And The World Falls Apart One More Day

You Can't Just Piece It Back Together

Feyd Emerson closed the door to his room, taking a shaking breath before pressing his back up against the wall. The way his sore muscles crushed themselves when faced with the hard surface was comforting, at least more so than having nothing to lean against. He hated feeling trapped but that feeling was usually overruled by feeling safe in a confined position.

It was nice to have a place to escape to.

It was nice to have a place where he could shut out the fracturing world for just a moment.

It was nice when he could run away.

Somehow, somewhere deep in his body, he felt safer when he was alone despite the crushing urge to go to his friends and ask for help. To tell them that he needed advice, that he needed a hug, that he needed at least a little more than the nothing he currently had requested. He didn't know what they would say if they knew how hard he was struggling, and he really hoped they wouldn't react negatively, but he almost felt it was worth risking their trust to get help.

Well, it wasn't really help he was looking for, just someone who understood how he felt. (Or even if they couldn't relate personally someone who could empathize with his pain.)

It wasn't anything specific he was struggling with but rather that all those intrusive thoughts just wouldn't go away. The ones that kept asking 'what happens if I fail?' 'what if they hate me for these choices?' 'how hard will it be once I have to provide for myself?'

All those thoughts that just made him feel more helpless than he had ever though possible. Well, at least more helpless than he had ever felt before he had started to 'mature'. Before all these ideas had been forced into his head by the simple act of growing up.

Surely his friends would not mind of he told them in this case? If he had been so heavily effected by the stress of looking into future possibility's there was no reason why his friends wouldn't be too.

Oxus, Chary, Reaper, Xa, all of them.

He was sure that even the girls he had met all those years ago- what had their names been? Shal... something? He shook his head, grateful in only the back of his mind for the short break from the helpless thoughts, whatever their names had been he was certain that by this point they had experienced similarly intrusive thoughts. It was almost comforting realizing that people outside of his friend circle probably struggled with the same things.

An oddly placed sense of pride filled his chest (right before deflating to half of it's strength). He was part of a bigger picture, a bigger picture where most everyone struggled with the same thoughts. A bigger picture where in reality there was no 'main character', not even Chary who so often joked about him being so.

Really he wasn't certain why the idea made him feel better, it just did.

Slowly, almost torturously slowly, he lifted his back from the wall and finally was able to appreciate the lack of pressure. Odd how in order to enjoy it he had to put himself in a situation where something else (which regularly worked as a coping mechanism) released the stress which he formally felt in the position which became hard to feel safe in.

He grimaced uncomfortably to himself to push the already returning thoughts away. He had to get back out there, back out into the world, and push himself to complete all those things he had been pushing away. The very thought sent chills down his spine as the stress came flooding back. He staggered, the panic coming almost twofold, before falling back against the wall and pressing against it as hard as he could.

Squeezing his eyes shut and choking back a groan he willed, no forced, his kind to move to other topics.

How about a minute or two of appreciating your friends? he suggested to himself in nearly audible (though still internal) words, that usually gets your mind off things.