Chapter Text
He's one tall, slender line. Dark line. You can't see him half the time. It's funny because he's unmoving, he's actually very still, really. He'd spend days not leaving the bed, holed up in the black cave he'd turn his hotel room(s) in.
He's like these prey animals playing dead, when he gets like that. Won't move, won't talk, won't open his eyes, won't do, won't listen, won't, won't. It's scary like nothing else in the world. You've got this thing curled up in a bed, right here, and it's not doing a thing. Not moving, not talking, not opening its eyes, not, not, not. A gunshot wouldn't wake him up. So you've got this thing between (in, in, in) your hands and there's nothing you can do with it. A gunshot wouldn't wake him up, because it's probably stuck behind his right eye. Tucked there. His hair tucked behind his ear. And you can't check because he won't open it, his eye. Or his mouth. Or his hand. That makes the syringe-wrangling quite tough. Curled up on himself, on his side, carcass-like, bone-still, bone-looking. With his spine sticking out his flesh and his head sticking out the covers.
It's like he's expecting for the door to open and for someone to carry him out there. When I say someone I mean a mortician. When I say out there I mean in a big, fancy coffin. But so far it's only been me, and he doesn't like it very much.
He's lost his shame around me— or his dignity, or whatever keeps him from doing these things in front of anybody who's not me. There's that. There's that, and there's no use shaking him because he's odd enough to chain himself to the bed. There's no use shoveling food down his throat because he's going to puke it all up, goodmorning-goodbye.
When he's not busy (or un-busy) starving himself until his skin fuses to his bones, he's doing this little trick I've seen him do, hunched on his bed or over a table; which consists of him chewing and chewing and chewing any food he'd got his hands on, and promptly before swallowing, he'd spit it all out in a random container that varies from being your usual bowl or a plastic bag, if he's been too unbothered to find a proper recipiant. Then he'd rinse his mouth out two or three times as if he'd just eaten (ha!) something rotten, and repeat like a well-oiled machine.
Following the later torture he had somehow happily enforced upon himself, Jimmy would spend days on end not eating anything but banana daiquiris, not eating anything solid, or not eating anything at all.
Most of the time, we sit on his bed, turkish style, no light save for the one in his eyes that's been blown off all these months ago. He says it's his head, that he wants blown off. Clean. For once. We don't talk. Or I do, but he doesn't answer much. Won't talk. Won't move. Hunched on himself, caved, caving, concave, conclave. Whole lotta nothing. A hammer to the head wouldn't crack him open. He's one tough nut (ha!). His stomach is hollow like an old oak trunk. The arch of his sunken ribcage bowing like a great gate. His spine protrudes like a miffed cat's.
July saunters quietly through the door. His eyes are a very pale green like the first summer's grapes. I've counted his vertebras more times than I can remember, the amount of them never changes.
Once, I found him hunched over a chocolate spread jar, stuffing it into his mouth before spitting each bite out carefully, inspecting every nook and crannies behind his teeth with his tongue. He looked miserable. I sat next to him and rubbed his back whilst he stared blearily into the mostly emptied jar, spoon held between shaky fingers. He'd told me the sight of it made him nauseous when he dug to get more, but he couldn't stop. Told me that his stomach churned and hurt even though he hadn't properly swallowed more than maybe half a spoonful.
It was the saddest thing I'd ever seen. I sat there until he finished the jar. When I got back from dumping away the bowl he had used, he was curled on the floor, knees to his chest. I watched him hack and heave and contort in pain until he vomited. I held his hair up and stroked his nape, sweat coating my fingertips and bile coating his.
Some nights he'll lay in my arms, head in my lap, his hair melting in the darkness of the room. He wants it to be over with, he tells me. He's off his head— off with his head, he says, bring down the four-headed monster, head in the wall, head in hand, hands in hands. I don't know what comforts him the most anymore, the color of my eyes or the wood of his guitars. There's no escaping, he says. He'll kiss my lips and curl up on himself like a child. He'll slap my fingers away. Jimmy does a lot of things despite the vines crawling around his limbs from all the time he's spent laid still. I'm surprised roots haven't grown out of him just yet, to anchor his body there, he who wants to be reclaimed by nature so much.
I'm threading lightly around him. Jimmy's holding on by a thread. Hanging by a thread. Hanging on. Hanging around. Tied to the ceiling fan. Hanging by a thread. Hangman. He doesn't know what's wrong with himself, tries to spell it out. I try too. It's not right, he says. Not like that. I run out of letters, there's only so much. He crosses them out. Neither of us are exceptionally good at this game. There's only so much words. Hangman. His tarots cards lay flat in front of him. He flips the last one around. Face up to the ceiling. The Hanged Man.
I want him safe and sound. The music doesn't stop. It comes out of his head, his fingers and his mouth. It pours out of him like an open wound, gaping hole of melodies, he's bleeding out. He's one tall, slender line. Life claws away at him, thin him out. The flesh melts off him like candlewax, I can't find the wick to put the flame out. It's oozing out of his every pore. He sweats and sweats and rages and spits. Won't move.
August comes to an end. The sun still knocks hard against Jimmy's windows but the curtains remain closed. The song remains the same. His hair has gotten long, long, long and tangled, curled and tousled like a bird's nest, a thick veil hiding his face. The Sun knocks. Curtains closed. There's so much red in his eyes, it's hard to dig the green out, it's hard to dig anything at all out. I dig him. In every way. The coffin hasn't sunken too deep just yet. Autumn settles in, orange and lukewarm. There's so much red, it's hard to dig the green out.
Fall gets in the way.
The leaves are falling. Jimmy keeps busy. He leaves. I don't know where. He's tired of living. He's tiring me. Tired of me. Tied to me. No more fan. Too much fans. There's nothing I wouldn't do for him. All Of My Love. I'd go to the end of the world for him, only his world stretches out and the edges are blury and I don't know my way around it anymore. That, if I ever did.
He's far, far, far away, retreated to the cliffedge of his mind, in hermit. Nobody can come and get him there. We talk in different languages, now. We don't get each other anymore. Stranger to one another. We've made a Babel Tower out of ourselves. My Babylon fell. Fall gets in the way. The show is over, they've slain my prince and the stage is empty save for his bleeding body. Curtains closed. Go home, he says, go home.
They've slain my son. My prince stayed home.