Hanging in there - A DDLC X DSMP CROSSOVER

Chapter 3 - Flashback

Author's note -TW- mention of suicide. If you are sensitive to this topic, don't read

I woke up late like usual. It was a habit for me to wake up ages before my alarm clock rings, if the rare occasion happened when I set the clock to ring. I would then sort through all the good and bad things I did the day before. Usually, the bad overpowered the good. I then usually reached the same conclusion - that maybe, just maybe, something good would happen at school. I would force myself out of bed, or not go to school at all if I was feeling particularly sad. I would then make myself a yummy breakfast, sometimes it was pancakes, sometimes it was waffles on toast topped with fruit. I had fun experimenting with different flavours. I would then quickly get dressed, brush my teeth and take a quick shower all at the same time. I would then rush to school, then remember that I had the literature club to look forward to, if nothing else. 

But, that day was special. I saw MC! Now I know that it was scripted? That some random guy scripted the whole thing, and that I was forced to fall in love with MC. I was a puppet on strings. I showed MC to the literature club, and he got closer and closer to me. I didn't understand it back then, but I do now. The MC I thought I knew was nothing but an empty shell. All our feelings were fake. Maybe somewhere inside, I knew that. It felt... unreal. I would get horrible pain when he spent time with me, and when he didn't spend time with me. My emotions were all mixed up, scattered like dandelions in the wind. If before I had little motivation, then now I really didn't have any motivation at all. Getting up was hard. Going to school was hard. Seeing MC was hard. 

It all exploded when MC chose Natsuki to hang over at his house. I knew it was the best thing for him but I felt so lonely like I never had before. All the while, Monika's words hung over in my head: "You'll never be enough for MC, he doesn't like you, you should just DiE."  It was too much for me to bear. I know I had promised MC that we would have fun at the festival. But why did any of that matter, if it wasn't real?  

The final straw was when I finally saw the truth for myself. As I was wide awake at night, I had a sudden urge to go eat a snack. I opened my refrigerator and saw a note. It wasn't signed. But it said that I was living in a simulation and that nothing is real. I thought it was blasphemy at the time. But I went back to my bedroom and saw just code, endless loops of strings. I couldn't take it. Monika was... right. MC was wrong. I was wrong. Everything was wrong.  Then suddenly, my bedroom was back in a flash, but in the middle lay a rope, as if someone had plucked a thought from my deepest desires. It took half an hour to tie it properly, my fingers desperately working harder and harder. I took a deep breath as I set up my chair. This was it. No turning back now. With shaking fingers and trembling legs, I slipped the rope over my throat, and took my last breaths...

Wait... something was.. WHY AM I ALIVE?

But all I can feel is pain exploding throughout my entire body, as I choked. My fingers tugged at the rope in panic, so many times they started to bleed. But my body was relentless. It wouldn't stop until I was free of the noose. I started second thinking, as I saw my blood drip onto the carpet. It was a grave mistake. I felt more and more and

More pain then.... 

nothing.