help (sequel to drown) // undergoing editing

XI.

A year has passed and Mark has become a tad impatient. He's more than excited to get married. Signe is excited to help you and Sean is doing whatever he can to make decisions much harder. And you? Well, you're overwhelmed, to say the least.

It makes you happy knowing that everyone is so excited for you to get married, especially Mark. It shows he really wants this. You do too, but you feel like it's all too soon.

You're still only in your early 20s. 23 to be exact. You still have a whole lot of time ahead of you and Mark is only 24, he still has plenty of time ahead of him as well. You sigh as you think of everything.

"Hey, babe. Whatcha doing?" Mark asks. You smile at him and look back down at the mess on the table.

"Just looking at bills and stuff," you say. Adulting sucks, but at the moment it's better than the wedding stuff. It's not that you don't want to marry Mark. It's just dreadful, stressing about wedding stuff.

"Hey, don't worry about that stuff, I got Sean and Signe worrying about that. You just focus on the wedding stuff," Mark says. You look down and sigh. Mark notices.

"Is something wrong?" he asks. You look a him, biting your lip in a contemplative way. You sigh. You have Mark sit across from you so that you can be face to face.

"Look, Mark. I love you, I really do and when I say this, I'm saying it because I'm looking out for the both of us-"

"You don't want to get married?" he cuts in. You stay quiet as he looks down. "So, all of this? Is just done with?" he asks. You look at him as if he's being an idiot.

"Mark, I don't want to get married now. I do want to get married with you, I can't see myself doing this whole life thing with anyone else, but I also can't see myself doing the whole life thing now. I know we've been together a while, and I'm glad we've been together that long, but this is all happening so soon and so sudden," you say. You see Mark is looking down still.

"Mark, I know you're excited to do this, hell, I am too. Just, I don't feel like I'm ready to take this big leap yet. It'd be like losing a big part of my identity and becoming someone new-"

"You can always hyphenate." He suggests.

"Oh, I know but the thing is, it's so sudden. It's all happening so fast. In my life plan I always knew I wanted to settle down with someone, but I wanted that to happen in maybe a few years from now. Plus there's always the fear that feelings will change," you say. Mark doesn't look up.

"Is this your way of saying that feelings are changing?" he asks.

"No, God no. I still really love you and I hope you still love me too. I just know that things happen over time. I really wanna see if we're really in it for the long run. You never know what can happen though. Mark, you mean the world to me but I also still have things to work on. I still have issues with myself-"

"Honey, you know you're an amazing and beautiful person and I love you and-"

"Mark, i understand that you feel that way, you never go a day without telling me something like that and I love it. But this validation from you isn't the thing I need to work on. I need validation from myself. I need to believe in me. I need to get over these internalized issues I have within myself and as much as it helps to have someone who loves me, it isn't the only thing that will solve it and I'm sorry but it's the harsh truth. Having a significant other doesn't make those issues disappear and I know the same applies for you. I know you're still dealing with things inside and I know I can't make those issues magically disappear by hugging you or even by marrying you. We need to work on ourselves, Mark. We can still be together, we can still be there for each other helping the other," you say. You see a tear fall down Mark's face, causing your heart to break. You instantly feel like the world's worst person.

"Hey guys, I was wond-oh...wrong timing?" Sean says walking into the kitchen. You nod. "I'll come back later," he says. He walks away. You grab hold of one of Mark's hands.

"I love you, but I'm not ready. I'm glad being your fiancee for now. I'm glad where we were a couple months ago before planning started. I'm glad with us just being us. Being Mrs. Fischbach-(l/n) would be amazing but that can wait a bit. Your mental health is important right now and so is mine. I know planning and your channel had been driving you crazy as well. I know there's so much you want to do for your channel, so do it. Expand your channel, I believe in it and in you and I'll be behind you every step of the way to catch you if you call. It's okay to scrape your knees here and there and that's what you need to do," you say.

"You're right," he says.

"Plus, are we ready for a family? I mean if we get married soon and we go on a honeymoon I'm sure we'll have an accident like last time that we won't catch this time. Last time was a close call, thank God I bought the afterpill in time," you say remembering when you and Mark had an accident after a night of fun.

"Yeah, I'm not ready for that." he says. You stand up and walk over to him. You grab his hands and put them on your waist as you straddle him. It wasn't meant in a sexual way, just innocently. He wraps his arms around you and you wrap yours around him, kissing him softly.

"I love you," you whisper in his ear.

××

Woah dramatic amirite?? Not really. I'm sorry if it was boring.

Anyways, how are you? How's life? Anything cool happen? Got anything planned? Keep up with hygiene? Are you eating well? Sleeping well?

Ive been fine lately. Taking care of children lately as well as taking in a lil too much of the devil's lettuce (Not really lol). I'm gonna go on a little ramble rn bc idk I just want to feel heard. Obviously, you can skip this if you feel like it.

Anyways, lately I've been thinking a lot about the future and it's scary. I'm glad I'm thinking about the future because it means I actually plan on being alive, so there's some progress on the depression front, but the more I think about the future, the more anxiety I feel. I mean, I'm going into my senior year of high school and I know plenty of other people have been there, done that but it's huge for me. This is my last year of regular education, from here I decide what I want to do. I legally become an adult next year and I graduate next this school year. Then I'm off to college, I mean I'm gonna do 2 years of community college here in my city but then after that, I'm hoping to go to Cal Poly or Humboldt to study Environmental Science and CP is like a three hour drive from my home and Humboldt is like an 8 hour drive from home. It's crazy. And when I do leave, I'm gonna leave everything behind for a while. I'll be slightly far from home with no one I know, I'll leave behind my cat (can't separate him from his bro) and idk it's scary. I'm gonna have to do taxes and pay bills and once im done with college, what then? Do I come back home? Do I move to another city, another state? Do I settle down? I don't know, it's scary. Enough rambling, I'm sure yall don't care.

Go ahead and ramble here.

What have you been questioning lately? What's been troubling you, I can lend my eyes and try to offer advice.

How far from adulthood are yall?

What are some fears of growing up you have?

-didn't proofread

$lanascoast$