Author's Note: A spontaneous and simple idea that came up at 1AM. It felt too appropriate. This is the first 1st-person story I write.
Written in paper at candle light again.
Written in silence, but I've been keeping Emilie Autumn's song '306' in mind since I read chapter 105 (a very eerie song about suicide and the L'Inconnue de la Seine) so I typed this down to it, and to the damned 'Thorny' from Book of Circus OST (which should need no comment to the melancholy). Title comes from '306'.
Trigger warning: with a more or less elaborated exposition, this still deals with the theme of suicide, so please, remember that.
Disclaimer: I don't own Kuroshitsuji or characters, Toboso Yana does. Dates and Grell's parents are my invention.
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It's not midnight yet, and I can see the reflection of a cold but bright moon peeking from behind the clouds. My own reflection staring back at me in the mirror, however, is not cold because of the light and shadows the candles cast over me.
I simply stare at that image of myself in the other side of the mirror. I'm not looking for a fault, or appreciating any trait. My eyes are simply fixed on themselves, and I see the form of my shoulders moving softly as I breathe in and out at a calm pace.
The feeling of exhaustion is familiar. Which is why I'm not really thinking. I'm too tired of thinking. This instant of nothing is what I long to have forever.
The mere flicker of acknowledment of the exhaustion is enough, however. My blessed nothingness is shattered and leaves me with the pathetic and ugly person that is me, and suddenly my breathing skips a beat and I feel I will burst and rip apart if I don't scream.
I'm constantly choking, trying and fighting to not do or say whatever I may want, so I won't be inapropriate. So I will be 'normal'. It's tiresome to be constantly controling how to act, how to be.
My brain is demanding me to scream, but I know it's no use. I'm too tired.
Stop being ridiculous. I will never even think of this again, and you will not either.
Aren't you happy, son? This is a better life than I hoped you might have.
Of course I am happy to be her son. I'm not too happy of being my father's son, but I still love him.
My family is not rich, but I have never and will never experience hunger. I am able to don in almost all garments of medium quality tailoring I want to. I've been engaged for a while, and in a couple more years I'll have enough money to ensure my marriage and my wife's happy life. My mother always said I'm pleasing to the eye, but a mother's word is biased. My bride says I'm beautiful, and she's lucky to have such a fiancé.
I don't typically view this in such a light, but I presume that many would wish to have all these reasons to life for.
I find them reasons to die for.
As I breathe in, I look at the reflection again and find a flaw. Always wished my hair would grow bigger. I like to imagine the feeling of locks of hair on my back, how the familiar and constant touch wouldn't even tickle. But I can't. No one has such a hair, and I'm not allowed to have.
The blade I've been squeezing in my hand is left forgotten for a moment as I look for the dark-wine dyed wig I keep only for myself. It's not hard to properly place it in my head, and I find myself more beautiful.
As I painted my eyes and lips in such an unusual manner, and as I pick up the blade again, I hear a faint chime from a nearby church as it signals midnight.
It feels better now. I look more beautiful now.
At first, my grip failed however slightly and I jerked involuntarily at the pain. But the second was a quick, deep swing of a terrible chiling coldness, only to turn into a burning hot sting. But it's better now.
When I attempt to change aim and do a third cut, the blade slips from my fingers from the weakness and blood that coated them, and the heavy screenching echoes as blood splatters on the floor.
Suddenly I become dizzy, I feel light-headed and my eyes blur. I firmly shut my hands on the bed frame behind me to keep some balance, but it's useless, my hands are shaky and there's a painful sting in my wrists. It's not a pleasant feeling, but the only course of action is to fall, and unconsciously I did. My body didn't hurt, though, but I didn't fall on the bed. I'm not sure if I slided to the floor.
The lack of pain makes me realize there's something tingling my face instead. I turn my head to the side to see my arm outstretched, maybe looking for the pouring gap, but everything is smudged and tangled, and I realize the tingling is the fake hair scattered over my face, ruffled from when I fell down.
No, no. I don't want to die like this. I must look a mess. I don't want to die looking like some poor wrench abandoned in a ditch. At least once, at last and finally, I want to be beautiful.
Please, I need to be beautiful at least when I die.
My hand feels heavy and numb, but I can't find any will in me to be angry or annoyed by that. I still manage to move it, clumsly trying to pull the fake hairs away from my face, not only so I can see, but more so others can see me.
I flinch suddenly, a reflex that apparently hasn't yet been drained to the puddles on the floor. Something wet fell on my face as I pulled the hair to the side, and then another. A drip, two drips, right over my cheekbone, and I feel them slowly slide over my skin like a delicate ink trail. I don't know why, but I moved to touch the lukewarm feeling, and when I looked at my fingertip, there it was.
Red.
Of course. It had to be red.
My eyes lower and adjust in focus on my forearm, the splintered and falling tracks on the pale skin that keep rolling and dripping. Oddly, I am reminded of marble veins, only these are red.
Red was flooding me as it drained away from me. How ironic.
Oh God, why do I have to die?, but the thought too drained gently and I smile. I can feel a warm tear fall from the corner of my eye all the way to the wig and my hair beneath it, but still I smile. Are my tears red too? What a beautiful color.
Did I... do I have to die to see all this beautiful red? Do I have to die so they will see it?
My hand and arm fall down against my shoulder and roll down to the floor. It's like I'm very tired, physically exhausted like I've always remembered feeling; tired of pretending, tired of playing, tired of tolerating, tired of enduring, exhausted of enduring this... life. But at least now I'm in control of the reasons.
At least I'm in control of my life, even if it's how it ends.
Surely when they find my cold corpse in such a warm color, they'll find me beautiful. That, they cannot take from me.
What a beautiful death.
I would have smiled again if I could. I think I did, at the end.
...
Grell Sutcliff
Son of Jonathan and Lauren Sutcliff
Born on October 31st, 1779
Died from blood loss on November 21st, 1802
Remarks:
Suicide.
Dispatch to be informed immediately.
William T. Spears read the file before moving to see the victim's cinematic record. He was holding the red stamp that should have been pressed against the photo as the analysis was completed, but returned it to his pocket without using it.
~おわり~
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Author's Note: I considered not putting William here and leaving the post-mortem part open, but ended up mentioning him.
Thanks for reading, reviews are appreciated
