Through the Living Elan

“No… NO!” Elan shouted. “Ez, don’t leave me! EZRIUM!”

“Ez?” Elan says, “Oh no… did you just… oh no… Ez…”

“I have no idea.”

“What?” Elan says, “I wasn’t gone? You… okay?”

“I…” Aydri said, “I want to be right. If I am horrible, that would make things so much easier. Things just get harder if I’m a good person. Elan and Ella blinked. “What happened?” He whispered to her. “No idea…” Ella said back, “but… well, at least we’re back.”

Elan gasped. “What-“ he said, surprised. “What happened…”

“I…” Aydri pauses. Then closes her eyes and bows her head.

“I do… I do… I’m sorry… I shouldn’t have… I never… sorry…”

“I… I can’t… all my friends… I can’t even talk to them anymore… I never say the right things… they should all hate me, everyone should help me, I make everyone’s lives worse…” Aydri whispers, “and worst of all, I try to fix it, but then things just get worse. I try to run, to save the people I love from myself, but I can’t… they find me, or I get stopped, or I’m dumb enough to just come back, because I’m too cowardly to run, too cowardly to just die like I deserve…” she finishes. Then she turns her head away. “I’m sorry…”

Aydri nods slowly. She keeps her mouth shut, worried she’ll say something wrong.

“I know… but I can’t tell anyone… that ruins things…”

Aydri slowly breathed, calming herself down. “I… my feelings… they ruin things… alway…”

“I…” Aydri starts, “I don’t want… I can’t…” she stumbles, and then breaks down, finally crying. Tears stream down her face and she buries her head back into her arms.

Aydri struggles, then goes limp, falling to the ground. She buries her head in her arms. Her breathing is shaky, and her body trembles.

Aydri starts running, keeping quiet, and breathing slowly in and out. Her eyes are squeezed shut, and she’s shaking her head violently.

Aydri stopped, head down, hands in pockets. “I… need to go.” She whispers. Then she turns and starts walking, quickly, away.

Aydri just shook her head, keeping quiet.

“Yes…yes I do. I can’t…”

“No, no… I have to be fine, always have to be fine…” Aydri said, zoning out. She blinked, coming back to reality. “Anyway, how about you? How are you doing? Better? Worse?”

“It’s fine.”

“Something, something always goes wrong.” Aydri said. “And I end up back here. Alone, at home, living the same monotonous life.”

“It probably won’t…” Aydri said. “It never does.”

“Probably…”

Aydri followed him, or, well, they did that thing where no one is following or being followed. "Yeah. Probably."

"Yeah... i dunno why."