My jaw tightened again.
“I don’t think people like me get better,”I said finally, lower now, but more certain than anything else I’d said so far.
“I think we just get better at pretending we’re not already halfway gone.”
That was the truth. At least mine. And once you see it, you can’t go back.
“You can’t do that, Rowan.”His voice was closer now. He still sounded controlled, and somehow that got under my skin far more than if he’d just started yelling at me.“You don’t get to just… end it like that.”
End it. I almost laughed.
It didn’t come out though. Just sat somewhere in my throat and turned into something bitter instead. I kept my eyes on nothing. There was a crack in the wall ahead of me. Thin and crooked, it ran from the corner down toward the floor like something had tried to split the room open and gave up halfway. I started following it with my eyes. Up. Down. Again.
“I’m not deciding anything,”I said eventually. It came out empty.“It’s already like that.”
That’s the part people never understand, little Ghost. They think it’s about wanting to die, but it’s not. It’s about already feeling gone. I sat there and tried to find something inside me that reacted to what he had said. I wasn’t even sure what, fear, guilt maybe, just something. There was nothing. Just this wide, stretched out nothing that didn’t even hurt anymore. That’s the worst part. When it stops hurting. When it just… is.
I dragged a breath in, slow, but it didn’t feel like it reached anywhere. My chest moved, yeah, but it didn’t connect to anything real. Just a motion. In and out. In and out. Useless. And that thought, it stuck. What’s the point of breathing if it doesn’t change anything? I blinked once and the room didn’t shift back with it.“I keep thinking about drowning,”I said.
I don’t even know why I said it out loud. Maybe because it was easier than saying the rest.
“It’s not even violent.”My voice dragged a little, like it didn’t want to carry properly.“It’s just peaceful.”I swallowed.
“It closes in slowly. You don’t fight forever. At some point you just…”
I paused, my brow tightened, trying to find the right word and not really caring if I did.
“Stop… And I think I’m already there,”I muttered. My hand moved without me thinking, pressing flat against my chest for a second.“Just not under water.”Because that’s what it felt like.
Like everything inside me had filled up with something that didn’t belong there. Something that left no room for anything else. No space to think clearly, no space to feel anything properly, just the constant pressure. No, not even that, just too full of nothing.
“I don’t think I’d fight it,”I added. That one hit somewhere low in me the second I said it, somewhere buried deep enough that I felt it in my entire body.“I think I’d just let it happen.”Because fighting requires something. And I… I didn’t have anything left to use. Behind me, I heard him exhale.
“Go take a shower.”His voice dropped, controlled again, back to that version of him that tried to keep things contained.“Get up. Take a long shower, then sleep.”Like that would fix it. Like water and time could clean something like this out of me.
“... Rowan.”He said, and for the first time since the conversation started, the words sounded final. I closed my eyes for a second. Opened them again. The crack in the wall was still there.
“I’m fine,”I said and it almost sounded convincing. He didn’t respond, but I heard him move. Footsteps faded until the room settled again. Just me and the quiet. But it didn’t feel empty, it felt full. Way too fucking full.
I stayed there long enough for the silence to settle back into my bones, to wrap itself around me again like it had never left. Then I moved. Slow at first, like my body needed a second to remember how. The stairs cracked under my weight on the way up, each step dragging a little, like I was pulling something invisible behind me. The house felt different now. Aware, like it was watching me move through it.
The bathroom light flickered once when I turned it on and I reached for the shower and twisted the handle. Steam started gathering almost immediately, creeping across the mirror until the whole room turned hazy. I pulled my shirt over my head slowly, the fabric catching for a second before I dragged it free.Let it drop somewhere near the door without looking. Pants and boxers next. Cold air hit my skin for a moment, harsh enough to make me aware of it again, before the heat from the shower swallowed it.
The water hit hard. Straight down over my shoulders, my chest, my back. Hot enough to sting at first, then settle into something duller and constant. It ran over me like it was trying to press me down, like it wanted to fold me into itself. I tilted my head back and closed my eyes. Let it fall over my face. Down my throat as my lips parted. Water slipped in, filled my mouth, pushed against the back of it, spilled down again before I could take in too much. Some of it caught in my nose, uncomfortable for a second, but I didn’t pull away. I just stayed there, let it happen again. And again.
For a moment, my body loosened enough that I almost forgot how tense I’d been before stepping under the water. The way it blurred everything. The way it replaced the noise in my head with something simpler, something physical. My chest rose under the steam, uneven now, reacting to it. I just stood there and let it take up space.
You’d laugh if you saw me like that, little Ghost.
Because it’s pathetic.
A man standing in a shower, letting himself half-drown just to feel something that isn’t himself.
My hand slid up slowly, dragging through my hair, pushing it back as the water kept falling, heavier now, running down the lines of my body, tracing every edge, every hollow. It made everything feel more defined somehow. Like I existed more under it than I did out of it. Or maybe I just noticed it more. I let my head fall forward again.
Water kept coming, didn’t stop. Just kept going, like it didn’t care if I stayed under it forever. There was something honest about that. I stayed until the heat started to fade. Until my skinfelt too sensitive, almost numb at the same time. Then I turned it off. The silence after hit harder than I expected. Louder, always louder.
I grabbed a towel without really looking, dragged it over my face, my hair, my shoulders just enough to stop the water from dripping everywhere. The mirror was fogged completely now, no reflection.
