Petal [h.s.]

Chapter 49

Violet.

Harry's face dropped slightly at my words. "Your brother?"

I nodded, sniffing a few times. The realization that I had to have this conversation now after we had such a good day, after my body was so tired, after all that had happened this weekend, hit me like a ton of bricks.

I was not ready for this. It was my last wall.

Tearing this down meant I had nothing to hide behind anymore and I was mentally completely stripped in front of Harry. It was terrifying.

"James is a few years older than me. I'm guessing by now he's around 27." I muttered and Harry was still quiet next to me. He seemed to be in deep thought, his forehead creased in a frown as his mouth was a line. I knew he was confused, and probably a little angry too that I had been keeping this from him. I could tell he was trying to be as supportive and patient as he could muster.

I cleared my throat and sat up a bit straighter. "You remember when I told you about the fire?"

"When your house burned down and your parents died?" Harry asked and I nodded.

"Well... It was James. He set the house on fire and left the three of us there to burn. He has schizophrenia and it did horrible things to him, which in turn made him do horrible things to us." I explained. I let out another sigh and shook my head.

"I had an amazing childhood, Harry. I had loving parents, a bunch of friends, we lived in a beautiful cottage in the countryside and had a ton of goats and chickens." A smile crept up my lips when the memories of my early years flooded my brain.

"I was happy." I concluded with the same smile. "James and I always got along, he once even punched a kid who was teasing me about my frizzy hair." I couldn't help but snicker at the thought but my smile faltered quickly.

"James changed when he was around 14. It just started with small things, like him having a completely jumbled mind or speaking incoherently. He would lash out and be very socially awkward while he used to be an extravert kid before. My parents took him to doctors and they eventually diagnosed him. It was about a year after that that the psychosis started."

I had noticed Harry's hand on my shoulder, resting gently while his thumb rubbed over the exposed skin. I was still only in a towel from the shower.

"He got extremely paranoid, always had the feeling people were watching him or following him and we were being spied on. It turned into him trashing his room most nights, and eventually he started hearing voices. They weren't nice voices, they told him to do certain things and hurt people. These psychosis could last a few hours, but also a few weeks. He'd be completely different during them and it set all of us on edge." I swallowed thickly before continuing.

"We eventually moved to a more secluded house, where James had his own attic that didn't have any furniture in it besides a soft mattress. Everything that he could hurt himself with was out of there. He was completely unpredictable by that point, being extremely angry and loud and then spend days in bed. He had no friends left and even claimed his name was Timothy. It's another reason that little shit in the RSP gives me the creeps." I sighed, keeping my eyes focussed on my lap where my fingers were entwined.

"They got him on medication, but nothing really seemed to work. Sometimes he reacted really badly to his meds and it only made things worse. He was taken to a mental hospital a few times, but my parents always felt too sorry for him and brought him back home. My mother stopped working and the bills piled up from expensive medication and certain treatments they tried."

"James and I were mostly close when we were kids, and it pained me to see him like that, but I hardly recognized him anymore. There wasn't much contact between us as he was mostly kept in the attic and I started going to high school and hung out with my friends. One day... I got home from school and my father was taking a nap after working multiple shifts at the factory nearby. My mother was going up to the attic with food for James, and that's when all hell broke loose." I paused for a moment. My heart was breaking all over again as I told this story. I hadn't told it to anyone in this much detail in such a long time.