The floor was always safer.
That was why he slept there, curled in the stale air like a discarded thing, the thin blanket bunched around his legs. The mattress stood untouched in the corner, a diseased relic with its cigarette burns and yellow sweat stains, sagging like a mouth missing teeth. It smelled of nights he had tried to forget, nights when his breath had been stolen from him, when the weight pressing him down wasn't his own. Even now, the mere sight of it seemed to pin him, to whisper against his neck with the heat of phantom breath.
So the boy kept to the floor, though it left his body aching by morning.
When his eyes cracked open, the silence pressed against his ears. Dust clung to his cheek where it had stuck with sweat in the night. He rolled onto his side, feeling the hard boards bruise his ribs. His mouth tasted metallic, as though he had swallowed a coin and left it there to rot. He didn't know if he had bitten his tongue in his sleep or if the taste came from nowhere, the way so many things did now.
His body was slow to move, as if stitched to the floor with invisible thread. His hands found the wall first, palms dragging against peeling wallpaper that flaked away like dead skin. The flakes clung to him, proof that the room was decaying just as surely as he was. He sat there for a long time, breathing in shallow gasps, until his own reflection caught him off guard.
The mirror by the door never showed mercy.
The boy's face stared back at him, unfamiliar and hateful. Sunken cheeks, purple shadows under his eyes, lips cracked and raw. His hair clung greasy to his temples. His skin looked stretched too thin over bone, except where it sagged, swollen in places it shouldn't be. He leaned closer despite himself. His breath fogged the glass, and for an instant, the stranger vanished in the white blur. He almost wept when the fog faded and the face remained.
Inside him, the murmurs began. They didn't speak aloud, but their voices pushed against his skull, their words sinking beneath his ribs.
Pathetic. Look at you. A fucking ruin.
Another voice, softer, tried to answer: You've survived worse. You're still here. That means something.
He pressed his forehead against the mirror until it hurt. Neither voice felt like his, but both lived in him.
The kitchen groaned as he entered. The fridge hummed like an animal dying slowly. He opened it anyway. A sour stench slapped him in the face. Bread furred over in green mold. Milk curdled into lumps. Something unidentifiable dripped down the side of the shelf, black as oil. His stomach lurched. He slammed the door shut and gripped the handle until the bones in his knuckles gleamed white.
"Eat," a voice urged inside him."Rot," hissed another."Don't look," whimpered a third.
His hands shook as he pulled the last cigarette from a crushed pack on the counter. The lighter clicked after three tries, flame flaring just long enough to bite his fingers. He inhaled until smoke scorched his throat. The sting steadied him. His chest rose and fell with it, shoulders sinking as if the ash inside him weighed less than air.
But relief dissolved as fast as it came, leaving him hollow again.
The memories slipped in then, uninvited.
The clink of a belt buckle.The hiss of leather sliding free.The sting when it landed, splitting skin open.The word that followed: useless.
His breath caught. The room swam. He clawed at his own arm, nails digging until thin lines of red surfaced. At least this pain belonged to him. At least this one he controlled.
Somewhere inside, the child whimpered—a tiny voice crying for arms to hold him, for someone to promise the monsters were gone. He pressed his palms over his ears, but the crying didn't fade. It pulsed in his chest instead, an ache older than memory.
He slumped against the counter, cigarettes smoke curling around him like chains.
The closet door stood ajar. He noticed it without meaning to.
Inside, the rope hung from a nail.
Even in the dim light, its shape was clear. He stared until his vision blurred, then blinked hard and stared again. His fingers itched. He imagined their weight curling around the fibers, the way the rope would bite into his palm. He imagined testing it, pulling, feeling how strong it was.
The crying inside him grew louder. The caretaker's voice joined it—scolding, pleading, warning. Only the hollow one stayed silent. Watching. Waiting.
With a sharp motion, he shoved the closet door shut. The bang echoed through the empty room. His chest heaved. He pressed his back to the door as though something inside were trying to get out.
The hours staggered on.
He paced the room in sets of three steps forward, three steps back. The floorboards moaned under him, the sound rhythmic, like a metronome for madness. The wallpaper patterns shifted as he moved, curls and stains blooming into faces if he stared too long. They leered at him, teeth bared, eyes mocking.
He scratched at his arms again, not realizing until blood smeared faintly against the peeling wall. He wiped it away with the blanket, then stared at the smear it left behind. A crude mark. A sign that he had been here. That he existed, even if no one cared.
The mirror caught him again when the light began to fade. This time, he didn't move closer. He simply stared at the stranger staring back. The stranger did not blink.
By the time night settled, he collapsed against the wall, pulling the blanket to his chest. His body trembled under its thin weight, every muscle refusing to unclench. His eyes remained open, fixed on the ceiling, until exhaustion dragged them closed.
"Tomorrow," he whispered. His lips barely moved. "Tomorrow again."
The voices quieted, but not because they were gone. They were waiting in the dark. Waiting for their turn.
And as sleep crept over him like mold spreading through damp wood, he wondered if tomorrow would finally be the day he stopped pretending.