callbacks | 3 ∅ [Anonymous Text]

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3 ∅ [Anonymous Text]

[Cleared font formatting, check. Autocorrect, check. Masked I.D., triple check. Dave's been wrestling with this question for over a week, and he's no closer to an answer than he was eight days ago. No closer than he was three years ago.

Where's Dear Abby when you need advice?]

Have you ever been in a situation
Where you knew something somebody else didn't
And you weren't sure if you should tell them or not
Like you knew that if they found out they'd be really upset but there's also nothing they could do about it
And you don't want them to blame themselves
Or
Get mad at you
But pretending it didn't happen feels
I don't know
A lot like lying I guess
What would you do in those circumstances?

I'm asking for a friend.

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It's not, huh

Does that apply in every case or like
Are there ever circumstances that justify keeping it under wraps

I'm sure there are, but I don't think it's a matter of what the thing is.

Are you hurting the person you're trying to protect, even by hiding this information? Are you hurting yourself?

If the answer to either of those is yes, then you shouldn't keep hiding it. Because wounds like that cut far deeper than anything physical, and it's not easy to recover from that.

...

It'll definitely hurt them if I say anything though
And I can't fix that

... No-win situations are awful, aren't they?

If you can't fix it, you can still help them cope and move along.

I don't know if I can?
Like
I'm part of the problem here
What if being around me fucks everything up for them

[... wow yeah this is. This is familiar.]

This person... they care just as much for you as you do for them, don't they?

If they do, then they would probably be more angry at you for thinking like that than anything else.

Hiding parts of yourself from someone you care about... trying to keep some manner of distance between you... it just doesn't work. And the fallout of it is can be much worse than what might happen if you just told them what it is you're trying to hide.

i guess i never really thought about it like that

[He feels really small, all of a sudden.]

so
i should
probably tell them

You should.

And it's okay to be scared. Believe me. I was scared for thirteen years of my life. I thought I'd lost the only family I had left when the secret I was trying to keep got out.

But the great thing about the people that care about you... they want to help you. No matter what. So it's okay to be scared, it's okay to be worried out of your mind, because... you won't be alone.

[It took her a very, very long time to understand that. Even now, she doesn't always believe it.]

They'll help you, just like you want to help them. You'll both support each other, and you'll both help each other heal.

itd almost be easier if

[He stops, because what's he going to say? It'd be easier if Jade didn't care because then knowing what she'd done, knowing he'd died wouldn't hurt her? Jesus.]

i just
i only ever wanted to protect something important
but it just gets fucked up in new ways every time i try

I understand. I really do.

[Elsa hesitates before continuing to type. She doesn't... really talk about this much, doesn't like to... but she needs to, or else all the "I understand" stuff just sounds so empty.]

I almost killed my sister twice, when all I was trying to do was protect her.

i let

[He stops, and then, shakily, locks the thread.]

my friend
i let her
accidentally shoot me in the back
and then i didnt see her for three years so i couldnt tell her it was ok and it wasnt her fault or apologize for not telling her when i knew it was gonna happen
and then
right before i got here
i
she
i dont really
know
or understand what happened
but one of the bad guys took over her brain or something and she started wrecking shit all over the place and she tried to kill my other best friend the mayor and
i dont know she got killed somehow??
and when i tried to help her i

i died too

[If Elsa had any doubts on who this was, they're gone now. And god... it hurts. It really does. Dave seemed pretty funny and pretty easygoing when they last talked, so hearing that he's gone through so much pain.... poor kid.]

... I'm so sorry. All of that. I can't even comprehend...

But...

Everything that happened after you didn't see her for three years? That's not your fault. It sounds like it all happened so suddenly, so there... there wasn't really any time to say anything.

You don't have to answer this, but why did you let her shoot you?

i had to
or i thought i had to
its kind of stupidly complicated and i dont really

[mmgngngh.]

basically it would have caused a time paradox if id done anything differently
so by the very nature of what time is and how it works
i couldnt do anything differently
its hard to explain in a way that makes sense to people

[Even after a year here, after being exposed to different kinds of magic and all sorts of new things the other outsiders here talked about, Elsa... doesn't quite get what it is he's talking about. But she tries.]

So this thing happened because of uncontrollable forces that are greater than you?

That's even more of a reason why it's not your fault. If you had no way of stopping or changing it... it's a horrible thing, yes, but it was something out of your control.

rose
my sister told me that maybe i was just relying on the unalterable alpha timeline shit to justify what i wouldve done anyway though
and i dont know if she was wrong
im
i think i really fucked up

You can't let others try and tell you what you were feeling. The only one who truly knows why you wanted to take these actions is you.

Your sister... does she know the full story? Did you tell her everything about what you were feeling when you did it? If not, then she can't really make assumptions like that.

Many people thought I was evil, for example, when I did something bad on a complete accident. All they saw was the danger I posed to others, and how I ran away after it happened. But the story behind it was... very different.

well
i guess i didnt
we started to talk about it once but then some other stuff interrupted us and by the time things calmed down like
so much had happened the only way anyone could really cope with it was by pretending everything was normal
or spending three years drunk as as skunk apparently
so it was sort of hard to engage her on the topic while that was going on

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