When it Snaps
—-- Y/N’s Point of View —--
“Cause I’ll never be her Pav! And it’s like you’re trying to keep me as close as you can to satisfy yourself, but then you never actually let me in.”
It’s all coming out. All of it. I don’t even know if all of it’s fair. But this violence might be the only justice I ever get for myself.
“How could you ask me to let go of her -”
“I’m not! I’m asking you to let go of me”
“What?”
He pauses, and fury flares in my chest again. Anger has gotten cozy in my chest, and it’s incinerating the walls. I don’t know how I'm surviving it.
“You tell me you love me, that you can’t live without me, and that would be fine, all of it would be fine, if I was just your friend. But I know I’m not.”
Talking to him is running in an endless loop. And the only one who can call off the race is me.
“Meri jaan -”
“No, do not call me that, not when you don’t mean it. I know I’m here to fill the void, but I’m never actually allowed to, am I?”
I’m a flame in love with a moth. He is desperate to touch me, and though I’m the supposed danger, he is the one in control. He flirts with me, giving me the idea that one day he’ll actually come into my embrace. But my wick is ash, and my wax has collapsed, I can hold no more flame to allure him. Maybe I’m more of a fly in a web, I certainly feel like my innards are being sucked out.
“Pav you can’t keep doing this to me, I am not some yoyo you can just keep yanking closer whenever you feel like it and then tossing me away when you’ve had your fill.”
The whiplash is going to snap my neck. He holds me in his arms at night. He runs his fingers through my hair in the dark, and I can feel the streaks left behind by his tears. With my head on his chest, his heartbeat reverbs through my soul, and for as long as I can remember, my heart has been attuned to his. I would nurse every need of his for the rest of my life, to keep his precious heart beating. I swear on my life I would do it, if he wasn’t being so cruel. I wouldn’t ask him for more, if he wasn’t constantly holding it over my head like something I can reach if I can just be good enough.
“I need you to decide.”
“Decide? What is there to decide on?”
I burst into flames.
“If there is any room for me!”
If one more moment of silence passes, I will be consumed. I’m a snake so driven to madness, all it can do is eat itself. Maybe that’s what I’ve been doing all along.
And then he looks up at me, with the eyes that have won my heart a million times over, the eyes that I see swallowed with grief every day. She pulled out the light in them when she left. And I’ll probably never understand just how much she took from him, how much she took with her into that grave. Is it possible that we’ll never see those parts of him again? I almost can’t believe I'm doing this to him. But I also can’t believe he is doing this to me.
“Decide Pavitr!”
I will never blame him for loving, I will never blame him for mourning, but I cannot let him keep me in a perpetual state of use, like I’m the cake he wants to have and eat too. I can't keep giving all of myself to him. In his eyes, I’m no better than a bottle of alcohol. I’m something to mourn with, and then use as an excuse to beat himself up, something that eases the pain but never gets to share his sober days. I am something he can consume. But I was not born to be eaten.
His mouth opens, and before the words are off his tongue, I beg myself not to hope. I beg in vain.
“She is half of my heart. I cannot, I will not ever discard her, I will not betray her memory. She was my life, and I died with her. I cannot dig up my heart to give it away.“
There is absolutely nothing inside me.
And then I laugh, tears welling in my eyes, as if it really wasn’t over until this moment. But no matter how relentlessly I tried, he gave up before I even came into his life.
“I thought I should give you a decision. But really, I knew I’d already made up my mind. Maybe I…I guess I was just hoping that maybe there was enough room for me to actually have a home with you. A life with you. Three years Pavitr. Three years. And I thought I could be second place. But I’m not going to live my life with a man who will never love me. I’m not going to spend my life loving a dead man.
I mindlessly grab my coat from the arm of his couch, and there is something so cruel about it: this final action, this final goodbye being so seamless. I idly ache to leave it there, leave one last thread uncut. But it’s already over my arm, and I know that even if I left it, I am too tired to ever come back for it.
“Goodbye Pavitr.”
—---- Pav’s point of View —--
I can’t think clearly.
“No! No, wait!”
Thousands of my fractured pieces are screaming over each other, begging her not to go. Bursting through the forefront is primal fear: if she walks out that door, I will never see her again.
I’m scrambling towards her, and suddenly my hands are tight around her arm.
“No no, Y/N please you’re my best friend.”
She scoffs, and it feels like it rattles through my whole chest, its impact crushing the frame of my ribs.
“I never would have asked you to love me Pavitr, if you hadn’t given me reason to believe you already did.”
She’d never be able to overcome my spider strength, and the slight yanks I give her everytime she tries to pull away are causing her to lose her balance.
“Pav let go, Pav let me go!”
And as much as I wish I could stop it, It is already crashing through my vision.
“Don’t let me go, Pav don’t let me go!” Gayatri, the face I’ve carved violently into my brain with religious repetition. We’re hanging from the top of the building, my hand around her slick wrist, the rain writhing itself through our palms, my grip growing more and more precarious as the Green Goblin stalks closer, I’m losing her I’m -
A brutal clap echoes through the room, silencing everything in my mind. Pain ravages my cheek.
Her hand has retracted defensively in front of her now, and tears are making her beautiful skin flare red. I can’t move, and my grip loosens just enough for her to yank her hand away violently. As she does, her sleeve retracts.
There are bruises on her arm.
A sob bounces out of her as she trips, but then her hand is on the door handle, and suddenly the door is slammed in my face.
Gayatri was half of my heart, and I feel like I’ve just lost the other half.