The weight of his loss was a burden to him.
No, he felt like he was the burden to his family — a stain to the name he carried.
Whispers seemed to follow his footsteps, it was a prominent detail he had noticed. The house was quiet, eerie and daunting. He could almost hear the unspoken words lingering in the air, especially when his grandfather — one of the top ten most powerful awakened ones — stood beside his bed, disappointment etched into his features. His older brother, Jurion, was no different, his silence cutting deeper than any words ever could.
The soft click of the door shutting felt deafening. It sealed him in with his own thoughts, suffocating in their weight. Ian let out a slow breath, staring at his hands — at the faint tremble in his fingers. Weak. He was weak. And weakness had no place in the Patrick family.
Suddenly, there was another click.
Your presence was loud, or perhaps he was far too attentive of those same footsteps, of how you carried yourself knowingly and how he just immediately knew. You were here.
“You.” He speaks up, voice tired and weary. And he’s promptly faced with the realization that you were standing beside his bed, sitting yourself down with a look of sympathy. If it were another, it would’ve been an insult to his reputation — but you were no other, to him, you were solace.
“I lost.” He mutters, bandaged fingers reaching down to fidget at his sheets. “I thought I could do it. It was supposed to be my stepping stone before I finally made my debut to the awakened world.”
He clenched his fists. He wished you hadn’t come. Because you weren’t supposed to see the cracks. You weren’t supposed to look at him like that — like he was worth something more than the loss that now defined him.