It's Understandable: A Tronnor AU

14. Ways (Twisted DIY Project)

Three weeks passed, and things were different in a lot of ways. The dance was in a week, and Connor hadn't shut up about it since being asked to take pictures. He wondered what he should wear, if he should practice, if he should use speciality film to extract an extra vintage feel. He was so distracted by not the job particularly, but by what it represented. Healing, a step in the right direction. It made Troye smile, it really did, seeing his boyfriend passionate about something. He saw it as a starting point, a propelling point. Connor was rising from his depression, one day at a time, it was clear. And Troye was so, so glad for that...

...but...

...and he felt selfish about this; he was worried about himself.

At first, when their relationship was shiny and new, Troye thought that his happiness was attached to Connor's. He thought that, if Connor was okay, he'd be okay too. But then days kept passing and, although he still felt the same way about his boyfriend, he realized that being in a couple doesn't mean they shared a mind. Serotonin wasn't something you could donate like blood.

The thing was, his anti-depressants weren't working. He tried and tried to force the feelings down, taking one every day, sometimes an emergency second. But they didn't give him release; it was either drowning or complete numbness. That's all he got anymore.

And he didn't understand it, but he wasn't really surprised by that: he knew he wasn't supposed to understand. Nobody was, especially not the people who wanted to. Connor...his depression was a little bit different: it wasn't any less hard, but it was situational. He couldn't pin his sadness on specific reasons sometimes, and it was just as overwhelming, but it all sprouted in the Petri dish of his surroundings. Troye, on the other hand, was clinically depressed. His brain had a chemical imbalance, and the sadness just screamed and slept as it pleased. And just when he was starting to believe he could count on things other than his pills for happiness, he couldn't even count on those anymore.

He felt terrible, in sadness and in guilt. He was not doing well, he was wearing himself out into early sleep, and he was cutting again. Well, he never really stopped, but it was much heavier to him knowing he was doing it behind someone's back. Connor didn't know about the pills in the first place, and he definitely didn't know about Troye's current mental state.

Being increasingly better, he thought he could spread his joy to his boyfriend with a simple smile. And he thought it was working, that Troye was okay. But Troye spent years using acting to survive. He easily pretended to be happy, when breaking open his skin was a numb habit nowadays. He didn't cry while doing it anymore. He didn't scream or stomp or even shake. It was almost a casual thing, in a twisted, twisted way. He would put in his earbuds, put his music on low so he could hear if his mom came upstairs, and just ran the blade in a pedantic pattern of lines down his skin. He still felt worthless as he did it. He felt like he was letting Connor down, that he wasn't even trying to get better when Connor was pushing himself so far out of his comfort zone to do just that.

He felt like Connor was climbing higher and higher up the ladder, while he had his foot caught in the first rung. He wanted to be okay, and he wanted to do it himself. He didn't want Connor to know or to feel an obligation to help, but maybe, just maybe he could climb a little higher by silently grabbing onto the hem of Connor's pants.

So, one day, when Connor was at his locker, Troye walked up from behind. He touched his waist gently, palms pressed against the slight curve of his torso, moving them slowly to his stomach so that he was holding him close. He breathed him in, trying to absorb the comfort before anybody noticed how desperately he needed it.

Connor flinched a little, surprised at the sudden PDA, and turned around with a nervous smile. "I, um...I thought we weren't going to do this in...in public." He stammered, trying to laugh too in order to keep Troye from thinking he was embarrassed of him.