He knew. He knew the last time he felt this empty was years ago, back when he was still a kid, not worried about anything but to have an eye on his brother Randall. They were close, as close as brothers could be. But Randall wasn't there anymore, passed away because of him. Because of Marc Spector. That was what every single person ever told him. His dad wasn't as straightforward as his mom, he tried to tell him that it wasn't his fault, but Marc knew. He knew dad was lying to keep him sane, maybe he told his son that lie to make himself believe in it. Marc didn't know that.
But the burning fever heated up his skin, every hair on edge as his body screamed for Jake, for that odd and unusual emptiness to be filled. That was something he knew again. How he felt like throwing up, collapsing because his body was weak and throwing a tantrum at the same time. How he felt like he could cry his eyes out for days and days and still have tears left to cry for Jake, how his throat was itchy and dry from the screams that left it, how his hands kept shaking, knuckles bleeding and nails bitten off. He hurt himself to remember what being alive felt like, to have the adrenaline kicking in every now and then when he needed it.
Adrenaline Jake used to shoot through his veins by drawing on Marc's skin with the tip of his knife, by holding a loaded gun to his head during sex without a single warning, by pushing him, shoving him, treating him like the unworthy human being he was. Every single insult Jake ever threw at him was deserved.
Marc Spector was convinced that, after all that he did, he didn't deserve to be happy.
And yet, Jake saw things differently. The spanish Fucker always made sure to go soft on Marc every once in a while to remind him that he's human too, that he's loved. Even though it wasn't Jake's style. Lockley was no one to go soft on a person who could take rough very well. Marc was his expectation. He had bought flowers for Spector more than once, had cooked, took him out to his favorite places, to late night drives, slept with him underneath the stars just because Marc had asked him to.
But now, with Jake gone, Marc was going insane, trying everything to stay alive. But he didn't know how much longer he could take it. Steven noticed what was going on, of course he did, and he tried to protect Marc from the shadows. But you can't protect a man from the darkness that became the darkness at a very young age, Steven just didn't understand that. Marc was no one to be saved or rescued. He was the kind of person you'd leave to die if it would save your own ass and he was very aware of that. But not Jake, never his Jake.
And that was why he left. To protect Marc Spector from the evil, from Khonshu and the gods, from killing more people, more children. Because Jake Lockley knew. He knew Marc wouldn't let him do that, would beg him to stay and he also knew that he wouldn't be able to say no to his boyfriend. So he had just left. Grabbed his stuff and went with the god of the moon. All Marc had left was his chain and a letter.
A letter that said how much Lockley loved him, how he wanted Marc to live a happy life, a good life, without all the issues he caused. But that letter wasn't enough, no one was left to remind him how to live. Marc forgot how to breathe on a daily basis, passed out more often than he'd admit, forgot to eat, sometimes even to drink when he wasn't downing vodka bottle after vodka bottle.
Jake Lockley left to protect him, but he didn't realize how much pain he caused Marc Spector with that action, how Marc - slowly but surely - killed himself without even realizing. Because when Jake left, he took all the reasons for Marc to keep going with him.