𝗨𝗡𝗗𝗘𝗔𝗗, 𝗨𝗡𝗪𝗘𝗗 [ 𝘊𝘰𝘳𝘱𝘴𝘦 𝘮𝘢𝘭𝘦 𝘹 𝘮𝘢𝘭𝘦 𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘥𝘦𝘳 ]
𝕮𝖍𝖆𝖕𝖙𝖊𝖗 12
"I see her in the back of my mind
All the time
Feels like a fever, like I'm burning alive
Like a sign
Did I cross the line?"
ᴡɪʟᴅғʟᴏᴡᴇʀ ʙʏ ʙɪʟʟɪᴇ ᴇɪʟɪsʜ
Chapter 12
Till death do us part
THE sun glimmered through the window, the sun rising to give morning dew, it painted the room in gold, as if the world itself believed nothing was wrong.
Mikhail woke with the faint, instinctive thought that M/n had simply risen earlier than him.
He sat up, eyes half-lidded, waiting for the sound of footsteps. The clink of dishes. A voice calling from downstairs.
But nothing came.
He frowned slightly, more confused than alarmed. M/n was never this quiet in the mornings. He lingered in bed, staring at the door, convinced it would open any second now.
“Mybe it’s too early,” Mikhail muttered, lying back down.
He waited. Minutes passed. Then more.
Eventually, he rose, washed his face, Fixed his hair, Adjusted his sleeves. He even paused at the mirror, smoothing his collar the way M/n liked, as if M/n might comment on it later...
Downstairs, the kitchen greeted him with stillness.
Mikhail moved around it carefully, almost politely, as though M/n were just out of sight. He took down two cups then stopped, he corrected himself.
“ah,” he said softly. “I think he wants coffee today.” He poured water into the kettle and waited for it to boil. When it did, he poured only one cup. then hesitated, staring at the second mug still sitting on the counter.
He laughed quietly.
“Hahah...You sure are taking your sweet time...” He left the mug there anyway.
The hours passed like that. small corrections, gentle excuses.
'M/n was probably sleeping in!'
'M/n must’ve gone out!'
'M/n probably needed space after yesterday!'
'M/n must be outside?'
Mikhail watered the garden with care, humming under his breath. The flowers swayed in the breeze, healthy and bright. Everything was exactly where M/n left it.
See? he thought. Nothing has changed.
Only once did the denial waver.
He reached for the hose, intending to coil it neatly, and his hand paused midair. The memory came uninvited. laughter, splashing water, Lucien yelling for him to stop cheating.
The image cut too sharply.
Mikhail dropped the hose and straightened quickly, breath shallow.
“M/n...” he said, firm.
“Please wake up...please come home...please...It's quite lonely...” He went back inside before the thought could finish forming.
By evening, the house felt heavier. Mikhail set the table for dinner, two plates placed neatly across from each other.
He sat down and waited. When no one came, he ate anyway, barely tasting the food.
M/n would scold him later for eating without him...he hope he would.
That night, Mikhail lay on the bed, eyes fixed on the ceiling.
“This is just a bad day,” he whispered. “Tomorrow will be better.” He turned onto his side, reaching out without thinking.
His hand met cold sheets.
"Please be beside me when I wake up..."
Still, he closed his eyes. Because if he fell asleep believing M/n was alive...
It was easier to believe this was a mistake, a bad dream that would correct itself allowing him to wake up beside M/n.
because denial was kinder than truth.
MIKHAIL woke with his jaw clenched so tightly it ached.
The house was the same. But it feels wrong. Sunlight slipped through the curtains like an intruder, bold and unapologetic, and something in his chest snapped at the sight of it.
How dare the day continue as if nothing had been taken.
He rose anyway. His body protested this time. The stiffness did not fade after a few steps; it lingered in his joints, a slow, creeping heaviness, as though his limbs were remembering what they were meant to be before M/n ever touched them.
cold, still, obedient to rot. His fingers trembled when he reached for the sink. The skin along his knuckles looked duller, stretched too tight, veins dark beneath it like bruises that never healed.
Mikhail stared at his reflection and scowled.
“Pathetic,” he muttered, to the mirror, to himself, to the curse that watched him patiently.
When he lifted his hand, his fingers trembled, joints resisting as though rusted.
“tch..." he murmured to his reflection. Pins and needles crawled up his arm, locking his fingers in place. He stared at them, trembling.
“…So it’s starting,” he muttered.
The curse did not warn him, it simply reminded him about the inevitable outcome. If his soulmate was gone, then so was the reason for his movement, his warmth, his borrowed life.
He cooked breakfast out of habit, not hunger. The pan hissed loudly, the smell of oil felt offensive. When a plate slipped from his grasp and shattered against the floor, the sound rang through the house like a challenge.
Something inside him finally broke.
He swept his arm across the counter, another plate fell. Then another, Porcelain cracked, splintered, at last, to the violence clawing its way out of him. His breath came sharp and uneven, chest burning, eyes stinging with a fury that had nowhere to go.
“This is your fault,” he snarled, though he wasn’t sure who he was speaking to anymore.
The curse pulsed beneath his skin in answer. His left hand locked mid-air, fingers curling stiffly inward, joints seizing as if invisible wires were pulling them tight.
"Good, keep going" he thought viciously.
"Take it back, take all of it." He slammed his frozen hand against the table. The wood dented. His bones screamed. Still, he didn’t pull away.
M/n had screamed too, hadn’t he?
The thought hit him like a blade. Mikhail staggered back, breath shuddering. Anger turned inward, Not at the world, not at fate, but to himself.
If he had not loved.
If he had not wanted.
If he had not dared to imagine forever.
M/n would still be alive. The house bore the brunt of his rage after that, achair overturned, a door slammed hard enough to rattle the walls, his voice rose once. raw, broken, furious, before collapsing into silence again. Shouting felt useless when the only one who deserved to hear it was gone.
By noon, his body was failing him openly. His legs dragged, movements jerky, delayed, like a marionette with tangled strings. Dark patches bloomed beneath his eyes, his skin growing colder no matter how much sunlight touched it.
“This is what I deserve,” he whispered, gripping the edge of the table as his knees threatened to give out.
To love had been his sin.
To be loved had been M/n's sentence.
The wake was happening somewhere else, he knew that. People would be gathering. Mourning. Saying gentle lies about peace and rest and how kind the world could still be.
Mikhail laughed once, bitter and hollow.
He could not go. He would not.
He could not stand before a casket and pretend M/n looked peaceful, knowing that his last moments were filled with pain. pain born from love, from escape, from a future Mikhail had wanted too much.
To see him like that would be to confess.
So he stayed where he was, alone in the wreckage of the day, body stiffening inch by inch, rage simmering beneath his skin like a fever that refused to burn out.
Anger kept him upright.
Anger kept him moving.
And when night finally fell, Mikhail sat in the dark and let the curse tighten its grip, welcoming every ache, every numb, creeping loss.
Anger didn’t scream; it sat with him, clenched in his jaw and fists, whispering that someone had to pay, and it might as well be him.
MIKHAIL woke whispering.
He did not remember when it started. only that his lips were already moving, breath thin and urgent, as if he might miss his chance if he stopped.
“I’ll do it,” he murmured to the ceiling. “Anything.” The house listened in silence.
His body was worse today. The stiffness had settled deep into his bones, no longer content to linger at the joints.
When he swung his legs off the bed, one foot hit the floor a second too late, as if it needed to be reminded how.
Pins and needles crawled up his calf, sharp enough to draw a hiss from his teeth.
“I’m still here,” he told himself.
“See? I’m still moving.” He shuffled through the morning like a man negotiating with an unseen god. Every step was careful, every breath deliberate.
He brewed tea he did not drink, cooked food he did not eat, setting one plate aside out of habit before catching himself.
Mikhail sat across from the empty chair and folded his hands together, fingers trembling faintly.
“M/n,” he said softly, carefully, like the name might shatter if spoken too loudly.
“If you can hear me… if there’s any part of you that can—” His throat tightened.
“I’ll take it back.” The curse stirred, cold and attentive.
“I shouldn’t have loved you the way I did,” he went on quickly, desperation sharpening his voice.
“I shouldn’t have wanted more. I’ll be less. I’ll want less. I won’t ask for forever, just let me see you again. Once.” His right hand locked halfway through reaching for the table. He sucked in a breath, forcing it down, massaging the stiffened fingers until they loosened with a sickening click.
“I’ll stop,” he whispered.
“I’ll stop wanting things.” He tried the garden again, kneeling beside the seedlings he and M/n had planted together. His knees protested, joints grinding softly beneath his weight.
The soil felt colder than it should have. He pressed his bare palms into it anyway, grounding himself, bowing his head as though before an altar.
“If this is my punishment,” he murmured to the dirt,
“then let it end with me.”
The words spilled faster after that, messy and unfiltered.
“Take my body, take my voice, take the rest of my time—just give his back. He didn’t choose me the way I chose him. He didn’t deserve this. I was the one who wanted to stay, I was the one who wanted marriage, mornings, years—”
His shoulders shook.
“I was the one who loved too much.”
By afternoon, fatigue dragged at him like chains. His skin had taken on a faint gray hue, veins standing out more clearly now, His heartbeat felt slower, as though each thump required permission.
Still, he clung to hope, not the gentle kind, but the frantic, bargaining sort that refused to die quietly. He lit a candle in the living room, even though there was no ritual left to perform.
“I’ll wait,” he told the flame.
“I’ll stay here. I won’t move on, I won’t forget, I won’t even be angry anymore if you just—” The candle flickered. Mikhail’s breath hitched.
“—if you just let me dream of him again.”
Night came without mercy. When his legs finally gave out, he sank onto the floor, back against the couch, staring at the darkened ceiling.
He pressed one cold palm to his chest.
“Please,” he whispered, voice breaking at last. “I’ll be good.”
The house did not answer. The curse did not loosen. And somewhere deep inside him, beneath all the pleading, something fragile began to crack.
the first quiet realization that no bargain would ever be enough.
MIKHAIL did not wake up crying.
That was what frightened him most, his eyes opened to the gray light of morning, and there was no rush of denial, no flare of anger, no frantic bargaining waiting on his tongue.
Only weight pressing down on his chest until even breathing felt like something he had to decide to do.
His body had stiffened further in the night. When he tried to move, only his fingers responded at first, like they were remembering how to be alive out of obligation rather than instinct.
His legs followed after a long moment, numb and aching, joints locked tight with a cold that felt permanent.
So this is how it begins, he thought dully.
He sat on the edge of the bed for a long time, staring at the floor.
Dust had settled where M/n's shoes used to be. A faint mark remained, a shadow of presence that made something in Mikhail’s chest cave inward.
He didn’t get dressed properly. He didn’t wash his face. He only pulled a coat around himself and moved through the house like a ghost learning its routes.
The mirror in the hallway caught him off guard.
His skin had dulled, the warmth leeched out of it. Dark veins traced his hands and neck like cracks in old marble. His eyes looked sunken, hollowed by something far deeper than sleeplessness.
“You deserve it,” he murmured to his reflection.
The curse pulsed in response, a slow, suffocating thrum beneath his ribs.
He didn’t eat, The kitchen remained untouched, the bread from yesterday hardening on the counter. Hunger existed only as a distant concept, something for the living.
Instead, he sat in M/n's chair. Not across from it. In it.
The realization struck him too late to stop. His body folded into the space M/n used to occupy, The chair creaked softly beneath his weight.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered to the empty room.
The words fell flat, meaningless.
He tried to imagine M/n's wake.
white flowers, quiet voices, a coffin polished to false gentleness and his chest seized so hard he nearly blacked out. His fingers curled, locking painfully as the curse tightened its hold.
He could not see M/n lying still.
Not when he knew M/n had died running, not when Mikhail could trace every step back to himself.
If I hadn’t loved you.
If I hadn’t wanted you.
If I hadn’t stepped into your life and asked you to stay.
His legs gave out when he tried to stand. He hit the floor hard, the shock barely registering. Good,” he muttered, teeth chattering.
“This is good.”
He welcomed the pain. The stiffness. The way his limbs felt heavier with every passing hour. It felt right, like justice.
“You died because of me,” he said aloud, voice flat, exhausted.
“So let me die like this.” The afternoon passed unnoticed. Mikhail remained where he had fallen, staring blankly at the ceiling, tears leaking silently from the corners of his eyes without any sound to accompany them.
By evening, sensation in his feet was almost gone. He dragged himself to the bedroom using his arms, movements slow and graceless.
Every inch of his body protested. His fingers locked twice more before he reached the bed, forcing him to wait it out, breath shallow and shaky.
When he finally collapsed onto the mattress, he didn’t pull the covers up.
He didn’t need comfort anymore.
“I loved you,” he whispered into the dark, the words barely strong enough to exist.
“That’s all I did wrong.” The curse answered not with words, but with silence.
depression settled in beside him, heavy and unmoving, like grief that had decided to stay.
MIKHAIL woke to silence that felt… settled.
Not heavy like yesterday, not sharp like the days before. Just still...like the house had finally exhaled after holding its breath too long.
His body did not obey him at once.
When he tried to move, his legs responded seconds too late, stiff and numb, as though they belonged to someone else. His fingers trembled violently when he clenched them, joints cracking softly like old wood.
The curse had spread further overnight; he could feel it now in his spine, a cold line threading downward, patient and inevitable.
'So this is how close I am,' he thought calmly.
He sat there for a long while, listening to the faint ticking of the clock downstairs.
Tomorrow.
The word surfaced slowly, Tomorrow, M/n would be buried. The realization did not hit him all at once. It crept in, quiet and almost polite, settling beside him like an unwelcome truth that had grown tired of being avoided.
Tomorrow, the world would lower M/n into the ground.
Tomorrow, there would be prayers, flowers, gentle voices.
Tomorrow, M/n would be called at peace.
And Mikhail would not be there.
At first, he accepted it with a numb sort of logic. Of course I won’t go, he told himself;
'I can barely walk.'
'I don’t deserve to stand beside his grave.'
'I don’t deserve closure.'
He tried to make peace with the idea the same way he had made peace with the pain in his body, by letting it exist without protest.
M/n would not know whether Mikhail came or not. M/n was gone. That was the truth he had finally stopped fighting.
Acceptance, he realized, was not relief.
It was exhaustion.
He made his way to the window, Outside, the sky was pale and clear, almost offensively beautiful. Somewhere out there, people were preparing black clothes, arranging flowers, deciding where to stand.
Somewhere out there, M/n was waiting to be buried.
Something twisted in Mikhail’s chest.
He imagined the coffin again. not the false peaceful version others would see, but M/n as he was: laughing too softly, eyes bright with stubborn warmth, hands always reaching out even when he was afraid.
'Wait for me', M/n had said once.
Mikhail’s grip tightened on the window frame. His fingers spasmed, locking painfully in place.
“I didn’t go anywhere,” he whispered hoarsely. “I waited for you, damnit...”
Tomorrow.
The word no longer felt distant. It felt like a closing door.
A sudden, unbearable clarity struck him then, sharp enough to steal the air from his lungs.
If he didn’t go tomorrow, that would be it.
There would be no later.
No second chance.
No quiet visit when the world had moved on.
M/n would be lowered into the ground, and Mikhail would remain here. rotting slowly, alone, reduced to something that survived but never lived.
His body was failing, yes.
But his heart—
His heart was still screaming.
“I can’t,” he breathed, voice breaking for the first time that day.
“I can’t let you go like that.” The acceptance didn’t vanish.
M/n was dead. That truth remained.
But another truth rose beside it, just as firm:
Love did not end just because life did.
Mikhail’s knees buckled as he turned away from the window, pain shooting up his legs. He caught himself on the wall, panting, sweat breaking out along his brow.
Tomorrow would destroy him.
He knew that now. The walk alone might finish what the curse had started. His body might lock up entirely. He might collapse before reaching the grave.
And yet—
“I have to see you,” he said aloud, voice shaking but certain. Not because it would save him, but because loving M/n had never been about safety.
It had always been about choice.
Mikhail sank back onto the bed, exhausted, trembling, staring at the ceiling with hollow eyes that finally held something solid inside them.
Tomorrow, even if it broke him, even if his body failed beneath him, even if it was the last thing he ever did.
Mikhail would go.
Because M/n deserved to be seen.
Acceptance did not mean surrender.
It meant knowing the truth and still choosing love.
THE sky was overcast when M/n was laid to rest.
Liezel stood before the casket, hands trembling as she clutched the edge of the podium. Her eyes were red, swollen from days without proper sleep, yet she forced herself to stand tall. For M/n.
“My brother,” she began, her voice breaking immediately. She let out a shaky breath, then tried again.
“M/n was—he was gentle. Too gentle for this world, sometimes.” A few muffled sobs rippled through the crowd.
“He loved deeply. When he cared for someone, he gave everything. his time, his patience, his heart.” Her lips trembled into a fragile smile.
“He was stubborn too. In the way that made you argue with him… and miss him the second he walked away.” She laughed weakly, then covered her mouth as tears spilled freely.
“He deserved more time. More laughter. More mornings.” Her voice cracked.
“He deserved to grow old. To love freely, to be happy without fear.” Liezel swallowed hard, looking down at the polished wood of the casket.
“I love you, M/n I hope—wherever you are—you know that. I hope you’re warm. I hope you’re not alone.” Her gaze lifted instinctively, scanning the gathered mourners.
Friends, Relatives, Familiar faces.
But not the one she unconsciously searched for.
Her brows knit together. Mikhail was nowhere among them.
Unbeknownst to her, he stood far from the crowd. half-hidden behind the trunk of an old tree at the edge of the cemetery. His body leaned heavily against the bark, fingers digging into the rough surface as if it were the only thing keeping him upright. He watched everything.
Every flower placed gently atop the casket.
Every bowed head. Every whispered farewell.
Even Giselle stepped forward, her expression solemn as she lingered longer than most, pressing her hand briefly to the wood before stepping away.
Mikhail thought, for a fleeting moment, that he should go then.
Before it was too late.
Before the casket was lowered.
But his feet wouldn’t move.
What if they see me? What if they scream? What if I fall apart before him?
And worse— What if I see him… and cannot bear it?
The priest’s voice droned softly. Final words, Final blessings. The ropes tightened. The casket began to descend.
Something inside Mikhail snapped, his knees buckle. His legs gave way beneath him, whether from the curse tightening its grip or from the sheer weight of grief, he didn’t know.
He fell to his knees in the grass.
Still, no tears came.
He only stared as the earth swallowed M/n whole. One by one, the guests began to leave. Murmured condolences. Lingering glances. Eventually, even Liezel was guided away, her shoulders shaking as she cast one last look behind her.
The cemetery emptied and silence returned.
Only then did Mikhail move.
He forced himself upright, every motion stiff, unnatural. His joints protested, his body sluggish and cold, but he ignored it all as he approached the grave, Fresh soil, a clean headstone.
In the loving memory of
M/n Percival.
His hand brushed the carved name. That was when the tears came. They fell freely now, uncontrollably, as Mikhail collapsed before the grave, pressing his forehead against the cool stone.
“I’m sorry,” he sobbed. “I’m so sorry.”
His breath hitched as his body began to lock up further, muscles seizing, joints stiffening like stone.
Panic flared briefly, Then resolve.
With shaking lips, he began to recite the vow M/n had once spoken, the words that had bound him to life.
“I’m bound to you till my last breath… bound to you until the very end…”
His fingers clawed into the soil.
“You will be happy, for I will be the cause of your smile…”
He dug, ignoring the pain, ignoring the burning ache in his arms, the way his borrowed life slipped away with every movement.
“You will not cry, for I will make sure it’s only tears of joy…”
At last, the casket emerged beneath his trembling hands. Mikhail opened it.
M/n lay inside, peaceful. Untouched by the violence of his end. As if merely asleep.
A broken sound escaped Mikhail’s throat.
He whispered the final words as he climbed inside, curling carefully beside him, hands intertwining with M/n cold fingers.
“From this day onwards,”
he murmured, resting his forehead against M/n's,
“I will be your spouse.”
The last warmth left his body, The curse completed its claim.
And for the first time since M/n's death.
Mikhail was no longer alone.
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