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He couldn't do it. He'd tried, he really had, but he just couldn't lift it in his fingers without breaking down. Not doing almost hurt worse - like he was a coward for not slicing into his flesh. He deserved it. He deserved it. He deserved it. Do it. Okay.

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Josh cut himself once. He refused to do it again. He'd proven his arbitrary point and he refused to take it farther, to fall back into the mess he'd created all those years ago. He'd gotten better, pulled himself out of that horrible darkness that followed him everywhere he went for years.

He wasn't exactly sure how long Tyler had been consumed by that same unwavering darkness, the darkness that, once you were in it for long enough, became almost like a friend.

God, why hadn't he just paid more attention? Maybe if he'd noticed sooner then Tyler would still be here. But he hadn't. His mind was constantly screaming now, cruel and unrelenting in a familiar way.

You deserve it. You deserve to feel all that pain, Josh. You let Tyler die. You let him die and everyone knows it's your fault. You deserve this.

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Josh started cutting himself again. He'd tried to keep that promise to himself, to his deceased mother, to never slice into his own flesh ever again. But she was dead. Tyler was dead. Josh was practically a walking corpse now. So what did it matter? Josh grabbed the blade - the same one Tyler had used to slit his own wrists. He cried as his skis split open, some lines thin and others wide, like horrific and jagged smiles. They taunted him, telling him to push a little harder. He didn't.

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Tyler's mother saw his arms. She had come by unexpectedly, another unprompted visit with soup and an unsaid responsibility to keeping Josh alive - practically her other son. Though they'd never spoken of it to her, Tyler's mother had easily figured out exactly when Josh and Tyler became boyfriend-boyfriend, and she was fully supportive. She was incredibly kind. Josh didn't deserve her, and she deserved better.

She'd walked into Josh's cluttered bedroom - that most likely reeked of alcohol, vomit and whatever stenches came with neglecting hygiene - and saw him there, on the ground, sobbing with his knees to his chest and the blade discarded carelessly next to him, blood dripping around him. She, surprisingly, hadn't seemed all that alarmed as she sighed and knelt next to him, pulling him against her in a comforting embrace that he so desperately needed. She placed a soft kiss to the crown of his head and pulled him to the bathroom, cleaning his arms as tears silently dripped down Josh's cheeks. He wondered how many times she'd done this before.

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It had been a year since Tyler's death. Josh was still far from okay, still crying himself to sleep at night and still wishing to join his lover wherever he may be. But he'd stopped cutting himself, cleaned up his apartment (with the help of Tyler's mother of course) and found a new job at the local pet shelter.

His first week there he found himself drawn to a golden retriever puppy that he'd given the name 'Jim'. A few days later, his boss handed him a leash with the dog attached and a bag of essentials as he was walking out the door, smiling kindly and patting his back as he teared up, thanking her.

Tyler's mom visited him weekly, usually to have some sort of meal together. He wouldn't have survived that first week after Tyler without her - hell, he wouldn't have survived the first day . But here he was, a full year later, sat upright on his living room sofa, Jim a foot away on the floor staring up at him quizzically. A single tear managed to slip out of Josh's eye, down his cheek and sitting idly under his chin before finally falling into his lap.

Josh had his phone in his hand, scrolling through pictures of him and Tyler. He noticed just how dead Tyler's eyes looked in the most recent ones, the ones taken just months - wells, even - before he'd slit his wrists in the bathtub. Josh could still hear the bang of Tyler's head against porcelain, the clang of metal on tile as that damned blade slipped from his fingers and onto the ground, the slurred words Tyler had murmured out in his last seconds. "I'm sorry."

He could still feel the warm, sticky blood all over his face, his hands, his clothes - he could still feel how gradually cold Tyler's skin became the longer he held on to him while waiting for the ambulance that he knew would be too late. Another tear threatened to fall.

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Josh wrote Tyler letters sometimes. The paper would be stained with tears and the ink would be smudged and he would shove it down into the center of the bouquets he brought to Tyler's grave every single day. He would write about how much he missed him, how much he wished he could be wherever Tyler was, or sometimes just about his day, his new dog, Tyler's mother.

He never lied in those letters. It was the only place he truly let his thoughts run free, his sprawling handwriting gifting the paper with secrets he had a hard time even letting himself hear. Some part of him still clung to the hope that Tyler was reading those letters, smelling those flowers, holding Josh as he wept on the ground and first stained his clothes.

The rest of him let that hope die a long time ago.

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Josh Dun was alive. Despite everything, despite how much he wished he wasn't, Josh Dun was alive. But Tyler wasn't. And that still hurt, despite how many years it'd been.