pull me apart, pick me apart
They joked that Merlin was a disaster.
That he would forget to tie his boots in the morning if Gaius didn't remind him. That he would forget which way was east if the sun didn't rise in that direction every morning. That he would lose his head if it wasn't attached to his shoulders.
Merlin felt like a disaster.
Every day, he was pulled in a thousand different directions.
He did everything for Arthur (almost quite literally because Arthur didn't know how to do a lot of things).
He helped Gwen when her chores were a bit too much.
He polished the knights' armor whenever the other castle servants were overrun on holidays.
He picked herbs and attended to patients for Gaius whenever the older man's arthritis acted up because of bad weather or coldness.
He cut the onions for Cook to pay her back for the rolls she let him steal because she thought he was too thin.
He changed the sheets in the spare rooms for guests whenever Mary's little brother came down with a fever and she needed to sit with him because both of their parents were dead.
He didn't mind. Not really. He was glad to help everyone. Growing up, he had felt that he was never for his mother when she sacrificed everything to make sure he was taken care of. She had been a single mother with a child of questionable origin, but she still cared.
In a way, Merlin was trying to repay her by helping others.
So he let himself be pulled apart, picked apart if it meant that he could be useful to someone.
He was a disaster. Sometimes, he wished the throbbing behind his eyes would go away and he could think straight, keep everything swirling around in his mind orderly, not trip over his boot laces because he had forgotten to tie them once again.
Because Merlin was a disaster.