Shades Of Styles

Stalker, Watcher, Psycopath (2 Years Later)

Sorry it's been ages since I've uploaded, I've had a life time of stuff happen in the last 3 months and I haven't had the energy to work on my writing.

"I still see his dying face when I close my eyes." I tell my therapist. "The way he looked at me, the way it sounded when his mouth filled with blood and choked on it." Tears begin to well up in my eyes and roll down my cheek. "I tell myself that it was self defense but...he never tried to hurt me. He only wanted me to love him the way he loved me."

"He held you hostage for 4 months. You did what you needed to do to get out." She defends me.

"He was going to let me out. He-he had planned on us, living together upstairs. He just wanted love and I killed him."

Getting over everything that happened 2 years ago has not been easy and I think ill live with this trauma for the rest of my life. After getting out of the hospital I tried so hard to ease myself back into normalcy but nothing worked. I couldn't sleep and when I did, I woke up from my nightmares. It felt like I couldn't even breath.

The trials lasted so long I never thought they'd end and they were the worst part of it all. Trying to recover from what happened to me while still having to be in that court room talking about it and actually having to provide the evidence necessary to win the case was exhausting.
I didn't even care about the trial, my parents were the ones who made the case, I just wanted to be as far away from the whole thing as I could.
When we did win and the trial ended, my family was so happy and I could see a huge weight lift from their shoulders but for me, I felt nothing. I no longer cared. He was dead so to me it didn't matter. Or that's what I thought.

I was numb for a long time after it was finally over, just going through the motions of life but at the same avoiding dark allies and not going out, almost ever. My parents suggested I take some time away from work just until I felt settled but I don't think I ever will.
I had to move back in with them because they couldn't afford to keep paying for my place hoping that they'd find me.

Recently though, I've started to feel guilty about ending his life. I'm not sure why and that's why I'm here. Everyone around me tells me I did what I needed to do to get out of there but had the circumstances been different, if his phone hadn't been on him I probably wouldn't have made it out of there, ever. I think that's what gets to me the most, the fact that the only way I survived was because of happen stance. Or maybe it was pure luck. But then again, if it were luck I wouldn't have ended up there in the first place.

"(Y/N)." My therapist calls for my attention making me realize I've been staring at some hideous painting behind her for a while now. My eyes find hers again and I can see how worried she is. It's the look I get from everyone these days. "You can't blame yourself for what you did. It saved your life."

"Can I tell you something?" I ask her and she nods once. "I wish I would have died." I finally say the words out loud. The truth. "It would have been so much better...so much easier for me if I would have just died. If he would have killed me. Then I wouldn't feel forced to live in this post traumatic state I've been lost in for the last 2 fucking years. I mean, I'm so exhausted by the way I feel but I can't do anything to feel different or to just feel a little better." I rant to her. What I won't tell her is the fact that I tried to end my life 4 months ago. I couldn't take the pain anymore, every time I look at that bullet wound or the scars I picture him, everything comes flooding back and it feels like I'm drowning again.
I can't tell her about that because she'll send me off somewhere and it'll make me go more insane than I already am.

"It's common for victims to feel this way, you just have to keep moving forward. Try to not let it consume your day." She explains and I scoff at her. Those are her words of wisdom? What does she think I've been doing everyday for the last 2 years?

"Try? That's all I've been doing, is trying! I can't try anymore. It's just as exhausting."

"And it will be for a while but it will get better (Y/N), I promise."

I just roll my eyes at her words as I've heard them a million times over the last 2 years. I honestly don't see it ever getting better, I feel like I'll be trapped in this state of mind forever.

"I love you," He breaths into my neck before kissing the spot there. His warm breath feels so good against my neck as his body leans into me. He pulls himself off of me, far enough to look at me and his beautiful green eyes look into mine.

Suddenly I feel a sharp pain in my stomach, I look down and there's a knife sticking out of me. I look back up as the blood pours from the stab wound. Harry's green eyes have turned black and his smile has turned wicked. I pull the knife from my stomach and turn it towards him before shoving the knife into his chest. He instantly drops to the floor, dead.

"(Y/N)!" A voice jolts me from my sleep and I wake up, eyes wild and covered in sweat. My mom sits in front of me and looks at me worried.

"Sorry," I gasp as I try to find my voice. Every night for the last 2 years since I've gotten out of the hospital I've had this same nightmare or something close to it. But it always ends with his dead body laying under me.

"Oh, honey...have you been taking your medication?" she questions. That medication doesn't work, it supposed to suppress my nightmares but they haven't worked much. Other than keeping me from screaming myself awake.

"Yes," I sigh. "I'm going back to sleep now."

———1 month later——-

"Girl you haven't been out in forever! You have to come with us tonight!" Carmen whines to me. I've refused to go out anywhere since...what happened. I just don't feel safe anymore.

"Yeah cause last time-" I try to defend myself.

"I know what happened." She says softly and then grabs my arms. "I know everything that happened to you and I know you'll spend the rest of your life trying to cope with it. But...if you're not living then what's the point? Let's go out and have fun!"

"Yeah...besides, this isn't even a nightclub. We'll be right next to you the whole time!" My other friend Dani assures me. I can tell they want me to come and I don't want to drag us down. I need to focus on right now and just hope for the best. But my therapist said to go at my own pace and I just don't feel ready to do that yet.

"I really can't. I'm sorry." I apologize. "I need you guys to understand."

"We do...it's not easy for us to sit here and watch you live life like this."

"And you think it's easy for me to live like this?" I ask, a little angered now. "When I close my eyes, I see him. In the face of every man, I see him. You guys just don't get it."

I can see on their face that my words have hurt them but how do they think I feel? What happened to me stunted any and all life experiences for me for the foreseeable future. As much as they want me to go back to normal, this is the new normal for me.

"I've accepted this as my new reality. If you guys were my real friends you'd be more understanding." I tell them. They look guilty now. As they should. They're not the ones who went through what I did. There's a long pause and then Carmen opens her mouth to speak.

"When you disappeared...it took us a while to accept that you were gone. We never really did I guess. And when we got you back, we felt so relieved. We finally got you back." She pauses for a second. "But now I can see, we never really did. You've been gone more now...then you were before."
What she said hits me in the chest and I feel my heart tear into two. That is the most selfish thing I've ever heard and I want to scream at her for making it about herself but instead-

"Get out. Now." I say with no emotion in my voice. "Both of you! You are not my fucking friends. Get out." I say with a hint of emotion but I drop it again. They say nothing before grabbing their things angrily and leaving.

I guess this is what I'm reduced to, a cold shell of a woman with no friends. Nonetheless I feel no way towards it. I feel nothing now actually. No emotion. Blank. Empty. And I've accepted it.