Familiarity

Chapter Twenty-Three

WOAH IT DIDNT TAKE ME 2 WEEKS THIS TIME OMG???

uhhh ik before i said "maybe there would be 26 chapters"... but i still have some wrapping up and some things to do, so.

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He had helped you with your bandages. And then something had changed.

You couldn't tell what it was, or what it meant. But it was there, palpable as the sickness in your stomach as you laid on your side, curled over yourself as your fingers dug into your shoulders. You had taken pain-relieving medicine after Katsuki left, and since then, you hid in your room. It wasn't that unprecedented change that struck you so hard you were forced into this state, where the silence wasn't loud enough and only you could hold yourself.

Everything, how much you affected everyone, was laid in front of you. That's what made you hide, desperate for something. Because, then, all of your thoughts were stronger, no longer soundless in the mess within you.

It was written on your sleeve, pressed to the tops of your eyes—unwilling to be anything but be seen. It was a residing feeling like starving parasites that stuck to the inside of your stomach, sucking every ounce of life from your veins. And all of the memories—of your brother's cries, the expressions on everyone's faces—were burned to the back of your eyes, printed onto every inch of your body. It all wanted to be seen, remarked, remembered. Just as all of the realizations wanted.

You could almost relive all of it. Everything.

From the day all of this started, back with your aunt and uncle driving you to houses to meet people that were doomed to die, to the instance in your own house just the day before.

And even if it was reluctant at the start, you tried to let yourself feel every second of it.

—

You fell asleep and woke up in sweat only a few hours later, the clawing memories from your nightmare fading upon the moment your eyes opened. You were still laying on your side, grabbing at your chest like your heart was the reason you felt as though you were being drowned and you needed to rip it out to save yourself.

Your body shook with each inhale, desperate for all the oxygen you could take. You touched your face and felt the perspiration spread to your hands like the blood that once infested your eyes. You touched the wound on your abdomen, flinching at the feeling before staring at your palms in the dark. You swore you had just hurt yourself again. You swore that even if for a second, you could see the red stain on your palm, still glossy and new from when you hurt yourself.

Still, you sat up and flicked in the lamp beside your bed, still breathing heavily. You propped your body up on your forearm, pulling the hem of your shirt up to look at the blood that had bled through your bandages. It had begun to stain the inside of your clothing, little specks of red riding within the orange of the shirt your father had pulled randomly from your closet.

Panic tried to settle within you, which felt a bit funny at first because you were already panicked. Your heart rate was still fast and you still saw flashes of your mother and blood and your brother with every blink. Your body was stupid for thinking you hadn't been at this stage of fear and vulnerability yet.

You stood up slowly, your teeth grinding together from the prominent ache in your abdomen and the pinched in your sides. Your legs shook and you felt weak when you grabbed the extra bandages from your bedside table. The feeling didn't lessen when you tried to walk toward the door, regardless of the way you got distracted by the sounds of voices and the feeling of blood leaving your body.

You opened the door, walking to the kitchen with a hand against the walls as the other held your midsection and the unused bandages. When you made it there, you let your shoulder rest against the wall.