Chapter Text
I didn’t mean to start talking in the past tense. Was I ever talking in the past tense? Jesus Christ, I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t know! Who am I yelling at? The days are getting more garbled as the minutes pass. No. That’s not right. I’ve been sitting in the darkness for so long. I don’t feel anything. That’s not right either. I never did. Does someone who feels burn the hands of others? Of course not. A person, a real person, knows the pain. So they would never burn anyone else. I set so many funeral pyres. Not one of them reached… what did they reach? I don’t know anymore. I don’t know anything anymore.
It’s a bit of a traumatic feeling, I’d have to say, not knowing anything. I remember when I was 17. I was so young and dumb and naive. I wanted to know everything there was to know, to learn everything there was to learn. I didn’t care about the inhibitions because glass ceilings were made to be shattered, right? At least, that’s what Nat used to say. Before… before. I don’t want to talk about it. Am I even talking? My dad said I was in my head too much. That it was all in my head. Well, father dearest, thank you for the insight. It’s certainly all in my head now, because I haven’t been awake for days thanks to you. I think tragedy made me funny.
A blinding light. That’s all I ever see these days. Malignant forces that track me down and hurt me. I remember an old proverb. Heavy is the crown. You could compare it to many people. But that’s not the real saying. Uneasy is the head that wears the crown. This… What was I saying? I am uneasy. I wear no crown. The only person with a crown has renounced her name in favor of a man who wishes to own a furniture store. Like I said. Tragedy and humor go hand in hand. It might not be outright humor, because humor is with the thought of someone else in mind. I’m the only one here. If there were someone else, I would be a comedian. But here, in this moment, I am a clown, standing in lights far too bright for a girl like me. Who am I kidding? I’m the whole fucking circus.
I ponder this for a few moments, then the light grows too bright to ignore. The light opens a hole in my brain and starts scraping around. I regret to tell it that there’s nothing left for it to take. But no. It’s not scraping. It’s not in my brain either. I want my brain back. Not even for the weak sense of control I used to crave so desperately. I want it back so that I can know. As my brain is wrenched further and further from my grasps, I feel the essential parts of Charlotte Matthews begin to slip away. I’ve already forgotten my middle name. Is this what will happen? Under the influence of the untested drugs, will I cease to be Charlotte Matthews in her entirety? I used to want that. You will think you want to die until you’re standing on the bridge, overlooking the water. But it’s too late for me. I’ve already jumped.
There are a strange amount of things I wish I could have. Maybe it’s not strange. I grew up a spoiled child, after all. Hunger has been in my bones since the day I was born. Every monster I became was always there. I don’t like that thought. I wish it was the Wilderness that had corrupted me. But It didn’t make me like this. That’s all the Wilderness really does, anyway. It brings the real you to the surface. Who knew a girls soccer team was really as cutthroat and murderous as we were? The Wilderness knew. It did. And it is the reason I am lying in a hospital bed, unconscious, and will be for the foreseeable future.
Foreseeable future. I never used to say things like that. Before, I had such a certain belief in the future and that it would be better. Put harshly, those are a dead girl’s dreams. But I don’t like to think that anymore. I know what we did. With all of my heart and what’s left of my soul, I know it was wrong. But knowledge doesn’t change everything. I could know all there is to know in the world and still feel the same rotting lack of my faith in it. I know what we did was wrong and awful and horrible and terrorizing. But I was happy. Charlotte Matthews was happy in the Wilderness, even though she watched her friends hunt and kill and worship in her name for something she never initiated. She was happy. Fuck, I’m tired of separating us. I was happy. I was happy because I didn’t need to pretend. No one even knew. It was like a fresh start. I don’t want to separate who I am now from who I am in the Wilderness. We aren’t different, and even if we are, I want some of her happiness for myself. Lord knows I’ll need it in here.
Some part of me knows I need to wake up, but I don’t really want to. Waking up will mean facing the world in all of its horrors, especially that of modern medicine. Staying here I can stay in my head. But it’s just that. In my head. Just a self-fulfilling prophecy for my father.
Jesus Christ. This doesn’t make any sense. The words coming out of my mouth rarely make sense, but now the ones in my head are following suit. Maybe Natalie was right. Words just aren’t for me. They don’t work the way they’re meant to, and they can’t help me. I’m not sure if they ever helped her either. I need to get out of my head. I can’t keep up this inner narration for myself for much longer. But I don’t think I have to.
Again, the light blinds me. But it’s real light this time. At least, I think it is. Cold air washes over my face, swarming down my throat and into my lungs. I gasp and sit up abruptly. The air is so sterile it stings, buzzing around in my lungs like our namesake. I’m coughing up, drowning in, choking on the yellowjackets in my lungs. I look around in my panic, but find that I am chronically alone. Pitiful, really. I’d bet money that my funeral would be empty, even. But no, I’m not alone. Because in the corner stands Natalie Scatorccio. She’s not real. Neither flesh nor bone, but a secret third thing. I don’t know what it is. It’s a secret.
Everything hurts. Everything everything everything. My bones, skin, brain, muscles. It feels like they’re all peeling away from the aforementioned bones, but I can’t even scream. I’m still choking on the thick air of the past. I whip my head towards Natalie, silently begging for help, but she does nothing. No step is taken toward me, not even a change in her expression. It takes me a moment to consider that maybe she wants to help. Maybe she does, but she can’t. If she can’t, then who’s restraining her?
It’s me, isn’t it?
She’s just a figment of my imagination, I’m sure of it, but I’m still holding her captive in my rapidly deteriorating mental landscape. Can’t escape Lottie. She’s too goddamn crazy. She’ll hold you with her mind. She’ll make you do crazy things and bit by bit, you’ll become just as insane as her. Charlotte Isobel Matthews is insane.
Finally, I see the slightest flicker of change on her face. Her eyebrows raise just slightly, walking a step towards a union between them. Just the subtlest change, yet the concern is clear. She really does care. But I’m still holding her here. She can’t move. She can’t help me. But I don’t know how to let her go.