[Mild trigger warning for deep dive analysis of depression]

Talking even briefly about Tristan had me rattled. Even though I went to my room I couldn't sleep, and I found myself pacing. Occasionally I'd try to figure out how to open the elaborate window so I could smoke, but I kept striking out. I was starting to think you couldn't--there certainly didn't seem to be any sort of lever or lock. So instead I paced around my room, plagued with horrible thoughts once more. I thought about how maybe, if given enough time, I'd get over Tristan.

Who was I kidding though, really? Time doesn't heal jack. If any quantifiable amount of time actually healed wounds, I wouldn't be as fucked in the head as I was.

I wouldn't have panic attacks. I wouldn't blurt out angry shit that I shouldn't say, even if I meant it in the moment. I'd feel, maybe, like I belonged somewhere.

That was the shitty thing about everything. For the first time ever, Tristan made me feel like I matched someone. It was a, "oh, you get me," moment. I only showed people the parts of me that I wanted them to see. I know, most people do that. Everyone strives to put their best foot forward. After a point though, I had been putting on a façade for so long I started to forget who I was to begin with.

I knew it was partially depression. Yet I couldn't nail myself down. Was I Orion Bauwens, dweebie kid back in grade school who sang in the church choir? Was I destructive Orion Bauwens who tried to trick everyone he wasn't miserable by being an absolute goof? Was I Orion Bauwens--rockstar, jazzhands--confident and sexy? Was I shameless and daring?

Was I drunken Orion Bauwens? Even drunken Orion had different facets. Was I fun Orion Bauwens, cracking jokes and making an ass out of myself? Texting people at all hours of the morning because I was plastered and actually felt good, so I got chatty? Or was I sad, drunk Orion, the one everyone felt bad for? The broken one, the pathetic, sniveling one, introspective and rambling. Or maybe I was angry drunk Orion, who snarled if you looked at him the wrong way. Orion, who wouldn't listen to reason and trash hotel rooms.

But Tristan? He was special. When my mind was a jumbled mess, and I couldn't rightly figure myself out, or what I actually meant or was feeling, he could. He took away the stress of trying to explain what was going on in my head when I myself didn't even understand it.

I knew that was a large part of where my anger came from. How do you tell people you're always sad? How do you tell people your own skull feels like Hell? How do you tell people that you'd like nothing more than to tell them what the fuck is wrong with you, but you don't even known yourself? That you're just this ball of malcontent. That my life felt like I was living in a fucking nightmare day in and day out. How do you admit that I never had anyone teach me how to love myself, so I didn't? I didn't have anyone tell me I held worth, so in my own mind I became worthless? How do you explain to people your own apathy towards yourself and your own happiness weighs heavily on your chest, day in and day out?

Those reasons are why when someone says something stupid, or that I think is stupid, I lose my patience. I get sarcastic, or I outright lose my temper. It's not even that I'm losing patience, it's that I didn't have any to begin with. All my fucks have been given already. I'm missing patience because there are so many problems...I've been through so much absolute shit...that I don't have time for stupidity.

Yeah, I sound like an egotistical maniac, like I have all the answers. But if people just married their lips sometimes and shut the fuck up and thought instead of speaking, the world would be a better place. But no, everyone is so wrapped up in their own shit, nobody cares. And that's why I took it upon myself to care.

They don't teach you how to love yourself in school. No one, except my foster mother, ever showed me true, undiluted love. I fucking know what it's like to feel unwanted and not loved. I've seen the dregs of society. So yeah, I'm a bit crass, but I have to be.

I'm like a damn porcupine. I don't want anyone near me who has bad intentions. So I'm a jerk, and I push people away. I make myself either your best friend or your worst enemy, because frankly I don't fucking have time for the in between.

My time is spent obsessing over the fact that I feel like nothing is wrong, but nothing is exactly right, either. Most days are spent either trying to forget everything, or reliving everything in excruciating details. Time to me is something that has to be delegated; I have to devote time and effort to making sure the fire inside stays brighter than the fire that's outside.

It's so exhausting having to fan those flames constantly. It's exhausting trying to keep yourself together. Mostly I feel like my brain is a spider's web, with little bits flying off in the wind as I'm trying to frantically grab them and weave them back together. Every strand lost is a piece of my composure.

I try so hard, so hard to not hurt people. I live in a constant state of fear over myself. What is the day going to bring? What stupid shit is someone I don't know going to ask me? What stupid shit is an interviewer gonna ask? What piece of myself will the general public try to chip off from me now and keep for themselves?

Every day I wish I could say these things. Every day I wish I could just tell people, "Hey, I don't feel alive, I just feel like I'm breathing." Saying shit like that worries people though, so I don't. I don't because I don't want to be a burden. I don't want to scare people by telling them I'm not okay. I don't want to tell them how some days, the word "stop" just plays over and over and over again in my head. I don't want to tell people I'm so moody because there's no end to the pain so I just try to make myself numb.

But with Tris? Fuck...I was under no pressure to make sense to him. I don't know anyone who could handle me like Tristan did. I felt like, for the first time, I might've found someone who could've saved me from my own mind.

If I could just take back everything...I wish he knew the truth of the matter was that, with him, I really was happy. I was happy, and content, and it scared me to death. So I did what I do best and tried to protect myself by burning it all to the ground. If I could just have Tristan know that for the rest of my days, from here on out, I was going to have to hide my aching heart behind a smile because I don't think I'd ever truly be happy again if I couldn't be with him. If I could send smoke signals and let him know there was now a gaping hole in my chest, and I was sorry, and admit that I had been a fool. If Tristan could only know how badly I missed what we had...How much I fucking loved him...

And yeah, part of wanting all that was selfishness. For once I wanted someone to fight for me. I was sick of having all these arguments by myself, against myself, in my head. It would be validation that there was something worth fighting for in the first place. I had started to believe that with him, and then I threw away the most perfect thing I had in my life.

I can't take the confines of my bedroom any longer. Quietly I sneak out. It takes me a while, but I find my way outside. I light up immediately, wishing for the first time I had alcohol available to me. Instead of kicking myself I just let that thought come and go, and don't hold it against myself. I mean, it's a thought I'm going to struggle with forever, might as well just acknowledge it for what it was--a shitty idea.

I've forgotten how enormous the grounds are. I wander around, enjoying the crunching gravel beneath my feet and the sounds of the night. Eventually I find what I'm looking for.

I had expected the stables to be just me and the horses. Instead I'm surprised when Scott is sitting on the ground in the dim light, legs splayed out in front of him, back leaning against one of the stable doors. I hesitate a moment, trying to decide if I should just turn around and go back in. But he sweeps his head towards me, so I decide to go join him.

I sit down next to him. He looks at me a moment before tilting his head back, resting it against the wooden door.

"Couldn't sleep?" I ask.

He lets out a heavy sigh. "Fuck no. I'm guessing you couldn't, either?"

"No," I say, going to pick at my nails but stopping once I see the nail polish. Instead I just curl my fingers on my knees, hoping Scott didn't notice.

For a while we just sit there, not saying a Goddamn thing. Scott eventually startles me by snorting. I look at him and he's chuckling, shaking his head. He's not looking at me, instead looking at the vaulted ceiling where decorative lanterns hang from black chains.

"Do you know how many times I sat, exactly in this spot right here, annihilating my liver?"

I lean my head back like he has, letting my eyes become unfocused.

"It's a lot," he tells me once enough time has elapsed where he knows I'm not going to answer him.

I look at him and focus. "What happened after your mom killed your dad?"

He looks at me, and for a moment he gives me a mean look. A look that says, 'How dare you have the audacity to ask me that?'. Yet as quickly as it came it fled, and he went back to looking at the ceiling.

"There was a trial. My sister and I lived with my mom's mom for a while. It dragged on and on, and then when it was finally decided the act was justifiable, we were released back into the custody of our mom."

"And?"

He laughs viciously at me. "And what? That's it." He put his head back again. "We never really spoke about it. She apologized for what she had done, and it wasn't spoken about again."

My eyes go wide. Suddenly, everything about him made sense. "Holy shit."

Scott looks at me evenly then, squinting his eyes like he's trying to decipher my very soul. "What're you doing out here, Bauwens?"

So I tell him. I tell him all the things I want to tell people on a day to day basis. I tell him how everything is such a painful mess in my head. How there's just this static jumble of self-deprecating shit that tumbles around m head about myself day in, day out.

And I explain to him everything I was thinking about Tristan.

And by the end of it I'm crying, and he has his arm slung over my shoulders, and I hate it. I hate being so weak in front of him. I hate being so vulnerable because all it's ever given me is pain, and I don't want Scott to use my feelings against me one day. I know he wouldn't, but that fear is a constant in the back of my head.

Yet for the first time, breaking apart feels good.