#look if ridley’s gonna wave away trauma and mental health SOMEONE’S gotta point out that these kids aren’t alright

[pulchritudinous-plants]

steep

have some post book six finn angst? i guess? that’s been in my drafts unfinished for months. mainly inspired by the fact that finn literally stabbed one of his best friends from childhood and it got kinda waved away??? therapy and meds are good but not that good. this is very rough very unedited but it’s 2 am so ya know.

His skin is red from the heat of the shower; scrubbed raw until tender. The water long stopped running pink but it doesn’t matter. He can still feel the blood on his hands, under his nails.

He should get out. Go to the infirmary, Philby and Maybeck were still out of it, after all, talk to the girls. Talk to security.

Are they going to send security after him? They probably should. He did kill someone, after all.

His knees give out at the thought. God, he killed Dillard. He’s sitting on the floor of his stateroom shower because he needed to wash off his best friend's blood before he could do anything else.

What is he supposed to tell his parents?

What is he supposed to tell Dillard’s?

His stomach rolls dangerously. Do they even know where their son is? He wasn’t supposed to be on the boat. He wasn’t supposed to be involved.

He isn’t supposed to be dead, either, though.

He buries his head in his knees, hands fisting his damp hair. Jesus Christ. He never should’ve come on this cruise. He never should’ve become a DHI. Screw his friends, how on earth could they be worth this? He never should’ve met Wayne.

Wayne. Anger flares inside him, but it’s muted. Wayne got them all involved in this. He’s the one that decided children could end a war that adults had been fighting for years. He’s the one that made Finn a Keeper. He’s the one that made Dillard a martyr.

Someone’s knocking on something far away. Everything sounds like he’s submerged in a swimming pool; white noise echoing in his ears. Someone is breathing loudly in the next room.

The door opens, light pooling in from the bedroom, casting shadows onto his mother. She looks worried, panic pinching her face. He can’t bring it in him to be embarrassed that she’s just walked in on him. He wonders why.

“Finn!” She rushes to him, pulling his face up in her hands. “God, you’re freezing, hold on.” Oh. He is freezing, now that she mentions it. The water’s turned ice cold; his skin is numb. How long has he been sitting here?

She leaves, just for a moment. The water abruptly shuts off and she comes back, towel in hand and clothes damp. She wraps it around him before smoothing his hair off his face.

“It’s okay, Finn, but please, breathe. You’ve gotta calm down” Breathe? He is, isn’t he? But no, the heavy breathing from before is him, not someone else. He’s hyperventilating, he thinks distantly. You’re having a panic attack, Larry.

God, how many times has he heard Charlene talk about panic attacks after tests? How many times has Willa called him at 2 am, crying from old nightmares? Why did he think he was so invincible, so well grounded that this wouldn’t ever happen to him?

Well, he supposed anyone would be crying in the shower if they‘d just stabbed someone.

He barks out a laugh at the thought, startling his mother. God, what is wrong with him?

He doesn’t know how long they sit there, on the floor of the shower. She breathes slow and even, willing him to do the same as she rubs his back. It feels like forever until he can take an easy breath of air.

Vaguely he wonders how his mom knows how to do this; whether it’s just some inherent knowledge that comes with age and children.

It takes longer still until he stands on shaky legs to grab a change of clothes, towel pulled tight around him. He’s not shaking, anymore, but he’s still cold. Still a little numb. His lips are chapped.

She leaves to let him change, looking weary at the thought of leaving him alone. He doesn’t blame her. He feels like he’s still teetering on the edge of another breakdown; one good push and he’ll be sent sprawling. She had grabbed his pajamas, he thinks idly. An old t-shirt his aunt sent him years ago that he’s yet to grow into and a pair of plaid sleep pants. They both smell like the lavender laundry detergent she uses back home.

Shit, he wants to go home.

“It’s a little late,” she says once he comes out of that bathroom, moving to put her hands on his shoulders. He doesn’t want her to move away. “Do you want to order room service for dinner? Or I could go pick something up?” She offers, but he’s already shaking his head.

“Can we order? Please? I just…” he trails off, not knowing what to say, but she’s already nodding, moving away to find the menu and call in dinner.

He stands in the middle of the room and tries to think. He needs to go down to medbay and talk to his friends. Philby and Maybeck are awake, no doubt, and they’re going to want to know what happened. It’s what a good friend would do. What a good leader would do. Hasn’t he fought tooth and nail to hold on to his precious leader title? He should be explaining; strategizing (apologizing). Instead, he’s leaving Willa and Charlene to explain everything, half of which they don’t even know because they didn’t follow him into that cave.

(They’re going to have to tell them how they woke them up, he thinks wryly. He’s almost upset that he’s almost certainly already missed out on Philby blushing as red as his hair; Maybeck’s cool persona cracking at the thought that he and Charlene kissed and he wasn’t even aware).

Would the girls wait for him to tell them what he’s done? Or do they already know that their leader's a murderer?

Maybe Philby should be the leader. No one’s died on his watch. What does Wayne’s opinion matter now, anyway?

He should go to them, even just to sit in silence with his friends. But the mere thought sends anxiety clawing up his throat. He’s terrified of what he might see when he looks into their eyes (disgust, horror, fear, anger, even sympathy).

He’ll be alone for tonight, he decides. Plead exhaustion if anyone asks in the morning. It isn’t a lie in the slightest. He feels drained, down to the very marrow, and just wants to sleep.

(He won’t be able to. He’ll toss and turn all night when he does finally drift off around four in the morning he’ll wake up from a nightmare with bile in his throat and phantom blood on his hands.)

-

His hands itch. They’re clean. He washes them anyway.

-

His hands start to crack. They’re dry, constantly, from the repeated washing and relentless hand sanitizer.

Their water bill is going to be astronomical, he thinks belatedly.

It’s been a little over two months since…since.

They haven’t crossed over once, Philby putting a stop to it as soon as he was back at his computer, not needing to ask the others if it was okay. There wasn’t much of a need for them, anyway. The OTs were surely scrambling to figure out what to do without Maleficent.

None of them end up caring too much.

They haven’t gotten together much since they arrived back in Florida. They had individual meetings with some high-up Disney execs and then were told to please forget this unpleasantness had happened and sign the new NDAs and oh, don’t forget they needed to post on the official Disney Host Interactive social media at least twice a month.

(His contract is extended for two more years. He doesn’t read the fine print as he signs away his life again. Not that it matters. They’ve already made a killer out of him.)

They’ve slowly been talking in the group chat again, small comments about class and families that carefully skirt around anything too heavy. Charlene sends a picture of her cat in a sink and Maybeck sends back his latest attempt at a donut vase and slowly, slowly, they start to feel like friends again.

Amanda keeps coming over, stretching out the last few days of summer with him whenever she can. He’s rotten company; doesn’t talk much but she doesn’t mind. She talks endlessly about her days, long and boring though they may be, until her voice goes hoarse and he can’t help but get up and grab her a glass of water.

He’s trying, slowly, to explain what happened to her. It had been surprisingly easy to hear Willa and Charlene fill Philby and Maybeck in on the story, he himself stepping in to fill their gaps. It’d been mindless, almost; he’d been too focused on how necessary it was that the panic and fear hadn’t hit him until hours later, hands itching until he’d scrubbed them raw.

(“PSTD,” his therapist says when he finally works up the courage to see one. “Trauma responses and rituals to help self soothe.”)

It’s amazing, really, dealing with grief. How often had he really thought of Dillard before the cruise? They’d certainly been growing apart in recent years, Finn spending more time with the Keepers and working and far less with his childhood best friend. It’d been easy to justify, at the time. Dillard wasn’t a Keeper, wasn’t a DHI; couldn’t understand what he and his friends were going through no matter how hard he tried; not like Jess and Amanda could.

Well, not until Wayne dragged him in.

He misses Dillard at the most random times, sharp aches deep in his chest at the mention of his favorite foods, the theme to his favorite video games; snatches of conversation from other neighborhood boys about girls and school and games. A sudden wave of grief and guilt a misery so strong that he’ll climb into bed and not be able to leave for days.

And then other times he won't think of Dillard at all for days at a time; feel content, almost, until he remembers and then the guilt of forgetting, of neglecting his best friend’s memory is almost the worst part.

He’s fifteen. He’s famous. He’s killed his best friend. He’s a soldier in a war he never should’ve known about. He’s a leader, or at least he’s supposed to be.

His hands itch.