"But our love it was stronger by far than the love
Of those who were older than we—
Of many far wiser than we—
And neither the angels in Heaven above
Nor the demons down under the sea
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee."
-Edgar Allan Poe, "Annabel Lee", Stanza 5
Weeks pass and the medication grows dusty. Emerald eyes never fail to read the marble tomb, and by now the etched words have become memorized. The waves continue to beat down on the coast, and children continue to laugh and play on its warm sands, as if the world hadn't just lost someone that Antonio holds so dear.
He can feel the sun, and the dirt beneath him, but he can't really feel anything—his body feels numb. His soul feels as if it's somewhere else, anywhere but where it should be. The only thing that he can come close to feeling is sadness, and it consumes him.
Antonio just wants to feel whole again, but he doesn't think he'll ever be able to.
He goes to the secluded beach when he's not at the grave and relives the moments he'll never be able to have again. The heated touches, the longing glances, smiles that conveyed more love than the word itself could. What would he give to see his lover just one more time? Anything, probably, even his own life.
He's thought about it a lot. Killing himself, that is. A few things stop him—his mother, for one thing. There's no way he's leaving her by herself. He wouldn't forgive himself for doing something like that, and then he'd definitely go to Hell, anyways.
Which is another thing that stops him: if he kills himself, Antonio's sure that he'll end up in Hell. Then he'd really never be able to see Lovino again, since he knows that someone as perfect as his Italian lover would've gone straight to heaven.
Then there's Lovino himself. Even though he's not here with him, his heart says that Lovino would hate him for all eternity if he took his own life just to be with him.
It hurts, knowing that he'll have to wait his entire life just to see the one person that he cares about the most.
Although, that might not be true—dreams never fail to bring Lovino's image to him, whether it be memories that he's relived a thousand times, or new instances that Antonio's twisted subconscious has created to torment him. Sometimes, when his mother comes in to wake up, he'll be sobbing in his sleep. She'll rush to free him from the thorns of slumber, and he'll cry for a while before returning to the hollowness that's taken him over.
Other mornings, though, he'll have a serene smile on his face, an occurrence that hardly ever happens during the day. It kills her on the inside to wake him up and return him to the harsh reality that the family has come to know. She wants her son to just have a break, to find the happiness that he once held so brightly.
It doesn't take her long to realize that Lovino was the one to give him that happiness.
Antonio's at the grave again, but it's nighttime, for a change. Stars twinkle above him as he sits on the ground, placing a hand on the cold marble.
"Hey, Lovino," he croaks. He hasn't spoken much in a while, and his throat hurts from all the crying and sobbing he's been doing. "I miss you so much." The ocean just beyond seems to still, pausing in its routine to mourn for Antonio. He swears that everything around him falls silent, as if to listen to the spoken lament. "Where'd you go? Why did you—why did you leave me all alone," he whispers.
He knows that Lovino's not gone, not really, because as long as his memory stays, Lovino will always be with him. But he doesn't just want memories, he wants his living, breathing lover back. He wants to touch him, to hold him, to talk to him.
"How's heaven?" He asks. "That's where you are, it's gotta be. There's no other place for you." Tan fingers trace the words on the grave, giving his brain something to concentrate on while he talks. "Are you happy? I hope you are. I'm not, not anymore."
Lovino wouldn't want this, he thinks. He wouldn't want me to be like this.
"It doesn't matter though, does it? You're not here with me, so it doesn't even matter." He runs his free hand through his disheveled hair. "I can't think about anything but you. Do you feel the same?" It occurs to him briefly that Lovino might not even hear him—what if heaven wasn't even real? Was there even a God somewhere up there? There couldn't be, if someone like Lovino had to die so young.
No, no, no; there had to be something there, something after life, or else Antonio will never be able to see him again. He clutches to that idea, and it grounds him. Live your life, and you'll be able to see him. It's a sick mantra that he keeps up, but it's the only thing that stops him from throwing his body into the sea.
"Wherever you are, I hope you think about me," he says after a period of silence. "Because I think about you all the time. It would kill me if you forgot about me."
It becomes a twisted routine. Antonio visits every night, because it means more privacy. He hardly sleeps anymore, although he wishes he did, since it's the only time that he truly gets to be with Lovino.
Instead of feeling empty, however, he feels a strange sort of happiness when he visits the ocean tomb. It's the only place nowadays that he can think straight, since it makes him focus on Lovino and Lovino only. It keeps him grounded.
Sometimes he falls asleep on top of the grave without even noticing. Antonio feels safe there, like his lover is with him, protecting him. It's the closest he'll ever feel to being whole again.
"For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling—my darling—my life and my bride,
In her sepulchre there by the sea—
In her tomb by the sounding sea."
-Edgar Allan Poe, "Annabel Lee", Stanza 6