Step 9: Hold Close

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The fact that Mark had stopped paying such close attention to Jack hurt him. The way Jack saw it, Mark didn't care about him. That's what Jack had wanted all along though. Jack wanted Mark to leave him alone, to let him die the slow painful death he was giving himself.

Mark had thought Jack was getting better, so his was trusting him with more alone time. He thought Jack was okay with it. But if someone is okay with something, they don't usually wake you up in the middle of the night to go outside. Which is what Jack did.

He carefully made his way up the stairs, shaking from not eating again, along with staying in bed for hours on end.

Jack knocked on the wooden door softly, not wanting to scare Mark out of bed.

"Jack?" Mark's voice was quiet and sleepy. That was when Jack liked to listen to him talk the most. It was like his filter turned off sometimes too, so he would ramble on like Jack.

"Come on in babe." Jack pushed the door open to see Mark rubbing his eyes, kicking back the covers to reveal him in a pair of boxers.

"What's up?"

"Can we talk? Outside?" Jack stood in the door way, a baggy tee shirt on and a pair of sweats.

"Why? What's wrong?" Mark sat up, looking worried.

"Nothing. Well, something. But it's nothing to worry about, I just want to talk." Jack looked down, telling himself it was a stupid reason to wake up Mark, who probably had plans for tomorrow. "Actually, just go back to sleep. It's nothing." Without waiting for a reply, he turned around and closed the door, going back downstairs to his gloomy bedroom.

Jack turned on a lamp, pulling out his notebook. He had stopped writing in it, but he wanted to. He felt like he had to talk about how he felt to someone or something, otherwise he would explode. Jack felt like he shouldn't have felt that way, after all he was a master at bottling up his feelings - he had done it for years.

My wings broke
But you were fine

I was falling down
But you were fine

I was suddenly saved
And you were fine

Now I'm healing
And you're doing fine

But soon I'll fall
Because you don't need me

When I fall
You'll be fine

Jack was half tempted to scribbling all over the page, but he didn't. He just left it even if it wouldn't make any sense at all. He looked at the page, which looked painfully blank. Jack used to write so much more, and he would draw. He shook his head; his thoughts weren't even making sense anymore. 

Mark opened the door, seeing Jack holding his head in his hands looking down at his notebook.

"You had something to say. I don't care how you think it sounds. Tell me." He placed his hands on Jack's shoulders, closing his eyes and ready to listen. 

"I just... I feel like you don't care about me anymore, you don't check up on my as much, and it just. It makes me want to go back, to before." Jack bit his lip, choosing his words wisely. "To before we met, because then if I kill myself, then you don't have to miss me." 

Mark rubbed his eyes, shaking his head. "No, I do care about you, alright? I just thought that you would like to feel more independent. And I don't want to say keep thinking like that, but I don't want to tell you to stop either." Jack looked back at Mark, confused as to what he meant. "The last person I had been assigned to help, she always thought like that. When I told her to not think like that, she snapped. She just went crazy, I mean you're so much more mentally stable than she was, but she said that she thought like that because it helped her with trying to make choices."

"I still don't understand." Jack sat up on the table, resting his feet on the chair and looking at Mark.

"She would do the same stuff as you, and she would tell herself that if she stopped she would die, but if she used any more than she already did, she would die. Her logic was messed up." 

Jack nodded, letting out a sigh. It felt awkward in the room, just because Jack was thinking about Zoey and Mark was thinking about some mysterious girl that was clearly insane.

"So my point is that you're going to have those thoughts, I mean you're depressed and that is a normal thing to think about in your state. So by me telling you not to, it's not just going to magically stop it." Mark shook his head again, yawning. "How do you not sleep for days on end?" 

"It's easy, just think about why we are really here. On earth."

"Kinda like a 'what's the point in human life' thing?" Mark sat down on the bed, resting his chin in his hands.

"Yeah, pretty much."

"Then how do you sleep for days on end?" Jack almost laughed, realizing that he was almost constantly wishing he was sleeping.

"Take a handful of sleeping pills. Then when you wake up a while later, do it again." Jack looked down, "That's why it's so easy to not eat."

Mark's eyes widened and he looked up at Jack, "You've not been eating again?" 

Jack wished he could reassure Mark that he was eating, that he was healthy. But he couldn't, because he wasn't. Jack was always sleeping. Jack was suicidal. Jack had problems.

"Okay, we are going to go upstairs, have some pancakes, and then go sit and look at the stars." 

Jack didn't want to, he wanted to sleep now. He wanted to listen to music and get drunk, do something stupid, sleep, and go back then go back to sleep once he woke up. But he followed Mark up the stairs, checking his phone to see it was 3 in the morning.

"Why don't you play some music. It might be a while."

Jack played music, watching Mark as he moved his head slightly from side to side with the beat of the song. 

They laid in the grass, looking up at the stars. Jack was cuddled into Mark's side, who put on a tee shirt and sweatpants before he even came downstairs. Jack looked up at Mark, seeing he was falling asleep. 

"Goodnight, Baby Boy." Mark mumbled before turning on his side and pulled Jack into his chest.

"Goodnight." And for the first time in a long time, Jack fell asleep without needing pills. And for the first time in a long time, Jack stayed asleep without getting up and felling upset that he hadn't died in his sleep.

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