Shroud

When it all went South.

The thing is, it didn't stay perfect long.
For a few months, maybe.
I met a guy, right after I started in university. Andrew Holmes. Nothing bad happened between us. I'm just sad I couldn't say goodbye.

We started dating, and he lived off campus. I would stay at his apartment quite a bit, but I never had the chance to move in. We both agreed that it would be much easier to just wait until we were both done school, at least the next 4 years of it.
Around 4 months into our relationship, things were going absolutely wonderfully.

Then I started seeing things.
It was small, at first. Simple things like branches reaching out to get me, or that feeling of my skin crawling as if I were being watched. I brushed it off as being tired or dehydrated, figured it would go away on its own.

It didn't.

Eventually they got worse. One in particular, a tall man. He had no face, and wore a suit. Sometimes he would sit in the tree I could see from my window, sometimes he would just stand beside it and watch. Every once in a while, he would be a bit closer to my window, other times farther away.
Every time he showed up, like clockwork, I would get a nosebleed. It would stay until he left, constantly dripping blood.

Though that wasn't the worst of it. Small marks started to appear on my skin. They were red, sometimes blistery. When I visited the doctor they insisted it was "just common dermatitis, it would go away soon."
It stayed, and got worse. It moved slowly, but it hit hard. During my last year of university, I was constantly in and out of the hospital while they tried to figure out what was wrong with me. Eventually, radiation burns were put on the table. A few tests later, and that was it. My dorm, my work, everywhere was checked for a cause that would nake it spread just during my every day life. Nothing.

I graduated in between hospital visits, and during one of them I found out I was accepted into medical school. Even with the burns, fatigue, and lack of motivation, I was excited. Maybe things would get back in the right track, right?

Andrew stayed with me the whole time. Every hospital visit, the day we graduated, when I was weak from various ailments. He stayed. We decided neither of us were ready to spend more time together, that we both still needed alone time sometimes so seperate apartments would stay.
The tall man stopped appearing for about a month, then the amount he did appear increased. My burns spread, and engulfed my left arm, side, and part of my face. They got my right hand a little bit, but mostly subsided after that. I was told the scarring would last the rest of my life, which to this point, it very much has.
I lost most feeling in the burned areas. There was a little bit remaining, but any feeling of tempurature was completely gone and I had to rely completely on ooks or touching it with what remained of my right hand.

I tried to make it not affect my studies. I had to go to physical, in person classes, so my grades did drop, but I was making it.

..

Things went smoothly for a while after that. I started coming up with stories to not make me seem crazy when asked about the burns, and it worked out. I had a nice little friend circle going, my relationship was perfect. I was honestly considering proposing.
Then the cracks literally started to show. On my face, miniscule cracks in my skin. It seemed easy to play off as dry skin, but they go bigger. More appeared. I started wearing my hair over my face, wearing medical masks more. I got strange looks, and was grilled for answers from people I knew, but I said it was just a "style choice" and that I was okay.

In reality, it hurt. A fuck of a lot. Every time a crack showed up, every time they got bigger, it was excruciating. I got used to it eventually, but the surprise of the pain always gets me.
When the cracks opened up more, I started hiding. The majority showed up on the right side of my face, though two showed up on my left. Rather than waiting, I.. sped up the process. More as an experiment, than anything. My left side had the burns, and I couldn't feel it too well anyway.
So, I cut them through. It was hard to do, But I did. They got bigger in their own, but I started it.
They had a completely different end result from the ones on the right side.
All the right side ones, they started to glow. That was when I went into total seclusion, avoiding everybody as much as I could. I stopped responding to my boyfriend and friends, but I didn't block them. I wanted to have the choice.

I don't really know what causes the cracks to glow, or why they started producing acid. I blame the same thing that caused the burns, but they seem seperate.
I got lucky enough to be immune to the acid I produce, but it did affect both of my eyes, and nobody else is quite immune. It burns away flesh, puts holes in clothing and ruins furniture.

I was on the road to being thrown out of school, being fired, and evicted.
My boyfriend came to my door a lot of days. I moved around in my apartment that he "knew I was alive", but he didn't want to call the police, just because he knew they would overwhelm me, but my lack of responses was scaring him.

One day, he did threaten to call for a welfare check. Every part of my memory after this remains crystal clear, as if I am experiencing it in real time every time I think of it.
He was crying, asking what happened to me. He sat down, on the other side of my door, and just talked about everything.
I was scared to tell him what was going on, to show him what I had become. My voice had changed as well, at least partially. Sounded like it was two, perfectly synced, but completely different people talking at once, one ever so slightly quieter than the other and sounding like a computer had produced it.
Instead, I wrote a note and passed it under the door. That was the only way we talked for two days straight.

On the third day, he asked me one question. "Is there anything I can give you to help us see each other again?"
Instead of writing back, I hesitated. Then, I opened the door. The light of the hallway rushed in, and his look of shock just broke me. I cried horrible, acid tears filled with sobs of pain from the worry I caused.
He just held me for hours as I burned his skin, and explained in a broken way what was happening.