Ink Flowers

What happens in your head...

A/N: this took way too long I know but hey, I'm still alive so let's call it a success.
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There was noise everywhere, the kind of noise that makes you want to rip your skin off and cry until you can't breathe anymore. And it didn't stop, the noise only grew louder and louder, like nails on blackboard, like a cat screeching, like a mother weeping.

It hurt his eyes, and ears, he could feel his heartbeat slowing down with every passing second that he had to suffer alongside said noise. It was draining, it was painful, a torture.

And he felt it in his bones, the pain and despair, he could feel it echoing inside his head, behind the lids of his eyes. His eyes, that were closed still, trying to muffle the sound, to make it stop.

"Make it stop," he muttered, his tongue dry and his lips sticky with something that wasn't saliva.

He felt strong hands underneath him, holding him by his shoulder blades, keeping him from falling apart once more.

The noise didn't stop, he could still feel it everywhere,  it was drowning him, like a hurricane raging inside his skull, between both of his ears.

He was being shaken, and little white stars flashed behind his closed eyes, pain in its purest form: light. With a grunt, he scrunched  his eyes, trying to stop the yells and screams, trying to ignore the sound of a fork being drag over fine china.

"Make it stop," he said again, begging.
He tasted it before he could feel it, the taste and smell of the iron in his veins was one he was more than familiar with. And when blood and bile reached his throat, he was prepared. He had felt it before it came, as always.

He couched once, twice, trying to breathe again, fighting to get the blood out of his system while simultaneously trying to stop the voices still. They called to him, his name, over and over again.

They laughed, they shushed, cursed and cried out. All while Joe laid there, trying to breathe still, trying not to drown in his own blood. There was blood dripping down his chin, there were cuts all over his face, and he could feel bruises in every part of his body, parts he hadn't been aware of having until then.

A thought flashed in his head, like the friendly shadow of a tree on a much too sunny day. While the voices grew higher and higher, and his blood stopped flowing through his teeth, Joe saw it. One word, plastered on the blinding light that made up his mind.

"Tyler," he said, repeated it, over and over again.

It all came crashing down, like a badly built house. The memories flooded back in, piecing through the noises, through the pain.

"Tyler," he said again, while the memory of his blood plastered across the lockers haunted him, and suddenly there were more noises than the ones around him, making his head spin.

He heard the little yelps of a boy that hadn't been born to fight, let alone to fight alone. He heard his tears falling to the ground, and he could almost hear the fear in his rapid heartbeat. Another memory stroke him hard, like the first kick Sam had gifted him.

Joe coughed again, his eyes still closed, the world still hurting, and more blood dribbled down his skin. He muttered his name once more.