She steps forward. No, no, too close. Too close. He points the barreled gun towards her, something light and golden glinting off the dark metal. Ironic, he thinks, amidst all the chaos, that light could still find its way through a churningly dark boiler room and two unstable kids. “I wish your mom had been a little stronger.” Something hits him, invisible hands grasping at his throat and making it hard to breathe. It feels suffocating. He doesn’t want to think of her. He can’t, not when destiny is on the cards. This plan is far bigger, far more final and catastrophic, than his mother walking into an explosion. She was weak. Left him behind. He tries to pry the hands off, but the silent grip is stronger than he anticipated. His thoughts are getting heavier by the second. It’s like a fog.
“I wish she’d stayed around a little longer.” Time. It all comes down to fucking time. It controls everyone. Warm Junes, bathing in sun and cool chlorine water. Stuffy, melting Septembers, mothers smiling as fire engulfs them, Empty Novembers, dead and spacious and those tears that just won’t fall. You fuck your head up, gulping down cold, icy slush that reminds you of blood, just not as warm, and it doesn’t work. Dead girls with hot breath and messy hair touch you, taste you and make you feel alive, so alive, you feel sick. Sick sick sick, just like Duke. The one that got away. Living her life away in the shadows, her skin turning a pale shade of green as the jealousy ate away at those pretty little organs. She puked up her guts, hoping it would cleanse her of the childlike monster inside, but it just grew stronger and stronger until her pale knees buckled with the weight.
Veronica is striding now, those strong legs that pinned him to the wood of his bedroom floor, batting those eyes when his back arched and he felt electricity in his veins. “I wish your dad were good!” Hot breath that smelt of lager cans and smoke, sharp slaps that stung and that harsh winds would still remind him of. Screaming so loudly the ceiling shakes, wishing it would and crush the life out of both of them. Out of that dead, angry home. “I wish grown ups understood!” Cold smiles, heels against the floor, greys and browns and nothing. They claim to worry, they don’t think twice. Click click click all the way home, open the doors of their little suburban bungalow they paid for in teenage angst. All that fucking matters to them is what’s written on their mental CV.
"I wish we'd met before-" Veronica. If her heart were ripped from her chest, it would glow, radiate like a heatwave from the summer of 79'. The blood would drip, drip, soak into your skin, pulsating and glaring and burning. She was light itself. A fire meant to be encouraged. He saw her and remembered an inferno in his bones. Veronica Sawyer lit the match, carved scorch marks into his skin, and now the world was to burn. Feel their light.
“-They convinced you life is war!” They showed him. Cut at his skin, tore him open and told him to breathe. He'd swallowed down icy poison, begging the cold would pay him mercy and numb the scars. Then everything had been reopened. It all came flooding back in rushes of hazy rose, milky and smokey and impossible. Then she promised to choose him and left, disappeared like everyone else had, and suddenly the bitterness transformed into venom and his skin bled from attacking the bedroom wall. Everything had returned, anger and chaos and fire. He'd decided then, his throat raw from screaming and eyes swollen from crying, his final act would be to free them all. They’d all be dead. No, revived, reborn. How kind, he thinks, all he wants is to make them feel how Veronica made him feel that night. Alive. Just not in the way society would expect.
"I wish you'd come with me-"
"I wish I had more TNT!"