He always saw himself as someone who could keep his shit together, someone who was resilient in the face of pretty much anything life could throw at him. He'd been betrayed by friends, he'd broken nose and bones, he'd been robbed a gunpoint, you name it. But he could not see this coming. He felt a seismic wave of sadness arise, higher and higher, and just could not see past it, no, he could feel it come down and overwhelm him. He was lost, and nothing else mattered any more. He was unmoored from his sense of reality, of rationality, and was focused on just one simple thing: the warm, wet, strangely comforting sensation on his cheeks, making its way up to his eyes. His voice was so different, he'd never heard it, it was as if someone else had come out of his soul to make those comforting sounds. He couldn't help but hug himself, and just let it work its way through him. It was catharsis.