My Nothing

Chapter #7

I'm in my room at Watford when my dream materializes. Baz is there, of course. He's always there. Sometimes I won't leave bed just so I can be with him -- a heartbreaking echo of him -- even if he comes to tell me everything I'm doing wrong. Because I love him. I'm tripping head over heels for a Pitch -- a vampire -- who isn't even alive anymore. I suppose he wasn't alive before, being a vampire and all, but he was so full; of everything, really. Magic, fire, personality, opinions. And he wanted to end it. End himself. And I helped him on his way. I saved him, but in the end, I helped him along. I am the reason that Baz is dead. Maybe everyone would be better off if I joined him. Just as I think it, dream-Baz knocks me to the floor and takes my head clean off. I wake up sobbing.

A thunderous banging wakes me up; I must've fallen back asleep. When I don't respond to the knocking, the Mage walks in.

"Simon," he chides. "You were due back in class yesterday."

"It seems pointless. You'd be better off kicking out your 'Chosen One', and just find a new one. I'm flawed and broken. I know you think so."

"None of this means that you can't learn like everyone else, Simon."

"I'm not going to class just so that Niall can mock me. So that he can shout to the rooftops that I love Baz. That I'm gay. I don't even know that it's true myself, but they all seem to have me figured out. I'm not going back to that. There's no damn way."

"Watch your mouth, Simon Snow."

"Does it bother you that I fell in love with the enemy? That I fell in love with a boy? Does it bother you?" I snap. It catches him off-guard. I snicker at it. Of course the Mage is fucking homophobic. It just makes too much sense. Maybe Baz was right about it all along.

"Yeah. I thought so." I storm past him and walk out the door. I'm headed towards the Catacombs. That's always where I'm headed lately. The only difference is that today, I'm not planning on leaving. This time, I want to join Baz's bones. Maybe Le Tombeau des Enfants will be a proper place for me.

Slipping through the secret door in the White Chapel, I slink down the narrow and winding pathways. I collapse at the door to Baz's grave. Baz. I should've died, not you. It was never supposed to be you. I'm a sorry excuse for a magician, and, well -- you. You were so vastly talented. I cry and I cry and I cry. A sound reaches the edge of my consciousness, but I couldn't care less.

I blink through tears at the Mage. He's standing above me, yanking me roughly up to my feet.

"You don't walk out on me, Simon. I was talking to you."

"Actually, you weren't. You were staring at me open-mouthed, sorta like this." I make the face he did when I said that I loved Baz. The Mage doesn't respond -- just drags me farther. He roughly shoves me out of the Catacombs.

"Stop blubbering, you crybaby," the Mage snaps at me. Honestly, I can't. The stupid tears only pour from me faster.

I'm dragged into a building I'm rarely ever in -- The Weeping Tower. The Mage forces me through foreign doorways, until I'm so spun around I'm not sure where north is. I think I"m somewhere underground, but even that I'm not sure of. A heavy iron door or two later, we arrive at the intended destination. There are locks and chains lying on the ground, and not a drop of light filters, natural nor artificial. I'm thrown on the ground and the massive door slams, followed by the next, and the next, the cacophonous sounds fading into the distance. I tremble, swathed in eternal darkness.