Chase's Book of YT One-Shots

Closet (RoyalChaos)

A/N: Trigger Warning- Mentions of/implied suicide. This is not meant to be a story which focuses on that, though.

In other news, we've nearly reached 500 reads. I find that amazing. Thank you all.
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There's a boy in my closet.

He's about my age, but he scares me. He doesn't speak often, and I think I might scare him too. He's taller than me, and paler, with darker hair and eyes. He usually tries to hide them, like he's ashamed, but I also know he has  long gashes in each arm from his wrist to his elbow. I think they're the scariest part of him, along with the blood dried all over him and at the bottom of my closet. He's not... mean, I think. He's shy, and not that bad for a ghost.

Sometimes I open my closet and he's not there, and over time I've begun to accept it, but at first it would make me relieved. I think I may have upset him with that, and I feel guilty looking back. He always returned, whether it was days or weeks or months later, he always returned and looked more gaunt than ever.

He used to hide from me, but it's hard to hide in the closet of a teenage boy. There's usually not much in there.

-/-/-/-/-/-

I opened my closet door and didn't look down, though I became chilled very quickly by the atmosphere. Because of the temperature that accompanied him, I'd begun to call him Chilled in my head.

I saw him shift while I grabbed a jacket, uncomfortable and backing into the wall like he'd been doing in the months since I'd first seen him. A frustrated feeling rushed over me and I tossed the jacket back onto my bed, then shut my closet door with me inside.

He jumped and scrambled to his feet across from me, but I sat down against the opposite wall and stared up. There wasn't much room, and my socked foot sat in one of the larger bloodstains, but I managed. I watched him with as much patience as I could gather while his widened, owlish eyes took me in. This was the first time I'd acknowledged him in at least a month, so I guess I could cut him some slack.

"You can still see me?" He asked in a quiet, nervous voice as he lost some of his tension. I nodded; it wasn't the first time he'd spoke, but it was the first time he'd spoke to me directly. Of all reactions I'd expected, him groaning in irritation and sliding to the ground across from me was not one of them.

"... Damn it."

My widened eyes and peaked curiosity were hard to keep under control, so I didn't.

"Do you not want me to see you?" I questioned, furrowing my eyebrows. He nodded after a second, and I felt irrationally bad for seeing him. "... Why?"

He snorted, turning his gaze to the back wall of the closet. At first I thought he was ignoring me and had shut down any want for communication, but then I saw his lips move like he was trying to find words, so I waited.

He sighed, and looked at me with surprising depth in his eyes. "Don't make me say the answer to that. Just look at me, why do you think?"

I knew what he meant, even though his arms were folded over his knees and I couldn't see the worst of it, there was still blood everywhere. I still had issues looking past it.

I wanted to say something, what I wasn't sure, but suddenly my mom opened the closet door and gave me an expression of confusion and frustration.

"Steven, we have to go, I've been calling for you for five minutes! What are you doing in here?"

I muttered something about not having a reason, standing up and leaving the closet which my mother shut behind me.