with his face so close to Aya’s, he realized he never kissed a girl before either.

What the Hell am I doing?!

He thought of his mother and what she would do if she saw him now, bent down toward a strange girl with his eyes on fire. He thought of his mother’s hands pulling him up, up, up, and throwing him in a dark little hovel. A closet. Anywhere dark where the walls were touching him as he sat in a ball and stared at the blackness. Anywhere that was small enough to make it hard to breathe and made him panic, scream, cry, pound on the doors.

He shot away from Ayameru as if she burned him, his eyes wide with that familiar panic. His face turned white, but he quickly spun on his heel elegantly, and lifted his hand in an off-hand kind of way. He could still hear his mother on the other side of that door, pressing her weight against it so he couldn’t get out. That cold old woman grimacing at him, wishing he were someone else—anyone else. Who would punish him—even now—for the smallest of crimes. He couldn’t escape her even if he wanted to. Not even with Ayameru close by, showing him it was possible to be who you wanted to.

“I guess I can show you around. I was born and raised here; I know everything there is to know about Castle Town.” His voice sounded flat and unyielding, when before he was smiling and laughing and teasing. It was easy to hide in his shell and never come out again.

He started into the crowd, not even bothering to tell Ayameru he was leaving. He was her official tour guide now, taking off one mask and replacing it with another. He would show her around like anyone else. He would point out the most mundane facts about the town and she would be bored and then she would leave like all the others. It was just another day. He looked around at the faces blurring by and tried to recognize those in the crowd. He didn’t see any of his mother’s finely dressed friends, those that would report to her exactly what he was doing. He knew this was wrong already—showing around a common girl with no pretty titles to her name who knew nothing about him. If his mother ever knew she would punish him. Oh Goddess, she would punish them both.

He glanced behind him to see if Aya was following and swiftly cut through the crowd. The commoners parted before him, knowing with just one glance who he was and that he was, by society’s standards, better than them. They couldn’t know how envious he was of them.

Suddenly, from the corner of his eye, he saw a glinting from a vendor. He turned and grinned at the kindly old woman behind her crudely made counter of old wood. She saw him and waved a withered old hand and smiled a toothless smile. He quickly strolled up to the counter and looked at her wares that shimmered and sparkled in the ruthless sun.

“Aya! Over here!” He called and already the flame was returning to his eyes. “Pick something out, anything you want. And something for your mother and sisters too—if you have any siblings.”

He gestured to the glittering jewelry spread out neatly on the rotting wood. There were necklaces, bracelets, earrings, and rings all made out of colorful beads. They were strung in intricate patterns and changed colors in the light. Brennan had always loved them and had even bought one for his mother once. There was no need to say she rejected the gift and broke it, letting the beads fall to the ground and scatter like blood.

The old woman smiled brightly and Brennan smoothed his hand over the sparkling jewelry.

“It’s on me,” he said simply, smiling over to the redhead. “So you remember Castle Town. Everyone needs a souvenir, right?”

And maybe you’ll remember me too.