A Rough Afternoon

A/N: Part 3 of the Ammie and Beryl pieces I wrote. I am posting them all at once, so please feel free to check my profile for the others. This is... well, no two ways about it, I am all but certain this is the worst one. I tried to take it in a more mature direction. Beryl is in a way a reflection of myself (I mean, I did make her up...) and she takes on some of my insecurities and mental health issues as a result. I tried to make this a serious piece about self loathing, discomfort with the actions of the past, and how they can lead down a dark road. Unfortunately it was really a swing and a miss. I wanted it to a jarring transition between the sexual part and the mature discussion, and it is, but it also doesn't really, well, work. Still, it was an interesting experiment.

Note: Amaranthe is 22 and the narrator is 20.

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I set the weights to the side. These exercises were valuable, to be sure, but not at all easy. "My arms are going to be sore as hell tomorrow," I muttered.

"Tell me about it," replied Ammie. She sat on the floor, reaching towards her right leg. Her flexibility was better than mine, but not by much - she could just barely reach around to wrap her entire hand around her foot. "The other day I did so much I could barely walk for the next hour!" She laughed. "We can take a bit of a break now if you'd like?"

I nodded. "Yeah, we've been working for a little while now. Catching my breath would be good."

Ammie stretched herself out on the floor, lying on her stomach. Her tail curled on the ground next to her. She wore only a sports bra and black exercise shorts, from behind seeming so little it could barely be called underwear. It was hard not to stare at her smooth skin as she rested her head on the ground.

"Speaking of things being sore, my wings are killing me. Could you please do me a favor? There's some soothing cream for sore muscles by the couch. I can't really reach around to apply it to my wings so if you could rub it in for me, that would be wonderful."

"Umm...Sure." I felt a bit of skepticism at her wings being sore — she hadn't worked out her wings at all yesterday or today! — but decided to oblige. I walked over to the couch and picked up a small white vial. Dragonsleaf Relaxant Cream, read the label. I'd never heard of the brand, or the Dragonsleaf plant it was supposedly made with, but decided not to ask. "How should I apply it?"

"Gently rub the base of my wings, moving upwards across the membranes. Make sure to get everywhere."

I'm certain the face I made was priceless when she followed that up with, "Afterwards, could you put some on my pectoral muscles too? Those are really sore right now also."

I groaned. "Your chest muscles? You're not sore at all, are you? You just made up an excuse to get me to rub your wings and breasts with cream."

Ammie turned onto her back to look at me. "Was it that obvious?"

We both burst into raucous laughter, so much so it hurt. "Amaranthe, you horndog!" I called out as soon as I had the breath to do so, which led to a second peal of laughter.

"I get my lust from you, remember?" said Ammie once she'd caught her breath enough. "You know you want to." Her voice began to take on a sultry quality, the sort that I'd never heard before. "I've seen you staring. And when Beryl and I stripped for you a few weeks ago, the desire in your eyes was so very clear. You ache to touch me, I know it."

Damn it. That I knew she was right made it even harder to resist. Yet, she'd just reminded me of something. Something important.

"Before we do anything like that, though, I've been meaning to ask you about Beryl. Ever since that day she's been acting a little off, and I can't put my finger on it."

Amaranthe froze. Her slightly wiggling tail stopped in place. "Oh." She paused for a moment. "Oh." All hint of sultriness was gone. All desire she felt seemed to have evaporated. She sat up and patted the ground next to her. "All right. We do need to talk about her. You're right."

My heart grew cold as I took the seat she offered. "What's going on?" I asked.

"Please don't judge her. She tries, she really does. I don't want you to think less of her for this. Please." Amaranthe looked into my eyes. She seemed to be holding back a few tears. "She's been ideating."

The surprise was enough that I would have staggered back, had I not been sitting. "Oh God. You know I wouldn't think less of her for that. That...That is concerning."

Amaranthe gave a pained laugh. "Yeah, I know. But I felt a need to say that anyway."

"Just ideation? That's all, right?"

"I think so. I hope so." She sighed, wings drooping. "I mean, she'll be fine. We're fictional. She'll never progress farther unless you make her, and you won't. My concern is ultimately nonsense, because her behavior isn't real. Neither is my concern. Neither are we. Hell, even if she does go through with it, so what? She doesn't even exist!" A tear rolled down her cheek. "I don't know why none of that seems to make it any easier."

Amaranthe pressed her face into my shoulder as I wrapped my arms around her. I held her for a few minutes, comforting her as she quietly cried.

"When did this start?" I asked after a bit. "She seemed mostly fine to me, just a little more timid than usual."

"You said it yourself on that day. That wasn't like her. She flirts but not like that, not with anyone except me. I think she felt rejected. She played it off, but she..." Amaranthe gulped for air for a moment. "She wasn't just toying around when she said she wanted to be fawned over. I was making her look unwanted in that situation, like I was better." She began to cry again. "Damn it. I should have thought harder about it and realized that just because she and I act like that sometimes, that doesn't mean she'll react just the same if someone else is in the room. It's my own fault."

"It's not your fault, Amaranthe. You couldn't have known this would happen." I closed my eyes for a moment. "So you think she saw that as saying she wasn't needed? That we weren't interested in her?"

Amaranthe nodded. "Beryl has never been able to accept herself. She's convinced she's inferior somehow. Not as pretty as me, not as athletic as me. I tried to explain that that's nothing, that she's so much smarter than I could ever be, that she'd amount to so much more than me if we really existed. It never seemed to sink in, though. Beryl needs people to cheer her on because without it she can't see why anyone ever would."

I remained silent. This sounded familiar. Painfully familiar, in fact.

"Beryl's a reflection of you, isn't she?" asked Amaranthe. "Not exactly the same, but similar. Your own self doubts as seen through the lens of your imagination, because that makes it easier for you."

I couldn't bear to answer. Amaranthe knew the answer anyway, and had since the moment she'd asked.

Amaranthe wrapped her arms around me. Her grip was so tight it ached. "So I think she pushed herself to do something she thinks was wrong. Beryl would have done something like that with you - eventually. On her own time. But I forced her to do it too soon and she's hating herself for it. I...I know her. She'll get over it before too long. She'll be okay. But I'm worried. Worried enough to try and distract myself with sex, promising myself that Beryl will be okay, just give her a little time, a little space."

The whole thing should seem absurd in truth. Amaranthe was right to say they don't really exist. But so too was she right that she and Beryl are just reflections of my own feelings and beliefs. Deliberately constructed ones, to be sure, but that doesn't mean they aren't saying true things about my outlook on the world. Beryl would be fine, for I will not, could not, ever imagine her taking her own life in shame for stealing attention from her sister, for feelings of needing approval, for being too lascivious too soon, for anything. And when it comes to that which is imaginary, it can go no farther than I actively permit it to.

Yet the question remained: Why did it begin at all? The only reason Amaranthe or Beryl act in any way is that I tell them to. The only reason Beryl would ever ideate is that I reflect my own struggles onto her. She is depressed because I am.

Amaranthe blames herself. Yet another reflection. Who blames whom for this? If anyone is responsible, it's me. I am the one to let Beryl act strangely, or to have these thoughts. I am the one to let myself have these thoughts too. And so too are Amaranthe's increasingly lustful thoughts as a means to cope and distract herself a familiar feeling. Amaranthe cries because I permit her to do so, begs for me to be intimate with her because I made her. A twisted knot, a circular mess, but it comes back to me in the end. I am the one at fault, for my own struggles and for those of Amaranthe and Beryl alike.

Yet at some point, all I could do was change the subject as Ammie dried her last tears. "I'm going to put this cream back. I'm not feeling it anymore. Maybe another time."

Ammie nodded. "I'm not really feeling it either."

I blinked. Not surprising in truth, but, well, Ammie would never turn down something like that, no matter how severe the situation.

"I get my lust from you, remember? If you're not feeling it, I'm not either. Let's get back to exercising, I guess. And when next you see Beryl, give her a hug and tell her she's beautiful, all right? It would make us — all three of us — feel a lot better."

I stood. "I will, Amaranthe. I will."