No matter how many times he's tried to wash off this feeling..
...
The memories, the sensations of his past, felt fresh to him as he tossed and turned, unable to make himself forget those memories and sensations. They seemed to torment him endlessly, and the more his mind tried to forget, the more he was reminded, like an endless loop of thoughts that kept him from even getting a second of rest.
"Why do I do this to myself? I sleep around like a whore, knowing fully well that it reminds me of him.."
Artyom pondered in thought, why did his life have to end up like this?
"Who am I kidding, I need to do this to survive.. otherwise, I'd be on the streets by now, starving, and Opal.."
His pet parrot, Opal, whom he cared deeply about, the tip of her feathers were pure white, like the colour of a dove or angel's wings.
Though, he did what he had to do to survive. It wasn't a situation of wanting to, it was a situation of needing to. He had to survive, and he had a little parrot to care for. And his body and mind were both exhausted tonight, but sleep still would not bless him that night even when he was so tired out.
Despite how tired and sleep deprived he was, finally, after a few long hours, Artyom had drifted off to a slumber, but not a restful one. He tossed and turned fitfully in his sleep, with an occasional shudder or twitch of his body as he was plagued by his subconscious.
His thoughts did not seem to stop at his rest. A nightmare had plagued his mind that night.
"Wuh..? Huh..?" Artyom's eyes widened in shock and realization upon looking around the familiar place. "I'm back here..? Why..? Is this some sort of torture..?" He had been transported in his dream to a familiar place of terror that he had hoped to never go to again.
He could see the room - a familiar place of horror and terror and the familiar face of his tormentor.
It was almost like a bad nightmare come true as he found himself back where he'd hoped to never return, but was still plagued by nightmares and memories to this day.
"Don't come near me! Mom! Please help! Someone!?"
His cries fell on deaf ears here. He would get no help nor comfort now. Not like it had ever been given to him before, no matter how deeply he wished for it.
There would be no help for him in this place of his nightmares; this place of terror and torment.
The familiar black hair, and blue eyes, just exactly like the ones he had, those same, soulless eyes, stared back at him. His tormentor had a resemblance to him physically, but it was a cruel thing, a demon in human flesh. The tormentor was always so composed, so composed and calm...
"Please...get away..." Artyom pleaded, maybe if he begged more, he would have had a chance before.
It was a fragment of Artyom's past; the nightmare felt so very real to him, yet somehow not quite right. Somehow, it felt a bit distant, but it still felt too real despite how fuzzy it seemed in his head.
He searched through the cabinets, desperate to find anything, anything, to defend himself. Upon finding a knife, he was slightly relieved, it was the sharpest one in the house afterall "Stay away.." he pleaded once more for the figure not to come near him.
His tormentor was coming over, his footsteps sounding against the wood of the floor; Artyom could almost feel his heartbeat about to stop.
A familiar sense of dread pooled into his gut as the man approached with those familiar blue eyes and that familiar dark hair.
A knife sounded like a good idea against this creature that had haunted him.
"You're not hurting me again.." Artyom whispered faintly before stabbing the figure in the chest, which the creature that haunted him, that had always haunted his nightmares, just emitted into black smoke.
He was so exhausted and sleep deprived, yet unable to rest easy.
It was gone. For now.
"Mother, you wouldn't believe me, no matter how much I tried.. did you know your husband was a monster?"
A deep sense of betrayal rested in Artyom's mind as he thought, a deep betrayal because his own mother would never believe him when he tried to tell her the truth, even now.
His father was a monster, a demon in human flesh, and his mother... his mother did nothing. She looked the other way like an oblivious fool.
"You cared for me.. yet you failed to see the ways he would treat me when you weren't there.."
She truly cared for him but never had the backbone to protect her own son. She was either too foolish or too blinded by love for a monster.
Perhaps even a combination of both.
There always was the question that plagued him. The ever so tempting, lingering one:
"Could she really not have known what her own husband was doing, to her own child?"
His own child.
But, the question still remained. There was a part of him that wanted to believe that she was so naïve, and simply did not realize what was happening to her child.
Then, there was the part of him that didn't want to believe that the mother who seemed to love and care for him so much, just let it all happen to him as if it were nothing.
"This knife.. I used it, to get rid of him back then, didn't I?"
He had made a choice, a difficult one that nobody else wanted to make back then. He knew he had to defend himself somehow, and so he defended himself, by murdering his own father, stabbing him in the chest 10 times.
He remembered the sight of the bloodied, distorted face of whom he once called his father. "How could someone do that to their own child?" He always thought.
How could someone be capable of doing that to a child? To their own child?
It was a disgusting thing. An incomprehensible thing.
How could someone do that to their children. Artyom wasn't the first, but he was the last. All his other siblings couldn't bear the feeling and took their own life, at the young age of no older than 15.
But he was the last one, the last one who survived... The one, forced to deal with this burden, if it wasn't for Opal, Artyom would be dead by now. No matter how hard he tried to wash the dirt off his skin, the stains were still there, glass tears still wasted, childhood still taken away.
The scars of his childhood and the memories never seemed to vanish. No matter how desperately he tried, not matter how much he washed, they always remained. It was a burden he had to carry for the rest of his life, as did the memories, the fears, the scars; all on his mind, and on his body.
How could someone live like this? He's sure the whole village thinks of him as a slut who uses his body to get what he wants.
Finally, after some time, Artyom could rest, until sunrise, that is.
