Neveah Jones. She was a pretty girl, with long, honey colored curls, caramel skin, and deep sea green eyes. She was rarely without a smile, and her peeling laugh sent a wave of warmth through your body, straight to your heart. It seemed as if Neveah had everything: the beauty, the brains, the angel personality, the picture perfect family. She was held on the highest pedestal available; that was until the night she killed herself.
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It started off as a normal day. She laughed and smiled along with all of her friends. At one point, she became too careless and the long sleeves of Neveah’s white shirt rode up. She quickly yanked them down, praying no one saw the blood-red cries for help etched fiercely on her wrists. She pretended like nothing happened, and went on with the rest of her day.


When the bus pulled up to her house, -bid her friends goodbye, and started the short trek to her front door. Once she unlocked the door and stepped into her dark, empty house, the façade was dropped. Her smile that she wore all day was replaced with a frown. She had nothing to smile about here; there was no happiness in this bleak stone structure she was forced to call home.


Dropping her backpack by the front closet, she slipped out of her shoes and trudged upstairs to her room. There she would stay all night, just like she did every night. But tonight was different; tonight was the night she was going to do it. She would finally do what she should have done months ago. She changed into something comfortable and fixed her make up. She dismissed the tiny urge to get the razor blades and continued to get ready.
As she gazed into the mirror, she became disgusted with what she saw, with who she was. The disgust with herself fueled the tiny urge she had dismissed earlier, into a blazing fire that took over all her senses. She ripped open her desk drawer and shuffled junk around until she found what she was looking for. She gripped the metal razor blade in her right hand, then continued what she had started earlier. As the blood streamed from the gashes she carved into her delicate skin, she gasped as the pain soon filled every fiber in her body.
When she felt that she had enough, Neveah threw out the dirtied razor blade and cleaned up the remaining mess. She sat in her desk chair for a few minutes, before deciding it was time. As she pulled out all she needed, she started to get a little nervous, second-guessing if this was right. Shaking her head, she tied the thick rope around a wooden beam exposed from her open ceiling just high enough from the floor. She then stepped on her desk chair and looped the noose around her thin neck. Taking a deep breath- her last breath- she kicked the chair away and jerked around as the life she despised greatly was slowly taken away from her.
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Mrs. Jones pulled her car inside her garage and went into her house. She froze, and listened for any sign of Mr. Jones. When she realized he wasn’t there, she slowly walked to the kitchen where she threw her keys on the counter.
It had been a long day; she had to come up with an excuse when her coworkers questioned the deep bruises covering her arms and neck. She couldn’t bear to tell them the truth. How he beat her, right in front of Neveah. How he turned on her 15 year old daughter once he was done with her. How she sat broken and defeated on the floor as her daughter cried out for her help. She couldn’t move; the fear of him turning on her again weighed her down, forcing her to listen to the agonizing screams of her child that would surely haunt her forever.
Forcing the chilling memories from her mind, Mrs. Jones made herself a sandwich and sat at the table alone. She decided when she finished, she would go check on Neveah. That’s when she would give her the delightful news; they were leaving Mr. Jones. They were going to move in with her mother, where they could live a happier life. This uplifting thought made her finish her dinner quickly and she rushed upstairs to her daughter’s closed door. Knocking softly, she called out to Neveah. No answer. Knocking again, and still receiving no answer, Mrs. Jones became suspicious. She slowly turned the cold, brass handle.
Opening the door, she peered in, and froze at the sight before her. It took a moment to realize that it was in fact her daughter hanging lifelessly from a thick rope tied to a beam from the ceiling. She collapsed to the floor, a strangled scream escaping her pale pink lips. Her eyes were glued to her daughter’s limp body as it swung gently from side to side.

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It was after the cops were called and her daughter’s body was removed from the room that Mrs. Jones found the letter. It was pushed up against the wall by Neveah’s dresser, as if it was kicked to the side during the chaos that took place earlier. Bending over, she picked up the letter. She stared at it, before finally taking a deep breath and unfolding the cold pieces of paper. As she read her daughter’s neat cursive, tears started to stream rapidly from her dark grey eyes.

This is for all of you who think you know me.
Neveah Jones. Tell me, what do you think when you hear that name? I know what you think. You think of a perfect girl with a perfect life and perfect future. Lies. All lies. You don’t know me.
You don’t know what it feels like to look in the mirror every day and be absolutely disgusted with what you see. To want to dig your nails into everything you are, and tear it all away in hopes of finding something better. And even when you rip off all that was you, there is nothing but emptiness and despair waiting for you.
You don’t know what it feels like to have no one care. To be surrounded by supposed “loved ones” and realizing you aren’t important to them, to anyone for that matter. That no matter what, you are never going to be the first choice; always last. To look into the faces who are supposed to love you, and coming to the realization that if you were to disappear forever, they wouldn’t even shed a tear. To look into their eyes, hoping, but realizing no matter how hard you try, they will never bother to look deeper and hear your cries for help.
You don’t know what it’s like to have to put on a show every day so no one will question what truly goes on in your life. To have to pretend like you are perfectly fine, when really you are dying inside. Dying to let it all out, because you are sick of keeping it to yourself. But you can’t, because you are scared to death of what will happen. Scared that people will judge you, or worse; take all that you have given them in your brief moment of weakness, and use it against you, hurting you even more.
You don’t know what it feels like to pray that in all the darkness pressing in on you, there will be a flicker of light to let you know everything will be okay. But no matter how hard you pray, you know that light will never come. That nothing will ever be okay.
You don’t know what it’s like to feel so lost, hurt, useless, and unwanted that you can’t take it anymore. To be pushed so over the edge that you can’t even go on with life. To truly believe that you’re better off dead.
You don’t know what it’s like. But, you see, I do. Every day. These are the struggles I face. Every. Day. I know what it feels like to feel so hopeless that in your eyes, there is nothing better than death.
You were convinced I had the perfect life.
You don’t know what life was truly like for me.
You don’t know what it feels like to be so overwhelmed with pain that you’ll do anything to escape.
You don’t know what it was like to be me.
Now you know.