Weightless - Prologue

Ethan could recall, when he was a child, that his Mother dieted often.

It was obvious that she was consumed by it. It was a compulsion that she clung to - something that was unwilling to let go of. He was a witness as she declined slowly throughout his childhood. It never made sense to him. He assumed it was because she didn't want to get 'huge'. It took him a long time to realize that wasn't all it was. Coping mechanisms come in all shapes and sizes.

Perhaps it was his Father's fault. But how could it be? He was never home - he was a doctor, so he worked long shifts - but he didn't want to be either. It's like he made destruction without being there. Maybe that's the point. If he just cut the ties with his family and left them then it wouldn't have been so painful. They could've moved on. There's no moving on over someone when they keep hanging about, prolonging the inevitable.

Ethan and Cal, his older brother, made a pact to never become like them. To never have their lives so undeniably fucked up. They wanted to be doctors - but not lothario medical men like their Father. And they wanted to be happy - not anti-depressant reliant like their Mother.

They know it's not their parent's fault that they are the way they are. But they didn't want to be carbon copies. They wanted to be whoever the hell they were going to grow into because that must be better. Surely.

"Blood pact."

"It's disgusting, Cal," eight-year-old Ethan says. He's got a lisp and a disapproving look on his face that, unknown to him, he'd come to master in the following years.

Ten-year-old Cal has a mischevious smile, lit up by the scarce light which creeps in through the curtain gap. They sit together, cross-legged, whilst Cal teases Ethan with a pin. He stops when Ethan tells him to.

"It'll hurt!"

"It'll be fine," Cal says reassuringly - having the persuasive charm of his father. "This is so we'll never be like then," ironic, "isn't that what you want?"

Even at a young age, Ethan didn't think you could choose who you grew into. Parents have huge roles in shaping their children. Could they escape being even slightly similar to their parents? But Cal was older - that's two more whole years worth of knowledge - so he decided to agree. Even if it'd hurt.

He holds out his hand. "Go on then."

Softly, Cal holds Ethan's wrist and then pricks his thumb with a pin before he can argue. Ethan yelps. Cal does it to himself, screwing his eyes closed, and then they hold their thumbs together. "This is a very serious-" Cal hunts for words that he's heard grown-ups use on television, "-and legally binding blood pact. Myself, Caleb Hardy, and my brother, Ethan Hardy, swear on our lives that we shall grow up into our own people. Never like Mummy and Daddy."

"We swear," Ethan says. He pauses, adds "solemnly," and then feels quite satisfied.

They hold their bleeding thumbs together for a bit longer. Then they drop.

"Did it work?"

"Dunno," Cal smiles. "We'll have to see what sort of people we become one day."

Ethan and Cal continued to be close when they were children. Like others, they didn't leave adolescence the same way they went in - they weren't unscathed by the cruelty of growing up. They split and then reconciled. Life was good when Ethan was with Cal; even when it wasn't.

Their pact stayed with them the entirety of their lives, followed with the over-used sentences of "careful, Cal, you're starting to act like our Dad" and "don't say that, you sound like Mum". It caused arguments and a wedge between them sometimes. They always came back in the end, though. Always.

They promised to grow to become different and they did. Happy and healthy. Together, not apart; never splitting like their parents. Ethan was determined, promising himself over and over that he'd never lose control like they did over his life.

But 2016 was the year it started to go wrong. And 2017 was the year Ethan finally spiralled down.

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It's new years day. There are bright fireworks outside, erupting alongside people's echoing whoops down the street. There are alcohol and fancy dress and celebration but they're having no part of it.

The television lights up the darkness of their flat, shadows of plants painted against beige walls. Everything is smothered by darkness. Nothing of any interest was on the screen, the only visible part of the room. Neither watch it. Ethan and Cal sit together companiably on the sofa of their living room, beer cans in hands, and listened to the noise of celebrations outside. There's a loud smash from outside. Ethan tuts.

Afterwards, there's the sound of drunken singing coming from outside. Ethan can picture it - everyone's bodies joined by their arms, fingers interlaced, singing until their vocal cords are torn, faking optimism toward the new year when all they actually want is an excuse to get intoxicated.

"Sure you don't want to join in?" Ethan asks. "I'm sure there's room for you to sing along too."

Cal chuckles. "There's always next year for all of that fun. Only so many times I can take singing Aud de lang."

"It's only sung once a year, you know."

"Yeah, and I've been alive about thirty," he says. "That's a lot of sing songs."

"I'm sure you weren't doing it since birth!"

"Well, at least since I was a teenager. About fifteen years, I reckon," he nudges Ethan. "So force me out there and it'll be your funeral."

Ethan laughs and Cal smiles with satisfaction. He finishes off his beer whilst Ethan keeps a smile on his face, the aftermath of laughing. There's still singing outside. It's a lot of garbled nonsense. Or maybe it's not and they're just drunk. Cal always manages to get his brother to succumb to beer, despite his grudge against the stuff.

"You know," Cal says, thoughtfully, interrupting the silence. He curls his fingers around his beer can but doesn't speak more.

"What?"

"Most people make resolutions right about now."

Ethan rolls his eyes and pretends to be shocked. Cal smacks him. "Ouch, that hurt!" He leans back on the sofa. "Stop. Yes, I know they do. And your point?"

"Like, we should think of resolutions, shouldn't we?"

"That's unlike you," it really is. Cal is usually the sort of person who goes with the flow and somehow ends up with great consequences to that. No planning. No organization. Just sitting back and enjoying the ride. "I didn't think you'd be interested."

"First time for everything," he says. "I've got one."

Ethan raises an eyebrow. It makes sense now. "Let me guess, you've completed it?" Cal's smirk answers the question. "Ah. It's a cheap way of bragging, is it?" He swallows a mouthful of beer and then asks the inevitable, "go on, then - what is the resolution?"

"To get a girlfriend."

That's not a surprise. Cal is a self-proclaimed womanizer. He claims that he could wink at a woman and they'd fall, swooning at his feet. Sometimes that's true; if they've had a couple drinks, that is, and are on the rebound. There's a lot of people who fall for Cal's charms, especially women - occasionally men, too, not that those relationships ever go anywhere - and he knows it. He's been in bed with half the female population of Holby and he's not shy about that.

It's a new goal to want commitment, though. Cal's idea of commitment is saying that he'll wash the dishes every other day. That's a suffocating promise for him. And he still doesn't do the bloody dishes anyway.

Ethan holds his beer can loosely, watching Cal's face in the darkness. "What's her name, then?"

"Mollie," Cal says, the name rolling off of his tongue lovingly. A little smile pushes his lips. "You'll like her."

"Hmm. Sure I will."

"What's yours, then?"

"I don't know." Ethan shrugs his shoulders. "Not really thought about it. Making a new years resolution always seems like a recipe for failure. Nobody ever completes them and it just puts a downer on the new year because you've started it feeling like a screw-up."

"Choose something achievable, then."

Ethan leans back, deep in thought. "I could try and get promoted," his long-term goal is to become a consultant at the hospital he works in but he'll have to overpass being a senior registrar first. "Take the exams."

"You're clever, Ethan, but everyone fails those exams the first time."

Ethan's face works itself into a disapproving look; the same one he's always had. It hasn't changed. Lowered eyebrows, wrinkled forehead, a deep sigh. "What do you suggest, then?"

It's Cal's turn to shrug. "I dunno," he pauses to think. Ethan takes three sips of his beer can in the time that it takes Cal to come up with something. "Do the obvious. the most predictable of new year resolutions."

"And that is?"

"Losing weight."

Ethan laughs. "Are you trying to tell me something?" This seems like a huge hint. It's not Cal's usual style - if he's going to if he's going to insult his brother, he's not going to be shy about it - but it's stinging all the same.

"No! I mean, Eth, after the other night, I just figured you'd, you know..." Cal's voice fades. Occasionally he has tact.

Ethan is confused until the unpleasant feeling of remembrance pushes the memory back into his brain. Oh. That.

Cal had caught Ethan at his worst at three AM; the usual time that a bad mood would set in. It's never good if you're still awake at that time. He'd been crying in the kitchen because he felt "gross and fat" after swimming with colleagues hours prior. Cal had patted him on the head and told him to go to bed, assuming it was a small confidence crisis - it often was with Ethan. He'd, unfortunately, inherited his confidence - or lack thereof - from his Mother. It wasn't something he could control. It wasn't something that presently controlled him either.

Last night, it hadn't been entirely to do with his weight. Ethan can look down at himself and see excess fat that can be lost but it's not enough to make him cry hysterically. It's enough to upset him, to bother him, sure, but not enough for that. Ethan truly didn't know what was wrong last night. He puts it down to overtiredness.

Cal clearly isn't letting it go. He hasn't teased - which, honestly, Ethan had been expecting. It's Cal's speciality. Instead, he'd mentioned it in a quiet voice which indicates concern. That certain Special Voice that Ethan can't stand but has used himself.

Ethan had been ready to forget it, blaming his random insecurities on the late night and overdose of caffeine from a busy shift at work, but Cal doesn't seem as though he'd be forgetting it anytime soon.

"It was just an idea, Ethan." Cal's voice breaks through Ethan's bubble of thought. "I only want to see you happy."

Ethan says only one word. "Mum." It's a single syllable but it means so much.

"You're not like her." Cal reaches forward, pressing his thumb to Ethan's forehead. It makes him smile at least, pushing him away. "Blood pact, remember?"

It was a silly thing they did as kids. Often times they did it. There seemed to be nothing more reliable. Ethan remembers the memory - well, memories - fondly. "I remember that."

Cal ruffles Ethan's hair as he gets up. "Quit worrying. That's my job." Then he strolls to the kitchen, switching the under cupboard lighting on, and fetches himself another beer. Conversation over.

Ethan listens to Cal's noise. It's only the sounds of the fridge opening, closing, then bare feet padding across the floor. A beer can is being opened. There's loud sipping noise from the kitchen. Ethan smiles at the sheer volume of it. Then he frowns. There's still a choice to make.

It's a new years resolution, at least. It's something to achieve. Nobody could make progress in their lives without finding a direction first. This is a direction. A harmless couple of pounds could be lost. Maybe he'd finally have confidence. That could help solve whatever on earth is wrong with him recently.

He'd be fine. He wouldn't get troubled by it, nor over-obsessed. It won't control his life or be an outlet. It's a diet. Nothing more, nothing less.

He speaks before it really sets in that he's going to. "Alright then," Ethan calls to Cal.

"Huh?" Cal re-enters, sitting back beside him with a new beer.

"I'll do it," he says with an unsure smile. "No big deal. It's just a new years resolution, isn't it?"

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A/N: Hi! Hope you enjoyed this prologue (which I re-wrote in July of 2018 as the 2017 version... oh dear). Before you go, here's a bunch of things which are necessary to know in this story if you plan on reading on! *Also, please read on below if you have a tendency to be triggered by anything*.

1) This is set in an alternate universe - so Cal is alive and they weren't adopted (which means Ethan doesn't have Huntington's disease).

2) This isn't written to bash anyone underweight, overweight, or anything between. Just bear in mind that many of the thoughts in here are poison and irrational in a way so please don't take it to heart.

3) Not ALL of the bad things below happen to Ethan - here are OC's too and other characters. Just thought I'd mention that!

*Trigger warnings* (the won't be mentioned on each chapter for various reasons, sorry, so here they are now): Depressing matter, self-harm, mention of suicide (in brief and deep detail), vomiting, eating problems, child abuse, homophobia, prison, panic attacks, depression, injuries, mention of being sectioned, dieting, drinking, mention of pro-ana/mia, strong language, violence and death mentions. Would not recommend reading if you're under 13, and if you are, heed my warnings for mature content as chapters progress.

Thank you for reading :)