The Light Will Guide You Home (Archaic/Sparroopookins)

Always in a rush, never stay on the phone long enough. Why am I so self-important? Said I see you soon, that was, oh, maybe a year ago. Didn't know time was of the essence. So many questions, but I'm talking to myself. I know that you can't hear me anymore, not anymore. So much to tell you, and most of all goodbye. I know that you can't hear me anymore, not anymore. It's so loud, inside my head, with words that I should have said. As I drown, in my regrets, I can't take back the words I never said. I never said, I can't take back the words I never said. Always talking shit, took your advice and did the opposite, just being young and stupid. I haven't been all that you could have hoped for, oh but if you'd held on a little longer, you'd have had more reason to be proud.

---

Perhaps one of the most saddening aspects of his condition was that the memories he once held so close to his heart were so easily slipping from his grasp, stumbling into the dark abyss, never seen again. He was simply an onlooker as his life and everything he'd once held dear crumbled around him, the destruction only bearing similarity to that of his own heart, yet there was nobody left to blame within his isolation, leaving his mind to become a chaotic mess and his heart to become a lifeless wreck. He was the designer of his own catastrophe, the architect of the maze he had lost himself within; there were so many things going on inside his mind, so many things that the world could not understand, so many insecurities. He'd lost sight of every dream he once wielded, his overwhelming fear simply progressing into fearing the day in which others would see him the way he saw himself.

The lack of them had killed him yesterday, sending him to hell and back with each passing moment, and in such seconds that passed he had wondered how he'd make it to the current day, the fading memories, ebbing and flowing on the blackening waves of his mind, keeping him on unsteady feet. He missed them certainly more than he did yesterday, though it was nothing compared to how he would tomorrow. The hole within his soul only grew as time passed, every part of himself that he'd once known lost, purely kept in the present by the need to ensure Gwen's safety. He had never honestly meant to depend on her, on anyone, purely down to the fact that he promised himself he'd never allow himself to sink into as deep a hole as Quintin was within. Though, as of now, he needed her more than the earth needed the sun to bear witness to another day. She was there for him, she always was... Why was it so difficult for him to believe it? Why did he feel so far from her? He wasn't dead, not at all, though he wasn't alive; he had become a ghost that wielded a faintly beating heart. She was the only thing left, the only remnant of his past, the only one who truly knew him for how he was. Cody was no more. The red wolf was once one of the most important figures within his life, he'd happily surrender his heart to the lupine, and yet such things went unsaid... The wolf had left him alone before he had chance to vocalize such thoughts. He'd left him alone before he could ask the shifter to save him. Did he ever mean anything?

Those around him and before inquired as to why he held the dislike of people as he did, humans would try to school it from their animals, beat it from them, train it from them, though the truth was that animals held more insight than mankind could ever truly imagine. People would always leave. The ugliest thing in life was a human without compassion. It got harder. Every. Fucking. Day. He didn't know how much more he could handle, though what day went by in which the thought didn't enter his mind? He told himself to smile, and be fine, due to the fact that nobody within this life would care, though there was nobody to smile and be fine with. There was nobody around him to force him to act. The man was caged purely with his own self hatred and blame every waking hour, lost within the labyrinth of his own mind.

Blank crimson irises, long since having glazed, surveyed the equally unmarked wall, the bland colouration doing nothing to relieve the darkening nature of his thoughts. The numbers had long since ceased, for they didn't work, not anymore. They could not cease the shrouding of his thoughts, or the exhaustion seeping through his bones. So there he sat, his only movement the trembling of his limbs, and the occasional streak of wetness sweeping down his facials, caring not to remove them at this point, for they would only be replaced. Though, as it were, it seemed as though the faint sound of scratching upon the doorway would bring a brief interruption to his unspoken suffering. Crimson hued irises slowly shifted, awaiting the sound of Gwen's footsteps, though they were not to be found; she hadn't been within the house for a good few hours, the lack of her presence lost within the dark thoughts echoing through his mind. Hesitating for a long moment, the man rose to his feet, supporting himself against the wall, precariously staggering down the stairway in effort to reach the door, the sound growing louder as he did so. A faint growl of irritation rattled within the man's throat, pale fingers curling around the door handle and slowly opening the wooden construction. Sorrowful irises immediately snapped downwards to survey the two bedraggled forms upon the doorstep, his eyes promptly situating themselves upon the feminine. The beast looked almost like... A ragged huff tore through his lungs, irises closing briefly in effort to steady the spinning world around him. "T-there's n-nothing for y-you here..." Everything in him told him to close the door on the canids, though somehow, as he searched the eyes of the Australian shepherd, something prevented him from doing so. "I..." His glazed irises quite abruptly grew more focused than they had been in months. "Is that you V-..." He shook his head, though, presuming the resemblance to be a cruel illusion of the world. "... I suppose I c-can... Feed y-you... If n-nothing e-else..." His frame shouldered against the door, allowing it to open for the presumed entry of the dogs.

---

So many questions, but I'm talking to myself. I know that you can't hear me anymore, not anymore. So much to tell you, and most of all goodbye. But I know that you can't hear me anymore. It's so loud, inside my head, with words that I should have said. And as I drown in my regrets, I can't take back the words I never said. The longer I stand here, the louder the silence, I know that you're gone, but sometimes I swear that I hear, your voice when the wind blows. So I talk to the shadows, hoping that you might be listening, 'cos I want you to know that it's so loud, inside my head, with words that I should have said, I never said. I never said. I can't take back the words I never said, I never said.

W O R D S
962 heaps of crap and sap.

T A G 
Vera Elizabeth Foster played by CHESHIRE COTTON.

N O T E S
:3

M U S E
Words, Shattered, So Cold, Happy Ending, Impossible, Coming Home.