this is just something I wrote rather quickly based off a good friend (charliemacmillan) giving me the prompt "running away". Enjoy this trainwreck.

TW: talking about depression and suicide, as always.

"Can I say something dumb?"

The words seemed so close; despite the rest of the world appearing so far away. The two boys were lying beneath the red-orange-yellow gradient of the sunset. Neither could even begin to suggest how long they had been laying there, shoulder-to-shoulder as they squinted their eyes to stare into the sky. They were atop a tall hill that had rendered them breathless earlier that day, such a trek that neither wanted to think about battling it again.

"Of course."

Lance turned his head to look at Keith, someone he thought was so much more beautiful than the sunset. He let silence wash over them for a second as the wind ran through the hair on their heads. There was something so picturesque about the way Keith's fringe bounced on top of his forehead. For someone so insistent on being 'emo', he seemed awfully soft. As he failed to think about anything around them, the distant look in his eyes made him look so carefree. Lance forced himself to look away as he followed his own question up. "Do you ever think about running away?" Lance's voice had never been so soft but he was fearful that he'd smash the wall between them and the world by speaking too loudly.

"All the fucking time." Keith then let out a laugh that made it all seem like a joke. To Lance, it didn't feel like a joke. There was something about the stiffness in Keith's perfect jawline and the way he continued refusing eye contact that seemed too real. 

Silence. Keith was the next one to break it.

"Why?" Again, his voice was as soft as Lance's which could have been compared to a blanket worthy of royalty.

"I dunno... have you never really thought about how much life sucks?"

"Of course I have. We're like four days into 2020 and world war 3 is already trending on Twitter. The world is fucked up."

"No, that's not what I mean..." 

Silence again. The sound of the road at the base of the hill filled the air momentarily. 

"Think about it, we're eighteen and we've been through way too much shit. I've been sad since I was thirteen. I was bullied and the school did shit all about it, making me feel like my only option was suicide. I wasted all of my teens wanting to die."

"Join the club," Keith murmured, sitting up and diverting his gaze to the road. He watched the blobs that represented the cars fly by whilst, as usual, he was stuck still. He was frozen whilst the world raced around him. "I've been in foster homes since I can remember. Most of the homes I've been in kicked me out for being gay. I've been emotionally and physically abused so I wouldn't know a healthy relationship even if it stared me right in the face. I didn't have a single friend because I moved schools much too often to ever even dream of settling down."

"I'm sorry," Lance picked at a couple of blades of grass, tugging them out of the ground and tearing them into pieces. His jaw was tense as he tried his hardest to suppress an arising sob. When he next spoke, his voice was nothing but a whisper. "We don't deserve this. We deserve so much better."

"Do you want the world to stop just for you? Do you think you deserve some sort of special treatment? It's not just us who deserves better, everyone does. There are always people so much worse off. At least we have homes and food and- and stability..."

"We shouldn't just settle for just enough. We should settle for happiness."

Keith pulled himself up so abruptly that it made Lance jump a little. "You want to run away to make things better for yourself?" Ashamed, Lance nodded. In response, Keith took a few steps forward and shook his head enough to make his hair dance. "The world doesn't revolve around you, as much as you may think so. We can't just run away and expect things to go our way. Have you thought about food? A place to stay?"

Lance's eyes widened as he swallowed. A tear dripped down his left cheek but Keith wasn't even looking in his direction so it went unnoticed.

"You make it sound like some sort of fairytale. We're not in a movie. This is real life and the reality is... it sucks, alright? We can't run away unless you want to get killed in the real world."

Finally, Lance sobbed. His body lurched forward as he buried his head into his hands and cried. "I just can't take this anymore..."

"That doesn't mean you have to run away," Keith looked up at the sky that had somehow gotten substantially darker amidst the exchange. However, it wasn't dark enough for Lance not to see the way his hands had clenched into tight, angry fists. "Running away isn't the answer, trust me. You're staying in this stupid town and you have no choice. Anyway, you're going to college next year, aren't you?"

"I guess. I'm not sure my parents want to go but-"

"Don't base your life on your parents. That's just dumb. Do whatever the hell you want to do. Promise me you'll do what you want and not what they want?"

"Keith, I-"

"Promise me."

"I can't-"

"Lance. You have to make this promise, for me, okay?"

"Fine. I- I promise."

When Lance raised his hands to wipe the tears in his eyes away and then dropped his arms back to his sides, he was on his own. He blinked a couple of times to ground himself before standing up. From the top of the hill, the rest of the world- including all of his worries- seemed miles away. It didn't matter that he had been excluded at school for most of his teenage years. It didn't matter that he spent most of his life wanting to end it. It didn't matter that his life sucked.

"I promise." He repeated so quietly that it might as well have simply been a release of air. Despite saying it aloud, he aimed the phrase to that boy in his head that kept him going in times of adversity. 

Now I'm going to get cheesy for a second

So you may think running away from your problems- either figuratively or literally- is a good idea but it generally isn't. At some point, you've got to stop thinking the future and getting better is a million miles away but you've got to start taking action. Things will get better but you've got to try.

You may feel like life is going nowhere but it isn't. I thought my life was going nowhere from the ages of like... 13 to 18. I was sad and wondered what the point in life was. Now I've started university, met some new people and things are getting better. I made the choice to go to uni and push on through my anxiety and now things are slowly improving. I've finally found a reason to go and see the GP about my anxiety.

The best way to go about things is to find help, I assure you. Please don't try and run away from your problems. Facing them head on is important so that you can learn from them.

This may be complete gibberish because I've slept way too much today and feel reeeeeaaaally weird but yeah. I hope someone took this shitty ramble on board lol.