♥ ɪ ʟᴀᴠᴀ ʏᴏᴜ ~ ʀᴇᴅᴅɪᴇ ♥

Chapter 5: Broken to Bits

Warnings:  child abuse, big arguments 

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Eddie watched through the crack in his door as his mother walked away from his room after forcing him to swallow who knows how many vitamins and fake pills. He'd lost count after 9. After he was sure his mess of a mother was in her room, he ran over to his bed and jumped onto the bed. The boy covered himself in his blankets and clicked his ipod on to text the losers. He made sure to keep an ear out in case his mother decided to check on him and texted the groupchat. 

edwardo:  good evening my tolerated coworkers 

stan the man:  evening 

tra$hm0uth:  evening edwardo ;) how goes it 

edwardo:  good evening everyone except richie 

tra$hm0uth: rude ass bitch 

edwardo: i canuHuhof

Eddie gasped and jumped as he felt the sheet be torn off of him. His eyes barely had time to adjust to the light before his mother had torn the ipod out of his hand. 

"No-! Mom please- It isn't what it looks like just-" 

"Here I was thinking you were getting better! Eddie-" 

Eddie could have laughed at the irony of the sentance as she looked at the screen in her hand. He had been getting better. He was happier when he was talking to his friends. His friends made him better. And now they were about to be torn from him all over again. 

"You've been texting them! I told you you weren't allowed to see them anymore!"

Eddie felt time slow as his mother raised her arm and threw the small ipod to the ground. The small device shattered on the ground. His heart shattered right along side it, and Eddie screamed. 

"No! Mom why would you do that?!" He was on the ground beside it, trying to put it back together desperately. He clicked the device's home button, and for a moment he had hope it would turn on. That was until his mother smacked it onto the ground, then delivered the final blow by driving her heel into it. 

Eddie sat on the ground, his broken gaze on the shattered ipod on the ground 

"Come on, Eddie bear, don't be like that. You're lucky i don't punish you. I told you, no more of those friends. they aren't good for you. they put those thoughts into your head, and we can't take them out if you have them putting them in all over again. it undoes all the progress you've had." 

The woman lifted her son to his feet and took his face in her hands. She took a moment to just look at her son. Her son who refused to meet her eyes and held a blank look on his face. Her broken son. Her son who she'd broke. Piece by piece she'd torn him apart. It seemed the flame behind his eyes was finally out. 

It seemed. 

Eddie stared blankly at the fabric of his mother's ugly nightgown until he realized something. He had every right to be angry. And why shouldn't he be? And just like that, his flame had returned. It burned low and dim, but he'd somehow managed to light it once again. It was his little glimmer of hope.  His gaze snapped up to meet his mother's eyes and he jerked his body away from her touch. Her touch that felt like sandpaper on his skin. 

"Don't touch me." 

"Edd-"

"Don't. Just shut up! I'm healthy. I'm not broken. There is nothing wrong with me!! I've never once been sicker than having the flu! I'm not too small, I'm not gaining wait, I'm not hanging out with the wrong people, I like my hair the way it is, and I am not disgusting for being in love with Richie!" 

Before he could realize anything was happening, he'd caught his mother's hand in his. 

"And you don't get to hit me and think it's okay!!" He shouted at his mother. 

He thought for a moment his mother may pull the crocodile tears. He thought she might blubber and wail until he gave in, but he was wrong. He watched a sickening anger fill his mother's face. He'd never seen that kind of anger on his mother's face, and it scared him. He dropped her arm and scrambled backward.

"there is something wrong with you!" The demon of a woman yelled at the now terrified boy on the other side of the room. 

"I don't know who you think you are, yelling at your mother like this! I do nothing but care for you and this is how you repay me? I've taken care of you day and night ever since you've gotten sick. Don't you dare try to correct me. You're sick in the head! I'm doing this because I love you!"

That was true. Eddie knew it was true his mother loved him, but he knew this kind of love was twisted. A love that had been a healthy and beautiful had turned to a thorned and dead rose. He loved his mother. He knew he always would. But loving someone and liking them were two different things. He did not like his mother. He did not like her at all. 

At that thought Eddie broke into tears, and his mother's face softened. 

"Come here, Eddie-bear. Let's get you into bed so you can rest.It'll be better in the morning." 

Eddie felt like he was suffocating as his mother guided him to bed in a way that seemed like clockwork. Over the broken pieces of his ipod, and his last hope of communication with the outside world. He felt sick. He was never going to break free of her. Of this. This was his new life. Trapped up in his room like some sort of monster. 

At some point in this daze of a conciousness, he felt his back hit the soft material of his bed. He heard his mother leave the room as the lights clicked off.  Eddie wasn't sure how long he laid there crying. Time seemed slow, and nothing seemed right. So he did the only thing he knew would offer the tiniest bit of relief. 

He cracked open his window and began to sing. 

Somewhere below the prison bars of Eddie's window, sat Richie. Richie who felt so guilty having heard the yells and the cries from Eddie. He paused to listen as he heard Eddie's song once again. 

And despite his tears and his quiet tone, it was still the most beautiful thing he'd ever heard.