[Ofc, massive timeskip because of my large laziness and no will to write these stuff anymore (even if it's still boring) and the fact that I changed over the 4 months and this is inspired off of my boring life but will have a decent ending unlike me-]

Zak's POV

It's been 2 months since I've became friends with Darryl.
A lot has changed since then.

We started talking to each other everyday and he actually doesn't seem like he doesn't want to. I still often feel like I'm annoying to him, so it's very rare for me to start talking.
He's usually the one that approaches me.

The fact that he actually seems excited to talk to me makes me so happy. I never thought somebody would be this nice to me.

Still, there's always the negative changes. I'll never get away from those, will I?

I've searched up what might be wrong with my lack of emotions, then found out there's a large possibility I have alexithymia.
But, since it isn't clarified as an actual mental illness, it's hard to find any data on how to get rid of it.

And so, I began thinking.

What could be the cause of it?

What might possibly help me, at least a little bit?

All I noticed is how much I'm longing for physical comfort.
I tried to ignore it as much as I could, but it always returns.

Sometimes, when I'm sitting next to any of my friends, I suddenly feel a weird urge to either lay against them or hug them.
Before, it was easy to avoid, and when I found any causes of it, I'd completely stop doing that, but now, it's gotten too hard, so I just go along with it, still never showing it.

Then, again, I remember seeing a completely random tweet on my timeline where somebody listed symptoms of depression.
It made me very confused over my current mental state.

For a moment, I thought I have depression, yet almost all of them fit for alexithymia, too.
I can't tell which one I have. There's a chance I have both.
Who am I kidding? There's no chance, right?

I guess I'll just figure it out someday.

I've also found out that I'm often stressed, but never feel it.

I remember when I simply saw the word 'stress' somewhere random and started thinking about it.
I searched it up, just like I do with various other things regarding my mental state.

After comparing the symptoms and finding many similarities, I realized how often I must be stressed.

I see my nervous ticks coming out during class so often.

I'm always so aware of everything I do, it's been messing me up so much.
It increased even more in the past few days.
It's barely possible not to notice any little thing I do.

Sometimes, when I'm trying not to cry, I accidentally dig my nails into my skin. I almost immediately notice it, and quickly drop it.
I can't even tell if it's helping me feel better or not anymore.

I never raise my hand during class anymore, unless I'm 100% sure that my answer is correct, which is rare.
Some of the teachers noticed the changes.

I really hate it when they glance at me as if I'm about to cry or something.

I've always been negative about everything. That's why I'm currently trying to be an optimist.

It hurts even more than straight up hating anything bad that happens to me, but I've already started.
It would be even harder to go back now.

Taking a positive point of view makes everything so much painful for me.

I don't even show the change. I'm just trying to change the way I think, but it's been destroying me so much.
From time to time, it gets extremely hard for me to keep a straight face.

Before I've done this, it was rare for me to cry, but when it did happen, I used the opportunity and just let it all go, alone.
Then, I'd just feel so lonely..

Well, what could I do?

Now, whenever I feel like crying, I can imagine a family member walk into my room and see me crying.

Whatever happens, I do not, under any circumstances, want them to pity me.

I don't know any possible reason why, but I hate them with a large passion.
They're great people. They're all amazing.
Both my mom and my sister have been through a lot, they've probably been through more than me.

And I still have the guts to feel bad about my problems.

Also, if they started comforting me, I'd only feel worse. It wouldn't help at all.

I can't control it.

I once had a dream where one of them tried cheering me up, and the more helpful and supportive they became, the more I felt like I was on the verge of a panic attack.

Besides, whenever I bottle up my emotions, the emptiness is somehow completely gone the next day. Of course, it returns next evening.

A few months back, I'd also think of all the people that don't care about me and ignored the ones that do, trying to cause myself to cry.

Now, I do the opposite.
I try my best to think of people that care, even if I don't let them in, and they don't even consider the option that there's anything else I'm hiding.

Well, that's just my fault, isn't it?

No, it doesn't matter. They care about you, that's all that matters.

I always try to force myself to believe it, but somehow, none of that ever works.

The positive thoughts only leave me off more empty.

I can't cry, no, they care. Don't cry, you have people who care, unlike many others.

You don't even deserve the right to cry, so just shut up and stop it.

You have literally no reason to. Everybody is so nice to you. It's all that matters.

The only things that help me stop the overthinking from continuing without an end are either playing games or sleeping.

Somehow, talking to Darryl helps me too, but I refuse to admit it.

Even if it's just to myself.

Since I obviously can't be asleep for entire nights and days, I spend most of my freetime playing Minecraft.

Sometimes, most often on mondays, I don't sleep at all.
I'd really like to say that I do something productive during that time, but all I do is play a block game (accidentally wrote 'gae') without any thought processes except for 'how much time do I have before school?'.

I wish using social media made the consuming thoughts dissapear.
Sadly, most of the time, they only bring the opposite effect.

Randomly finding vent tweets on my timeline only makes me feel worse, seeing how much worse many people's lives are.

I hate myself even more when I can't find any good advice or a supportive message for them in my head.

I can't help but feel guilty.
Guilty for every single thing I do.

Because of all that, school is currently the worst place in my life. A place where my thoughts are so hard to contain, it becomes almost impossible.

Well, unless I haven't slept the entire night, and am too tired to think anything.

Exactly what I did today.

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(fiNALLY sTARTING THE DAY-)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I finish a game of TNT run, checking the time yet again.

5:42 AM

Perfect.

I don't know why, but today, I feel a strong urge to go to the treehouse.

I haven't been completely alone for a long time.

I guess that's good, right? Yeah, keep going with the positive thoughts, even if it hurts. Doesn't matter!

I lazily get up from my chair, looking into my closet to find any clothes I could wear.

•~•~•~•~=_€€|€¥\\
timeskip idk
_•_¥|'~•_~~>#=•_•~'

Finally packing up all my school books, I head out of my room, soon exiting the house.

Without hesitation, I start walking towards the direction of the field that the treehouse is near.

On my way, I slowly began to wander off into my thoughts.

I already know so much about what might be wrong with me, but what would fix it?

Really opening up to somebody will help a lot, along, with their support, but it definitely won't repair everything.

What can I do without anybody's knowledge to change for the better?

As the thought joins the others, I could clearly feel it become harder for me to keep a straight face. I probably could just start crying, and nobody would care.
Actually, I couldn't.
I can never help but feel judged by anybody I pass. Whether it's a stranger, or somebody I know. Even my own family.

I wish I didn't care so much about the opinions of other people.

I feel watched all the time. I can't escape from the thought that there's always a chance for me to accidentally meet my family or a teacher.

There's also the students of our school, but I don't know all of them.
Something always tells me that just from a different expression, somebody could make up gossips about me.

Shaking my head and pushing my thoughts away, I see the treehouse and start quickly walking towards it. Soon, I start running, knowing I wouldn't be able to keep my expression for long.

I finally get to the place and walk in. I lay against the wall with a sigh.

So weak.

You can't even do anything in time, look, you had an entire night yet all of your homework is still missing.

Burden.

Useless.

You aren't even helping or supporting anybody, and when you do, you fail to cheer them up.

Feeling tears rolling down my face, I groan.

Can't even hold it in for long enough.

You barely lasted a week.

Imagine somebody saw you right now. They would think you're so pathetic.

No, shut up.

People care, and that's the only thing that matters.

I wipe my tears, trying my hardest to stop them from flowing.

Don't be such a crybaby.

No, shut up, that only makes you cry more.

I take a deep, shaky breath.

I look into my phone to see my reflection, changing my expression and everything back to the numb one, no matter how hard it is.
Finally stopping my thoughts for a moment, I delicately wipe my tears, careful not to do it too hard so there aren't any slightly red marks. (I made this mistake once when my brother hit me with his hard as a rock backpack lmao)

I stand up against my will, knowing that staying here for too long could potentially make me accidentally fall asleep from the all-nighter I pulled off today.

I look outside, realizing that I'll be very early, but that'd better than being late.
Maybe not always.

_¥|£{£[='+£]¥{}+]^€
timeskip
oh look russian gibberish
цзыьавьфжыбвьвжпхубйзцкл

After a couple minutes, I start seeing the school, already tired just from walking.
I should have slept. I'll probably fall asleep during class and embarrass myself again, won't I?

Last time I did that was a few months ago, but I still remember it.

I laid on my desk during math class, and before I could realize or object against myself in any way, I fell asleep.

From what others said, them shouting or the teacher calling me didn't even make me flinch.

Probably pitying me, the math teacher let me sleep, then woke me up at the end of class and told me to come up to her.
Not sure if I imagined that or if she said it, I simply packed my stuff and started walking towards the door, until she called me again.

What made me slightly uncomfortable, is that she also had something to discuss with Darryl.
Even though I wasn't friends with him yet, I still felt uneasy that the teacher wouldn't be the only one knowing that something's wrong with my sleep schedule.

Realizing I zoned out again, I look towards the school. Since there's around 2 hours left, I turn to head in the direction of a nearby shop instead.

On my way back, I start to think - what should I do when I'm there? I still have a plenty of time.

I'll just read some articles online.

[+{*}€][¥{¥
this is like the 50th timeskip
~¥\¥\|£|£\¥~¥|¥|+|+\_+£|£~|

It took me quite a while to find a topic, until I stumbled upon something I've read about before.

Age regression.

I've wondered what it's like before. I've considered it, but I don't think I'd be able to start or end it in any way.
Maybe I'd try this, but it could result in me unknowingly slipping into the thing they call the 'little space'.

Yeah, not my thing.

What's annoying at times, is that if I even think of the existence of it, it will not disappear from my head for weeks.

I huff, annoyed at my thoughts. If I were to do it, everybody would be weirded out that the isolated piece of trash is actually so childish.

My parents would avoid me, my friends would be weirded out.
There's just too much that could happen, I'd rather not risk it.

I huff. Even if it's weird and awkward, I like reading about it.
Only reading, though. I would never do it.

Making sure nobody's looking at my phone and what is written on it's screen, I look around. Luckily, I don't see any person.

I start wondering again. What should I read about?

Suddenly getting an idea, I type 'why I'm longing for physical comfort', hopeful to find something I could do to stop it without another person helping me.
I don't want to bug anybody about such a stupid thing, it's weird.

I scroll down for quite a while, only finding solutions that require another person. I groan, not knowing how to prevent myself from feeling like this.

Everybody in this school already knows me as the one person who hates any sort of physical contact. It would be very awkward for them to find out otherwise.

Darryl probably knows about it, too.

Wait, why am I considering him first? No, he's just trustworthy. That's why!

I already get embarrassed just from my thoughts. That's so weird for anybody to do.

I cover my face with the sleeves of my hoodie, hoping I don't have a red face.

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how tf is there so much timeskips yet 2420 words
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It's only been 3 lessons, yet I'm barely holding myself up.
My common lack of sleep seems to be hitting me hard, all from just one night of not getting any of it.
I sometimes sleep 4 hours, but I often just don't sleep at all.

During 2 of the classes, I could feel Darryl's concerned glances.
I clearly knew it was him, as nobody else actually seemed to care that much.

It made me feel a bit annoyed, but appreciated at the same time.

It was currently the break, and I saw him sitting down against the wall, so I joined him.

I laid down in a way where I'm only supported with my arms a bit, able to lay against the taller in any given moment by an accident.

I hug my backpack and hide my face in it more to make myself comfortable, which might've been a bad idea after such small amount of sleep.

Not realizing what I'm doing, I subconsciously lean against him.

Noticing how close to him I am, I flinch and jerk away a bit, trying to make myself less sleepy.

"Calm down." he simply says, putting a hand around me and pulling me closer, most likely just wanting me to be more comfortable around him.

I lean into his touch even more, suddenly feeling drowsy. Before I knew it, I fell asleep right there, cuddling him.

A place I never expected to be in.

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I feel like at least 1 sleepy person will get very confused with the big words cuz their brain will refuse to process them

I almost ended this at 5 AM but fell asleep so I just finished it 20 minutes before first online school

(2614 words with most timeskips)