05-26-2016, 02:02 AM
Oh, she sees. Of course she does; she was a lost girl too once, and she knows what it feels like to be broken. The way she holds onto me, cradling the silence between us, I know she understands just how jagged my insides are. How sharp the edges, how deeply they can cut. I try not to need that touch, try not to need her holding me, but I am weak. And she is safe. She is strong. She is putting herself back together piece by piece. And I am so very, very fragile.
So I hold on, just breathing in the scent of her skin, of family. We linger in the smell of her hair, the gentle touch of her lips to my spine, the softness of her voice when she tells me “It's not your fault, Nevi.” I let her words wash over me, trying to battle the ocean of blame that has slowly been drowning me, the tide rising inch by inch until I am almost completely submerged. She tries so hard to turn back the sea for me, and all I can do is cling to her words like a life preserver. Barely managing to keep my head above water this time.
I want to pour apologies at her feet, beg her to forgive me for almost ruining everything, for almost breaking us, for coming so close to destroying what I tried to give her, what Mom and Dad gave her like they gave me. Home. Safety. Family. I almost killed it, and I hate knowing what I could have cost her. But she deserves so much more than useless apology, and the words fall from my lips unspoken, I'm sorry drowning alongside me a thousand times over.
“I love you too, Leelee,” is the only answer I can give her, the only truth that won't cut her open too. “So much. I'm so glad you found me. And I found you back.” Always find me, I want to beg, because I feel so far gone, so lost in the dark even with her wrapped around me. Even as I sink into her embrace, I am gasping for breath, fighting to hold back tears. “I'm scared, Leelee,” I mouth against her skin, but I can't find the air to even whisper the words aloud. I came so close to oblivion, danced along the razor's edge between life and death, and it was only the touch of sunlight on my skin that kept me from throwing myself over that edge.
I don't know how to say the words. How do you tell someone you love so much that you came within a heartbeat of killing yourself? That it wasn't love for them that stopped you, or an angel looking at you with love in her eyes and calling you hers, or anything as unbearably ephemeral as hope. It was the crushing knowledge that you weren't strong enough to finish what you'd started. I still breathe because I am weak. Not because I'm brave or strong or good, but because I am a coward. Too scared of the dark to let it devour me completely.
“Lieschel, I...” My voice trails off and I breathe out a sigh weighed down by weariness. “I don't know how to make it stop, Lee. I tried, but all I did was make it worse.” So much worse. “All it does it hurt until I can't breathe anymore, and I don't know how to stop it and I don't know how to keep breathing when every time I do I feel like shattered glass is cutting my chest open and it hurts, Lee, and I wish I could just--”
I wish I could reach inside and pull out my heart, and trade it for Argo's. I'd give him mine's perfect function and rhythm and keep the way it slices through my ribcage and leaves me bleeding out into my chest and drowning from the inside. I would take away his pain and the way his selfless, off-kilter heart steals the breath from his lungs and leaves him weakened and dizzy, and leave every piece of him that just makes me love him more. He deserves a whole heart, and I would happily give everything I am to give it to him.
I try to cover my lapse with a lie, something innocent and not weighted down with boulders and bombs waiting to drop on someone I love. But there are no clever lies to disguise this, and no words come to me. “I don't know what to do anymore, Lee. And I'm so tired.”
So I hold on, just breathing in the scent of her skin, of family. We linger in the smell of her hair, the gentle touch of her lips to my spine, the softness of her voice when she tells me “It's not your fault, Nevi.” I let her words wash over me, trying to battle the ocean of blame that has slowly been drowning me, the tide rising inch by inch until I am almost completely submerged. She tries so hard to turn back the sea for me, and all I can do is cling to her words like a life preserver. Barely managing to keep my head above water this time.
I want to pour apologies at her feet, beg her to forgive me for almost ruining everything, for almost breaking us, for coming so close to destroying what I tried to give her, what Mom and Dad gave her like they gave me. Home. Safety. Family. I almost killed it, and I hate knowing what I could have cost her. But she deserves so much more than useless apology, and the words fall from my lips unspoken, I'm sorry drowning alongside me a thousand times over.
“I love you too, Leelee,” is the only answer I can give her, the only truth that won't cut her open too. “So much. I'm so glad you found me. And I found you back.” Always find me, I want to beg, because I feel so far gone, so lost in the dark even with her wrapped around me. Even as I sink into her embrace, I am gasping for breath, fighting to hold back tears. “I'm scared, Leelee,” I mouth against her skin, but I can't find the air to even whisper the words aloud. I came so close to oblivion, danced along the razor's edge between life and death, and it was only the touch of sunlight on my skin that kept me from throwing myself over that edge.
I don't know how to say the words. How do you tell someone you love so much that you came within a heartbeat of killing yourself? That it wasn't love for them that stopped you, or an angel looking at you with love in her eyes and calling you hers, or anything as unbearably ephemeral as hope. It was the crushing knowledge that you weren't strong enough to finish what you'd started. I still breathe because I am weak. Not because I'm brave or strong or good, but because I am a coward. Too scared of the dark to let it devour me completely.
“Lieschel, I...” My voice trails off and I breathe out a sigh weighed down by weariness. “I don't know how to make it stop, Lee. I tried, but all I did was make it worse.” So much worse. “All it does it hurt until I can't breathe anymore, and I don't know how to stop it and I don't know how to keep breathing when every time I do I feel like shattered glass is cutting my chest open and it hurts, Lee, and I wish I could just--”
I wish I could reach inside and pull out my heart, and trade it for Argo's. I'd give him mine's perfect function and rhythm and keep the way it slices through my ribcage and leaves me bleeding out into my chest and drowning from the inside. I would take away his pain and the way his selfless, off-kilter heart steals the breath from his lungs and leaves him weakened and dizzy, and leave every piece of him that just makes me love him more. He deserves a whole heart, and I would happily give everything I am to give it to him.
I try to cover my lapse with a lie, something innocent and not weighted down with boulders and bombs waiting to drop on someone I love. But there are no clever lies to disguise this, and no words come to me. “I don't know what to do anymore, Lee. And I'm so tired.”