The Friday morning in question came with a jolt.
The first thing he noticed was the sweat, his shirt was soaked through at the back, and his legs felt grimy, like the sweat had dried overnight. Then it was the breathing. It was strained and rapid and his chest hurt. God he was so tired.
Life was hard, he knew that but it was just everything. His waking hours were draining and awful and now sleep was just the same.
He hadn’t felt like himself in a long time. Whoever that was.
He took a few minutes to let tears slip across his cheeks, lying on his side facing the wall. He felt empty again.
Temples pulsing, he reached for the water on his bedside. Took one Xanax. One of the three he had been given for today. He slipped on black slacks, a white shirt and the school tie, red and yellow.
As he dressed he tried not to look at his own body. It filled him with a kind of revulsion now, mingling with a detached distant perspective.
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After breakfast, Artemis paced in the corridor. James would be in maths class. He stalled for ten minutes, before heading for the classroom.
Ms Kilbride stopped when she saw him, “Vectors OA and OB are equal-”
He made for his seat.
“Artemis, why are you late?”
“I just…” He trailed off.
She raised an eyebrow, “You just?”
“Sorry.” Was all he could say.
She raised an eyebrow, “Come back at the second half of lunch then. Clearly you and James see punctuality as merely optional.”
The lesson continued and Artemis drifted into his mind, not wanting to see Ms Kilbride’s judgement, nor James at all. It really would be easier if he was dead. Why did his chest hurt so bloody much.
The lesson was filled with silences and Ms Kilbride lecturing, it lulled him into a rhythm.
He skipped French. Walked off into the grounds, Ms Finch didn’t often hang out with the more influential teachers and didn’t gossip, so he figured it would be fine. The language department were pushovers.
Detention though, he knew full well that if he missed a detention after being late to one of her lessons, Ms Kilbride would talk to senior staff, and it would eventually reach his parents (or Butler).
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He met Jess and Kieran at the library, where they were standing near the door, coats on. He dumped his bag on the blue carpeted floor, “Hey.”
“Hi.” Kieran said.
“Hi.” Jess was shifting impatiently, “Food?”
Kieran nodded in agreement, “Food. I’m starving.”
Artemis snorted, sensing that the other two wouldn't do much talking until they’d eaten, “Food it is then.”
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Artemis and Jess stared at Kieran, a bit horrified.
“That’s not what I’m saying, you shouldn’t gaslight anyone over anything important, just choose stupid funny things.” Kieran snorted, “Like,this one time I tried to gaslight my dad into thinking that Benedict Cumberbatch was a dragon. It didn’t work but I might've convinced him I need psychological help.”
Jess covered her face, laughing, “Oh my god Kieran. You can’t gaslight people for fun.”
Kieran kept digging, “No, no, hear me out, It would be really funny if I went up to that dinner guy, gave him my plate and said, ‘I love you’. Then he’d go ‘what?’ and I’d go, ‘thank you’. It’d be hilarious.”
Artemis sighed, “You’re so embarrassing to be friends with sometimes.”
Kieran had a concerning gleam in his eye, “I’m going to do it.”
“No!” Jess and Artemis both said a second apart from each other.
“Do not do that.” Artemis hissed
“It’s creepy.” Jess added “And harassment of staff, who are, I will remind you, quite nice and badly paid.”
Kieran raised his hands in surrender, “Okay, okay, I won’t do it.” But he couldn’t keep a straight face, a smile creeping onto his faux earnest expression.
“Oh my god, you're going to do it.” Jess said without missing a beat.
Artemis shook his head, “Kieran no.”
Kieran had finished his food and stood up, “Okay, bye!”
The other two shot up and escorted Kieran out by his sleeves.
Kieran was sulking, “I wasn’t even going to do anything.”
Artemis shook his head, “We do not trust you.”
“We could see what you were thinking all over your face.” Jess said.
Kieran went from his sleeves being held with his friends to linking arms with them, much to their discomfort, “You’re both killjoys. I stand by it, it would have been hysterical.”
“You’re such a fuckhead Kieran.” Jess said, in a flat irony that the other two knew by now meant she was joking.
Artemis, cringed at both the words and the arms linked around his, “Can you mind your language in the halls, the headmistresses office is right there.”
“Chill out.” Kieran said, “No-one cares.”
Artemis groaned, “I hate you both.”
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He made his way back to the grounds at the beginning of lunch, Stopping at the maths building. It was eerily quiet. He arrived at the classroom, Ms Kilbride stacking papers.
“Ah, Artemis.” She handed him a practice paper, “Can I trust you to have a go at this till forty-five past? I have a maths clinic now in the sixth form.”
Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.
He nodded, “Yes.”
James arrived, an apologetic smile on his face, “Sorry, got held up talking to Mr McNair.”
Ms Kilbride raised an eyebrow, “I would hope that some of that guilt would translate into timeliness to lessons. But alas. James, if you weren’t so polite, I could almost be angry at you.” She handed him a paper, “You’ll both start this paper, you can go at one forty-five. I have a maths clinic, then lunch, so I won’t be back here till two-fifteen.”
James smiled, “Yes Miss.”
Ms Kilbride hurried out. The corridor had been empty. The whole building was empty, and James was here.
Artemis tensed; he had been running on autopilot till now. James dropped the papers on the desk, gaze roaming Artemis’s form. He moved forward and Artemis moved back between the desks, but his back hit the wall and James closed the distance, breath warm on Artemis’s cheek.
Eyes wide, Artemis’s voice trembled, “Stop.”
James rolled his eyes, “Christ, stop being so dramatic.”
He was frozen.
James was kissing him.
For a moment he was too shocked to do anything, then he broke away, “No, stop, you can’t-” he struggled against James, but he was too strong, he grabbed Artemis by the arms and slammed him down on the line of desks, holding his arms above his head.
Artemis froze. He watched it happen from somewhere distant. He shut down.
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He cleaned up in a bathroom. Robotically climbed the stairs. This was worse than normal when James had touched him before. So much worse.
His room was quiet. He lay on his side, staring at the wall.
At two-thirty he went to the nurse, said he was dizzy and lay in one of the beds. He couldn’t face the rest of the day.
Things had seemed brighter for a brief time but now he just wanted to be dead. Or more accurately, he was too tired to keep on going.
Because this would happen again and he wouldn’t be safe, and there was no point trying.
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Kieran was at his door again that evening, seemingly resolute not to leave him to wallow alone. Artemis was laying on his bed, “Come in.” He saw Kieran and just curled up on top of the covers.
Kieran smiled, “Hey.”
He mumbled, “Hey.”
“You alright?”
He tried to shrug. He wasn’t sure if Keiran saw it.
“Okay. One of those days?” Kieran sat by the end of his bed, “D’you want me to leave?”
Artemis didn’t. He didn’t want to feel so numb. “No.”
“Cool.” Kieran smiled and took his sketchbook out.
A few minutes passed. Kieran’s presence almost intensified the ache in his chest. He was lost, really lost. “I’ve been… I don’t know. I keep wanting to- I keep thinking that, if car hit me or…” The steady scratch of Kieran’s pencil stopped, “Well it would be easier. Kieran, I’m… I’m really scared. I don’t want to die. It’s getting worse.” He sat, glancing over at the other boy.
A flash of pain flickered over Kieran’s face, “Oh, Artemis.” Kieran pulled him in for a hug. He really was an affectionate person; it was the main way he communicated his feelings to others. Kieran went strangely mute when confronted with emotion. He’d said something about being… what was the term? Neuro-spicy.
After a solid minute, Kieran sat back, “What can I do?”
Artemis shook his head, “I don’t know.”
Kieran’s smile was as sad as it was comforting, “Okay.” A few moments passed when Kieran looked as though he was sorting through his thoughts, “Do you know what it is?”
He wrapped his arms around his middle, “Yes. I… yes.”
“Do you want to tell me?” Kieran said, measured and kind. It was clearly optional. That was nice, he supposed.
Artemis rubbed his arm, “I… do you remember the party? When I left you in the bathroom?”
“Yeah.” Kieran said, like he’d been expecting it.
Artemis cringed at the memory. How was he supposed to say it? He took a breath, “I was too drunk to move and this guy, he uh… started… well yeah.”
Kieran frowned, “Oh shit. Oh my god. Artemis. You- the day after you were- off.”
Artemis shrugged.
Kieran’s shock was fading, “You've just been dealing with this alone?”
“I’ve been… managing it.” Artemis said. He shifted guilty at the thought of Tom and the pills tucked away in the drawer of his nightstand.]
“Jesus, who-?”
“No.” He shook his head, as if trying to dislodge a sticky thought, “Can we- can we stop talking about this now? Please?”
Kieran leant back, and he blinked, “Yeah, sure. Of course.”
They talked for another ten minutes before he told Kieran he was tired. Kieran smiled and sai his goodbyes, but right before he was about to step out of the door, “Artemis, if you- if you want to talk or like- you need help, you can ask me, no stress.”
He frowned, then with a small upturn of his lips, “Thank you Kieran.”
Kieran stepped out, leaving the room quiet. Why had he wanted him to leave again?
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Artemis spent the rest of the night dissociated and withdrawn. He was more aware of his body than he ever had been. He lay in bed the night before Butler was due to pick him up.
He traced his fingers over the smooth wall. He felt like he was floating, the room was spinning, he felt sick. A tear slipped down his face and he frowned, was he sad? His body was separate from him for now, he’d have to feel it later but now he enjoyed the feel of spinning.
Maybe he wasn’t real, maybe this was a dream, the type that seemed to last a million years but was over after an hour. Maybe none of it was real, Kieran, James, Ms Kilbride, Jess, himself even. It was just a dream he’d wake up and forget.
He focused on the spinning, his stomach flipping and he fell into sleep.
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He woke slowly. Awareness came in painful waves. His chest hurt, and he curled into himself a week's worth of pain leaving him in sharp sobs. Ten minutes passed before the sobs petered out. He sat, tears drying on his face.
There was a sharp vertigo at how real he felt suddenly. The room was spinning and he didn’t like it anymore. He didn’t feel real sometimes and it was getting scary, he could do anything in that state. He was too unstable. He needed someone to catch him, he was falling, and nothing was solid.
It was quiet in his room. He really feels alone these days. He could be stuck like that for weeks, with no-one to pull him out, maybe longer, he could be lost.
He should tell someone, because he can’t do this. He can’t. Something in his chest squeezed.
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Saturday morning came and he was glad to meet Butler at the gates.
“Sir.” Butler greeted with a smile.
“Butler.” He said tiredly. Butler had asked how he was. Artemis couldn’t remember what he’d said.
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Butler wasn’t sure if it was his place to say what he was thinking. He wasn’t the boy’s father after all, but it wasn’t as if anyone else was carrying out that particular role with any competence or efficiency.
Forgodsake, it had been fourteen years and the man had barely become comfortable sharing the most basic feelings. Additionally, the senior Fowl didn’t know his son as a person and made no real effort to.
The man was more amicable to Artemis than he ever had during his son’s formative years. Hardly an achievement.
And amiability wasn’t really enough here, as Artemis’s mother so artfully demonstrated. She was often polite to her son but any real drive to parent her son had for the most part escaped her.
So yes, Butler felt a few things had been left unaddressed.
Artemis spoke less than he did a few months ago, even before his mental break. Withdrawing socially can be one of the first signs of depression.
He ate less, and Butler supposed he had lost weight. A definite warning sign for most mental illnesses.
He always seemed tired, doing the most he could to conserve energy rather than pursuing his own interests as he had as a young child. Fatigue. A symptom of most illnesses.
That was a problem in itself, Artemis had lost interest in almost everything. His projects had been left, forgotten and neglected for months. A definite primary effect of depression.
But things weren't supposed to be getting worse, Artemis had been treated at the clinic for months, he hadn’t had a single hallucination or delusion since he came back. Things were supposed to be getting better.
What else could he do?
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Foaly couldn’t possibly keep an eye on all the bugs and cameras he had hidden in his years, so that’s why he left a trainee AI in charge of the datastreams.
He fully expected the machine to learn how to be as short-sighted and self centred as the humans it watched in time.
And Foaly hadn’t thought much about it at all in the last few months until a flashing alert popped up on his screen.
ARTEMIS FOWL - PRIORITY LEVEL 2
He glanced at the screen and saw the readings there, an elevated amount of liso-dex-amphetamine in the blood, coupled with an elevated level of benzodiazepines and topped off with a consistently high blood alcohol content.
He tapped a few keys and pulled up the footage. The house was peaceful, and the mud boy was sitting in his room. Nothing to worry about. A quick sweep of the area showed no hostiles of site.
Artemis was growing into an adult mud-man and mud-men took these kinds of harmful substances for some reason. Humans apparently had an entire culture based around ‘shots’; gastly tasting concentrated alcohol solutions mud men would drink as fast as possible so as to keep the tase from lingering.
He had never quite expected Artemis to partake in such things but perhaps that was Foaly’s personal bias. The mud man was clever, almost like a centaur himself, perhaps Foaly was trying too hard to see him as one of the people. Perhaps he equated intelligence with his own species.
He went back to work.
But his mind wandered back for some unknown reason and he opened a tab on his computer.
‘Amphetamines’
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The weekend was leaving Artemis feeling stretched and fragile and he felt he was approaching crisis point. He knew but there wasn’t anything he could do anything about.
He wanted to call Keiran. Not fair. It was his weekend, he deserved a break.
He could call Jess. Not fair, he didn’t know her well enough, he didn’t check in with her enough. He could be better friends with her, he just wasn’t.
He wished he could talk to Holly. Not fair.
He was broken and he didn’t know how to fix it, upsetting people with it would achieve nothing.