FicWad

A/N: This is a slight continuation of the fluff break, even though there is a little bit of it in here. I realy, really like writing from Keefe's point of view, so I was really glad I got to give you guys a peek into his background.

Disclaimer: I do not own the lyrics to "All These Things That I've Done".

Song Used: The Killers' "All These Things That I've Done".

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Thirty-Four: All These Things That I've Done
Puppet: Keefe O'Kane

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When there's nowhere else to run,
Is there room for one more son?
One more son,
If you can hold on,
If you can hold on, hold on...

When I took a job down at Black Jack Ranch, I'd thought that the only reason I'd chosen to leave my home and abandon life in the city was because I'd met my special someone and it was the only way I could be with her. But it was only after I'd learned how to rope a calf and put a misbehaving pickup back in its place that I realized that I'd been trying to escape.

It was almost laughable, really. Mac always told me, “one of these days, you're gonna be so deep in your own head that you're gonna get seriously lost,” and now here it had happened. I had been lost inside my own head. I'd been so enamored with that pretty tow-haired, blue-eyed cowgirl that I had been able to lie to myself, tell myself that the only reason that I wanted to get away from home was because I was in love.

I was. But that wasn't the main point.

The point was that house, that big, drearily painted house in the city, held many bad memories that I was overjoyed to never have to revisit again. Never again would I walk in and remember all the times I'd done the same thing and been confronted with a drunkard that I had to call Dad. Never again would I have to worry about having to fight with him. Never again would I have to watch Mac, my best friend, get the shit beaten out of him.

Black Jack Ranch had been the first place to offer me such a refuge from those memories.

I wanna stand up, I wanna let go,
You know, you know – no you don't, you don't,
I wanna shine on in the hearts of men,
I want a meaning from the back of my broken hand...

“Did'ja ever try to run away?”

I drew in a deep breath and gazed intently at Casey, unsure if I was happy that I'd found someone I trusted with the little secrets from my past or is I was worried she may go and talk about them. She looked right back at me, not flinching away from my intense eyes the way I'd slowly become accustomed to. I'd made her tell me all about herself when she was a kid and now she was returning the favor, even though my story was far less pleasant to hear than hers.

“No,” I answered after a long pause, “I wanted to, but I didn't want to leave Mac behind. I was afraid that maybe he'd...”

Actually, when I was younger, I'd been terrified that my step-dad would kill my brother and I'd lose the one person who seemed to love me no matter what I did. I had been just like any other kid, after all; I wanted to mean something, and if that meant breaking a few knuckles saving Mac, so be it.

Another head aches, another heart breaks,
I am so much older than I can take,
And my affection, well it comes and goes,
I need direction to perfection, no, no, no, no...

I'd heard it said that, in an abusive family, the person who's hurt the most by it all is the one who stood by and watched. Though I thought that theory was a valid one, I profusely disagreed; I knew better than anyone, better than Paige herself even, that Mac, though he had grown up to be a semi-well-adjusted young man, suffered far more than I had and would continue to do so for the rest of his natural life.

I had always wished I could, but I could never find the words to tell my twin just how much I had hated to see him so battered and bruised after one of our step-dad's episodes. I kept my feelings bottled up the way I usually did, forcing myself to grow up faster than was needed so I could feel as if I had the strength for both myself and Mac.

“So you and Mac have always been really close, then.” Casey commented, nodding slowly as if it had all made sense.

I chuckled wryly through my nose at her innocence. I couldn't help it; she was trying to describe an elephant when she had only felt its trunk. “Actually, to be perfectly honest,” I corrected gently, “there were times when I hated him for putting so much responsibility on me.”

“Responsibility?”

I nodded. “Yeah. I would have to watch him get smacked around, then when I talked to him the morning after, he would always make me promise not to tell anyone...you can't even imagine the huge amount of pressure that puts on a kid.”

Help me out,
Yeah, you know you gotta help me out,
Yeah, oh don't you put me on the back burner,
You know you gotta help me out, yeah...

“So what did you do?” She asked, and though at first her questions had been mainly curious ones that she obviously wasn't quite sure she understood, this one seemed different. She leaned forward a little and her sky blue eyes glimmered with concern, as if she was worried that perhaps I was going through the experience all over again.

And to a certain extent, I suppose I was. But it actually felt kind of good to talk to her about it.

“Met a girl named Jess.” I answered flatly, pausing for just a moment to look at her to see if she was jealous. Seeing nothing but sheer interest, I continued. “I loved her and I thought she loved me, so I told her about the whole deal with my dad and she said she wanted to help me...but then my step-dad came after me and I went to her...”

I swallowed hard, surprised at how much that wound still hurt.

“She wasn't ready for it after all. It was too much and she...she left.”

And when there's nowhere else to run,
Is there room for one more son?
These changes ain't changing me,
The gold-hearted boy I used to be...

I was startled to find myself gazing at the ground rather than at her, and even more surprised when I couldn't force myself to look back up. It hurt. God, it hurt to talk about her, even after all this time...

Young as I may have been at the time, I knew that Jessie Rusher had been my first and probably strongest love. Back then, I'd seriously thought about asking the girl to run away with me, elope, live happily ever after...I'd been heartbroken when she told me she didn't want to see me anymore. When she moved on to another boy a little sooner than what was normal, I asked around and learned that she'd cheated on me for the last month of our relationship.

She'd cheated on me. She'd lied to me. She'd betrayed me.

I'd been distraught. Nothing in the world could've hurt more. I'd been so vulnerable, so powerless, so defenseless and she'd just thrown me to the Goddamn wolves to be with someone who could never love her the way I did.

I'd sworn I'd never let my guard down again.

I looked up at Casey suddenly, another chilling realization shuddering down my backbone. I had let my guard down again, and it was for the same exact reason as it'd been with Jessie. I was lost and broken, but she made me feel like I had some sort of purpose. Just like Jess.

And here I thought I'd changed, I thought, chewing the inside of my cheek, what if she...

Yeah, you know you gotta help me out,
Yeah, oh don't you put me on the back burner,
You know you gotta help me out, yeah,
You're gonna bring yourself down,
Yeah, you're gonna bring yourself down,
Yeah, you're gonna bring yourself down...

“Case?” I asked, interrupting my own story and peering questioningly at her. She hadn't looked away the entire time and, for a moment, I found myself swimming in the stormy blue ocean that I hadn't known existed in her eyes. How was I supposed to ask her that question? Was I ready for the answer? It seemed so serious, so sudden, but I had to know.

Was she going to be a waste of my time and love, like Jess had been? Was she going to purposely hurt me, like Jess had? Was she going to end up just being another weight dragging my heart down ten years from now, like Jess was? Was I just a fool putting myself in this vulnerable position again?

“Yeah, Keefe?”

I reached out and held out my hand for her, not once breaking my gaze. “I...I'm scared,” I admitted softly, “I don't want to lose you like that.”

I got soul, but I'm not a soldier,
I got soul, but I'm not a soldier,
I got soul, but I'm not a soldier,
I got soul, but I'm not a soldier,
I got soul, but I'm not a soldier,
I got soul, but I'm not a soldier,
I got soul, but I'm not a soldier,
I got soul, but I'm not a soldier,
I got soul, but I'm not a soldier,
I got soul, but I'm not a soldier...

Casey finally tore her eyes from mine so that she could look at my hand, her lips neither parted as if to speak nor pressed tightly together in refusal to. Slowly, she unfolded one of her hands from underneath herself (for she had been laying on her stomach in the grass) and placed it in mine, entwining her fingers with my own and giving it a gentle squeeze. “The only way you're gonna lose me is if ya' let go, city boy.”

A euphoric warmth that I hadn't felt in far too long started up in my heart and spread quickly through my body, relaxing my limbs and making my fingertips tingle with the urge to bring her closer. That had really been all I really needed to hear. I trusted her.

The realization struck me like a lightning bolt.

I trusted her. I was telling her about my step-dad, about Jess, about my fears, about how I felt, when not even my own twin brother had been so lucky. I was pouring my soul out for her, and the feeling was one I hadn't had the pleasure of enjoying for so long.

I'd been passionate about things, but up until then I'd never done anything about it because of fear.

(Time, truth, and hearts)...

I chose not to say anything for a long while. We had long since given up trying to hold one another's eyes, and I think I spoke for both of us when I thought that we were too busy looking at our joined hands to notice. I wasn't quite sure why; there wasn't anything particularly interesting about them. They were just appendages, after all; pieces of skin, flesh, and bone molded to serve the purpose of picking things up and holding them. Mine was a little bit larger than hers and hers was a little bit rougher in texture, but that was all. They were just hands.

But then again, perhaps it wasn't just the hands themselves that meant anything; maybe it was just the fact that they were tangled together, skin of one human being pressed comfortingly against the other's. Maybe it was the idea that they connected the two bodies and, in some odd way, managed to bring the hearts together as well.

Time healed all wounds. I still hurt after all those years, but I'd come to accept the pain.

Truth was light. I doubted that my intentions were pure, but I loved her and that was all that mattered.

The heart was strong. I didn't care that I was endangering myself anymore.

Yeah, you know you gotta help me out,
Yeah, oh don't you put me on the back burner,
You know you gotta help me out, yeah,
You're gonna bring yourself down, yeah,
You're gonna bring yourself down,
Yeah, oh don't you put me on the back burner,
You're gonna bring yourself down, yeah,
You're gonna bring yourself down...

“Casey?” I broke the silence by saying her name so softly that I could barely hear it myself, causing me to wonder if I should've said it louder.

“Yeah?” She replied, closing her eyes and smiling a little as if she somehow already knew what I was going to say. So that's what Mac means when he says I creep him out when I do that, I thought to myself, and here I thought he was just being a wuss.

I released her hand from my grasp and slowly pulled it away, sitting up straight. I scooted over so I was sitting next to her and facing the same direction, then stretched out on my side with my front facing her. I propped the upper half of my body up with my elbow and simply looked at her for a while; no staring like I wanted to screw her as soon as look at her, no gazing like I was a lovesick puppy...just... looking.

“I love you,” I murmured after a while, closing my eyes in contented satisfaction, “I need you to remember that.”

Yes, I needed her to remember that before she decided I had too much baggage and turned me away. I needed her to remember that before she found another boy who could offer her more than I could. I needed her to remember that before she dealt a blow to my already-low self esteem.

Perhaps it was wrong for me to want to forget my step-dad. Perhaps it was wrong for me to want to forget Jessie. Pain was part of learning who one was, after all, and if I forgot everyone and everything that had caused me hurt, I would lose the image I had of myself. If I forgot my past, all the things I did and all the words I'd said, I would never know why I was who I was.

But then again, speaking of those memories had freed not only them from the tightly locked safe I kept them in, but myself as well, and that couldn't be a bad thing, right?

I was drawn from my thoughts when a pair of soft, warm lips briefly brushed against my own. “I don't think I'll be able to forget even if I tried,” she whispered, “love you back, greenhorn.”

I'd hold on to those words forever. Would she?

Over and in, last call for sin,
While everyone's lost, the battle is won,
With all these things that I've done,
All these things that I've done,
(Time, truth, and hearts),
If you can hold on,
If you can hold on.

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A/N: I really enjoyed writing this one. I think it's probably the best one I wrote over Thanksgiving break, but I could be wrong. I really liked getting into Keefe's background a little, and I just really like his character. EMO BOY!