Chapter 5: Off To Work.
Alex woke up feeling like utter shit. Her body groaned, every muscle aching as she tried to rise to her feet. She couldn't make it.
She flopped back onto the couch, the two short thing only reminding her how bad her back ached. She just laid there helplessly without the wonder and peace of the night. The light was there and everything was sensory chaos. People always smiled as if the day was good, but the day wasn't good, it was a false setting where people hid in plain sight. Kubra had always reminded her of that, always one step ahead of her until she won and ultimately lost.
The smell of pancakes wafted into her nostrils and into her thoughts, but all she smelled was the saturation of sugar which only made her sick to her stomach.
Poison, people eating poison so others could prey upon them. How was that not a crime?
If it had been any earlier Alex wouldn't have gotten up, she couldn't stand to have gotten up. Her bones felt like broken glass, sweat covering her whole body, while her heart raced off at relative speeds. The only problem was there was no tiger for her to fight or flee from, all there was was a striped beast named Tuesday waiting to devour her and her soul.
Get up. Get the fuck up.
She didn't budge, she just stared up at the ceiling.
The knife.
Yes, the knife was right in the cushions where she'd stowed it away. Any second now she could pull it from its cushion of a sheath and bury it within her breast.
It was the roman way to die, to run upon a sword.
No, it was still the coward's way out. In rome you had to have someone else do the deed or hold the blade, she'd heard that somewhere. Piper, Piper must have said that sometime. She was always spouting this and that fact… but… the fact was it didn't make it any better.
The sunlight continued to play across the ceiling, the light reminding her of candlelight in the dead of night. She didn't like the day, she was a person of the night, someone who held the power and enjoyed it.
Still Alex knew she was missing something. She felt like her life was in the light above her. It was stupid, she was stupid to be such an idiot.
Still there was something there, there was some truth in the light above her, some truth about her life that was staring her in the face, a truth she didn't know yet.
She couldn't die, not until she figured it out.
Alex slowly climbed off the couch and fumbled to put on her glasses in the bright light. Her body wobbled and her vision blurred as if she didn't have enough blood sugar to see straight, it was a familiar feeling. Food made her sick now, after prison she'd thought anything would be great. She'd loved food before, but now she could barely stand it. She'd lost weight, she knew that much easily; all her ribs showed as her thin skin clung tightly to it. Piper would be concerned, but she hadn't seen her naked or without a bulky sweater in months. She didn't need to know, she wouldn't know.
Slowly but methodically Alex made her way and stumbled into the kitchen area.
The place was the warmest in the house and the most sickening. They had a small electric stove that had been there from at least the 70's and the cramped little room had to be smaller than her old walk in closet. Still somehow Piper found it to be cozy and cozy enough to make pancakes on a Tuesday morning, something was really off.
Food, Alex hated food.
"Well look who's up," Piper beamed.
Something's off, shit her leg.
Alex was luckily on the right side of the counter, the right side of the counter to press her leg up against to avoid Piper's gaze. She could throw on sweats and hide the cuts, she could do that.
"Sup Pipes?" Alex managed as she sunk down to a lien on the counter as casually as she could muster.
"Sup then Alex, and how are you today?"
"Shitty as always, how about you Pipes?" Alex groaned.
"I could be better if someone was willing to get to work in my pipes that is," Piper shot back with a wicked grin. Alex couldn't even manage a smile.
"Sorry babe, but you're the one that's held back on me before, and…"
"I'm worried about you Alex," Piper stated outright as she turned towards Alex, her mood dropping faster than the real estate prices after a nuclear fallout.
"What?" Alex sputtered, her face growing red. "I…"
"It's just that I thought you'd be happy when we finally got out of prison Al. I thought you'd love anything but that place and that this would all work out. I thought we'd just get some time away from the big city and live up here in the state on our own little patch of land..."
"Sorry Pipes, but I'm just someone who doesn't know when they have it good. I am the Lennie to your George here, I don't know any better than misery. Really I'm just a burden to everyone around me."
"Alex…"
"No Piper it's the fucking truth. I don't do anyone any good, anytime. I hate my life, I hate my job, and I hate the way I fucking treat you. You've stuck through all this shit with me and for what, so I can just fucking complain all the time? No Piper that is just fucked up, I am just fucked up. You need to be treated like a fucking goddess, not some stupid cum rage I can bitch at."
"Alex.."
"No Pipes I just need to calm down and get to work so I can enjoy the fun of scrubbing dishes all fucking day."
"Alex…"
But she was already on her way out.
Alex ignored the pancakes behind her as she ignored her jacket and stamped out into the cold chills of the winter air. Her stomach was empty and so was her will to live. Her body immediately clamped up with her shorts and plain t-shirt in the fresh snow and freezing weather.
Maybe she'd curl up and die in the snow, or freeze to death. She didn't care, life was a pointless list of fuckups and that was it. It would be a blessing to die.
Just one more day, she'd only have to live one more day and then she'd get her chance to die and once again. This time she'd do it, she couldn't bare the pain anylonger.
For Piper, she'd do it for Piper.
Author's Notes: Sometimes there are those who need saving, those who don't want to be saved. In life our minds aim to make us miserable here and there. Fighting it, suffering through it, whatever happens, happens. There is no easy cure for the troubles of life, no cure besides control. We can control our thoughts and nothing else. Our thoughts are all we have.