Prompt: Grabbed by the Hair

Character(s): Laito, Cordelia

Warnings: Child abuse, implied csa, implied incest, emotional abuse and manipulation, Cordelia

“I love you,” she crooned, face buried in the crook of his shoulder, and Laito felt absolutely sick.

His sweaty bangs fell in his face, hair damp and clinging to his neck. His chest heaved with uneven breaths, trying to keep up with everything that he’d just been through. His hands, by his sides, were shaking.

Cordelia, his beautiful mother, had pulled away as soon as she was done with him, smiling like the cat that had caught the canary.

Laito closed his eyes for a moment, exhaustion weighing him down. He was tired, so tired, cold to his core now that she wasn’t leaning on him, holding him in place. Unpleasant as it was, as all of this was, sometimes, Laito only felt like he was still a part of the world was in those moments.

His mother’s expression soured. She paused in tugging her dress back on, and turned towards him, features trained into something cold.

“Laito, are you forgetting something?” Cordelia’s words were kind, but her tone was sharp and bitter, cutting like a knife, and Laito flinched.

“I love you too, mother,” he said, voice a whisper in the dark room, and Cordelia smiled again. She always wanted the attention, always wanted to be thanked for every moment she spent with someone, and Laito should have known that forgetting to reaffirm her would end in a foul mood.

Stepping closer, Cordelia ran one fine, long-fingered hand through Laito’s hair, an imitation of a caress that almost felt real, unpleasant only in the chill of her touch and the unamused stiffness of her movements.

“You’re a good boy, aren’t you?” she soothed, and Laito shivered. Attention like this was rare, even when it was clear she didn’t want to do it.

“Yes, mother,” he replied, fighting the urge to roll over and bury himself in the blankets, soak in her affection while it lasted, even false as it was. His eyes closed, the only respite he could allow himself for now.

“Laito,” Cordelia’s voice went cold. “I don’t like that tone.”

A part of Laito registered that today would be one of the many days when his mother found something, anything to pick on and used it to make him hurt. The other part started like a frightened rabbit at the viciousness in her tone, going cold as he realized that she was angry with him.

“I’m sorry, mother. I didn’t mean to offend you.” His voice came out quiet, terrified, and Laito cringed despite himself. That would never be good enough to appease her when she got into one of her moods.

Abruptly, Cordelia’s hand tightened in his hair, twisting her long fingers into the soft strands just hard enough to pull.

“You didn’t mean to?” she repeated, tone mocking. “Then please,” words punctuated with a yank to his hair, “do better next time. I don’t need your sass, not after everything I’ve done for you already.”

It didn’t make sense, but Laito nodded, ignoring the way it pulled at his scalp. He was terrified, cowering under his mother’s wrath, and the knowledge that he’d somehow done something wrong chilled him from the inside out. Cordelia had no room in her good graces for failure.

It was like this, sometimes. She’d take offence at nothing, take it out on one of them, then pretend like nothing happened. The routine was familiar, but no less frightening than it ever was.

Tugging his head up off the bed, pulling so hard that it drew a pathetic little whine out of him, Cordelia roughly twisted him to face her.

She slapped him, once, twice, then again, sharp enough to force his head to the side with each hit, yanking painfully at the hair she still had in her grip. Laito’s fangs went through his lip on the second hit, and there was blood dripping down his chin by the time she was through with beating him.

Starbursts of pain exploded around his scalp, face, and lip, bloody and beaten parts of him aching in a way that hurt no matter how quickly they’d heal. Cordelia’s face was stern, looking at him like he was some kind of pest.

Laito didn’t dare ask if she was satisfied now.

A few tense moments passed, his mother still holding him in place by the hair. Laito forced his eyes to stay open, not not look away from her.

Cordelia dropped him as soon as she got bored, shaking some hairs that she’d torn out off of her hand. She didn’t bother to tell him that she was done with him for now. The door slammed behind her moments later.

Left alone in the dark room, curtains blowing in the faint night breeze, Laito closed his eyes. It felt almost more alone to see where she was.

He was cold, bare skin chilled by the wind blowing in, and in the wake of his mother’s wrath, Laito felt like everything had been drained out of him. He still didn’t know what he’d done to upset her, beyond some passing mood that she decided to take out on him, and that hurt almost worse.

How affection could turn to pain so quickly, Laito would never know.

Oh, but he did know, didn’t he? That was just how love went, for creatures like them; half pleasure and half pain.

Laughing quietly, Laito rolled over. His mother’s words ringing in his head, he felt as if he was standing on unsteady ground. She loved him, she had to, and all the pain she caused him was just a consequence.

Her scent lingered on the pillow, almost as if she was there beside him, heavy perfume, blood, and something uniquely dark.

Scalp still aching, blood staining the sheets beneath him, Laito turned his face away, absentmindedly shoving that particular pillow onto the floor. Cordelia never stayed with him after things were done.

Their little routine would stay the same, he knew, for as long as she could get away with it.

@badthingshappenbingo