slide away {lorenzo berkshire}

54. snap out of it

"I have done bad things. I can't take them back, and they are part of who I am. Most of the time, they seem like the only thing I am."
- Veronica Roth

~~~~~~

Cassie Avery

I didn't leave my bed for two days.

I made excuses: I was tired, my muscles ached, I needed to catch up on sleep. But that was only the surface. The truth was, I couldn't face anyone. Couldn't face the noise, the conversations, the eyes that would want to meet mine and ask questions I couldn't answer.

The curtains around my bed stayed closed, shutting out the soft autumn light of the castle. It could have been day or night, but I wouldn't have known. My chest felt heavy, my limbs disconnected, like moving them would take energy I didn't have. I ate nothing. I barely drank anything except the glass of water someone - probably Onyx - kept replacing on my nightstand.

I couldn't stop thinking about what we'd done, replaying it over and over like some broken record I couldn't stop. Ollivander's shaking hands. His voice when he begged. Greyback's grin when he pressed him too hard against the wall, when he made him cry out. Mattheo standing there, calm, collected, cold. Untouchable.

He hadn't looked away. He hadn't hesitated.

I had.

I half expected him - Mattheo - to come and find me. To burst through the curtains, grab my wrists, force me to get up like he always did when I shut down. To argue, to shout, to do anything that would snap me out of it.

But there was nothing.

No knock. No voice at the door. Not even a note left on the bed.

That silence weighed heavier than his arguments ever had.

Part of me wanted to believe him, wanted to hold onto the idea that maybe he wasn't just the storm tearing through my life.

But the storm was still there.

The coldness, the anger, the way he pushed me to places I didn't want to go. And beneath it all, a truth I couldn't escape: I was unraveling. Lost in a maze of fear and doubt, trapped between what I was becoming and who I once was.

So I willed myself to sleep again, because at least then the images, the voices, they would all stop. At least for a while.

When I woke up, I thought for a second I was still dreaming.

The curtains of my bed were drawn halfway open, and someone was sitting at the edge of the mattress, their back to me. Broad shoulders, dark, messy hair.

I blinked hard, pushing myself upright, my voice scratchy from days of disuse. "Lorenzo?".

He turned slightly, and there it was - the faintest hint of a smile. "Morning, sunshine," he said, and it was half-teasing, half-genuine.

I stared at him, still trying to shake the fog from my brain. "What are you doing in here?".

He shrugged, still not looking at me directly. "Checking to see if you were still alive".

I blinked at him. "That's dramatic even for you."

His mouth twitched like he was trying not to smile. "Maybe. You've been in this bed so long I was considering staging an intervention. Thought I'd better make sure before I brought in the banners and motivational speeches."

"Motivational speeches?", I raised an eyebrow, tugging the blanket tighter. "That sounds terrifying."

"Oh, it would've been." He finally glanced at me, eyes scanning my face, and I felt pinned under the look.