Other Sanders Sides One Shots

Important: Not Good Enough

[Written February 5, 2018]

Genre: Virgil angst

Word count: 1664

Tws: Mention of suicidal thoughts, depression, vivid description of a panic attack, the only fic so far without a hopeful ending but like this isn't the last in the series or anything so it's chill, one food mention, little bit of cursing

Eventually, it became too much.

Virgil sat in his room one night, with his head in his hands, his heart pounding, his brain screaming. Everything went wrong so fast.

He'd originally been in the kitchen. He'd felt fine, even a little better than usual- More confident. He'd been sidestepping all the self deprecating jokes and suicidal thoughts. Patton had spoken to him earlier, and he felt fine enough to stay out of his room a little longer than normal.

He was sitting at the table with his hood up, Patton humming while making dinner and Logan typing away in the next room. Roman came bounding down the stairs, flitting past Virgil and sitting up on the counter.

Patton glanced back and asked, "Anxiety, do you want to watch a movie with us after dinner?"

Virgil perked up and flipped his hood down. He hadn't noticed before, but Patton had four plates lined out. That seemed like as good of an invitation as any.

"We're eating with him again?"

It was one of the least scathing of Roman's comments. Really, it was mild. But something about it, something about the way he said it, just hit Virgil the wrong way. All of his confidence shattered at his feet and he sunk in on himself.

Roman's eyes widened as Virgil put his hood back up and ducked his head. "Not that I- I was just surprised and-"

"Shut up, Princey," Virgil muttered, rising from the table and leaving.

He shakily sat on his bed, where he was now, his throat closing up with tears. He wrapped his arms around himself and dug his nails into his arms, swallowing and squeezing his eyes shut. For a moment, he shut down every thought he had- "You're not-" "They'll never-" "Nobody-" -before a sob ripped from his throat and a very prominent thought began the attack.

I'm not good enough. I'm trying so hard, I'm trying so goddamn hard it hurts, and it's not enough. I can't make them care about me, they'll never care about me.

All of his progress in the last few months, destroyed by a comment Roman didn't even mean any harm by. Anxiety fell back and wrapped his blankets around himself. His crying intensified and his violent thoughts attacked him so fast he didn't even quite understand what they were saying. His breathing picked up, faster and faster until it ripped against his throat and his chest contracted.

He had no way to calm himself down, nobody to help him.

It all crescendoed inside him and screamed its way out his throat, his pillow barely obscuring the noise. He laid like that, screaming in his bed, sobbing, not breathing, for a good twenty minutes before blacking out and nobody came to help him.

((Not that they didn't hear. They were sitting in the living room when it happened- Logan immediately jumped up to check on him, but Roman stopped him. Patton thought Virgil might get angry, or embarrassed if they saw him so vulnerable. So they ignored it.))

In the aftermath, when Virgil was hazy and barely coherent, he decided it was all too much. He clearly wasn't capable of doing all he wanted- Protecting the others, taking care of himself, and making the others like him. He couldn't do it. So he'd just focus on one.