Disclaimer : I do not own Kingdom Hearts, any of its characters, or anything associated.
A/N : This was inspired by "Only Ashes" by Something Corporate when I was walking through Barnes & Noble with it on repeat thanks to my Ipod. It's not my usual style, but I actually really like it. Be warned though, it does have a few curses (like three) in it, which I usually avoid, but I believe it fit the piece. Oh, and thanks to rileyluvr13 for proofreading it, sort of, and keeping me from dragging this over to the trash bin. (I couldn't really think of a title, but I thought this fit pretty well, so I stuck with it)
Please review, because you know, it means a lot. Thanks for reading.
Nothing But Cinders
It's just me, alone and silent in a room that used to be bursting with life and excitement, enough to wake up half the surrounding houses and earn me at least ten furious phone calls and glares from both of my neighbors for days. The picture I'm clutching is crinkled now, superficial trenches spurting over the surface from where my nails had dug in and my fingers had clutched it too tightly.
It feels almost painful to keep my hand from shaking, to keep my eyes, which feel so heavy and just drained, on his face.
Before, when we were together in our little dreamland of laughter and trust, where there was a purpose and a point and some reason for not letting myself just rot in bed for hours, I could still see reality. We weren't perfect, but we had something, and I could look past his flaws, accept them but not dwell on them.
Now it's different. I'm staring down at his sheepishly grinning face, the stark yellow hair, his bright blue eyes that look so dead on paper, and all the wrongs are blaring up at me like flashing alarms exploding around my subconscious.
I notice the freckles dashed across his nose, little brown spots that used to be impossible to make out against his tan skin but are suddenly huge scars marring the image. The way his left eye squinted a little smaller than his right when he smiled, a slight that used to be endearing, making him look now like some deformed, grotesque beast, a human frankenstein.
Maybe it's because, unknowingly, I'm trying to make myself feel better. Suppose that it's just so excruciating, so blatantly unbearable, that my mind is trying to show me that he was just another disfigured person with too many flaws to mourn for.
And somehow, it just makes everything hurt so much more.
Because, I had never believed in good, the real kind that is supposed to ran rampant around Christmas and the type I would have heard sung by operatic choirs if I'd ever found any reason to go to church. People were untrustworthy, crawling sneakily on their treacherous bellies like snakes through the flea-bitten corpses of those who they had fed on for their own selfish gain. I was like that too; I didn't try to think otherwise. Existence itself is based on being alone, because no matter what, in the end only one heart stopped beating at a time.
And yet, oh and of course there's that 'and yet,' that something that stops everything from staying in place the way it should. Somehow, I found someone, someone who was so completely different than me, a being who in no way suited who I was, that we really had no choice but be perfect for one another.
I don't think it was fate, and I don't think it was luck. I think it was God's cruel idea of a joke, some otherworldly blurb that seeped out of Hell and poisoned my shoes that morning, making me walk into that store, the one where he sat. There he was, how can I forget, all alone and small and with a face so blank that I thought he might have died with his eyes open. I believe the Devil was puppeteering my lips too, along with my legs, forcing me to step forward and talk to some stranger when I normally wouldn't have given him a second glance.
But I don't want to think about that now. I don't want to remember how we instantly clicked and somehow managed to talk for almost two hours before we were kicked out for not buying anything. My stomach churns at replaying how we spent the whole day walking through town, just two guys with no commitments or plans, chatting about fucked up the world was. By the time I play back exchanging numbers (which didn't matter as much as that his skin felt damn electric when he pushed the paper into my open hand), meeting every Friday some place or really anywhere, just so we could be with one another, the feeling of the first time I grabbed his shoulders to pull him in, (only to find out he was gripping mine too), I think I'm going to be sick.
So why won't my mind stop doing this to me?
Maybe it's this picture, maybe it's your face, so I think I'll let it go.
I watch it slip out of my grip, fluttering like a bird with broken wings until it hits the ground with a thunderous thud I shouldn't have been able to hear. Now. even with it beneath me, I can't stop looking, staring into those horrible crystal eyes that I used to read so well I should've gotten some type of degree.
I wonder why I couldn't tell that he was going to leave me the night before he did it. Why hadn't I noticed? There must've been some clue, some sign that something wasn't right. No, when I think back, I still remember a soft smile following my movements, adoring arms wrapping around me when the sun set and we were both too exhausted to keep our eyes open.
How could it go from that, to me waking up alone, as if a mass of cold sheets could substitute a warm, living body curled next to mine? How could I wake up, still trusting through my confusion, and now even find some sort of note on the kitchen counter? How could I go on with my life as though it was normal for three days until I realized you were gone?
A light weight whispers to me from my pocket, and in one fluid motion the metallic body of the lighter gleams up at me, its hushed voice welcome against my ears. Funny how I could stand that, but not the static that would emit from the machine only a few feet away, constantly forcing that red blinking light into my eyes. This is easier, a more sonorous tone to accept, than what lay on that black box. I could hear it already, a chorus of siren calls that still haunted my memory from when I had tried. All these people, people who I didn't care about and who I knew didn't really care about me, trying to reach me when I was so far away.
It's okay, Axel; he'll come back.
You need to get out of the house, Axel.
What are you going to do Axel, mope in there for the rest of your life? Don't destroy yourself because deep down you have to know he's not worth it.
Axel. Axel. Axel.
AxelAxelAxelAxelAxelAxelAxelAxelAxelAxelAxel
All of them, patronizing me as if they have any right to pretend they know how I feel, that they know what's best. Each of them, trying to fix something that can't ever be repaired, as if they're so much stronger than me. I can't stand it, the sound of their revolting noise, guttural gurgles that grate against my ears.
They have no idea that every time they say my name all I can think of how he said it, the way it rolled off his tongue in a way that actually meant something.
Kneeling down, I click the tool open, watching the silver head flick back and a hungry flame take its place, writhing like a newborn in the darkness it wants to devour. All it takes is a swift kiss to the paper corner and he's up in smoke, his golden blonde hair fading to gray ashes while those disgusting eyes finally crumble upon themselves. The lighter slips back in my pocket, and I know I'm finished with this room, noticing that the carpet is starting to blaze but deciding not to care.
In these grayscale, sepia-tone flashes I'm moving through the house. I see the patched up couch that was sagging with too many years, hating how two ghostly forms were watching the blank screen of the television set with this unknowing rapture in there faces. The kitchen comes next, along with out-dated notes sticking to the side of the cabinets, little fake 'I Love You's' and 'I'll Be Home at Seven's.'
And then I'm out the door with it banging behind me, and I can see the glow of orange and yellow competing for who could devour my past first. I'm glad when the smell of burning wood and fabric catches me against the wind; I'm happy that everything I ever cherished is disintegrating into nothing more than useless dust.
Because every single thing reminds me of him, and I want it all to burn and die, because it makes me hurt.
No, I don't know where I'm going to go, and I don't care. Maybe I'll go stop at a friend's house, one of the bastards who left fifty messages on my machine, and steal his bed and food and take advantage of his unwanted pity until he tosses me in the street, and then I'll just stay there until some truck runs me over.
Or you know what? Perhaps I'll just walk down the highway, waiting until someone has the balls to stop and pick up some punk with bright red hair and tattoos bleeding down his face. Though there's a fifty something chance that absolutely no one will, and some murderer will slice my throat and rip out my guts just because he wants my wallet.
And then, oh and then, he'll be sitting on his expensive couch, fingering that checkered bracelet he never takes off no matter what, holding that blonde whore he ran off with to his side, and then the news will come on. He'll watch, because he's a good man who stays updated with current events, and there will be a nice small story about a poor guy whose house burnt down before the fire department could get there.
The same idiot was found on the side of the road with his stomach sixty feet away, but of course the newscaster will say it all sorrowful, as if she knew me. Then he'll see the police photos of my body, all ruined and destroyed so it matches the way my soul feels, and I hope he feels so guilty he slits his wrists so I could slam his head into the rocky walls of Hell. I'll punch him until my zombie hands bleed, till somehow I run out of breath, and then I'll kiss him senseless, and tell him that I love him and that I hate him so much for doing this to me.
And he'll tell me that he's sorry, and he'll find some god-forsaken reason for his shit, and then we'll go up in flames together, because that's how it was always supposed to be.