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The wall feels different against his back today.

The floor is smooth instead of cobbled and crumbling.

He hasn’t seen the mouse even once. Hopes nothing happened to it. Wade heard them talking about putting out traps as they passed the cell the other day. He doesn’t want to think of that poor little bastard with his tiny feet stuck in glue or his head caught under a wire.

The mouse visits him even when he doesn’t have food to share. Not that he ever has enough to share, but a morsel here and there ain’t gonna make a difference. It even sits in his hand by now and Wade hates how attached he’s grown to that animal.

Things are off today. Everything looks and feels wrong, but that could be the drugs.

Can’t trust what he sees on the best of days, but even more so when they bring out that little vial and the liquid burns in his veins.

He’s so fucking out of it that his delusions almost circle back around on themselves until it’s all crystal clear again. Almost.

They usually don’t shoot him up unless they’re moving him, or he’s trying to off himself.

He doesn’t think he tried that today. If it’s even still today.

It could be next week already. Have they moved again?

Is it really different, or is he only seeing something new to provide himself with some variety?

He’s not sure, but the fact remains that they’ve lost interest in him for the most part, so the drugs mean something.

They don’t show up as often to take out their frustrations.

He’s not new and novel anymore, and they’ve got other captives for that.

He goes long stretches without seeing anyone except the hand that shoves his food through the door.

Even that can take a while. He’s found himself missing the days when there was commotion around every corner.

In some ways, the pain is better than isolation.

Did he slam his head against the bricks again?

Hard enough that he’s forgotten? Maybe. Only remembers that the door opened before the butt of a gun slammed into his face, then everything went dark.

One more head injury to add to the pile.

A few more memories shattered. He hardly remembers his own name anymore.

Then he woke up again with telltale nausea in his gut and three of them holding him down.

All his fight should be gone by now, but it isn’t.

Won’t be until he’s dead, or until he sees Kara again, and he can’t die because he has to see her.

He has someone to fight for. At first, self-preservation kept him going.

That was fleeting, though. In the end, the vast majority of him only thinks about Kara now.

At least, in the few memories he still retains that feature her.

Like that reunion in the hallway of her apartment building, a pile of rotters between them, and her beautiful face lighting up before she flung herself into his arms.

“I thought I’d never see you again. I went to your place, and you weren’t there.” She breathed into his neck. “What the hell is happening?”

It had been only a couple of weeks after the news started reporting on a rabies-like virus sweeping the world.

He was with…someone else, but he can’t remember their name anymore.

Can’t remember what the fuck he was doing before he went looking for Kara, only that he had to find her.

And then there she was, covered in gore from fighting her way out of the hall.

His smile had never been wider than the moment he saw her alive and felt her in his arms.

They told him once that she’d been captured after he mumbled her name in his delirium. Did it just to fuck with him. That’s when he started headbutting the wall and it turns out toys are no fun to play with when they’re broken beyond repair.

If she’s gone, he has nothing left. They told him the truth eventually, that no one has seen her, though he has his doubts. He let his cards show and put her in danger by letting on that she’s important to him. There’s no taking that back now.

Wade has to live to keep her safe. Usually, that’s enough motivation to see another day…mostly.

Sometimes he’s weak, but not always.

Sometimes he’s not even here at all.

A funny thing happens after years of unrelenting isolation and suffering. The mind shields itself, and for him, it’s easy to take her hand and let her lead him back to where he’s safe and warm.

To the treehouse they spent quiet nights in as children, hiding from one of their foster fathers until he slept off his drink.

She visits him in his cell now, like she visited him in his room after particularly hard nights when the lash of the belt burned his skin.

She even stays this time, curling up by his side when it’s chilly.

She visits him during his worst days and most mundane ones. Runs her fingers through his hair, and offers up an alternate reality plucked from their past. They are sparse and mottled, with holes in his memory that keep the full picture from forming, but he still tries to imagine them, anyway.

The first day he met her, after he was moved to a different foster family.

They were twelve and packed like sardines into an old house with several other children.

Another boy tried to take her sleeping bag, and Wade shoved him back, making himself a target on his very first day, but it had been worth it to know that she wouldn’t be sleeping on the cold wooden floor that night.

The day he told her he enlisted in the army and she cried in his arms, saying that maybe she’ll join too, claiming that she had nothing else going for her anyway.

The day they went skinny dipping in Walden Lake on her eighteenth birthday and he blushed like an idiot when she stripped down right on the dock.

“What’s wrong, Wade? You can make out with Jenny up the street all day, but you can’t go swimming with your best friend? Do my boobs offend you that much?”

He squeezed his eyes closed while his pulse pounded. “We can swim with our clothes on, you heathen.”

“It’s hot out. Are you getting in or what? I promise I won’t tell Jenny that you got naked with me.”

“Oh my god. Me and Jenny ain’t even a thing. Not that it matters,” he grumbled under his breath until the water splashed, indicating she jumped in and he could finally open his eyes.

“You act like I haven’t seen your naked ass before,” she laughed.

“Fine. Fine. You win. Shut your damn eyes and give a man some privacy.”

They splashed water at each other all afternoon and then got ice cream from the truck up the road. He still remembers how it dripped down his fingers and made a mess.

It’s only when the ache becomes all-consuming that he lets himself go further.

Feels guilty after, but all he wants is one good thing and her bare skin against his, that soft gasp in his ear and her warmth wrapped around his cock, is what saves him.

Not that he would have any clue what that actually feels like.

They have never been together like that, not once.

But his imagination offers plenty of options in the form of vivid hallucinations.

He can’t go to any of these moments now, though. Nothing works when he’s this hazy. It’s all jumbled and abstract, leaving room for the pain in his joints to flare and the cold of the room to hit his bones.

There’s a blanket but he can’t use it. It’s a trick. He won’t make those mistakes again.

The music keeps playing like it always does, but it’s muffled. He can hardly listen to himself think, let alone hear the songs they play for him anymore, after all the damage to his eardrums.

Can’t hear what they’re saying either. Not really. Someone’s in here with him and they won’t fucking leave. They keep talking in that underwater voice over a loudspeaker. Shoving food at him that he knows better than to eat if it’s not slop.

She looks like Kara. That’s how he knows it’s not her. She wouldn’t be in the cell with him, relaxing like it’s their home. She wouldn’t leave him in here if she found him. Not a chance. All the times he’s conjured her up, she’s quick to whisk them away.

No. It can’t be her, but a part of him still wants to believe it is.

Just leave, he wants to yell. Let him be while he comes down from an unwanted high before someone else shows up with fresh, new bullshit. That’s all he’s good for anymore, and he wants to be clear enough to see her again before it happens.

One thing is different, though. He’s not tied up. His wrists throb where the cuffs kept him from killing his captor, and he wasted no time in calling their mistake today. Almost had this one. Almost had them. Should have known there’d be more. It was only a test, and he failed like he always does.

You know that’s not me, right? she says, crouching down in front of him.

He whimpers in relief when she runs a hand across his shoulder, past the scar from the bullet he earned years ago. Maybe he’s not so far gone after all that she’d stay away.

I need you to promise me you’ll be careful, Wade , his hallucination whispers softly. Don’t fall for it this time. You know what happens when you do.

“I know.”

It’s not me because I’m right here. Remember that. I’m always with you. If I were out there too, we’d be gone by now. You’d be home with me for real. Remember, okay? Promise.

“I promise.”

Her face evaporates into his cell, and the spot where she stood is empty as ever.

He presses back into the wall, avoiding the stares of the one still with him. Whatever’s gonna happen is gonna happen. He can’t worry about that. All he can do is curl up and wait.

The drugs have made him nauseous as usual. He vomits up bile and the last of the slop from two days ago. Flinches away from it, ready for the hit because making a mess is a sure-fire way to get one.