maybe that makes me a fool

now take what i offer, straight up the nose, down the throat

it's a bearable bruise on your conscious

It’s a heavy weight, one he’s placed on his shoulders out of fear and the inability to help, the way he feels like he needs to atone for the sins he’d committed against those other boys in his Trial. He nearly flinches as she mentions a dragon, but when she tells him to look at her, he does. His gaze is tired, still slightly unfocused, but lined with exhaustion all the same.

And she makes so many valuable points, it makes him miss his mother — wondering if perhaps fate had brought them together so she might be a voice of reason for him when he can’t see the light at the end of the tunnel. “You’re right.” He says perhaps a bit wearily.

But then the bigger question begins to catch his attention. How does he stop, how does he not feel the regret within him of not being more? “What do I do?” When would he be able to tell himself it’s life and not learn to regret not being the one that takes the fall? When does he learn that type of trust that it wouldn’t backfire in his face as his father had time and time again, gaslighting him into thinking that everything that happened was a product of him and the decisions he made?

but don't it feel good? don't you feel calmer?

i am the way and the life in the best looking truth