#The Furbies had legs they would crawl in your face

[themockingcrows]

Companionship Through Circuitry ch. 6: Setbacks

Bro/Hal cw: blood, violence, deathclaws, and a generally bad day in the wasteland

Journeys are never without their inherent dangers. When you're living in the wasteland, it's to be expected. Doesn't make them suck any less, though.

AO3 link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20942408/chapters/64071430

     I spy with my little eye-

     “Hal, pick a new game already.”

     I can assure you this is the best game to play out here.

     “Fine,” Bro said, exhausted. They’d been traveling for days on the remains of the highway by now and there was no sign of a proper township. He smelled, his back and legs hurt, and despite having plenty of food water was always a precious commodity. He also had at least four letters to send by now, including a few sketches and schematics he’d designed after toying with the Furby body some more, in case Dave wanted to get his hands on a little guardian bot of his own. The kid was smart, even he’d be able to handle basic scripting to make a functional system for it. Surely someone else he was buddies with could figure out an AI of sorts for it, too. 

     True, it would have been easier to follow another path by now, but following the main point of the highway just seemed the best, most direct route for him. Who’s to say it was brahmin who made the trodden paths that led further into the wastes, or humans? What if it was mutants, or worse, deathclaws stalking the wastelands? Scuttling parties of mole rats or vicious dogs.

     Would you like to know what I spy or not, Bro.

     “I don’t want to know, but I’ve got a feelin’ you’re gonna tell me anyway aren’t you.”

     Correct! I’ll give you a few hints.

     Bro groaned in irritation.

     “A bloatfly,” he guessed off the bat.

     No, though it is annoying.

     “As annoyin’ as you? Why isn’t there a fuckin’ mute option on these shades..”

     Your second hint is that it’s bipedal.

     That perked him up somewhat. Bro scanned the horizon further off for signs of a city or outpost, a wanderer, a courier. Anyone. Instead what he saw was the lanky, sharply pointed edges of a juvenile deathclaw. A definite pain in the ass, but nothing he couldn’t handle.

     “...And how long have we been in deathclaw territory for, Hal?”

     Uncertain, my saved map mentions shopping centers, not deathclaws.

     “Ooh, shopping centers?” he said. “Put a peg in it, if we find somewhere to trade soon we might do a run back to grab some more supplies for trade and keepin’.”

     The deathclaw is still nearby, you know.

     “I can avoid it if I want,” Bro said, taking out his sword. A juvenile would take some fast work, but he knew he was good for dispatching the monstrosities, and people paid good money for their clawed hands, even the small ones. Hell, even he wanted some bits off of one sometime, though mostly for show. How sick would a deathclaw fang necklace be, after all?

     You appear to be approaching the small one instead of fleeing.

     “Watch and learn, Hal,” Bro said as he shifted his weight and began to run. Aching feet or not, his boots cut into the crisp cooked layer of topsoil and sank ever so slightly with each step. The deathclaw noticed him and turned, beginning to awkwardly run towards him, long limbs ungainly but just as deadly as an adult. They met in the middle, Bro’s sword singing off the armored hide of the creature’s forearms, taking a chunk with it as he went. The deathclaw lunged for his middle with a shrill noise, catching a chunk of shirt on the end of one of its spiky hands, but just missing his tender vitals. He turned, and used the momentum to slice at the space where its behorned head connected to its body, the sword sliding against softer skin. Staggered, the small deathclaw stepped forward, then tottered back unsteadily as it began to bleed out.

     Bro lifted a foot and kicked the creature backwards to its spiny back, then followed with the sword to spear its chest, cranking the blade to the side once it glanced off a rib, forcing downwards till it stopped moving. Planting his boot on its chest, he yanked his sword free and swung it in the air a few times to rid it of blood, and smirked. Fuck, that felt good. Nothing like taking out a little nightmare to give a nice rush of adrenaline and dopamine. Hell, he wouldn’t even say no to a smoke or a drink right now, ride that high long as he could.

     Excellent, now how do you intend to deal with the mother?

     “Mother?” Bro asked, about a half second before he felt something plow into him like a freight train, sending him flying and pain searing through his right shoulder blade. He landed flat on his face and skidded before rolling over, hand on his sword raising it defensively and other hand reaching for his gun.

     Shit. Shit, shit, this was definitely a mother death claw, the hide was darker than usual. He must’ve just killed one of her brood. Not a good look for someone not interested in dying in the middle of nowhere. He fired a quick two shots, missing the first and nailing her in the left eye  with the second, though it only seemed to make her more enraged after a brief second of shaking her head. She raised a hand and slashed downwards where Bro was scooting backwards, forcing him to block with a weakened grip before the second slash sang home across his chest, blood spurting where her claws shredded flesh and fabric alike. One of the straps of Bro’s bags was severed, leaving him half dragging it as he continued to try crawling backwards, firing till his clip was empty.

     Hal was urgently trying to tell him something, but Bro couldn’t hear anymore, couldn’t think, could only focus on the burning in his chest and the taste of copper in his mouth. Things were flashing through his mind as he stared down the deathclaw, who was raising both of her hands for a double slash that he wouldn’t be able to block in the slightest. Things he still wanted to do, to say. Memories.

     Dave the day he left home to travel to the city, bag on his back and barely a look back as he wove past the traps. Dave as a lanky tween, perched by his side on the counter top as he cooked an omelette for them both, telling him a joke that he still didn’t think was funny but that he’d laughed at anyway. Dave at five, sitting on his lap as he fiddled with a new project that would eventually become a birthday present game for him, looking up at him with big red eyes almost full of tears when he refused to tell him what he was working on.

     Dave, still struggling to put weight on as an infant as Bro kept him warm on the sofa through a bout of fever, trying to coax him into eating just a bit more from the bottle, wondering if he should make the trek to find a doctor or keep hunkering down and hoping it would work itself out. Being scared out of his fucking mind about this tiny, sick thing in his arms and on his chest, worried he’d break if he moved wrong.

     This wasn’t fear he felt. It was acceptance. Dave being sick or hurt was fear, even when he’d been the one to hurt him in the preparations he’d run repeatedly over the years. A deathclaw? This was his just rewards for being cocky without backup. He wanted to have time to apologize to Dave, like he always really meant to.

     He wanted to apologize to Hal, too, for not managing to take him to get his body. For getting his hopes up about Dirk and then dying with him in the middle of nowhere. Maybe the shades would get crushed by the deathclaw after he died, spare him much misery. They’d both just go out like a candle in the breeze and nobody would be any the wiser.

     A shot rang out, and blood spurted from the side of the deathclaw’s head. She staggered, stomping her sharp feet on his abdomen and legs as she adjusted her balance and snarled in alarm at the new threat. More shots, each one more precise than the last, till finally one hit the same eye he’d shot earlier, and the beast went down on top of him. Though his ears were still ringing, Bro could feel his pulse slowing down and everything going darker as the feeling of faintness took over.

     Bro. Bro!

     “Sorry, Dave,” he mumbled, blood on his lips and eyes unfocusing as red eyes stared at him. No, wait, not Dave. “Hal..”

     AMBROSE.

     The last thing Bro was aware of was a high pitched repeated beeping pattern ringing out from the shades on his face, a signal he knew so well. Anyone out here could recognize SOS when they heard it, but Bro couldn’t care anymore who did hear it.

     Darkness claimed him.

 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

     “...p. See? I think he’s waking up! Jake, push more fluids!”

     “I’m going as fast as I can, don’t you think he’d bl-........”

     “...ver if we don’t. Sometimes you have to do dangerous things in a time of crisis, just pu-...”

     “...rry chap, we’re doing our best. Why were you playing with a deathclaw mot-...”

     “...’s going under again, God damn it why don’t we have more gauze!”

     “...aid last time we wouldn’t need that many, let me check his ba-...”

     “....tting sick, stupid coat, ugh! Hand me a clo-...”

     “...ehozaphat he’s rolling in meds and chems! Lookit all this, it’s a kings ran-...”

     “...ab whatever you can, inject him with at least two, and hand the alcohol to me so I ca-...”

     “...nk he’ll make it? He’s in an awful way, Jade. We’re still at least a few miles out fro-...”

     “...re he’ll make it, we just need to hur-...”

     ...ve him. Please. Pulse is falling at an alarming ra-...

     “...re trying our best, believe me, it’s up to him if we ca-...”

     ...n’t lose him to-...

 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 

     When Ambrose woke, it was to clean sheets and a bright light coming from a window. He reached up to touch his face and panicked to realize the shades weren’t on him any longer, looking around as he tried to sit stark upright to look around. Tried being the correct term, considering when he got a few inches upright his abdomen and chest sang with burning pain and forced him to lay back on an aching shoulder. Sighing an exhale, Bro took the room and himself into account.

     The room itself looked to be a standard medical setup for a scap town, shelves of supplies and a few more beds shoved into the same room with him, a shabby gray curtain sectioning the space off from another area. He was laying on a cot with the aforementioned clean sheets, which were a hell of a commodity, and wrapped what felt like head to toe in bandages. His chest had padding underneath that seemed fresh enough, as well as his abdomen, and another bandage seemed to be wrapping his shoulder. His forearms had bandages, a shift of his legs revealed smaller areas of wrappings and-

     Bro snatched the sheets and lifted them upwards, looking down towards his groin in worry. Okay. Phew. Dick still there and in one piece, no need to panic. Thank fuck.

     Were you honestly more concerned for your dick than me? Came a voice from the top of the shelves, arms folded in and tucked at an angle to not get damaged or in the way.

     “To be fair, I’ve been attached to my dick longer than you,” Bro said, giving another try at this standing thing and getting as far as sitting upright before he had to stop, dizzy. He was also connected to an IV he realized, two bags half drained already and the tether attached to his arm carefully with another bandage and some tape to keep it from moving. One of the bags was unmistakably blood. “Where’s my stuff.”

     I’m fine, thank you for asking. I can really tell you were concerned for my safety after being nearly disemboweled. I can also tell you’re just dying to know how you went about not dying.

     “My stuff, Hal.”

     In the other room, safe and fucking sound.

     “Thank you. Gimme a second and I’ll come get you,” Bro said, running a hand through his hair. He realized with surprise that it was clean instead of gritty with sand and dust and blood, freshly washed like the rest of him. Someone had taken care to wash him thoroughly it seemed. Hell, even his fingernails were spotless. Shocking. He couldn’t recall the last time he’d been this squeaky clean, it was almost a shame he didn’t remember it. “How long have I been out?”

     Almost a week.

     “Jesus,” Bro rasped as he finally stood up on shaky fawn legs, reaching for the IV stand for balance before making his way over to the shelf, naked as the day he was born save for the bandages. He groped for the shades hurriedly when he started feeling faint again, and had just grabbed them when the curtain pulled back.

     A tall girl with dark skin, shocking green eyes and long wild hair tied back into evenly sectioned ponytails stood owl eyed behind large round glasses with a single crack in the left lens, a stethoscope around her neck and familiar leftover military gear covering her from head to toe. She frowned, and immediately rushed forward to grab Bro by the elbow and middle of his back, steering him back to bed.

     “How long have you been awake!” she asked. “Why didn’t you wait till someone came to help you? Are you in pain? Do you need any water? Food?”

     “Few minutes,” Bro said, more than a little startled. He sat and covered himself soon as he could, but the young woman didn’t back off in the slightest, swooping close to shine a pocket light in his eyes, checking his pupils.

     “Has there been any bleeding? Any night terrors? Do you have any numbness or weaknesses?”

     “I feel like shit, but otherwise,” Bro said, grimacing and jerking his head back from her grasp as she turned the light off.

     “I’ll get Jake to bring some lunch in for you, I’m glad you’re not running on glucose anymore. Actually, I’m glad you’re running at all,” she said with a grin. Her canines were strangely sharp looking. “My name is Jade Harley, and I’m half of the reason you’re alive right now.”

     “Is the chap who tried to cuddle the wrong end of a mother deathclaw awake yet?” asked another voice from beyond the open curtain.

     “He is! Get some of those mirelurk cakes and mac and cheese, please?”

     “I’ll bring some of that slackjaw jerky too, I imagine he’s half starved for real food,” said the male out of sight, before Bro heard distant sounds of dishes and metal scraping metal.

     “...So what, you a doctor?” he guessed.

     “We both are, in our own right. My cousin, Jake English, is the one who spotted you first out there. The primary reason you’re alive, however, is because we’re both sharpshooters! There wouldn’t have been much left to save if we hadn’t pegged that bitch into the dirt,” she said enthusiastically.

     Bro’s lip twitched in amusement. This person couldn’t have been older than her early twenties, but she was a doctor? And a sharpshooter?

     “So who really saved me?”

     Jade’s smile sharpened somewhat, looking predatory. “I don’t think I’d tease like that when you’re still so weak. All it’d take is a cushion to take you out right now, I bet.”

     “Sorry, just. You’re so young…” he trailed off as another figure entered the room with a dinner tray. This person didn’t look much older than Jade if he was a day, face clean shaven and hair styled but messy, standing at about the same height. He looked much more solid, though, shoulders broad and chest straining a little at the fatigues shirt he wore, and his demeanor seemed much sweeter than his cousin at first glance. More innocent somehow, or somehow less aware of the intensity of their surroundings.

     “Here you are, I’ll get some juice for you as well in a few ticks. First time I’m seeing this much of your outside as opposed to your inside since we got you scrubbed down!” he laughed, setting the tray on Bro’s lap. The food smelled fresh and was warm on his thighs beneath the sheet, mirelurk cakes looking greasy and delicious, mac and cheese that smelled plenty creamy from the box, and some kind of soft looking jerky rubbed with spices that made his mouth water as much as the fresh stuff before him

     “Try to eat slow,” Jade warned him as Jake trotted back out of view for a moment and came back with juice as promised. “Hope apple’s okay! It’s what we’ve got.”

     “Apple’s fine,” Bro promised, tucking into the mac and cheese first, eyes closing in bliss. Salty, creamy, rich. He could feel it flooding his system already, a body starved for nutrients beyond the bare minimum of functioning and safety. Once he shoveled a second bite into his mouth, he slid the shades onto his face and grinned a bit when haughty red eyes looked at him. Hal was clearly annoyed, angry even, but those eyes were full of concern too.

     “We’ve got tea too, though not everyone enjoys what we brew,” Jake chuckled.

     “Their loss, it’s delicious,” said Jade with a shake of her head.

     Scans show temperature readings as normal. Pulse normal. Pupils overly reactive to light, but not abnormal.

     “I hope he didn’t talk your leg off,” Bro said. “He’s kind of annoyin’.”

     You have terminal stupidity, I propose an immediate lobotomy to put you out of my misery.

     “Will you knock it off for ten seconds and let me eat before rippin’ me a new one?”

     It’s true. The doctor said so. You’re just stupid.

     “You were snuck up on by a creature twice your size in the wasteland,” Jade pointed out with a smirk. “Though I’m glad Hal’s giving you a positive reading. He was quite useful while we were saving you.”

     “How much did he talk,” Bro wondered aloud.

     “A bit,” she admitted. “We discussed why you were traveling, though he wasn’t that talkative about details. He let us know about Dave when you kept saying his name, in case you didn’t make it. He wanted us to be sure to let him know, and to send your other letters.”

     “You’re a long way from home,” Jake chimed in, taking a seat on the nearest bed to talk while Bro shook his head and went back to eating. “But it’s all fine now. Er.. mostly.”

     “How much do I owe you,” Bro said almost immediately, breaking a mirelurk cake in half with his fork before stuffing it into his mouth. He’d worry about manners when he wasn’t sitting in a room with two strangers who’d apparently saved his life and seen him in more detail naked than anyone else had in years.

     “We’ll figure out caps in a little bit,” Jade said. “You’re going to need to stay here a while longer either way, and we had to use a lot of your medical supplies.”

     “Helped ourselves to a little bit of your food as well, but mostly it was the chems and supplies we needed at the moment. Lucky for us you were damn near carrying a medics inventory on your back!”

     “Yeah, I just got through a vault,” Bro said. “Place hadn’t been looted yet till I got there.”

     “A vault!” Jake interjected excitedly. “Was it like they say, all sterile and eerily perfect?”

     “It was full of the people who used to live there, and they weren’t human anymore,” Bro said simply.

     It was quite a show to see that many feral ghouls get put down in one go.

     “Oh, that doesn’t sound very dapper.”

     “Vaults rarely are. They’re either fulla deadly shit, full of a shit load’a nothin’, or fulla people who don’t want you to bother them because you’re all gross from bein’ outside and they know you just want the goodies they’ve got.”

     “My grandpa was from a vault,” Jade said with a grin. “He’s the one who raised both of us, taught us everything we know.”

     They traded conversation for a time while Bro continued to eat, though it waned when he finished and looked exhausted, surprised that the very act of eating took so much energy out of him. Jake took the tray away and Jade performed a followup examination as Bro settled back tiredly on the pillows. Before she left, he requested his belongings, or what was left of them.

     He had an important letter to write.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

     Bro’s head ached sickly by the time he finished writing the letter, nearly as much as his heart, and his eyes were wet. He didn’t dare to rub at them, nor to even draaw attention to them, but the fact he’d cried while pouring his fucking soul out onto the page wasn’t something he’d admit to anyone. Hal, bless him, remained quiet aside from occasionally offering a correction on a phrase to make it sound better. At first Bro had resented the dictation, but found the changes in wording to be a positive thing, eliminating double meanings. What he ended up with was the letter he’d envisioned sending Dave when the deathclaw was about to do the killing strike, and the fewer mistakes and misunderstandings that could arise from it was for the better.

     It took another few days of resting, eating, and conversing with the doctors before Bro was strong enough to go for walks around the town. First thing was first: he paid express for his letter bundle to be sent to Dave along with some money, the most recently written one marked URGENT in bright red stamped letters. Secondly, he got himself a cola and drank the entire thing in one go. The doctors had been kind enough to spot him some clothes, since his shirt was ruined and his pants were scrapped in the moment by bloodshed and emergency bandage use on top of their general wear and tear. The down side was he hated fatigues… but hey, beggars couldn’t be choosers.

     He was settled with another soda at the little bar and grill early one morning, having shared breakfast with Jade and Jake once more (his own recipe this time, which only Jake seemed enthusiastic about once they’d tasted the product), but wanting to just sit outside and enjoy the early morning before the sun really got going on cooking everything in the wasteland to death. Hal was quiet, watching as well he presumed based on the little target viewers moving around every time someone moved.

     What do you plan to do if you don’t get a reply?

     “Keep goin’,” he said with a shrug, taking a sip. “I’m not expecting a reply to any of my letters, but he knows which way we’re headed if he wants to write back. Kid knows how to use a map of settlements to send ahead of the curb if he wants to.”

     ...I was worried I lost you too, back there. But you’ve never once apologized to me yet.

     “Apologized for what?”

     For nearly making me watch someone I care about die. At least the first one had the decency to not die while wearinng me on his fucking face.

     Bro was pensive and stretched his long legs out from his seat before tipping it back on its hind legs, balancing in place as he took another sip.

     “I promise I won’t die while wearin’ you, then.”

     You f-

     “I wouldn’t wanna hurt you at all.”

     … That is acceptable I guess.

[sleepyverstappens]

Dancing Through Life (Chapter 2/?)

Title: Dancing Through Life

Pairing: Aaron Dingle/Robert Sugden

Rating: M (for later chapters)

Warnings (New warnings in italics): Canonical Character Death, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, Non-Graphic Violence, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con

Summary:  Two boys, stuck in a small village in the Yorkshire Dales, until they found their unlikely way out, through ballet and each other.

(Read on AO3)

(Chapter 1)

A/N: I said I would upload this once a week, but I've decided to change the upload days from Saturdays to Mondays :)(New warnings have been added, so be sure to check those in case of triggering content.)

Chapter 2: Aaron

Aaron had started dancing young, yes, but he hadn’t always been into dancing. Not like a lot of his peers who always said they pretty much came out of the womb dancing. No, Aaron had spent most of his early years running about with his friends, kicking about a football and climbing trees. But then his mum had left him, dropped him off at Gordon’s out of nowhere and his whole world had come crashing down.

He had been crying a lot. Had been acting out a lot, because he missed his mum so much. Missed her bright smile as he gave her the treasures he had found on the beach, missed the slightly freaked out look on her face as he had opened his new Furby on his 8th birthday. That’s why he hadn’t been able to understand why she had just left him with Gordon out of seemingly nowhere. Yes, her and Gordon had been fighting a lot, but even so he didn’t understand why she had just left him. His friends with parents that had split up still saw both of their parents, so why didn’t she want him anymore?

And then Gordon had been sacked at work and the world had come crashing down even harder.

He could still hear the creaking of his floorboards as Gordon had come up to his room that night. Could hear the ringing silence as he had just stared at him. Could still feel his sheets being ripped away from where he had pulled them over his head. Could still feel everything he had done to him. Could still remember feeling dirty and ashamed.

After that everything had happened so fast, one day he was still living with Gordon and the next he was in a group home waiting for his mum to pick him up. For his mum to pick up the pieces that were left of him.

It had been hard to glue the pieces of him back together, but that’s when he had found dancing. Counselling had worked sure, but it still left him with this nervous energy inside of his body that he couldn’t get rid of. He could never keep still during his sessions with his counsellor, so she had suggested it to him and Chas. She had suggested an activity to help him get rid of the nervous energy coursing through his body. And since football clearly wasn’t doing the job they had looked at other sports and found an elementary ballet class in Hotten. He had to use his whole body in ballet, letting him shake off all the unwanted energy. And unlike football, in ballet you needed a certain level of control over your body, control he craved.

When he was dancing he felt free, he was able to lose himself in it. There was this fire inside of him, this electricity sparking him back to life, making him feel like he could fly.

He had always looked forward to his dance classes, wishing he could go more than those two classes each week. When he found out that there were more classes each week he had begged his mum to let him go to more classes, but Chas was a single mother working two jobs at once and the drive into Hotten twice a week was expensive as it also cut into her work hours. Nevertheless he practiced every day of the week to get better.

“Okay, everyone find a place at the barre,” Mrs. Flint bellowed to try and get the attention of the 14 girls and 1 boy in the room.

At first Aaron had felt weird being the only boy in the ballet class, but now he didn’t care anymore as he had found that ballet was the only thing that could really make him feel better. The boys at football had laughed when he told them why he stopped training with them and it had hurt, but they didn’t know what had happened to him. They didn’t know that whilst ballet made him feel better, football had the opposite effect. Football had been something he used to do with him and just thinking about it now made his skin crawl.

“Aaron, first position please,” Mrs. Flint voice broke through his thoughts. He looked around the room and all the girls were already in first position, some of them giggling at his mistake. With a quick glare in the direction of the giggling girls he got into first position, head held high.

 At home he had wondered what his family would think of him doing ballet. He knew his mum wouldn’t care, she was just happy it was making him feel better. He could’ve been into finger painting for all she cared as long as he was happy. Lisa had hugged him tightly as he had come back from his first class and asked him to show him what he had learned that day. Even uncle Zak and Cain were alright with it, only good-heartedly teasing him about it. And as he had told them all about his classes they had just nodded along and ruffled his hair.

The only person that had had a problem with it had been his grandad. His grandad had kept going on about how it was a girls sport, how surely there could be something else he could do.

“Football, you always liked football. That’s what a boy your age should be doing, running after a ball getting dirty, not dancing around in tights with a bunch of girls, people will think you’re some sort of poof,” Shadrach said.

Those last words rang in his head. He couldn’t know right? No he couldn’t, because he wasn’t. Just because he did ballet didn’t mean he was. Just because he had liked Kyle a lot didn’t mean he was.

He didn’t say anything about it though, instead he yelled: “I hate football!” just as his mum yelled ‘Dad!’

“Leave him be dad, you don’t know anything about it!”

“I’m just saying there are loads of other things he could be doing. What about I dunno, judo or wrestling, proper boys sports.”

The thought of judo or wrestling made his skin crawl, the thought of people touching him like that, it was too close to how he had touched him. No, he just wanted to keep doing ballet, where no one touched him when he didn’t want them to, where he could just forget about everything else.

 And so he kept going to ballet classes and slowly his life started to feel normal again. Living with his mum meant he got to see his extended family loads. With her working two jobs he had found himself having his tea at Zak and Lisa’s more often than not, but he hadn’t minded. He was never the only one stopping off at Wishing Well, one or more members of the family usually dropped in at random. Life back then had been quite chaotic, but he had loved it. And even though his mum was working herself ragged to keep him fed and happy, she always made time to drive him to his ballet classes. Though on one memorable day, when he was 10 years old, it hadn’t been his mother’s face he had seen peeking through the dance studio’s window.

Aaron was just finding his balance again after a botched attempt at a pirouette when he caught a glimpse of his face. He felt his face twist in confusing as he looked back at the window where all the parents were waiting to see his uncle’s grumpy face staring back at him. He was clearly uncomfortable between all the mom’s gathered around waiting for their daughters – he was still the only boy in his classes. Cain scrunched up his face as one woman tried to make some small talk with him, clearly curious about who this mystery man they had never seen before was.

“Aaron!” Mrs. Flint’s voice cut through his thoughts.

“Yes, Miss?”

“Try another pirouette, but keep your focus on your spot. And you need to keep your other leg higher you keep letting it drop out of retiré,” she said as she showed him where his leg needed to be. “Go on, give it another try.”

He got in position and focused on the spot he always chose for pirouettes – a crack in the mirrored wall- and turned his body around on his left leg, focussing on keeping his other leg in the right position.

“That’s it! Well done Aaron. Keep practicing and maybe next week we can try doing it attitude,” she praised him, a secret smile playing on her lips. “Okay class, time’s up! Well done everyone and I’ll see all of you next week.”

Aaron grabbed his bag from the side of the room and made his way over to his uncle.

“Hey Cain, what’re you doing here?”

“Your mum had to go back into work, some emergency order at the factory or something.”

“Ah,” he sighed. “Were you waiting long?” he asked Cain as he pulled his track bottoms over his shorts and switched his ballet shoes for his battered trainers.

“Nah, s’allright. You seem to be getting the hang of those… uh… what’d you call them,” he said twirling his finger around.

“Pirouettes.”

“Yeah, them. You were a lot better at them than all those girls in there.”

“Really? Mrs. Flint is always telling me what I’m doing wrong,” Aaron said, a frown twisting on his face.

“She must just be paying more attention to you, even I could see you were better,” Cain shrugged.

“You’re supposed to say that, you’re family.”

“Hey, learn to take a compliment will ya, I don’t give ‘em out freely. Anyway you ready to go home?”

Aaron quickly pulled his hoodie over his head, before nodding that he was ready to go.

 It wasn’t long after the day that Cain came to pick him up from his ballet class that Mrs. Flint mentioned the Royal Ballet School. She mentioned it to the whole class, but his mum was the only one she spoke to about it afterwards. Chas had been surprised to hear that Mrs. Flint actually thought her son was good enough for the Royal Ballet School. After all ballet had just started as a form of therapy for Aaron, a way to deal with what had happened to him, a way to try and forget it. But she had seen how much progress he had made the few times she had been early enough picking him up to see more than just the tail-end of his class. Mrs. Flint had mentioned to them that the Royal Ballet School usually did auditions in Manchester early in the year, so they still had plenty of time to decide and train.

The next day was a Sunday and he had begged his mum to take him to the café to use the computer there; he had to look up this prestigious ballet school all the way in London. He had looked at the pictures on the website in awe, it had all looked so professional compared the his ballet studio in Hotten. There were actually boys there as well, if he got in he finally wouldn’t be the only one anymore. He had spent so long on the website and the website of the Royal Ballet that his mum had to finally drag him away after an hour when other people had started to grumble about wanting to use the computer as well.

So in the months leading up to the auditions he had practiced as much as he could. The Dingles had even started up a roster on who would drive him into Hotten, just so he could go to an extra private class each week. Cain had even started to get used to the attention from the mothers waiting around for their kids. But they had all banded together, working odd jobs to help Chas out in paying for the extra classes.

So when the day had come to drive up to Manchester it hadn’t just been Aaron and Chas making the trek up, no their car was crammed full with as many Dingles as could fit. It hadn’t really helped with Aaron’s nerves, but knowing his family was so supportive had been great.

“Mum, I can’t do this!” Aaron hissed at his mum as he looked around at the room full of kids in ballet gear.

“Of course you can, you’ve been training for this for months.”

“Look at ‘em, they’re so much better than me.”

“Hey, you know we’re proud of you no matter what happens right? But you’ll do great Aaron,” Lisa said in her calming voice.

Just as he the nerves fluttering in his stomach were settling down a bit a serious looking man came in to call his group in. He took a deep breath, took in his family’s calls of support and thumbs ups, and made his way to the packed dance studio.

As they were working through the different positions and movements the stares from the Royal Ballet School people only made him take notice of how his limbs were shaking. Deep breaths, he reminded himself as he was focussing on holding his arms in first position.

And then all of a sudden it was over, the people at the front done with their scribbling and staring and instead thanking them for their time. Aaron wondered if it had been enough, some of the kids in the room definitely looked like they had more experience than him. But then the website had said the school looked at artistic talent and potential, not just how good you already were. Yes, by now he knew everything about the school that was available online.

 He had walked out of the dance studio to be met with the expectant looks of his family, but all he had been able to do was hope for the best. Thankfully they hadn’t had to wait too long for the invitation to the auditions in London. Getting to London had meant that the Dingles had to find some extra work to get enough money, looking back Aaron realised some of those jobs probably weren’t legal.

But then soon enough the day had come for them to make their way down to the capital of the country. For some reason he had actually been less nervous for his London audition than for the one in Manchester. While the other kids had been pacing the locker room or jiggling their knees, he had felt calm and ready for the audition; grateful that he couldn’t compare himself to the other kids in the solo auditions. And while the stares from the judges were now solely focussed on him it had been easier to forget about them on that day. When they had asked him how he felt when he danced, the answer had come easily. To this day dancing still made him feel free, free to forget about everything else but dancing.

Leaving the audition room that day he had felt calm and content, knowing he had put his all in the audition. He had been confident, but had also known that if he didn’t make it he had given it his all and he couldn’t have done more.  

Waiting for the acceptance letter had still been a test of everyone’s patience though. Every time he had seen a Dingle or even some random other villagers in town they had asked him if he had heard anything yet. So of course when that letter had finally dropped through the mailbox he had been home alone. When his mum had come home he had just been sat there at the kitchen table staring at the envelope, afraid to open it.  

“It came,” was the first thing his mum said as she walked into the kitchen. He had been sat there staring at the envelope ever since he came home from school; he had almost opened it multiple time, but never could go through with it.

“Yeah,” Aaron whispered.

“Well come on, open it then.”

“What if I didn’t get in though?”

“Then you didn’t get in, you stay here and keep dancing and maybe give it another shot next year. And even if you don’t want to try out again that’s fine baby. But let’s see if you got in or not first yeah, before we start with the doom scenario’s. You said the audition went well, right?”

Aaron nodded, before picking up the letter again. He ran his thumb over the embossed logo on the front of it, then turned it over and ripped it open. He had to take a few deep breaths as he tried to get his eyes to focus on the black letters on the page he had folded open. But when the letters finally got into focus his eyes immediately fell on one word: Congratulations.  

 Moving to London had all been a blur. The end of the school year back at Emmerdale had come quickly and the summer holiday had seemed to pass even quicker. He hadn’t minded though, he had been glad he could leave Emmerdale behind. He would miss his family of course, over the last couple of years back with his mum they had shown him so much love. But Emmerdale also held the memories of before, even though he had not lived there with him it still always reminded him of what happened in those few months he hadn’t lived in Emmerdale. And not only that, after he started ballet he had lost most of his friends. None of the boys wanted to hang out with the lad that did ballet and after he got accepted into the Royal Ballet School a lot of the girls in his ballet classes had gotten jealous of him. So going to London would mean a new start he had really needed.

So that last summer he had spent mostly with his family, getting up to some real Dingle shenanigans whilst he still could. And then all of a sudden they had been down in London unpacking his suitcases and his new life had started. He was finally around people whose lives also revolved around ballet. His family had been very supportive, but they had never gotten it the way this new group of people did.

Soon enough he got used to the new rhythm of his life. Waking up early was the hardest thing to get used to. At home he had always been running late for school, often shoving toast in his mouth on the way to the car as his mum drove him to school. So now he had often found himself sleepily staring at his breakfast in the dining hall, the other kids chatting around him cheerily. When he would still sit down at the dining table grumpily after the first few months and there had been a mention of his uncle’s nickname for him, ‘Sunshine’ had been taken on by his friends.  

The rest of his new day-to-day life had been easy for him to get used to. He had never been a very good student, but the smaller classrooms and one-on-one teaching did help his grades a bit. But what he had loved the most was of course his dance classes. Even though he had often been bone-tired after a long day of school and training he still loved every second of it.

Then as he was almost 13 years old most of the other boys had started to notice the girls, and how their bodies were changing.

“Did you see Lacy got a new leotard?” David asked the group of boys at the table.

“Huh, did she?” Aaron asked.

“Yeah, it’s cuz she’s getting boobs,” Eric snickered.

“Totally! I think Marion is getting a new one soon as well, have you seen hers?” Mark joined in.

Aaron looked on at his friends confused, should he have been looking at the girls? Sure he noticed it when one of the girls got the hang of a new move quicker than the rest of them, but his eyes had never wandered in that direction.

“I know right. Have you really not noticed Aaron?”

“No, of course I have. Just didn’t realise it was a new leotard, that’s all,” he lied quickly.

The conversation that morning had left him wondering, so during the next dance class he paid attention. And he did notice more and more girls started to get curves in certain areas, but looking at them didn’t make him feel giddy like it seemed the other boys felt when they looked at the girls. Was something wrong with him?

 After that particular conversation he had started to think about it more. At first he had just assumed he was just a bit slow on the uptake and that he would start noticing girls in that way soon enough. But then he had started to notice that instead of his eyes wandering to the girls in his classes they had started to wander to the boys. To how their tights clung to their thighs and arse. How their shoulders started to get broader and their biceps more muscled. And most obviously how his eyes would sometimes linger on the bulges in their tights. He didn’t really know why he had all of a sudden taken more notice of that, it wasn’t like that really got all that much bigger and muscled like their arms and thighs had.

He had buried those feeling pretty quickly though, turning his focus on his dancing even more instead. Whenever the other boys had talked about the girls he had just played along with them. If he never started those kinds of conversations, well they had never noticed.