LOVE IS GONE
dylan matthew, slander
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↻ ◁ II ▷ ↺
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It had been an exact week since the quartet had been to the ice skating rink - a day that had gone amazingly well but, unfortunately, had ended on a puzzlingly negative note.
Nyx walked down the deserted hallway with half of her attention fixated upon reliving the memory of how this same time last week, Warren had convinced her and Azriel to give in to his plan of having a nice evening out.
Now here she was, seven days later, without either of them by her side.
What made this day worse was the awaiting counseling session that she was currently headed for. She didn't have an excuse to skip it now that the new counselor was here.
Nyx's sneakers tapped against the marble floors rhythmically with every dreadful step she took closer to the place she'd always wanted to escape from. Her gloved hands were hidden beneath the draping sleeves of her baggy flannel. Habitually, only one of her crew socks was pulled up to its full length while the other was left in rolls around the lining of her shoes.
She wanted nothing more than to turn around and leave, but she knew she couldn't.
However, it wasn't just some compulsion holding the nyctophile back.
It was an ember of hope of seeing a certain raven-haired boy with the most magical eyes that was pulling her with a force unimaginable.
Azriel had been avoiding Nyx ever since that incident at the rink.
Every vein in him was coursing in protest, his beaten heart was howling longingly in the pit of loneliness it was trapped in, every mending bruise of his was screaming at him to go back to his person with a healing touch.
None of these feelings, though, were strong enough even as a whole in comparison to the haunting echoes of the raven monster's resurfacing past.
Damian was a terrifying reminder of it all.
Everything was progressing at a steady rate, the pair's strings had only started tightening, even Azriel had slowly but willingly started accepting his feelings.
So, Nyx knew that it was something about the green-golden-eyed serpent that had thrown him over the edge, so deep down that back then he could find no way or reason to push back.
It was dominant enough to have cracked their building shell.
A friendly tap on her shoulder shifted the brunette's attention from her racing thoughts and brought her awareness back into focus.
Switching off her worries, for the time being, Nyx turned her head to her right to find the source.
"Hello to my favorite bookworm." Warren grinned down at her, his dimples winking.
It comforted Nyx greatly how he hadn't cut ties with her the way his best friend had. She was relieved to not have lost one of her handful of friends.
Smiling a little, the girl pointed out, "You look chirpy like always."
Shrugging once, the aureate listed, "School's out, it's the weekend, I don't have practice till Monday, I can finally go home and have one of my 'eating till I'm bloating' episodes that I haven't had time for, possibly take a long nap that's as good as hibernation - what's not to be happy about?"
He succeeded in making his shorter friend let out a hearty laugh at his blabbering, and it flattened his adorable grin into a content smile.
"Want me to drive you home or to the diner on my way back?" Warren offered.
"I would've taken you up on that if I hadn't gotten my bike to school. Plus, I have to go see one of my teachers since I dozed off during class," Nyx replied, fluently lying about the second part.
She wasn't ready to let anyone know that she had 'issues' that needed professional help.
Warren nodded, "That sucks. I would've waited for you if you didn't have your bike."
Still not used to someone caring so much, Nyx appreciated softly, "Thank you,"
"Anyway, I'll see you later. Don't get in too much trouble with that teacher, and get home safe!" Warren bid goodbye, bringing his head down to lightly bump it against Nyx's.
The cinnamon head chuckled at how loveable her friend was. She waved and watched as he jogged off in the opposite direction.
It was only minutes later that Nyx found herself in the coldest, loneliest corner of Auradon High.
As soon as the counselor's office came into sight, both, her feet and heart came to an abrupt halt when her blazing eyes found what she had silently been looking for all along. The pit in her stomach was greater than the relief she felt upon recognizing who it was.
Motionlessly slumped in one of the seats, artistically disconnected from the world, was Azriel.
His eyes were curtained, tuning out his surroundings without much effort. His head was tilted back to rest against the wall right behind him, maybe it was because of how heavy it felt with the burden of the havoc going on inside it. He looked like the nyctophile's favorite night, one that she could only imagine but never touch, like a starless sky that she would kill to see, a night that comforted her, yes, but also scared her. He was wearing the hooded denim jacket that he had let her borrow when they had shared the same sky.
Nyx gulped down the urge to ramble her heart out, to confront him as to why he had shut her out, and quietly sat down, leaving an empty seat between them.
The girl didn't know if he was aware of her presence or not, and even if he was, he did absolutely nothing to acknowledge it.
Nyx took this time and their silence to digest how relaxed his eyes looked when they weren't glaring at someone, his lips looked so delicate when they weren't cussing someone out, his limbs looked so limp when they weren't beating the life out of someone.
Little did Nyx know that what she thought was Azriel's wonderland was a hell of his own.
She knew that the raven monster had something disturbing inside of him, she knew that there was a demon reigning over his being, twisting his mind and beating his heart till all of him bled.
This very creature had abused him into thinking that he turned the happiness of the land he walked on into dust, it had tortured him into thinking that his touch was fire, that he was capable of burning down the world, that nothing could ever be powerful enough to be worse than him.
All the nyctophile had ever wanted to do since she'd laid eyes on the boy was to pull out this demon - which, unbeknownst to her, was a savored figment of all that had ruined him - and crush it into many unimportant pieces till there was nothing but ashes left of it.
She wanted to show him that he mattered. She wanted him to know that he made her world a better place.
The door on Nyx's left opened, startling her out of her absentmindedness and calling for her attention. She turned her head to the side and looked up to see who it was.
Azriel didn't bother opening his eyes or moving even a little, he stayed still as a cloudless sky.
"Hey," the third person greeted. "Nyx Hayden and Azriel Logan, right?"
Nyx felt lost for words for a couple of moments as she stared at the man looking down at her.
His dirty blond hair was parted to one side, there was a polite warmth gleaming in his honey brown eyes, the smile on his lips was friendly in greeting.
It took a few seconds to remember where she'd seen him before until she realized that she had bumped into him at the skating rink.
Back then, only one of them knew the other, and it wasn't her.
Knowing that Azriel wouldn't reply, at least not nicely, Nyx nodded and returned a small smile.
"I'm having everyone pair up for a joined introductory session. You two happen to be the last ones, come on in." the new counselor informed and held the door open for the pair, waiting for them to follow him inside his office.
"What the fuck's a joined session?" Azriel scoffed, finally coming back to the real world.
The man didn't flinch at the boy's tone or words, he didn't address it either. Instead, he kept his voice calm like it initially was and explained, "It's only for today. Think of it as a way of making friends with someone based on our problems and maybe even relating to them,"
Nyx risked taking a glance at Azriel only to see his jaw clenched.
"We don't relate to each other in any fucking way," he snapped.
The brunette swallowed the lump in her throat and looked away, balling her clothed fists to keep herself composed and not let the hurt show.
The blond, on the other hand, knew just how to handle the situation. "How about you two come in and we'll see about that?" he suggested.
Nyx was half expecting for Azriel to get up and storm away, but he simply stood up, swung his bang around his left shoulder, pulled the sleeves of his denim jacket down to his fingers, and, without bothering to even glance at the girl, walked inside the room.
Blinking in the direction he disappeared in, Nyx got up too and followed after him.
A minute later, Nyx and Azriel were seated next to each other in different chairs, looking expectantly at the man sitting on the other side of the desk separating them.
"I'm Jonah Miller, your new counselor," the dirty blond introduced himself, a comforting smile on his structured lips.
Nyx didn't know what to say in reply because one, he already knew who she was; two, she didn't even want to be here; and three, the air in the room was growing intolerably awkward.
Azriel, on the other hand, sat there with an annoyed face. His head was tilted to rest against the support of his thumb, index, and middle fingers - his posture screamed 'impatiently uninterested'.
"So," Jonah began. "Are you two friends?"
Before Nyx could even process the question, Azriel had already answered, "No."
Jonah's brows rose questioningly at this, he clearly didn't buy it, but he chose not to act on it.
He focused on Nyx and gave her a reassuring nod. She didn't know what it was for at first, but when he spoke to her, she understood that he was telling her to trust what he was doing.
"Nyx, how's everything been at home?"
It's all falling apart, she wanted to say.
"Like it's been for a while now," is what she said instead.
She was being honest, she was admitting that the situation was as bad as it had been for a long time. It surprised her that she was completely abandoning the pocket of lies she brought along. She did, though, feel relieved that she didn't have to go too much into detail and was able to answer in a way that didn't give away a lot.
"Your parents, what about them?" Jonah asked further in gentle tone.
Playing with her wrist gloves and without meeting his brown eyes, Nyx answered, "Not getting any better."
Jonah pointed his chin in the direction of Nyx's hands, "Those are some nice gloves. I don't see a lot of people wearing them,"
The girl shook her head, "Maybe a lot of people don't like them as much as I do."
She tried her hardest to not let Azriel's burning gaze make her crumble, she could feel his narrowed eyes locked on the side of her face, but she knew she couldn't look.
Sure, she was being briefly honest unlike she had planned, but she never wanted anyone to find out that she had moments where she'd lose control to the point where hurting herself didn't feel like a wrong choice.
She hardly ever did it, but when she did, she hated herself for it.
The scars on her knuckles weren't signs of lost hope, no. They were reflections of her bottled-up emotions that roared in frustrated anger.
Jonah knew that it ran a lot deeper than Nyx was letting on, but he didn't want to prod any further just yet.
So, he turned his eyes to the boy sitting next to her, "Moving on to you, Azriel,"
Jonah then asked Azriel a question that shook Nyx to the core of her senses.
"Have you tried smoking recently?"
The girl's eyes widened and her head whipped to the side in Azriel's direction. He, unlike her, sat perfectly composed despite the question, still looking dry as ever.
"So what if I do?"
"I guess you and I both know who's life will be at stake, then, don't we? You'll be responsible for killing yourself." Jonah reminded.
Not fazed by this information, Azriel informed, "It'll take a lot more than cigarettes to kill me, Miller,"
Jonah didn't mind the disrespectful use of his last name.
"It takes time, yes. But that's it, isn't it? Slow death - the most painful sort," he replied.
Azriel shook his head, "I don't fucking care. Everyone's dying a slow death - we're all only living to get closer to the end."
It scared the older man to think how a kid was using such heavy words. What was more was that he sounded like he meant what he said, that he believed in it.
It was terrifying.
Jonah leaned forward in his seat and placed his elbows on the arms of his wing chair, bringing his hands together and knotting his fingers. With a challenging glint in his warm eyes, he dared to look the raven monster right in the eye.
"Isn't it disturbing, Azriel, how you don't care that you're killing yourself so slowly? Doesn't it scare you, being your own culprit?"
Azriel's voice held equal quest in it as he narrowed his mystical eyes, "I'm giving in to the inevitable, Miller. I'm not a coward to run from it like everybody else."
Jonah disagreed with the boy.
"Giving in is what's cowardly. Waking up every day to face the hurdles that life puts in your way is what takes real courage, simply turning your back to them is the easy way out,"
All this while, Nyx had been listening uncomfortably.
She was unsure of where this conversation was heading. There was so much going on in the room, so many things she'd thought of and some she hadn't even imagined.
"Thinking about death and accepting it is what takes the courage that you're talking about. Do you know what's easy? Sitting on the other side of the desk and watching it all happen," Azriel corrected in a dangerously deep voice.
"There's always a solution to that. Instead of spending your time trying to find reasons as to why you should end it for yourself, open your eyes to all that there is to survive for," Jonah advised collectedly, clearly not satisfied with how high he had gotten on the boy's nerves.
Azriel stood up abruptly. Nyx grabbed her bag to chase after him in case he decided to run away.
"Listen to me, Miller. For me, there's more to leave for than to fucking stay for. You're just someone with a degree that permits you to dig limitlessly deeper into a person's worst horrors. You get your satisfying kicks out of making people relive their darkest memories, by forcing them to sink further into the void they're struggling to surface from. So you might want to rethink just who's braver between the two of us - you, who preaches life by tossing around professionally unhelpful advice, or me, someone who actually has to survive the absolute shit show you put me through,"
Azriel's voice was ablaze with fury, his gorgeous eyes were storming with raging lightning.
Throwing his bag around his shoulder, Azriel stood up and turned around to walk over to the door.
Before pulling it open, though, he said over his shoulder, "When you're someone like me, you don't need cigarettes to do the job for you. All that you are is more than enough,"
Then, he left.
Without wasting a breath, Nyx immediately stood up and hastily latched her trembling fingers around her bag, holding on to it while making a run for the door.
There was a deafening frequency screeching in her ears, she didn't know if it was her blood that was pounding or her heart that was punching at her chest, her insides were constricting with so much worry after sitting through that revealing conversation between Jonah and Azriel.
"Azriel!" she called out desperately to the boy who had made it only a few steps away from her.
He stopped immediately, restraining every part of himself that wanted to go back to her, and stayed without turning around.
She jogged over to him, standing right in front of him, shorter and smaller.
"Don't go," Nyx whispered.
At that moment, she didn't know if she was asking for him to come back to the counselor's room or begging him to be here, breathing and alive.
Azriel's stormy irises met the girl's glassy ambers, casting aside the mask of insensitivity and letting the world see just how lifeless they were. There was no coldness in his eyes, no, there was only a plead for help.
He was screaming to be helped.
Yet, somehow, he looked defeated, like he had given up long ago.
"I have to," When he spoke, his voice trembled with all the emotion he'd been denying for so long.
Nyx shook her head, her lips shivering, "No. You don't."
Azriel then reached his bandaged hand out. Fisting his palm around Nyx's top, he gently pulled her close to him.
His rumbling voice fell to a murmur as he said softly, "I have to get away from you. Staying is suffocating,"
Nyx held onto his jacket while blinking away her tears, "I'm sorry. I'll make it better, don't leave."
The raven monster dropped the smallest of smiles, it was so sad, it shone with no strength, just a flicker of lost hope. Bringing his forehead down to rest it against the nyctophile's own, he confessed.
"My world's small, Nyx, and you're all the good in it."
Even though he was making his demon unhappy by finally letting his heart overpower it, he knew that in the end, the creature would win.
"I'm what's wrong, and so I have to push you away. You deserve all the light in the world, Nyx, and nothing hurts more than knowing that I can never be it. I'm just not it. I'm not enough and you're worth a lot more than only that," one tattered soul told the other.
Azriel didn't want to let her go just yet, he was convinced that unlike before, this was the last time he was going to see her.
This was his last memory with her.
That was all it took for both of them to close their eyes and seal their lips, wanting nothing more than to feel each other, foreheads touching, breathing synchronized like a broken melody.
After what felt like forever, the boy finally loosened his grip around the girl's shirt before completely letting it go, taking a step back and plunging himself back into the real world - a place he desired an escape from.
His gaze was so weary, so weak, it almost made her knees give out.
But she stood strong.
Swallowing a painful cry down her choking throat, she watched the overthrown monster move further away from her with that same, crippled smile.
With glistening eyes, Azriel conceded, "You'll always be my light."
Nyx didn't know how to stop him as she stood there and watched him fade into the darkness of the hallway. When he was gone, she felt like she'd lost all her stars as if the night wasn't hers anymore, she felt powerless, even her moon lay crying.
Nothing felt right.
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