//PAIN||so i run//Open

[CC is SO Sorry D:]

A person lay in the green forest, on top of a moss-covered stump. The dark shadows the trees made it difficult to see much, so the tall hunter crept slowly forward. As he drew nearer, he found that the person was a woman. She was slim, with slight curves and long brown hair pulled back. She was lying with her face towards the ground, and the hunter realized as he drew closer that her clothing was ripped. Ripped and bloody. In fact, she was covered with blood. Her hair was matted with the dried liquid. The hunter was trembling as he pulled on her shoulder, revealing the face of his mother...

Rhys awoke with a start, sweating through his sheets. He quickly kicked them off and stood up abruptly. His sleeping clothes were also damp, and Rhys swiftly stripped himself of them. He stood naked in his room, shivering. Goose bumps ran up and down his arms.

Rhys didn't usually think about his mother. It was the Reaping that brought it on. Every year when the reaping came around, Rhys thought of how the tributes were probably going to die. That led him back to his mother, who had died in a shooting accident eight years ago.

Eight years. Sometimes it only felt like only a couple of days. Other times, he felt like he hadn't seen his mother in centuries. Hadn't felt her loving touch. Hadn't heard her soothing words. Hadn't felt her eyes watching him. Hadn't had her near him.

Rhys dressed in running clothes as he reflected on his mother. Her hair and eye color, her scent, her gentleness. He needed to clear his mind. There was really only one way to do that, and that was by running. Like every time this year. His father understood. He missed her too. They both felt her absence keenly each day.

Rhys and his father were tough. They kept going, not allowing themselves to wallow in pain and grief. Life goes on. You can choose to wait for it to stop, or to make the most of it. Rhys had chosen the latter a long time ago. But he carried his mother with him wherever he went.

Whenever he won a race, he won it for her, and thought of her smiling at him, watching his victory. Whenever he brought down big game, he thought of how talented his mother was at finding and catching large beasts. Whenever he went into his father's room, he thought of how his mother had slept there, next to his father, when they were all together.

Rhys and his father weren't close anymore. Not as much as they used to be. They didn't do anything together. Rhys knew that he reminded his father of his mother. He knew he had her eyes, and the freckles that dusted the bridge of his nose were from his mother. Rhys knew his father saw this every time he looked at his son. It was too painful for him to be too near his son for too long.

But Lyscek Lanoa didn't know how much more difficult it was for his son. Every time Rhys looked in the mirror, he was reminded of his mother. He hated his father for not being able to see the pain he was in all the time. For not understanding. For becoming cold and distant.

But Rhys also loved his father. Because his father was the only one who could understand how much he missed her.

Because his father was the only one left.

Rhys had been running for a while now, without specific thought to where he was going. He found himself now to be on the outskirts of town, only a few houses scattered here and there. Rhys continued to run until he came to the edge of the forest.

He spent hours here each day. Hours stepping in his mother's footprints. Hours and days and years in the forest. And yet, he wasn't able to bring himself to step into it now. It was much too painful.

Too painful to think that maybe, if his mother hadn't died, she would've been with him right now, talking a late-night run. Perhaps he wouldn't have been on a run at all. He had come out because of the pain of remembering his mother. He needed to clear his head.

It hadn't worked. It never did. Rhys hadn't expected it to. But he couldn't sit around in his room. He couldn't do nothing. He couldn't sit and remember his mother like it was easy for him. It wasn't easy. It was hard. Even after all these years, he felt the pain she inflicted upon him. Pain she brought him because she had left him.

Rhys felt anger surge unexpectedly through him. He punched a tree, hard. How dare she? How could she do this to him? Abandon him? Leave him when he was so young? She died. She died and left him. It was her fault! f*ck her! f*ck her for leaving him! And taking part of him with her. He felt pain everyday because of her. It was her fault! Her fault he was out here in the middle of the night. Her fault that his father didn't love him anymore. Her fault he was alone.

Suddenly, Rhys broke down. Tears leaked down his face, and he collapsed where he was. It wasn't her fault. It was his fault that he couldn't get over it. Rhys knew he should've made peace with the fact that his mother was dead a long time ago. He just couldn't get over it, though, because it felt like betrayal.

It wasn't supposed to feel like betrayal, was it? Accepting that life happens? Death happens? It was supposed to be a part of life, right? But it wasn't. Not for Rhys. He couldn't accept it. Couldn't accept that his mother was gone. That she had been gone for eight years.

The anger came back, but this time it was aimed at himself. Why couldn't he get over her death? It wasn't her fault. She couldn't control fate. He was being a wimp. It was pathetic that he was out here. That he hated his father. That he felt so abandoned.

When the anger finally died, Rhys just felt empty. No feelings were left in him at all. He had exhausted himself beyond the point of feeling. There was nothing he could do. Nothing...except run.

So he did.

ooc: O.o This is really angsty. More than I expected. Not exactly normal for Rhys. This is actually quite strange for him. But I just went with it.

--Over a thousand words! Cheers!