Distorted & Disordered

Chapter 15

*Trigger Warning*: Heavy discussion of suicidality, eating disorder and feels. Bring tissues, I swear!

He sat at the edge of his bed, trying to will himself to pull out his homework and actually complete it this time. Yesterday he had managed to get the textbook sprawled open but today was proving to be more difficult.

Every breath that rattled through his ribcage came at the expense of more energy being thrusted into living and Loki despised it. He despised himself for still being around to breathe another breath.

He should be dead.

He couldn't help but think it-it's what everyone else in his mind was already thinking. It's probably what everyone else said about him the moment he left a room.

Loki: the unwanted, dutiful brother of Thor was just another waste of space. Too fat to even consider anything less than obese. He had fat rolling off of every crevice of his skin, every lining of his muscles. He was disgusting.

And it all came back to that one thought: he should be dead.

No one would miss him. No one would care.

Just another soul extinguished from life too early on.

Strange, how emotionless, how numb he had become.

The weight of the world was on his shoulders and he was just about ready to heave it off. Dying didn't scare him anymore these days, it was like a quiet understanding between him and Death, they were friends almost, but every plan of suicide felt too inconvenient for him at the moment. His thoughts were consumed by it, every waking minute felt like another minute too long. He just wanted to be released, he wanted to be free, why couldn't he be free?

Tears, unwanted tears, welled up in his eyes, the only shred of emotion still left within his decaying soul. If it was because he was afraid of what lay before him, he couldn't be sure. If it was because he was afraid of where his mind was taking him, he plainly ignored.

This was his life.

This was his end.

So be it.

It was October 29th when the urges to die hit him like a tsunami again.

Halloween was only a few fair days ahead and the pain that was roiling through Loki's soul was becoming too much to bear alone.

He needed his release, but he wasn't sure how to get it. He felt everything had just gotten worse, that his life was so completely and utterly meaningless, that his suffering was so acute that it took the breath from his lips and it made him feel like an absolute cockroach in a field of butterflies.

Everyone else was so pretty, everyone else was so worthy, why couldn't he be, too?

The urges to take the knives from the kitchen sink and plunge them into his flesh were so bizarre, so inescapable, so tempting that he wasn't sure how he didn't kill himself that very evening.

He just knew that he had to be around for Halloween. He had to be alive to see his favorite holiday. He had to be alive just a little while longer: for Thor, for Frigga, hell, for Odin even. He had to be alive a little while longer for his family's sake of having one more day with him in their lives before they had to say goodbye. He just had to hold on one more day.

He could handle one more day.

If he could have handled the previous days, he felt that he could handle just one more day into the future.

He hadn't made his own costume for the Halloween celebrations only to die before getting the chance to wear them.

He had to live today.

Tomorrow, he could die.

Halloween: the moonlight twinkled on the fallen droplets that rained down from the sky. It wasn't the ideal set of circumstances Loki had been praying for, but it would due for now.

He had become such a fragmented part of himself. His skin was paler than usual, his collarbones sticking out more prominently. He wished he could lie and say he didn't know how much he weighed but he knew it; he knew it all too well.

107

He had consumed 262 calories that day. 345 the day before. 560 the day before that. He kept track of every little morsel that did pass between his lips. It was an obsession for him, as much as dying was-anything to put him out of his misery.

He wasn't happy yet.

He wasn't happy at 128, he wasn't happy at 112, he wasn't happy at 110, he wasn't happy at all.

He didn't know what he was doing wrong. He didn't know where he began and Ananias ended. Ananias, that's what he called his ED. Ananias was separate from him, something strange, dark, twisty and unkind. It wasn't Loki.

Hell, even Loki was no longer Loki anymore.

He didn't know who he was, he could only vaguely recall who he once had been but even that memory was fuzzy these days.

It was a brain fog, he decided; a lack of proper nutrients reaching his brain so that his consciousness and comprehension was subpar to how it used to be. But it was worth it, it was worth it, Ananias chanted over and over. Because being thin was worth it. Being thin was worth the pain. Being small was everything to Loki now. Everything.

He was nothing without it.

At the present moment however, Loki rolled his glassy eyes over to his older brother as they knocked on another house's front door, dressed up in their fancy costumes and telling a tale of their characters.

Except Loki didn't talk as much these days. He didn't really see the point in it; he didn't really see the point in most things anymore.

He was still light years behind in his school assignments, begging for make-up time when he knew full well he wasn't going to make up any of his missed work. It was all so draining these days. Everything was: living, breathing, eating what few bits and pieces of food that came down his dried up esophagus. He felt like he was decaying. He was decomposing before everybody's wavering gaze and they were too stupid to even notice it.

If this is what living was supposed to be like, he'd much rather not. He felt like a zombie, a vampire, a monster. He felt undead. He felt as if he was already one foot in his grave and the other was barely holding onto the edge.

It just didn't seem to matter anymore.

Nothing mattered.

The world would spin with Loki in it as well as without Loki in it.

What was the point in anything?

What did it matter if he ate or didn't? He was just going to die anyways.

Beside him, Thor scored another round of chocolates and took off hurriedly down the street.

For a split second, Loki wanted to see him get squashed by a car.

It was mildly terrifying thinking of his brother dying but the resentment towards his elder sibling was growing each second that ticked by. Thor was so….carefree. So non-understanding. So…oblivious.

Loki didn't have the strength left in him to form complete sentences. He would trail off from his train of thought so easily these days and he could only sigh in protest then do nothing about it the next moment.

Thor didn't know.

No one did.

Loki couldn't help but wish that someone would.

Maybe, maybe that would have made all the difference.

"Do you want my Twizzlers for your Dots?" Thor asked eagerly, eyeing his brother's contents out of the pillowcases they'd used for bowls.

"You can have everything," Loki remarked dismissively.

Thor's mouth fell open in surprise.

"Really, brother?" He moved to gather Loki's candy before pausing in hesitation. "Are you sure?"

"I don't fucking care," Loki hissed, turning from his sibling and heading up the stairs. "I'm going to bed."

With that, he closed his door with a soft click and buried his face into his pillows on his unmade bed.

Keeping up appearances was getting harder.

But he had a new mission in mind. He hadn't written it on his calendar officially, but he had mentally circled November 13th.

He didn't think he'd ever get around to officially placing a red X on the day, it would require too much energy, but he was giddy about it. He wanted it to come now. He couldn't wait another moment.

That was the day he was going to flip a coin: if it landed on heads, he was going to kill himself, and if it landed on tails, he'd try for another day.

A sense of calm blanketed over him.

He could do it. He could show them all. He would die.

And then, then he'd be free.

Dear Thor,

If you've found this letter, it may not make any sense to you. I know my life was "cut short" as you'd say, but I finally found peace, is how I would reframe it.

Loki scratched out the note, tearing it free from the binding of his notebook, crumpling it into a ball and tossing it alongside the other drafts he'd been crafting for the first few days in November.

He placed his shaking black pen to the paper again and started over.

Dear Thor,

If you've found this letter, I'm sorry.

He scratched it out again, sighing in dismay.

Nothing was coming out the way he wanted it to.

He shifted his head a little, before thinking of a possible solution. He reached for his iPod and hit play on a particular song before nudging his earbuds into his ear canals. The music drifted in and he couldn't help but bite back a sob.

Dear Thor,

Do me a favor, in honor of my memory, and turn to the Internet. Once there, find the song "One More Light" by Linkin Park and listen to the beginning of the song with its haunting lead up. Listen next, intently, to the chorus. It is a melancholy song and it defines my last few months so well. Far better than I could ever dare to form into words… Know that I'm yet another light that extinguished from this cruel, cold universe. I had cared; I had mattered, but seemingly not enough. And it isn't fair, it's never been fair and it never will be. My fight was invisible, my mind at war and I…I couldn't overcome it alone, but it felt like I had to. I'm so-.

No, I-I start off this letter with a song that I related to more than you realized. What was my point? I can't recall but please don't see my death as anything other than…

Loki pursed his lips for a moment, unsure where he was going with that train of thought. He crossed out the sentence, then, skipping a line, started again.

Please don't see my death as anything other than merciful. I was in so much pain, Thor, so much pain. This is the only way out that I could envision.

Please, don't blame yourself. It wasn't your fault; you are so naïve, and I mean that in kindness. There's no way you could have known this would happen, I was excellent at keeping secrets. If I wanted you to know, I would have told you. But I didn't.

Because I didn't want you to stop me.

I didn't want help… I think. I just don't think I was ready to give up the lies and the darkness. I wasn't ready to let Ananias walk free.

I fear I'm not making sense, but maybe that's closer to the truth than I realize. Because life is cruel, life is the one who doesn't make sense. Life is the one that caused me so much irreparable pain.

But if you've found this letter, it means I am no longer in pain.

I wish you nothing but the best, brother. For now, I have another life to lead.

Goodbye only for now,

Loki.

Loki tore out this page and folded it up into a neat and tidy square. He gently placed it alongside some of the other notes he had guiltily written, mainly for his teachers.

He doubted they'd ever get into their hands but it made him feel a little better to write them out and praise them for all that they did right rather than focus so peculiarly on what they missed that went wrong.

He felt the urge to write Frigga's but his heart felt heavy and his breath couldn't leave past the knot in his throat.

He was the most anxious for mother's letter.

What could he say to her when he was no longer there to comfort her? What hope could he offer her when her world turned dark? When her second son was ripped away from her?

Loki bristled at the notion-did this mean that in some hidden part of his brain he was unaware of that he realized he mattered to mother after all?

He laughed.

Now, that was a funny joke.

But in all seriousness, he felt that today wasn't yet the day to write to mother. Nor father either.

Instead, he slid his perfectly made squares into the bottom of his underwear and sock drawer, nestled into the hard wood like a monkey to a tree. He hadn't decided yet where he would leave them, perhaps on his bed as he carried out the deed. He felt a sprinkle in his step when he wandered away from his bedroom that evening.

Maybe things were going to be all right after all.

Just with one less Loki in the world.

A/N:

Okay, I know this may sound a bit incomplete but I think I'm stopping here for now for this chapter and start off the next one also today, which would be great. This was definitely a heavier chapter than most (maybe in contender with Chp 6 actually) and I FELT each blow from scene to scene. I was actually listening to "Hold On" by Chord Overstreet for the duration of this chapter which was helpful if that makes sense. Like, it set the mood, you know?

I have ideas for what Chp 16 will be and where I can take it largely in part from some plot holes that some awesome person pointed out on AO3. And I just realized how fitting it would be in this story and it made me cry a little.

So, hold on just a little while longer because things are going to get better! I know this chapter was hard to read, especially since there are a few people out there who can relate to mental health stuff like me, so please take care of yourselves and practice some self-care for the rest of the day! I also find it intriguing how much of my own story plays out in this fic. It's interesting how much we can convey of ourselves through fictional characters and plots.

But any who, I'm going to go, please take care of yourselves and know that the suffering you're going through is temporary! No matter how dark it gets, the sun will shine and rise again. xxx

USA suicide prevention hotline: 1800 273 8255

ED website: NEDA

USA mental health conditions and suicide prevention organizations: NAMI and AFSP

Thank you to Chord Overstreet and Linkin Park for their musical inspiration. I don't own any of the characters; I just like to dish out a lot of shit for Loki to deal with-sorry buddy!

Thank you so much for reading. Leave me a review if you can, I do take them under consideration and I like interacting with you peeps. :]

Written: 4/3 and 4/4/2019

PS I should clarify: If you know me or have heard of me from my IOOV presentations, I am okay myself, I've been super stable and out of the hospital for the last year! I go to a day program MWF which helps a ton! So, I'm okay, in case any of you were concerned from some of the themes in this chapter. I hope you're okay, too! xxx

EDIT: I'm a fool and somehow completely missed an obviously written rule on FFN's ToS so now I'm updating and changing some stories and fixing them up, revising others etc. (i.e. Removing all song lyrics) So, sorry about that! Gwah. I don't know how I managed to miss this but I'm aware of it now so if you see anything else I've written that sounds like lyrics, let me know! Best, - Sep. 24.2020