Vile Shade [Book 3] [Jeff the Killer x Reader] [JTK]

Memory 16: Stamina (Day 405)

Loud. Loud. Loud. The world is too loud. They're shouting things I don't want to hear; it hurts my ears. Don't care about the things they say. I'm morbid.

I'm not one for songs or anything, but I find rhyming words somewhat comforting. I can say them over and over in my head until the tune gets old and I don't care about them anymore. Just like how I don't care about anything that isn't my top priority. I hate the way my mind thinks, to be true and honest. I think about the past a lot, like the past I spent relocating from hospital to hospital, room to room, to be treated for an accident.

It's kinda strange how we have hospitals. I mean, we're all gonna die one day, so why bother?

"We don't live forever, Jeff!"

I... I know. Your words echo a thousand times in my head.

But lately, I've been waking up unable to move. It usually happens in the middle of the night when it's dark and your eyes make things appear as if they are floating when they aren't even there in real life. I remember last night there was a lamp that was flickering on and off and off and on and I couldn't fall back asleep, but I couldn't get up to unplug it either. When I woke up a few hours ago, the only thing in the corner of the room was the glare of the sun through the window. The lamp was never there! She doesn't own a single lamp in this house.

Sometimes I see Johnny in my stages of paralysis. He started showing up more, metaphorically (of course, I haven't physically seen him in ages), now that I've avoided everything he's been telling me to do. He says some really messed up things:

"Come on, Jeffy boy. You know that the best thing you could do is kill her. You care about your brother more than her."

And I'd reply, "It's hard to choose between the past and the future. It's just that he is part of the past, and whoever I choose is part of my future. She's destined to fall soon, but it's never really too late to save someone, right? If I can hurt people so easily, it should be easy to fix them. Right?"

Johnny doesn't approve of me thinking this way. After everything I try to tell him, he grabs me by the throat, lifts me in the air, and sucks all possibilities of revival straight from my soul. Every time. It's so reaper-like. I'm starting to believe that death literally resides within me, attracting everything from clueless individuals to its own host. And as soon as it tears apart it's own home, it will find a new one thousands of miles away in a vulnerable person wishing for the world to be different. I know for a fact that whoever receives it will become another victim of a game in which morals are separated from mind, and matter conquers the heart.

Johnny acts as if I'm a voodoo doll, and he throws me around with the flick of his finger. If you thought she was acting on behalf of what I wanted, you should consider the fact that I have been controlled this entire time by a force I can only stop by accepting the cold and solemn isolation of misery. Most of the time, I'm completely unaware that anything I'm saying or doing is what he wants rather than what I want. I'm terrified inside.

But I'm picking up speed now. With less and less sleep, it's more accepting to leave the one I hopelessly "love" alone. This account, this account with thousands of unwritten entries, will soon be subject to discrimination as well as myself. As soon as I leave her to go find my brother, I'll be blackmailed by fate to broadcast everything I know to the world and destroy it on live air. Soon, I'm going to find him.

February is more like a winter than I've ever known. I'm depressed, I'm lonely, and I've got nothing going for me than fixing one mistake out of many. This mistake is causing me to remember things that are better forgotten.

How funny. I used to believe that we're invincible, but now I wish we were simply immortal. I think I understand now why we fix things... Why we always stitch the wounds that we create. It's because we want to enjoy life while we still have it. Ultimately, there's no point, so why not use what was given to you?

It's impossible for you now... I'm so sorry.

-+-

YOU CHOOSE THE ENDING:

So this is the second time you, the reader, gets to decide what happens next in the story. Your decision will not only affect the next chapter, but it will change the outcome of the entire story. Choose wisely...

A gun or a flower? Otherwise known as the means to an end or an oblivious life respectively. Would you rather be able to fix every mistake you've ever made and be the only living person with memories of it, or would you rather forget about your mistakes and be the only person without memories of it? Which version of peace would you rather achieve?

Vote here:

I CHOOSE THE GUN.

I CHOOSE THE FLOWER.