A Pillowcase Correspondence
Title: A Pillowcase Correspondence
Authors: megyal and lesinnocents
Pairing: Patrick/Peter
Rating: PG-13 at the moment
Summary: Dear Patrick...
Disclaimer: 100% Disclaimed.
Patrick,
I think that I’ve been choking lately. Like when you breathe the wrong way and instead of inhaling, the air stops halfway to your lungs and all you can do is cough and cough and hope the burning goes away after a few cups of water. Only I’m pretty sure I’ve been breathing just fine and it’s words that’ve been strangling me. All of the syllables in my head are wrapping around my throat and even though I can still speak and everything, air hasn’t been getting to my brain. Something like that. I’m not quite sure exactly what it is, I’ve been chasing the idea around with a hammer, trying to nail it to the inside of my skull just to get it to hold still so I can try to put a definition to the feeling. I need a dictionary to look it up once it starts bleeding from the puncture. I couldn’t find it in Webster’s, though, so I guess… I guess it’s like I have a cold. Like I have an allergy to my own prose and the sinus infection’s dripping down the back of my throat where it’s seeping from my brain and maybe that’s the choking feeling. It’s something and nothing without an antidote.
I had a dream last night that’s really been bothering me. Something tells me that the dream and the suffocating are related, but I’m not quite sure why. My bathtub was covered with mold; there was fungus in the grout between every tile, with sickly white splotches dusted over the black-black of it. I couldn’t even see the bottom of the tub, it was all just encased in mold, but at the bottom of it all there was a dead rat lying against the china, and it had the same black starting to creep over its eyes. They were open, maybe rotting a little, but just covered in mold. Mold everywhere. It didn’t smell bad, though, I remember that, because I’m pretty sure decay like that’s supposed to have at least a little bit of a stench to it. But anyways, there were all of these streaks where you could see the white ceramic hull of the tub - claw marks running like rivulets down the inside slopes of the bathtub. I think the rat had been trying to climb out, maybe he was getting attacked by the impending mold, but he couldn’t. He couldn’t escape from the bottom of the tub and every time he tried, he’d just slide right back down to the base again. He died down there. He died because he couldn’t climb out. Died, died, died, dead.
Why am I telling you this?
Tendrils of hot air steamed over Pete’s lowered face as he watched his feet devouring the pavement beneath them, keeping careful track of every chipped bit of cement and crack between the slabs of sidewalk. The wind always seems more violent when whipping down the aisles of buildings in a city like Chicago, and it was lashing at his cheeks and forehead as he walked, threatening to tear the skin right off of his body and send it gusting along through the air, leaving small spatters of blood along the side of the street as it went.
His hands were stuffed firmly in the pockets of his threadbare hoodie, zipped up over his equally thin tee shirt in a futile attempt to block out the cold. His fingers were wrapped securely around a sheet of paper folded neatly in his pocket with the edge still serrated from where he’d torn it from its peaceful resting place inside of some long-forgotten notebook sitting at the bottom of his closet, collecting dust and memories as it heard the muffled melodies and sentences through the door. He couldn’t feel his hands.
I think it needs to be said, or at least, it feels like it needs to be said. I guess I’m technically not saying anything, am I? So I feel like it needs to be written. Written and read and, well, I’m not asking you to reply, but… I don’t know. Read. Seen by someone else, known by someone else other than me because my own words are failing me, trying to make me fail and tear me down and cut off my air supply. It’s internal sabotage - I’m positive - subconscious internal sabotage. I’ve been told I do that a lot. The point is, I need some way of communicating with people, and I guess you’re being forced to play the victim here, and I’m sorry for that. Maybe (hopefully) you’ve already given up and stopped reading this by now. My pen’s running out. I think it’s a sign for me to stop bothering you by filling up these lines. But, Patrick, I don’t have a way to tell people what I’m thinking, what I’m feeling, what’s going on inside of me at any given moment. I can’t explain things like that any better than I can explain how my lungs expand and contract or how my heart pumps or how my nerves move through my body. There are times when I even think I have a grasp on it, but there’s no one to tell. No way of telling.
Pete pulled open the door of the mailbox, the metal chilling his fingertips, though the digits were too thick and stiff and sluggishly-moving from the cold already that he barely noticed. It took two or three decent tugs before the entrance grudgingly pulled away from its rusted cavern, hinges squealing in protest. He pulled the crumpled paper from his pocket and quickly shoved it into the mailbox, the lined paper looking out of place amongst the neat white envelopes stacked orderly against one another. Without another glance, he forced the stubborn door closed and pivoted to start heading back the way he’d come, keenly observing the sidewalk for any trace of drip-drops of his own blood.
Authors: megyal and lesinnocents
Pairing: Patrick/Peter
Rating: PG-13 at the moment
Summary: Dear Patrick...
Disclaimer: 100% Disclaimed.
Patrick,
I think that I’ve been choking lately. Like when you breathe the wrong way and instead of inhaling, the air stops halfway to your lungs and all you can do is cough and cough and hope the burning goes away after a few cups of water. Only I’m pretty sure I’ve been breathing just fine and it’s words that’ve been strangling me. All of the syllables in my head are wrapping around my throat and even though I can still speak and everything, air hasn’t been getting to my brain. Something like that. I’m not quite sure exactly what it is, I’ve been chasing the idea around with a hammer, trying to nail it to the inside of my skull just to get it to hold still so I can try to put a definition to the feeling. I need a dictionary to look it up once it starts bleeding from the puncture. I couldn’t find it in Webster’s, though, so I guess… I guess it’s like I have a cold. Like I have an allergy to my own prose and the sinus infection’s dripping down the back of my throat where it’s seeping from my brain and maybe that’s the choking feeling. It’s something and nothing without an antidote.
I had a dream last night that’s really been bothering me. Something tells me that the dream and the suffocating are related, but I’m not quite sure why. My bathtub was covered with mold; there was fungus in the grout between every tile, with sickly white splotches dusted over the black-black of it. I couldn’t even see the bottom of the tub, it was all just encased in mold, but at the bottom of it all there was a dead rat lying against the china, and it had the same black starting to creep over its eyes. They were open, maybe rotting a little, but just covered in mold. Mold everywhere. It didn’t smell bad, though, I remember that, because I’m pretty sure decay like that’s supposed to have at least a little bit of a stench to it. But anyways, there were all of these streaks where you could see the white ceramic hull of the tub - claw marks running like rivulets down the inside slopes of the bathtub. I think the rat had been trying to climb out, maybe he was getting attacked by the impending mold, but he couldn’t. He couldn’t escape from the bottom of the tub and every time he tried, he’d just slide right back down to the base again. He died down there. He died because he couldn’t climb out. Died, died, died, dead.
Why am I telling you this?
Tendrils of hot air steamed over Pete’s lowered face as he watched his feet devouring the pavement beneath them, keeping careful track of every chipped bit of cement and crack between the slabs of sidewalk. The wind always seems more violent when whipping down the aisles of buildings in a city like Chicago, and it was lashing at his cheeks and forehead as he walked, threatening to tear the skin right off of his body and send it gusting along through the air, leaving small spatters of blood along the side of the street as it went.
His hands were stuffed firmly in the pockets of his threadbare hoodie, zipped up over his equally thin tee shirt in a futile attempt to block out the cold. His fingers were wrapped securely around a sheet of paper folded neatly in his pocket with the edge still serrated from where he’d torn it from its peaceful resting place inside of some long-forgotten notebook sitting at the bottom of his closet, collecting dust and memories as it heard the muffled melodies and sentences through the door. He couldn’t feel his hands.
I think it needs to be said, or at least, it feels like it needs to be said. I guess I’m technically not saying anything, am I? So I feel like it needs to be written. Written and read and, well, I’m not asking you to reply, but… I don’t know. Read. Seen by someone else, known by someone else other than me because my own words are failing me, trying to make me fail and tear me down and cut off my air supply. It’s internal sabotage - I’m positive - subconscious internal sabotage. I’ve been told I do that a lot. The point is, I need some way of communicating with people, and I guess you’re being forced to play the victim here, and I’m sorry for that. Maybe (hopefully) you’ve already given up and stopped reading this by now. My pen’s running out. I think it’s a sign for me to stop bothering you by filling up these lines. But, Patrick, I don’t have a way to tell people what I’m thinking, what I’m feeling, what’s going on inside of me at any given moment. I can’t explain things like that any better than I can explain how my lungs expand and contract or how my heart pumps or how my nerves move through my body. There are times when I even think I have a grasp on it, but there’s no one to tell. No way of telling.
Pete pulled open the door of the mailbox, the metal chilling his fingertips, though the digits were too thick and stiff and sluggishly-moving from the cold already that he barely noticed. It took two or three decent tugs before the entrance grudgingly pulled away from its rusted cavern, hinges squealing in protest. He pulled the crumpled paper from his pocket and quickly shoved it into the mailbox, the lined paper looking out of place amongst the neat white envelopes stacked orderly against one another. Without another glance, he forced the stubborn door closed and pivoted to start heading back the way he’d come, keenly observing the sidewalk for any trace of drip-drops of his own blood.