Loneliness

He shook his head, scoffing a little. He forced himself to let loose a loud bark of laughter in hopes that the action would quell that rising feeling deep in his chest. The unknown feeling that bubbled and dug its claws deep into the fleshy crevices of his heart. But the laughter was dry and it rang, loud and empty in his condominium.

The sound appeared to be miles away from his body. He could barely hear it even though his body was what had created that laughter. His ears felt as if he were underwater, and the sound was muffled and empty. It echoed about him eerily, like whispery taunts from the monsters in the dark.

His monsters.

His mind seemed to be detached from his physical form, far away in a dark and unknown place. It floated, his mind. It grappled, slipped and tried to register what he had just heard. It struggled and gripped at the information. It repeated the cycle in that dark place.

Amber had a soulmate. She had told him that. He had known that. He just never expected it to be Hikaru. He blinked, shaking his head. No, no who cared if it were Hikaru. Even if it wasn't Hikaru, he knew that she had a soulmate. He knew.

He knew. He knew all along. He knew she wasn't his. He knew and that was why he pushed her away. He expected this. He did. He knew this would happen. Yet, why did he feel as if his heart had been ripped out of his chest?

His heart was chewed on by the monsters in the dark, bits of it spat out like some badly served dish and stepped on by thousands as if it were a piece of shit on the sidewalk from a stray dog.

You wanted her from the start.

The voice curled over his shoulder, whispering those words. It was insidious and its tone was sharp and high. It rang and rang within him, scratchy and pitched like the sudden blast of Bluetooth speakers at their loudest.

The voice pierced into his fleshy brain, scratching and tearing into his mental eardrums. It hurt.

You shouldn't have waited.

It snapped, roaring in his head and raised into a horrendous pitch that sent Ezra doubling over on the floor, clutching at his head.

You shouldn't have run.

No, no, no. Ezra struggled to stand, his feet knocking painfully into the wooden legs of his chair. The furniture overturned, slamming hard onto the marble floor but he couldn't care less.

He was okay. He told himself, stumbling into the toilet. The tiles were cold on his feet and usually, he would wince. But he couldn't bring his body to react now. He couldn't care. He was numb to such physical discomforts, the stinging and flashing of pain.

You should have stolen her.

He was okay. He clumsily flicked on the lights, slamming his tender palms on the switch.

You should have fucked her.

He was okay. He stepped before the mirror, eyes registering his appearance.

You knew that as long as you had asked in the car she would have let you take her.

Heh, him? He snorted, finally answering the darkness that plagued his mind. Why would she want to fuck him? The man before him was a wreck. Disgusting sallow skin that was coated with a thin layer of grease. He looked as if he'd been dunking himself in oil for the past three hours, spraying that shit on his skin like a damned beauty routine.

Tiny eyes that made his nose seem to take up his entire face, stupid fish lips. Matted, clumps of sticky, oily hair that clung to his forehead. A pimple or two at the side of his damned fat and round face. That ugly dark, purple circle that surrounded each bloodshot eye. He was so fucking ugly without the glitz and the glamour. A pathetic waste of space. He froze as he met his own gaze in the mirror.

His eyes were red.

Red and glistening wet with moisture, with tears. Tears that he didn't know had formed. Tears that he couldn't feel dripping down his cheeks, spilling from the corners of his eyes to stain his shirt. The biological response was automatic and he gasped, his chest struggling to form a dry sob. The pathetic sound tore from his throat in a horrendous croaking sound that the musician in him despised.

He hated it.

He gasped his body shaking with pants beyond his mental control. Gasping for air like a dying fish on land as moisture dribbled from his eyes. Why? Why was he crying?

He tried to reason with himself, tried to grasp a hold of the situation, of that numbing burn in his chest. So what if he had fucked her? It would have felt the same as with any other woman. She was, after all, human and human females were structured similarly. In the end, even if they did share amazing sex. It would have been just sex, so he shouldn't care. He shouldn't be crying like this, like a damn loser.

He was okay.

He pulled at his sleeves, violently rubbing away at the tears that were dripping from the corners of his eyes. He was okay. He repeated in his head as he scrubbed the skin under his eyes raw. He was okay. He shook his head, scrunching his face as he closed his eyes in an attempt to stop the tears from flowing.

No, no. It must be something in his damn eye. He was just a little sleepy, one too many darn yawns. He bent over, running the water through his hair and letting it flow into his exposed eyeballs. It hurt for a while and he stepped back wincing as he blinked viciously.

He was okay.

He stepped back, staring at himself in the mirror. A broken smile flickered across his lips before it dropped. He was okay. He tried again, raising the corners of his lips. Again. He tried. Again. His lips pulled and fell. Again. Again. Again. Again. AGAIN.

He broke and he stared at himself, watching as the despair crept up his face. The look of utter and irrevocable sadness. Ugly, and pathetic. What the fuck was wrong with him? How could it hurt this much? He didn't know her. He didn't know her. She was just another female. Another person. Another girl. Just another face.

"FUCK!"

The decorative pot collided with the mirror, shattering into pieces. He was not sure when he reached for it or when it escaped his fingers. The pot was smashed into smithereens, white shards sprayed all over the floors along with puffs of powdery bits. The mirror had cracked from the impact shattering into clean lines that cut across his image.

Ezra watched horrified as the figure before him morphed into something from his nightmares. His features were segmented into individual shards, enlarged and multiplied in some places, shrunken and merged in others.

A monster with hundreds of eyes stared back at him, each dripping with pathetic tears. A change in the angle revealed his trembling lips, a turn of his body and again his eyes.

It loomed before him.

A monster.

He roared, swiping his fingers across the shelf. The pieces fell across the floor, toothbrush, cups, facial soap, shavers... They clattered and banged against one another. Something broke at his feet, cutting into his uncovered skin. He panted, chest heaving as he propped his hands against the sink to stare into the mirror again.

A monster.

Something sliced his palm, maybe the edge of a razor blade. He didn't care. His breath came too fast and it was too loud. Too loud. Too damn loud.

He stepped outside numbly. His feet moving without a thought, desperate to escape. He needed...He needed a drink. Something, to ease this. This...This breathlessness. This burning in his lungs, that seemed to prevent him from drawing enough oxygen. This exhaustion that clung to his muscles, worn out from all those damn muscle spasms.

The black hole of his chest that seemed to suck out his organs from deep within him, pulling them from their place. It left an emptiness inside him.

An emptiness that reminded him too much of—

His mother, her eyes consumed by the darkness. Pathetic. She said. The box. It was there when he was sad, there when he was angry, there when he was afraid. His tummy was empty and had always been. The emptiness. It transformed into something that seemed to tear at the insides of his stomach, consuming him alive. Unwanted, alone—

He gasped, feeling the world rush back to him. No, no that was behind him. That feeling. That—

Loneliness.