Grace

Two

He decides this on the way home. He is whispering, "I am a coward. A coward. A fucking coward." He does not slow down when he reaches his street, he does not bother to shut the front door quietly, he does not look at his father as he passes through the living room, he does not take all his dirty clothes out of his duffel bag when he gets to his room. Instead he sits down on the floor, not bothering to shut the door, and cries. Not because he is sad, not because he is mad, but because he is exhausted. And he doesn't feel anything when his father steps into his room, his hands clenched tightly at his sides, his breath hot and angry.

And he doesn't feel a single goddamn thing.

He decides to go out into the garden. He lies down on the icy grass and looks up at the sky.

They get shorter and shorter as it moves on. He stares up, blinking at the clouds covering his landscape; his escape, his only hideaway. And he sighs, wondering when again he'll get to see the night.
After letting everything out, he feels more lost than ever. So unhappy, so happy with his unhappiness. He is not tired, he is never tired. Except at school or around people who bother him, only when it's convenient. He wishes she were here with him. But she is far away, not in a literal sense, but she is mentally distant, hiding away in her room with her sorrows and tears whilst she's trying to make herself believe she is not crying. She will not pick up her phone. She will not call to let him know she is alright.

But what meaning would there be in calling him? She does not know of his feelings, it hasn't been long enough, there hasn't been time. There is not enough time. And the nights keep shrinking and getting shorter. He fears one day maybe he will have to stop doing this. He does not like the idea of this all. He thinks for a moment about how a conversation like this may be :

Example A:

Her : I want to die, but I don't want to stop living. (He thinks this because she has said this, not because he is smart enough to think of something she might say in any case)

Him : I love you.

But this would be totally irrational, that's not a good way to approach it.

Example B:

Him : Can we talk today?

Her: Maybe.

Him: So I know this is weird, and I don't think it's because we had sex, and I don't want to sound strange. But I...

That's all wrong; he'd never say anything like this. He doesn't even want to finish the sentence.
He looks up again, in one last glimmer of hope that maybe the stars decided to shine bright enough, right through the clouds, to make him feel alright. But he decides to keep feeling like shit because he can only see grey.