𝐄𝐍𝐓𝐈𝐑𝐄𝐋𝐘 𝐌𝐈𝐍𝐄

ᴇɪɢʜᴛʏ - ɴɪɴᴇ

Injuries this, injuries that.

If he had just been smart enough to keep himself out of the line of fire, he wouldn't have to wear the damn thing to support his shoulder. If he had just paid attention to the mission instead of letting his emotional high get the better of him, maybe Isaac would still be alive.

Little did everyone know, he kept it off because he liked the pain—it reminded him that his best friend killed himself, in fewer words, to make sure his lungs continued to fill with air, to make sure that the scrap piece of heart behind his ribcage would beat for a long time after his own stopped.

There's still someone to live for.

The words he misinterpreted the day he passed away, the ones that didn't belong in the dream, haunted him to his core. He couldn't understand them—he couldn't wrap his head around the basic thought process behind them. Didn't he know?—there is no one without him.

"Fucking asshole," he spoke to the grave.

Who did he think he was?—what kind of biblical being did he transform into right before dying practically in his hand? Who told him that it was perfectly reasonable to tell the boy he basically raised himself some jack-shit version of gospel rather than to phone a goddamn friend for help?

"Did you want to die? Is that it? Was there a piece of you that just decided to give up that day?—was there something inside of you that mattered more to your self-mantra than it did the consequences of your actions? Did you even think about how I would feel, seeing you dead next to me, my wound magically patched up?"

Mason shook his head against his pants, not even bothering to complain to himself over the roughness of the stitching and fabric. His eyes, likely red-rimmed and sore, deserved to be mishandled—they didn't deserve to see when Isaac's no longer had life behind them.

Something festered in his system the more his thoughts rambled on without him. The more his vision stayed stuck to the hunk of rock before him, the more his eyebrows dipped and the sadness he'd been feeling all day morphed into a kind of anger that no one should have to experience.

What nobody told him?—throughout the five stages of grief, anger, and bargaining were like oil and water—impossible to mix, but pointless to try separating. There was no grief without anger, and there was no solution to his problems with the bargain of his life for Isaac's.

"I fucking hate you!"

His voice reached an octave louder than he could muster all day as his fist wrapped around the sleek silver of the flask; without even thinking, blinking, or breathing, the chunk of metal slammed against the grave and burst open, splashing vodka down his name, seeping into the dirt below.

"I'd like it if you didn't damage my son's grave not four hours after he was buried."

In a flash, he pulled his arm out of his jacket and slid on the sling so quickly, a person without a trained eye wouldn't have seen it. Brushing off his pants with his good hand, he stood up and turned, facing the woman whose voice just spooked him out of his feelings.

"Mrs. Mikelson!" he squeaked, "I thought you left for New York!"

"I should've," she replied, tired, "But I wanted some alone time with my son before I left since there wasn't a moment during the service I was given any."

Mason forced himself to swallow the lump in his throat as he took in her frayed curls and dropping eyes. Not only had she lost her son and daughter-in-law at the same time, but not three months prior, her husband bit the bullet while investigating a warehouse surrounding the same people.