Yu-Gi-Oh! Fan Fiction ❯ Urgency of Life ❯ falling 1.0 ( Chapter 1 )

The Urgency of Life

A Seto/Joey fanfic by subaruxkamui4ever

Before I get into this I will issue - the warning - . Seriously, this fic is not for the kiddies. Rated R for serious angst, yaoi, and extremely explicit drug use and abuse, possible character death/suicide, self-inflicted injury, and mutilation of others with/without consent. I shouldn't be writing this at all, actually. I'm right in the middle of my other fic, Clear Vision, but this has been stuck in my head for some time now, so it's time to let it out. Rest assured I will be updating C.V. very soon. This story will be much shorter, and much more desperate and sad. Do not expect a happy ending from this one, although I won't promise anything as of yet. Once again, I'll be Joey, because just thinking about trying to get inside Seto's head gives me the creeps. Can you just imagine what goes on in there? No, thank you.

falling. .. . .. ….. . ..

I'm in love with him. I wonder if he knows? He couldn't possibly. I certainly don't act like I love him. I treat him as harshly and without feeling as I possibly can. I must. How else can I survive? It is much better this way, this game that we play, back and forth, tossing hatred and loathing across our schoolroom, our dueling arena, wherever we happen to be together. This is the only way I can think of to make you show me that you care about my existence. You notice me, because you hate me so much. You don't even have a moment to spare on thinking about hating anyone else, yet you spare the time for me. I've come a long way, apparently.

I was staring at my ceiling for a long time that night, thinking about Seto Kaiba. I suppose it sounds strange, but it's true. I do it all the time, have done it, for a long time. I'm in love with him. I say that to myself a lot. I like the way it sounds. I've heard the phrase numerous times, from the people around me, the shows on TV, you can hear it anywhere you go. It's not a very interesting phrase at all. It's commonplace, boring, and even irritating at times. Until you say it to yourself. I'm in love with him. I closed my eyes and said it with my voice.

"I'm in love with him."

It sounded gorgeous, and I loved the way the words felt on my tongue. I decided, a long time ago, that this feeling would have to be enough. He would never feel for me the way I do for him, for while my hatred was a mask, his was true and real. It would have to be enough. I didn't ever allow myself to imagine what life would be like if things had been different, if he had been in love with me as well. I rarely even let the thought cross my mind. It had no purpose in my life, these false hopes. Just loving him was enough. My feelings were all I had here in this place I lived, and I clung to them violently. If this was as much as I would get, I would do anything to keep it safe. These feelings were my life's work, my only ambition, my one source of energy and will to survive. Without them, I was lost. I was nothing. I couldn't imagine what my life would be reduced to if these feelings were stolen from me. I wouldn't want to imagine. The framework of my existence had already been slowly withering and fading from the inside out, due to my…problem. My feelings were keeping my head above water, so to speak. Without them, the entire foundation would crumble upon itself, leaving my spirit a shattered mess, never to be repaired. This was why I thought about him, as I stared at my ceiling, my eyes glazed, and seemingly empty. He was all I had.

Every night I laid there, on my floor, not owning enough energy pull myself up. I didn't even really mind it. After the events of the day, it always felt good. Now I was home. No matter who lived there or what they did to me, I didn't have to put on any shows here. In this place, I could be my true self. I could take my mask off and rest from the constant burden of wearing it for everyone else. There were no friends to save me from myself here, I could drown in whatever I chose to, no one would stop me, no one would care. No one would know. Everyone else here was here for the reason. The reason I was here, still came back, after all that's happened. We didn't care anymore. We don't see each other very often. When we do, we keep to ourselves. Titles such as "Father" or "Child" no longer exist between us. We mind our own business.

I often became lost in my own thoughts. Even now, as I try to recount the events as they happened, I begin to ramble, become one with the past as though I am there now. But the things I did then, and the things I do now, are very different. I begin with this day in particular, not because the day itself was particular. Far from the truth. In fact, this day was, moment for moment, almost identical to every day that came before it, for a very long time. The day exactly following, however, was the first twirling snowflake that eventually became the torrential avalanche, and destroyed everything in its path and wake. That is where these things begin to move, and these events unfold.

falling. . .. . . .

I opened my eyes, and immediately felt the air in them, burning, as though they'd been open all night. It wasn't far from the truth. I slept rarely, and when I was able to fall, my eyes would sometimes stay open of their own accord, glazed and blindly staring straight through absolutely nothing. Turning my head, I looked at the clock that sat near my sleeping place, on my desk, the only piece of furniture in the room, if it could be called that. 6:06 am. `I need to get ready now if I want to have time to wake up before I leave', I thought to myself, knowing what I meant in my own way of speaking. I rolled over slowly and sat up on the floor, where I slept, in a pile of blankets and clothes used for both covers and pillows. Digging through the mess, I found my blue uniform and tossed it to the side of the room, now distinguishable from the pile. I went to the bathroom and brushed my teeth for a long time. I always brush for at least a couple of minutes. There's a constant taste in my mouth, but still, I try to rid myself of it, even for just a moment. It's a bad taste. Everything begins to taste that way after awhile. I rinsed out my mouth and wiped my face off with a towel. I'm finished in the bathroom. On my way out, I looked at the shower and a thought crossed my mind. `When was the last time I took a shower?' I couldn't remember. It couldn't have been more than a week, though. I never seemed to have time for things like that. Everything was pushed back and forth in order of importance, until my priorities found their way to the front of the line.

Back in my own room, I slipped out of the sweats I had worn to bed and pulled on the uniform I had cast aside. Just out of curiosity, I glanced in the mirror that hung above my desk. Looking at him, he looked right back, and I saw him and the way he felt, for he showed it clearly through his demeanor. He was very, very tired. His eyes were rimmed in red, not even a pink, but a dark red that reflected the tenderness and mistreatment of the skin there. The circles under his eyes weren't all that bad, but he had never been prone to them, so they were easier to miss. However, above his eyes, scattered along the top of his eyebrows, he had broken out, and tiny, irritated blemishes sat and refused to go away no matter how feverishly he scrubbed at them. Looking still at him, I thought about what I looked like to my friends. I wondered if they would notice, perhaps if they already had. If I could see it…well there was no use worrying about it. I looked how I looked and could always just tell them I was sick again. It seemed like I was sick a lot…I chuckled to myself at the thought, even though it wasn't really all that funny. It was an inside joke, and even though I was the only one in on it, It was still funny to me. Or maybe I was tired. I couldn't remember. I knew my body was exhausted, but I couldn't tell if I was actually tired. Either way, I needed to get ready for school. Now that I was all set to go, I had to get ready. There is a huge difference between being set to go and being ready. Sitting down at my desk, I opened the top drawer to my right and pulled out everything I kept in the back corner, tucked in an empty cigarette box. Flipping the lid open, I pulled out a blade, which was beginning to dull, a piece of a straw from a fast food restaurant cut at an angle, and a corner of a sandwich bag tied off in a loose knot, containing the precious substance that fueled my body through each day. I undid the knot at the top of the sack, and gingerly reached in with the blade and collected an amount on the tip. Carefully I brought it over to the CD that sat on my desk, flipped over to the mirrored side, and dumped it in a pile. Tapping the blade twice to the disc to cast off any powder that had stuck, I retied the knot on the bag and stuck it back into the box. Placing the straw near the disc so it wouldn't roll away, I began the tedious but strangely calming process of cutting. Taptaptaptaptaptaptaptaptap…….My mind always wandered at the repetitive noise….taptaptaptaptaptaptap………I thought of him…….and smiled.

After a few minutes, the rocks all seemed to be gone, and what was left was a smooth pile of silky white powder, cut so fine it almost stuck to itself. I hoped it would be enough for the day because I couldn't exactly find the time or the atmosphere at my high school to do this again. I could make it with what I had, I was sure of it. I didn't have the constant, gnawing feeling in the back of my brain that came when I knew I would run out soon, and have to buy more. What I had left in the drawer would take me to the end of the month, if not a little farther. I would be fine. And no one would ever know. It was partially for them, the people I didn't want to find out. They expected Joey to act like they had built him up to act, and I had to play that part. I owed them a lot more than just that. I'm not in any way going to say that I began this game for them, because I didn't. I just found a way to ease the burden of being who I was supposed to be. Who I really was sort of, well, got in the way. I could be what everyone wanted me to be, what I secretly wanted me to be. What I would have been if…things hadn't been so hard, so early on. But most importantly, with this game, I found that I could be the person that Seto hated. Everything that I would normally be far too frightened to say to him, it all just came out, with a little help. I had the nerve, the spark, the audacity that drove him over the edge. I needed that, more than life. I needed him to react to me. And react he did.

I separated the pile into four uniform lines with the corner of the blade, each one almost perfectly unison with the next in both height and width, still leaving half of the original amount to take with me. I had become quite good over the past few months. It didn't begin at four, however. Not even close. This had been going on for about eight or nine months now. At first it was just a weekend thing, something that everyone in my neighborhood did anyway, and was widely accepted for a few blocks around as a perfectly decent "weekend" activity. After a few weeks, I realized that the time I spent `off' was mostly directed at hurrying towards the time I spent `on'. Partly because the `off' time was becoming a blurry mess. It took me a long time to scrape up the nerve to take the stuff to school with me, but I realized that my chances of being discovered were becoming greater while I was `off'. No one suspected a thing while I was `on' because I slowly began to need to be `on' in order to act the way I used to when I was always `off'. It's confusing, but essentially, I was more noticeable when I was `off', so the decision was made, and I made it a daily habit. Which took my capacity for volume to amazing heights. What used to keep me awake for days would now only keep me awake till lunch. But I wouldn't complain. This was my life, my game, and none of it really mattered to me. I thought of nothing but him. Constantly, endlessly, obsessively, nothing and no one could break my attention or my devotion. Each time we got into a standoff, I ran my mouth louder and more aggressively, hoping to perhaps spark a new level of hatred and, inevitably, feeling, which Seto had never felt before. For anyone. And I kept on this way, and things did not progress, until this day, which I recount to you now.

I leaned over the disc, one hand holding the straw thrust up my nose, the other hand pressed against the other side of my nose, closing the passageway so I couldn't draw any air through it. Lining up the tip of the straw with the beginning of the first line, I sharply drew air through my one nostril, and the powder traveled up into brain. One….two…three……….four! After taking up the last line, I dropped the straw and threw my head back, freezing in that moment. The moment where it all begins. The burning sensation began, the one that told me that all the vessels in my sinuses were doing their best to carry the substance into my system. It burned, but…it felt so good. Then, a few moments later, the mucous came. This was by far the worst part. It left such an awful taste in the back of my throat, so much that I still retch even today. Grabbing a can of soda from under my chair, I snapped it open and took a huge drink, swallowing slowly to make sure it carried some of the taste with it. I always kept a ton of soda around, it's the only way to pass it down and kill the taste at the same time. God, it tastes so awful, but afterwards, when the feeling kicks in, I feel as though I could do a thousand things at once. I feel so good that I'm alive and here, and everything is right with the world. I feel contentment with life that I couldn't reach before.

Now, I was `ready to go'. And after the whole process was complete, it was time for me to leave for school. Not that I would be able to pay any sort of attention when I got there. I can't sit still. I get nervous, fidgety, even rambunctious when I'm `on'. My speech speeds up tremendously as well, and the words tend to run together, slurring into what sounds almost like an accent. Feeling more than rejuvenated, I grabbed my backpack, stuck the cigarette box in my pocket, and ran out the door.

AN: I'm gonna break for a chapter here, but its not that much longer. Well…crap…maybe it'll be longer than I thought. Damn! I seriously thought I would make this two, maybe three chapters, maybe! Well, I'll get both stories out, swear. I like both of them far too much to leave them unfinished, and anyway, there's nothing I hate more than an unfinished story. Well…..maybe silentshipping. You guys, It seriously pisses me off! I swear, the untamed anger….