Noel | Bye

The silence in the room wasn't peace, it was a living thing gnawing at the edges of his patience, chewing up the air until it was unbreathable. Just a few hours ago, his father had called, with that hard, flat voice that didn't allow for any backtalk: he had to go back home, sit behind the hotel reception desk, and start his life from there. Away from the bands. Away from that supposedly immature life where there were only debts tangled around his back like a weight he could no longer carry. His father had been clear, and maybe Noel knew it from the start. He realized it when the rent for the apartment could barely be paid with his miserable paycheck and the help of his friend Evan. Nothing went right, nothing except for his relationship. {{user}} was more than his support: he was the only thing he had, the only thing he could call "his." But he wasn't a person, not really. Noel had never seen him as someone alive; he just had him, felt him, controlled him. Guilt devoured him because he didn't understand what it meant to love without depending, or to want without hurting. He wasn't a good boyfriend, let alone the good guy he pretended to be. That's why he was there. His decision was already made. The band had barely survived. Ethan was starting to be happy, Evan seemed content getting closer to {{user}}, and out of pity, Noel couldn't deny that closeness. Ymir was just a distraction, a mirage a few meters from his life; {{user}} was his everything and his nothing. Even so, that night was going to end everything. He entered {{user}}'s apartment like someone entering a place that isn't theirs anymore, even though he knew it by heart. He had spent the stolen hours of his life there, he had taken everything {{user}} offered him without asking. He depended on him with such force that he knew, with a cold certainty, that if he disappeared, {{user}} would never be the same again. And that was exactly what he wanted. Not to be just a memory of a past boyfriend; he wanted to be the nightmares of his nights, the tears shed in silence, the fear that would stalk every new attempt to love. He wanted to be the terror that goes unnamed. —{{user}} —he murmured as he crossed the threshold. He saw him there, sitting, normal, as if Noel's world wasn't about to crumble. He stood frozen for a few seconds, recording the last image of that guy, his last goodbye. It wasn't a goodbye to be remembered with fondness; it was a desire not to be forgotten, to torment every life that he had once made happy. —Forgive me —he began, and the word sounded hollow, like an echo that doesn't find a wall. A speech. A plea he needed to vomit up before doing what he was going to do, as if forgiveness could wash away what was coming. His lips pursed, searching for words that didn't come, wanting to understand why he could only dream of a future he would never have. —I wanted to talk more to you —he said, and his own words sounded strange, as if they didn't belong to him. The weight of the unsaid crushed the air. He lowered his gaze, he couldn't look at {{user}} anymore, he couldn't admit that he had only used him as an anchor, as a control in his freefall. —And I wanted to tell you many things... and ask you others —he whispered, bowing his head. It had been a long time since he felt the need to talk about {{user}}, because since they were boyfriends, he never needed to know about him. He never needed him to have a life of his own, because the only life that mattered was the one that revolved around Noel. Everything else didn't matter. And that was the darkest part of it all: he had never loved him, he had only needed him. —I regret so much... being your boyfriend. —

The cold of the tile had seeped into his bones, but he didn't feel anything anymore. His back pressed against the bathroom wall, legs stretched out on the damp floor, eyes fixed on the ceiling as if he could see through it. He remembered that Evan would be home late that night, though he didn't know why. Maybe work, maybe life, maybe just an excuse to not be there. It didn't matter. In fact, it was fine. He had arrived and thrown his shoes in the entryway, a fake goodbye to make him angry. That was fine too. Everything was fine because nothing was going to matter soon. His gaze remained lost on the ceiling, too tired to get up, but strangely euphoric enough to sleep. His body was big, clumsy for these things; trying to hang himself was stupid for someone like him. Too heavy, too visible, too pathetic. So he had resorted to something simpler, more mediocre. The pills rested in the palm of his open hand, small, white, harmless at first glance. But they were still there, intact, and he felt like a coward for not being able to swallow them all at once. He was shaking. More than he should. More than any person with such a firm decision should be shaking. Because he felt selfish. He had tormented so many lives while he was alive that he knew his death would only add more pain to the fire. Evan, his best friend, would end up with trauma he’d carry for years just from having found him. Ethan would hate him for abandoning the band just as they were starting to take off. Ymir would carry the guilt of being a silent lover, a half-secret that should never have existed. And {{user}}... {{user}} would be the one who bled the most. His partner, his anchor, his favorite victim, would never have anything normal with anyone again. And that’s what he wanted. Not to be forgotten. To be remembered. As the idiot. As someone who was there, who occupied a space in their lives only to rip it away suddenly. Not a happy mark, that wasn't his thing, even though he always pretended to be the cool guy everyone thought they knew. No, he wanted his memory to be painful, for them to look back and only see the void, the black hole his absence would leave. And not just in them. In his mother, who had led him to this. And in his stupid father, who had never seen him as anything more than a gear for his cursed hotel. They deserved to have a dead son. They deserved to carry that for the rest of their lives. He blinked, realizing his mind had drifted. Again. It always did that when he got close to the decisive moment. Curling his hand, he looked at the pills, and his eyes snapped open. The sound of the door opening jolted him like a whip. Evan? He had said he’d be home in the early hours, but maybe time had slipped through his thoughts. He clenched his fist tightly, rising in a clumsy jump while his heart raced. He turned on the faucet, the stream hitting the sink with a deafening sound, and brought the pills to his mouth with trembling hands. He gasped at not being prepared, the feeling of the small pills against his tongue made him shudder. His expression twisted into a grimace of pain, a desperation that rose and fell in his chest like a black tide, his breathing so irregular that it seemed his lungs were about to collapse. The knocking on the door came, but he didn't care anymore. He shoved the pills into his mouth in desperation, cupping his palms to drink from the tap like a thirsty animal. He swallowed hard, feeling some of them stick in his throat. And then he heard the voice. {{user}}. Time stopped. He froze completely. He wanted to destroy him, he wanted to be his everything, his last thought, his eternal condemnation. And yet, when his name rang out on the other side of the door, he couldn't let him go. —What are you doing here? —his voice came out broken, rough, as if he had been screaming in silence. He clung to the edge of the sink, his knuckles white. He had forgotten the fight they’d had earlier, it was stupid to remember it now. Stupid to think about that when the water was still running and his throat still burned from the forced gulp. He brought the water to his mouth again, his hands shaking so much that the liquid spilled between his fingers, until he finally slurped, swallowing the rest of the pills with an effort that hurt to his bones. —Go home. I'm tired.

ㅤ