Numbness

It was the mind-numbing torture that killed him.

The girl, no more than age 13, slowly sank under the surface of the water, her body a mangled and torn mess, the results of his breakdown.

Turning around, he walked back into the town, where the people were. He didn’t know what he needed, but he wanted to feel the buzz of life again, anything except the emptiness.

He could not cry. He had to be strong. Life had taught him a very important lesson indeed. When all falls, be detached. Be strong. The world could jeer at you, mock you, curse you, break you. But you could not give them the satisfaction. No reaction was to be given, ever.

He knew no consequence would come to him though. He had gotten significantly better at hiding his tracks. It wouldn’t do for him to ruin everything he had now, would it?

He stops at the outskirts of town. The wide forest, the wild freedom was narrowing into one small path, towering buildings looming over, confining and anxiety-inducing.

Maybe that was why he snapped. Really, this never should have happened. It was the third time this week he had lost control, and he didn’t understand it. How could he? He barely knew his name when he was in the trance, as he liked to call it, and when he was free? Not a chance of reining himself in until something happened.

It was the numbness, the unfeeling sensation that controlled him, sending his feet towards his apartment which wasn’t home, but it would do.

It was the curse of the people, he was sure of it. People on the news never depicted him for who he was. Just himself, not the famous criminal. For once, he thought. Just for a moment. One peaceful moment that wouldn’t haunt him forever, one moment without the demons wrecking havoc in his mind. He seemed to be in a dream, drifting away, and his body was controlled by some unknown force, just. Coping. A silent force of nature.

He looked at the pills on the cabinet shelf. Pills?

He remembered now. The ones that had kept him alive once, that let him live one day, just one moment unanchored by that unexplainable sadness.

He seemed to break out of the stupor, the haze that kept him from falling harder, faster. The medication had finally worn off.

With a sense of nervous determination, he picked up the bottle and swallowed one pill. Then another. Then another. It was not enough.

When the people find him, one week later, they would see how he had bitten his own wrists and let himself bleed to death, slumped over a chair, empty bottle tipped over by his side.