Work Text:
Blood. Everywhere.
That bathroom was a theatre of horror.
His body trembled violently, standing in front of the mirror.
Between his fingers, he clutched something slender and cold to the touch, yet warm with crimson liquid. A pair of scissors.
He buried his hands in his hair and shook his head frantically, letting the weapon clatter to the floor as a sob escaped his throat—tight and dry from the terror of it all.
He looked at himself in the mirror. He held his breath and decided to take a bath. In the tub, filled with water now stained crimson, everything went black.
Bill woke with a start, his heart in his throat. Magnificent, another nightmare. As if his life wasn’t one already, both professionally and privately. Beside him, his boyfriend slept blissfully. He decided it was time to go back to sleep without worrying. He didn’t even dare wake him, knowing a stupid nightmare was no excuse to disturb him. So, he closed his eyes and tried to sleep, in vain.
Bill was now focused on the laptop screen in front of him on the living room table. He was in his home in Hamburg, alone, on a break from the tour and intent on living his romantic life. But apparently, his partner wasn't very interested in making him happy or fulfilled in that regard either. Marc—that was the name of the lucky man—preferred spending time with his friends rather than with him. This hurt Bill deeply, obviously. But he tried to hide it from his boyfriend, because the last time he had pointed it out, he’d received a right hook to the cheek and had to spend his workdays caked in concealer and foundation for a week.
Marc joined him and kissed his hair gently.
“Working on a song?” he asked, seeing him with a Pages document open and a few verses typed out. The blonde nodded while softly humming the melody to concentrate.
“Yes, but I can’t find the words to express the concept,” he admitted, receiving a slight, amused huff in response from his boyfriend.
“What a load of bullshit,” Marc muttered, and Bill bit his lip slightly, uneasy.
“Why do you always have to belittle my work?” he asked in a thin voice, receiving a mocking laugh from his boyfriend, who grabbed him by the hair at the nape of his neck.
“I’m not belittling anything,” he whispered in his ear. “I’m treating you according to your artistic worth.”
“At least I have a job,” the blonde retorted.
“What the fuck did you just say?”
Bill bit his lower lip until it bled and squinted his eyes to hide his distress, adding nothing more. He hated not being supported by his own boyfriend, but he endured it. By now, it was a defence mechanism for him.
“Give me a kiss?” Marc asked, and without waiting for an answer, he took it, grabbing Bill’s face.
He sighed slightly as soon as he heard the door close behind his boyfriend a few moments later—a sign that he would spend another day out at "work", which meant filming stupid, senseless videos that people, apparently, enjoyed watching.
Bill was now in his bathrobe, smoking a cigarette with eye patches under his eyes. He exhaled the smoke and rolled his eyes, noticing that the dishes Marc was supposed to clean were still in the sink, waiting to be polished.
Once the cigarette was out, he got to work, careful of the long nails he loved to keep colourful and sharp.
His face was smeared with blood.
The cold scissors, their blades warmed by crimson liquid.
He saw this in a snap, a flash, that made him jump and lose his grip on a plate. It shattered, cutting the skin of his foot. He hissed in pain before heading to the bathroom to wash the wound and dress it.
He washed his face too, to shake off what he had seen, but soon his eyes widened. The water wouldn't go down the drain; it was murky with blood. He pulled the sink stopper and lifted it, noticing how his own hair was clogging the passage. His hair was also bloodied.
He looked at the sink again and saw that everything was normal. Nothing wrong, nothing macabre.
—————————
“What is it?” Marc asked boredly, lying in bed with him.
“Nothing,” was Bill’s reply. Instead, he had spent the afternoon searching for his symptoms on the internet, reaching conclusions he didn't like at all. Schizophrenia? He had never considered it, and he had never realised he suffered from it. Not until then.
“Okay,” Marc huffed, continuing to look at his phone. He didn't acknowledge Bill in the slightest.
“I wasn't well at home today…” he began. “I don't know… has it ever happened to you, seeing episodes that didn't actually happen?”
Marc laughed. “No, I’m not a psychopath.”
“Are you calling me sick?”
“Look, I don't have time for your bullshit. I’m tired, and I just got back from work, clear?”
“If that's what you call work,” Bill muttered, getting out of bed to head toward the bedroom door.
“Ah, so you want to be a prick, huh?” Marc hissed, grabbing him by his extensions, making him let out a small whimper of surprise.
“At least now I have your attention,” the blonde snapped.
“You’re just a narcissistic whore. Do you want to fight?”
“No, but where have you been all this time? Fucking someone else?”
Marc lost it and struck him full in the face with force, making his boyfriend's nose bleed. Before long, Bill found himself in the bathroom hyperventilating, staring at the mirror, then the sink, his vision growing increasingly blurred. He saw the flashes from that morning again and couldn't calm down. He collapsed onto the floor.
—————————
“Hi…
Yes, yes, everything's fine. Listen, can I stop by your place in a bit?
…
Okay, that's fine, thanks.
Bye. Bye-bye.”
Within forty-five minutes, he found himself at the table with his brother, who had prepared a hot tea and served it with a worried smile, seeing him so distraught.
“You know, it’s getting worse,” the blonde admitted. “Has it ever happened to you, seeing things that never happened? Like flashes?”
“Well, our minds are built to create; sometimes they do it autonomously,” was Tom’s response to those questions, spoken with a calm, almost professional tone. “Are you afraid when it happens?”
He nodded.
“Whatever I do for him makes no sense, and maybe he has every right to think so, but why humiliate me every time?”
“Sorry, but who are we talking about?” Tom asked, setting his cup down beside him.
“About Marc, who else?” the singer replied with a half-laugh. “Maybe he’s right; maybe I should give it all up and become a prostitute, since I'm so good at it…”
“No, music is the only thing you have left after the acci—”
“After?”
Tom had to sigh.
“I know it hurts to remember…”
“No, I’m not understanding, Tomi…”
“I didn't want it to come to this…” the brunette began with an almost pained expression, “but maybe it’s the only thing left for us to do.”
Bill remained confused, watching him, offering a slight smile with a soft sigh. He wasn't understanding the situation at all; his brother was being so strange that he couldn't grasp his meaning.
Tom stood up and went toward a cabinet with drawers Bill had never seen before. He returned with an official file with the name “Marc Eggers” written on it. Bill still didn't understand.
“These are the photos from that night… don’t you remember?”
Bill began to flip through the documents inside with a slight huff and a tight smile. He didn't believe it. Marc’s destroyed car, the photo of the body… no, it wasn't possible.
He had a flash of himself preparing the bath that fateful night. He reached the front door and watched his boyfriend, ready to go out, warning him not to wait up, that he’d be late.
Bill couldn't believe it. Wasn't he just with Tom?
“Finished writing?”
“No, I gave up… you were right.”
Marc smiled, almost victoriously. Then he began looking for his car keys.
Bill moved automatically, retrieving the scissors from the bathroom drawer.
“Are you sure?” Marc’s voice reached him from behind with a slight grin, "You'd be all alone.”
“Do you remember now?”
He was back with Tom.
He thought back to that day with all his might, realising that not for a single moment had he been in Marc’s company and that he had been living alone since that fatal night. He had fought with a void. Argued with no one.
He shook himself and looked at the wall, seeking visual stability, and his breath caught. Since when did Tom have degrees hanging on the wall? He blinked a few times and saw his private psychiatrist before him, observing him in silence, waiting.
“That night, he was in the car with a woman. He was drunk and didn't stop at the sign… it happened eight months ago. Do you remember now, Bill?”
But on that day, Bill remembered holding the scissors and ending that toxic relationship by stabbing his boyfriend to death, then treating himself to a warm bath to wash away all guilt.
But not a single drop of blood had been spilt in that house, let alone in that bathroom.