Chapter Text
Leonardo was not an easy teen, he hadn't been an easy kid, either. He could list all the reasons why he wasn't easy like script lines he'd rehearsed hundreds of times. And sure, none of them had been relatively easy per say. They all had their quirks and oddities, but his brothers had things they were good at. Uses they often fulfilled without trying.
He wasn't like Donnie, who their dad had deemed the funny one. He didn't make tech gear or hack computers or invent anything useful. He wasn't like Raph, who shoved his own feelings and desires aside to protect his brothers and keep them happy. He wasn't like Mikey, who was creative and kind and fun . Unique, they all had their own skills, their own things .
Whenever Leo subtly asked what they thought he was good at, all he got were joke answers.
" You're good at being a pain in my ass right now."
" you're good at talking over movies, shhh!"
"You're good at getting us kicked out of places- this is the third pizza place leo."
That one hadn't even been his fault, but he could stand being a little more selfless once and awhile and take the blame.
He guessed it was fair. A joke answer for a joke of a person. He had never really thought that far into it though.
Until Splinter caught the flu, and he latched onto Leo immediately. Cooing at the turtle in blue and calling him names he hadn't heard since he was a tot, he had yelled out about being their rat fathers least favorite. A joke, at the moment. A last ditch, helpless effort to not get infected.
But laying in bed, at 3 AM. Counting the scratches in the ceiling, he realized it wasn't a joke.
It was never a joke.
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Leonardo was Loud.
Not only was he hard of hearing, but his ADHD often had his voice unconsciously raising in volume. Which, his brothers often understood, as Mikey too also had trouble with volume control with his voice when he got excited.
Key words being, when he got excited.
Leo talked loudly all the time. He could never tell when he was mumbling or yelling, leading to awkward situations where one of his brothers would have to turn to him and hush him, or gesture for him to lower his tone. It was often a little embarrassing for him, and sometimes it…hurt. Especially when he was rambling about something he was interested in. He understood they were still interested in what he was saying, they were just…telling him to lower his voice.
It was rational to not want him to be so loud, so why did it still hurt him?
He himself often found his volume control irritating, it had gotten him caught once or twice on missions. And he could never whisper properly without being uncertain that anything he said actually made sense. The things he listened to were loud too, his shows, his music. He could rarely hear things normally, and yet he still decided to blast things at full volume.
Leonardo was too sensitive.
He was always the one to take things directly to the heart, he was worse than raph and Mikey with his feelings. Raph at least worked to contain his anger, while Leo let him make him snappy and unapproachable. Movements and anything that created too strong a vibration made him jumpy and panicked, it was worse when he was younger. And anything like a phone's vibration in his hands could set off a tantrum, but it was still pretty unbearable and uncomfortable for the slider when he was faced with similar situations. And Donnie often had to adjust things to accommodate his inability to deal with it.
He could still feel the tingling, numbing pain around his throat when the electricity coursed through him. Sending Shockwaves of not just the painful energy, but heavy vibrations crawling beneath his skin he wanted them out get them OUT-
He got upset easily, and he was often a bit…petty because of it. Like when his brothers didn't believe his suspicions of big mama, he had been right. And he should have just gone and helped his brothers when they got practically kidnapped by the insane spider woman.
But he hadn't.
He'd run off, he could have gotten himself trapped and then his brothers would have been stuck being clowns in a battle nexus, but he'd risked such a situation anyways just to prove himself better. Sure, things had ended up alright. But because of his petty nature, he could have gotten them hurt. And even still, his emotions drove him to do the same things over and over again.
Leonardo was a hazard to himself, and to others.
He wandered too much. He didn't listen. He was too competitive. He was arrogant, and reckless. He put himself, and others in danger far too often. Even as a tot, he wandered off far too often in order to sunbathe, or to follow meaningless flashes of movement he would see from small animals and insects he spotted in the corner of his gaze. On missions, if something was glowing, or bright, or just mildly interesting he found himself diverting from the main objective to check it out. Sometimes, when he got competitive because of something one of his brothers said, or when he was just feeling impatient in general, he would rush ahead into fights without any regard for his own safety, or the safety of those around him. And often, his eldest brother would sit him down to give him a lecture he rarely remembered by the end of it.
Leonardo didn't take things seriously.
Leo didn’t plan, he didn’t feel like indulging his eldest brother with his unprofessional training, and he did everything by just winging it. In his defense, it worked out a lot of the time. But that didn’t mean it was right of him, even when his dad tried to get him to be more serious about things. He always brushed it off or insisted that it was fine, he always felt horrible afterwards, seeing his family roll their eyes or shake their heads at his antics. But for some reason he could never just..
He could never make himself do what he actually wanted to.
He wanted to stick to plans, he wanted to take things seriously, he wanted to do better but he just…
He never could. Maybe he was just that bad at following directions, maybe he was just bad at trying, that would make sense.
Leonardo was "spacey".
Leo was, what mikey and donnie had called, a maladaptive daydreamer.
This often caused him to ‘space out’, staring out into the distance or at someone until he was finally snapped out of it by some outside force. Either by him getting caught in a mission or one of his brothers shaking him out of it, he could never seem to get himself out of it though, Diving far too deep into the far too realistic images in his mind. A lot of the time, it was different things, rarely continuing from the last. Sometimes it would have to do with a mission they were on, or something that happened years ago that developed its own alternative story in his mind. Sometimes, his younger brother would ask him to describe the things his mind created so he could draw them. That was mostly only when Mikey had an art block though, which was a rather rare occurrence.
He supposed he liked his “wall of Conjuration” though, which was just a wall in his room with drawings of things he’d described that his brother ended up giving to him. It was the only thing he liked about it, receiving the delighted light in his brother's eyes as a wide smile spread across his face with Leo’s praise of accuracy and detail.
Donnie seemed to understand it a bit easier than raph and his father, just slightly shaking him out of a trance whenever he saw him in it and reminding him about what they were doing so he could get back on track faster. Raph wasn’t…he didn’t like Leo’s ‘episodes’ in the slightest, even if he never said so out loud. Whenever he was pulled out of it he could always see the eldest staring at him with this…look. He would almost mistake it for concern, but he was sure the red-clad turtle just didn't want him to mess up.
And dad just didn’t understand it, period. And he wasn't going to bother trying to explain it. It was just an excuse anyways, right? There wasn’t anything wrong with him. He was just…he was just bad at everything.
That had to be it, it couldn't be anything else.
Or maybe he’d just convinced himself of that.
But there was really no doubt about it, as he lay on disheveled sheets, staring with eyes burning from his tiredness but his body buzzing with restless energy as he counted each mark, dent or spot on his ceiling.
Leonardo was far from the favorite.