The day my life got dragged into terrifying chaos and mourning, started off with snow. Gemma and I waited all winter till it finally snowed in January (me and Gem were a little disappointed that we didn't have a white Christmas). Gemma was 24, I was about to turn 21. I thought life was good. Till my mother called, asking me to pick her and dad up and since Gemma laid in bed with a terrible cold, I took the car.

The news blared with glazed frost coming soon. I won't ever forget the blasting sound of rain hitting the top of my care as I drove that night. I felt the street getting slippery, the wheel moving lightly underneath my tight grip.

I should've stayed there with mom and dad. Till everything was over. But dad drank a little, patted on my shoulder and said "be a good boy and get your old man home, nice and safely," Ben hiccuped and ruffled my hair.

The accident happened so fast.. It brought darkness into my life, right the second the other car crashed in the side of ours. My mommy's head split open, blood spilling out of daddy's mouth. I was alone, unable to move for a good thirty minutes before somebody came and got me out of there safely. Haunted by the smell of fear, of blood and the dead bodies of my parents, I wasn't able to sleep or talk properly for weeks. Months.

"I shouldn't have driven.. I shouldn't have-"

Covered in sweat I found myself in bed countless nights, screaming those words at the top of my lungs. Gemma tried to help me, staying a lot of nights in my bed to calm me down again, lulling me to sleep. She always tried being strong in front of her little brother. The death of our parents hit her hard but she wasn't feeling the guilt. She wasn't feeling the nagging monster that grew in the pit of my stomach, getting bigger every day. Developing sharp teeth that ate me up alive.

I still feel it sometimes.

It was hard to get out of the house after that. To leave home where mommy and daddy still lived somehow, to leave the place where I grew up as a child. Gemma and I moved in together, due to the fact that we just needed each other. I needed her more than she needed me though.

Hate started to build.. From feeling guilty, I was developing anger and hate on myself. Why didn't I drive more careful? Why didn't I just stop and took a better look at what was laying ahead?

I started to consult a psychiatrist after Gemma had begged me for weeks to do so. At one point, I was numb. Numb to things happening around me, numb to everything. I just wanted everything to stop, to stop hurting me. Because it did.. Since that day in January everyone seemed to look at me disappointed, everything seemed to move, cornering me in.

I tried to manage my temper through boxing. My psychiatrist called it 'anger management'. "Just imagine that this box bag is the person or thing you hate most. Get your aggression out," he encouraged me. My face showed up in the centre of the boxing bag, so I hit. Hit and hit and hit till my muscles were too sore to move. During that time, I felt empty. Driven by anger and hate. Those emotions were the only one I felt, anymore. I never thought of suicide .. I couldn't do that to Gem.

After a while of therapy I slowly got my life together, on the outside at least. I started a job in a bakery, helped people and well, baked. It distracted me for a good while and I was really enjoying it there. Till a small girl stumbled inside. She was indeed very pretty, her hair curling gently at the height of her collar bones. A lovely girl that was at the wrong place, in the wrong time.

Amelia, yes, her name.

She was having pity with me. Amelia was one of the few people who really look at you. The petite girl did have pity but I didn't want that. Yet, I asked her out. Why? Because I needed a change, needed someone back in my life, someone that told me that the accident wasn't my fault. Maybe I just wanted a person I could let my anger out on, from the very start, as well.

Nevertheless, she said yes.

My sexual orientation and experiences had its up and downs. Boys, girls, girls and boys again. I eventually settled with her for quite a long time.. Our relationship developed from dates to a kind of.. Therapy session. She had problems, I had problems. But hers were bigger at that moment.

With her, I found out what I longed for.

Control.

To be able to control the things that happened around me again, to be the one who can handle them. The world of BDSM was my escape. Before the accident, I've been interested into that kind of scene already but my sexual life has suffered ever since January. Everything I did, they were with me, ghosting in my head.

Amelia somehow held them back. She gave me a space I was able to slip in, a place where I was in control. Where I didn't feel guilty or was being haunted.

Our sessions got more and more intense. She was into pain, I liked spanking her. Tying her up to just let her take me till I decided when she had enough. I wasn't in a good mental condition back then. I wasn't stable.

And that's why she yelled her safe word at the top of her lungs and I wasn't able to hear it. I took therapy lessons again, then. Distancing myself from that woman who showed me freedom, a kind of easiness in life. Who showed me the danger of letting go, also.

At that time I was alone, whether Gemma was there, nor anyone else. Alone. I continued my job at the bakery though somehow, needing the money until one day I called my sister while I broke down in my bathroom. She's one of the most important persons in my life, I wouldn't know what I'd do without her.

She held me the entire night. Calmed me while I sobbed, stroked my hair like she did when we were younger. "Everything's going to be good, Harry, I promise, because I love you," she repeated over and over until I believed her.

I went to therapy until I was in a better mental state. Until I could handle myself. I spent a lot of time with Gemma then.

On November, 29th we received a letter.

The business of my dad. What happened to it now? Gemma just smiled as she read the letter and peaked up at me saying, "baby brother you just stepped in dad's footsteps.. I'm so proud," we both cried a lot that day. Mostly because dad was gone wholly now. I took on the responsibility for my father's business, running his company and it went well.

I was good at something.

The business bloomed like crazy and Gemma and I moved into a very large house. Well, she spent me company there until she moved to her boyfriend's flat. I was back alone but that was okay.

I met a man a few weeks later and we worked together, well.

My engagement with Eric though didn't last long. I understood that I was different. That I looked for something else in a relationship that maybe wasn't considered 'normal'. He, on the other hand, was only there for the money.

After a long time of strolling around lonely, tormented by demons that started to nag again, I ran over an Irish blonde lad, laying on the street. Too young, too innocent, too broken. I took him in without hesitation, offering him a warm bed at my house. Yet it wasn't enough for me. Something just missed.

~

"Am I going insane? Abnormal?," I whisper and bite my wobbling lip before I lean down, placing a bouquet of flowers on top of the grave of my parents. Ben and Anne. I sigh and look up into the sky, closing my eyes. They are somewhere up there. Looking down at me with love. Watching over me and Gem.

"I can't do this.. How am I supposed to take care of someone other than me?", I say quietly and smile sadly at the grave, blowing a soft kiss at them before I turn on my heels and make my way down the street. Calling Gemma.

"You really think this is a good idea? I just.. What if I do something wrong, what if I loose my temper, Gem I-"

"Harold."

I swallow, resisting the urge to roll my eyes at the name.

"You are a great man. Running an impressive business, having me by your side for support. I'll always be there, Harry, fucking always," I smile and bite my lip. Gemma always started to curse whenever she got emotional.

"You can do this.. It'll enrich your life, baby brother," Gemma smiles through the phone, "Mom and Dad would be proud of you.. I believe that they are."

"Thank you," I whisper and exhale shakily mumbling a quite "love you," into the phone before I hang up, shoving my hands in my pockets and lower my face down to the floor, my curls falling in my face before I brush them back again and brace myself.

I walk into the building, long legs carrying me quick before I get lead into a room with a tiny desk, two seats and a pathetic little shelf of books by the side. A small window. It reminds me of a cell.

My eyes fall on a small boy with soft brown hair and piercing blue eyes, that have their very own painful story, sitting at the desk. Just like mine have. I smile, my deep voice echoing softly through the room, catching the boy's attention immediately.

"Hello, I'm Harry. You are Louis, right?"