Eyes Open ✰ Jalex

13 // Warmer Climate

Happy October. And happy birthday to Mayday Parade's self titled album (it's tomorrow but oh well.) On a non happy birthday note, I've been updating very regularly but I've finished chapter 14 and it's not even emotional but the ending is just aah and I just

I don't know.

I've been writing this story since March and it's October and I'll have it done before November so this will have been 8 months in the works. And I don't know what to think about it and it'll be exciting to have new stories to post but this is the first fanfic that I've ever started and completed (well, almost) and I'm actually proud of it and people actually read it, like- I'm going to have over a thousand reads by the time chapter 15 goes up. So, I'm going to have a mega emotional author's note at the very very end of this but just aAH. AH! Ah. This is emotional. 

On a lighter note, this chapter sucks ass but oh well. Enjoy, if that's even possible. (THE "WOOAHS" IN TO LIVE AND LET GO ARE THE SOLE THINGS KEEPING ME ALIVE GOD BLESS)

-

// and i can barely see your face in front of mine

// but it is knowing you are there that makes me fine

-

Jack was an artist and Alex had never been aware that he actually knew how to create art. Not that Alex thought that Jack wasn't capable of it, but a sunset that Alex had seen before had actually been painted on his back and Alex didn't want to get rid of it.

He had spent the next day wearing a baggy t-shirt as to not smudge the paint while hanging around his house and staring at the Christmas lights silhouetted against his wall. He had showered the next morning, not knowing why he was getting rid of the art on his back. Showering was always something that calmed him down; he should make a list of the things that calmed him down and why.

Showering helped in the way that it could wash everything away, and that was a good thing and a bad thing. One Halloween, his face had been smeared with makeup that he hadn't been able to get off the previous night and his body had been dirty and grimy and his mouth tasted like sugar and spice and everything unhealthy and gross. He had been all too excited to get in the shower, and had taken up all the hot water in the house which caused his mom to get mad at him but it didn't matter because he was clean. And once his parents had had one of their major fights that most times revolved around the fact that one of their sons was slowly becoming an alcoholic that wasn't even his mother's kid so she didn't want to deal with him and besides, he was an adult and should be able to take care of himself, and then their other son was completely fucked in the head and they didn't want to waste their money on medication and therapy or waste their time trying to help him. Alex had been semi-involved in the fight, because he had started off down in the kitchen where most of their fights took place and had ended up fully clothed sitting in a bathtub full of freezing water.

He had wondered how it would feel to fall asleep and simply slip under the water and stop breathing.

That wasn't a shower either, but every time he got clean in some way he got clean, clean like someone who hadn't used a bad drug or hurt themselves or drank alcohol in a long time. He was clean. His bathroom was white, the type of clean white that was due to there being an oddly placed skylight in the ceiling that lit up the whole bathroom that he could see the stars through at night and he had always wondered why of all places the skylight was in the bathroom but it made it really bright and nice.

So Alex showered. The paint fell and mixed with the water, a cascade of pink, blue, and yellow mixing with the clear water and falling around Alex's hair. He stayed under the water until it ran cold and then he still stayed there until the water was fully clear again.