Emma

Chapter 21

Cole let the breeze fill his ears as he rode to nowhere in particular. 

He wasn't mad, well he was, but he just didn't seem to want to remember why. The feeling of her palms on his cheek still seemed to distract him much more than he liked to admit.

It just calmed him.

She just soothed him.

Everything about her, she was just so calming and he couldn't even explain the measures on how sedative her mere presence was. It didn't completely kill all his worries, but it did take a very large chunk of it out.

Just her smile, her voice, her touch, her in general, she made his head spin in the most satisfying way he could ever imagine.

He was ready to jump Jake, to lash out on him with partially no regrets. 

And be a murderer just like you always prove to be. 

His fist tightened round the handlebar at the feel of the voice.

Sure he still felt it, he still felt the taunting voice reminding him that he deserved literally nothing good, but it wasn't as much as usual.

The only time he couldn't feel it at all, the time when even if it tried to voice out it always seemed so distance, was when he was reading, not just any book, but a particular pink book. 

A book won't save you.

It was like the voice had buried into his head and was reading his thoughts, reading his fears and voicing them out. 

He rode faster and faster. 

Wasn't this thing ever going to go? Ever disappear and just live him in peace. 

You don't deserve peace.

His grip tightened more if possible and his knuckles began to turn white. Why was he even angry in the first place? He could remember Jake said something, but he tried not to remember what he said, knowing that it would only fuel his rage.

His fist twisted on the handlebar, his head banging as he let out a shaky breath. There was a pang in his chest, a deep pain. It felt like when you hit your foot on something wooden; it was painful in a way that he felt nothing at the same time. It was the paralyzing pain that he felt so many times but still never got used to it.

He wasn't angry anymore, he didn't know what he was. He was confused. He didn't know why he felt the way he did.

He didn't know why his feelings changed when he looked at her, he didn't know what his feelings changed to, and they just confused him.

One moment he is ready to break someone into pieces and then just a glance at her, just the mere thought of her, it just deflated everything, and it confused him.

He sped up the bike as though the faster he went the more understanding he would gain, his thoughts flew different directions, so many unanswered questions floating all around. The hammering in his head only increased, and the thought of never getting an answer, grew his frustration. 

Why, why why.

There were just so many things he needed answers to, and he hated the thought that some of those things he'd never get to know what they were or what the answers to them were, he hated the fact that he even wanted to know, he just wished he could walk freely, without thoughts flooding his head, without worries and without doubts...Without fears. 

It annoyed him. 

It angered him, and worse of all. 

It scared him.

He went faster and faster. He forgot, forgot everything that might happen, forgot everything that had happened and completely forgot everything that was happening now.

The darkness began to slowly seep in, he could hear a tiny voice trying to tell him something, but all his thoughts chocked it and just the mere thought of how to make room or space just to hear that tiny voice annoyed him. It frustrated him and added more and more confusion into his head.

He could hear it choking, struggling to get out, struggling for just a small outlet to be voiced aloud, but the darkness just grew stronger and stronger as everything began to fade away.

Then he heard it.

His grip loosened and his teeth that he didn't even know he was gritting together abruptly stopped. It took him all the remaining strength that he had not to completely freeze. The tiny voice finally whispered out.

"It's not worth it." 

 Just the feel of her voice triggered it, it calmed him, it did not completely calm him, but it calmed him enough for him to realize what he was doing.

He realized that it wasn't the world going dark, it wasn't his surrounding fading away, but it was him, it was his brain that had slowly began to shut down. He had slowly begun to fade away, to go absolutely dark. It wasn't fainting. It was just the state of complete and utter oblivion and that was what had happened the last night, he had begun to shut down.

"It's not worth it." 

The voice spoke over and over again in his head, slowly becoming louder and louder and blocking away any more thoughts. He focused on it and it was as though he could feel it again. 

Feel her.

Feel the soft palm of her hand gently against his cheek, feel the gentle pressure of her deep brown eyes burning into his own, see the small smile on her face begging him to stop. 

"It's not worth it." He sighed and began to slow down.

He didn't want to see that look anymore, that look that had filled her face, the look of pure worry. He hated it and he didn't want to be the cause of it. She didn't have to feel bad just because he decided to do something stupid, he didn't want her to care about him at all, but he knew that if she didn't, he wouldn't have a reason to stop.

He concentrated on her voice, concentrated on her eyes, concentrated on the smile that played on her lips. It may not have completely extinguished the fire burning in his chest but it had stopped the fuel from pouring.

He let out another sigh, this one way more relaxed and less tensed up, those four words ringing in his head over and over and over again, making room for just the right amount of space. 

"It's not worth it."

A/N

Idk why, but I'm really proud of this chapter 😅