Page 47 of Lessons In Grey

I shook my head, half wondering if she would even remember this in the morning. She was so careful about keeping on her mask, I was sure her mind would make her forget this. Forget that, for a moment, she had opened herself up to me. “I don’t want whole, Emily, I want you.”

“I am broken fractals. If I crack my bones and let you in, you will suffer.”

“Then let me suffer,” I pleaded, carefully pushing back her strands of inky black hair. “I would gladly suffer if it meant I could live within you. Our broken fractals are made for each other, baby. We aren’t whole unless we are together.” That’s what she was doing? She was trying to protect me? The last thing I wanted was to be protected from the things that she was made of.

She inhaled a shuddering breath. “People aren’t pieces of puzzles, Grey. I am complicated and fractured. I don’t make sense.”

“Yes, you do. You make sense to me.” I kissed her palm, memorizing the soft, warm skin. Fuck, I could fall into herforever. “Sleep, Snowflake, and dream of a white Christmas.”

13

Emily

October9th, 2021

The morning was more difficult than I could have ever imagined.

I was groggy and felt half drunk. Everything felt like lead, and my head was pounding.

Somehow, I had ended up in my bed. The best-case scenario was that, in my fucked-up state, I had managed to clean myself up, clean the bathroom, and crash.

However, the little paper rose dipped in blood claimed otherwise.

He had been in my house. In my room. He had been in my bathroom, cleaned everything up, cleaned me up the best he could, put me to bed and as much as I wanted to feel thankful for that, I didn’t want to think or feel or do anything at all.

I went through the motions of taking ascalding shower, wrapped up my arm, put my hair up in a messy bun with a few strands framing my face, pulled on frayed black jeggings, boots, and finally an oversized sweater with a giant red bleeding rose plastered on the front.

On the drive to the campus, I was honestly considering turning around the entire time. I should have. I didn’t have the energy to do anything but sleep, however my grades were already dropping, so I didn’t really have a choice.

The walk from the parking lot to the writing hall felt like an eternity, but I didn’t have the energy to be nervous or afraid or ashamed. I was just existing.

I could remember everything he said to me. Every single word. All of them.

What was I supposed to do with them? Was I supposed to wrap them up inside my empty chest and form them into my heart? I couldn’t do that.

I shouldn’t have to.

But how could I keep on keeping on without thinking back to everything he had said? All of those things he had remembered. Pointless, useless things. Each one something he had used to convince me not to die.

Had I been dying?

Had the goal last night been death or what? That was the only thing I couldn’t remember. What had been my purpose?

I opened the door, my eyes immediately found the desk, found him sitting there alone. His sleeves were pushed up, revealing those stark tattoos and bloodied knuckles.

My throat went dry, and I instantly turned away. Why were his knuckles bloody? I remembered a bunch of loud noises, crashing, shattering. I had thought it had been in my own head because why would he get so angry about what I had done?

And then I remembered, and guilt filled me.

He had lost his father. A gunshot wound.

I had looked up suicides once. Out of morbid curiosity. I hadlooked up statistics, causes, reasons, everything. All of it, I had gone down so many dark rabbit holes, it had taken me weeks to climb out, and one of the most important distinctions I had learned was that men found violence even in death. Women? They liked to do it, I suppose the best term would be in a quieter way. Pills, slit wrists, something that took them slowly.

Thinking about it now, I suppose some of the research was wrong. I remembered how my wrist had felt last night. Through the haze, the torment, the softness, it had been painful. A sharp throb that was still pulsating now.

Except now I would have to live with what I had done. Now, I would have to face the consequences rather than fading off into oblivion.

Every step up those stairs felt like I was climbing another mountain. I should have just stayed in the first row, but then I’d have to deal with people asking why I was in their seat, and I truly didn’t want to talk about anything at the moment.