𝑨𝑬𝑻𝑯𝑬𝑹𝑰𝑼𝑺 𝑴𝑬𝑳𝑨𝑵𝑪𝑯𝑶𝑳𝑰𝑨 •𝒃𝒙𝒃•

'distance makes the heart grow fonder' what a joke

AN: WARNING! MATURE THEMES AND SWEARING LATER ON!

"You deserve more than what life has given you."

Did he? Truly? Wholeheartedly?

"I wish I came sooner. I wish I had gotten there in time—before things ended the way they did."

But he didn't.

"I wish you'd have gotten the life you deserve."

The life he deserved? Did he even deserve a life at all, no matter how horrid it was?

People could grow strong enough to whisper at the iron bars that held them and see them bend out of their way, like the craziest of magic. That was what love could do: fix souls, fix brains, cure them all. He wished he could have mastered that way, but it was hard when he has been starving for so long.

He could sit and call for help. He could act like there was no cage, wear a mask of coping and normality. He could rage against the bars. Yet what love made simple, no other thing could solve. There was another escape route, yet it was one into another great pain. It was possible to be so emotionally starved that he would slip through the bars, no longer bound but with his soul crumbling.

That was his way out.

What followed were endless emotional marathons on bleeding knees. He learned how to hide the pain, how to look normal.

He understood why some went cold inside to escape the pain of isolation, why they let their empathy wither and die: numbness over feeling, mental anaesthesia.

His insides were in chaos. A mess. Something was bothering him. Something was hurting him. Something ached inside him. Something felt so wrong, so invalid, but he couldn't tell what. He tried to pinpoint the cause for this unexplained pain, but failed. He tried to reason this unbearable burning, but couldn't. Everything felt so confusing, like a jumbled up puzzle set.

A puzzle he didn't know how to solve.

The bed creaked as he shifted. His elbows dug into the mattress, messing up the covers as he pushed himself up. In the corner, he could see the neon red, flashing numbers brighten up the room every other second: 22:09 p.m.

He was restless, and curfew hadn't begun yet.

Which meant...

Swinging his legs off the side, the floorboards let out a soft creak as he stood up. He caught sight of his jacket and silently grabbed hold of it. Quickly throwing it on, his bedroom door clicked open and he walked through on his tiptoes, careful not to alert Aizawa of his presence. There was no telling if the man was awake or not.

Thankfully, the hallway separating their rooms was carpeted.

Slowly, he walked along it, eyes glued forward where the front door was.

And then, as he slipped past Aizawa's room, he stopped when he heard the TV. Someone was laughing, maybe even two people, and a voice rang out, "You know what they say, distance makes the heart grow fonder, right?" It was a woman's voice.

"Perhaps. Do you think that's the case for us?" This time it was a man's voice.

"Perhaps."

Arashi stood still, the words repeating over and over inside his head.

DISTANCE MAKES THE HEART GROW FONDER

DISTANCE MAKES THE HEART GROW FONDER