Coming Home

I strummed the guitar, waiting for the tune to find something more than a few chords. As much as I liked to believe that I was getting better with my sessions, I knew the truth was that I was never going to be better.

Zacky and Johnny believed that somehow my life would magically get better with Dr. Miller. They always touted how much their own lives had improved with their therapists. They had found love and created families, but I wasn't like them. Zacky had seen the worst on his one tour with me, the one where Rae and I had been taken captive. Johnny had seen the worst when Jimmy died. What did they know of my life? What did they knew of what I had seen?

Brian held this belief that I was broken, but I could be pieced back together. He thought that time with my family, the Avenged family, would make me better. He thought that those little nephews and niece of mine would make me a better man. He thought that as long as I avoided everything there ever was to do with Rae, I would get better.

Of all the men, Brooks had an idea of what would happen. He knew that nothing could heal me. He could only hope that I wouldn't kill myself, that I wouldn't let the PTSD and depression get to me. Brooks knew that the nightmares and the dreams and the terrors would never actually get better. These were all things he knew, and he knew that the talks with my therapist helped, but that nothing would make it better.

The only person who understood what I was really going through was someone who hated me. She would never talk to me again, and she probably never would again after our one day in Virginia. Rae knew what it was like to give life and limb and friends and family. She knew what it meant to get so wholeheartedly involved in something like the SEALs. I would never be the same man I was. I never could be.

"Matt?" Brooks called my name. "You've been in your room for a while now."

"I thought I had a tune," I said, opening my door so Brooks could see I was okay. "I guess that tune wasn't really anything."

Brooks sent me a crooked smile. "Well, Maddi and I are going to dinner with the boys. Do you want to come with us?"

I shook my head. "I have some food here, Brooks. Thank you though. Besides, the four of you need to have family and date time without me being dragged along. I'll be okay for one night without you idiots taking care of me."

Brooks smiled at me and chucked a drumstick at me. "Fine. Call us if you need us."

"I'll be fine. I just have to take my medicine and the dreams won't haunt me, okay? I'm an adult man, I can take care of myself."
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How did it always end up like this? I put the bottle of vodka to my lips and took a swig. Vodka was not my friend, but I felt the need to drink it. It helped drown out the voices and dreams that plagued me at night.

I bumped into my desk and dropped the bottle, shattering the pieces and instantly stepping on them. I cursed under my breath as the tiny pieces of glass ate into my foot. Blood seeped out of the tiny cuts and I stumbled my way to my bathroom.

"Ugh, fuck." I sat down on the toilet seat and waited for the fucking pain to ease. Whoever said paper cuts were the worst pain and never stepped on fucking glass. I gritted my teeth and found some tweezers to pull the glass out. It was a good thing none of the guys were here because they would fucking eat away at me and tell me I was a dumbass.

The tweezers slipped from my grasp as an image of my bullet striking Bin Laden danced through my head. It wasn't an image that often hit me, but when it did, it felt like a searing pain. It hurt more than the others because it reminded me of Jimbo's death.

I lost it then. I screamed and punched my mirror, making more shards of glass hit the floor and enter my feet and hands. Screams punctured the room as I kept punching the mirror and the door and the walls, anything I could fucking get near. Then I punched the medicine cabinet and all my pills spilled to the sink.

Something came over me then, and I did what I never thought I would do. I just wanted silence. All I needed was silence, and I would be okay again. I picked up a handful of the pills, no longer truly knowing what they were. And I swallowed them.

Let the silence fucking take me. LET IT TAKE ME!

Notes

Sooooo I'm an asshole, aren't I?