A Long Trip Home

[chimeramimicry]

The door is two yards away but I can't move from the top of the stairs.  It's been months, four or so, since I've been here, in this spot.  Gone were the days of trudging up the stairs with my satchel on the way home from work because my building's landlords refused to fix the elevators properly.  Gone too was the pleasure I had of returning to this apartment I paid for with my own money and not from my trust fund.  I donated all of that to charity the moment I turned twenty-five and finished paying off my loans to school.  It was two years ago.  It feels like forever.

I'm not the same man I had been.  I'm not a child anymore.  At least, I want to think that.

I'm still clutching the photograph of my brother and I in our tuxedos.  There's a smudge on it from my thumb and full of creases.  I've not let it go since I opened that box containing everything that I am.  Everything I was.  I left Ireland without looking back.  There was, there is only one thing on my mind.  Nathan.

Nathan.

Nathan.

I know he's here.  I've always felt a connection to him.  Mohinder Suresh called it part of my empathy, to feel things like that.  Funny to be so empathically linked to someone I spent my whole life pining for, who has always had a life to live without me.  He's never had time for me.  Never.

"Just walk, Peter," I whisper to myself as I move to a door I have not touched in a long time.  I swallow.  And knock.  I know he's in here without knowing it.  I almost lose the nerve to knock.  Please answer, Nathan.  Please.

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[chimeramimic.livejournal.com]

I know he's trying to keep things light between us, so I smile. I smile and I pull his arm around my waist. He is not allowed to know what I'm thinking about. I can't have all of him, so he can't have all of me. I lay my hand over his hand. I curl my fingers through his. And then I close my eyes.

Of course, he presses. He's a lawyer at heart. This what he does. I can only sigh as he kisses my skin in way that make it light up and catch fire.

My lips tremble, and I turn my face to look at him and slowly open my eyes, catching his. "What am I thinking? Right now?" He nods and I sigh, rolling over to settle my nose against his. "I'm thinking that if I was a woman, I could give you children. And if I could give you children, you'd stay with me."

He asked.

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"Peter--" I start. "You're not--" --really thinking that, are you?

He's not really serious, is he? "I already have three children, Peter," I whisper, shutting my eyes. "I don't need you to give me that," I moan. His words spear through my stomach just as cleanly as a knife would, and all I can do is hug him even more tightly.

This shouldn't surprise me, with his talk of marriage and wanting to be with me, really be with me. His desire to make me happy runs so deeply inside him that he wishes he weren't my brother either. When he said he wanted to marry me, he really meant it.

"Peter." I take his face in my hands and press my lips to his forehead again, willing myself not to lose it now, not to make him hurt with these next words of mine. "You're my brother. I don't expect you to be anything but that."

More lies. I do expect more than that. I expect him to be not only my brother, but my lover as well. But what he seems to wish for, it's unreasonable. He feels inadequate, because he's not everything he wants to be for me, and he never can be, because he's my brother.

This is yet another example of why Peter is the way he is, and it breaks my heart, because it's my fault. I made him this way. "I'm sorry," I gasp, before I even realize I've said it.

[chimeramimic.livejournal.com]

I close my eyes against the tears as his words cut so harshly against me. "Oh." I'm his brother and just that. I wish I could rip that stigma from over my head. The thought of being his flesh and blood no longer gives me the tingles as it once had. He's the closest genetic link to me, and that makes it impossible for him to be the closest emotional link to me as well.

I settle down against his throat, my face burning with anger at myself for letting it slip. The covers are pulled up to my chin and I press my fingers against his chest. I'll just sleep through the hurt of being just his brother.

And in the morning, it will be all right again. I believe that. I have to believe that. I can feel him staring at the ceiling as my tears touch his neck, but neither of us are willing to speak about it right now. Nathan is giving me my pride for once, even if I have almost none of that to spare.

"Happy Birthday Nathan."

And then I fall asleep. It's snowing again when I wake up and I blink, slipping out of bed. It takes me a few minutes to get my bearings and I pick up a shirt from the floor. His shirt. Collared, button down. Odd, it feels bigger on me than usual. I reach down to button up and blink.

I blink and then I scream.

I do not usually wake up with breasts. Even if I've dreamed that I turned into Heidi, I have always known that was a dream.

[law-anddisorder.livejournal.com]

The sound of a woman's high-pitched scream wakes me from my sleep, and I can't place the sound. Did Peter let me fall asleep with the television on? Is he awake watching one of those silly Lifetime movies he likes?

The television is off, and Peter's not in the bed. He must have gone to the bathroom. I settle into the warmth he's left there, and waiting for him to come back, I drift off again.

I hear a soft voice repeating my name, frantic and scared. A small hand on my shoulder, shaking me out of my dreams.

"Pete, come on, leave me alone! I'm tired..." I grumble, pressing my face into the pillow, trying to hide from the light of the sun coming in through Peter's bare window. He didn't put his blinds back up yet.

I hear my name again, and I don't know the voice. Oh, God, did I get drunk and take some woman home with me? No...I'm not hungover, just tired. It was just me and Peter. We didn't go out.

I open my eyes to see just what the hell is happening, and then I see the owner of the voice. A woman I've never seen before in my life is standing next to the bed, wearing my shirt, unbuttoned, open. I can see the dark nest of hair below her belly, the inside curve of one cream-white breast, half of a brownish-pink nipple. The woman looks down at herself, shrieks again and pulls the shirt closed.

"What--the fuck?" I ask, nearly jumping out of the bed, out of my skin, almost. I grab her slender wrist tightly and stare down at her, shaking her. She's a few inches shorter than I am, very petite. I've never seen her before in my life, of that I'm positive.

"Who are you? How did you get in here?"

She gasps and tries to hide behind her shoulder length, dark hair. Then I lock eyes with her. With...him.

This woman...is my brother. Was my brother. I don't know what the hell is going on. I don't want to know what kind of trick he's using to make this one happen.

"Peter?" I whisper in disbelief.

[chimeramimic.livejournal.com]

I nod. Slowly. Yes. Peter. Think about how you use to look... I close my eyes tightly and then look down at myself. No change. "What the hell is this, Nathan?!" It's not that I expect my brother to have any damned clue, but I have to ask just the same because I feel like I'm going to burst into tears if something doesn't happen to make things normal again soon. I realize that I've been crying a lot more than usual, but that's because--

Oh, fuck it.

I half run out of the room to the bathroom and stare at myself in the mirror. I'm shorter than I had been before. I guess five feet, nine inches is on the smaller scale for men, but at least I could see my chest in the bathroom mirror before. Now I only see my shoulders. That's make me, what? Five four? Christ. At least my eyes are the same. My nose is smaller, my cheekbones are higher. I don't have stubble on my chin and my jaw is narrow. My Adam's apple is gone. The shoulder hem in my brother's shirt hits below the midpoint of my upper arm.

I'm shaking as I grip the sink, bowing my head as my dark hair falls in front of my eyes. A smaller skull and finer features make it longer than it had been before, but it was already pretty long then. Now the edges curl under my chin.

It's like a repeat of that night on the balcony. I crouch, feeling small and vulnerable. It's not fair. All I want is something normal in my life.

"I'm Peter Petrelli," I whisper to myself, my voice high and sweet. "I'm Peter...not...not this... I'm Peter."

[law-anddisorder.livejournal.com]

I shake my head and wonder if this is some delayed hallucination related to my alcohol withdrawal. I do, sometimes, after all, wake up in cold sweats, nausea sending me to bow my head over the toilet.

Nope. I feel absolutely fine, just a little sleepy. Yeah. Dreaming. I never woke up. I pinch myself just to test it out. Still standing here.

I hear my brother talking to himself--herself?--in the bathroom, and I open the door a crack. He's staring at himself in the mirror, and he's dropped my shirt at his feet. His chest heaves, his full, rounded breasts rising and falling with each breath. He's so little, smaller than he was before, and he's curvier in the ass and in the hips. He looks at me in panic and bends over to grab my shirt, to cover himself. He's scared. This isn't happening because he wants it to.

"You're not doing this on purpose?" I breathe. He shakes his head, and tears run down his cheeks. His lips are fuller, and his face is less angular. His ears are even smaller than they were before.

He tries to put the shirt on, but I stop him. "Wait a minute, Pete. Let me see," I ask very gently.

I always considered my brother beautiful, but this new incarnation of him--her, I guess--is absolutely breathtaking.

"Can I--can I touch you?" I whisper.

[chimeramimic.livejournal.com]

"Can you touch me?!" He has to ask this after he mentions that he assumed I was doing this on purpose? All right, so what I said last night points out that this could very well have been a use of a power to attempt to change myself for the better to be closer to Nathan... But really? What's being a woman going to do now? He's never going to leave Heidi. I missed the boat, and like he said last night, he already has kids. He's got the perfect life. He's got a wife to cherish. And when he wants something different, he's got me to sleep with. The universe of Nathan Petrelli was complete.

So why this? Why now? And how do I turn it off?

I look up at him with tears in my eyelashes. They're actually longer than his, which is astonishing. He's always had such beautiful lashes. He crouches down in front of me, and though I'm sure that he wants to hug me, what he's going for is not my shoulder.

"No you can not fucking touch me," I say, pushing him aside. "Go home, Nathan."

[law-anddisorder.livejournal.com]

"Go home? And leave you like this?" I'm not surprised, not really. I can't help him fix whatever this is by staying, but I can't even look away from him. Her. I reach out tentatively toward him, and he slaps me away with a trembling, delicate hand. He looks like he wants to punch me.

So I try being the comforting, supportive big brother. "Peter, it's probably just temporary. You were talking about this just last night, and all of a sudden, it happens? Your subconscious mind just kicked in, and here you are. Your weird powers put you in a coma for two weeks, remember?"

Peter looks like he's on the verge of another panic attack, and I really just want to give him a hug. Her. It's mind-blowing. My little brother is now my little sister.

I can't leave him. I don't even know if like this, his other powers would still work. As far as I know, he can't really use more than one at a time effectively. Is he still super-strong? Can he still read minds? Is he still indestructible?

"If it helps, you're really...very pretty." I give him a smile. His hazel eyes, the only feature of him that's recognizable, burn with fear and intense anger.

Hell hath no fury like my brother scorned... I can't help my ridiculous thought and my subsequent peal of laughter. If he catches that thought, he's going to kill me.

[chimeramimic.livejournal.com]

He's...laughing. I blink at my brother with my dark, angry eyes and then start to laugh too. It's either that or cry some more. He's close, and warm, and folding myself against his chest is comforting and comfortable... And something else too. He's got on his boxers, but that's it and the smoothness of his chest makes me blush as certain sensitive portions of this new -- and hopefully very temporary body -- move against it.

"Wasn't I pretty before?" I joke with him as his hand finds the back of my neck and pulls me close. I close m eyes and hide my face against his throat. His stubble is comforting. "Jesus Nathan, I think I need to be committed." This is all just too much.

I find myself blushing as his fingers move down my spine, soothing me as I tuck my arms against my chest. Things are different now. I'm still a man on the inside...

But now I have a woman's body with female hormones. Sometimes cultural upbringing and ingrained gender can't do anything about the chemicals in my brain.

"Maybe it's a dream." A dream in which I have a sweet voice and soft, white skin evidently.

[law-anddisorder.livejournal.com]

"No, not a dream. I tried to pinch myself awake when I saw you," I whisper. "Not that it's necessarily bad..." I feel like a pervert, strangely enough. My brother has breasts and longer hair, and a curvier body, but he's still Peter.

Except, my God, he's not.

"This is officially the strangest thing that's ever happened to you, Peter," I say, pulling away from him, trying not to make it too evident that my dick is rock hard in my boxers, and simultaneously trying to glance his new body over. I don't know if he'll be angry or flattered that his new female body is turning me on like this.

He--she--I really have to choose one before I lose my mind--has his--her--Fuck it. I'll have to think of him as a "she" now to make this easier. She has her arms crossed over her chest, and she's smiling, still crookedly, at least. But she's still uncomfortable.

I suggest very sincerely, "You should enjoy this while you can. No one in their life ever gets to have the experience of being both genders...unless they have sexual reassignment surgery, and that's just a little weird. But seriously, Peter. Take this body for a test run. See how it feels to be a woman. You should look at yourself in the full length mirror. You're beautiful."

I tilt his head up--"her" is just not working. I have to lower my head to place a kiss on his cheek, and his face is softer than it's ever been, even right after he shaves. I hope he puts some clothes on soon, because I just know I'm going to have a really hard time not wanting to take Peter's new body for a test run myself.

[chimeramimic.livejournal.com]

There's a towel nearby and I grab it, pulling it around myself and tucking it around my breasts and under my arms. I can't help but glare at Nathan, actually jealous of this new, female body. "Don't you get enough sex?" I ask, the constant bitterness of my having to share him seeping through the conversation. "If you want to have sex with a woman, go home to your wife."

I stand up, bare feet padding on the floor, and leave my brother just staring after me. In a way, I'm flattered that he thinks I'm pretty. I'm just too stubborn to admit that at the moment. In my bedroom, I fling open the mirrored closet doors without really looking at myself.

It turns out that my jeans don't fit. The legs are too long. The hips are too small. The waist it too big. "What the fuck," I curse, trying to hold up a pair of boxer briefs so that I can get the jeans on and then I roll up the hems.

The tshirt is not so bad. I'm glad that it's a bit large on me...but without a bra, my large breasts are still rather caged inside the fabric. I hit my hand against the wall out of frustration and then fling myself back into bed, pulling up the covers. If I hide...it will get better. Right?

[law-anddisorder.livejournal.com]

I knock on his bedroom door, but he doesn't answer.

He must have listened in on my thoughts, or more likely, saw how ridiculously my cock was tenting the fabric of my boxers.

What a surprise. He's pissed off at me again. Wonder if it's that time of the month?

A hard bang shocks me out of my inner laughter; it sounds like he threw a shoe at the door. He definitely listened in on that one.

"I'm sorry!" My apology still doesn't bring him to open the door, and I'm not just going to walk in there if he doesn't want me to.

"Don't tell me you're not curious," I say, still chuckling at my own sense of humor.

I really have to stop being such a jerk to him. Peter is normally a sensitive guy, and he's probably even more sensitive as a woman. I'm not making it any better by thinking sarcastic thoughts at his expense, by being so Goddamned horny all the time. I can't even imagine how he must feel right now.

"Come on, Pete. Let me in. I promise I won't look at you, okay? Unless you want me to. Please?"

[chimeramimic.livejournal.com]

I sigh against the pillow and then pull it over my head. I don't want him to go, not really. And I don't want him in here either. He'll end up doing something ridiculous to me. Or touch me. And how can I say no to him? I never can, I've never been able to.

"If I let you in, you'll behave? I'm trying to think of a way to get back to how I'm suppose to be. With a dick!," I add for emphasis.

He's silent for a moment, but by the creaking sound of the door, he's coming in just the same. I pull the covers down over my head and glance over at him with one eye, mostly shielded by my hair.

I'm glad he's here. Sometimes, I feel like Nathan just abandons me when the going gets tough. Maybe he's just trying to help because he's a fucking horny shithead.

I blink. Where are those thoughts coming from anyhow?

"Nathan..." My lips are slack for a moment before I pull the blankets aside, offering him a spot beside him.

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I slide into the bed, and make sure I don't touch him at all. "See? I can control myself." Just barely. "Aren't you glad you're in between jobs right now? You'd have a really hard time explaining this one away, huh?"

He blinks his visible eye and then covers his face with the blanket so that he's totally hidden.

Peter doesn't appreciate my gentle humor either. I don't really know what else to do. I can't help him at all, and I'm starting to feel uncomfortable myself.

I wouldn't mind just sitting here with him like this until he can figure out a way to get his body back, but he wouldn't even be able to talk to me without reminding me of his transformation. His voice, formerly deeper and rougher than mine, now comes out sounding a bit like Ma's, if she were twenty-seven years old again, that is. He always resembled our mother, even as a man, but now that he's like this, he looks even more like her. And I've always considered my mother one of the most beautiful women I know. Biased of course, but true.

Peter makes a frustrated sound under the blanket. He's expecting me to do something, but I just don't know what.

"Pete, what do you want me to say? What can I do? Nothing is good enough. I can't help you at all. Maybe I should go home." I know he doesn't want me to leave, but I don't want him to feel like the only reason I'm still here is to try and get my hands on him. Her. God damn it.

[chimeramimic.livejournal.com]

My hand sneaks out. I can't lose him to her. Heidi gets him for weeks on end. I get him for one lousy night? I don't think so. My brother and I love each other. We're in love with each other. And damn it...if I have to share him, I get more than one day. Heidi is lucky, blissfully unaware of me. I don't want to suffer any more than I have to.

Grasping Nathan's shirt, I do what hundreds of girls have done to me and I've witnessed thousands of others do to men that they know find them attractive. I'm not trying to manipulate him, not like he's always manipulated me. It's not like that. I just want some more of his time...and I'll use what I have to do it.

It's terrible that I feel like I couldn't do this with my own body...perhaps he's just hardwired to respond to pretty women.

"Just...hold me?"

[law-anddisorder.livejournal.com]

"Peter..." I say, trying to put a stern edge in my voice. "I can't, Pete, not when you're like this..." My arms don't listen to my mind's protest. I pull him closer, and he buries himself into my embrace just like he always does.

Except this time he has breasts. They're heavy, soft and warm through the thin fabric of the too-big t-shirt he's wearing. They're a nice size, too. They looked right when compared with the rest of his new body.

I run my hand along his side, and it's almost electrifying when I notice each difference of him, even through the ill-fitting clothes. I touch the rounded curve of his hip, and just leave my hand there for a long moment, until I'm able to control myself.

His waist is even smaller now, and he's a little softer in the belly, in his thighs. He's really very beautiful.

His natural scent is a little different too. Not much, but enough. I breathe him in, and I get used to it more quickly than I thought I would. I press a kiss to his ear, tuck away a strand of his hair. It's shinier, and a little darker than it was before.

"I'll just hold you like this until you go back to normal, okay? I won't touch you anywhere you don't want me to. You're still Peter to me."

I close my eyes, and in the darkness behind my eyelids, and our comfortable silence, it's true.

[chimeramimic.livejournal.com]

Then it's settled. Nathan does prefer me as a woman. I try not to be annoyed by that, but it's impossible. I cling to Nathan because there is no one else here, no one else that understands. I give into his touch because, while I am hurt that he gets so hard being with this particular body -- I know he finds my regular form sexually exciting too. I'm just...sensitive. Overly sensitive.

I guess I just have to keep it on with this. If he wants me like this, then it's not a waste. If I can keep him interested, keep him wanting me, he'll stay.

This is absolutely twisted. Incest between brothers is one thing. But using my so called feminine charms is all I have right now. My lips press to his chin. I kiss the corners of his mouth.

I decide to use a line I've heard so many times in teen movies. It's not as if I'm lying to say it. It's the truth. "I...I'm afraid, Nathan."

[law-anddisorder.livejournal.com]

Of course he's afraid. He has a woman's body, and he has no clue what to do with it. I'll bet he hasn't even really looked at himself yet, he's so scared.

I have to help him, somehow, and not by thinking with my dick, for once. "Peter, sit up." I pull him to an upright position and stroke a finger down his cheek.

"Look at me."

I lock my eyes with his so I can really see my brother, trapped in there behind the female exterior.

"This is temporary, so you should enjoy it while you can. In your mind you're still yourself. So what's a little accidental shape-shifting? Maybe you have to learn how this body works so you can change back."

I'm clearly no expert on the multitudes of powers that can exist in everyone like us, being only able to fly myself, and synthetically at that. But my suggestion could be valid.

"Maybe if you get familiar with it, you won't be so afraid of it. Now come on. Go take a look at yourself. All of you." I haul him to his feet, take him by his shoulders, and walk him over to the mirrored closets. Then I sit back down on his bed.

"I'll stay right here, all right?"

I really hope he understands what I'm trying to do here. I just want to help, and I know he wants me to help him. This is, unfortunately, the best thing I can think of.

[chimeramimic.livejournal.com]

My brother will fuck anything pretty that's still moving. I try to push out the dark feelings, especially because I know that they are not coming from him. Not that it helps. My heart is aching as I slowly remove my clothes. I can't bring myself to look at the image in the mirror. It's not that I'm ugly, and it's not that I'm going to whore myself to Nathan to try and get him to stay with me. I've already done that to many, many men while I was in Philadelphia.

Even so, this is a move that makes me ill with guilt. I don't play the manipulation game too well. As I push down boxers already too big for me, I keep my eyes closed and turn around to gaze at Nathan, naked and according to him at least, absolutely, mindblowingly beautiful.

"Do you like this better than what I usually am?"

My eyes smolder into his as I move closer, within touching distance of him. He could put his hands on my hips with minimal effort.