A/N: I put a violence tag on this story for this chapter specifically.As a rule I don't usually write about suicide and my character don't really have a need to experience it or thought of it. That being said after some consideration I thought it was appropriate for the story, specifically for Owl given his history and the current turn of events. This piece of fiction is of course not intended to be disrespectful in any way if you have experience with either thoughts of suicide or know someone that's taken their own life. There is a happy ending to his, just in case you were starting to lose faith.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
He felt numb.
As if all feeling had left his body. That couldn’t be true, because he was in pain, deep, throbbing, endless pain but how could he be in pain if she was so numb? He remembered the day when his heart stopped beating, the day he made Cat walk out that door. He had made the biggest mistake of his life and there was no way he could ever unmake it. He should have told President Vaughn to shove her orders up her callous ass; he should have just told Cat about his feelings and let the younger man interpret them how he wished. It was only then, as the door closed and he lay sobbing on the floor that he realized the words he hadn’t said were not filled with hesitant “like” but with first “love”. How was he supposed to know what his love felt like? He’d never loved anyone before! He cried for hours on the floor of his apartment, stopping only to allow his headache to subside and to move into his bedroom where he cried more because he saw reminders of his former mate everywhere.
He started using Cat’s soap in the shower and wearing the other man’s left behind clothes. He refused to come out for his appointments with the Vampire and because of the declining state of his mental and physical health his exhibit was closed for the time being. Since he couldn’t bother to take care of himself properly his new keeper came daily to force him to eat and wash but also to remove anything that was potentially dangerous after Owl had nearly killed himself with a kitchen knife.
Owl had never contemplated suicide before, even after spending twelve years alone, watching the men and women around him receive mates and live happily together. The moment Cat walked out the door and it sank in that he would
never come back and that Owl could
never say he was sorry and that he really did love him all Owl could think about was death. His chest ached with a constant dull pain that only spiked whenever he thought of Cat, which was every hour of every day. There was no point in living if he couldn’t be with the other man but his new keeper had been quite forward thinking. She shackled an ankle to his bed every night with an ankle locked by an ever changing password. The chain was so short he couldn’t leave the bed and anything that could be used to cause harm to himself had been removed.
The scars on his wrists were pink and new, the stitches only removed a few weeks ago. He stared at the long lines that raced up both arms. He was staring which meant they failed him. If he couldn’t have Cat he didn’t want anyone else, anything else. Death was preferable to a life he now had to live alone, secured in the knowledge that he had caused his own pain and suffering and he couldn’t bear it. Every breath he took was a labor, his heart beat with sluggish slowness, increasing the pain he felt, headaches of varying degrees were a daily nuisance and all he wished was that everything would stop.
He reached up to rub his sleepy eyes in irritation unsurprised to feel wetness there. He cried so often these days it was hard to tell when he started and when he stopped. The room was dark, lonely, almost empty. In a rare fit of rage he had destroyed most everything that wasn’t a book but felt worse afterwards because some of what he had broken belonged to Cat. He laid down on the bed and tried to breathe finding it almost impossible these days. He felt light headed and nauseous. That wasn’t unusual however given his terrible eating habits and fits of depressive sobbing on the floor. He hadn’t left his apartment in six months except that time he was rushed to the hospital when he slit his arms.
Owl smiled perversely as he remembered the sharp knife sliding along his flesh, a line of red opening, blossoming, making it difficult to complete the task on his other arm. He had managed however and dropped the knife from numb fingers, watching his life spill out of two seemingly innocent lines. He was miserable but he smiled anyway because now he could be free, wherever he was going, whatever lay in store for him on the other side he would be gone from this world. Hell couldn’t be any worse than what he suffered now at his own hands, the suffocating loneliness that engulfed him, choked him. Heaven…well… even if he deserved to be in Heaven he imagined only happiness as he forgot all about Cat and the pain he caused him. Maybe he would get to watch over Cat in his life, like an angel. He could definitely make sure his mate was happy with someone else. The darkness crept up on him quickly but at least he knew it signaled the end.
Except he woke up in the hospital attached to machines, his arms stitched and bound tightly with gauze a troubled looking President Vaughn nearby. She said nothing however; she hadn’t spoken to him since that day he kicked out Cat, which was all well and good since he wasn’t sure what he would say to her anyway. He realized that day it was useless to try and actively kill himself, what with people posted outside his door, hidden video camera’s watching his every move he would just have to pray to some higher power that his life ended quickly on its own.
Maybe his prayers were being answered, he felt weaker every day, he didn’t really care because he didn’t want to live anyway but he’d lost so much weight it was hard to tell he had once been healthy and vital. His eyes always seemed bloodshot and not to mention filled with tears and despite eating he felt no nourishment. He was tired all the damn time and slept fitfully, dreaming of Cat, waking up crying his name in a hoarse, abused voice, desperately reaching for the formless specter his imagination had conjured for him. In his dreams Cat always came back, always came through the door and took him in his arms. He swore that he would never leave again and called Owl all sorts of names for being stupid enough to tell him to leave when he knew he loved him.
His eyes fluttered closed and he took in a deep, painful breath. He was so damn tired; it was so damn hard to keep breathing. He didn’t want to try anymore; it had been six months how he survived this long was a miracle but no longer. No… no longer.
~*~
Owl was unconscious even though the paramedics burst into his room seconds later having been alerted by the heart monitor in the anklet he wore. They applied oxygen to the barely breathing man but insisted that he be rushed to the hospital; one commented off handedly that it didn’t look good. As they passed through a special emergency exit there was one attraction wandering the halls at night who had heard everything and it was he that pushed his way into the apartments of Devil and Cherub to use their gaming system and prayed that a familiar face would be on. It appeared that everyone’s prayers were being answered that day because Cherub excitedly exclaimed that the name he’d asked for was on.
“Puss-Puss where are you?! You have to come back to The Birdcage right now, Owl is
dying.”
