Broken- And Fixed Again- (A Jamilton Fanfic)

Chapter 7: Wildfire

//TW: physical, verbal, and sexual abuse, self-harm, suicidal thoughts, self-hatred, graphic violent imagery, swearing\\

Thomas

James Madison is like a wildfire.

Unpredictable.

Destroys everything in its path and leaves nothing behind.

Dangerous.

Deadly.

And no matter how hard you try, you can't get rid of it. No matter how hard you try, how fast you run, how cunning you think, you can't get away. You can't escape.

It will follow you until the ends of the earth. Until you are the very last thing it hasn't eaten, hasn't destroyed. And once you are gone, and once the world is purged of both sin and purity, both hatred and love, only then can the fire finally burn itself out.

It leaves nothing but ashes in its wake.

And yet, you keep feeding it. You don't want to, but you do. You have no choice.

For deep down, there is an inkling of fear lurking in your stomach, of what could happen should the fire disappear, bringing its intolerable heat and devastating light with it. Then you must ask yourself, is the ice and the darkness so much better than the fire? Are the trivial amounts of the blazing fire's comfort something I can survive without, especially compared to the nothingness that stands as my alternative? Can one exist while the other dominates? Is the sacrifice truly worth the consequence?

Or am I doomed to live in fear, to live in endless suffering and pain and heartache? Perhaps it was always my destiny, perhaps I was a creature bred and fated to be burned by the unrelenting wildfire.

Oh, how the fire burns. There is a beauty to it, in a weird, twisted way. There is something so orderly about the chaos, so sweet about the vile nature of it. And as much as I cower from its heat and its light and its destruction, I cannot tear my eyes away from the graceful dance of the red and orange flames.

It eats up your insecurities and turns it against you. It uses your fears as kindling. It feeds itself off of your pure desire to just give up and end everything. How bad could it be, though? How bad could it possibly be to escape this nightmare once and for all?

Maybe I should let it consume me. Maybe I should just give in. Maybe the singular hope of freedom I can have can only be obtained by letting go of the world I had grown so fond of, the world and all its simplistic, hidden beauties. The darkness will be uncomfortable, sure, but not unfamiliar.

And it burns down your hopes. Your dreams. The idea that you can be loved. The possibility that one day, you'll wake up with someone you truly care about, who truly cares about you, the memory of this abuse nothing more than a nightmare fading into the mist.

It burns everything.

And not all of us can leave the fire behind.

Not all of us can flee and find shelter and safety.

Not all of us can escape, not all of us can run, not all of us can get away from it.

Sometimes, we can do nothing but sit and watch the world around us slowly get eaten up by the fire, disappearing and becoming nothing but ash and burnt remains.

The thing about fire is that once the damage is done, it can never be undone. Once the forests have been burned, it'll take years for them to grow back. And even then, it'll never be like it was before the fire consumed the forest, it will never be what it once was. It'll never be perfect again.