Chapter Text
Tick. Tick. Tick. Tick.
Had the clock always been that loud?
Tick. Tick. Tick. Tick.
Was it getting louder?
Abed lay in bed, staring up at the ceiling and tapping in time with the incessant ticking. He had barely left his bed in weeks, and yet, the clock had only just started grating at his skull. It seemed to be a common occurrence that being exhausted made his senses more vulnerable, but what excuse did he have for being exhausted? He couldn’t remember the last time he’d walked further than the bathroom down the hall.
He rolled over to face the wall, scrunching his face up and covering his ears. If he could just sleep, then he wouldn’t have to worry about the nails scraping against his skull or the sharpness of the label of his pyjamas. If he slept, then maybe he’d dream of an alternate timeline in which Troy hadn’t left to sail the world. The moment Troy had stepped out the door, Abed’s heart had snapped in half, and everything had gotten a million times more difficult. His head ached constantly, his fingertips wouldn’t stop trembling, and he had a constant sheen of sweat on his forehead. It was like he was grieving, even though the person he was mourning was alive and well on the other side of the planet.
Tick. Tick.
Rolling over again, Abed glanced at the clock. The sun shone directly into his eyes, since he hadn’t bothered to shut the curtains, and it might as well have been a portal to hell out there. He blinked. For a millisecond, the flames licked at the glass, but Abed didn’t have the energy, nor the will to flinch.
Tick. Tick.
That was it. He threw his bedcovers off himself and stood up, the cold air hitting him hard enough to numb him like a shot of anaesthetic. He stormed towards the clock, pulling it off the wall and ripping the batteries out of it. He dumped them on his desk with a loud clatter, letting out a soft sigh and placing a hand against his forehead as he got the first second of peace in what felt like weeks. After a moment, he turned around to get back into bed, but his mouth fell open as his eyes lay upon something he hadn’t seen in two seasons— someone he hadn’t seen in two seasons.
Evil-Abed.
He hadn’t changed much. His goatee still clung to his chin as if it were glued on, edgy as ever. His eyes were cloudy and dark, mysterious and unreadable, as he stared at Abed with a frown so deep that Abed almost got lost in it. The same black shirt hung off him, a size or two too small to accentuate his slim frame, paired with the same skinny jeans. The only sign that time had progressed was the tiny crinkles by his eyes.
“For fuck’s sake,” the words tumbled from Abed’s lips with little input from his brain. There had been a brief period (before Troy had left), where Abed had felt better, where he felt like he’d figured out how to blend in with humankind as if he’d been one of them all along. Seeing Evil-Abed meant he’d regressed to season three. That wasn’t good. Season three had been a series of bottle episodes, full of, as Abed had once described it, “wall-to-wall nuance and facial expressions,” with him slap bang in the centre of it all.
It had taken Abed years to learn to trust after his mom had left, and Troy had trampled on that progress as if it were an ant on the ground. It was impossible not to think that Evil-Abed had been right back in season three: everyone left, even Troy. Wonderful, empathetic, perfect Troy. Despite saying he loved Abed and swearing he’d stick around, he had walked out on him, just like his mom did. Just like every other person he was destined to meet in the future would. Abed was an idiot for ever thinking Troy might have been different.
With a huff, Abed tilted his head to look up at the ceiling. There was a long, thin crack running through the middle of it. Abed wondered if there was a metaphorical crack running through him, too, waiting to smash him into a million pieces.
“Annie’s next door,” Evil-Abed simply said. He raised his eyebrows and folded his arms as he drifted to stand in the centre of the room. His frame blocked some of the rays of light, but one still managed to make it through and hit Abed in the eye. He squinted, his arm feeling too heavy to block it. When Abed remained quiet, Evil-Abed walked towards him and held out his open palm. “You should tell her how you’re feeling. She can help you.”
Abed snorted. If Evil-Abed genuinely believed Abed was special, then he was an idiot—just as much of an idiot as Abed was for ever trusting Troy. Abed was destined for loneliness because that was the safest way to exist. No one could stab you in the back if you never showed them your back, after all. Abed pushed past Evil-Abed and climbed back into bed, pulling his bedcovers over his head to immerse himself in darkness. He closed his eyes as his bottom lip wobbled, mumbling, “You’re fine. You’re not hallucinating.”
“You can’t lay in bed forever. You’ll starve or dehydrate… and you totally are hallucinating.”
Poking his head out of the covers again, Abed thinned his eyes and spat, “So?” The room spun a little from his rapid movement, so he placed a hand against his forehead and scrunched his eyes shut until it balanced itself out again. Up until that point, he’d been living off the odd glass of water Annie brought to him. She’d tried bringing him food, but he refused all of it, instead sneaking into the kitchen in the middle of the night for a handful of Lucky Charms every once in a while. The thought of anything that he didn’t consider a safe food made his stomach churn– it had even gotten bad enough that buttered noodles made him feel queasy, too. Hence, dry cereal was the way to go.
“Troy didn’t leave out of malice. He left because he wanted to travel the world and learn more about himself. He’ll come back for you.”
“That’s what Mom said.”
The day his mom left was ingrained in Abed’s brain. She had crouched down and put a hand on his shoulder, before wiping his tears, hugging him tight and promising that she’d always care and she’d always call. She had looked him in the eye and sworn that, every Christmas, she’d come back for him so they could watch Rudolf the Red-Nosed Reindeer together. At first, she’d kept her promise, but as time went on, she asked fewer questions, she called less, she made excuses to avoid Christmas, and, eventually, she replaced him with her new family. That brought him to where he was in that moment– he hadn’t heard her voice or spoken a lick of Polish in years. Part of him wondered if she felt guilty, and the other part figured she had forgotten he existed. Abed hardly blamed her: he’d been a handful as a kid, and time hadn’t been the medicine he’d hoped for. In fact, considering he was still the burden he was, he didn’t blame Troy for leaving either.
Evil-Abed’s silence was loud; louder than the clock had been. Hoping that meant he had given up, Abed rolled over to face the wall. The space on the mattress beside him was cold, and it felt too big for one person. He was supposed to lie there, entangled with Troy as if they were one, as they chatted endlessly about Inspector Spacetime and all the movies they wanted to watch together. They’d made a list on Troy’s phone with 127 different movies on it, but Abed supposed he’d taken that with him, too. They had reached movie 63: Mulholland Drive. The movie had left Troy confused, which may have been subtle foreshadowing about how confused Abed would be when Troy decided to leave. Or maybe he was looking too deeply into it because none of the tiny details really mattered when the world was ending.
“Why are you here again anyway? I thought you were supposed to be stuck in my mind these days,” Abed asked, forcing himself to look away from the space where Troy should’ve been. He looked up at the top bunk instead, with the tiny stars he’d blue-tacked to the frames. He was supposed to find adventure and hope in the pieces of plastic, but that time, all he found was childishness and an endless void of nothingness. Without Troy, everything was off, wrong, empty. He made a mental note to rip the stars down when his body didn’t feel like it was made out of lead.
“Your fears and anxieties are taking over again.”
“Oh, cool. Cool, cool, cool. Does that mean you can give me some rules to follow so I don’t get hurt again?”
As much as he hated to admit it, part of Abed had loved it when Evil-Abed had given him strict rules. He’d hated the pushing his friends away part, but at least he felt like he had some semblance of control. He wondered, if he’d followed the rules to a tee, whether Troy would never have left.
Maybe Troy leaving was a canon event that happened regardless of what Abed did.
Maybe, if Abed followed Evil-Abed’s rules again, he could at least pretend that he would never be vulnerable enough to get hurt again, even if hurting was inevitable.
Evil-Abed sighed and climbed into bed beside Abed– in Troy’s spot. If he actually had a physical form, Abed would have shoved him away because it was like forcing two pieces of a jigsaw puzzle together that didn’t fit. “You don’t want that. You need to talk to Annie,” he whispered.
That was not the response Abed had wanted or anticipated, so he scrunched up his nose. He scanned Evil-Abed, from where his legs were stretched out in front of him to his soft, shiny eyes. “What have I done to you? You used to be all cool, and now you’re… lame.”
“I’m not lame, I’m practical.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I’m your protector, remember? So that’s what I’m doing. Protecting you. You need to lean on your friends to get over Troy. Pushing them away is just going to make things worse.”
Abed laughed, but it was bitter. He clambered over Evil-Abed, shaking his head wildly as he began to pace. It felt like there was static inside of him, urging him to move until it spread throughout his entire body. “I got hurt because I let Troy in. I’m not making that mistake again,” Abed muttered with a roll of his eyes.
“Please don’t isolate yourself. Do you remember your support plan after you got out of hospital? The steps we need to go through when you’re in crisis?”
Was he having a crisis? His crises were usually meltdowns or panic attacks, not a massive hole in his chest that told him life wasn’t worth living. It wasn’t supposed to be heaviness, exhaustion, or headaches. It was supposed to be pounding hearts, breathlessness and the urge to scream until his throat was raw. He stared down at his hands, and, for a second, he questioned whether they were his own.
“Abed… being in a crisis isn’t just panicking.”
Abed snapped his head back up to glare at Evil-Abed, snapping, “If you’re not going to be helpful, can you just go back inside my head?”
“I can’t just sit back and watch you suffer.”
Sucking in a deep breath, Abed curled his hands into fists. He stomped his foot and leaned forward, body trembling. “I don’t need you anymore. I haven’t needed you in a long time. I’ll figure this crap out on my own.” Evil-Abed being there meant things were really bad, so surely, if Abed made him go away, things would be okay.
As Evil-Abed opened his mouth to argue against Abed’s logic, a knock on the door made them both rotate to stare at the doorway. Seconds later, Annie yelled, “Abed? Who’re you talking to?”
“Tell her I’m here,” Evil-Abed demanded.
Abed swallowed thickly. He brought his right hand up to pinch at the skin on his arm, rocking his body back and forth before replying, “No one.”
Annie opened the door and stepped into Abed’s bedroom, wearing her pyjamas. Her hair was staticky, and her face was devoid of make-up, with dark circles around her eyes so prominent that she looked like a panda. She frowned as she glanced around the room, glassy eyes bouncing from dirty glass to dirty glass before finally settling on Abed. “Is he here?” She asked. She was rubbing her arm and jiggling one of her legs, like a bomb on the verge of an explosion. Even Abed understood that the best thing to do in that situation was to play it dumb– he wasn’t a bomb defusal expert, after all.
“Who?”
“You know who.”
Raising his eyebrows and shaking his head, Abed answered, “No, I don’t.”
Evil-Abed stood up and approached Annie, bending down to her height and shoving his head in front of hers as if they’d be able to make eye contact. “I’m here,” he whispered. A tear trailed down his cheek, but it may have been a trick of the light. Abed forced himself to look up at the ceiling again, the gaping hole in his chest getting larger the more he acknowledged Evil-Abed’s existence.
“I was just talking to myself. Not a clone of me, just myself. I was reciting lines from Inspector Spacetime, if you really care.” Abed shoved his hands into his pockets to feign nonchalance, a trick he had learnt from Jeff. Annie continued to frown as she chewed the inside of her cheek, searching for someone she would never be able to see.
“I’m worried about you…”
After shifting his weight from one foot to the other and rubbing his hands together, Abed muttered, “Well, don’t be. I’m fine.”
Gulping, Annie stepped towards Abed. She lifted her arms like she was going in for a hug, but then she dropped them to her sides again. Her bottom lip wobbled and, when she next spoke, her voice cracked. “You’re not fine.”
It reminded Abed of the time he’d smashed one of his Troy and Abed in the Morning mugs. The pieces had gone everywhere, and he was finding shards in the most random places for days after. Despite trying to be careful, he’d cut the palm of his hand on the piece with his own face on and ended up needing stitches. He had begged and begged Troy not to take him to the hospital, but the moment he had admitted that the world had been spinning from the blood loss, Troy had forced him to go.
“Y-You’re not eating or drinking… You’re not watching TV or- or doing anything, Abed. All you do is sleep and stare into space.”
“I’m fine, Annie.”
“Friends don’t lie.”
Someone might as well have stabbed Abed right through the heart. He huffed and clenched his hands into fists, shaking his head so erratically that the world began to spin again. “If friends don’t lie, then why did Troy promise to never leave? Troy lied. Everyone lies,” Abed blurted out, making Annie’s face soften.
“He won’t be gone forever. He said he’d come back for you.”
“So did my mom.” It was a broken record, fragments of an unwanted memory that kept replaying in his head, but it was true. The world was full of people who lied and pretended to love, so, at the end of the day, Abed was better off alone. As Abed watched Annie’s eyes well up with tears, he bit down on his bottom lip. He wrapped his arms around himself, pinching his upper arms hard enough to leave bruises while keeping his face as straight as possible.
“Abed…”
“Leave me alone.”
“I’m not…” Annie rubbed her eyes with her fists. “I’m not leaving you. I care about you. I- I want to help.”
No one could help Abed. His parents couldn’t, his doctor couldn’t, and Annie most certainly couldn’t. His brain was a mess of wires that not even the biggest tech nerd in the world could understand. He was crazy. Crazy, crazy, crazy. The sooner people realised that, the sooner they’d give up on him. There was no point in trusting, in stimming, in watching TV to escape reality, because all of that was temporary relief; he always ended up back in the same empty place. Isolation was dark. It was scary. It was lonely. But it was the only place he knew: it was his home.
When Annie hunched over and sobbed, Abed gritted his teeth and turned to stare out the window. The longer he looked at her, the closer he got to his own breakdown. His legs were already jelly beneath him, and his heart was beating erratically, but he couldn’t risk being vulnerable. “Leave me alone,” he repeated.
“Abed, please.”
“Leave me alone.”
Annie sobbed again, wiping her nose with the back of her hand. She took one last glance at Abed before rushing down the hall. When she didn’t close the door behind her, Abed slammed it for her and leaned against it, breathing heavily as if he’d engaged in intense exercise.
“She cares about you,” Evil-Abed tried, but Abed ignored him in favour of slipping back into bed. His head hit the pillow, and he stared up at the top bunk, numbness encapsulating him once again.
His inability to cry was a red flag that he was getting bad again, but still, he found himself whispering, “You’re not crazy. You’re not crazy. You’re not crazy.” After he repeated the statement eleven times, he realised it made him sound kind of crazy.