#anyways regardless of anything this is the most wholesome pure wonderful friendship

[sexynetra]

Hey can we talk about how Dawn literally gave Amanda her first estrogen pill

[sanders-sides-fic]

A hole of your shape in my heart

So… My brain went to war with me today. So I wrote some Anxceit-centred angst to cope. Consider yourself warned, this will hurt. I do hope you'll enjoy it regardless, though.

Trigger warnings: implied depression, mentions of panic attacks, self harm, fainting, memory loss

If I forgot a trigger or there is something you would like to be added to that list, please go ahead and tell me. You can do so anonymously as well.

It wasn't that bad at the beginning. A bit of a cold shiver, running down his spine. Ice that seemed to settle in his lounges. A dull ache. Nothing serious, really. He knew that it wasn't good to ignore it, he knew that from the start. And yet he couldn't help it.

They were happy. That was all that mattered to him then. Remus and Janus were happy. That was more important than a bit uncomfortableness. He was used to having panic attacks, mental breakdowns and the sudden urge to cry anyways. This didn't make such a big difference.

Except that it did.

You see, Remus was born without a soulmate. He just didn't have one. Janus, on the other hand, had an accident when he was younger. There was a nasty scar on the left side of his face, which he had covered up with a tattoo of a snake later. Ever since that accident, he'd been soul-blind. Colourblind for soulmates. He did have a soulmate, he just couldn't feel the bond anymore. Oh, it was still there, alright. He could feel that much. But he just couldn't tell anything beyond that. So he'd given up on finding that soulmate.

That's how Remus and Janus had gotten together in the first place. And that was wonderful. It was great. They made such a nice pair. They were happy and in love and sweet and… And it had come as a blow to the face to Virgil.

The three of them had been friends for years. When they'd become teens, Virgil had finally realised what the bond had been telling him all the time. The pretty sparkles around Janus, the glitter in the air that portrayed his emotion in colours, the warmth around his heart that reminded him of Janus. Janus could only feel that warmth. He wondered what it felt like to him. What he felt like to him. Because Janus was Virgil's soulmate.

Virgil had been a bit happy and a bit sad about that. Happy because he liked Janus and he knew him and that was fine. Sad because Janus couldn't tell that they were soulmates.

And that was why he kept telling himself that he'd tell Janus. For sure. But somehow he always ducked out the last moment. Something always happened. Just little things, but things that were bad enough to make him retreat into his shell.

He should have known. When Janus said he would give up on searching for a soulmate he couldn't even tell apart from the rest of the world, he should have known. And yet he hadn't expected Janus to start dating people. Janus was his soulmate, his. He didn't even consider the possibility that he might see other people. How very stupid of him.

He had almost told Janus that day. They were eighteen then, and he had bought a yellow nasturtium, Janus's favorite flower. It was inside a black pot that he'd made himself. He'd always liked to do pottery, it calmed him down. This was the best one he made so far, he thought.

He also wrote down what he wanted to say. How much Janus meant to him, how badly he wanted to be with him, that they were soulmates, that he didn't even mind that Janus couldn't tell and that he was sorry he hadn't said anything before. That it was okay if Janus needed time because this was so sudden, but that he hoped he'd give Virgil a chance anyways. Virgil had used his favorite paper. It was a bit fancy, but not over the top. And it smelled like Lavender, which always calmed him down. He'd wasted quite a bit of this paper because he kept starting over, but that was worth it. Janus was worth it.

But Janus had already told him that he wasn't waiting for his soulmate anymore. And when Janus arrived at his apartment that day, it was with his hand in Remus's.

"He asked me out earlier. I can't believe I said yes, the way he did it was terrible, really." But Janus had smiled, and Remus had laughed, and Virgil had been late.

He knew Remus wasn't to blame, and neither was Janus. They were happy right now. Remus hadn't been happy or confident when it came to the topic of love in forever. Janus had suffered because he'd always been so, so scared of his soulmate rejecting him for not being able to tell. And now they were happy and it was without him.

It hurt. A lot. But he didn't want to ruin their happiness. It was only his fault. He was to blame, for hesitating. For not wanting to ruin their friendship. For being selfish.

So he secretly took the letter and hid it in the bottom of his desk drawer. And he wished them the best.

After that, they started to drift away. Remus and Janus had a lot of date nights. And Virgil drifted away from them because he couldn't stand seeing them. It hurt too much, was all. Whenever Janus would smile at him, whenever Janus laughed, whenever Remus sighed and told him about a cute thing Janus had done, whenever they shared a milkshake, whenever they were so there, so with each other.

Whenever Janus insisted Virgil come as well, saying he missed him. Because Virgil knew, he knew that was because Janus could still feel the soulmate bond. But Janus didn't know, and Janus didn't see him that way, and that was just cruel. Why did fate do this to him? Why did it hate him so much?

After a while, when Virgil couldn't take it anymore, he begun to initiate fights. Janus was too much of a liar, he was too anxious to trust him. Remus was creepy and gross, he couldn't understand why he would say something like that. In the end, he became more and more of an asshole to the two of them. Their days were either spent apart or fighting, and Virgil would cry himself to sleep, pain and cold emptiness gnawing away at his soul.

After a while, he had pushed them so far away that he barely saw them at all anymore. And by then he was so used to it that he could just pretend everything was fine during the day. Sure, he couldn't bare to take off his hoody even in scalding hot summer. Sure, his panic attacks got worse and more frequent. Sure, he had started to wear black eyeshadow purely to hide the bags under his eyes. Sure, he woke up to dried tears on his face every single day. But it was fine. He was fine. He could take this, if it meant that the two most important people in his life were happy.

Patton, the soulmate of Remus's brother, had somehow ended up noticing how he was alone all the time now. And he'd adopted him into their friend group.

Roman and Remus were on bad terms with each other, so he barely knew them. It was kind of a fresh start, even if it was a rocky one. Remy and Roman were the least accepting of him. Roman because "A, he is the type of person Remus would hang out with. And, B, he hurt Remus with his sudden bullshit. Believe me, if you knew the things I learned through my brother…" and Remy just because he didn't want to breath the same air as him. Apparently.

Remy didn't hang out with the group if Virgil was with them. They meet up without him, which was a solution everyone was fine with. Besides, Remy had always liked to suddenly disappear and appear according to his mood. At least that was what his soulmate, Logan, said.

Roman, on the other hand, couldn't stay away that much. After all it was Patton who stuck to Virgil like friendly glue made out of puns, and Patton was Roman's soulmate. Both of them were extremely clingy too, apparently. So the two of them exchanged sarcastic comments and rude nicknames, but they didn't outright hate each other. At least Virgil didn't hate Roman.

Logan was nice to talk to. Almost as good at debates as Janus. They didn't have debates about philosophy, though. Those were reserved for Janus, and it felt like betraying him to have such a debate with someone else. They soon got to a point where hanging out was almost enjoyable, where they kind of liked each other.

And then, suddenly, it got a lot worse. A lot worse. So bad, Virgil couldn't get up in the morning. He couldn't eat anything, couldn't stop crying, could barely breath. About four panic attacks and one night of terrible, terrible loneliness later, Roman, Logan and Patton showed up at his door.

He couldn't help himself. He was so lonely, and he felt so worthless, and Patton was the only one who really wanted him around anyways. So he shrugged their concerns off, taking a sip from his hot coffee - the only acceptable hot beverage in August - and saying: "Well, I just… assumed you didn't want me around. I mean, you don't like me much anyways, so."

Patton had gasped in offence and horror, and Virgil couldn't help but smile at that, though the hole in his chest was still too much to bare and he couldn't look at them. "Yeah, yeah. Except you, Pat."

He'd been wrong. Logan drew up an entire chart to prove how much he contributed to their friend group and how much he provided. Even Roman told him that he was wanted, needed even. It was nice and wholesome, and to his surprise, it made him feel so much better. For just a moment, the hole inside his chest wasn't as icy and cold.

They ended up watching Disney that evening, with a bowl of popcorn and too much comments to actually concentrate on the movie. Later at night, Virgil even confessed that he knew his soulmate. A sore subject he didn't want to touch normally. They asked him why he was single, of course, whether it didn't work out between the two of them, whether that was even possible. And Virgil had shrugged. "I wouldn't know. We never tried, he already has someone." Then he'd chuckled. "I guess that was why I was such an asshole to Re and Jan when they got together, too. Kinda made me feel jealous and… lonely. Don't tell them, though. They don't even know that I already met my soulmate."

Janus would have been proud of him, for how well he had managed to lie to his new friends. Well, not lie directly. But a lie of omission, right?

There were many days like this after that. Days where everything got too much. His new friends understood that he sometimes had bad days. Patton would sent him videos of cute dogs and cats when he let them know he was out of order for that day. Roman would send him memes and Logan would tell him fun facts. It was precious of them, and it made Virgil feel a lot less lonely. The cold was still there, layered around the soulmate bond, the hole was just as gaping as always, but he didn't feel as lonely. And that was good enough.

Other days he could almost pretend that things were fine. He would be around his new friends for as long as his little, introverted heart allowed him. Then he'd listen to music, get stuff done, worry about dead lines and the world instead of Remus, or Janus and his absence in Virgil's life. Sometimes he would read, too. Or do pottery. He didn't do pots anymore though. Or flowers. Just art or tableware.

He didn't even mean to do it the first time. Really, it was an accident. He was just tired, and he did the dishes and then he accidentally cut himself with a knife. But as the blood trickled down his finger, the pain outside kind of overwhelmed the pain inside. So he sat down and watched his finger bleed. Because his hand was wet, it looked like more blood than it actually was.

He thought about that moment often after that, whenever the pain got too much to bare and he could barely hang on. And he did try to fight it, really, he did. But in the end, it was too tempting. Just a few cuts at a time, at first. Somewhere where no one would notice. With the hoody, that wasn't even that hard, actually. He always put on gauze, too, to make sure it didn't get infected.

It got a bit more when he heard from Roman that Janus and Remus had broken up. Apparently Janus felt weird dating Remus. They suspected that it was because Remus wasn't his soulmate - because Janus was Virgil's, his, he was supposed to date him and he wanted to yell it at Janus already, telling him the truth, finally holding him and kissing him and filling this Janus's formed hole in his heart - and Remus fully understood it. Things were a bit awkward between the two of them, but they would keep being friends.

And it got even more worse when Patton was Patton and decided to use this opportunity to get Virgil to make up with the two of them. It was nice of him, but the thing was that Janus was still Virgil's soulmate and didn't know about it.

He and Janus didn't get along too well. He made up with Remus way faster. And Roman didn't like Janus too much either, but once again Patton insisted on adopting the man into their friend group and Roman was too clingy to avoid him. But Janus made it, in the end. Of course Janus made it. He was dazzling and charismatic like that.

Only Virgil couldn't help keeping his defences up. If he let them down, he would tell him the truth. And he couldn't do that, not now, not until he made everything okay again. But he couldn't do that, not without letting his defences down and that just killed him on the inside.

And then he had a bad day. But he wanted to see Janus, so he got up and met up with the others. It helped. Seeing Janus there helped. Hearing him and Patton talking about Kant, watching him smile at Logan and joke around with both Remus and Roman… It helped. And yet it made him so much more aware of what he was missing.

Remus and Roman drove home together. Logan was supposed to meet Remy, so he had excused himself earlier. Patton worked in the café they'd been in, and his shift started after their meeting. So that left Virgil and Janus to walk out together.

Janus smelled like coconut, and his lips were a little chapped. Early winter, he always got chapped lips this time of year. The light made his skin glow, and from this angle with the way the light hit them his left eye looked a lot more golden than brown, unlike the right one.

It hurt. He wanted to grab Janus's hand, he wanted to kiss those lips, he wanted to hug him and never let him go, he wanted to grab him and hold him close until the smell of coconut would transfer to himself as well. He wanted, he wanted, he wanted so bad.

But how was he supposed to do any of it? How was he supposed to tell him?

In the end, he decided to just get it over with. Like a bandaid, just ripping it off. Straight out with it. But just when he was about to, had already taken a breath and opened his mouth…

"I missed you." Janus's melodic voice sounded way too sad. Virgil didn't like it. "Why did you just leave us behind, Virge? I missed you, but… You were acting so strange. You still are. Are you mad because I never texted you?"

He didn't say anything. Couldn't, even though he wanted to.

"If that's it, then I'm sorry. But, Virge, I… I did miss you. And you acting so cold to me really sucks. You're getting along fine with Remus now, so why not me?" He stopped and looked Virgil in the eyes, looking like he was searching for something. What, Virgil didn't know. But he didn't find it, judging by the way he averted his eyes. And that hurt, too. Everything hurt. He just wanted to go now. "I thought we were friends."

"No. I don't think we ever were supposed to be friends." Virgil took a deep breath. Now. He had to tell him now. Bandaid, remember? Just tell him. Virgil opened his mouth, looking at Janus.

Right. Just out with it. "The truth is we're soulmates. I'm sorry I never told you, I was scared. But I love you, Janus." Right. That was all he had to say. Just three sentences. Go on, do it. Please, just get them out already. It's been years now. You've known since you were sixteen, you've known for four years now. He deserves to know, too.

In the end, he shook his head. "Sorry. I didn't mean it like that, I…" couldn't say it again. He ignored the tears gathering in his eyes as he turned away from Janus's hurt look. "I'm not feeling that good."

And he ran. He ran away, like he always did. God, he was such a coward. And for what?

At home, he pulled out the letter from last year. Then, he screamed. He couldn't take it anymore, he just screamed and sobbed. And he knew that it wasn't fair, that he'd done this to himself, but he was in so much pain. He just couldn't take it.

But he'd done this to himself. By hesitating, by not giving the letter, by ruining what little relationship he had with his soulmate, by pushing him away, by lying, by not saying what he wanted to. And what for? A fleeting happiness, a failed relationship, a churning ball of fear in his stomach?

Virgil didn't mean for it to get that bad. He meant to stop earlier. He didn't mean for the wounds to be that deep either. But they did, and he didn't, and he only really realised when he got dizzy at standing up. Oh. Oh, that was a lot of blood. And he was still bleeding. Damnit, he needed help. But who would…? Who could…

He grabbed his phone and called the first number in his contacts. It was Remus's voice that picked up after the second ring. "Hey, Rem. It's me." He winced at how weak his voice sounded. "I, uh… I did something stupid. And I know I've been an asshole, but I really, really need your help."

"Janus said you didn't feel so good." Remus sounded genuinely worried. And was that Janus's voice in the background? It was, wasn't it? Tears sprung to his eyes again.

"Yeah. Hey, tell him I'm sorry for me? I wanted to say something, but I didn't again, and… yeah." He couldn't understand the response he got. Blinking, he tried to stay awake. Falling asleep was bad, right? Oh, right. Remus. "Listen, Remus, I… Did something stupid. There's a lot of blood. I think I need to go to the hospital."

"Blood? The hospital? Virgil what did you do?!"

He flinched at the panicked voice. That didn't suit Remus at all. Wait, wasn't that Janus? Had Remus put him on speaker? Well, it didn't matter, really. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to." He said instead. And then: "I'm scared."

"Okay. Okay, shit. We're almost there. It's alright, we're almost- Take a left, Re, that's faster. We're almost there, okay Virge?"

"Okay." He hesitated, lump in his throat. He thought he could feel tears running down his face, but he was a bit too out of it to be sure. "Thank you."

They kept their word. He could hear Janus's shocked cry and Remus's cussing before the darkness took over.

❖

When he woke up, he was in a white room. Around him, he could see a bunch of people. One with dirty blonde hair and freckles, holding hands with a brunette with glasses. Next to them sat a man with similar glasses and black hair. On the other side was a man much like the first, but with one strand dyed silver and the rest chestnut brown. And another man, who stole the breath right out of his lunges.

Long, golden hair, tied up to a bun, pale skin, warm eyes somewhere between gold and brown, and a snake tattoo on his left cheek. He wore black, with yellow and gold accessories, and he was absolutely stunning. Around him there were weird fireworks, almost like glitter. Did the others see that, too? It was blue, and something inside him told him that that was worry. The same part clenched around his heart, demanding to make the worry go away.

But… "Who are you?"

They all gasped, looking at him. "Virgil?! Oh my god, you're awake." That was the voice of the man with the dyed hair. What was his name? He couldn't quite remember.

"I don't… Who are you? Where am I? Do I know you? I think I know you, but…" He trailed off, regretting having said anything when hurt crossed the stunning man's face. "Sorry."

"Oh, no, you don't… I'm sorry. I should've noticed you were hurting." He sighed, putting on an obviously fake smile as he grabbed his - Virgil's? His name was Virgil, had the man said, right? - hand. "We are your friends, Virgil. That's Logan, Patton, Roman, and Remus. And I am Janus." Janus. Yeah, Virgil though, that fit him. But somehow, Janus looked like he was steeling himself for something. He took a deep breath, smiling more, tears in those wonderful eyes. "I'm you soulmate."

"My soulmate?"

Janus nodded, clutching a purple piece of paper in his hand. "Yes. It's a bit complicated, but, I am. We're soulmates."

Virgil nodded, looking around. There were a lot of people around him. And they all looked so happy to see him awake. His friends and his soulmate, huh? Virgil looked back to Janus. "There's a lot of people here."

"Do you want us to go, kiddo?" That was Patton who'd said that, right? He sounded sad at the idea, and Virgil didn't like it much either. So he shook his head.

"No. I was just thinking, there's a lot of people caring about me."

He got a few sad smiles in return. "Of course, Virge. We all love you very much. And don't you dare to forget that again, you hear?" Janus clenched Virgil's hand in his and put it to his forehead, almost desperately. "Don't you ever dare forget that I love you. You idiot."

General taglist🖤: @gattonero17 @alias290