atonement | andúril oneshot (camo)

a n d ú r i l .

"if i didn't have
to tell you the
truth i'd say i've
nowhere else to be"

I start running.

I don't know when; sometime after the vomit and before the gasping started. Branches whip me in the face as I go and I feel one slice my cheek but I keep going. Tears slip down my face and I stumble, reaching forward to catch myself and I hit the trunk of a tree.

It's hard.

My breath is coming too fast. I know that, in my head I know what is happening to me but I can't make it stop. Quick little bursts of air go in and out, in and out and I know I'm breathing but at the same time I'm not, not really. I can feel my face is hot, that I'm crying,

I know it's happening, but I can't make it stop.

It's always like this, been like this since I was little but mom and dad ignored it.

I lied and said I liked it when they ignored me but I never did like it, I hated being a ghost at home. I hated being invisible and I hated how Violet would turn everything on and then flick it off again. I hated how I'd be alive for a few hours in his arms and how he'd watch me do anything at all like I was something special but then the next day he'd stare.

Right through me.

I was a ghost again.

"You're always high."

But how else am I supposed to make it stop?

Being invisible was always better than my dad beating me. So I did it, I did what I had to do.

I made myself feel invisible too, like I really was just floating. It worked for awhile too until I had to go and fuck it up and get mad. Tell him to leave me alone. I didn't even want him to leave me alone at all and now, now I'm here and I've just murdered someone.

I've just murdered someone.

I wipe my hands on my chest, breath not even, I don't know how to make it even, I don't know what I'm doing here, it's like waking up after a bad night out.

I push my hands into the pockets of my onesie and-

my fist curls around paper.

I pull it out, staring at my hand like it holds something precious. It does. I don't know how it got in there, Jivaz? A message from my stylist? I unfold the paper with shaking hands and I read.

Lovely,

There was once a time I felt shame, admitting that you were mine. It's cliche, isn't it? A letter slipped within your pockets when my hands yearn to keep you here. I wish we'd run away when you'd suggested. That I wasn't such a fool to believe that we would end happily ever after. I'm waiting for you. I promise. It feels as though a part of me has been torn apart, but it feels good to know that you are carrying it beneath your tongue.

When are you coming home? I'll feel better if you give me a date. Because I'm waiting- fuck I'm waiting. I already miss you but I know you'll be here in front of me. How will you kiss me when you get home? Tell me now. I can't keep this up, the smiles that feel like plastic. I want to touch you- not watch you through a screen. I think it might kill me.

Baby, I'll see you. I'll see you soon. I love you. God, I do. I'm sorry I didn't tell you sooner, you deserved so much more.

-Violet.

Why does he still hurt me when he's so far away.

I wipe my nose with the back of my hand and look up through leaves that are too green at a sky that is too bright.

"Don't wait for me," I say.

We both know I'm dying here. Shit though, it feels good to read his words but I wish I could hear his voice, that I had that. I don't though. I'll never have that again.

Somehow my breathing is slow again though, somehow I heard him. I know his voice well, the way it sounds all gravelly in the morning because he's just woken up, the way it sounds when he calls my name while we're having sex, the way it sounds when he whispers in my ear in the hall at school and the way it sounds when he's screaming my name across a games square.

I know how it sounds when he says he loves me now too.

"I love you, but don't wait for me."

I'm not going home.