Piper

My body went rigid immediately.

Did he just say?

My eyes scanned his, hoping I had heard him wrong. The pain held there only confirmed my suspicions. I looked down to his wrist.

Leather bracelet. How did I not notice this before?

I yanked at it, tossing it to the floor and turning his wrist up. Those same scars from the picture were there staring up at me like little eyeballs.

I choked down some air, suddenly unable to breathe. I needed to get the hell out of here as fast as I could.

Why did I have to be naked?

"Piper say something." Ty said, his words strained and full of so so much pain.

"You lied!" I yelled. "You said your name was Jonathan!"

I scooped up my clothes, yanking them back on and shoving my bra into the pocket of my sweats. I grabbed my shoes and gave him one last look before walking out of the room.

"I didn't know. I thought it wouldn't matter. I didn't know it was you I swear." He pleaded, following me from his room into the main room.

"When did you know? When did you realize it was me?" I said, spinning around to face him. My fists were clenched at my sides, ready to punch the first thing I saw.

"Just now I swear."

"How? How did you figure it out? I made sure to keep every identifying thing about me out of it so this wouldn't happen."

Was he going to tell people about Jack now? Did I need to go home and pack and find another school?

"The scars. I studied that picture you sent for a solid hour, memorizing the patterns. When I looked down at them it jumped out at me." His eyes held so much pain I wanted to just forgive him and move on, but I couldn't. I couldn't just forgive this.

He knew more about me than I ever intended him to know and I didn't think I could stay here. I didn't like being so exposed.

"Why were you looking at my scars when your dick was in my mouth Ty? That's twisted." I wanted to scream all over again, to take out all my anger on him, but I couldn't seem to make my voice cooperate.

"It wasn't on purpose I swear. You were there on your knees and I wanted to see you so I looked down. Your hands were gripping into your thighs and I thought about how sexy that looked and they just jumped out at me. I swear Piper I'm not some twisted freak. They are part of you and I accept that. I don't actively seek them out when I look at you. When I look at you I just see you." He wrapped a hand around my wrist, hoping it would stop me from leaving him, but it wasn't going to. I was leaving.

This was all too much.

"I can't- I can't do this." I said, turning and running.

Déjà vu rushed over me. I had ran from him like this before. I had ran and it only ended in him carrying me back to his apartment where we had sex for the first time. For the only time.

He didn't chase me this time though. I wondered if that meant he had finally given up. The one time I wanted him to chase after me, to prove that it was me he wanted and all my baggage didn't matter, he didn't.

That spoke magnitudes. None of it had been real for him. I was just another lay.

I felt stupid. I felt stupid for ever thinking it could be something more. For ever wanting it to be more. It hurt like hell knowing it wasn't. It hurt deeper than losing Jack.

Maybe the doctor was right. I didn't truly love Jack. Maybe it had all been just about keeping the pain away. Maybe I was a monster. Maybe I was a sick twisted freak of a monster.

Why did it hurt so much losing what I thought I had with Ty? Was this love? Did love hurt this badly? I didn't want to hurt. Why would people even want to love if it hurt?

I didn't know. All I knew is I felt something very different with Ty than I had ever felt for Jack. The connection between us was stronger and more- I don't even know what it was more of, it was just more. And it had been there since the moment I stood there staring into his eyes on that mountain when he wouldn't take no for an answer to take me out.

I ran, all the way home, panting and crying as everything ran through my mind. This time running wouldn't take the thoughts away. This time running did nothing for me.

I burst through my door and Sophie jumped off the bed in alarm. I would have been scared too, seeing me like this. Especially after everything that had went down in the past few days.

"What happened?" She asked, noticing the tears running down my red face. "Are you okay? Is it me? I couldn't leave like this Piper, I just couldn't. I'm sorry. I'm sorry for all the terrible things I've ever said to you."

"It's not you." I said, falling into my bed and shoving my face into the pillow.

Into the pillow that smelled like him.

I cried even harder now, completely broken into a shell of a woman. That was all that was left of me. A hard broken shell.

"Talk to me Piper." She begged. "Please."

"I don't want to talk!" I screamed. "I'm done talking! I want to cut. I want to cut until there's nothing left of me."

Life was so much easier when I was the one in control. When I chose whether I lived or died. I had no control over anything right now and it felt like all I wanted was to just die.

If I wasn't here any more than Sophie wouldn't have to worry about me. She wouldn't be tied down to me. She could be out living her life going on adventures and not having a care in the world.

Sophie stood from the bed, going to my desk to dig through the drawers. She handed me a red sharpie.

"Don't cut, just write. Write it all out on your body. All the things you want to say. Just write. It will be therapeutic just like the cutting but it won't hurt you. I'll even help you. Come on, we can do it together."

I took the marker from her, yanking my sweats down and setting to work. I started with one simple word, Fuck.

Sophie was watching me as she wrote her own words into her own skin. I glanced over to her and saw worthless written there. Then I saw screw up. Angry. Bitter. Jealous. Scared.

When I finished my own body, I had both legs covered and one arm.

It truly was therapeutic. I felt a weight lifted off me and wondered if I could use this tactic from now on whenever I felt weak. It wasn't exactly the same as cutting, but it made me feel in control.

"Sophie you aren't worthless." I said, glancing back down at her words. "Angry and bitter sure, but you aren't worthless."

She laughed, throwing her head back and falling back on the bed.

"I feel worthless ninety percent of the time. Did it at least make you feel better?"

"Yes." I said, honestly.

It had made me feel better in a way. It didn't solve anything with Ty, but neither would cutting. I was so confused about everything that I didn't know what would solve it.

I had fallen for him knowing that it was the wrong thing to do. I knew that it would inevitably come to an end, I just wasn't ready for it to happen so soon.

I kept glancing to the door, expecting him to knock and tell me he fucked up and to just let him explain. I kept expecting a text message from him, but I got nothing.

The later it got, the more I realized that it was really over. He wasn't going to chase me now. He had gotten exactly what he wanted from me.

"Soph, I need to tell you something." I said, knowing that it needed to be out in the open before it destroyed what little trust I had left with her.

"You can tell me anything Piper, and I will try not to over react. I didn't realize what I had been doing to you until you spelled it out for me. I sat here waiting for you the whole time you were gone thinking back over everything and I realize I was a complete and total bitch. I was a terrible friend. I'm going to work on that." Sophie said.

"That guy I was texting, Jonathan, I just found out tonight he was really Ty."

"Holy fucking shit." Her eyes grew to the size of small saucers as she took in exactly what I said. "Loser guy?"

"He felt the bandages on me one night. We were studying and he went in for a kiss and then the next thing I knew I was pants-less on the bed and he was kissing my scars. He said all the right things, he made me feel beautiful. He made me forget all the hurt I was feeling. I was ready to move on and be with him. I was ready to just let the past go. I fell for him Soph. I fell hard." I took a deep breath, willing the tears not to fall but failing.

"Shit Piper you really love him don't you? I thought he was just some loser you were latching on to as a rebound." Of course Sophie would still be blunt as ever. I couldn't hold it against her, she was trying.

"I think I love him more than I ever loved Jack. I didn't even feel this broken after Jack died. I'm starting to think maybe I didn't love Jack at all. That maybe the doctor was right and he was my safety net. All I can ever remember feeling about him is not wanting to let him go. I didn't lose my breath when I was around him. I didn't find myself speechless. My knees didn't go weak when he was looking into my eyes. Ty, he does things to me, things I don't understand. It's frustrating but at the same time it's magnificent." I smiled, thinking about the way it had felt when we were together, the way we just fit to one another like puzzle pieces.

"I know Piper. Jack knew it too. But it didn't matter to him, because he loved you enough for both of you. He just wanted to save you. I didn't stop him because it was helping. You stopped cutting and you started smiling more, you looked happy so I left it alone and I made him promise to never ever bring it up to you."

All along Sophie knew things I didn't even know about myself. And all along Jack knew too. It hurt, knowing that he knew I was using him when I didn't even realize it myself. But what hurt the most was he allowed me to do it.

He loved you enough for both of you.

Why would he do that? I wasn't worth it. I'd never been worth it.

"I'm sorry I never told you. I just didn't want to see you fall again." She whispered, reaching out for me. "Maybe that's why I was so harsh on you about moving on."

"No it's okay." I said through tears. "I wouldn't have believed you anyways."

"Why aren't you with Ty right now Piper? It sounds like that's where you really want to be."

"I was with him. I was naked in his bed getting ready to sleep with him again and he called me sad lonely girl and I lost it. It was overwhelming knowing that he knew things about me that I wasn't ready to share. I yelled at him and ran out. I wanted him to chase after me, to try to explain why he lied about his name. But he didn't. I think that's what hurts the most. I think I was just another lay. I didn't mean anything to him Sophie. Why? Why don't I mean anything to him?" The tears fell all over again, the weight of it all crushing me and pulling me deeper into my ocean of despair.

"Did he say that? Did he say you meant nothing? Because the way he looked at you said otherwise."

He hadn't said that. He had said the opposite, but why didn't he run after me? Why didn't he try to stop me like he did the first time I ran away?

"No. He said I was special."

She took me in her arms, holding me against her while she combed her fingers through my hair. It was comforting and soothing.

"You think maybe you over reacted a bit about the name? Maybe he had a reason to lie about his name. Maybe he was scared. I mean shit Piper, look at what the guy has gone through. Those were fucking welts on his back. Welts where he had been maliciously beaten. You and I both know what that is like. Maybe that's why I was so quick to judge him when I met him. Because self-consciously I knew he was like us. We went through so much at that house Piper. So much fucked up shit. I thought it was just foster homes that those things happened, but his own father did that to him. And the burns, he has to look at those everyday and relive that. At least most of our scars are inside. We can hide them away. He can't even do that."

Maybe I had over reacted. Maybe I hadn't given him a chance. I was so caught up in the fact he lied about his name. So caught up in the fact he knew everything about me and yet I only knew a fraction of what he lived with everyday. I felt exposed and completely naked in an emotional way and it scared me, so I ran. Just like I always do.

"I have scars that I look at every day." I said, refusing to acknowledge that I had fucked up.

"Those are different Piper. You made those scars on purpose. His scars weren't willingly made. Can you imagine what runs through his head every time he looks at them? Well I guess you can. When you look at the scar on your chest, what does it do to you? Now imagine that but worse. You have one scar, one dreadful memory that stays with you, he has a bunch of them. That can't be easy for him."

As always, Sophie was right. He had already admitted that he had nightmares about it. At least I didn't have to live with nightmares. Maybe Ty was waiting for me to come running after him this time. He had ran after me so many times and I had done nothing but reject him. Maybe he had given up because he thought that's what I wanted.

"I've gotta go Sophie. I've gotta go make this right."