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Their parents were fighting again, over something stupid and pointless and petty like taxes.
Kris kept clutching their ears, kept shoving themselves further between their bed and nightstand, kept fighting the violent and relentless tremors that rocked their body every few seconds, but they couldn’t escape the truth.
Their parents didn’t love each other.
Nothing was ever going to be truly the same ever again.
Kris was never going to escape this destructive, systematic, fatal change. It happened with Dess, then Elly, then Azzy. They were acutely aware of the simple truth that their life was imploding and there was absolutely nothing that they could do about it. And their parents fighting was one more thing to add to the pile. More irrefutable proof that no matter what their parents said, no matter how hard Kris tried, everything was changing and they couldn’t stop it. They were helpless to stop the fighting and destruction and entropy in the awful little system Kris had the misfortune of calling their life, and now they were going to shake and sob and claw at their ears pathetically until they died.
The arguing was so, so much louder than their wailing, and with nobody else to hear them, help them, save them, they choked on their own tears. Wouldn’t their parents hear them? They didn’t really want to die here, drowned and suffocated in their misery. But how could they keep going all on their own, when everything seemed so awful all the time? The angel knew Kris wasn’t strong enough to face this all by themselves. Wouldn’t someone please just come find them, help them do the hard parts until they were strong enough?
Azzy would’ve saved them. Would’ve held them through their shaking and given them his headphones to muffle the arguing and wiped away their tears and made sure they didn’t hurt themselves. Azzy kept them safe. They needed Azzy, needed him so badly it was impossible to describe.
They wanted it to be quiet again. Wanted everyone back. Wanted everything to stay the same forever. Was death like that?
No. The angel would never be that kind.
Kris sobbed and choked and hyperventilated and ripped their hair out until the sounds of fighting waned into talking and the violent tremors that expelled impossibly more tears became waves of disgusting, slimy feelings in their chest. The crying left them hollowed out and used up, with no way of knowing if that was better or worse than apathy.
Around 3am, Kris made their way from their window to their parents' balcony and then onto the roof. As they watched the sky get brighter, they knew that they didn’t want to feel better, they wanted to rip the stars to shreds.