I was running through the empty school hallways. Running away is more accurate. I couldn't take it anymore. I couldn't take the stares and the laughs and the dirty looks any longer. It hadn't been so bad at first. Just a few side way glances and a murmured rumor here and there. Other than that, people avoided me like the plague. I could have dealt with that easier than I could what happened next. I'll never forget that day for as long as I live. I was sitting at one of the tables at lunch (by myself as usual). I was desperately trying to disappear into the copy of A Clock Work Orange that I was reading. When I looked up, I was a little more than surprised to see two of the most popular girls slipping into the chairs across from mine. Not being used to having to talk to people, I sat there, silently waiting for them to speak.
"I know you." The blonde haired girl smirked. I should have had the common sense to walk away then. But like I said, I wasn't used to people talking to me.
"You do?" I asked, confused with the entire situation.
"Yeah." The brunette grinned, nodding her head. "Aren't you that girl that went to the nut house after you went crazy and tried to kill yourself?" Silence. That was the first thing that hit me...how quite it was. There were dozens of people laughing and smiling and carrying on around us, but in my head all I could hear was the ringing in my ears. And the blonde girl laughing like it was the funniest joke she had ever heard in her entire life. I couldn't think, I couldn't even breathe. It was like I was suffocating, I needed to get out before I drowned. I wanted to cry, I tried to cry, but all I ended up doing was grabbing my things and stumbling out of the cafeteria as fast as I could. It was true what the girl said. That was me, the crazy girl that lost it and tried her hand at suicide. Unfortunately, it didn't work out. So, while all the other kids my age were going on vacation and lounging their summer away, I was wasting away in the psychiatric ward of the local hospital. I laughed that week before school when my best friend told me she was nervous about going back to school.
"It won't be so bad, for you I mean." Erika had smiled, measuredly rubbing my scarred arms.
"Yeah." I mumbled, trying to think straight through my Lithium/Xanex cocktail.
"Besides, nobody will even know unless you tell them." She smiled. Well, I wasn't smiling. I was choking, running towards the nearest exit. Nobody would know ... unless I told them. And I had. I had told the one person I thought I could trust, the one person I had left. I had told Erika and she promised she wouldn't say anything. Promised. But they were just words.
"It's no big deal." She had sobbed when I confronted her. No big deal. She had told everyone. But it was no big deal. They had ostracized me, but it was no big deal. They had torn down what was left of my already fragile being and stomped on it, but it wasn't a big deal. It wasn't her problem, so it was no big deal. By now my eyes were blurred with the tears I didn't even know I had. Finally reaching the outside doors, I tumbled out of them and stumbled onto the ground. I didn't care who saw me anymore. I was tired of hiding from everyone's prying eyes. There I was in the middle of an open school sidewalk, curled up like a baby crying into my shaking hands. I didn't see anything. All I saw was my world crashing down before my eyes. I didn't even see the guy walk up to me until he was right in front of me. Who thought three simple words could change my life so much. I sure didn't, until he pulled my hands away from my eyes and asked softly:
"Are you all right?"