Monophobia

For years, loneliness has been a bitter taste on her tongue that she can't get rid of regardless of how often she's tried. It lingers after water, it's vile with alcohol, it burns with coffee. It's always there, a pit in her stomach that bubbles acid up her throat to coat her mouth. She masks it with as much confidence, as much certainty, as she can muster but sometimes it fails.

She's seen her sister date a string of men over the years while she's draped herself in the shadows, unsure of who she is or what she wants. She plays off her solitude as a series of jokes, that she's waiting for the right person, that she's too busy with her job.

And then Oliver had entered her life.

A smile that shone light into the darkest recesses of her soul, it wasn't a surprise that the man saw straight through her deflections. Years of resisting relationships made her weak when Oliver touched her waist, pulled her closer, begged for the truth when everyone else had been pacified by lies.

She'd let herself fall. She'd let herself tip over the edge, to take what she'd never been sure about allowing herself.

In the quietness of the night, their limbs entwined and their hearts exposed, she'd whispered her deepest fear: of being alone, of losing everyone she loved.

Oliver's thumb brushed against her knuckles, his breath a soft exhale fanning over her face in the dark. "You'll never feel alone with me by your side," Oliver promised and she'd let herself believe it. She'd let herself believe the words. She'd let herself trust someone with her heart, with her loneliness.

The shards of glass from the shattered photo frames litter her living room in the seconds after she returns to their, her, apartment. She rips whatever she can get her hands on, her pain turning into physical destruction of belongings stained with Oliver, with her, with them.

Tears stain her cheeks as her knees give out on her, a photo of her on Oliver's lap at Christmas clutched in her hands. Oliver's smile was so blinding with light, his blue eyes so alive, and his hand clutching at Elysian's hip to anchor her across Oliver's thigh.

She notices the smear of blood on her fingers from when she'd tried to stop the red liquid spilling from Oliver's chest. A sob sticks in her throat, snagged in the acid loneliness coating her insides, as she remembers the way the light had faded from Oliver's eyes, the way his smile had faltered before slipping off his lips, the way his chest had grown still despite her pleas to keep breathing.

"I'll never feel alone?" She whispers to the photo, a sneer twisting her lips painfully.

Right now, she's never felt more alone.
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