Alvin hadn't slept.

How could he? Sloane was gone and it was all his fault. If he'd just said no like he'd intended; if he'd just given stricter boundaries; if, if, if.

None of it mattered. She would have gone without him, Alvin knew that much. Sloane had never been bothered with trivial expectations like a chaperon. Why would she? It wasn't as if he was the best one ever anyway. There had been the debacle a couple summers ago with the squid and the fucking cat. Once again, he hadn't been too far away and that time she had almost drowned, would have, if it wasn't for her friends. Was he so oblivious? Alvin had never thought himself to be too self-absorbed, but perhaps he had been. Too busy, or distracted, doing anything but what he should be doing, especially when it came to Sloane...

Fuck, the cat? Where had the cat gotten off to?

Alvin didn't have the wherewithal to even think beyond the four walls of his bedroom as he paced. His parents were down at the station, trying to figure out what would happen next. Surely some sort of search had to continue. She hadn't just disappeared. Her body had to be somewhere. She had to be somewhere. She just had to. Alvin couldn't imagine a situation in which they wouldn't find something. Anything. Zero was not an option.

Frustration and uselessness welled up inside him, warring with every other emotion a person could feel in a situation like this; guilt, grief, astonishment, disbelief, an unwillingness to accept what had happened, even though he had been right there. Had watched it happen. His shoes, his clothes, all still drying as he'd dove headlong into the swells to try and get a hand on her, anything. Alvin had been a strong simmer once, but with his useless hand, it was like being a seventy-five percent capacity, despite the muscle he hadn't lost. Someone had dragged him out as he'd started to go under too. Alvin had been too distraught to even acknowledge the savior, hadn't bothered to thank them or get their name. He was too wrapped up in the panic at the time to think clearly.

Anger rose up next, hot and bitter, biting at his insides like a wild, ravenous dog. He struck out at the picture frames on his dresser. The sound of the shattering glass echoed off the walls of his room and went right through him. Another as he lashed again and again at anything he could smash. His easel was the next victim, crumpling to the floor as the wood splintered under his fury. Tears had started to fall, but Alvin was too caught up in the destruction to notice. He cleared his small desk in one fell swoop, ink and papers scattering as a glass paperweight joined the shards and shreds of broken pictures on the floor.

This was worse than his accident. He'd only ruined his own life with that stupidity. He'd lived to see another day, despite the darkness that had crept over him last autumn. It breathed down his neck now too, eager and hungry, waiting in the shadows for enough of the doubt to creep in and overwhelm him. It was a good thing he didn't drink anymore. The slope was too slippery, too familiar, too easy, for him to allow and sort of shortcut down that path. Now he had to figure out way to survive this guilt; the looks on his mother's face day in and day out. She didn't blame him, of course she didn't, Fiona knew Sloane just as well as he did; obstinate and unyielding once she got an idea in her head. Alvin would never let himself live it down though. Rage at his own incompetency surged through him.

He hadn't even realized he'd been holding the splintered piece of his easel until he'd hurtled it across the room, shattering the looking small looking glass beside his wardrobe. Half of the shattered pieces scattered to the floor, the other half barely clinging to the frame. Alvin tightened his his good hand and slammed it into the remaining pieces until they all hit the floorboards, blood dripping from his fingers. His knuckles were raw, bruises blooming beneath the cuts. Never in his right might would he have jeopardized the only limb that allowed him to work, to find some sort of independence, but the frenzied, chaotic energy had barely dissipated.

His hand stung and Alvin sighed. Without flinching, he pulled a small shard from his finger, throwing it to the floor with the rest. The broken glass crunched beneath his shoes as he crossed the room once more and grabbed a clean handkerchief from the drawer. He looked at the destruction around him and felt no better. Nothing would ease this ache in his chest, but he was exhausted, all of his energy finally spent as he ransacked his own bedroom. Running his bad hand haphazardly over his face, Alvin sought his wand on his nightstand. It only took a few practiced spells to right the room, each piece of glass and fractured piece of wood back in place as if he'd never done it at all. The only evidence was the blood leeching through the handkerchief wrapped tightly around his hand.

If he cared enough, he would head down to the kitchen to have cook look at the damage to his knuckles, but Alvin, for all he needed that hand, needed the pain more, to keep him from feeling numb, from slipping into the dangerous nothingness that loomed over his shoulder. The sob that escaped as he realized he was still crying, vibrated off the silence around him. Exhausted and spent, Alvin collapsed into his bed, trying to muffle the gasps that wracked his body.

Later, he would do it all again. Trash his room, put it back to rights. And again the next time nobody was home. He'd have his hand looked at. He wouldn't make that mistake again, couldn't give his mother anything else to worry about. Physically he had to appear whole; even if he was nothing but an empty void inside.