That huge elephant in the room that no one talks about

Liam was seated in the front seat of his sister's car. Usually Rowan or Helmer were the ones to drive him to and from therapy, but both of them were busy and he ended up getting stuck with Aspen. He leaned back in the seat and used his thumb nail to pick at the foam covering on his cane, trying to pretend the car ride wasn't really awkward, even though both of them knew it was.

Don't get this wrong, Liam loved his younger sister just as much as he loved both of his other siblings, he would literally do anything for her, die for her if he needed to. But Aspen was.... difficult... or at least difficult for him to understand. They had been fairly close when they were really young, but as they grew up they kind of stopped being as close. The two of them could probably blame it on their father's way of making them compete against each other in everything, but it didn't change the fact that they weren't so much as close siblings as they were enemies of each other. And it only seemed to get worse after Liam spent a month in a coma, hell, he was fairly certain this was the closest she'd gotten to him since he woke up. And it was really starting to get to him.

Most days when Liam had to go to therapy Rowan or Helmer were able to take him. Aspen was fine with that plan. It wasn't that she was avoiding her brother. No, not at all. It was just well, she didn't make a habit of spending one on one time with him often. Especially since for that passed while she had been very focused on getting sober. She had quit drinking and it was one of the hardest things she had ever done. There were plenty of moments especially with everything happening in her life where she could really use that relief, but she managed to stay strong.

Her father had been taken into custody by the police. As much as it was crap that he had beat his own son to the point he was in the hospital and was no going through therapy, Aspen was rather close to her father. He knew everything that had happened in her life and it was a safety net for her to go to. Although, she knew the safety of her siblings was the most important thing. More than her need to have someone by her side and to understand the pain she had gone through. She could find that in another person if she just let herself open up to others.

However, this car ride with Liam was fairly painful. Just in the sense that it was awkward. You could cut the tension in the car with a knife. Aspen hadn't muttered a word to her brother yet. What was she supposed to say to the golden boy? The boy who had, had it all? But yet here he was having to go to physical therapy.

Liam eventually looked up from his hands and trained his eyes on the passing trees outside the window. Yes, this was probably one of the most awkward car rides he'd probably ever been in. This was almost as awkward as the one time he got suspended for fighting a Sherman in the fifth grade, and his dad had to pick him up during a "very important" meeting. Speaking of which, Liam was perfectly aware of how Aspen felt about the entire mess their family was in right now. He wasn't blind or dumb, he knew that Aspen had gotten along with their dad better than the rest of them. Still, he wasn't sure if that was the reason she was ignoring him now or not.

Liam was too the point where he felt if he didn't do something drastic, like, at least turn on the radio or something, his brain would explode. The silence was almost worse than the therapy he was about to go through. He tapped his fingers on the arm rest as he gave a sideways glance to his sister, who had both her hands on the wheel and was staring intently at the road. He almost held his breath in as he made up his mind to reach over and flipped the radio button on. He then drew his hand back quickly, cause he wasn't actually sure if she even wanted the radio on or not....

Aspen and Liam still didn't speak a word to each other. The car was silent. So silent that you could hear the car running. What was she supposed to say to him? It's not that she liked that they had become distant over the years, but it was just the reality of it. She sighed softly as the radio got turned on. She let it play for a few minutes before her eyes shifted to look over at Liam.

The brunette turned the radio off and her eyes went back on the road. After a few minutes she spoke, "How's therapy been going anyways?" She managed to choke out. It was all she could say to him. There should have been more that she said, but that was it. Aspen thought about telling Liam about things that had happened in her life, but with everything that had happened to him she couldn't bring herself to say anything about it. She may have lost her fiance, but Liam could have lost his life. It wasn't a burden she had wished to put on him. Not now.

"I liked that song..." He stated, he was mostly joking though, not that she would get that. He didn't actually care about the song that much, he wasn't even sure if he even knew who sang it.... Were they there yet? He didn't remember the drive being this long to the hospital. "Therapy's ok, I guess." He answered her question, as he glanced over at his sister. "I can walk now." He added, smirking. He was definitely going to try and make this the least awkward conversation they've ever had. "What's been going on with you?" He asked.

When Liam mentioned that he had liked the song that was on the radio her hands gripped the steering wheel harder. She couldn't tell whether he was joking or not. Aspen had to bite her tongue to stop herself from saying anything to him. "You walk now? So you finally have a chance of catching up to me now, huh?" Aspen said with a cheeky grin sliding onto her face. It slid off almost immediately when he asked her what had been going on with her. "Well I don't go to the Tipsy Toga anymore. Haven't had drink in over three weeks now. Some days it gets really hard not to." The younger Davenport admitted.

'Ok, so no joking!' Liam made a mental note, to keep himself from saying any further half-ass comments. She was literally the only person who didn't get his humor, or she was choosing not too, he would never know. He huffed out a breath, if she was just gonna be mean, what was the point of her even asking... "Please, I could still beat you, even like this," he said back, smartly, and kind of getting mad. Ok, so he knew she would totally flatten him, right now. Hell, he could barely lift his arms two weeks ago... but she didn't have to be an ass about it...

"Well that must suck, guess it would be hard to not drink when you want too..." He told her, trying really hard not to say anything else to his sister. She had kind of just ruined what could've been a normalish conversation by calling him weak, and he'd already had enough of being called weak in the past two months, that he could probably go the rest of his life without hearing the word or any equivalent ever again.

When Liam mentioned that he could still beat her, she raised an eyebrow at him. They both knew the condition he was in, that wasn't a likely statement. He was just starting to walk again, all she had to do was hit him in the back of the knees and he'd be down. Of course she didn't have any reason to do that.

Aspen noticed a shift in his demeanor. Was he upset at something she had said? She had just been trying to joke around with him. "I was too dependent on it. I can't have that." Aspen said. She didn't want to talk about why she had started drinking, she didn't want to get into the details of any of it. She didn't expect anyone to understand that pain she had gone through. How could they? In that moment the brunette could feel every fiber in her body start to crave the burning sensation that filled her chest until eventually it turned numb and so did all her feelings. She didn't want to feel emotions like these, they were hard and sometimes it felt like she could breathe.

Finally they ended up in the parking lot of the hospital and she parked the car. She was gripping the steering wheel tightly, so tightly her knuckles were white. "I can drive you closer to the door if you want. I just needed to stop the car for a moment."

He nodded, and looked over at Aspen. He noticed her knuckles were gripping the steering wheel tightly enough that they were white. He figured it'd be best not to bring it up, she had issues going on, if she had wanted to talk to him about it, she would've. "Don't worry bout it. I think I can make it myself..." He told her, before opening the passenger door. He looked down at his crutches and over at the hospital doors, suddenly, they seemed farther away now. He pulled the door shut again. "On second thought, probably not a good idea..." He mumbled, leaning back on the seat.

Liam glanced over at his sister once more, she hadn't changed in the last few seconds. He took a deep breath. "Look.... do you... maybe... wanna talk about it?" He asked, he knew that there was no way he'd understand what was going on with her, just like she would probably never understand what was going on with him. That didn't mean that he couldn't try and help anyway, not that anything he could say to her would actually help.

Aspen watched as he was about to get out of the car. He paused for a few moments and got back in. She didn't know what he was doing. Maybe he decided that it was too far or something. Her mind didn't dwell too much on it after that point. There was complete silence filling the car besides the radio.

She inhaled deeply as he had asked her if she maybe wanted to talk about it. Aspen finally let go of the steering wheel and her hands fell to her lap. It was hard. She could feel the emotions pouring into her body. At this particular moment she refused to let the tears pour out. The daughter of Bellona looked over to her brother and she managed to speak no amount of words.

"I haven't dealt with emotions like these before. Having something to numb it made it easier to deal with. I don't know if I can handle these emotions that are going to surface soon. I just want them to go away." Aspen said her voice faltering as she tried hard not to cry.

Liam bit his lip, and looked at his hands for a few seconds. He did actually understand a small bit of what she was going through, but she wouldn't know that... He looked back up at her. "Maybe it'd be better if you let yourself feel the emotions, instead of trying to push them away?" He answered, almost cautiously, "drinking didn't help you deal with it, it only helped you pretend that the emotions weren't there. Now that you've decided not to drink, you have to deal with the emotions that the alcohol got rid of..."

Aspen didn't move an inch. She sat there perfectly still as she listened to Liam. How would he possibly know what would be good for her? The brunette took a deep breath in as a few tears rolled down her face. "I'm afraid if I let the emotions in, I wont be able to handle them. I feel like they'll be the end of me. They'll drown me and I wont know what to do." Aspen said thinking aloud. It was something she wasn't going to admit, but the words fell out and there was nothing she could do about it.

Liam sighed and looked up at the ceiling, trying to find the right words to use. He and Aspen had never been really close, not since they were really young at least. She had never needed/wanted to come to him for things like this. Not to mention, Liam wasn't the best with words to begin with. Back when he was a centurion, he had mostly just let his co-centurion handle all the talking that required more than a few sentences. "I'm really not trying to pretend that I know what you're feeling or what's best, ok? I just think that you should let yourself feel whatever emotions you got pushed aside. You're never going to know for sure if you can handle them or not, until you try." He told her, then finally looked back over to her, "Aspen, you're strong enough to handle them, ok."

More tears just rolled down Aspen's face as her bottom lip began to quiver. She felt so weak. So weak for crying and having to give into the emotions. So weak for doing it in front of her brother. He was the one person that Aspen always tried to appear strong around. She didn't want to be seen as the weaker one. Aspen always wanted to come out on top, but it never felt like she did.

"What if I'm not strong enough to handle them, Liam? I'm not you. I'm not the golden boy, I'm not the prize of the family. I didn't even make it to centurion. I couldn't even save him." Aspen said speaking the last part quietly.

"You're stronger than me." Liam stated, he knew that people thought of him as the elite Davenport sibling, he had been first cohort centurion and then went on to be a senator. He also played quarterback in high school, and did all that other stuff that elite kids did. But that didn't mean he ever felt elite or meant that their father thought he was. "I'm not the prize of the family. I couldn't even defend myself against dad. I stood there as I let him beat the shit out of me." He took another breath, "Asp, remember when you first started training? You hadn't even trained a full day, and you managed to pin me to the ground, and break my nose? I knew it then, hell dad knew it then, you are so much better then me. At everything. I promise you, you are strong enough." He said the words jumbled, they weren't the exact words he wanted to use, but he hoped she would get his point anyway.

When Liam said the words out loud. The words that she was stronger than him she could only feel a big lump in her throat. How could he even say that? It was so often that she would hear her father tell her how much better Liam was than her. Maybe that was supposed to drive her, she really didn't know the intentions behind her father. These days Aspen didn't know him at all. That left it open for Aspen to realize that she didn't know Liam very well either. Not since they were younger. Something had just changed and they hadn't been as close.

"That's because you don't believe in opposing authority. In a way that makes you stronger. Being able to just stand there and let someone beat you without even fighting back? I am sorry I wasn't at dinner that night, and I know I wasn't around a lot when you were in the hospital. Just hospitals are hard for me. Death is hard for me. I didn't know what would happen and I couldn't be back there so soon. Not after Rowan was shot. I love you guys, but you all scare me." Aspen said with a few sniffles here and there. Contact wasn't a huge thing between the Davenports, but she lifted her shaky hand and placed it on Liam's. The contact wasn't the usual, but in some way it was better than none.

Liam had to fight the very small urge he had to move his hand away. It's not that he didn't want the human contact, he just wasn't used to it coming from his family. He shook his head in disagreement. "No... That's what dad always said uh says. That I'm the failure and that you're better than me. At everything. And I'm glad you weren't there at the dinner. It was bad enough Rowan was there to watch it..." Liam told her quietly. He was starting to think that maybe their dad told them that to keep them fighting, to make them stronger or something. Maybe he and Aspen weren't too far apart when it came to their strengths. Well he was fairly sure she'd beat him in a fight now, but still. "Really you weren't at the hospital? I don't seem to recall." Maybe it was too soon for coma jokes, but hey she really could've been there, and he wouldn't have noticed.