Forked Roads Back

1 - ARCHIE

"MATT!"

I wake up calling his name, tears staining my cheeks, my body and the sheets drenched in cold sweat.

Every morning I wake up the same way; with the same horrific realisation that my dreams are all real. Every single minute of them. Every night my dreams go from my best friend listing off everything that makes him happy, to him dying in the back of an ambulance with no one there to comfort him.

It's been nearly four months since he died, and almost two since I decided to cut myself off and move here. But it hasn't helped. None of it has helped. My plan backfired massively, and all I have to show for it are over eight weeks of restless nights, and I know they're only just getting started. They aren't letting up, and if anything, I think they're getting worse.

I'm tired.

I'm so tired.

I haven't had a proper night's sleep since August. I can never get more than hour's sleep before the dreams take hold, and after two months I'm really close to my breaking point, wondering if I should just end it all.

I could do it. I could. And then everyone else around me would be better off... But then, whenever my thoughts start to think that low, when I get that desperate for sleep, I think of what Matt would want.

He would want to live. And when I feel like I have nothing else to live for, it's that thought alone that keeps me going every day... That is the thought that keeps me alive.

But that's just it. I'm living for a memory of what was. And I'll be damned if I give it up, because it's the only memory that's keeping my dying spark alive.

***

MY DAYS ALL GO the same.

Every day I wish for the sound of Matt's laughter, or his bright but husky voice. Every day I wish to be able to watch him fly through the air again, saving goal after goal. I would give anything to hear him hurling profanities at the referees and players at Brighton games. I want to hear him getting annoyed at me every time he misses my penalty shots. I want him to throw cushions at me because I'm talking through a good part of a movie. I want to ring him to ask what I should do about...

I swallow.

I want to ask him what I should do about Tessa.

My mouth goes dry thinking of her, and I attempt to swallow again, remembering how it feels to say it.

Tessa.

God, I'm living in Hell in both reality and dreams because I don't have either of them. In my dreams, I lose my best friend. But in my reality, I know I've lost them both. And it's all my fault.

What happened to Matt was beyond my control, I knew that. But it still hurt because of how it happened, and the way in which he died. He had tried to hide how bad his injuries were when we were waiting to be rescued, but I saw it. I saw all the blood running down his shirt, his arm and his face, and I saw the blood he kept coughing up whilst trying to assure me it would all be okay.

But with Tessa, everything was completely within my own control and I completely fucked it up.

All I had to do was let her in and talk to her. I only had to smile and let her be there for me, just like she always had been. But I couldn't. Most days I could barely look at her. I could barely look at anyone. It was all too hard.

I'd taken away someone who was so central to all of our lives, and despite saying otherwise, I knew they set the blame squarely on my shoulders. Seeing them all so sad, knowing it was because of me... well, that's something I'll carry around with me for the rest of my life.