déjà vu?

nine // the fault in the fight

"Really?" Zack rose from his spot on the seat, sitting in a more straightened position, with a smirk on his face. He was totally ready to consume any information to gossip about with practically anyone.

"Well.. yeah there's one thing that pops out.." Zack had sang a chorus of "what"'s after I trailed off. I rolled my eyes at him, but he didn't seem to be looking at my eyes, or caring. He was annoying me now, and.. I told him. My voice sounded identical to Tyler's when he had told me that day on his birthday. I was a stuttering wreck with my own touch to it. "T-Tyler c-c- he c-can control t-time."

"Oh. I- oh." Zack stuttered out and that was the last of our conversation before he mentioned having to be somewhere and we nodded our goodbyes.

In our second fight, when Tyler paused time and told me he was sorry for losing his mind, I didn't make the connection to the promise we made that same day. I only made the connection when I saw him laying on the hospital bed unconscious that day four months ago. The memories were suddenly filled in my head drowning out any noise, explaining why I had words being mumbled out from my mouth. I remembered the day like it was yesterday, when in reality, it was 4 years ago. Tyler and I were just entering high school and we stayed up all night the night before the first day, making those promises.

"Hey, Josh?" Tyler had asked. We were both snuggled up in blankets, sitting on the couch as the credits scrolled on the television screen. We had the movie volume set to mute while captions of what people were saying had been going across the bottom. It was the day before ninth grade, and we didn't want to get caught staying up past 10 o'clock.

"Yeah?" I replied, worried for my friend. It was just three years after Tyler had told me about his power and he had just started to get control of it again. Though his number one flaw was pretty much healed, he wasn't. He was still depressed and wasn't doing too good on the emotional side of things. Tyler took a while to reply, I remember, as I watched him fiddle with his thumbs through the darkness of his room. "What is it?"

"Let's make a promise." He paused to look up from his hands, making eye contact in the dark. I smiled weakly, only because I was half asleep and nodded, understanding what he was asking. He'd always been the type who wanted a cliche relationship with all the promises and the memories, and boy do we have them now. We had stated a few promises, and for the life of me I wouldn't be able to state all of them. They were stupid and small that involved cheesy lines like how "we promised we would always have to be friends", and would you look at that? We broke it. Silly and stupid. But, the last few were obviously more memorable. It was after we said we would do two more, that I blurted this:

"Don't ever take your life, don't try and don't hurt yourself ."  Tyler was shocked, his eyes went wide and his lips faded to a frown. The color of his eyes slowly dimmed to a colorless shade. He looked bewildered with my promise, his voice was low as he spoke again.

"Only if you promise too." He replied. We shook on it, only having one promise left to make. I thought for one good promise while he probably did the same. We had our minds working for a promise probably to top off my last one, what I didn't know was he was searching for one to prevent my last one. He spoke long after I had given up, letting me know of the last promise. "Don't let me lose my mind."

"Wh-" I started to question, but he explained faster than I could ask. I knew now that his promise was made to prevent him from committing or harming himself. Little did he know then, that I wouldn't make the connection until after he attempted to kill himself.

"I'll lose myself." He whispered. "And that can only lead to loosing my life."

I sat back in my drivers seat now, replaying that moment over and over. How Tyler had refused to make eye contact with me when he explained what loosing his mind could lead to. How his eyes didn't make color as if he were created in a black and white movie. How his eyes were wide with shock yet his lips faded to a frown at the mention of suicide. It all made my stomach nauseous with fear for him. It was how much I cared for him, how much it killed me to see him on that hospital bed. It killed me to know he's been thinking like this. I just couldn't bare to see him suffer any longer than he has already.