A/N: Here's the second part of the latest update! It covers Meliodas perspective but still contains some of those sensitive topics.
I also forgot to mention that I'm on Wattpad now (lol) so feel free to check it out. My username is the same on here minus the spaces (DramaLoversDream513). I might also post some original stuff on there :I But enough with the shameless self promotion!
.12 - You're welcome for the update! I'm glad you're enjoying my writing :)
Till next time,
D.L.D
*TRIGGER WARNING - this story does mention some very sensitive topics such as suicide and self-harm so if you're sensitive to or easily triggered by this sort of material please don't read it. Take a complementary brownie instead :)*
Eat for me: Smile for me (Pt 2)
She hated herself too.
Meliodas scoffed, examining his hand in the low light of his bedroom lamp. The injury was still there, long and deep like the many scars that Elizabeth wore. Dried blood caked his palm, the drops long evaporated and dehydrated over the day. The cut itself stretched from the base of his palm to his mid-forefinger. But it hadn't hurt. It couldn't hurt. How could it when he knew that Elizabeth, the bright beam of sunshine Elizabeth, had done much worse to herself?
He smiled at the thought of her. She was too wonderful for this world. The bullies, those who watched her suffer, didn't deserve to know her. They didn't deserve her tears, her words, her smile. Meliodas knew and believed that. He knew that Elizabeth was above the scum that populated the earth.
But to Elizabeth they were above her. She was not a shining pillar: she was a monster. She was someone who deserved her hatred, someone who deserved to feel shitty and someone who deserved the self-harm. So she cut herself, she burned herself and she chopped that beautiful hair of hers. She even went as far as to let people beat her up, never once fighting back when a gang of condescending pricks decided to jump her.
So naturally the cut was nothing to Meliodas. It was a simple scrape in comparison to everything else Elizabeth went through. But who was he really kidding comparing it to her: Meliodas had done much worse to himself. Much worse than Elizabeth had ever done to herself.
That's why he had known she was broken: he knew the signs. He could see through her mask of smiles and hopeful words; he could sense the building dread and self-hatred hidden beneath her timid and meek demeanour. But sadly, she didn't - couldn't - recognise it in him. Meliodas was too broken to be fixed now, so no-one knew that he truly was broken. No-one saw his unusually lean figure, or the blonde hair that sometimes fell out when tugged too harshly; no-one heard the looping thoughts that came into his head, or saw how he was bent over backwards trying to obey his father's wishes; no-one knew of the noose he had prepped in his closet, the day of his death only driven away because of her: Elizabeth.
But soon she would tire of him too. One day her bright smile will not be reserved for him, it will not want to be aimed at him, and that day is the day he will die. It is the day his clock will finally stop ticking.
Meliodas releases a sigh, running a hand through his thinning hair. Golden strands rain down with the motion, thin and wispy due to his own self-starvation. They match the heavy bags and skinny frame that was hidden only by his tan complexion and muscled form. Those were the only things he was thankful for these days: his skin tone and muscles. But that was only because they hid what he did to himself.
What he did to himself...
Meliodas shivered, frowning as he glanced at the plate of food before him. The family were eating out, celebrating a big boom in his father's business, and so they had gone out to eat. Naturally, Zeldris and Estarossa had been ecstatic with the news - they were tired of eating crap home cooking - but Meliodas himself was a little hesitant. Very hesitant. It showed well as he sat there, staring at the plate and fiddling with the silverware.
Numbers were running through his head, adding and multiplying and dividing, as his gut was knotting at the thought of eating even a single grain of rice. One, ten, fifty, a hundred, two hundred...the odds weren't looking good in his mind.
"Go on, eat," Meliodas' father eyes him, nudging the blonde. "Don't let it go to waste."
So Meliodas ate. He forced every last piece of that food down into his stomach, even though his throat protested to such an action. It wasn't long before his intestines began to swim and his mind began to race, numbers already crunching to calculate the calories within that one meal. It was too much; too much for him and way too much for someone who kept continually screwing up.
"I'm gonna take a leak," Meliodas slides away from the table.
It's only once he's out of sight that he truly dashes and throws open the door to the bathroom. All the food he ate ends up being bile that's flushed into the sewer system. He looks pale afterwards, shaking, and he runs a hand through his hair. More strands fall. The blonde curses.
It seems he can never stop screwing up.
Or at least he thought he couldn't. Elizabeth had proven him wrong.
"You need to look after yourself," The female sighed, her silver hair still growing out after having been chopped. Her blue eyes creased with worry, her lip being sucked between her teeth. "If not for yourself then for everyone else."
He feels his face warm at her words, caught off guard by her sincerity but also by the assumption that anyone truly cared for him. That anyone would miss him if he were gone. Cause Meliodas knew that no-one would. He knew that if he died today, tomorrow or even in a year, the only person who would really care is her. Only her. That was why he was delaying his death date, he didn't want hurt her by dying when she needed him most.
He didn't want to break her heart.
"I'll be fine," Meliodas rolls his eyes, huffing as he watches her rummage around her bag. He then wiggles his brows, playing his self-doubt off as an attempt to flirt or joke with her. "Why do you care so much?"
Elizabeth squeaks and reddens at his tone, freezing as she drops her bag. Meliodas chuckles at the reaction, a grin stretching over his features.
"Y-you're the best person I know," Elizabeth finally answers. She breathes raggedly, gently applying a plaster to his cheek. "It hurts me a lot to see you injured, Meliodas. More than you can ever know."
She then ruffled his hair, catching a few blonde hairs. Cautiously, she looked at him, stared at him, but didn't say anything. Instead Elizabeth gave him a gentle smile, picking up her bag and waiting for him to join her for lunch - that's where they were going before Meliodas decided to get into a small scuffle.
But Meliodas couldn't help but feel his gut swim, his stomach knot, as he glanced at Elizabeth. He couldn't help but feel as if the guilt itself was wrapping cold and cruel hands over his throat, choking away his joy and words.
She knew. Meliodas knew that she knew. But Elizabeth never brought it up, or rather she kept it very close, like an intimate secret. But she knew nonetheless.
It was only today, a week after he had caught her cutting herself, that she had brought it up. She had noticed the still fresh wound on his hand, the strands that fell from the slightest touch, and decided to confront him on it.
Just as he had her.
"Meliodas, we need to talk."
She was there, in the rain, waiting at his doorstep. A black umbrella was in her hold, shielding her from the offending rain, but contrasting with her pale skin and light pink jacket. Her silver hair was fixed into a ponytail, the once choppy bangs grown out just enough to form a somewhat even fringe. Red rimmed her pure blue eyes, highlighting that she had scrubbed and wept the skin raw before coming here. That was evident. Clear.
He wouldn't say it out loud, but it pained Meliodas to see her here - to see her looking so torn and upset right now. She shouldn't be looking so conflicted, so broken, over a waste of space like himself. She shouldn't cry over him, shouldn't worry over him, nor should she be out waiting in the rain for him. She should be at home, she should be getting better and getting closer to forgetting him, but she wasn't: Elizabeth was here. She was standing before him, asking him, requesting him, to talk.
"Sure," Meliodas answers warily, grabbing his keys and unlocking the front door. He raises a brow. "But why now?"
"You know why," Elizabeth answers, following him inside and closing her umbrella. She removes her jacket and folds her arms over her chest, a disapproving look filling her eyes. The sort of look he knew all too well. "I thought you were looking after yourself."
He tenses at her tone, freezes at the emotion laced within it. It reminded him of a week ago, of how crippled and desperate she had been when she clutched that single razor blade. He could see it, see the tears and twisted features and limbs that were littered in battle scars; he had caused it. He was the one who brought that emotion, that look, back, and that was all he could think as he looked at her. That was all Meliodas could feel as his stomach furiously twisted and knotted within him.
"I am," Meliodas answers simply, already climbing the stairs towards his room. There were too many ears here. Too many prying eyes. "I didn't break my promise."
"Liar," Elizabeth scoffs, catching him by the arm. She swiftly turns his palm over, frowning as she notices the fresh wound. Blue eyes crease as a soft finger traces over the injury, her bottom lip being pushed between her teeth as she drops the hand. Then she was guiding him towards his room, silent yet supportive, as she intertwined his bloody hand with her pristine one.
That brought Meliodas to where he was now. He was sat here, staring at his hand, while Elizabeth sat beside him. She was now trying to get him to eat, poking his face with the spoon every time he tried to resist her attempts.
"Come on," Elizabeth pouts, frowning as she prods him with the spoon once more. "Just one more, I promise."
Meliodas rolls his eyes, hating this degrading feeling of being spoon fed, but opens his mouth and accepts it nonetheless. Elizabeth smiles as he does, glad that they were making progress somewhere. She gently guides the spoon towards his mouth, beaming as he pulls a face and forces the food down into his stomach.
She rewards him with a hug, soft and warm, her arms wrapping around his frame as she runs her fingers through his hair. His head rests on her chest, comfortable and not at all fussed about being relocated. Not right now. He was comfy, warm; Elizabeth drowned out the ugly, raging thoughts of his mind.
"I feel sick," Meliodas grumbles, his stomach feeling unusually full for once. He frowns, his digestive system working in a way it never has before. It is still twisting and knotting, blocking and building, and yet he can feel himself wanting to push that sensation away. He feels as if he can push it away, but at the same time he hasn't needed to for many, many years. As a result the urge the throw up was growing closer and closer by the second.
"You have to eat," Elizabeth shakes her head, sighing as she rests her chin on the crown of his head. "If not for yourself...then at least for me."
"I know but - "
"Meliodas, listen to me," Elizabeth speaks clearly, truthfully, her voice ringing in her own ears. She could see it now, sense it, the self-hatred that Meliodas harboured within his heart. Like her, he hated himself too. Just as she hated her image, he hated his own being - his existence. Elizabeth felt herself tear up, the desperation in his voice being something she never wanted to hear again. "Please, don't do it anymore. Please."
A thin silence trickles between the pair, soft and understanding like the very nature of their friendship - no their relationship. It was filled with the hesitance of Meliodas, the reluctance to abandon his death day plans and his ideals of dying; it was filled with Elizabeth's silent pleading, her comfort and desperation that was hidden within the hug she provided for her hurting friend. The silence was filled with all sorts of emotions, both good and bad, but ultimately it ended with a simple question.
"Will you stop if I stop?" Meliodas speaks out, his voice muffled by the cushion of Elizabeth's chest. He peers upwards, showing that he was being serious, sincere. "Truly stop."
Elizabeth flushes at his words, knowing that she had been caught out. Once again she had returned to her friends, the lighter and razor blade, to release the pain that had built over the week. She had figured that if she were more stealthy, more careful, then Meliodas would not know about it.
But clearly she had been wrong.
"I'll stop if you will," Elizabeth affirms, nodding. "Truly will."
They sink into silence once more and stay like that for a while, just hugging, contented and basking in the gentle stillness of their embrace. Because even though she was not beautiful, neither was he: so they could be broken together. They could be imperfect together.
