I was sitting in the comfort of my bathroom, my feet in my empty bathtub. And I was just sitting there, listening to the sounds of the pouring rain and the wind and the thunder. I really loved storms. And this one was particularly special. I was home alone and I had a certain…event planned for the evening. An evening that no one would be disturbing.

I carefully leaned over and removed the razor I had hid under the plastic stepstool in the bathroom. Then I returned to my sitting position. Grasping the razor in my right hand, I took a deep breath and calmly let it out. Then I carefully placed the razor atop my left wrist. I closed my eyes….

"Axel!" a male voice exclaimed.

I froze. I knew that voice all too well.

"Axel, what the hell do you think you're doing?" he asked worriedly. He was already fighting the urge to hold back tears; I could tell by his shaky voice. "Axel!"

I opened my green eyes and turned my head so that they landed on Roxas. His body was shaking just as bad as his voice.

"Give me the razor," he ordered, holding out his hand as steadily as possible.

I hesitated, but handed the sharp object over to him. He quickly swiped it out of my hand and pocketed it.

"Now, can you please explain to me what the hell you thought you were doing?"

I still couldn't speak. And not because I didn't want to, but because my mind couldn't form a coherent sentence at the moment.

Roxas sighed out of frustration. "Downstairs," he continued with his demands. "I'm calling the others for a last-minute intervention."

And in about ten minutes, I was sitting downstairs in the living room with Roxas, Riku, Demyx, Marluxia, Sora and Zexion. Once Roxas told the others why he had called them and told them to come over, not much was said. Everyone was simply speechless. They all knew that I had been having problems with my depression, but they never imagined I would fall so deep down into it. But there was a lot they didn't know.

"Axel," Riku finally spoke up, breaking the dreadful silence, "what the hell is wrong with you?"

"Obviously a lot of things," I replied.

"I'm being serious!"

"So am I."

He sighed. "This is fucking ridiculous, Axel. Why do you feel the need to cut or commit suicide or whatever? We already had to fucking deal with this before with Zexion. We don't need to deal with it again with you!"

"Yelling isn't going to help, Riku," Sora cut in. "We all need to handle this as calmly as possible."

"Axel, why didn't you talk to me?" Zexion wondered. "As Riku just kindly brought up, I went through this, too. I know how you feel and—"

"No, shut up, you don't know how I feel," I denied, cutting him off. "You don't know shit. Okay? None of you do."

Zexion pursed his lips. "I don't know you feel?" he repeated. "You feel empty, right? You feel worthless? You feel as if you don't matter to the world or anyone in it? And because of that, you feel like the world would be better off without you. Or that it wouldn't make a difference if you disappeared? You've been smiling on the outside, but slowly dying on the inside and withering away to nothing." He paused. "Trust me, Axel, I know exactly how you feel. I understand. So don't you fucking tell me that I don't know shit."

"I don't understand, though," Demyx admitted, speaking up now. "I thought you were getting better."

"I thought I was, too," I replied. "But I guess we both thought wrong."

"I should beat the shit out of you right now," Marluxia thought aloud. "We don't deserve this shit, Axel."

"What the fuck do you mean by that?" I asked heatedly. "You don't deserve this? Like I do?"

"He means that your suicide wouldn't just hurt yourself," Demyx answered. "It's a permanent solution to a temporary problem."

"Depression isn't a temporary problem," I mumbled.

He sighed sadly. "Either way, it would hurt all of us, Axel. We all care about you and we don't want to lose you. Do you not understand that?"

"I don't understand how I could mean anything to any of you," I admitted. "I don't understand how my death would affect any of you."

"You're kidding, right?" Marluxia said back. "You're a frigging idiot."

"Okay, I really don't think any of this is helping!" Sora cut back in. "Again, we need to sort this out rationally."

"There's no being rational with Axel," Riku pointed out. "He always has to make shit difficult for everyone."

"Exactly!" I exclaimed. "I'm tired of being a burden."

"You're not a burden," Demyx denied. "Don't ever think that."

I let out a heated sigh and turned to Roxas. "You've been awfully quiet," I stated. "And you're the one who called them here in the first place."

"I want to talk to you in private," his replied, his voice soft.

Zexion nodded. "Do that. Some of us," he looked to Marluxia and Riku, "need to calm down."

Roxas nodded once in return and left the room. I followed after him, glad to be getting away from the others.

For what seemed like forever, nothing was said. But the blonde in front of me kept shifting his weight from foot to foot.

"So…?" I spoke up.

"Do you know how it feels?" he asked in reply. "Do you know how it feels to walk in on a person you care so much about with a razor to his frigging wrist? It hurts, Axel," he then stated before even giving me a chance to respond. "It felt as if I was the one about to be cut. It felt like I was being stabbed." He swallowed hard. "I just…I don't know what I would do without you. And I don't understand why you haven't talked to me about this before. I'm your boyfriend, Axel; you're supposed to talk to me—"

"How was I supposed to talk to you about all this?" I cut him off. "I knew how you would react and I didn't want to scare you."

His blue eyes widened. "You didn't want to scare me? So you decided to just attempt suicide instead? Yeah, that makes plenty of sense." Sarcasm was ringing in his voice.

I sighed. "I wasn't going to attempt suicide—"

"Cutting isn't any better."

We fell silent again. And again, Roxas was the one to speak first.

"I love you, Axel," he told me. "And I don't know what I would do if I lost you." He paused. "I would probably give up because I would no longer see the point in living without you."

I shook my head. "That's total bullshit."

"You really don't get it, do you? It isn't bullshit, Axel! I would be completely lost if I lost you. And like Demyx said; you wouldn't just be hurting yourself, you would be hurting all of us. And that's not very fair, now, is it?"

"Who said anything about fairness?"

"You need help, Axel," he then told me. "And I know you like helping yourself, but you can't this time around. So please, let us help you."

"How? By never leaving me out of your sight? Or by never leaving me alone? Yeah, I don't think so." I turned to leave.

Roxas stopped me by grabbing my hand. "Axel, I am not letting you walk away from this. You do need help. And no I don't mean that we'll constantly be breathing down your neck."

I yanked my hand out of his grasp. "Then how do you plan on helping me?"

"I'll do whatever the fuck it takes to help you. All of us will."

I covered my face with my hands. My stress was building and I didn't know what to do or what to think. None of this was supposed to happen the way it did.

"Axel," he removed my hands from my face and looked deep into my green eyes with his blue eyes, "I love you," he repeated. He kissed me. "I am not going to let you hurt yourself."

I swallowed hard, choking back tears. But apparently they had managed to escape because Roxas was wiping them away with a small smile on his face.

"We're all here for you," he assured me. "Me, Riku, Demyx, Marluxia, Sora and Zexion; all of us. We are not going to leave your side and we are going to get through this and rise above it. I promise."

I forced a smile across my face now. "I'm sorry," I said in a strangled whisper. "It won't happen again. I promise."