Work Text:
The first thing he notices is the scent of pizza.
It’s thick in the air, wafting over his nose like a piece of a feather that ruffles the senses. The second thing he notices is the distant sound of talking. It’s faint, too far away for him to really understand what’s going on. The even fainter clattering of dishes fills the backend of the distant talking, covering more of the words that he wishes he could understand. The third thing he notices is that everything hurts. It starts from his head and works down to the tips of his toes, a feeling echoing the time he came back from the Prison Dimension. He musters the energy to open his eyes, to find the cords that he can use to pull them up and look at his surroundings. It takes time, far too much of it, but he finally opens them.
The ceiling of Hueso’s office is something that he dreads and cherishes, something that brings him comfort and anxiety. He can see the many knickknacks and pictures that line the walls, all telling stories of Hueso’s years of living that he wishes he knew more about. He wishes that he knew of what the man was before he opened the pizza shop, of what his life used to be like and how he got to be the way he is now. The wall tells stories that are untold, like pictures in a book that describe the scenes of something that exists beyond his own memory. He looks down at himself, white bandages catching his sight and he finds himself staring at them.
Black wrappings are gone, white clashes with green skin. It inches up his arm, stopping just before his elbow. He gazes at them, the faint urge to poke prodding at the back of his mind. He raises his arm, fingers shaky as he pokes at the bandages. He winces, pain flashing like a bright light suddenly going off and it both explains and doesn’t explain why he feels like he got hit by a truck. The black wrappings on his other wrist remain, a small constant for his mind to settle on.
“Ah, there you are. Was going to think that you wouldn’t wake up.”
He moves his head a bit upwards, feeling the pull in the back of his neck and his head swirls with the stronger poundings of a headache to see Señor Hueso sitting at his desk, model ship in front of him. A paintbrush is held in-between his fingers, the slow strokes of a brush filling in the missing colors of the boat. Hueso’s eyes are locked onto the ship, barely looking at him as he attempts to slowly sit up. Keyword being attempt because the world spins further with his headache, a dry and parched feeling to his throat making him want to cough. He holds onto his throat, saliva barely doing anything to make it feel less like sandpaper.
“There’s a glass of water on the table for you.”
He glances at the boneman before looking around for the table in question. It rests on the other side of the couch where his head used to be, fingers wrapping around the cold glass and he reframes from chugging it like a man who hasn’t had water in ages. He can hear Donnie’s voice in his head, telling him to take small sips of the water if he doesn’t wanna make himself feel sick and he follows through with it. He finishes off the glass, putting it back where he found it. He doesn’t attempt to stand up, not if he wants the world to start spinning again.
“What am I doing here?” He finally asks.
Hueso looks up from his model ship, eyebrow raised. “Well, when one of my regulars found you bleeding out in my alleyway, do you really think I would kick you back out there?”
“I see.” Guilt churns inside of him, tight and wound and he looks away again. “Thank you for helping me.”
“Of course. I am not heartless.” Hueso sets down the paintbrush, leaning back in his chair. “So, would you like to tell me why you were bleeding out in my alleyway?”
His gaze flickers between his lap and the man, mind switching between running away and telling the truth. Part of him doesn’t think it would hurt to tell him, that Hueso isn’t his brothers or his father, that there is no real risk in telling him what’s going on. But the other part of him reminds him that Hueso won’t help him, that Hueso can’t erase anything that happened to him. Hueso is the runner of a pizza place who makes model ships in his downtime and has to deal with the likes of him and his brothers. The last thing Hueso is qualified to do is be the therapist to a sixteen year old.
But something in his head, something that sounds a little too close to Gram Gram, tells him that maybe Hueso actually wants to help him, that maybe Hueso is actually worried about him. He glances back up at the man, black suit covering white bones, and he thinks about that fact for far longer than he should. Hueso is an adult. Hueso isn’t his brothers. Hueso isn’t his father. Hueso is just… Hueso. He is the man that lets him eat at his restaurant, is someone who calls him Pepino and looks at him with something that seems like fondness sometimes. He is the man that once helped him get his brothers back when his portal was jacked, was the man that asked him and Mikey to save his restaurant when it was nearing failure.
Hueso is someone that cares, someone that worries, someone that has a heart under all of that seriousness and indifference.
Hueso is okay.
“I couldn’t do it anymore.” He confesses, softly in the space of the room. “I tried but I just… couldn’t anymore. I can’t be the leader that my brothers want me to be. I can’t live up to what their expectations of me when I wasn’t even ready to be leader. It’s been almost three years since I was made leader and I… I don’t know what they want from me, Hueso. I don’t know if they want a serious version of me who doesn’t have fun and who acts mature or if they want me, the person who jokes around and has fun and acts like every other teenager.”
“I don’t know what they want from me anymore and I don’t even know if I can live up to what they expect from me. All of this was easier when I didn’t have to deal with this, when I could just be a kid and exist as one. I didn’t ask to be leader. Hell, I didn’t even beg for it. It was just dumped in my lap one day without warning or training or anything. I wasn’t ready for the responsibility and no one seems to understand that. I was forced to grow up when I wasn’t ready to. I was forced to be mature when I wasn’t ready for that. How do you deal with people telling you that you’re doing a terrible job as a leader without telling them that you never wanted it?” He picks at the bandages, eyes burning. “I wanted to be a child, Hueso. I wanted to sleep in and jump off rooftops with ease and just be. But now I have to lead my brothers and be responsible and make sure that every order and plan I make doesn’t kill them.”
“I don’t know what Dad saw in me or what he was thinking when he made me leader. Maybe he wanted me to start growing up, maybe he felt it was best, maybe he saw something in me that I didn’t. Whatever it was, I didn’t want it. I didn’t want to be the person people looked to fix everything when I hadn’t been prepared for it. I didn’t want to be the shining light that people followed when they needed guidance. I didn’t want to be the guy that commanded armies and coordinated all of these things and…” His lips quiver, throat turning into a lump as tears rise. “I just… don’t wanna do this anymore. When I threw myself into the Prison Dimension, I thought that was it. I didn’t wanna die, but we had no choice. It was either that or watch the Krang take over Earth and… I thought that me dying would be better than living in a future where all of my loved ones died because I couldn’t make the needed choice to save all of them.”
“Pepino.”
“And- And I was fine with that, you know? I was fine dying for the sake of the universe if it meant that Earth would be fine and my family would live and I was fine with it and I was okay with it and then…” He stops, hand wrapping around his bandaged wrist. “And then I was brought back. Mikey and Donnie and Raph brought me back and I had to confront what I had done and I didn’t want to because at least it saved the world, right? It saved everyone, right? And as long as it saved everyone, it was okay, right? It was fine, right?”
“Leo.”
“But then the nightmares came and the hands around my neck wouldn’t go away and I couldn’t look at New York without seeing destructing and I can’t look at a sci-fi movie with aliens in it without seeing the Krang and I can’t look at Raph without seeing the Krang and I can’t look at Donnie without seeing the Technodrome and I can’t look at Mikey without seeing the fucking cracks down his arm and I thought that if I couldn’t be the leader that they wanted me to be that I would get rid of my sins and isolate myself and then that didn’t work so I thought that if I finally killed myself that everything would be better and everything would be fine because everything has to be fine and everything has to be okay it has to be—”
“Leonardo!”
The babbles of an insane man stop, tears dripping down his cheeks and he can’t breathe anymore. He wanted to die. He wanted this to stop. He wanted to be a kid again and if he couldn’t be a kid here, then at least he could be a kid in the afterlife. He could see Gram Gram again and be with her and have her sing him songs and tell him stories of her life and find out what she was like and isn’t it just funny that both of them locked each other in dimensions with a dark and powerful and dangerous evil just so that they could protect the world and the future of humanity and isn’t that just great—
Arms wrap around his neck, pulling him closer to Hueso. He can smell the cologne that he uses, musty and slightly sweet with a hint of tanginess that feels like Hueso. It’s soft and comforting, protective and secure. The hold matches all of that and more, a safety net of his own declining sanity.
“Pepino, let me be the first to say that I’m sorry that you went through all of that. No one deserves to go through that and that includes you. But throwing yourself into the Prison Dimension wasn’t going to fix anything. Yes, it may have saved the world and yes, it may have saved humanity, but it was at the cost of your own sanity and well-being. It put you at risk of death or worse, of being the only being in the known universe that Krang could take out his frustrations on. And because I am certain that no one else has informed you of this, but the weight of the world should not be on the shoulders of a sixteen year old who was still trying to grow up.”
“You were a child, a person who was still learning how to grow up into an adult when you were thrusted into the role of growing up far too fast and forced to sacrifice yourself for the betterment of the universe. Of all a sudden, you had all of these things that you needed to worry about that you never had to before. You had to learn how to deal with them whether or not you had your brothers by your side to help you deal with those things. The responsibilities of a leader should only be passed down to those who are ready and willing to deal with what the role brings and it’s clear that you were neither of those. And I’m not saying that you could never handle those things, but there’s a difference between being prepared for those things to happen and having it be dumped on you.”
He sniffs, fingers wiping away his tears. “What do you mean?”
“Take Raphael for instance. When your father made him into a leader, he did so because he had reason to. Maybe it was because Raphael was responsible. Maybe it was because he had the attributes of a leader. Maybe it was just because Raphael wanted to be a leader. The point is that he had years to settle himself into the role of a leader and settle himself into the responsibilities that came with it, whether or not he had someone there to guide him through it. You, on the other hand, had it given to you with no warning and expected to settle into it when you weren’t ready to do so nor when you had wanted it. Your father may have had his reasons, but it does not justify or excuse putting that kind of pressure on someone who wasn’t prepared for it.”
“And from what you have told me, it sounds like your brothers have a hard time understanding this. Have you talked to them about it?”
He bites down on his lip, inwardly hissing at the pain. “No, I haven’t. I didn’t because it didn’t feel like they wouldn’t understand.”
“Pepino, you cannot truly know how someone is going to react or feel about it unless you ask them. Sometimes, it may be obvious, but with things like this, you have to say something before it is too late. You cannot push a rock up a mountain by yourself and then cry when no one is helping you when you haven’t even asked for that help. Your brothers, despite how much you might not get along with them all of the time, seem to be the type of people who would understand you if you told them.” Hueso pushes him back, bony hands holding on to his shoulders. “You are not as alone as you think you are, Leonardo. Despite what your head might say, you do have people by your side who will understand you. I know that believing it is harder than knowing it, but I do want you to trust in that.”
His lips go back to quivering again, eyes shining with unshed tears. He latches onto the words, clutches onto them as tightly as he can. It’s everything that he needed and everything that he didn’t know he needed, a type of validation that comes in the form of an adult who isn’t his father and in the form of a person who isn’t his brothers. It comes from someone who understands, who took his words for what they were and responded with empathy and compassion, with comfort and a knowledge that he wasn’t alone; at least, not as much as he once thought. It causes his eyes to water more, to boil over and drip down onto his thighs as he buries his face in Hueso’s chest, sobs muffled in the fabric of his suit.
Hueso, despite being all bone, is warm when his arms go back around him once more, back to holding him tight as he sobs and sobs and sobs, as he grieves and mourns for the childhood that was lost. He isn’t sure if he’s ever going to get it back, isn’t sure if he’s ever going to have a childhood to speak of after all of this is over. So he grieves while he still can, mourns while he still can before all of it is over, before he has lost the moment and all of it comes crashing back down onto him.
He just wants to mourn.