Chapter Text
Vi is tired. Her spine contorted up against the rough brick of a shabby convenience store on the furthest outskirts of Piltover. She shifts slightly, grunting as the street lamps sway in her vision. Vi knows she has a problem. She does. Yet the uncomfortable but familiar weight of a cheap alcohol bottle drags her hand down. She should stop. The other similar bottles scattered around her feet practically scream of a unhealthy excessiveness. But she can’t. So she does the next best thing.
Opens up a fourth bottle. Or fifth? Third? Seventh? Shes not too sure any more. The deceitful blurring and doubling of her vision makes it hard to tell.
Listen it’s not even a big deal. Shes just doing this to clear her head, shes just tired… and worried and sad and stressed and furious and betrayed and… floating. Floating, a kind of freeness that can only be achieved by Vi through frowned upon means.
Crash…! Cans scatter up the alley way disturbing her in the silence of dusk only interrupted by the faint buzzing in her ears.
“Vi..?”
Caitlyn. Vi thinks blearily. She can’t see her like this, Vi knows it’s a problem and thats all ready one to many people knowing, Caitlyn can’t know. It’s wrong and compulsive and an addiction and corrupted. Nothing like what Caitlyn deserves. How did she find vi? She made sure to go far? Leave quietly..? She was so, so careful. So obsessive over keeping this part of her- because she knows by now it is part of her, theres nothing she can do- securely hidden with all the other things she hates about herself. Maybe Caitlyn all ready knew? Shes not that subtle sometimes surely. What if..?
“Vi!”
She hears the sound of clamouring and rapid footsteps as Caitlyn rushes over scattered litter.
“Gosh Vi I was so worried, i just woke up in the middle of the night and you were gone and luckily Loris spotted you but do you know how frightening that was? Are you hurt? Why on earth are you out here this la-“
She stops her rambling abruptly, taking Vis face into her hands.
“Are you…drunk?”
…
“Oh my gosh Vi sneaking out in the middle of the night to get drunk like some teenager! We are not kids anymor-“
Vi harshly rips Caitlyns hands of her face, pushing back against the wall, face scrunched up in displeasure.
The truth is Vi is scared. She has always been scared. Shes tired and scared and drunk so she responds the only way she’s ever known. Anger.
“Get offf..ff of me”
The slur of her words squashes any of the intended harshness of the demand.
“I don’t… I don’t… it’s not a problem… you shouldn’t be here. I bet you’re … I bet you’re judging me because you don’t get it with with your life and pearls and… and money but I don’t want that.”
Even the slurring doesn’t reduce the harshness of the words this time.
“I don’t want you to see… no I mean I don’t need your shame you kno’ ffuck yo-“
…
“Why-r you lookin at me like that just say it. Say I’m disgusting or a disappointment or… or leave like everyone else”
Vi can’t stop. Just like the drinking and the fighting and the anger. She can’t stop pushing. In any glimpse of vulnerability she thrashes, rolling, punching, kicking to stay on the surface whilst also pushing everyone else down to drown.
But Caitlyn stays quiet just staring. Why is she just staring?
Caitlyn presses her lips together, biting softly, shock dancing in her eyes as she vehemently tries to keep a straight face.
Shes’s still just staring..?!
Ah. That’s why.
Vi reaches to swipe her hands across her own skin.
Vi’s crying.
She hadn’t even noticed the way her breath began to hitch in between her drawling, biting remarks or how her hands began to shake with the fevor of her sobs or how her sight began to sway with something other than her own damming drunkness.
“I’m sorry”
To Vi’s surprise the words come out of Caitlyn’s mouth rather than her own despite the growing pit of guilt in Vi’s stomach.
Caitlyn crouches, leaning her back against the wall, her side presses against Vi’s.
“I don’t.. I don…tt”
“I shouldn’t have been so quick to judge, you’re right. I was just scared. And I know you are too. Can’t hide much from me anymore you know? Although it seems you have been able to hide this from me for some time I assume..?”
Vi scowls, turning her face away in shame.
“I thought so”
Caitlyn smiles a soft sad smile and only now does Vi notice the gaping bags under her eyes and distressed nature of her hair. She looks… scared…tired. The guilt only grows.
“Want to talk about whats going on now or tomorrow?”
…
“I’m sorry”
Vi thinks her voice sounds pathetic, weak, broken.
“ I know Vi. I know. So please… just…”
“let me help you”
“But-!”
“And before you say anything I am too tired and you have stressed me out to much to deal with your I don’t need help bullshit. I want to help. Just please. Let me.”
With tear tracks still on her face Vi knows she’s been defeated. She lets the water pull her under its depths, succumbing to the painful, terrifying ordeal of being known. Being cared for. So she responds,
“Okay.”
"Promise me. Promise me you will let me help."
...
"I promise"