Darker Blood

Chapter sixty-seven

As soon as I moved away, he tried to pull me closer in reassurance but I only panicked more.

"It's okay, you're safe, love."

My anxiety shot through the roof as my ears washed over, unable to let any more sound through and I tried to wriggle away from his insistent hold, but he wouldn't budge. I lost control, my cry breaking through the wall of silence as I felt an intense burst of ice leave my body, and Jungkook's body vanished from beside me.

After a moment, I looked at what I had done. I looked at him as he rose from the ground, frost stinging into the skin of his face and down his neck, his skin contorting over and over as it tried to heal the damage I had done. I curled into a ball on the bed, looking through terrified eyes as he picked himself up from the ground, already reaching out to comfort me once again.

"Don't touch me," I sobbed, holding my knees tighter, burying my head into the shame my own body could provide.

He panted, the ice finally disappearing from his face, skin coming back even more flawless than before, the freezer burns vanishing from his neck and down his chest almost instantly.

"Why?"

He was hurt, sounding weak by his voice alone. I felt something in my chest, a painful twinge that made me want to apologize, to accept him again, and to stay close to him again.

But I can't do that. I can't have him. I was a weapon, and I could kill the boy I loved.

What's even worse, is the thought that I might not feel anything after I did. No sorrow, no regret, no loss. It was that mere thought that kept me anchored in place, refusing to answer him or let him close to me again.

"Inori," he started again, slowly stepping towards me. "You are not a weapon. You're just the girl I love."

"You're not real," I cried. "This is the dream, this is why I can't feel things right anymore."

"Inori, you're coping with a lot right now, but I promise this is real."

I couldn't even say that I hated exactly how I feel right at that moment, because I couldn't feel anything. All there was, was this disconnection that distanced me unexplainably from the whole world, even from Jungkook. The sobs that tumbled from my lips were from the pity I had for myself, the tears surely as cold as my heart.

What on earth is wrong with me?

He was sitting on the side of the bed now, right beside me but not touching me in any way, and his presence was enough to offer a ray of light through the darkness in my mind.

"Do you want to hurt yourself again?"

I thought hard over everything about the way he had asked me that question, the tone that was quiet and prying at my deepest insecurities, the words themselves that stabbed deeper than any knife could. And after an even longer moment, I nodded, and he stayed silent.

'Depression.'

"So," I laughed purely out of bitterness. "This is what depression is like."

Jungkook's lips sealed shut tight. "I never said that-"

"You didn't have to." I unwrapped one of my arms from the death grip around my legs, tapping it against the side of my temple a couple times. "I could hear it, what you were thinking."

Hearing thoughts is new, which means I'm only falling deeper into the endless crevice of my own demise. The boy beside me didn't speak or think anything else, trying to provide silent comfort with worried eyes and broad shoulders open and waiting for my hold.

"I just want to feel something again. I want to stop feeling so far away."

He waited for a moment before his hand held the side of my cheek and I let him, the cold blending with my own skin now. His eyes were searching for something in my face, and my hold around my legs slackened as I started to relax in front of him.

"Are you going to go flying off into space on me, love?"

I half smiled against his lips, leaning my head down slightly so that his hand rested more comfortably in my hair. I stayed silent deliberately, waiting for him to clarify as his own smile brushed against my lips.

"I'll have to be the rocket that pulls you back down, won't I?"

The only answer I had for him was the press of my lips against his as I kissed him gently, my movements becoming feverish in desperation for more.

The boy who had taken away my pain, even if it was only for a few moments, gave me one last loving peck before he pulled away, uttering a delicate 'I'll be back in a minute with food'.

"I love you," I spoke out after him and he froze for a second in the doorway, instinctively turning around to face me before he stopped himself, looking back as far as the floor beside his feet with the biggest smile I've seen him wear for a while.

"I love you more than a book loves a library, more than a bird loves to sing, and more than the stars love the sky."