Here it is, the final chapter for Without You, please enjoy. I'd also like to know that this chapter is not for the faint of heart. It deals with depression and some very sensitive subject matter, be advised this story is rated the highest allowed rating for that reason.
They say that time has the ability to heal all wounds.
I would have to say that saying is complete bullshit.
Time does not have some magical entity to it that makes all of your pain fade away. All time does is put distance between you and the incident that resulted in the wounds that you want healed.
With every second that passes, my heart aches just a little bit more. I see her beautiful smile in my memory. Whenever the corners of her mouth pulled up, it felt like she was bringing light into my darkened world. Whenever I had felt a little lost because of the supernatural hold over me, she would light up my life with a radiant smile. In those wonderful moments, everything always felt so perfect, so right. The ache in my chest burned as my hand brought the glass to my lips. I felt the warmth that enveloped my throat as the whiskey slid down.
Minutes trickle by. My thoughts wander to her eyes. They had always been like an open book. There was never a moment where there wasn't some sort of story being told within their depths. Those beautiful chocolate orbs allowed me to see into her soul. Knowing that our souls were entwined is, was, an honor, a privilege really. Not a single moment would go by that I didn't mourn the loss of the deep connection that we once shared.
My hand lifted, bringing the glass to my lips once more. I wanted the liquid to help ease my pain, maybe even erase it for a brief moment. It was so hard for me to get drunk, so I wasn't expecting the contents of the glass to do anything for me.
The passing days did nothing but remind me of all that I had lost.
My hand shook as I brought the glass to my lips another time. I downed what was in the cup, which was more than a mouthful and placed it back in front of me. I felt the familiar burning sensation as it slid down my throat. It was times like this that I wished I was a normal human being. I wished that I didn't turn into a gigantic ball of fur. If I was completely normal person, I'd have already drunk enough liquor to keep me on my ass for a long time. As it was, I felt the mild buzz of it in my system. There was a faint blur to my vision, but it wasn't enough, not yet. I was at the entrance of the world where Bella still existed.
I reached forward and my hand grasping the half empty bottle of Johnny Walker. As I brought it towards my cup my other hand came up and uncapped the lid. Before I filled my glass, I brought the top of the container to my lips, sucking down a mouthful. As the remnants of my gulp slid down my throat, I poured another full glass. Sighing, I replaced the lid and slid the bottle back to the center of the table.
All I wanted was to feel just a little less pain. I wanted to feel like I could heal, like I could attempt to move on. Those feelings, they would never come. Deep down, I knew my soul would never recover and I would never love anyone like I love Bella.
No matter how hard I tried to persuade myself that the healing would come, that the pain would subside, I knew I was lying to myself, it was a harsh reality but I didn't care. All I cared about at the moment was a fantasy world that I was building in my mind. It was a world where there would be need for me to mourn the loss of Bella. She'd still be alive in that world. There would be no chance of her being so cruelly ripped away from me. Her gorgeous smile would make the sun rise every morning, her eyes would always be filled with her love for me, our souls would forever be whole and attached. That world, the one I was dreaming off, the sun would forever shine and a rainbow would always loom on the horizon. Maybe, just maybe if I tried hard enough, I could make it come alive, make it more than a false reality that exists in my mind.
If only that false place I wanted to create could really exist.
My disturbing thoughts of a place where Bella was alive, they continued to swirl around in my head. Each painful memory had me slipping down the rickety wooden chair a little further. The images and the thoughts, they were going to drive me mad and were pulling up the emotions I wanted to keep buried deep within me. It was the moments like this, that were happening more and more frequently, that I wanted to be numb and emotionless. There was only one thing that I wanted more than I wanted that inviting numbness and that was impossible. Bella would never be real again. Her face swirled in my mind and I felt myself drowning in the pain the imagery was causing.
Nothing would ever matter but her.
Swallowing another swig of the whiskey, my eyes drifted to the chair beside me. The slight grip that I held over my control was continuing to slip away from me. I hated myself for allowing a stupid chair to bring me pain. But it wasn't just some random stupid chair, it was her chair. The one she always sat in to do homework with me. Looking at it brought an image of her sitting here at the table with me. Her sad eyes were watching me as I destroyed myself with grief and alcohol. Then, they drifted to the table and took note of the item beside the liquor bottle. I couldn't bear to see what she would think and my eyes focused on the glass in my hand.
With every passing second, my hand tightened around the glass. It started to crack against my increasing grip. After a moment I heard the slightly cracking but I didn't care. My eyes came back up to the chair but my vision of Bells had disappeared and now there was only the empty space where I wished she was. Anger at her missing presence engulfed me and my fist clenched tighter. The cup didn't stand any sort of chance against me. It shattered.
I felt the stinging pain almost immediately. Pieces of the glass cup had lodged themselves into my skin. My mind wandered to the pain that my dear Bells must have experienced after being struck by the car. It made the pain of large glass shards being embedded in my skin feel so trivial. As I pushed the pain from my mind, I stood up from the chair I was sitting in. There was clambering sound behind me and I realized I stood much faster than I had realized. I didn't even make an effort to right it; I just moved away from the table and came to stand by the garbage bin.
Opening my hand, the loose pieces of glass fell into the trash. Most of the shards that fell from my hand had a coating of my blood. It made my mind wander to the road that Bella's blood had soaked. Pain tore at my heart as the image rolled around in my head. It took everything I had to push the image away, I could think about that right now. No, I refused too. My thoughts would turn to the insane bitch who fucked everything up; I couldn't go there, not again. Just a mere glimpse of the thought made my body shake from anger.
I managed to suppress the urge to phase. The last thing I wanted was to share a pack mind right now. They were all mourning the loss of a friend. None of them needed to feel the pain I kept bottled up and they didn't need to see any of the thoughts swirling in the back of my mind. If they knew half of what I was seeing and feeling, then they would do everything they could to stop the different things I was considering. I loved the pack, they were family. They have always been there for me but I couldn't be around them right now.
I shook my head slightly, attempting to dislodge the thoughts of the pack. Sighing, I reached forward and tugged on the handle. There was a slight rattling sound, but it calmed within a second. When the water came cascading out of the faucet, I slipped my injured hand underneath. The cool liquid came in contact with the open wounds, which stung like a fucking bitch. I'd always thought paper cuts were the worst, I was wrong. Having chunks of glass sticking out of your hand, that was worse. With yet another sigh, I made sure to flip my hand in an attempt to wash away the majority of the blood, which was coming out at a steady pace.
For the briefest of moments, I contemplated allowing the large chunks to remain imbedded in my skin. There wasn't a point in doing so though, not with the plan that was slowly coming together in my fucked up mind.
Besides, it would be worse to allow my body to heal with the chunks of the cup still present. Granted it would take awhile, but the wounds would eventually heal around the glass. Sometimes being involved in the supernatural world was nothing but a curse. Especially times like now, when I silently wished that I could bleed to death like a normal person. It would allow me to experience what Bella may have felt. I wanted to watch the warm red liquid flow out of my body, feel my strength weaken, I wanted to eventually pass out and never wake up. It would allow me to feel a connection to her, or at least I think it would. But no, I couldn't do that. That wasn't the way that I wanted to die when the time comes.
I wanted the time to come soon; I wanted to be with Bella again.
After a long moment of standing still, water still cascading over the shards protruding from my skin, I moved my free hand into position. As I quickly ripped the first piece out of my flesh, there was a slightly sickening sucking sound. It was very quiet, only my increased hearing allowed me to hear the sound. Once I allowed the distracting sound to fall from my mind, I dislodged another piece, and then another. It only took me a few minutes to pull every piece free. The shards littered the bottom of the sink. My eyes wandered down to look at them. I noticed the intense coloring of the water as it hit my hand, fell to the sink, and then washed away the blood on the pieces of glass.
My free hand reached over to the opposite side of the sink and grabbed a dark dishtowel. With the towel in hand, I brought it over. I pulled my bleeding hand from the spray of the faucet and quickly wrapped it up. There was no sense in allowing my blood to stain everything as I waited for the injury to begin healing. As I waited, my mind wandered.
The cuts on my hand, which were more or less self-inflicted, they seemed like nothing compared to what SHE had faced. Mine, they were shallow and unremarkable. Hers, they were fatal. Unwillingly, my mind conjured up an image I wished that I could forget.
I remembered holding her, kissing her, laughing with her moments before the evening had been destroyed. It was because of her shoe, her shoe that I had accidently kicked into the street. With a smile, she'd gone to get it. Then there were the headlights, we saw them at the same time. Somehow, she managed to react quicker than I could, even though I was the one with supernatural speed. Even though I did everything I could to get to her, it wasn't enough. I'd live with that for the rest of my days, I should have been able to change the outcome. Hell, I wished it had been me, maybe I would have survived, no; it should have been me, no matter the outcome.
My eyes closed as I watched it all happen in my head, yet again. The car colliding with her body, the sickening noise of the tires squealing as the vehicle sped away, the heartbreaking sight of her body landing painfully hard on the road. I blinked away the moisture in my eyes as I thought about holding her bloodied, broken, body in my arms. So many times I begged her not to leave me, to just hold on, to stay with me. Oh how I begged, but begging never seems to work, not for me.
It really is terrifying how things can change in just a brief moment. All it really takes is a blink of an eye and the world is forever altered.
With my mind conjuring those images, the moisture I had tried to blink away, it became too much and a single tear rolled down my cheek. I wanted to be strong for her, even if she wasn't here with me. But damn it, every fucking thing caused me pain. I couldn't sleep because she haunted my dreams. I couldn't eat because nothing tastes as good as her home cooked meals. Everything that came into my mind somehow revolved around her.
Life was a fucked up thing. I was angry that fate had given her to me, only to take her soon after. That was how life worked, right? Like I said, life was so fucked up.
In life you give and you take. At first, fate had been wonderfully kind and given my Bella. I had been allowed a chance at the happiness I so desperately yearned to have with Bella. She was like the missing piece of my puzzle. With her, I'd felt true happiness. It was like my life was looking up and I would always have a reason to smile. She was the light in the darkness of my supernatural existence. Bella was mine. She was the one thing that only I would have. Imprints were the only individual thing within the pack.
As happy as I was with how kind fate had been, I should have known it wouldn't last. The best things never do, do they? The fucked up plan fate had cost me my happiness, it cost Bella her life. She was cruelly ripped from the world. Her loss made the entire puzzle fall apart for me. She had been the key piece, the glue, without her everything began to fall apart. At first, I was so angry about losing her. I was angry with her for leaving me, but it didn't last.
Standing here in my kitchen, I relished the fact that I wasn't angry anymore, not to the extent I was before at least. Now, I was sad and lost. My emotions circled around in an endless assault but anger remained at a distance most of the time. Some people say anger is all part of the grieving process, but it isn't for me. For me, it's about allowing myself to actually feel the pain, the sadness, which I couldn't do. I couldn't allow the full barrage of emotion because I couldn't accept what they would mean. Even though I knew she was gone and never coming back, I still didn't fully believe. Not when my mind was constantly skipping around in the world of sunshine it invented. Just thinking about it brought moisture to my eyes.
I tried to blink away the wetness but failed.
The pain that I had been trying to keep at bay suddenly took hold of me. It started to pull me under as the image of her broken body invaded my mind. It tore at the pieces of my shattered heart to remember the blood that had soaked through her clothing, staining her pale skin and making the ground around her darker. Seeing the light in her eyes slowly fading away had been hell, I kept begging, pleading with her to not leave me, to stay and fight. Tears were running down my face as I pushed away the images from that horrible night.
It always came to haunt my dreams, but now it plagued me when I was awake.
Just as I thought the images were tucked away, they came slamming back to me. I felt like an outsider watching the scene unfold like it was happening all over again. It was all I could see now. M y mind tried hard to surface her smile, a smile that lit up my cloudy world. The images wouldn't come. They wouldn't bring me one moment of piece as I tried to remove the sight of her bleeding out on the pavement while I continued to tell her she couldn't leave me, not like that. All I wanted was a little luck while trying to conjure up something relatively happy, but luck had never been on my side before, I doubted it would be now, not when I needed it most. If it did come, I'd be lost in my anger.
I'd want to know why that luck didn't come to Bella and I when she was dying in my arms. Why it chose to stay away when it could have made the difference in whether she lived or died.
My feeble attempts to surface something happy were now over, I knew they wouldn't come.
With a sigh, I pulled the towel away from my hand. It was no longer bleeding; there were just angry pink lines. I had no interest in the towel and tossed it into the sink with the glass shards I'd eventually have to clean up. Before the towel had even landed, I'd already pulled out another cup and placed it on the table. My hand reached for the bottle of Johnny Walker, quickly uncapping it. Bringing the container to my lips, I gulped down several mouthfuls of the liquid. I didn't really need the cup; grabbing one was just an instinct. Setting the bottle down, not bothering to uncap it. I moved to the chair that Bella had once claimed as hers. It would always be hers, it was the closest thing I had to her right now, and I was cherishing it.
Time passed and eventually the bottle of liquor had been emptied.
Bella's chair now sat in the living room. I couldn't look at it right now, not when I had other things on my mind. My head was spinning as I reached towards the center of the table, grabbing the one item I had been avoiding the entire evening. Grasping it tightly in my hand, I situated myself into a comfortable position on my chair, hearing it creak in protest as I moved. I placed the item on my lap.
As I sat at the dining room table, the gun resting peacefully in my lap, I thought about all the moments— those few short moments— we had together. Without Bella here with me, my life was incomplete. I brought the muzzle of the gun so it rested against my aching temple; my eyes gravitated towards the window. In the split second between when the trigger was pulled and the gun fired, I could've sworn I saw Bella standing there waiting for me to join her.
We would finally have our happily ever after.