Patient name: Izuna Uchiha

Date of birth: 13/09/1985

Journal entry: 15/05/2023, final journal entry.

Currently: Meeting with patient with plan to dismiss him from the ward. Patient says he's not suicidal and is feeling less depressed. Says he's able to feel positive emotions such as happiness for the first time. He is happy to have started Prozac, no adverse effects, aware it might take a few more weeks before effect is noted. Happy with Melatonin, sleeps well on this. Eats six meals a day according to schedule, does not remove or separate foods before ingesting. Patient has plans to go back to work as an aerodynamic engineer, plans to move for this job. Regarding patient's boyfriend he affirms he's worried but not to an abnormal amount. Reasons spontaneously that most people would worry about their partner in his situation. Patient is deemed to no longer be in need of in-patient treatment. Write off the Psychiatric Health Care Act. Patient is written out. Expresses no worry.

Psychiatric status: Clean exterior. Good formal, acceptable emotional contact. Patient smiles several times during conversation, laughs twice when we speak about his former eating habits. Uses body language and facial expressions sparsely but still an increase from before, which was nil. Partakes in conversation, paints a good picture of the scenarios talked about, respects turn-taking. Nothing psychotic. Denies suicidal thoughts or plans. If such would occur, the patient agrees he will phone the ward nurses.

Planning: Follow-up within the week as out-patient. Contact with out-patient psychiatry once a week. There is room for increase in Prozac dose. Continues with Melatonin at night and Alimemazine if needed.

He got back on his medication, just as he promised. 

He seemed to be a man to keep his promises. I appreciated that. I was afraid I was a man who couldn't be with someone who didn't keep their promises. It would break me too much.

He needed softness from me. He was fragile, and very much so. I didn't mind. I found it quite adorable. At the same time, I was ashamed I found it adorable as he truly suffered because of it. He held it back for my sake, I could tell, but it was crystal clear to me; Tobirama, happy as he was to see me get better, was terrified it would cause me to leave him because I wouldn't need him anymore.

How could I make him understand? How could I make him understand that my love for him had nothing to do with me needing him, with me being sick, with him being sick? How could I make him understand that to me, it was about him, who he was as a person, how clearly he could read me, and how clearly I could read him? How could I make him understand that for the first time in my life, I could envision a future for myself, and that future involved him, waking up next to me every day in a way I would never, ever let anyone else do?

I tried to figure out a way to tell him but failed. I could only be there for him. Giving him that softness he had promised me, and given me when he fucked me. I would come to his room in the ward at night and just hold him, and he would let himself be held as I whispered words of comfort into his ear. The words differed from time to time, ranging from our future together to things I'd done that day to funny things I'd come over on Reddit. Sometimes, I would even explain the physics of planes for him.

"The airplane wing, if cut through vertically, is not flat. The bottom part is flat. But the top part is convex. So the airflow on the top of the wing is faster than the airflow below, causing the air pressure to be higher below the wing and above it. That's why the wings can make the plane lift."

"I understand. I just can't imagine it", he said.

"Wait here", I said and clambered out of his bed to go to the dayroom. There, I picked up a sheet of paper which I brought back. "Blow air horizontally on top of this paper."

He did, and it lifted.

He furrowed his brows.

"No way."

I smiled. It came naturally to me these days. Smiling. As natural as breathing. And as loving him.

"See?" I said triumphantly.

"But I'm blowing on it! Shouldn't it go down?"

"The airflow above the paper is faster on top than below when you blow on it. The pressure gets lower on top then."

He blew again and again, engrossed, eyebrows furrowed in concentration. It was quite adorable how fascinated he was by this simple piece of physics.

"I can't believe you're twenty-eight and figured this out just now", I teased.

"Shut up you old, old man", he teased back.

We ended up wrestling, me shrieking with laughter. I treasured those moments more than anything because they were so rare. Tobirama's depression stuck to him as a wet blanket, seemingly impossible to get rid of. It made me feel guilty. Guilty of becoming better, of getting closer and closer to be written out because he needed me.

And then the day came when I was actually written out.

I hadn't told Tobirama. I had declined permissions. I tried to tell myself it was because I didn't know what I would do out of the hospital, anyway. But I knew it was because I didn't want Tobirama to know I was on my way out of here. The doctors knew about my true reason, too, but didn't say anything. I thought it was because last time they intervened with mine and Tobirama's relationship, they fucked up.

But then, I was written out, and I knew I had to tell him. Which was why I found myself outside his door, feeling as nervous as that first time I had knocked on his door.

As soon as I came in, he looked up from his book which he was reading cross-legged in his bed. I saw on his facial expression that he knew something was wrong. Which meant I must have shown some sort of facial expression. The more you knew.

"Hi", I said.

"Hi", he said, his voice warm, and I saw his eyes, his stormy, grey eyes, soften for me. "What's up?"

I was quiet for a while. He was quiet for a while. We looked at each other. His size seemed to diminish by the way he sat curled up in his bed. It made me want to lay over him as a shield to protect him from everything bad that could ever happen to him. Including my own well-being.

Trust him, I thought. He knows this is a good thing. That he's allowed to feel it's hard even if it's a good thing.

"I'm getting written out", I finally said.

I could see he had expected it. That it wasn't a surprise. It took the edge out of it for me a bit.

"I'm so happy for you", he said.

He genuinely sounded as though he was. Happy for me. But he himself was devastated. I stood, quiet, not knowing what I should say.

So my moon-man, my sweet, sweet moon-man, took control of the situation from out of my hands, stood up, walked to me, put his arms around me, and hugged me.

We hugged for a long, long time, re-gripping from time to time to press each other closer. We hadn't slept together more than that one time, and I suddenly missed it. And I felt in his soul that he missed it, too.

"We can't", he murmured.

"I know", I whispered back. "But I want to."

"Me too", he said.

I suddenly grabbed his face desperately.

"The only way is if you start to feel better, Tobirama."

I stared at him, tried to make him understand how important this was by sheer willpower. Finally, Tobirama furrowed his brows, grabbed my wrist softly and started caressing it. I didn't let go of his face. His rings and watch created a cool sensation on my skin. It didn't bother me that much anymore. Next time he fucked me, I would let him wear his rings and I would be naked.

"I know", he said, bringing my hand to his lips, kissing it softly. A thunderstorm was created between us then, the lightning bolt being the connection between his lips and the skin of my hand. "I know", he repeated.

"Ouch!"

I looked around me to see if anyone had noticed. To my great shame, my colleague was smiling at me. I looked down shame-facedly, but couldn't help but smile a little, too.

I had, once again, poked myself between my eyes as I was adjusting my glasses that I didn't wear. I was short-sighted, meaning I didn't need glasses for computer work, and since I wasn't used to working, I kept acting as if I still wore them. My colleague, a young girl who had just graduated and was razor-sharp, had noticed several times. We had bonded when I'd found her crying in the break room when she thought everyone had left, and she told me she'd come out as gay to her parents who hadn't accepted her. I wasn't good at comforting people, so I just told her I had a boyfriend and hoped it would suffice.

To my great surprise, it did.

Now, I would say that except Tobirama, who didn't count because we fucked, she was the first friend I'd ever had. We didn't say much, but it suited us both fine.

I had gotten back to work one month after I had been written out. Companies who needed aerodynamic engineers were rare, but aerodynamic engineers were rare in themselves, causing the situation to balance itself out neatly. I had found an incredible job out of town, and decided to move there which was quite an unbelievable choice since I hated change. But it had been good for me, the move. With the antidepressants and meeting with a psychiatrist every week, I no longer needed the assistants I had the right to due to my autism. I was, I believed, nowadays a normal person with autism, a way of defining myself which I thought some would find controversial, but in my own head, I allowed myself this one word I'd been craving for so long. Normal.

I finished up what I was doing on my drawing board, slung my backpack over my shoulder and left without saying goodbye to my colleague; we never did. But she threw a paper airplane of insane complexity at me; she always did.

It was a beautiful summer day outside, the sun scorching. I rolled the sleeves of my light blue shirt up, let the sun play on the muscles beneath my forearms, slightly more toned now as I had started climbing a couple of times a week. My black trousers absorbed the sun, as did my black hair. At least my neck was free from the heat as I'd put it up.

I walked from the skyscraper where the office was located and to the park, where I walked around for a while, just taking in the surroundings in a way I had never been interested in before. But I was now. Interested in the surroundings as they were the backdrop to my life.

And I knew it was because of him.

I smiled as I thought of him. My love for him was fierce, but contained in a way it hadn't been before, when it had been a raging fire. As my insatiable hunger for him was replaced by a deep satisfaction, he was initially worried that it meant I didn't love him anymore. I never reassured him, not because I was a good boyfriend who saw that as beneath him, although I hoped that was also true, but because I simply didn't know how to, except to keep going. I knew I loved the boy, and figured that with enough patience, he would understand.

Which seemed to be true. He had begun to calm down. He wasn't in any way better in his depression, but he wasn't searching for my approval as desperately as before anymore.

I was, however, worried about his depression, and had talked about it with my psychiatrist.

"I know I'm being unfair, but it feels like I'm not enough."

"Actually", my psychiatrist said. "This is a positive thing."

My face seemed to show facial expressions on its own accord now, which was a strange sensation for me.

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"I meet a lot of patients who meet a partner, and suddenly, they're fine", the psychiatrist said. "I never tell them, but those relationships are very fragile. As my patients need their partner to stay away from their depression." I thought I understood where he was going. "The fact that your boyfriend still struggles is awful, of course, but at least it means your relationship and his depression are two separate entities. It doesn't automatically make the relationship strong, but I believe it's a requirement for a strong relationship."

I smiled up towards the sun as I kept walking in the park, remembering. It had been good for me hearing that.

I walked to my favourite coffee shop, bought a strawberry white chocolate coffee, brought it with me to the flower shop on the other side of the park. I chose a sunflower for him, then went to the bus station and took the bus to the ward. It was strange, coming there as a visitor. In the beginning, it had made me incredibly uneasy, and I had been frightened I would long back to the safety of the routines I'd had. But as the weeks passed and I felt nothing of the sort as I visited the ward, I had begun to relax, allowed myself to truly enjoy the time I spent with my boyfriend.

"Hi", I said.

He was standing at the pool table, holding a cue.

He looked up at me, then burst into a smile. I never announced when I was coming, wanting to always surprise him. But I visited him almost every day, so the element of surprise was slightly lost. Not that I minded, though. Not that he minded. We wanted to see one another as much as possible.

"How the fuck do you do this?" he asked.

"Do what?"

"You just... Put the balls in the holes!" I couldn't help but laugh at this expression. "Oh, how old are you?" he teased.

"I'm thirty-seven", I said.

"At least I'm not into younger men."

"At least I don't have daddy issues."

He jerked. Shit, that was insensitive of me. I knew Tobirama's parents were dead.

But to my great relief, he burst out laughing.

"You're fucking insane", he said.

"No, you're the one who's insane in this relationship. That's why you're locked in here while I'm not."

I put my coffee and the bag with the sunflower on the ground, walked to him. Suddenly, the mood between us changed, and I could feel him soften. I went and stood behind him, put my arms around him from behind. I felt him melt beneath my gentle touch. I put one hand on his elbow, the other on the cue, guiding him. I had never really thought about how I did it before, how I always scored, but now I imagined myself standing with the cue in my hand, trying to think how to translate my body work to audible words.

"Relax your knees", I said. He obeyed. "Strong hips. Form a line from your eye along the cue to the ball and then further to the hole. You want to hit the ball exactly in the middle." I moved his elbow back towards me. Then, I made the cue push the ball. It went straight into the hole. "Well done", I said.

He turned to me, put his arms on my shoulders. We'd never had this dynamic this strongly before, where I felt I had control over him, this strongly before.

"I want to fuck you so bad", I murmured into his mouth.

"I thought we did it the other way around", he said with a smirk.

"I'm serious", I said and something in the way I said it must've made Tobirama understand I was because suddenly he backed away, sat down on the armrest of the couch, looking at me with fire in his eyes.

"Izuna..."

"I want to play with ice all over your body, not because you have anxiety but because I love you so much. I want to decide what you wear so it's completely to my satisfaction. I want to have you pressed up against your carpet at home with me riding you from behind while holding your hair. I want to leave no doubt in your mind who decides."

Tobirama stood frozen.

"God..." he finally said. His face was pale.

I suddenly walked to him, grabbed his face harshly, made my lips touch his. He gasped.

"Get out of this", I begged. I put my hand in my pocket, fished out my spare keys, pressed it into his hand. He stared at me, mouth agape. "Get out of this so we can begin our life together."

He looked at the key in awe, then up at me.

"I love you", he said.

"I brought you a sunflower today", I told him, my way of saying that I loved him, too. "It's my personal favourite."

"I will remember that for when I get better", he said.

I felt different when I came to my new apartment that evening. Lighter, somehow.

I was undoubtedly much, much happier now than I had ever been. But the weight of Tobirama's depression had been heavy on me. I hadn't realised I had an inherent desire to tell him how important it was for me that he got better. I felt I had done that now. I didn't know if that changed anything for him, but it did for me. It had given me hope. Hope that he could get into a different state of mind, just like I had.

I walked around my apartment, turning on some small lamps that cast a warm glow on the wooden floors. It was so different from my last apartment that had been old and yellowing and smelled strange, something I hated as I was sensitive to smells. This one was open and airy and tidy. I couldn't wait to show it to him.

My phone pinged, and it was a message from him.

Moon-man <3: Thank you for the bitch-slap. I can't promise anything but I feel like something has changed. I don't feel hopeless anymore. Thank you. I love you <3

I felt something then; a surge of happiness that was unlike anything I had ever felt before. This is it, I thought. This is my life now. It's okay. It's going to be okay.

I smiled at the text, deciding I would answer later. Instead, I went to water my plants. I was just going to water my monstera when a thought was implanted into my head.

If the next person who walks by the window is a man, I must kill myself.

Time stopped.

I dropped the glass jug of water I used to water my plants.

It split into a thousand pieces.

As if controlled by some higher power, I was drawn to my window, oblivious to the shards of glass boring into my bare feet. I held my breath, looked out. My mind went blank as I just stared, out into the dark, for two hours, although I was completely unaware of time.

And after two hours, he walked by.

I have no idea who he was. The poor man had no idea how important his passing was, how much it would affect this one particular life that was mine. But it didn't matter. He was a man, and that was enough.

Unable to think, I walked to my hallway, put my shoes on. I wasn't even wearing socks. I walked out into the night in my dissociated state. I must have walked for a long time because suddenly, I stood there. I stood where he had stood twice already. The wind ruffled my hair, created tears that it then dried, just like a lover who made me upset and then dried the tears off himself in pure shame, apologising. 

The wind didn't need to apologise because I wasn't even aware of the tears.

It all happened so fast. I didn't jump, really. I wondered if anyone ever did. I just took a step out. That seemed more reasonable. 

And it was then, when I was in that weightless state between stepping outside and falling, that I finally came to my senses.

And I realised what was happening.

My lifetime and a thousand more passed through my heart during the short time span between life and death, during the few seconds which I fell. There was the confusion, about what state of mind I had been in order to make a decision of this magnitude so fast. There was the fear, the fear of pain. There was also the hint of curiosity, about how it would feel, whether it would hurt, and what would come after.

And the strongest feeling of all. An indescribable sadness that I was leaving Tobirama, that I was never going to see him again. All the dreams we never made into reality, all the times we would make love now lost.

And there was the furious fear that he, upon learning about my death, would kill himself.

Please, no.

Too many thoughts.

Tobirama, I'm so sorry.

I hit the surface.