Who: Kevin Ford (narrative; OPEN to anyone at the end) When: Sunday, March 28; afternoon, when the memories come back. Where: His dorm, then down by the lake. What: Losing his memory was the best thing that's happened to Kevin in recent memory. Unfortunately, now it's back, and he hates himself once more. Rating: PG-13 for language and utter despair.
Kevin was hanging out in his dorm room, which he was almost a hundred percent certain by this point was actually his, just relaxing and sketching a little bit. He'd learned to keep the gloves on if he didn't want to keep destroying books and pencils, but other than that, his power didn't really bother him much. Sure, it sucked that he couldn't really touch people (he was willing to bet that back in his real life, he didn't have a sex life, and that was sort of depressing), but it was sort of cool what he could do if you ignored how morbid it was at the core, and it made him feel right and good and powerful to make stuff decay. Anyway, at least he wasn't blue or weirdly deformed like some people around here were, and that was something to be thankful for.
So there he was in his dorm when all of a sudden he got the worst headache he could remember ever having. (Not that he could remember anything prior to five days ago or so, but whatever.) He cursed under his breath and grabbed his head, and a second later, all of the memories he'd lost came pouring back into his head, a veritable flood of information that made him gasp and shake. He remembered now. Who he was. What he was doing here. What had happened to him and what he'd caused. The day his mother had been killed, far too young. The day Kevin's power had manifested and he'd clung in fear to his only remaining relative, only to watch in horror as he killed his own father with his cursed touch. The time on the run, certain that he would be arrested for the murder of his father. Months spent alone and terrified in a junkyard because he couldn't trust himself not to kill someone else. His time at this school, with his walls built high because he was so afraid of letting anyone close enough to hurt. All the times he'd hated another mutant because he would have given anything to have the powers they treated so casually, rather than this curse, good for nothing but hurting and murdering and destroying.
For five whole days he'd been without all of these memories. Looking back on that now -- what he'd done and said and written, how he'd felt about his power, most of all the lack of guilt and fear and harboring awful secrets -- was torture. That was what he could have been, ignorant and innocent and happy that way, and he wanted it back. This past week, he now realized, he had felt as though his soul had been wiped clean along with his mind, and now that he had his mind back, all the weight of his guilt and his hatred of what he was had come crashing back down on him. It felt as though it would physically crush him, and the air in here was suddenly suffocating. He couldn't breathe in this school.
Kevin made it outside, ignoring everything and everyone he passed, just running with his head down, gasping for air, until he was running down toward the edge of the lake. It was sunny, though still not really warm, and the lake was shining under the sun as if the world was all great and wonderful, and he hated that damn lake for being happy. He stopped dead, his breath coming in gasps, his heart hammering inside his chest. "Fuck," he whispered, and wrapped his arms around himself, a little chilled out here. "Oh, fuck. Take it--" He shuddered, his cheeks already wet with tears. "Take it away again," he shouted out over the silent lake. "Take it away. Please, God, just--" He was crying now, not only at the returned memories, but also at the taste of what he could have been in a kinder world. He'd been a nice person, a good person, who'd been lively and curious and talked to people and wasn't afraid to let them close. He truly had been happy for these few days. Even after that happier, better version of Kevin had found out about his curse, he hadn't been absolutely miserable and terrified of it; he'd accepted it and dealt with it and knew that it wasn't the end of the world. And that was the worst thing -- remembering how he'd felt over this past week and knowing that he could have been happy just like that, if only his life had gone differently.
It sucked. It sucked more than anyone else could possibly imagine. Kevin felt as if he couldn't breathe, couldn't even stand up, and he crumpled to his knees right there on the lake shore, getting out all his heartbreak in tears. It wouldn't solve anything, the more rational part of his mind told him, but right at this moment he didn't care.