Scene 13
Benjamin pushed the store door open.
The walk had given him something.
Not calm —that would’ve been too much to ask— but the illusion of control. A pause convincing enough to fool himself for a few minutes.
It didn’t last.
The interior swallowed him whole: overlapping voices, faceless footsteps, lives that didn’t belong to him.
The space was wide. He could see that. He knew it.
It still pressed in on his chest.
“Beautiful, my ass,” he muttered, flat.
He moved forward.
Slowly.
As if every step needed permission before it could exist.
His gaze fixed on the floor.
His fists buried deep in his pockets, tight enough to hurt.
He was afraid.
Not for himself.
For them.
Because he didn’t know when he would lose himself again.
Didn’t know when Andrew would come back.
Or how long he would stay when he did.
And the worst part wasn’t the possibility.
It was knowing it was happening more often.
He kept walking without thinking, held together by nothing but momentum, until the disconnect snapped all at once.
He stopped.
Looked around, like he’d just woken up somewhere he wasn’t supposed to be.
“…Shit.”
He hadn’t come for anything.
Nothing planned. Nothing decided.
Mayonnaise.
Bread.
Sandwiches.
That was enough.
It didn’t have to be more complicated than that.
He turned, stiff, and started walking again, clinging to a straight, invisible path, as if straying from it would be the first mistake of many.
Aisle after aisle.
Not looking at anyone.
Not letting anyone fully exist.
Until he found it.
The shelf.
The mayonnaise.
He lingered on a single jar, as if there were something in it he needed to understand before touching it.
He reached out.
Stopped.
A suspended instant —not doubt, but resistance.
Then he took it.
And in that same motion—
something took him.
An arm locked around his neck, clean, precise. No excess force. No hesitation.
Professional.
There was no time to turn.
No time to think.
Just the needle.
Cold.
Intimate.
Irreversible.
His body failed first.
His mind tried to follow… one second longer.
Long enough to understand.
Again.
The noise of the store cut out, like a switch had been flipped.
The lights smeared into nothing.
Shapes lost meaning.
And then—
nothing.
Benjamin fell.