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Josh was everywhere, he was in everything.
Josh made Tyler into a package deal. If you had one free ticket, you didn’t invite Tyler, you’d just expect him to say no.
Not without Josh. Josh would like that. I’m not doing that without Josh.
Everything. He was everywhere.
He was in Tyler’s prayers, his thoughts. His dreams, his rambled stories he’d share with his cluster of siblings.
His letters, his notes.
His note.
Tyler had a hundred things to say to a hundred people, but all he could think of was the soft hands, and fried hair, and gorgeous eyes.
Drip.
He crumpled the paper. That’s disgusting. He got a new one, he started again.
“Josh,
I know you’re surprised I’m only writing to you, and I’m sorry that my family will probably shun you for it after you’ve read this.
You are the best thing I’ve ever had. You helped me understand.
I wish I could live to continue to thank God for you. And I’m sorry I’m ending in a way that makes it so I won’t be able to do that again.
I’m not scared to go to Hell. I don’t need to be forgiven. I’ve had Heaven on earth with you.
I lo” —
Drip.
Fuck. He crumpled the paper, he got a new one.
“Josh,
I know you’re surprised that I only wrote a note for you. Sorry it’ll tick off my family. I love them all too, but I love you the most. Sorry about that too.”
His hands shook, he could hear his heartbeat.
”You kept me alive this long, and I need you to know that you did your best. It’s my fault, and I’m sorry.
I feel like I can’t breathe sometimes, like I’m being suffocated. I feel that way around you. The way you make me feel is heavy. It makes me nausheous nauseaus nauseous”
I look stupid.
He crumpled the paper, he got a new one.
“Josh,
I love you. I could only figure out anything to say to you. I know it’s weird you’re the only one with a letter,”
Drip.
He could just do it right now.
Who needs a letter?
He crumpled the paper, he got a new one.
”josh,
it’s not your fault and i love you”
He set the paper down. He felt suffocated, choked. By hands. Someone’s hands, they felt like his own. Callouses in the same places he could only recognize because he picks at his flesh.
His wrists felt sore and tingly, like they were losing circulation. Hands, again. His own.
The longer his wrists tingled, the more they stung. Red. Red and Black. Black and Red. Black.
His vision was foggy. Foggy might be a bad word. Staticky, like television static.
He stood in front of the full length mirror that unfortunately cursed his bedroom. He didn’t look like himself.
He was covered in black goo, like paint. His hands, his neck, his clothes.
Choked, suffocated. Surrounded in black.
He wanted to be suffocated, surrounded in Josh.
Why wasn’t Josh here for once?
Drip.
His carpet was ruined. Well, not ruined. crime-scene ruined.
he stepped back and he looked up. Then, he took a step up onto the flimsy plastic kitchen stool planted in the center of his bedroom.
It was barely tall enough to be what he needed, but that made it all the more perfect.
He stood on not quite tip-toes and leaned into his knot.
Then he tripped, and the stool moved a little too far to the left.
And then he really was suffocating.
I win
I win
I win
He wanted to rip his brain out.
I knew I’d win
he was so proud of you
you ruined it
He ruined it.
He ruined it, and Josh knew.
Josh knew from the minute he saw the number that had called him mid day.
The contact read: ‘kelly joseph 🧡”
He was nausheous nauseaus nauseous
“Hello?” He answered, and he heard no response, just a long, sobbed wail.
He hung up, and then he sped.
Tyler was cold. He was cold and his eyes were dark and his mind was black.
Josh read every single letter, every last crumpled piece of paper. He could almost hear Tyler’s thoughts about why he’d crumpled them.
All of the blood was so dry it was clear this all happened hours ago. Tyler was dead. There was nothing they could do.
He laid limp, cold, in his mother’s arms. Josh held her, and tried to hold him without disrupting her.
He’d gotten enough. He never realized he was everything. He was everywhere. He should have realized, if he knew, he would know Tyler needed him to be everywhere.
Tyler looked at peace, his mind silent.
Josh knew. Josh knew about the voice, the voice that tells him he’d win all the time.
The voice that wanted Tyler gone. Josh’s worst enemy, the stupid fucking voice.
The voice, the face. The face that Tyler is not. The voice, the face that makes his eyes look all dead like they look now.
Blurryface.
Blurryface had won. Tyler had lost.
Josh was still so, so proud.