Work Text:
***
The writing on the walls
May be foreign to us all
'Cause the casualties of war
Haven't changed us much at all
-10 YEARS-
***
Tommy was home. He himself wouldn't believe it but a paper said it was over, at least for him.
He couldn’t remember what his bed was like. He slept on the floor that night, the bed was so soft that Tommy felt like he was sinking. That night everything started. He woke up suddenly to the feeling of being watched even though he was alone in his room. His parents were next door, so he tiptoed his way to the kitchen to get a glass of water. The air was lighter there. Instead of returning to his bedroom, Tommy stayed in the living room and went to sleep on the couch.
Since coming back home, he could only enter his room during the day. Just as the sun started to go down Tommy would feel a stare fixed on him and the air turned so heavy, he couldn’t bear it. Every morning his mother found him sleeping on the couch. She kept her worries to herself.
Weeks later, he couldn’t stand being in his room altogether. Tommy took his things out and left them in the basement. Since then, he would either spend the day there or in the living reading French poetry to his mother’s dismay.
Some days he stayed with her in the kitchen to help. Tommy was cutting a carrot in dices when he felt the eyes and their cold stare stabbing his nape. His body froze and the knife fell to the floor, making his mother turn around and look at him. Soon her hands were over his cheeks. Tommy saw her tearful eyes, so he hugged her as soon as his body let him. She was trembling as much as he did, her tears soaking his shoulder.
Months later Tommy couldn’t stand being inside the house. Feeling watched all the time was unbearable and so was the heavy cold air. As soon as the sun rose in the sky he’d get outside. He sat on the porch every day and remained there until the night fell. His father got him a chair and a little table for him to read and fill crossword games. At night Tommy sat on the couch and tried his best to ignore the overwhelming stare. Some nights he couldn’t sleep at all, other nights he simply blacked out, worn out. The lack of sleep took a toll on him, he was moody all the time and when he was not, he was too depressed to even pick a book. Those days he sat on the porch in silence, looking at the neighbors and the strangers walking on the street. They were living the life he lost.
As expected, the stare followed him there too after a few days. The porch became unbearable too but sitting on the stoop was fine, but not for long. Soon he spent the whole day in front of his house.
The first time he did, his mother called him inside several times, the only answer she got was his head shaking. That night his father had to drag him inside, Tommy’s feet wouldn’t move. His mother took him to the market the next day, hoping that a change of air would help him. It did, a little bit. From that day on, every morning they’d walk together around the neighborhood.
Weather was nice that day and his mother was busy preparing lunch, so he went to the library by himself. The uneasiness Tommy felt while walking down the street took him by surprise, it was the same he felt inside the house. He rushed back home to hug his mother’s knees. She was terrified.
No matter where he was Tommy could feel the eyes fixed on his back and a constant sensation of drowning. Every day he found himself fighting the tides again.
One night his father offered him a glass filled with something cheap that burned his throat. He gave Tommy a second and a third, he kept pouring until the boy was slumped on the couch, passed out.
Tommy felt like shit, more than usual, in the morning. The next night he refused the glass, so his father drank it and went to sleep. Tommy couldn’t.
--Leave me alone --, he murmured in desperation.
The walls cracked and the light flickered. Tommy coiled his arms around his knees and hid the head between them, he was sobbing.
His father found the bottle on the kitchen table the next morning, empty.
Doctor said he was fine, that he needed to go outside more often and find a job to occupy his mind in something else.
He was stuck in a house where he could not breathe and, on top of that, he was a burden. His parents were sleeping when he got in their room crying. His mother jumped out of bed to hug him while his father searched through him looking for wounds, there was none other than the one he carried in his heart. He was just a lonely boy stranded on a cold beach.
Tommy knew he was not alright. He couldn’t get himself lost in books anymore, so he started writing. Some days he felt brave enough to read his stories to his mother, but even if he could move her to tears, he knew she didn’t get it. Neither could his father. Maybe his brother could have. It didn’t matter, he was long gone.
Like Gibson.
His diary rested over his chest as he laid in the empty tub, fully dressed. His eyes looking at the ceiling. The air was heavier than ever. Tommy was being watched.
…Death found no prey but a man who couldn't listen at time and whose ankle got stuck in a chain. Panic amused itself until the water filled the man's lungs and the game was no fun anymore…
The walls cracked and the lights flickered a second time. The tap screeched, getting Tommy’s attention as he watched in utter horror the water starting to fill the tub. His body refused to move.
Cold fingers coiled around his neck, tightening their grip as he struggled for air. The diary floated until its pages got soaked. Gibson wouldn't let go.
--Don't look at me like that. It's not fair --, he said.
Tommy’s mother found him in the morning.
The inspector declared it a suicide. Of course, he noticed there were things out of place. There was no letter, but an unfinished story about a man drowning, and the hands printed on his neck couldn’t be his own nor his mother’s. They interrogated the father, but nothing pointed in his direction. Calling it a suicide was the easiest way to close the case. After all, Thomas Atkins was a young troubled man. It was expected. What the inspector couldn’t stop wondering about was the writing on the walls. All in French.