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You aren’t always strong.
You don’t like people to know that, though, and you go through great lengths to keep them in the dark. You laugh, grin and smirk, and make fun of whatever crops up and cuts you down. You joke about it with tears in your eyes, carefully concealed and quickly removed.
Steven looks up to all of you, so much. You never thought anybody would ever look up to you, but there he was, his eyes full of stars and his face awed. He actually thought you were cool. He thought you were strong. You couldn’t let him down, you couldn’t ever let him find out.
But nethertheless, every time you look at him, every time you see him smile or giggle, you can hear her and feel her and sometimes you’ll catch little glimpses, as though she were still there. He’s so much like her, too.
You know how he feels regarding the subject of Rose. You know how much it must beat him up, knowing that his three surrogate mothers are now leaderless and lost thanks to him. You can relate to him. You know how it feels to have never asked to be born, yet you were born anyway and people blame you for whatever consequences came with it.
You can’t let him find out how much you miss his mother. You can’t show him how cut up you are inside, how lost and fragile you feel, how sometimes when you’re alone you’ll realize that she’s not there to protect you and love you anymore. You’ll remember how her arms felt, so soft and warm and strong, and you’ll remember how she would talk to you and refuse to let go until you felt safe. You’ll remember how you’ll never feel that again.
But yet, you miss her so much.
Most days, you’re strong. The feeling that something’s missing is almost unnoticeable. You’ll be with your teammates, and you’ll be part of the team, and you’ll know how valued and loved you are. You’ll see Pearl smiling at you when you finish an attack, or feel Garnet’s hand on your shoulder when you’re relaxing, or hear Steven calling you excitedly when he finishes a video game, and you’ll feel how great it is to be part of this family.
Other days, you’ll feel fine, and then the reality will start to sink in. It creeps through you and fills you with first unease, then dread, then hopelessness and fear.
You’ll feel so powerless, so alone, so angry while knowing that the anger isn’t going to solve anything. You’ll feel like you’re struggling against restraints you can’t escape, or drowning in an endless sea. You’ll feel a hollow feeling in your chest when there’s nobody there to hold you and tell you that everything’s ok.
You’re trying to stay strong, you really are, but you’ve been getting worse throughout the day. You don’t know what it is about today. Pearl is nowhere to be found, Steven’s with his father, and Garnet’s on a mission. You’re sitting on the couch, staring out into space. Your hands are clasped together, the knuckles going white.
You try to breathe deeply, the way Vidalia had taught you a little while back. Gems didn’t need to breathe, but it was a bit of a habit that had been picked up by the team thousands of years ago while on earth. It didn’t seem to be helping much now. The breaths of air you took felt like just that; breaths of air with no meaning and no aid to your anxiety.
You get up and head into the kitchen, wondering if you can take your mind off the creeping thoughts with food. Stress eating is also a habit you’ve picked up, though a much more uncomfortable one. You look into the refrigerator. The first thing that catches your eye is a jar of pickle relish. You’re a little fearful when you realize you don’t even feel like eating right now, and close the door, dragging your eyes up to the ceiling.
You slump against the fridge, sliding down to the floor and sighing. It’s dark outside already. A summer storm had rolled in yesterday and still wasn’t gone, and the cloud cover was impressive. It hadn’t rained in a good while. You supposed the earth needed it.
Instinctively you feel the urge to move after a minute or so of just sitting. Your body is determined to distract you from the emotions getting ready to drag you down, but you don’t want to move. You can already feel it coming on, that awful, slow feeling that always manages to make you feel like garbage.
She wasn’t here to help you now. And you obviously couldn’t do that yourself, now, could you? You should know how to do this. You shouldn’t even be here in the first place. Why are you moping around? What’s wrong with you?
You can’t even keep yourself happy, and that’s impressive in a morbid way. You really can’t do anything.
It really is a wonder, you think, that somebody as amazing and smart as Rose ever thought to take you in. Sure, she was leading a disheveled pair of surviving soldiers when you joined, but she never struck you as somebody who took people in simply to increase headcount. It now felt like a mistake. She must have made a mistake. You really didn’t deserve to be pulled out of that miserable wasteland.
You were meant to be strong, and brave, and you were meant to destroy the planet you were borne from. You even did a little, just by living. You had sucked the life right out of the ground around you when your gem was first formed. You had contributed to the destruction the kindergarten had caused.
You can feel your hands beginning to shake a little. Not noticeably to anybody else, should anybody have been watching you, but enough to increase how unstable you felt.
And really, what did that make you if you had already done irreparable damage? Sure, you were never going to be a strong, brave soldier like you were meant to be, but could you really ever call yourself a protector of the earth, if you had hurt it? You were beginning to think more and more that you couldn’t. You gripped at your cheeks, feeling blunt nails against your skin, and clenched your jaw, trying not to cry.
You felt like you were going to fall apart. You shouldn’t have ever come here, you shouldn’t have ever left that gem-forsaken place you had come out of. You were so stupid, thinking that you could ever help this planet after what you had done. You drew your knees up to your chest and buried your face behind them.
Your head snapped up when you heard the distinct chime of the warp pad, and the room was suddenly full of bright light. You knew you were behind the counter, and whoever it was wouldn’t see you. That was good. You didn’t want anybody to see you cry.
However, it became clear that whoever it was knew you were there. You could hear footsteps, leaving the warp pad and drawing near to you. You began to panic. You couldn’t let anybody see you like this. Without thinking, you shoved your head back behind your legs and curled up into a ball, trembling furiously, hoping that if you made yourself small enough nobody would spot you on the floor.
The footsteps stopped, just a few feet away from you, and you could only hope that your hair was blocking out your face.
“Amethyst?”
That was Garnet. You moaned softly, trying to coil tighter.
“Amethyst.” This time, she spoke softer, and you heard her coming over before you could feel her presence hovering over you. One hand was placed on your quivering shoulder, and you could feel the other slowly stroking back your hair, pushing it away from your eyes. It was barely a second that Garnet’s hand tensed, seeing your blotchy face, before you were gathered up in her arms and pulled against her chest. You winced as you sobbed, clenching your teeth together angrily.
“Tell me what's wrong,” she murmured, rubbing a hand against your back in an attempt to steady your breathing.
“I- I…” You couldn’t answer. You didn’t know how to answer. Garnet was quiet, listening to you try to get the words out. You could see her lips pursed with… what was that? Concentration? Worry? You didn’t know. You let out a frustrated breath and squeezed your fists together.
“It’s alright,” Garnet said quietly, after waiting another few moments for you to speak.
“N-no, it’s-s not…” You gasped out, feeling your face get a shamefully deep purple. You were pathetic. You had no reason to be upset over this, and here you were, crying on the floor and barely able to speak.
Garnet drew away from you, still holding you in her lap, but no longer pressing you to her body. She rested her arms on her legs. Patiently, she sat, watching you and waiting for you to continue. Realizing that you hadn’t really given her much of an answer, you tried to continue.
“I… I wish Rose was s-still here,” you whimper. “I… I’m…” You screwed your eyes shut. “I’m s-sorry…”
“You don’t have to be.” Garnet’s voice was deep and soft. “We all miss her.”
“I… I just…” You didn’t know how to explain this. You didn’t want to offend Garnet, who was the leader of the gems now and would consider this her responsibility. You just didn’t know any other ways. You fought yourself bitterly, clenching your muscles the way you did when you were panicky or upset.
“I don’t… feel safe… the way I did…” You mutter, hoping that those words explained it simply enough. Garnet didn’t react visibly. She seemed to be deep in thought.
When her arms had wrapped around you, they had been strong and warm. But they hadn’t been soft like Rose’s. Not in the same way, at least.
Sometimes, you wondered if this was a piece of how Pearl felt. Sometimes you grew resentful towards her. She didn’t usually seem to realize how affected you were by the absence of Rose, but when you felt lonely or unstable like this, you thought about how much that must be amplified for her, and then you got guilty. This was a feeling you wouldn’t wish on anybody else, no matter how insensitive or blinded.
“You know, we’ll always protect you,” Garnet said at last. Her words were slow, but in no way hesitant. “We will always protect each other.”
You nod, nudging back against her again in an attempt to hide your face. “I know,” you whimpered softly.
Garnet squeezed around your shoulders. “We’ll always be here to keep you safe. Even if you don’t feel that way.”
You found it so hard to believe, but you weren’t sure if you could tell her that. Still though, her repeated words sounded so calm and sure, so level. She was so sincere, you were almost convinced. She planted a kiss on your forehead, and though you were still doubtful, you did feel yourself calming down.
The first kiss was followed by another, and another, and you relaxed against her, letting out a soft exhale. She stopped after a few moments, simply resting her head atop yours.
One wonderful thing about Garnet - she was warm. Gems didn’t have to produce heat, so they didn’t typically bother wasting the energy. But rubies were often very warm to the touch, being elementals, and as far as you knew sapphires were probably cooler than your average gem as well. The two in a fusion balanced each other out perfectly, creating a comforting temperature that wasn’t overwhelming, but created an appreciable contrast to your own.
When you sat with Pearl, she was very pleasant to be close to - she felt gentle and cool all the time, but there were times when you craved warmth. You remember all those years sitting alone in the kindergarten, never feeling any warmth from the dust or dirt or stone there. There had been a few times when the sun had somehow shined down, warming up your climbing rock, and you had splayed yourself out on it in a feeble attempt to feel more than the shadowy cold that was the norm. It always passed by quickly though, leaving you unsatisfied and irritated.
But Garnet’s temperature almost never changed. She was constantly warm, and no matter what, she always seemed to know how to talk to you. You hadn’t really taken the time to remember that in a while.
You angled your head up quickly and gave her a very swift peck on one of her cheeks.
Though it was difficult to see in the dimming light of the house, Garnet’s face darkened considerably under her visor. She smiled and dipped her head, pressing your faces together. You smiled softly, feeling a little more stress melt away at her kind touch.
“How do you feel here?” she asked. “We can sit somewhere else if you want.”
“I… I think I want to stay here. Just for now.” You felt comfortable, your buzzing thoughts threatened into submission by Garnet’s gentle touch and presence. She nodded, and leaned back against the cabinets you had been huddled in front of just minutes ago.
She was never going to be Rose, no. But she was Garnet, and she was going to keep you and Pearl safe. And you and Pearl were going to keep her safe. It wasn’t ever going to be the same as when Rose was around, but you could feel little bits of what you missed so badly, that security and warmth, coming back ever so slightly through Garnet’s arms.
Little pieces, like bits of a puzzle that had been your life before Rose had left. Falling slowly back into place, sometimes into different arrangements, sometimes being familiar, and sometimes being something entirely new. You could feel that now, as fragile as it was, and you held on as tightly as you could.
You heard Garnet sigh, and briefly the realization hit you that she could have shared a lot of your thoughts. She was another person after all, another gem who Rose had taken in despite everything. How had she felt when Rose had gone? You couldn’t even begin to imagine what it must have been like. You could remember those days after Rose left. You remember how Garnet had taken charge immediately, the emotional side of her that you had known so well disappearing right along with your former leader.
You held onto her arm, though you weren’t sure you were the one you were trying to comfort anymore. She placed her hand over your back in return.
You stayed like that for a while, before the warp pad chimed, signaling Pearl’s return.