"Ugh!" I growled as I roll over again for what felt like the hundredth time. The glaring red numbers on the alarm clock beside me tauntingly reminded me that it is four in the morning. Rubbing it in my face that despite going to bed much earlier than usual, I had gotten zero sleep.

I close my eyes and try to let sleep take over me but it's impossible, I can't get comfortable at all. My pillows are too hard despite them being perfect yesterday, my blankets are too warm but it's too cold without them.

I turn my pillows over, punching them slightly before settling back down once again but this isn't right either. Why can't I sleep? I'm so tired, all I want is to get some rest before the sun comes up and I have to deal with another day of work.

I could take some sleeping pills but if I were to take them at this time, I know that I wouldn't wake up to my alarm. The tension in my body seems to double as I give up for the moment and roll onto my back. My bedroom is almost completely pitch black, there's only a sliver of light peeking through the blinds.

"This is bullshit." I mutter to my empty room. The familiar noises from the city reached his ears and I smiled, it was a sad smile. "I see…it's going to be one of those days is it?" I realised as my eyes started to burn with tears.

There was no trigger for the tears, nothing bad had happened that make me upset but every now and then, I feel an unbearable sadness. It's kind of off-putting, I, Orihara Izaya having a mental illness like depression. I knew it was common, more people have it than not these days.

But… I am ashamed.

I'm strong, smart, rich and beautiful but I cannot win against this no matter how hard I try. I can control it, hide it behind a façade but I can't get rid of it. This horrible feeling when everything I have been repressing comes crashing down on me like a tidal wave of despair and self-hatred.

I sit up with a sigh. This feeling…this festering wound inside my heart that feels like an itch I can't scratch. If I rip open my chest would I be able to find it and pull it out? Pull out this feeling inside of myself?

I know that's impossible so why do I want to try it? Stab a knife into my chest, open myself up and dissect all the rotting flesh inside. Feel the intense pain of being tortured, bask in the suffering I so deserve.

I want to destroy myself.

I sigh again and rub my face with my hands. My eyes still burn with tears I refuse to let fall. My throat closes up and my nose itches as I realise once again that I am all alone. No one, no one is here. Not one person in this world wants to be my friend, no one loves me, no one not even the woman that gave to birth to me.

I want to be loved.

I want to have friends that care about me and that I can trust but I can't trust anyone. Everyone just uses me, they use me so I use them. If I keep everyone at arm's length then I won't be hurt when they abandon me but I'm so lonely…it hurts.

Tears finally fall, trailing down my cheeks and splashing onto the bedsheets.

I'm going to be alone until the day I die. Why did it have to be this way? I didn't want it to this way at all. Why did I have to born like this? Ever since I was a child, I was considered strange, my parents hated me, and other kids didn't want to come near me. Even now, I can hear their voices calling me a freak, I can feel the rocks they used to throw at me hit my body.

I bring my knees to my chest and curl into a ball. I never know what to do when I feel like this. I barely function as a normal human being. I'll have to contact Namie to tell her to cancel all my appointments, I don't want anyone to see me like this, I can't face them.

I reach for my phone on the bedside table and send a message to Namie making it out that I'm sick. Well, truth be told I am. I've been sick for a long time and no amount of medication I take makes me feel any better.

I get up from my bed and enter the bathroom refusing to turn on the light as I don't want to see my own pitiful reflection, my own eyes staring back at me in contempt. Opening the medicine cabinet I easily find my sleeping pills, I know where they are by heart now.

If I could sleep, maybe this feeling will be gone when I wake up. I fill up the glass on the sink and swallow two of the pills. It's enough to make me sleep for the entire day and I pray that I will. Maybe asleep, I can escape this feeling.

This horrible, horrible feeling.

I stumble back to my now cold bed and I pull the covers up to my chin. Even as I close my eyes, tears roll down my cheeks. It's so cold here, in this empty bed, in this empty room in this empty apartment.

Everything is so cold and empty.

Just like me.

Sadly, my dreams don't offer me any sort of solace, I dream that I'm somewhere cold, dark and I'm running, I don't know what I'm running from but all I know is that I have to run or something terrible will happen. I can see a small light in the distance so I run toward it but no matter how hard I run, the light never gets any closer.

My legs hurt, I'm out of breath. What do I do? Should I just give in? No matter what I do I'm not getting anywhere but whatever is chasing me, it wants to swallow me whole. Devour me until there is nothing left.

I'm scared.

I'm scared.

I'm scared!

I don't want to disappear!

Please! Please! Someone, help me!

I'm screaming, I'm yelling but no one is coming to save me.

As my heart pounds in my chest and my breath comes out ragged, my legs tire and give out from beneath me. The light disappears and the darkness starts to swallow me-

I wake with a start, completely drenched with sweat. My breathing slows as I come to my senses. "Shit, it was a dream." I murmured. I should be used to it by now, it is, after all, a reoccurring nightmare of mine. It's still dark outside, barely any light reaches my bedroom, it seems as no time has passed at all but a glance at the clock beside me tells me that it is now seven at night.

I slept for over twelve hours. I sigh and turn on the lamp on the table beside me. I don't feel any better which is disappointing.

"Maybe a shower will help…if not…there's always that." I remind myself as get out of bed and shuffle over to the bathroom to take a shower and perhaps a nice, long bath. The shower eases the tension along my shoulders and washes away the drying sweat on my body.

As I lay in the bath, I stare at the white ceiling with a blank expression. I feel nothing, like an empty husk. It's probably better than the overwhelming sadness I would feel if I let my emotions out. But I don't want too. Emotions, they make me feel so weak and useless.

Sometimes I wish I didn't have them. Then I could live without regrets. I wouldn't have to worry about feeling sad or lonely. I wouldn't have to deal with anything like that. I wouldn't feel happy either but I can't remember the last time I truly felt happiness.

I always act as if I'm having the time of my life but really it's just an act. I stir up trouble, I taunt people and make them hate me because at least that way, I exist. They say hate is the second strongest emotion next to love, no one will ever love me so I'll have to make do with second best.

If people hate me, I will continue to exist. The darkness can't swallow me because those who hate me will seek me out for their revenge. I made it this way, this is the only way it can be. Someone like me can't touch the light no matter how much I try.

My eyes once again burn with tears but I swallow them down, quickly getting out of the bath and pulling on a pair of shorts and a hoodie.

When I pick up my phone, there is actually a message which is surprising. It's a shame it's just a response from Namie cursing my existence and demanding she still be paid despite not working. I ignore the message and open my contacts, scrolling down until it reaches a certain name.

I don't remember when it started. When I started messaging for him to come around when I'm like this. I don't know what possessed me to form this sort of strange relationship but all I know is that I don't want to be alone and he's the only one that will stay with me even if it's just for a few hours.

It's a distraction, a remedy to this loneliness. I should be ashamed, offering myself up to have someone be willing to stay with me for a few hours but it's all I can do.

Plus, there's a strange justice to it. I feel like I'm being punished but at the same time as he is holding me, willingly connecting himself me more than anyone else ever has. I've read about this, that people with depression will often act recklessly and do things that may hurt them.

Having sex with him is like that.

It hurts, it hurts a lot. Not the act its self but the impact it has on me. When it's all over and he leaves, it hurts even more than before but the itch I have to claw at the festering wound inside of me in sated and I can act like I'm alright.

It's almost a twisted way of self-harm. I purposely call him over because I know it will hurt me, I know that despite how pleasurable the sex may be, it only ends up harming me in the end. Because the warmth of his body makes what used to be cold, freezing - what used to be dark, a pitch black void.

But I crave it. I crave the feeling of being connected to him, being punished like that. So every time I can't escape this feeling, I send him a message. A simple message of just two words.

[Come over.]

It doesn't take long before a reply comes. I already know what it will contain.

[I can't.]

He always protests, always tries to make up some sort of excuse on why he can't come, why this is a bad idea.

[Come over.]

But he always comes over because he knows, he's the same as me. He knows this feeling all too well as he has it too.

He'll come over no matter what.

Because I always do when he calls me.

We always make excuses, try to escape this cycle but it's endless.

It can't be broken.

Because it's all we have.

[I'll be there soon.]

My smile is full of desolation.

Because we're both broken inside.

[I'll be waiting.]

The next chapters will be different variations of who 'he' is.

Each chapter will be a different character:

- Ryugamine Mikado.

- Heiwajima Shizuo.

- Shiki Haruya.

- Kadota Kyohei.

Please comment if you would like to request another character and I may or may not write it.

I don't know when this will be updated.