The Water That Never Warms

—and the silence that scares you more than the cold.

The water’s been running long enough to wonder if you’re paying to feel nothing.
Not nothing exactly.
Too much.
Not enough.
Grief dressed in static.

Forehead against the tile.
Cheap kind. Sweats even when you don’t.
A voice in the background: does it even matter?
Fuck. Maybe it doesn’t.

Did you already wash your hair?
You can’t remember.
So you do it again.
Just in case.

Pump. Lather. Rinse.
A marionette with the strings cut.
Moving on old instructions.
Your reflection in the faucet doesn’t blink.

This isn’t pain you talk about.
It wraps your ribs like a weighted blanket soaked in gasoline.
And every so often, a lyric cuts through the haze:
Who cares if one more light goes out?

You do.
God, you do.
But not out loud.
Not in a way anyone hears.
Not in a way that saves you.

Did you wash your body?
Your face?
Five minutes?
An hour?
Conversations replay.
Proof you were real today.
Proof someone felt you.

But you keep circling back:
If they say I should be gone…

You think about stepping out.
But the cold isn’t air.
It’s silence.
The moment the water stops.
The sound of nothing.

So you stay.
The music keeps playing.
You keep forgetting.
The hallway light flickers
like it knows something you don’t.

Maybe you didn’t wash your hair.
Maybe you didn’t need to.
You were never trying to get clean.

You just wanted to be seen
before you disappeared.

And then it hits you.
You are still here.
Dripping. Breathing.
Fucked-up heart still hammering at the cage.

The silence isn’t the end.
It’s the stage.
It’s waiting for you to break it.

So step out.
Skin raw. Eyes alive.
Because this isn’t just my story.
It’s yours.
And if you’re reading this,
don’t you dare let the water keep running.

// Scorpio Veil