So Your Heart Of Gold Turned Platinum, You Can Take My Life, But You Can't Take It With You

-TRIGGER WARNING-

I think I want to die, but I'm not really sure. Everything just seems like one bad nightmare that no matter how hard I try, I just can't wake up from. Waking up from life itself seems to be a reality bending concept that makes me sick and dizzy from just glancing my mind over it momentarily.

It's haunting me, following me wherever I go, and I just can't stop it, no matter how hard I try; these thoughts, they're everywhere. They manifest inside of me, and inside of everything around me. They live in me, and they breathe the same struggled breaths of oxygen, because the thoughts are inside of me and there isn't a single doubt about that.

I write it, regardless, because I think I'll need it. I don't like to write it out onto paper in the real world; I don't want to realise this all, but I have to because drifting thoughts and broken hearts are no good when I'm gone.

I choose red ink.

Red is after all, my favourite colour. It's the colour of blood and nights alone that Vic Fuentes can't do anything about.

He likes to think he can control the whole world and in particular, my emotions, but he really can't do anything but be another pathetic bystander. Bystanders irritate me, but they're certainly preferable to interrupters, and people that do something about this mess. I like this mess, and it's certainly sadistic, but this is my mess and I live inside it.

This mess is my home and as the red drips down the walls I don't ever want to open that door to reality. I don't even want to open a window; I always keep the shutters closed, but somehow Vic had managed to rip through them and sit on my window sill, looking into this house, my home, but he can never quite get in, because I'll never quite let him.

A part of me wants nothing more than to let him in and watch as he holds my hand and tries his best to fix everything, but things don't work like that. He'll only stare at the red, he won't even wash it off the walls, let alone fixing the leaky pipe.

He doesn't know that it's all under the surface; it's external damage, but internal torment. I can't blame him though, he thinks I'm external, as that's all he sees - he'll never see the inside, so I think he deserves to read this letter at the very least.

The paper's lined and without wrinkles, it looks far too perfect, crisp white clean, so I grab a lighter and set fire to it. I don't know why. It looks kind of pretty, I guess. I don't particularly like fire, or well, I'm not a pyromaniac by any means. I just like to watch the whole world burn, but I want the flames to engulf me too.

I think about setting fire to myself. I wonder how flammable human skin is and the lighters pressed against my arm, but I don't think I'll do this; I need an arm to write with and not just a scorched corpse. Because I know I won't stop the flames once I start, in fact the paper's blackening now. And it doesn't quite concern me as much as it should.

I'm aware that the paper could burn to the point of illegibility, so I put it out with some tap water. The paper's drenched afterwards, so I dry it with my hair dryer and soon enough, it's dry, crisp, crumpled and suitably burned. I prefer it this way and I'm simply not sure why. I just like destructive things, because maybe I can relate to them.

Now, I have to write. I'm nervous, of course, but eager at the same time. I don't know if I'll spend forever getting this perfect or whether the words will just flow right onto the page like the red flows at night. I want it to be done, all over easily and simply so I can get onto the fun part, but I know I'm incompetent and it won't be like that it'll barely begin tonight.

I get my red, it's a biro. It's a teacher's biro - I stole it from a supply teacher. I don't feel guilty in the slightest. I think maybe I should. A lack of guilt is a lack of living. I should be sorry, maybe I should make myself sorry.

Maybe the colour red shouldn't overpower me to the point it makes me a thief, but the colour red is overpowering and it's who I am. I shouldn't go around stealing biros though, I can make my own red and I should be satisfied with that, but somehow I'm still not.

I don't know how to start, do I apologise? Do I address it someone in particular, or a more broad audience. It's not like a have a broad audience of people that'll actually care about my dying words. I'll have a 'Thank God He's Dead' party as opposed to a funeral I think.

Hello.

That sounds pathetic, like a casual chat, like I'm talking to a friend, a casual greeting towards a stranger. Not the first of my last words... it doesn't feel like that at all. I don't think I even deserve last words, I think I shouldn't end with a bang, but a whimper, because I don't deserve a spectacular ending, I deserve to just vaporise into nothingness like the rest of reality.

So I try something else. I try new words and I wonder if somehow they can manage to serve me better. I doubt it, as I doubt my luck, but I try nonetheless.

I'm sorry.

The problem is that I'm not, and I don't particularly like lying- well, I'm not severely opposed to it, but these are my last words and they should be truthful, they should matter, they should count. I don't like not being sorry but there's there little I can do to fix the blatantly obvious.

To whoever it may concern.

Now, that sounds like the start to an letter written for the Victorian era - it sounds like an English assessment, it sounds like this is all fake, all good and fucking fake, but it's not fake, everything is far too real, and there's very little I can do regarding that matter.

Maybe the world would be better if this dilemma of mine was irrelevant and just pretend. Maybe I want to be pretend myself. I don't want to be real, because reality isn't where I belong and that's awfully clear.

I don't even belong within the pits of hell or the clouds of heaven or maybe I'll just drift in purgatory. Neither of them sound particularly enticing, but at least I fit in with the dead folk, because I feel like a walking zombie, living a lie right now. Wanting to die is certainly perplexing, but it's a complex matter so who could expect it to be anything but complex in all.

To Vic.

Somehow, this sounds better, this sounds more real, but it's missing something. I need everyone I mildly care about.

To Vic, Mum, Dad, Christa, and Maia.

That's five people, I think... I think that'll suffice. I put Christa despite the fact I'm talking to lisp girl, and not her, but it's how I assume she'd prefer to be addressed by. Maia was an odd one, Maia really isn't conventionally my friend, she doesn't even know about half of this shit, but I care about her, and maybe I want her to know.

Maia is important to me somehow and I don't even care that it doesn't go both ways, because once I'm gone there isn't a second way to go. So things do work out in the end. I won't leave a hole in reality, because I'm rather detached from it right now. I've been work on things lately so I'm not important to anyone, so that I'm not a fixed point and maybe, just maybe, people won't notice when I'm gone.

The other three go on there without question; my parents and Vic deserve to know. Even if Vic got himself into this mess accidentally, he stubbornly refuses to leave, so he'll get this. If he didn't want it, he shouldn't be here in my life, sitting on the window sill, looking in with wide eyes and bitten lips.

I'm writing to inform you that I've died.

Now that just sounds pretentious, like I don't care, like I'm telling them I lost my dog or found some money on the ground. But I'm not writing for either of these things, I'm writing, because... I've found myself in an awful god complex, where pulling the trigger on myself is the only foreseeable way out.

I try that. It sounds good in my head, maybe it'll sound good on paper, but I don't know. Things in your head can drift away and be gone within seconds, but things on paper are all the more permanent - you can rip paper up, burn it and throw it away, but the words would always have been imprinted into it.

They're always there, a part of reality forever, but now... it's not like that. I can destroy cells within my own head far too easily with a loaded shot gun.

I'm writing this letter because I'm in a god complex, and pulling the trigger to my own head is the only thing I can do.

It sounds far too poetic, but I roll with it. Maybe poetic is good. I don't know - I'm not exactly an expert at this kind of thing, and if anyone is, then they're truly a sadist, and I don't think I'm usually one to judge. I don't think I quite have the god complex for it, but within moments like this, when you put your death between your own teeth like a metaphor, you really have the god complex.

Because you can end it all. People say suicide victims don't go to heaven, because they defied the whole world, they defied God himself, but I think if there is a God he should have made their world bright enough for them to not go out like this.

Or maybe he should just wake up and realise that we're not puppets in his little game, we're people, and we're made to defy everything and anything just because we can.

All five of you are important, because I chose you out of all seven billion people on the planet to write to.

That sounds weird, I wouldn't write to anyone else, and they know that, they all know how much of a waste I am, they don't need informing, they don't want to know. I don't think anyone really wants to know, but part of me almost screams for this letter to be written.

I think maybe I'll do separate letters, one to Vic, one to Mum & Dad, one to Maia, and one to lisp girl, or Christa. It'd be so much more writing, but so much easier, because I don't want my mum to see half the things I want to say to Vic, or Maia to see half the things I want to say to my dad. Things need to be private, even to the grave.

They'll probably have to end up sharing letters though, because my parents will want to understand more, they'll want to see what I've written to my 'friends'. Vic might just show them, Christa will. Maia won't. I know Maia won't. Maia just hates adults, and it'll be more to spite everyone over the age of about twenty five rather than to respect my privacy.

I start to wonder about my funeral, I want a burial, I think. Maybe cremation would be better, my body would still be a waste of space upon this unholy planet, but then, it'd no longer be my problem. I wouldn't want my ashes kept on someone's mantel piece or something though - that'd just be really fucking creepy.

They could burn my body if they wanted, I didn't mind. Maybe I should state that in one of the letters, aren't you kind of required to state what happens to your body after you die? Or is that lawyer stuff? I don't care. I might just scribble 'blast my fucking body into space' or something like that at the bottom.

I think Vic might mind though. Vic might particularly mind the whole ordeal, which is why it's of the utmost importance that he doesn't find out. I think I want to write his letter first, but I don't know how to put into words half the things I want to say to him, and I shouldn't rush into this, because this is important, this is the most important moment of my life, this is my death.

I'm scared I'll die accidentally. I'm really scared of this, because I'll never be able to finish these letters and these letters are my memory - these letters are all that'll be left of me and I don't want there to be nothing at all. I'm human - I'm awfully selfish like that.

I'm scared one day I won't focus on crossing the road, and then one day a car will come all too fast, unexpected, and bang. Or maybe it'll be a splat as my organs hit the front window and smear down in a mess.

And then I don't wake up in the hospital, and I don't even wake up in the morgue.

That's not how I want to go out. I should be able to choose how I die, it being my death after all. But God doesn't like it when we make our own rules, so I don't think I like God. I'm not going to start painting pentagrams all over the walls of churches or anything; I just want to die alone and with letters in my hand.

I want to make sure that when I go I'm ready. That's all I'm asking. It doesn't seem that much to me, but I'm selfish, I can't judge my own demise. That's not for anyone other than the afterlife to decide.

I think I'd be happy without an afterlife, but I can't help imagining something with Anubis weighing my soul against the feather and then I'd have my chances with getting devoured by Ammit.

I don't particularly believe in Egyptian mythology either, but that seems a fairer justice system than God's own judgement, because God can have preference, God can sway. A feather is a feather and it stays the same.

How heavy souls are I don't know though. So I'm not sure what my chances are if I'm up against a feather. Then again I'm not all that knowledgeable when it comes to the Egyptian afterlife or even why I'm relating my own American demise to one of the ancient Egyptians.

I think I'm stalling - I'm definitely stalling. I should just write, write away my own life. Construct my own ending.

And I want to make sure I can say my goodbyes, in letter form, of course. Face to face is too hard to go through with it after, especially when it comes down to Vic. Seeing Vic's eyes as I choke the words out would be impossible, because he'd convince me otherwise. I know he would.

Vic's like that - Vic's good with words, Vic's persuasive, and most of all... Vic's beautiful, and I'm in- and I love him. The heart is the last to leave, because I'll aim for the brain.

Vic will not let me go, so it's essential he doesn't find out. I have to hide this all from him - it's hard but possible, maybe it's one final test to prove I'm worthy of my final and perfectly planned demise, or if I'll fail and be locked in a white padded room and studied by psychologists with clipboards and if I'll have to eat off a tray with plastic cutlery.

I don't want that. I want to be six feet deep, with a blasted brain and a still heart.

Vic's very stubborn, far too stubborn, and I'm tired, far too tired of everything, this world, and all the people in it. I want to fall asleep from the world, and I never want to wake up, but I can't do that yet. The notes aren't done and the time isn't right. I need a date, an exact date and an exact plan.

But I can cure my tiredness temporarily between blood stained sheets. So I put the note in a drawer, I lock it and then I fall back onto my bed, and as the darkness chokes me away, I wonder, I pretend, I imagine, what it'd be like to never wake up.

-TRIGGER WARNING ENDS-

-

Unfortunately though, I did wake up, and I find myself remembering how much school sucks after a long weekend of plotting my own physical demise. It wasn't the most positive of matters and I wasn't sure that it's what school expected I'd be doing upon the bank holiday, but whatever, I do what I want, bitch.

I decided to skip algebra, because I'm not going to need it, and if you feel the need to argue against that, I'm not going to live long enough to need it. I probably won't even leave long enough to go to my next class or maybe the class after that. I haven't completely removed myself from society quite yet.

The bathroom isn't the best place to skip, but it's usually deserted and it's my place to skip. The smell of shit had somehow become homely. This really is the sign that I'm going insane. I don't mind though because insanity can drive you to a gun pressed against your temples easily. Maybe I won't even notice as my light goes out.

I didn't even bother going into a cubicle, I just threw my bag into the corner and sat between the sinks, avoiding my reflection to avoid the guilt, because I didn't want to remember the entirety of who I was, because that'd make me change my mind.

I didn't like remembering that I really existed and that I was an actual person either. It was just weird and oddly compelling - I didn't like that. I found myself not liking most things anymore though. It was depressing surely, but I was in a pit of depression what else was there to be found than the expected?

My demise wasn't certain yet, I didn't have a date. But it was there, solid in my mind. A fixed point, a statue something never to be changed.

I liked that; just knowing it was there, always there, so if things did get to breaking point, I'd always have it to fall back on and I know it would catch me with its cold stone arms, outstretched and ready like the bony hand of death.

It was sadistic in a way, but I couldn't care at all. I didn't have time to care; I was wasting time already - I needed to get these letters done, set a date and load my gun.

The bathroom smelled of bleach and far too little of blood, I desperately wanted to recitify that, but I didn't want a Vic Fuentes incident similar to what happened last time. Vic couldn't walk in again, I wouldn't let it happen at all. Vic was already far too involved in this mess, and it had already done a pretty great job of making my head spin like crazy.

"Kellin?" My eyes darted up at the figure that had just walked in the bathroom. "You're skipping algebra?" The figure however was not Vic Fuentes. This figure was entirely more feminine, this was Maia Newton, stripper esque clothing and all. I didn't even want to think about Vic Fuentes dressed like a stripper. That would be.... unusual.

"Yeah..." My words trailed off, knowing that someone like Maia definitely wouldn't be one to lecture me upon my truancy, but rather one to celebrate it, and I wouldn't be all that surprised if she pulled a bottle of vodka out of her school bag.

I'd simply given up upon questioning as to why Maia hung out in the boy's toilets anymore either. i think maybe she tried to pick up guys in her algebra period, but apparently the watering hole was empty today.

"Skipping school and now this?" She raised her pencilled in eyebrows at me, "I thought you'd be a model student, Kellin." I shrugged it off and she narrowed her eyes at me, "Vic Fuentes?"

"Not at all." She laughed at that, and somehow I found myself joining in. Maia was alright, she just had a lot of sex, with a lot of guys, and therefore people said shit and rumours were spread. It wasn't fair, because Maia wasn't a stereotype at all - she was a nice girl, who could be ruthless at times.

"Are you okay, Kellin?" She asked, her gaze meaningful, but I doubted that her words too held that kind of value. Maia was hard to read though, because Maia really followed everything to the opposite. She gave a whole new meaning to originality and it was astounding, but I wasn't the type to idolise her as a a few of the girls did - the rest of them hated her. She was that kind of person.

"Yeah, of course I am." I shrugged it off like it was nothing, but my tone didn't quite come out as enthusiastically as I'd hoped and I soon realised that was my greatest mistake of all, because one slip up really screwed everything up, and I was Kellin Quinn, king of mistakes and wrong turns.

"I thought you were getting better." She threw her words around as if they were nothing, but my heart stopped; she couldn't know, she didn't know. The note was the only thing that'd tell her, she could never know now whilst I was still alive and she could stop me.

This would ruin everything. She could tell Vic- but she wouldn't tell Vic. She hated him after all. Or at least I prayed that things remained that way.

"What?" The word tumbled from my lips like a tumble down the stairs. "W-what do you mean?"

She just raised her eyebrows and smiled at me kind of in a sadistic manner. "Kellin, I'm not stupid, but I'm not going to tell anyone, and I haven't. Don't worry." I was uncertain at first, entirely opposed to the fact that somehow she knew, because it didn't feel right; I didn't want her to know. It made me sick. Sicker than sick.

But she was Maia, she'd been through shit, she'd put up with the rumour spred by the football team that she'd had a foursome with Dylan, Josh and Lucas, and had sucked all three of them off simultaneously - which, I'm not sure is actually possibly. Maia liked having sex, but even she didn't go that far. Maia knew what it was like for people to spread things about you, so I found myself trusting her, but trust is the most deadly weapon and I should know that by now.

"I'm getting worse." I didn't make eye contact as she sat between the sinks beside me. I wanted to tell her about the note, but I could, especially not now.

"It's Vic." I inhaled deeply as I said his name, attempting rid my head of all the panicking thoughts that immediately followed. Maybe I could tell her this, keep my head off the note and the possibility of the words tumbling right out.

"What's he done? I could kill that guy, I swear!" I just laughed at that, because really, she was imposing her death wish on the wrong guy entirely.

"Don't. It's not his fault - it's mine." I confessed, letting it all sink in and drowning myself in the mess I've made.

"Kellin, what could you possibly have done?" She was almost laughing the matter off, but it didn't fit, it didn't fit at all. None of this fit and I wanted to physically rip myself from the fabric of reality, but the thread attaching me was too strong,

"I fell in love with him, Maia." The words tumbled out, a confession came out of nowhere. "And he has a girlfriend."

Her eyes widened at that, "you're gay?" She wasn't saying it in a homophobic manner, she just seemed a little surprised that's all, maybe disappointed, because maybe in some messed up alternate universe, Maia was going for me.

"I don't know - I mean Vic's the only guy I've ever, um..." I paused for a moment, my cheeks flushing a brilliant shade of red. "'Like-liked'. I don't know, I've never properly dated a girl though." I confessed, letting the embarrassment just sink right in.

"Want to try?" She winked at me, and I just sat there in shock, "cool it dude, I'm joking - I don't do commitment with guys. They fucking creep me out."

"You sure you're not a lesbian?" I asked her in curiosity.

"Never been with a girl - I can't say, but if you find some girl that's attractive, with decent boobs and an IQ higher than that of ham sandwich, send her my way." I chuckled a little at that, because she was practically asking the impossible in this school.

"Will do, not that I can actually talk to girls, that is." She took her turn to chuckle at that.

"Hey, I'm a girl and you're doing pretty good." She noted.

"Yeah, well you're different."

"How so?" She asked.

"I don't know, you're just Maia." I confessed, blushing a little, not because I fancied her, but because this situation reeked of awkward.

"I'm not sure what to say to that." She laughed a little, and I nodded, because I wasn't sure what I wanted her to say at all. The world was just confusing.

"Hey can you kiss me?" The words just popped out, and I don't know why. Maybe to spite Vic, maybe I didn't want to be gay, maybe I just wanted to prove nothing to myself. I hadn't a clue at all, and I think this was just making my head spin further.

She looked at me dumbfounded, "uhh... yeah, I guess."

"Just so I can see if I'm gay or not." I confirmed with her that this was strictly no feelings, because now that'd really get messy and the only messy I like is blown out brains messy.

"Oh, yeah of course." She blushed a little and nodded, before pulling me closer and leaning in.

Her lips tasted of cherry, and lipstick grease, a lot which I was sure had now transferred onto my lips. She most certainly wasn't a bad kisser, but there was nothing, no spark, not a single speck of attraction, as I had expected.

She pulled away, looking up at me almost instantly, "well?" I looked at her confused for a moment, "are you...?"

I inhaled sharply, "yeah, I'm sorry. I... god... I don't want to be in love with, but I am."

"Hey, don't apologise to me, it's fine." She gave me a friendly shove. "Now go get that guy." I rolled my eyes at that - Maia was overly optimistic of course.

"Like that's going to happen."

"Oh, Kellin you'd be surprised."

Hey guys:) Hope you enjoyed this chapter and as you can see, things are definitely heating up right now so votes and comments for more drama huh?;) hehe:3 Love you guys always<3