Problems

|| Chapter 29 ||

TW: suicidal thoughts/actions, talk of past self-harm, eating disorders, panic attack, implied smut (yeah sorry not writing smut since Alex is underage, not to mention that these were actual men at some point and that's sorta creepy)

Am I posting this at 3 am? Yessir.

X

The railing was smooth underneath his palm, freezing cold in the icy wind. Water thundered down below him, and the spray flew high into the air, sending up a chilly mist that created a cloud-like effect over the river.

Alex put his foot on the bottom rail and stepped up, then swung his other leg over the edge. He sat, hands braced out beside him on the top rail, and let his legs swing over the chasm.

He blinked out into the abyss.

He felt absent. Floaty. There wasn't anything there, really, not anymore. Just absence. He was hollow, but that wasn't the right word, was it?

It's never the right words.

One step.

One push.

One fall.

He was going to die.

That was something Alex knew. He knew a lot of things. He knew that the Mariana Trench was 36,070 feet deep. He knew that the Latin word for blue was caeruleum. He knew he had depression.

He knew he was going to die. John was going to die. Hercules, Laf, Eliza, Angelica, Peggy. They would all die, at some point. Some sooner rather than later.

Maybe you will be sooner.

It didn't matter.

He was going to die.

Or maybe he was already dead. He'd been out here enough, been in this same spot, many times. How did he know he wasn't already dead? How did he know he hadn't jumped? Is John already in a crisp black suit, staring down into a casket? Are Johns tears falli-

Don't think about John.

Breathe in.

Breathe out.

Silence surrounded him, so different from the noise and life of the college.

He didn't feel alive. He felt empty.

Was this real?

Was any of this real anymore?

Footsteps crunched on the path behind him, crackling in the snow.

"Alex?"

John.

He stayed silent. There was nothing to say.

A hand landed on his shoulder, covered in a glove. John's glove.

Alexander focused on the snow melting through his sweater, cool on his feverish skin.

"What're you doing here, Alex?" John asked softly, and Alex shrugged.

It was quiet for a few beats. Then-

"Do you ever think about what it would be like if we were gone?" he said suddenly, still staring out into the darkness.

John's eyebrows furrowed down into a concerned look, and his eyes flickered between Alex's frail hand on the rail to the rushing water down below.

"What do you mean?" he asked carefully, and Alex shook his head a little, a blank expression on his face.

"I dunno, just...gone. Like-like dying or something...Or nothing, I guess. I don't know. If you were just gone," he rambled, and a stab of fear sparked in John's chest.