𝑽𝒊𝒐𝒍𝒆𝒕 𝑯𝒂𝒑𝒑𝒊𝒏𝒆𝒔𝒔

𝑻𝒆𝒔𝒕𝒐𝒔𝒕𝒆𝒓𝒐𝒏𝒆 𝑻𝒘𝒊𝒏𝒔

"Hey, François," he sniffled on the phone. "I did it again...what should I do?"

"Baby, what did you do?"

"I cut again..."

"Don't move, I'll be right there."

He laid in bed. He already bandaged and cleaned the cuts. He scheduled an emergency appointment with his therapist for tomorrow afternoon. He felt so damn stupid. He was five months clean at that point, that was gone. He tried to smoke, but he kept crying too hard to even turn on his lighter. He hugged the bear squishmallow, feeling too ashamed face the worried trio of dogs that sat by the bed.

He heard the door opening and closing, Blueberry going downstairs to investigate. They both came up a few seconds later. He sat up so François could hug him.

"Thank you for telling me." He rolled down his sleeve. "I'm so proud of you for bandaging it."

Lloyd muttered thank you as he cried into his shoulder. François sat on the bed. He never self-harmed personally, but Marcel did. He knew what to do. He spoke to him gently, held him, and kissed his head.

"Can you tell me why you did that? If you tell me, we could prevent it from happening again."

"Two reasons." He wiped his eyes. "The first one was because my period started, and that made me feel really bad about myself..."

"I totally understand that. Periods are super hard." He kissed his forehead. "What was the other reason?"

He started getting worked up again, so the other rocked him back and forth. He hated seeing him so upset, but this was a huge step. He was never open about these kinds of things a year ago.

"K-Kim."

Both their bodies tensed up. They silently agreed to never speak about him. They didn't go to his grave, bring up memories involving him, François even burned his photos, and the Catch 22 book, which was his favorite.

"Today's his birthday. I remembered how happy we were." His voice was tight.

François, still a bit shaken from hearing that name, sighed. "I remember that too. Fucking bastard. Even in death, he finds a way to torture you."

He looked touched his face gently, only having his fingers on his cheeks. "Franny, be honest; is it my fault that he went crazy?"

"Absolutely not. He was always crazy, you remember how he would just stare at things or say that he heard voices telling him to hurt animals?" He hugged him tighter. "If anything, he shouldn't have been listed in the first place, they gotta fix that in Korea."

There was a presence in the room. It was making the room heavy and human. Ben was on alert, his ears up and his hair standing up. Apple was standing next to him, her tail straight up. Blueberry was huddled next to François' leg, her eyes full of concern.

"I knew him better than anyone." He hugged the other's neck as he whispered in a broken voice, "He was my best friend..."

"Some friends aren't good, and you can't save everyone." Lloyd looked up at him. François wiped his tears with his thumbs. "It's not your fault, he was always a cannon ready to explode."

He sniffled. "I hate him, but I also love him. Is that bad?"

"No, not at all. I feel the same way about my mom. I hate her for what she did to me and my brother, but I also love her because we did a few good memories together. You could love Kim-" that left a nasty taste in his mouth. "-for the happy memories, and you're allowed to hate him for what he put you through."