Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“For the Angel of Death spread his wings on the blast,
And breathed in the face of the foe as he passed;
And the eyes of the sleepers waxed deadly and chill,
And their hearts but once heaved, and for ever grew still!”
― Lord Byron

The poorly labeled cardboard moving boxes hit the floor, sending a resounding echo through the small, empty apartment. It smelled of musk and rat poison, mixed with dust and soured paint.

"This will be good for us, you'll see," Peter's aunt tried reassured him as she walked into the hallway to bring another box in, this one labeled kitchen utensils.

He didn't know where they were supposed to fit all their stuff, after all, the apartment felt like a shoebox compared to their old house. There clearly wasn't going to be enough room in the kitchen for all the things his Aunt had packed. There was a fridge that had a broken humming sound coming from it, and cabinets with the paint scratched off it from what looked like claw marks from a dog. Aunt May liked to bake, he thought, running his fingertips over the cracked countertops. She'd never have the space to make anything in a kitchen like this.

"Just give it some time," she asked of him, noticing as he stood there, staring at a particle of dust floating through the air. "It'll feel like home soon enough."

Peter didn't think so. His home smelled like warm cinnamon whenever he walked in. The walls had no cracks, the windows no chipping and the plumbing no leaking. The refrigerator didn't make odd sounds and the only scratches anywhere in sight were those purposely etched into the wall where his aunt and uncle measured his height through the years. The walls here only seemed to close in on him, devoid of the comforting familiarity he had left behind. They brought him no comfort, only misery.

Sighing in discontent, May sat him down on the couch they'd brought from their old house. It was too big for the living room they had now, but they didn't have the money to buy a smaller one. "I know you're not happy about this," she said. "But promise me you'll give this place a chance?" She asked, her eyes pleading with him for some support.

Peter looked away, staring out of the window. He felt small. He always felt small, really. The adults around him treated him like glass, an orphan too fragile to even speak to in anything besides a docile tone. Even though he could recite the entire periodic table by seven and solve college level algebra by nine, the world still viewed him through a lens of vulnerability.

He nodded lightly, the words stuck on his tongue for a moment. "Promise," he eventually whispered, looking back at her. He could see the relief in her eyes at the response. It was so empty and monotone, but she'd accept it because it was the first word he'd spoken all day.

These days Peter was as monosyllabic as he could possibly get away with. He still said please and thank you, because he was raised to, and it was expected of him. He said excuse me when he bumped into someone and apologized for his mistakes. He answered questions when asked, albeit in succinct answers, but otherwise kept to himself, slowly saying less with each passing day.

What was there to say? Uncle Ben was dead. He died and after the funeral they had moved away from everyone Peter ever knew. One by one the people he loved most were being taken from him. May said they were in a better place, heaven, she'd claimed, but Peter wasn't foolish, even at ten he knew that God hadn't claimed his family, he'd stolen them. He didn't know why, maybe it was some cosmic game or a cruel twist of fate, either way, he blamed God.

His aunt kissed him on the cheek, a small show of gratitude that he wanted to shy away from but couldn't. "Thank you," she said, squeezing him in a hug.

Peter put his chin on her shoulder, staring aimlessly at the cracks in the walls and the soured paint peeling off it, lost on thought. Silence hung heavy in the room as the desire to pull away, to escape the condolences and the sympathy washed over him. But he stayed, because he knew she needed it more than he did.

When she pulled away there were tears in her eyes, the kind that he'd seen too much of in recent days since the funeral. This move was how she was choosing to deal with her grief, channeling her loss into something productive. Peter preferred to wallow, letting the pain and sorrow consume him until he felt nothing at all. He was getting good at it.

"Okay," May wiped her tears, blinking away any remnants of the pain in her eyes. "Why don't we unpack a few more boxes and then get some dinner?" She suggested.

She waited for some semblance of a response, a yes or a no. Maybe even a request for something he wanted to eat like pizza or spaghetti. All he did was nod vaguely. "Sure."

Peter could tell she was disappointed by his reaction by the way she squeezed his shoulder, trying to keep a smile on her face despite wishing he'd at least make an effort to embrace this new fresh start the way she had. He knew she wanted the old Peter back, and he was trying, really he was. But it wasn't as easy as he knew they both wished it was.

"Alright then," she whispered, getting up, sniffling slightly as she ripped the tape off of a box, the sound bouncing off the walls and making the neighbors dog start to bark.

He was fairly certain it was a Chihuahua. Earlier in the morning, when they arrived, he had spotted their new neighbor downstairs collecting her mail with a small dog comfortably nestled in a bag on her shoulder. She was old woman, and telling by the way she gawked at Peter with an expression that made him feel like an exhibit at a museum, she was probably a mean one as well.

He stayed seated on the couch, staring at his hands for a moment before he got up to help her. Peter found it unsettling how all of their memories and the remaining remnants of their life could all be packed away in cardboard containers. As if it was all replaceable.

They unpacked in silence, mostly the essentials—the kitchen utensils, new bedding set to replace the provided sheets tainted by bed bugs. The silence persisted, occasionally broken by the rustling of packaging and the soft thud of items finding their place and destined to stay their for as long as they lived here.

A place for everything and everything in its place, his uncle used to tell him he forgot to put something back where he found it. Everything seemed to remind him of his uncle, every poster he had on his bedroom wall at home, every pair of shoes he owned that his uncle had bought him, every chore he used to complain about having to complete.

Eventually, growing tired of the silence his aunt began to talk. It was like a distant humming in Peter's head.

"We'll get the heater fixed soon, I promise," she reassured him, when she opened the box containing every blanket they owned. "Is the cold bothering you?"

He shook his head. He honestly hadn't really noticed it very much with his jacket on.

"We can paint your room if you want," she said a little later when she accidentally opened a box of his old room decorations. "Is your favorite color still red?"

He nodded. It had been for as long as he could remember. She knew it hadn't changed, she just wanted him to confirm it.

"Why don't we bake cookies to take to the neighbors after we get the kitchen settled?" She suggested hopefully after putting the silverware in the dishwasher to run it tomorrow before putting it away.

He shrugged. He wasn't very good at baking and he didn't particularly like it. But if she wanted to, he would try his best, even if he thought they might be pepper sprayed for knocking on someones door around here.

"The school down the street has lots of kids," she told him when taking out a photo of Peter and Ben at last years fourth grade science fair. "I'm sure you'll be top of your class again."

He didn't care about school or being the top of his class, so in response, Peter remained silent, handing her another plate, he attempted to contribute through actions rather than words.

The silence, however, had become too much for his aunt to bear. "Oh for God's sake, Peter, say something!" She exclaimed, setting the plate down on the counter with such force it shattered against the surface, sending pieces across the counter and onto the floor.

Peter winced at the sound, sharply inhaling as her heard her shout for the first time since before his uncle's death.

"I'm sorry," she apologized quickly, regretting her mistake, the remorse evident in her voice as she wrapped him in another hug.

Peter just stood there, looking at the glass on the floor. "Me too," he whispered quietly. His aunt pulled away, putting her hands on his cheeks softly. "I-" he swallowed, the constricting feeling in his throat making it hard to speak. "I'll try to- to be better."

His words came slowly, disconnected from one another as he struggled to articulate his feelings. Yet, they were uttered nonetheless and it nearly broke the both of them in the process.

"Oh no no no," his aunt rushed to shake her head. "You don't need to be better, Peter. None of this is your fault. You understand that right?" She asked. "Right?" She repeated, her voice cracking.

Peter nodded and she exhaled in relief, hugging him again. "Why don't I order us some dinner?" She suggested, preparing herself for another silent response. The nodding or shaking of his head.

He stood there, his mouth open, words eluding him as the seconds passed. "Not hungry," he finally said softly enough that the whisper could barely be heard over the humming of the fridge.

"You need to eat something," she explained, trying to enforce the idea of dinner as gently as possible, knowing the harder she pushed the less likely he'd be to eat.

Peter knew the look in her eyes, the one that meant she was a few moments away from crying. "Okay," he agreed, choking the word out slightly louder than the last ones.

He didn't know which hurt worse, seeing her face when he spoke or when he didn't. Both made him hate himself. Peter watched as she dialed the number off of the posters hung to their door when they first got here. She ordered pepperoni, his favorite, and he tried not to think about how repulsive it sounded to him. His aunt was trying her best, they both were; but his best didn't seem good enough anymore and he didn't know to fix it, fix himself.

"Pizza will be here in a bit," she told him, setting the phone down. "Why don't you get changed for bed?"

He nodded, taking the opportunity to get out of her way and breathe away from her worried gaze.

When there came a knock on the door Peter watched his aunt fetch her wallet from her purse and pay for the pizza. He sat on the couch, reaching his hand into the box as she set it down in between them.

Peter ate a single slice of pizza under his aunt's watchful eye, the smell made him sick, but it was nothing compared to how disgusting he found what was once his favorite meal. It tasted fine, he supposed, but it was racked with an undeniable guilt. The world kept spinning after his uncle's death, they kept living and Peter couldn't shake the feelings that it was all wrong. Everything, all of these decisions he had no say in, they weren't the right ones.

"How is it?" His aunt asked, wiping her mouth with a napkin, a small glint of hope in her eyes.

Peter lifted his hand, giving her a weak thumbs up and his aunt's concerned gaze lingered on him, searching for a glimmer of reassurance in his response.

She nodded. "Good."

He didn't know if she was convinced or not, after all he hadn't put very much effort into masking his reluctance to eat. She seemed to accept his answer though, either way. Maybe she was just as tired of him as he was of himself.

"Are you tired?" She asked, noticing his eyes beginning to grow heavy. "Do you want to go to bed?"

Peter nodded, dropping the pizza crust back in the box, much to his aunt's dismay.

"Alright," May said understandingly as he stood up. "Let's get you to bed then."

He helped her take the pile of blankets out of a box and carry them to his new room, twice as small as his previous one. She unfolded them in silence and draped them over his small bed. Their mattresses hadn't come yet, so they'd have to make do with the beds they had for now.

"There," she smoothed out the wrinkles and downturned the bed. He climbed in, the frame creaking softly and tucked him in, fluffing the pillow behind his head. "Is there anything you need?" she inquired, her voice a soothing murmur.

Peter shook his head and she smiled softly, as if trying to make the last image of her for the evening a good one. He could see through it though. She kissed him on the forehead, and told him goodnight before she left turning off the light and closing the door behind her.

He turned over, watching her shadow from under the door. She kept unpacking for several more minutes before the light from the hallway finally clicked off and she went to bed for the night. Laying flat on his back, Peter stared up at the ceiling in complete darkness, the humming of the fridge keeping him awake. Or maybe it was lumps in his mattress, the bugs nipping at his skin, or the sound of sirens that came and went more times than he could count.

He couldn't tell the difference, if it was an ambulance or maybe a police car. He just knew that they were out there and people, just like his uncle were dying.

The only thing louder than the sirens was his aunt's weeping, muffled from the next room in some feeble attempt to contain her sobs. She cried every morning and every night and Peter pretended not to hear her. He thought it was better that way.

Lifting his pillow, Peter covered his ears with it, trying to suppress all the sounds keeping him awake. But that only left him with his thoughts, which were arguably far worse. The weight of his grief crushing him in ways he didn't know were possible. He'd been five when his parent's died, he didn't remember much aside from the police showing up at his aunt and uncles home, the funeral, and the patronizing manner that adults spoke to him in when offering condolences.

His pain may have hurt then, but he'd forgotten just how bad. That is, until the familiar despair crept back up when the door rang last month and a cop broke the news to his aunt while Peter hid on the stairs. The sirens faded from his mind as he drifted to sleep, doomed to be haunted by nightmares. But even his nightmares were safer to live in than hell's kitchen.

Chapter Text

“Death was a living creature. Death was a man tormented by his past. Death was once a human.”
― S.K.N. Hammerstone

Like most things, Peter's life got better before it got worse. He had made a few friends at school, started talking more, and even tried embracing living in Hell's Kitchen, despite missing his old home. Then, just when he thought he might have been able to get used to his new life, tragedy struck again, and Peter felt a numbing sense of deja vu consume him as he stood in the kitchen. His heart pounded as he gazed at the blood smeared across the cabinets and pooling onto the kitchen floor, staining the grout they'd cleaned just last week.

He had known loss as long as he could remember, but this felt different. Practically redundant. His life was like a Greek tragedy where he starred as Thanatos, made for the sole purpose of leaving a trail of bodies behind him wherever he went. He supposed he should have gotten used to it, being hated by God or perhaps cursed by the devil. Either way, the world always took and took and never gave to him.

Without shedding a single tear, Peter dropped to his knees beside his aunt, the shock still fresh in his mind as he brushed the hair out of her face. She would have looked like she was resting had it not been for the blood spilling out of her mouth. His eyes began to water as he felt his throat tighten and his heart pounding. "No," he whispered over and over, his voice cracking as he put his head down. "Not again."

Her eyes were closed, her skin still warm, and her pulse non-existent. He could have done a lot of things to try to save her, but he didn't. He just sat on the floor, his clothes covered in her blood as he sobbed over her corpse.

And when he got tired of sobbing, Peter screamed. Screamed about how unfair the world was, about how angry he was, about how much he hated her for leaving him. He screamed so loudly the neighbor, who took any excuse to berate the child, came to yell at him. She found him on the floor and called the cops.

Peter didn't know what happened after that; it had all been a blur to him. The police asked him if anything was missing, but he didn't know why it mattered. She was the only thing of any importance to him in this run-down apartment, and she was gone. Nothing they did would ever bring her back, so why bother trying to recover the stolen television and her jewelry?

It had only been a year, almost to the day since Peter's uncle's death, and here he was again, dressed in black, standing in a cemetery, watching someone he cared about be laid to rest in the cold, dark ground. Only this time, he had no other family to return home with. Peter was utterly and entirely alone, surrounded only by people who knew his aunt and the CPS case worker that had been assigned to him.

People bowed their heads in prayer, but Peter kept his head up, looking at the small crowd of people that had accumulated for her service. His aunt was a good person; she deserved more than this. All she'd ever done was take care of him, and this is how she was repaid? By being murdered in her kitchen and getting a cheap funeral, surrounded by people in her knitting club.

The crowd dispersed, some people staying to make small talk or wish him well. He always found it ridiculous that anyone could believe a simple condolence could fix this kind of damage.

His case worker, who'd yet to leave his side during the entire service, seemed to be as sick of the funeral as he was. "Are you ready to go, Peter?" She asked, putting her hands on her knees as she bent down in the patronizing way all adults did when they spoke to him.

There it was again, he thought, that choking feeling in his throat that kept him from speaking. That dark abyss in the corner of his mind, beckoning for him to return to it. Peter didn't have it in him to be sad, to stare at the fresh mound of dirt covering her casket and weep. He wanted to leave the cemetery and never come back.

Without a word, he started walking past her and towards the car she'd parked in the lot behind the mortuary. When his parents died, he remembered feeling scared of what would happen to him. He didn't want to be sent to an orphanage or adopted by some strange family claiming to be giving him a home. That weight of worry fell from his shoulders when his aunt and uncle had taken him in. But now, with both of them gone, his worst fear had come true. Actually, something worse than his worst fear had happened because he wasn't just at an orphanage, he was at church.

It was like God himself was laughing at him as he and his case worker walked up the steps to be met by a nun whose name he'd forgotten. They all looked the same to him, wearing their ridiculous matching attire and speaking the word of God as if they knew him personally, knew why he was so cruel.

"How was the funeral service?" She asked him, her hands clasped together as she wore a small smile of sympathy towards him.

Peter didn't respond, just opened the big, heavy doors to the church and walked directly through the service that was being held. He looked at the scattered number of people with lost souls sitting in the pews, and he felt angry. He had lost everything. What could have happened to any of them that was worse? What could they be praying for that was so important they had to abandon their lives and seek shelter in a church in the middle of the afternoon? He didn't know, and he truly didn't care all that much.

Peter shut the door to what was meant to be his room behind him. It didn't feel like home; it felt like a prison. He sat on the stiff bed that felt like it was made of cardboard, his mind replaying the funeral service over and over, finding new details in his memories each and every time.

He missed his aunt. He missed all of his family, truly. But he had gotten sick and tired of mourning them. He couldn't cry anymore, not even if he wanted to. Peter was angry, no, not angry. He was enraged. Every minute of every day, he was enraged by everyone and everything. The nuns who pitied him, the priest who tried to get him to speak in a confession, the other kids; orphans who thought he was just like them and couldn't understand why he hated living in a church. A church filled with stained glass windows and statues of saints who were meant to protect people, but only ever brought him misery and pain.

Peter was enraged, and he didn't know how to cope with that feeling, the one that gnawed at him inside. He kept it locked up with the rest of his thoughts and his words, but he just couldn't do it anymore. Without realizing it, he had stood up and begun to pace around the small room.

He swept the miscellaneous objects off the table beside the bed, sending them scattering across the floor. Then he went for the shelves, bolted to walls, but filled with pictures he'd been allowed to bring with him. He threw the frame that held a photo of him and his Aunt and Uncle at the wall, followed by the frame with a photo of him with his parents on Christmas morning. The glass shattered against the wall, and Peter couldn't help but feel relieved by the sound of broken glass hitting the ground.

He reached for the statues, the ones of angels and saints; they were supposed to be symbols of supposed protection and benevolence. Pathetic, he thought, breaking them all without hesitation, as if he could physically purge the pain that coiled within him. The statues crashed to the floor, the shards of porcelain mixing with the other broken glass and trashed objects.

Peter rumbled through the desks and drawers, looking for anything he could destroy, anything to help him feel better, even if it was just for a moment. He found a journal tucked away in a drawer, its pages filled with his thoughts at the request of his case worker, who thought writing would help him process his grief. He grabbed it and flung it across the room with a loud thud that was sure to get someone's attention if the rest of his wreckage hadn't by now.

He could have stopped there; he knew he probably should have. But he didn't. Instead, he continued his search for more objects to vent his frustrations on. He yanked drawers open, spilling their contents onto the floor as he sought to find anything worth smashing. Peter scanned the room, desperate to find something else to ruin in his frustration. He tore the bed apart, ripping the cheap feather pillow apart and letting them tarnish the room further.

With one last bit of rage, he reached for the Bible. The goddamn Bible they made him read and recite, as if it would help guide him or rid him of sin. He hated that book more than anything else. More than he hated the nuns waking him up at six am each morning, more than he hated listening to sermons and praying, more than he hated the sterile confines of the church that masqueraded as a sanctuary.

He began to rip the pages out, chapter by chapter, verse by verse, destroying the Lord's word, littering them on the floor where the rest of his anger resided within the broken glass and destroyed statues. Reaching the end of the book, he threw the spine at the wall as hard as he could before finally letting himself breathe.

Peter stood in the midst of the wreckage, his chest heaving with exhaustion and a short-lived liberation. He sunk to the floor, resting his back against the side of the bed as he took in the damage he'd done. It looked as destitute as he felt. Maybe he'd get kicked out and finally be rid of this place once and for all.

The door opened a few minutes later, another nun whose name he didn't care about enough to remember stood there, making sure nothing would soon fly at her head before slowly pushing the door all the way open. She took note of the room, the feathers along the floor and the crunch of glass under her shoes.

Peter could see the disappointment on her face, but he didn't really care all that much as he pulled his knees to his chest and buried his head in his arms. She gently took ahold of his arms, pulling him off the floor to get him away from the glass before he accidentally cut himself. He didn't resist, just let her drag him out of the room as he kept his eyes glued to the floor.

She took him back up to the chapel where service had been cleared out for the afternoon. He saw all of the candles lit at the altar, flickering softly as they burned. Sitting down, Peter placed his hands in his lap, staring at them instead of at her.

"That's the third time you've destroyed a part of the church," she noted, as if he'd somehow forgotten. "First, there was the confession booth, then the classroom, and now your own room."

He didn't need the reminders; he'd been there. Each previous time he broke something small, the partition of the confession booth and the blackboard in the classroom. This had been different, and they'd both know it. Peter remained silent, his gaze fixed on his hands.

"Do you like baseball?" She asked, seemingly out of nowhere, trying to relate to the little boy. "Is this your attempt at a third strike?"

Peter didn't say a word, just sat there, waiting for the pity and sympathetic questioning to be over so he could be reprimanded and go back to the broken-up room.

"We're not sending you away," she continued. "So if that was your goal, you haven't succeeded."

He stilled his twiddling fingers and looked up, his eyes reflecting pain and grief, but not an ounce of regret for his actions. He didn't truly have much to hold against anyone in the church, but the way they spoke, as if they had any idea of how he was feeling, drove him insane.

She had begun to give up on getting him to speak, just as most of the other nuns had too. "Eventually, Peter, you'll have something to say, and I just hope you have someone around to hear it." She stood up. "Fetch a broom; you have quite the mess to clean up."

It didn't take long for Peter to see the consequences of his actions play out in front of his eyes, starting with him cleaning up the entirety of his mess and being forced to apologize for the damage he did. He then had to attend additional counseling sessions, as if twice a week wasn't enough time to waste sitting in an uncomfortable chair and saying nothing while listening to someone lecture him on the importance of healthy coping mechanisms.

He wondered if it would ever end, if they'd give up on him like he'd given up on himself or if he'd be forced to live here until he was old enough to go out on his own without child protective services dragging him back against his will.

Peter found himself sitting alone in a pew once more, a few weeks later, the only one in the chapel aside from Sister Maggie, whose name he'd finally managed to remember after she began personally escorting him to and from each counseling session he attended.

"Praying?" she asked, hopefully, stopping beside him.

He held up his hands to show her the research paper he was reading about astronomy. He sat in the pews from time to time, not to speak to God as she and other nuns hoped, but because it was quiet, and he could be alone.

"Astronomy," she remarked, with a small nod of approval at his reading material. "That's quite a change from the quantum physics you were reading about yesterday."

He liked science, but he also liked reading about the stars. He sometimes imagined what it would be like to live on a different planet, the furthest one he could find from here. Scientifically that was impossible, he knew, but he still liked to dream about it. A place away from everyone and everything.

Sister Maggie took a seat beside him. "There's someone I want you to meet," she said in a tone that he knew all too well. The one that meant she was trying to make her request sound like a suggestion instead of what it truly was, a demand. "He's, well, he's someone close to me, and I think you'd like him quite a bit."

Peter suppressed a scoff at the thought of her thinking he'd like anyone she introduced him to. The last time she'd said something similar, he'd met a monk who had taken a vow of silence and hadn't spoken in four years. He supposed she was trying to give him someone to relate to, but Peter wasn't mute because he wanted to be. He stopped talking because the words never came, no matter how hard he tried to make them. Talking had become a burden, and he was much more content when he didn't have to force one-word answers out for the sake of appeasing his counselor.

He heard the tapping of a cane echoing through the chapel and turned his head to look over the pew. Sister Maggie had gotten desperate, he thought, realizing she wanted him to meet with a blind man. For what purpose he'd yet to decipher; maybe she wanted to make him guilty for being able-bodied. Or maybe she thought putting a blind man with a mute boy would magically cure one of them, otherwise there'd be no way for them to converse.

She stood to greet him in a hushed whisper, brushing her hand against his arm and guiding him towards the pews and towards Peter. "Matthew, this is the boy I was telling you about," she muttered softly, as though he wasn't just a few feet away. "He reminds me a lot of you, how you were at his age. I thought you two could talk for a moment."

The man nodded. "Of course," he said, leaning his cane against the side of the pew and taking a seat. Sister Maggie's footsteps retreated, the echo of her shoes slowly fading out of hearing range as she left.

Peter couldn't wait to get this over with. He'd sit and listen to the man's lecture about the Lord's plan and his place in the cosmos, then he'd return to his room and finish reading the paper he'd spent all day trying to finish in peace.

"So, Peter, how many people have they had you meet with?" he asked after a few moments of silence. Peter turned his head, curiously; none of the other people he'd met had even acknowledged they weren't the only one. "I mean, I appreciate the church thinking I'm worth talking to, but I'm definitely not the first choice. I'm guessing you've scared off most of the others, haven't you?"

Peter nodded, quickly realizing he had no reason to since Matt couldn't see him. He thought, for a brief second, about answering him verbally, but Matt seemed to somehow know he nodded and kept talking.

"The monks and the priests, they usually come in with a script. They say the same things, hoping for a conversion or some miraculous change of heart," there was disdain in his voice, as if he was speaking from personal experience. "The nuns won't like me saying this to you, but I respect the whole not speaking thing, so don't feel the need to give it up on my account. Or anyone's, for that matter."

Peter had met with plenty of religious figures, both from the church and surrounding communities, but no one had ever told him to stay silent. They'd all encouraged him to speak, once even screamed at him to. But he didn't truly believe Matt; he just figured it was some sort of manipulation tactic to get him to open up by making him comfortable.

"The Bible says that words are powerful, but I find that they often create more confusion than clarity," Matt noted. "Listening is the right way to understand, if you ask me. It tells you more truth than words ever could."

His voice held a hint of weariness, like he too, had been through the same motions. Peter, for once, was actually curious about one of the people the church had him speaking to. Matt had to have grown up in the church too, he thought. Or at least visited it often with his family.

"I used to destroy things too," Matt said. "The nuns here, they thought it was about violence or rage, and maybe in some ways it was, but mostly it was just about breaking something before it broke me. It made me feel in control."

Peter had given up on putting his emotions or thoughts into words; he felt it to be a waste of time. But Matt had summed it up rather well. He wanted to feel some semblance of control over his life even though he knew he had none. He wanted to break things so they'd match how he felt inside. Matt wanted to keep from breaking, but Peter felt like he was already broken.

"Fools give full vent to their rage, but the wise bring calm in the end. Proverbs 29:11," he recited from memory. "That's what they would tell me before handing me a broom and telling me to sweep up my mess. I never got the hang of that proverb," he admitted. "I still like to break things every now and then. Sometimes out of rage, frustration, or a need for control. That grief you're feeling, it never goes away, if you were wondering."

He wasn't. Maybe a piece of him hoped it would one day fade, but he knew it would never disappear. Feelings like these that tainted someone's heart never left, not completely.

"But it does get better, eventually," Matt added. "It takes a while, and it'll never be gone forever. You try to bury it, but it comes back, those questions of what if. What if I was faster, what if I'd said or done something differently, what if I could have changed it? There are so many ways it could have played out, so why that one?"

Peter felt like his thoughts were being articulated for him, and aside from feeling both amazed and saddened that someone else could feel something so similar to him, he felt like coming to terms with the reality of his life would nearly kill him. Maybe he was partially willing to let it.

"Some days are worse than others," Matt went on. "Sometimes you feel like the guilt might consume you. But you learn to live with it. You learn that even if you would have been faster, if you could have somehow managed to avoid it, the people you love would still disappear eventually. God just chose to take them sooner rather than later."

Peter frowned, looking at his hands. He knew the grief would persevere, but having someone say it out loud was strangely hard to hear. It made it real, that this pain and his anger would never go away. Matt said God chose to take his family from him; he couldn't help but wonder why.

"Don't ask me why," he said, as if he could somehow sense Peter's question. "I don't know why he does half the things he does. And I'd be lying if I said I didn't question it sometimes. I question it a lot, actually. But pondering the grand scheme of things just tends to lead to more questions than answers."

Peter's family had been religious; they'd taken him to church and attended services quite frequently. Not each week, but at least once or twice a month, which was a lot for a little boy who wanted to do anything else but sit in a pew with his hands clasped and his head down. They'd always told him the Lord worked in mysterious ways, but Peter didn't like mysteries. He liked science, logic, and reason. He liked having the answers no matter how dark or complicated they were. God, his teachings, his methods, it felt like a cosmic joke meant to ruin the lives of good people and raise cruel people on an untouchable pedestal. He didn't like it very much.

Footsteps echoed through the chapel once again as Sister Maggie walked back towards them.

"If I could give you a piece of advice?" Matt whispered, as she approached. "Learn to embrace the pain. Acceptance doesn't mean surrendering to it; just try to acknowledge its existence and let it in from time to time. To remember them and remind yourself that you're human."

The thought seemed inconceivable to Peter. If it had hurt this badly when he was pushing people away and trying not to think of his family or of his pain, what would embracing it do to him?

"Well, how was your conversation?" Sister Maggie asked, running her hand over the wooden pew she stood beside as her steps stalled in place.

"Very productive," Matt responded, standing up and retrieving his cane. "Peter's been quite talkative."

"Really?" She asked skeptically, turning to Peter to confirm.

He didn't know why Matt had lied for him, but he wasn't going to question it if it helped get the nuns off his back about being more social. He nodded his head, standing up and trying to ignore the constricting feeling in his throat as he forced out a one-word answer. "Yes."

It had been the first word Sister Maggie had ever heard him speak before. "I see it has yielded results," she commented. "Perhaps we should have asked you to come in sooner. It could have saved us replacing all those porcelain angel statues."

"Ah, we talked about that, and he promised to stop destroying things," Matt added. "if you cut down his counseling sessions to once every other week."

Once again, Peter was caught off guard by Matt attempting to help him. Why was he doing this? What could he possibly have to gain out of it?

Sister Maggie's expression softened, a hint of satisfaction crossing her features. "Well, that's a step in the right direction. I'm glad to hear you're willing to work on this with us."

Peter nodded again. "No p-problem," he said, swallowing as he felt his throat close. He'd managed to get the words out, and if it resulted in him getting out of counseling, he'd consider it a small victory.

She was clearly happy with his progress, as small as it was. "Thank you, again, Matthew, for coming down."

"Not a problem," he replied with a courteous nod in her direction. "It was nice meeting you, Peter," Matt said, reaching into the pocket of his suit and handing him a small card. "If you ever need to talk or not talk, you're welcome to."

Peter flipped the card over in his hand, reading the company name and number as the echoing of Matt's cane tapping against the floors echoed through the church at a steady pace. Peter didn't know quite what to make of him; after all, his experience with lawyers was limited to being present at multiple will readings and eavesdropping on a conversation about how much compensation his aunt and uncle would get for his parents' accident. All the lawyers he'd met had been scum. Then again, Matt seemed different. His presence felt genuine, his intentions unclear but not malicious by any means.

Peter shoved the card in his pocket and sat back down in the empty pew, picking up the research paper he'd been reading and flipping to the last page he'd read. He didn't think this changed much, if anything at all. But most often, the biggest moments of someone's life never seemed very important when they happened. It was the mundane, inconsequential moments that proved to have the most impact.