careless // joshler

11½; josh

trigger warning; slight mentions of self-inflicted pain and such, as well as suicidal thoughts and voices in your head.

and hey, a reminder that if you ever feel like you can't read through a chapter cause you get triggered, message me or comment on the story and i'll tell you what happens in said chapter so that you won't have any plot holes!

josh was quite exhausted. his week had been full of stuff to do, and now that it was finally saturday, he didn't even have the energy to get out of his bed. it was just too comfortable to lay in. and besides, josh's parents were both gone for the day, something to do with their company.

and so, josh was laying in his bed, blanket around himself. he decided he'd try to sleep again, but as he closed his eyes his thoughts started racing, going through every single thing he had possibly said or done wrong in the past week. he thought of how he didn't help ryan. which was dumb, obviously, but he thought that if he just would've told his friends what had happened with the bench boy then ryan would have known to avoid any kind of contact with said boy. and although josh was sure he hadn't done anything else wrong or acted embarrassingly, the voice nagging at the back of his head had differing opinions.

it told josh a lot of things. it told him how stupid he was, how unworthy he was, how he should be dead by now. and josh agreed with it. he had learned to agree with it and believe what it said. he knew he had to punish himself from time to time, he knew he couldn't tell anyone about the friend inside his head or it'd get angry and something bad would happen.

nevertheless, josh wasn't afraid of it. it had been there for years now, and it was a part of josh nowadays. he felt as though it was the only thing keeping him grounded and telling him the truth. it was more sincere than his friends, so josh thought of it as his very best friend.

this time the voice was different, though. it wasn't telling josh he was worthless, it wasn't telling him he should've been gone by now. it was telling him something completely else, and this was something josh was terrified of. it had found out the truth, which josh had tried to hide form it. it had found it, and now it was inspecting the whole thing through a microscope, evaluating it out loud and throwing its own opinions into the cold air of josh's room.

it was saying things josh for once didn't want to hear or believe, and he didn't agree a single bit. but he did not want to say it. he did not want to think it, he didn't. no, he did not.

"i know you're trying to resist me, but you know it's the truth," the voice said.

josh could never quite put a thumb on what the voice sounded like. he didn't know if the voice was that of a man's or a woman's, or if it was one's at all.

"it's not true!" josh cried, lifting his palms up to his ears to cover them, although he knew it was no use. the voice was inside of him.

then it hit josh.

it was him.

it was his own voice.

but how?