They say rock bottom is solid, but this feels more like sinking in air, grasping for something—anything— that won’t disappear when he reaches for it. He used to be somebody, or at least someone who believed he could be. Now he flinches at mirrors like they’re loaded guns. It started small, a shortcut here, a comfort there— a drink for the ache, a lie for the rent, a silence when truth was too loud. He tells himself it was the trauma, that broken compass inside his chest, spinning at the scent of abandonment, ticking louder when touched. Grief is a…