Deadly Discern - Book Three ✔️

Chapter One - Falling To Pieces

I had never felt so desperately alone.

The best way to try and describe it would be to say that it felt as though my heart had been ripped savagely from my chest and the space where it once had been is now constantly aching.

At work, Peter can sense that something is wrong and has been giving me my space, but he still kept me busy with work. I'd always welcomed the distraction from deep emotion anyway, so I couldn't be bothered by that gesture.

But everything now felt dulled. I don't feel the need to eat or sleep, and when I do, the tasks seemed pointless. Though I knew that I could only ignore the rumbles of hunger for so long, and gave in when the noise became unbearable.

Though in all honesty, every single thing I did had become unbearable.

Going home to an empty house is what strikes me the hardest most nights. I reluctantly enter the dark and silent place, expecting to hear Ditz speeding towards me at the door and the sound of the television on in the sitting room, but when I don't hear either of those normal things, the sensation of loneliness returns tenfold. The waves of despair make me fall into an even deeper slump, my shoulders somehow become heavier than they already were, my head clouds over, the thoughts within become dreadful and suck me further into the darkness that is my dismal mind. I then shuffle blankly down the hallway, dropping my bag by the end of the bed - our bed - and the original clash of hurt hits me all over again. Then the tears return, I force my leaden legs to carry me to the mattress where I sink beneath the covers, attempting to disappear altogether, pleading desperately for the layers to swallow me whole and end the completely unbearable heartbreak.

And as I lay down at night, wallowing in my own misery, I cannot help but rewind to the events that had put me in this dark and lonely place. The events that I had caused. Back to the fight that broke what I thought was solid and unbreakable, I had disrupted the unusual balance Alex and I had forged.

How had it come to this?

After he left, I had chosen not to pursue the next target that Alex had caught me looking in on, something about it just wasn't right without him along for the deadly ride with me.
He had become my anchor more so than ever before, he had found some way to accept the truth of what I'd become and was trying to work with me in my new and improved form, but had it all gone to die when we had that fight?

Had I pushed too much?

Coming into my own, moulding and then controlling myself was the most difficult part. And I had worked so hard to be who I want to be, to unleash the true strength and power within me that I'd thrown it all callously at the person that only wanted to work with me.

What had I done to us?

It seemed like he had left me aeons ago. Time is dragging, the days feel like weeks, and the minutes were more like hours had gone by. No length of time would make a difference though. I just needed him back. Though I knew that I couldn't find him. I wouldn't even know where to start. It'd been four days. Four measly days and I was struggling to survive without him. It was like I'd lost a limb, I am hobbling pathetically through life now, trying to figure out how to manage without him.
Maybe I couldn't.

I blink, the motion robotic but necessary. My eyeballs having begun to dry out from all of the blank staring. I couldn't tell you how long I'd been sitting here staring at my lifeless hand on the mouse at my desk, it could have been hours. No one dared even speak to me in the state I'd sunk into. I didn't even know where I'd fallen. Every surrounding seemed to only show me shadows and thick fog, suffocating me. I couldn't see beyond it. There were moments where the fog would clear enough for me to regain some sense of normal composure, but it wouldn't last. I could only work through it when I had a file before me or a meeting to sit in on. Somehow, that could pull me away from the greyness just long enough to get some proper work done, keeping me above water for another day. But once all was said and done, the thoughts began their downward spiral again, returning to the last thought I'd had.