Tʜᴇ Pᴀᴛʜ Tᴏ Hɪɢʜɢᴀᴛᴇs

Mʏ Hᴇᴀʀᴛ Wɪʟʟ Sᴛᴏᴘ Iɴ Jᴏʏ

Cʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ 52

The sound of footsteps broke him.

The empty shells of transience as his love walked away from him. His love abandoning him. Leaving him to fret to himself. The horror of loneliness burrowing under his skin. His tears subsided slowly, his wailing softening.

He allowed what was left to vanish. The joy of being with you, his end goal of happiness now unreachable. He didn't care anymore. What once was fun was now sorrowful. There was no more joy left in him. It had been used and abused. Not by you, but by himself. He was angry, of course he was angry. But he couldn't stay like that for long. Eventually, all that remained was the endless oblivion of sielvartas coiling around his empty soul, the sea of stars within dimming until darkness was all that prevailed.

He wasn't angry anymore. He was too drained from crying all night to be. He was just terrified of being alone. Terrified that the one person who he truly loved was just a lie. He wasn't angry anymore, he was only scared— unhappy. Once he could no longer hear your footsteps, all the anger in him vanished. And he couldn't contain his fear any longer.

Slowly, he drew his head up, and wondered.

Why was he so mad? Really, you should be the angry one. What you said was hurtful, but if you ever found out the things he had been doing, you would be broken into a million pieces. He liked to pretend he was the innocent one in this scenario. But in the end thats all he had— pretend. None of it was real.

How did you feel when he hurt you? When he took what he had learned from his father and applied it to his own relationships? When he noticed what his father had done to his mother, and did the same to you?

Was it as euphoric as he hoped? Did it truly make you think less, so you could think more of him? So you may be completely on board with all his shitty ideas, as, in his mind, thoughts weren't constructs under immobilisation. If he could make you a dead man within, he believed you could live better throughout.

He wanted to know. He had to know.

He wanted to know you were okay in the end, that he wasn't really hurting you.

Reich stood up. His head low and heels dragging as he made his way to his desk. He knew he had put a spare bottle in his drawer sometime ago. But he had always been too scared to take any.

But now he wasn't afraid. He wanted to know what it felt like, he wanted to know if it would make him feel happy again. Just like they did for his mother.

The drawer opened with an obnoxious squeal. The hinges rusted and battered. The wood damp and tired. There were a few sketchbooks laid underneath. He hadn't touched them in a long while. He had no inspiration anymore.

His misery had been his muse for a long time. It had always made him feel better once he got it out on paper. But after you came along, he hadn't a need. He was overjoyed all the time. He was in love. But now the sun was hidden, the rain had finally come back after the beauteous summer months. He felt it in his chest, deep and unyielding. Coming out as anger and held in as depression.

There was no greater misery than this.

The feeling of sadness, and the anguish of wanting to get better, but being unable to.

Atop his sketchbooks were what he wanted. A bottle of pills he had stolen from his father years ago. Pills he knew his mother used to take. It had worked for her. They made her feel happy. Now he prayed they would work for him.

He lifted them out with unsteady hands and shut the drawer with a hesitant drag. Then sat back on his bed again.

He stared at the bottle.