If I Stay✔️

39

A/N: I still need songs for Eleo, suggestions pls x

trigger warning: mentions of suicide, sexual assault, rape, mental illness, problems with food (possible ed), marco, drugs.

The atmosphere was tense, the only sound heard between the ragged breaths and hallway noise, was the clock as it ticked loudly from it's place on the wall above Leo's bed, the ticks rhythmic and in sync: like a steady heartbeat.

"Marco?" Callan broke the silence, his voice shaky and choked with emotion: mostly guilt, whilst his eyes were angry and red with water dripping from the corner of his lids. "For two years? He's been-he's been hurting you for two whole years?"

Slowly, Leo nodded, he couldn't bring himself to look up, to look into Callan's ice like blues, to fearful of the judgement and disappointment he was so adamant he'd see.

Ignoring the hot searing pain that flared in his torso, he shuffled himself to the left side of his bed, putting as much space as he could between himself, Zac and Grey. Despite his body's protest, he pulled his knees to his chest, curling his arms around his thighs, he buried his face in the scratchy blue blanket that shielded his bottom half, rocking himself back and forth in an attempt to settle his overwhelming mind.

The sound of crashing filled his ears, that followed by muffled yelling, Ace's tone distinguishable amongst the chaos. "I'll kill him, I will fucking kill him."

This is all your fault.

"Ace, calm down." He heard Grey say, his tone tired and tainted with sadness, the sound making Leo's stomach clench with guilt.

You wanted it and now look what you've done, they're falling apart because of you.

"I didn't want too." Leo whimpered, moving his hands to his ears, pressing them palm flat against them, praying to drown out the whispers. "I didn't want too, I didn't want too, I didn't want too." He repeated, over and over again, rocking himself harder, the pain in his stomach intensifying, his whimpers escalating to sobs.

Ace stilled in his carnage, pulling his bloodied fist from the new hole he'd made in the drywall, his head turned to Leo as his words hit him like a tone of bricks. Here I am in a fit of blinded rage and my brother is struggling, traumatised. How could I be so selfish?

"Le, we know." Ace said as softly as he could, "we know you didn't, no one blames you, this isn't your fault." He paused, hesitantly shuffling closer to the bed, placing his hand on the edge of the sheet and gripped the end tightly. "You're so strong, Le, and we're so fucking proud of you, we always have been. Everything will be okay."

We're so proud of you, we always have been, but those words didn't help, they'd done the opposite of what Ace had hoped, because to Leo, that would mean that everything had been for nothing. That all the pain Marco had inflicted, had been for something that was already there— had always been there.

He's lying, just like you are.

"I'm not lying," Leo shook his head rapidly, "I'm not."

You wanted it, you wanted him.

"That's not true," Leo wheezed, the phantom hands around his nape feeling more and more like a noise. As the voices grew louder, the rope only tightened and his airway became near nonexistent. "You're lying," he repeated, with a bit less conviction than the first.