AN: For the Suicide Challenge on HPFC.
WARNINGS: Contains: (barely) incest, and strong drug use, self-harm and suicide.

.e.n.o.u.g.h.

Too many people, too much noise. Colours. Sensations. Smells; she can smell the heroin and the cigarettes, the pizza and the meth, the cheap wine and the whiskey on ice. And she can hear the hard rock, the screaming lead vocalist. She feels the sting of her razorblades and the bitter points of needles. Too much.

She wants to pick up the phone, call somebody. She has nobody but she wants someone to talk to, anybody. He won’t let her, but he wants to dial too, wants his mother’s soothing voice on the other end, telling him to come home.

He is thin (she is thinner) and his hazel eyes are listless, they swivel in his sockets, he nods off. So many drugs, so much heroin. Gone too far, he’s never coming back. She’s losing him, he’s losing her. She started with these blades, those gorgeous scars but he brought the drugs. They’re going down together. She sleeps with random men for him, she takes their money and buys him drugs, all for him. She loves him, and in his sick and twisted way, he loves her, the way she feels under his rough skin, the way her empty stomach curves inward. The sharp angle of her jaw and the jut of her ribs. He is all she can see in the swirling pounding mass.

He still won’t call.

And one day she wakes up next to him in a hotel room (still so many people) and she can’t think, hung-over, (too much.) hurting, needing the black tar, the monster- she can’t think but once she’s vomited and had a cup of coffee and her first hit of the day, her mind is clearer.

(As clear as it can be around him.)

And she looks around in a fog at the mess they’ve created. How am I supposed to do this? She cannot do this another day, too much, too many, too fast. What is left for me? She has nothing, she is left with nothing but drugs and regret. She can feel everything, her senses seem hyperaware as she loads the syringe for the second time. Too much, she tells herself, drawing it past the carefully marked line. Too much heroin. Too many drugs, too much emotion all crammed into one little girl. She can’t do this anymore.

And as it enters her system, she can feel it. This isn’t her normal high, this is peace, she knows she is going to die and she can feel it and she isn’t scared anymore, everything is lessening. She gently traces the outline of his mouth, I love you, but sometimes love isn’t enough- and he wakes up and he sees the needle sticking out of her scarred elbow (too much).

He reaches for his mobile, he doesn’t know who he’s going to call now that he finally needs to- too many drugs; no ambulance. They’re siblings, lovers; no family. And he realizes they have nobody but each other and she gently squeezes his hand and says Don’t even bother, I’ve already lost this battle. I love you. I love you, Al.

And he’d cry if he could, but there’s nothing left in him, no emotion, no magic. Only drugs, self-hate and bitterness. And love for her. Don’t leave me, love. I need you here, I need you. Don’t leave me here with nothing.

Live for me, she says, and her hand drops and he sits there, shocked as he holds her. Her brown eyes are flat, they’ve got nothing left in them, she gave him all she had and he used and abused her tossed her around. And her empty shell is what she’s stuck with and now he is nothing.

And so he picks up the phone.

Just enough.