January 16th, 2009

I didn’t know, I didn’t even bother to think that, that one rumor would turn into a complete s*** storm. Everywhere I would go people were pointing and muttering to their friends. This all was just adding more fuel to the fire that powered my hatred for life. I even had school counselors approaching me. Every time they did, I just gave them an empty stare and walked away. They never tried to stop me, Proof that they don’t care. They were just doing their job.
Today in the hallway, a boy and a girl stood at their locker, and as I passed by I heard the boy say,
“Lauren told me that she watched her dad kill himself.”
The girl said, “Oh my god! How did he do it?”
As if she even really cared.
“Pistol, in the mouth”
I closed my eyes as I remembered…
“I can’t do this to you, Lucy. I can’t be so scared to hurt you all the time. Now go to your room and close the door behind you.” He put his hand on my shoulder and pushed me towards the door.
“Daddy, no, I don’t want to go to my room.”
“I’m so sorry Luce, I love you” He kissed me on the head, I heard him whimper, and sniffle. He closed the door. I noticed that I had left my teddy bear on the coffee table. I opened the door.
“Daddy?”
He was sitting on the floor.
“Daddy?” I say again, but he doesn’t hear me.
He holds the gun, he pulls the trigger. I scream,
“Daddy!” One last time, but it is muffled by a BANG.
He goes limp, rolling onto his side, his face hits the floor. Revealing my teddy bear, still on the table where I had left it, splattered with my father’s blood.

I realized that I was stopped in the middle of the hallway, the boy and girl still there, staring at me. I felt wet on my face and noticed that I was crying. Out of the corner of my eye I see Jacey staring at me, with that same emptiness that I saw before. Just as I began to run for the stairwell, I see her face flinch with pain, with sympathy for me.

The bathroom door closed behind me, and the only thing to stop me from screaming is the knife I held in my hand. I walked to one of the sinks, and looked in the mirror. I grabbed and pulled at my dark brown hair, breathing heavy; I pulled up my right sleeve. Scars covered my forearm, from my palm to the crease of my elbow. Some silver with age, most were red and scabbed, every single one screaming a reason for existing. I gripped the knife with my left hand, and dragged it down my arm. It left a deep cut, 4 inches long. I did another, shorter this time. I turned on the faucet until the water ran ice cold. I heard the bell ring, but I didn’t leave. Warm blood dripped down my arm onto the floor. I put my arm underneath the cold water. The blood flowing fast down the drain, mixed with the water to create an ugly shade of rust. I grabbed a paper towel or two out of the dispenser and slide down the wall between the sinks. I cried as I held the paper towel to my arm. The late bell rang, and I still didn’t move. I cried for all the same reasons, mostly for myself. Maybe if I cried enough I would forget what happened 10 years ago. I would forget watching my father take his life; forget the feeling of his warm blood splattered on my face. In that moment I forgot, feeling floated away with the memories. Just for that moment, I felt alive.









January 19th, 2009

Only 2 days had passed, but the memories sunk back into my mind. It all just feels like yesterday again. Last night, my mom’s boyfriend, Marcel, came over; he ate dinner with us, and asked us about our days. I just shrugged and said it was fine, because I knew he didn’t really care, he wouldn’t be nice much longer. Once he finished his plate he stood, and said to my mother,
“Eve, Come on.”
It was strange to hear someone call her by first name, especially Marcel. She stood, both of them leaving their plates behind, but my mother taking her cup of alcohol with her. Once I heard her bedroom door click shut, I hurriedly grabbed all of the plates and threw them in the sink to wash later. I then grabbed my coat and quickly ran outside, before I would have to hear the sound of him hitting her.
After first period I ran to the 3rd floor, but as soon as I opened the door to the bathroom I could sense that something was different. I suddenly was overcome by that unexplainable feeling of another’s presence. There was someone else there. Anger flushed over me. That was my bathroom; no one had dared to set foot here for the past 3 years of my being at that damn school. Whoever was there was probably there to play some trick on me, or to see why I was there all the time. I walked and stood in front of the sinks, facing the stalls, so that they were all visible. They all appeared to be empty. But there had to be someone in one of them. There had to be someone here. All was silent for a few seconds, and then I heard the tink-tink sound of something hitting the stone floor. I located the stall it had came from, it was 3 away from the windows. I could see a small, shiny metal object lying on the ground inside the stall, but I couldn’t quite make out what it was. I moved closer, and saw that it was a razor blade. I felt my face grow hot. Who was this? Were they trying to play some sick joke, and I walked in on it? I still stared at the blade sitting on the floor, and something red dropped next to it. I realized it was blood. I fell back a step. The person inside the stall whimpered.
“Hello?” I wasn’t sure what I was feeling. If this was not a joke, this was someone I could relate to. Did I feel bad? Was I still angry?
“Look… ugh... You can open the door.” What else could I say?
There was still just silence.
“Okay, I will turn around. I won’t look. Then you can leave.” I did as I had said I would, to my surprise.
“I’m not looking now.” Why was I showing mercy to this person? I’m sure they didn’t care about me.
The lock in the door clicked, and I head it creak open. There was a crack! As the person jumped of the toilet they had been standing on. They were clearly wearing a pair of heels, and so I assumed it was a girl. The heels click clacked across the bathroom quickly. But, they stopped just before the door, and then I heard the door open, and close. Slowly, I turned, and peered around the empty room, then to the stall. The spot of blood still on the floor, but the razor blade was gone. On the walls of the stall were smears of blood, from where the girl had been bracing herself.
Whoever that was, was gone. She was alone, and looking for an escape. Just like me.


At the end of the day, the bell had rung and most of the people had already left the building and were waiting for their buses to arrive. I was on my way out when I noticed I had left one of my text books in my last period class. When I was making my way to the room, which was at the end of the 2nd floor hallway, I heard a familiar sound. The click-clacking of the heels from the bathroom, and there was no doubt in my mind that it was the same pair, on the same feet, the same person. I slowly turned around, to see Jacey Burnet walking at the other end of the hallway, with her nose in a book. I gasped. Jacey, The oh-so perfect, Jacey? That had to be a joke.
Something loudly smacked onto the floor startling the both of us. A book had slipped out of my arms and crashed onto the floor. She kept her thumb in her book, as not to lose her page, and lowered it to her side. Her eyes were so wide looking at me, as if she was just caught at a crime scene with a bloody knife in her hand. I wondered if she knew that I had just discovered that she was the one in the bathroom.
“Jacey…” I took a step forward, with questions in my tone. But she didn’t say anything in reply. Her mouth just hung open slightly, and then she darted for the stairs. She knew.

The sound of her high heels echoing in the corridor, and the sight of her blood in the bathroom stall would not disappear from my mind. Nothing could stop my thoughts from racing. For the rest of the day, all I could think was, Jacey Burnet. Jacey Burnet? Jacey Burnet.




January 20th, 2009

Jacey didn’t come to school today.



January 21st, 2009

She didn’t come today either, Should I be worried? Maybe she is sick? Or maybe she did come and she was just avoiding me. I didn’t understand why I cared about her all of a sudden. But it was as if I were walking down a dirt country road, in the dead of night. No lights, except one small orb of hope, glowing. Its name was Jacey. Jacey was the light in the pitch black dark of life, a light that told me I was not alone. But, what would I do when she did come to school? Did I even have the nerve to approach her?



January 22nd, 2009

Jacey came to school today, but I didn’t have the courage to approach her. What would I say anyways? She didn’t even look at me when I passed her in the hallway. It was as if nothing had changed, or even as if nothing happened. If I went to the bathroom would her blood be there still? That light in the darkness that was Jacey was fading. I decided to skip 3rd period and go to my bathroom, so when the bell rang and released me from 2nd period, I headed straight for the third floor. The stair well was over crowded as usual, so I didn’t notice when Jacey said goodbye to her friends and began to follow me.

Her blood was still in the stall, I knew it would be. Didn’t I? I climbed into the window sill and hugged my knees to my chest, as if that would help me collect my thoughts. I could feel cold air radiating off of the old panes of glass. With my back to the wall of the sill, I rested my head against the glass. The school yard was deserted of any living creature except for a squirrel that my eyes followed. It darted around, then stopped, darted, stopped, then zig-zagged its way to a tree with all of its leaves missing. But in the tallest branches of the tree was a heap of twigs and dark brown leaves, which I assumed was its nest.

Just when I thought my mind was about to settle down, someone opened the door to the bathroom. They slid in quickly, and kept their back to the wall. Jacey slowly slid down the wall until her butt hit the floor. She looked at me, her eyes pleading, and then buried her head in her hands. I turned so my legs were dangling off of the ledge, and we sat there facing each other, not making eye contact, not needing to. Two girls, on opposite ends of the world, both so alone, yet crashing down together in the silence of their tears.