Only

Alone

Thinking back to the first few years of his life was hard. It wasn't because he dreaded those days. Rather, it was quite the opposite. During those rare instances where he could remember the feeling of a warm blanket or his late mother's embrace, he smiled. It felt foreign on his face. Though, it was hard remembering. A thick haze blurred those memories and only those memories. While he swore to his daycare mates and his therapist that he had a great memory, those memories remained beyond his reach for most days. He is thankful for that now, but in those days, he cursed the fog that blanketed his only comfort.

In the middle of the night, covered in bruises, he held his blanket tightly. He closed his eyes and pretended it was the blanket in his memories. He wrapped his arms around himself and allowed himself to believe his mother was still with him, giving him one last warm embrace. For a brief moment, he smiles. He was there. She was there. He was once again a toddler, unaware of the world. To him, his bedroom was his world. His superhero blanket, a vivid mixture of cool and warm colors, was his fortress. She was his guardian. As long as he remained under the comfort of his covers, his guardian angel would keep him safe from all of the monsters.

His eyes opened. The dull red light of his digital clock shined into his eyes. It was mocking him. It illuminated his surroundings enough so he could see the bruises and scars on his arms. Once upon a time, he feared the clock at this hour. Its red light reminded him of the eyes of a monster from his darkest nightmares, sizing him up for slaughter. Now he hated it. It was no longer a predatory monster, but a scavenger, waiting for him to slaughter himself. It lit up his bruises, reminding him who the real monster was. It lit up his scars, as though it was asking for him to continue with his self-destruction. Worst of all, it told him he only had an hour of reprieve before it would screech, alerting the monster that he was awake.

His body was weak, but his eyes managed to dart across the room, using the red light to navigate. His eyes settled on his blanket. It was no longer held against him. It lay on the floor. No longer was it the blanket from his early years. It was a dull color with a single, homogenized hue. At the seams, it had begun to tear. His fortress was slowly falling apart. Its walls were now old and worn. Where once she had repaired his walls, there was no such maintenance now. Even when his walls fell, she had protected him. His guardian angel was now no more. Her wings had been clipped by the monster. His eyes drifted to her once radiant white clothes, buried in the depths of his closet. Slowly and quietly, he moved to the closet and clenched the clothes in his trembling hands. Once pure and untainted, it was now stained with splotches of crimson and bore tears and cuts, reminding him of how she had protected him from the monster.

Desperately, he attempted to bring himself back into the world of memories. This time, as with most times, he could not smell his vividly colored blanket. He could not see his mother. It was a haze of thoughts and sensations just out of reach. He clenched his hands as he flung his window open out of rage. Whether it was the frigid winds ripping through his room or his split second realization of what he was planning on doing, he shivered. But he persisted as he climbed up on his window sill.

His fortress had fallen. His guardian angel had left to go back to Heaven. He will follow. She had left in the same way, falling from the Hell that he currently resided in. She had told him that Hell was below the Earth, away from prying eyes. But he knew better. It was 13 stories above the cold pavement below.

He took a step and as the wind began to pick up beneath him, in the brief seconds before he could be reunited with his guardian angel, he remembered the pain he endured in the Hell that was now above him. He remembered the apathy amongst his daycare mates. He remembered the cold, analytical eye of the therapist. And he remembered her last words to him before she had disappeared in the same he was about to now. "I love you, son."

Only she told him that she loved him.