Gonna Be the Death of Me (adopted by Brendon Urie)

//forty four - loaded gun//

Everything was dark. The windows of her room were covered in black paint and her bed was just a mess of blankets in the corner of the room. Her heading was pounding and the room was nearly pitch black. Eva noticed a light in the far corner with a mirror over where the door should have been, and when she looked into it, her skin was spread so thinly over her skeleton that she the vauge outlines of her organs and the slow, unsteady pumping of her heart. Her face was a shade of white only seen in hotel linen closests with nearly black pits underlying her eyes down to the start of her overly-defined cheekbones. A large thud from the window startled her as she cowered into the corner of the room trying to wrap her mind around what was happening. Before she could think much more, the streaked glass shattered and in came a haze of fog followed by the shadow of her father. "You can't run from me" he said as a grisly smile fell across his otherwise emotionless face. His fingernails dug into her skin, and with one great upswing of his arm, her bones were exposed. "One step closer to what you should have been a long, long time ago."

Eva shot up from her bed as she looked around urgently, only to see that she was in her room at the hospital. She felt her face and looked at her arms and legs, only seeing the burning red fingernail scratches that she must have left from her nightmare. The window showed a slowly lightening skyline of Los Angelos and the alarm clock that was lone on her bedside table flashed 6:00 AM. Eva had been in treatment for a week now, and this had become her normal routine. She'd fall into an uneasy sleep at 1 or 2 in the morning and get woken up from a nightmare only a few hours later, and she could never get back to sleep. 

Today was Saturday, meaning it was the day she finally got to see her family again. Even though she had made the exact opposite of progress here so far, she needed to keep pretending that she was okay, especially in front of Brendon. She knew him and Sarah were probably a mess since she left and them having to see her like this would kill them. Eva grabbed a towel, her tolietries, and a change of clothes before walking out of her room and into the shower room. As she stood under the steady stream of water, the nightmare replayed in her head over and over again. She had mentioned them to Dr. Sella which earned her just another diagnosis of post traumatic stress, but she hadn't mentioned the scratching and the numerous wounds that she constantly woke up with from the severity of her dreams. She didn't want to stay here longer, so she ate as little as was allowed for her, which was way too much, participated as little as possible without repercussions in group activities, and attended all of her meetings. But she didn't feel better, she didn't feel the weight of grief and despair and anxiety getting lifted slowly with every milestone reached. Instead, her weight was slowly rising, her sleep was semi-regular, even when disrupted every night, and she had gotten so much better at pretending. 

Eventually she went back to her nearly empty  room and as quickly as possible got herself ready. It hurt to look in the mirror too long because she wasn't even close to being okay with the changes she was making. As she finished braiding her hair and throwing a beanie on her head, she heard a small sniffle coming from the hallway. Eva stuck her head out and saw a girl sitting on the ground with her head in her hands. "Hey," she whispered as she bent down next to her. "This is probablyt a stupid question, but are you okay?" The girl looked up and gave a small smile before wiping her eyes and nodding. "But I know you aren't, so what's up?"

"Everytime my family comes, they belittle me. They make it impossible to feel better. So I finally told them to just stop coming, well all of them except my older brother. But now, I just feel so alone. It's stupid, I was the one that told them to stop, it's my fault." Eva helped the girl up and pulled her into a hug, rubbing her back gently as she continued to sniffle. "You and your brother can hang out with my family today. They accept everyone instantly." Eva offered, pulling away and looking into the girl's eyes. Her hair was a dirty blonde color that hung messily over her green eyes. 

"Really?" she asked, her mouth hung openly slightly from shock. Eva nodded and smiled as the girl  hugged her again. "Thank you so much, uh..." 

"Eva." she filled in, smiling after. "I'm Grace, nice to meet you. Want to go get breakfast?" That question, so innocent, made Eva's skin crawl and her face to turn into a look of disgust. "Uh, I'm not really reeady to face the mess hall yet today, I'm sorry." Grace nodded and twisted her fingers together. "I understand. Just so you know, this place might suck, but it helps if you let it." With that, Eva's new friend waved and turned away, headed towards the mess hall. The words sunk into Eva as she watched Grace leave. Sure, she was going through the motions of the program, but was she actually letting any of it help? Between the med changes, the new diets, and schdules, Eva had been all of the place mentally. Maybe she just wasn't letting herself get help?

Eva ran back into her room, threw on her shoes and ran after Grace, catching her right outsdie of the cafeteria. "Grace!" she called as she ran up to her. "You're right." Grace smiled and nodded before walking in and Eva following  her.

-----

It was now noon, and Eva was sitting on her bed feeling the contents of her stomach churn with every movement. Eating hurt. It felt wrong, it felt bad, it felt like Eva was giving up on everything she had worked so hard to achieve. All she wanted to do was get rid of it, but she couldn't. She was supposed to be getting better. Eva stood up and paced around the room, digging her nails into the sleeves of her sweatshirt that she wore to cover the scratch marks from her family. "I need food, I need to eat to live, I need to live for them." She kept repeating it, her eyes filling more and more with tears as the time passed until eventually she fell to the ground in a sobbing heap. Someone knocked and in walked Grace who rushed to Eva's side, lifted her up, and hugged her, much like Eva did to Grace this morning. "You're going to be okay, E. I promise." After awhile, Eva had calmed down a little. "Family is here, don't you want to see them?" Eva smiled a small and shy smile at the thought of hugging Brendon before nodding. "Then let's go," Grace said comfortingly with a smile. 

They walked down the halls and into the meeting rooms. At the other end of the room stood a tall, black-haired man and a beautiful woman with a beaming smile. Eva ran to Brendon and jumped into his arms as he spun her around gently before passing her to Sarah who kissed her head and hugged her so tightly that for a split second, it felt like Sarah and had glued all of her borken pieces together. "I missed you so much," Eva whispered to them. "Well, we have a few more family members" Brendon said with smile. Eva looked up and saw Tony, Vic, Tyler, and Pete all walk into the room. She ran just as fast to them, hugging Pete first and ending with Tony, making sure to hug him just that much tighter. She missed her safty blanket that was these amazing people. But that's wehn she realized, to see them all of the time again, she had to actually let herself get better.