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Amber. A pretty name, a pretty colour.

 

The colour of warmth and forgetting. A colour he had come to trust and depend upon. The scent was of forgetting, which was really the best he could hope for anymore. When he held it up to the light, or even better, to the soft warmth of a fireplace or candle, it gave off the prettiest glow, refracting the broken light in a way that was almost magical. It was so inviting and comforting that he wanted to consume it, wanted to feel it in the corners of his empty heart and soul, assuming he still had one.  If he ever had one, and that was dubious. It was like somebody had stepped inside his soul and little by little they robbed and stole until someone else was in control. If only he could consume enough of the light, he was certain he could feel that amber glow and the blessed numbness that came with it, that warmth and it would last forever.

 

Nothing lasts forever echoed in his mind, and he pushed the thought away bitterly. That was the last voice he wanted to hear. The voice that blended the truth with the lies until it was too hard to figure out which was which, and it was just easier to believe what you wanted, what made things easier. The lies could be beautiful, the truth was ugly and painful.

 

He shook his head in denial, wanting that to be a lie, needing it to be. The bastard had lied about everything else, although with just enough truth embedded within the lie to sell it The irony was though that he had more truth from that voice than any other from the Centre. Plenty of thigs lasted forever, just not the things you wanted to. The aching loneliness lasted forever, the bitterness of betrayal, the loss of self. They all lasted and ate away at you from the inside, a little more each day. Forever stretched on interminably.

 

Best of all was the sleep it gifted him. Deep and dreamless, usually. The times he did dream, they were very vivid and usually awful, as were most of his dreams. It was even worth the price when he woke, just to feel that he had achieved some rest, his mind had been turned off for a few hours. There was a price for everything after all, and this was certainly worth it.

 

The glass was of the finest crystal, a perfect diamond cut and his first guess was it was probably Waterford, not that he really cared. Miss Parker more than likely drank out of glasses like this, and now he understood why. He liked the feel of it, the nice solid weight of it in his hand. It had a certain presence that was comforting, anchoring him to at least one thing that was real, that he could hold onto. No more cheap dives with cracked glasses that were often filthy. Why shouldn't he enjoy some of the finer things life had to offer? The Centre was picking up the tab, and that made him enjoy it even more, especially when he had dipped into the slush funds that belonged to Cox and Lyle, the ones nobody was supposed to know about. That somehow made the amber colour taste even better.

 

He had sunk to a depth of self-loathing that he had never before fathomed possible. Jarod had thought he understood depression and despair, but that always came with underlying anger, as well as hope, which was perhaps the most dangerous of all the emotions. Then there had always been the damn guilt, which overlaid everything. Now, however... this was different. The hate was directed at himself, for being so stupid, so weak, so gullible. He had never thought of himself as a vain man, but the bitter truth was that he was, incredibly so. He had been too stupid to predict Sydney's inevitable betrayal, Parker's second betrayal and the fact that Lyle had played him like an ignorant fool. Out of everything, that is what stung the most, just how easily he had let Lyle trick him. Jarod had barely put up a fight, because it was easier that way. He hadn't even wanted to fight. The truth was, Lyle had seduced him and he had gone along willingly in the end. Hell, he had wanted to go along, anything to kill the pain and not be alone. It didn't matter that Lyle was a monster and that the game had been so obvious it should have failed.

 

Another lesson that had been extraordinarily hard on him was the realisation that all the people he'd helped meant nothing really, not in the grand scheme of things. Perhaps he was finally beyond guilt now, it meant nothing, Lyle had taught him that. All those negative emotions he had bottled up for years, clinging to hope when there was none, looking to a future when there was none. It was just a fool's dream, nothing else. He was what he was, nothing was ever going to change that. Things had to change. He had to find new things to hold on to, he had to let go of the past, which was, of course, completely impossible. It was all he had left, after all.

 

All of his life, the only worth he'd ever had in the Centre's eyes was his intelligence. They praised him on that, valued that, and in many respects, it was the only way he knew how to define himself. If he didn't have that anymore, then what did he have? What was he?

 

Jarod's descent into despair had been as swift as it was complete. He had left his family, if it could be called that. After all, he barely knew the man who was supposedly his father and the boy was nothing more than a carbon copy of himself. Somehow he didn't think that it would qualify under a Webster's definition of family. It didn't feel like family, it felt like... nothing much at all. It was impossible to ignore the pity in their eyes, the way his father looked between him and his younger self. How could he not want back all of those missing years that were stolen from him? Gem was his son now, Jarod was just the copy, and a badly broken one at that.

 

It hurt to look at him sometimes. He was so whole, so undamaged, a constant reminder of how broken Jarod was now himself. His future was ahead of him, he would grow and be the man Jarod could never be, live the life he could never have. He was young enough to heal, to build real relationships and find a place in the world where he felt he belonged. For Jarod, there were too many lost years, too much pain and loss, and he had saved Gem from all of that, and part of him hated the boy for that, for stealing what should have been his. This was grossly unfair, and Jarod knew it, he just didn't care, it was how he felt and he didn't know how to stop feeling that way.

 

The week after he had left, he had wandered aimlessly, sticking mostly to the coast, wanting to be able to see the ocean and feel the warm breeze on his skin. The bright warmth of the sun and blue sky, however, was not enough to chase away the chill and dankness that had crept inside and taken up permanent residence. Nothing was like it was before, and he had struggled to find the joy he had once so delighted in and it just wasn't there. It scared him dreadfully that it wasn't ever going to come back. That was all he had to balance all the bad that had happened to him, to make it seem far away, not something that defined him.

 

Running had been easy, and he had worked purely on instinct, staying one step ahead of them for nearly half a year now. Ties had been cut completely with the Centre, something he should have done the first time he had escaped. By the end of the first month though, he had begun to wonder just what the hell he was really running from. It seemed no matter how far or fast he ran, he always ended up in the same old places, and the problems were all still there. The worst of it was that he was still him, and he still felt the same and that wasn't ever going to change.

 

The pretending had stopped, he just didn't seem to be able to care enough to do it now. Surviving was all he could manage for now, maybe ever.

 

 At least that is what he told himself, he didn't owe them anything, he had paid and paid and then kept on paying. That was a lie though, and even halfway to drunk, Jarod knew that. He just didn't think he could do it anymore; the hard truth was that he had lost his confidence. It wasn't the first time he had lost his confidence, but Sydney had always been there to coax or bully him back to working. Sydney was now just a distant memory, and Jarod had fooled himself so badly with Sydney that it hurt almost as much as allowing himself to fall for Lyle's bullshit.

 

His little brother had been right. They had never made a difference anyway.

 

With that last torturous thought, Jarod threw the last of the top shelf scotch back, slammed the heavy glass down onto the bar and stood up, more than a little unsteadily. Fishing his wallet out of his jacket, he pulled a hundred dollar bill from the stack, then reconsidered and added a second, letting them drop to the bar before leaving without even looking at the bartender. It was the Centre's money after all, why should he care what happened to it and the bartender had been astute enough to leave him alone and not bother him with any inane chatter. Even the women, and sometimes men, had learnt to stay away from him, and he was grateful for that. He did not come here to pick up, he wanted to be alone, having company only made him feel worse, more inadequate, not knowing how to make small talk, behave in an expected manner. What the hell did he have to talk about or in common with these people? With any people?

 

Part of him knew this self-destructive behaviour had to stop, knew that if it didn't, he would surely end up getting caught, maybe even killed. There was some small part of his mind that remained detached and clinical, with a suspiciously Belgian accent, that asked him if maybe that wasn't what he was really hoping to achieve, that he wanted to make it easy for them, he belonged there after all. White leopard and all that shit. That voice was not a welcome intrusion, even if it was right.

 

It was time to do something, take some control back and he knew the only way he was ever going to be able to do that was to end it all. Taking down the Centre though was not within his grasp, so he would do the next best thing, and chop off its head. It might not end the misery that they traded in, but it would damn sure feel good. With that decision made, he felt a little better and stumbled his way to the elevator and up to the luxury suite he had been staying in this week, on the Centre's dime of course. He would worry about it all tomorrow. Tomorrow was another day and right now all Jarod really wanted was a soft warm bed and sleep. Blessed sleep.

 

The next morning Jarod woke with a pounding headache, gobbled down some aspirin, washed it down with some scotch and got to work.

 

It took Jarod two weeks to formulate a plan and set everything in motion, and it felt good to be doing something again, something definitive, something destructive. There was a sense of purpose that he hadn't felt in the longest time, even since before he had been recaptured. He was doing what he had been made to do, what he was good at, the only thing he was really good for. This was going to be his turning point, now that he had found something to turn to. It didn't occur to him that he should be worried that he might be taking the wrong path.

 

 

 

 

 










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