The encroaching isolation was unbearable, forcing me into a corner. My heart started to sear with fresh pain as it spread through my system. I wanted to relieve myself of it, but how.. how..?
Muffled sobs echoed throughout my unkempt bedroom. Objects of sentiment littered the dank floor and what once used to be a bright yellow wall was splotched with grey and black. The door was embellished with scratches against its grain, its doorknob once a polished gold now a faded yellow. I crawled to it and wiped it with the sleeve of my jacket, trying to look at my reflection. I was a mess. My ruffled hair fell around my once-handsome face in curves, much different to the neat and combed hairstyle I used to sport. Lines of worry were etched onto my forehead and my vibrant red eyes were now a dull crimson, fresh tears brimming in them.
I backed away from the doorknob and went into the corner again. My knees slid up my chest and felt my arms wrapping around them as I buried my head into them, warm tears cascading down my cheeks. The salty bitterness of them reminded me of what I did, what I wanted to do and what I should have done. Regret is the inevitable in our lives, whether we all like it or not but there’s a limit on how much regret someone can take before they break down and by the looks of it, ‘broken down’ was an understatement for me.
Shouted accusations tormented my mind, my twin brother as the source. Zavier leaped into my thoughts again, the pain his presence brought surging through me like a virus. Crimson droplets slid down his visage, contorted with sick amusement. He laughed. Laughed maniacally as he pointed at me. Me. Accusing me.
“A..are you leaving.. me ag-gain?”
Too much. His voice was too much.
“I kept.. waiting.. in this dark place.. I hoped that you would.. come back to me.. as always.. together forever.”
His image violently twisted. Twisted into a malevolent figure. Sae, her name was. Zavier’s snowy hair growing longer, turning black. His red orbs rolled back into his face and turned white, no, black. The black that reflected oblivion itself. His face changing, the sick amusement being erased, replaced by a pallid female face, somberness spread across it.
A bright red rope mark adorned her neck, glowing bright with the pain she suffered for a very long time. Sae donned a plain white kimono, the obi downwards stained with crimson. She looked up and smiled. She was a macabre puppet, malice encapsulated into a human body.
Walking towards me noiselessly, she tilted her head, a sickly crack resounding from it, the sound burning my eardrums. Her benevolent expression turned malicious, blood foaming from her mouth as she treaded towards me faster, outstretching her pale hands towards me with the intent of grasping my neck and squeezing the life out of me. Her face was getting closer to me. Closer. Closer.
Stopping just a hair’s breadth from mine, she threw back her head and let out a laugh. The laugh that was etched into my mind forever, the laugh that reminded me constantly of the hurt I went through. The laugh that caused guilt to flood my being.
Sae locked her eyes onto mine, her piercing black eyes that overfilled with malicious intent. I felt her cold fingers like tentacles wrap around my neck, each digit digging into my skin.. I felt the air escape my lungs.. my life leaving me..
Suddenly, I was running.
Running through the forest, my legs crying out in exhaustion. The red butterfly that was my brother’s soul fluttered relentlessly before me, trying to get away from me, trying to run away. I scream words of disagreement, words of the want for my brother back. I ran through the thick vegetation, my legs being decorated with scratches from the plants that were trying to slow me down. I did not stop.
The crimson insect slowed down and flew up, its wings breaking into a million fragments. I was alone, alone in this forest. Alone forever. Zavier.. why did you leave me?
A crunch resounded throughout the woods, breaking the tortuous silence. I turned around for the figure which did that, only to find my best friend Ayden leaning against a tree. His lips cracked into a boyish, handsome smile as he reached out his hand for me. I reached out to him, outstretching my arm and fingers as far as I could to grab onto his-
Then I was falling.
Falling down a darkened hole. The musty smell assaulted my nostrils as I reached out. For what, I will never know. I groped around in the darkness, trying to find something to grab on to, something that would safe my life…
No. I don’t want to be saved. I never should have survived, I should have died along with Zavier. I shouldn’t have left him there. I hate myself. The guilt ate away at me like many locusts. I want to see him again, I want our lives to carry out per normal, I want to be able to hold him in my arms and protect him from everything.
I let my arm relax and fall to my side as I continued falling through this bottomless pit, into oblivion. I was a fragment of my former self, I knew that, that was why I wanted to die, I didn’t want to suffer anymore..
My train of thought derailed violently and I got thrusted into the disappointment of reality again.
I stood up and ruffled my hair in frustration. I berated myself for killing Zavier, for leaving him there. I scratched at my limbs, digging into my skin and relished the pain that the action brought forth. It was not as bad as the pain my mind and heart was going through, anyway. Punching myself in the gut, I laughed as I coughed out blood, staining my hands with red. I stared at them and started biting them, the hands that ended my twin’s life willingly.
I hated every part of me.
Ayden’s face materialised in my mind and that made guilt drag me down even further. Guilt was like a monster to me, it tried to kill me relentlessly but always left me alive to suffer in its thrall. I had loved Ayden more than just a ‘best friend’, but that made me selfish. I did not think of Zavier’s feelings. I was his everything and he was mine too but we were just brothers. We couldn’t get closer than that, but somehow he hated me for it.
My sanity flickered as I opened my mouth and let out a scream, anger and sadness dribbling out my mouth like blood. I wanted everything to get out of my system. I didn’t want to feel anything negative anymore.
I scanned my room for something, anything, that would help me. A glint caught my attention, and its source was the penknife I always carried along in case of emergency.
My mouth curved into a smile of satisfaction as I sauntered towards the potentially fatal instrument and pushed its lock up, enjoying the clickety-clack sounds it made as the blade forced itself out of its faded plastic shell.. and I slid it across my opposite arm.
Nothing happened.
My brow furrowed in frustration as I tried again. I pushed the blade harder into my arm, my brain finally registering pain. I ripped my skin open, the cold, bitter twinge of feeling my skin opening being replaced by the warm sensation of my blood soon after. It felt good.
My blood ran down my arm, leaving trails of scarlet in its wake, the scarlet that brought me back to reality, the reality that I cannot be with Zavier anymore. The next best thing was to hurt myself so badly that I’d finally feel that I have done enough justice to avenge my sibling.
But Lady Justice herself is a lying cheat, isn’t she?
So I caused pain to myself more than that, more than enough to ‘avenge my sibling’. Countless scars etched themselves into my skin on my arms and legs. I would occasionally reopen them with that same penknife, just to feel my life fluids sliding down my limb, comforting me, telling me that I’m doing the right thing.
Telling me that someone would notice and help me.
Help me get over everything.
Help me live my life once more.
Help me feel happy again.
Help me
