It just hits him sometimes. He was fine one minute, and then all at once, his mind would begin rearranging itself, like jigsaw pieces forcefully fitting together to form a puzzle he was never able to make sense out of.

His thoughts were doses of potent psychedelics, and when he would share them with you, he would lure you in and meticulously detach you from reality.

His voice was monotone, but listening to him speak made you feel like you were floating. Every syllable, every word, lessened the earth’s gravitational pull, every sentence lifted you further off the ground.

Sometimes I would look into his eyes and see nothing but dread, and sometimes I wanted to reach into the depths of his being and drag his demons out, but they had already built a home inside of him.

When his tragedies would bleed through his body, he would collect the blood in jars and use the red to paint self-portraits, and when he would burst with anger, he would rattle the core of the earth, and everything around you trembled.

I tried to love the pain out of him, but to no avail, because it seemed like the pain had become him, and if I were to love the pain out of him, then I would love his soul away.