*Please note that all stories remain anonymous, names and dates may be changed*

This is the story of the author

It is not to be read by those who know me outside the Webverse. Please discontinue if you know me so.

Mild Course language

There isn't much to my story really, I grew up in a relatively financially stable household. Two traditionally married parents and the eldest of two younger sisters. Like any other household they had their ups and downs.

However, some things were different; firstly, my mother was the controlling one in the household. A primary school teacher, works all day with screaming children, comes home and has to deal with it for another few hours without getting paid.

Yeah she didn't like that.

So we had to tip-toe around the household after school which is the exact opposite of what any normal primary schooled kid wants to do. We had to be quiet, do our homework silently and quickly. Otherwise the fuse of the bomb would be out and everything would explode in a bright flash of colours... And pain.

Compared to some of the reports I've heard, my mother wasn't exactly kill me now abusive, but it was certainly close to it. It was hard enough that it would leave marks and bruises to display the next day, causing me to come up with a string of lies to cover it up. I became very good at lying, this often would spill over into other places that it shouldn't, especially at home.

"Have you done your homework?"
"Yes."

It was easy to lie, to let the false string of words pour out of my mouth, unaware of where it was taking me. Of course, my mother would find out, toss me around the house a couple of times for discipline and so would the cycle repeat once again.

Unfortunately, one of my earliest fears actually was being underneath my bedsheets. As odd as it was, I wasn't scared of the monster under my bed because I knew there was something scarier to fear. But anyhow, underneath my quilt was my fear and I never really understood why until years later.

Truth was, one of my earliest memories, birthed from my fear, was after a particularly painful night. I'd crawled into bed, whimpering my sorrows to myself. And I had wondered what would happen if I'd just... Y'know, shuffled under my donna, and just laid there until all the air ran out. Until I existed no more. I was barely no older than five or six and I had contemplated suicide.

Granted, I wasn't aware of the effects of taking my life at such a young age, death, even though I somewhat understood such a concept at such a young age, was something that wouldn't happen to me, couldn't happen to me. I wasn't old or dying, and I didn't drive crazy on the roads like my mother does when she's angry at us. It just didn't happen.

I was about seven when I first began dreaming about running away. The freedom in which would come with being on my own, weaving beds out of leaves and vines, eating different types of plants and grasses. But I was a coward, I feared the unknown more than I did with what I did know... So I stayed.

When I was twelve years old, I was given an iPad. A nice present, something to use for school and so forth. But it had a dire consequence. I easily became addicted, it provided a distraction to the harsh reality that I lived in. I didn't have to sit on my bed for hour on end, contemplating the reason why I continued to struggle on in this stupid world.

A year later, my addiction became strong, for an entire year, my iPad was not confiscated nor taken off me, I played well with others to keep what I wanted. I never let go of it, it was always barely an arm stretch from where I was. Nights turned into mornings in what felt like a minute and I still didn't realise what was happening.

A year later I went on a ten-day mission trip in a very dangerous developed country. I was not, under any circumstances allowed to bring my iPad. I could do this. I told myself. Ten days, that's nothing.

Simply arriving in the country was awkward, it'd been a ten hour plane flight and the climate change was unbelievable. The new air was stifling and it clogged my thoughts. I already had a tense relationship with some of the group leaders as I was suspended for half a day for stealing their chocolates and lying about it (lying was easy). I had very few I could count as somewhat friends. Before even arriving I was isolated, and this time without the distraction of technology.

It was day four of ten when I attempted my first suicide attempt. I'd been isolated in a room, alone while all my friends were in pairs or trios. I'd snuck out to buy some food from the Cornerstore and had been caught on the way back. I lied for the first story that had come to my mind, but for the first time in a long time, it didn't work. I was dragged back to my dorm in shame and throughout the next day, forced to spend being humiliated and threatened by those in charge.

I didn't mention that the group members were teachers from my school and that the main leader was our principle. In the mess hall, I was dragged up in front of the catering benches and in a loud and clear voice. (In front of ambassadors from different countries) He stated my possible punishment, I could be sent home early, a public disgrace and embarrassment to me and my family (as they were heavily involved in the workings of the school) or I sit out many of the activities in embarrassment. His face leaned forward in such a way that I could draw back my hand and slap him hard across the face. Then run. Re-living my childhood dream in a much more dangerous and wild place.

Instead I ran back to my dorm, locked the door and began to cry. I was always a bit of a crybaby and I hated myself for it. I'd cry from the first few words that came shouting out of my mother's mouth. I cry when my sister was being thrown again a wall and I was locked in my room, unable to do something about it. But this time I didn't just cry, I found something sharp.

Now let me tell you. In a foreign country where you have to pass through security checks to travel across countries, it's easier to not have sharp items on your person. But luckily I did have a whale necklace, carved out of some form of Ivory. It wasn't sharp. In fact, it was very blunt. I tried that on my wrists, I heard that's where the stereotype came from (plus we had also watched this bullying video in class, the protagonist had cut in it). It was too blunt to do anything but irritate my skin.

So jump. I thought to myself. Your life at home sucks anyway, why not here? Where you can't face the scrutiny of your parents so easily?

The window was quite small, perhaps half a metre in width and no more than a metre in height. The window frame was split into two sections and I managed to slide my body through the one without mesh. I was about fifteen floors up. Suicide was easy, just a simple push, such a permanent fix to a temporary problem. I was mentally saying my goodbyes, when there was a knock on my door.

It was literally a split second that had saved my life. Instantly, I slid back inside and answered the door. Standing behind it was actually my secret idol for the trip, she told me that she knew what I was going through, that it was going to be okay and that I could come to her with anything. She hadn't seen me fifteen stories high, but she could tell. And that kept me going.

...

I returned home, relieved to return to my addiction but thoroughly aware of its dangers now. I tried to allocate a time to tell my mother about the whole sneaking-out-and-lying-convenience-store-thing. But I pushed it to the back of my mind. Been there don't that, she was in a good mood.

Exactly a week later, she found out, by the principle in fact (I was really starting to hate him), he told her a wound up story of how I'd disobeyed his direct orders, slunk down the fire escape like some kind of Mission Impossible bull and snuck down to the cornerstore to meet with some of the 'rougher kids'. Frankly, mum believed him. She was used to my lies, every word I spoke was a lie, it'd become a reflex of survival.

She confiscated my iPad for a week, it sounds dramatic, but it tore me apart, I didn't tell her about the attempted suicide or my try at cutting. She just shoved me into my room at four thirty in the day, dressed in my school clothes with dinner and left me there.

Well that time I found something better than an ivory whale necklace, I found scissors. They were blunt also, but they were the sharpest things I could find. It took a few tries to my right arm, but eventually, I got it. It bled, not a lot, but the pain made me realise that this was real and not some extremely lucid nightmare I was having.

I cried a lot that night.

But scars heal.

Memories fade.

Pain fades.

For me, especially fast.

I was in a car accident one time, a drunk driver nearly slammed into our carpool at nine o'clock at night. We missed it, thankfully, and went sliding into a ditch. No one was hurt, nothing in our car was broken, me, three other girls and the driver (one of the fathers) were all fine. The driver got out to go check on the other car whose flipped and crashed into a tree.

Coincidentally, there was a house party a block or two down where everyone was getting pissed drunk. Alerted by the tyre screeching and female screaming, a guy ran over to check on us.

"Are you guys alright?" He asked. We have breathless yeses. "Are you sure?" Yes. "Okay, okay,"

He stood there for a few seconds. Then was joined by another guy.

"Oi mate what are you doing?" The new guy said.

"Looking after these girls," The first one said, "they've been in a car crash,"

"You know what? I'll f*ck your mum."

"You wanna f*ck my mum?"

"Mate, are you drunk?"

"Yeah, I'm f*cking pissed," they both laughed raucously.

"Oh my god," one of the girls whimpered and began to cry.

"Knife, knife, knife," I whispered, beginning to cry, "does anyone have a knife?"

"Oi, shut up you little c*** or I'm going to r*** your ass in that bush over there," The guy pointed to one of the girls and the crying rose in a crescendo.

The guys opened the side door I was on and pulled me out he dragged me, over to that road and in the direction of the bush he was talking about. I sucked in a breath to scream. Luckily one of the other cars from our group almost ran us over, giving me enough time to escape.

Weird thing was, anything could've happened that night. Absolutely anything. But I was over it in barely half an hour, I was back to laughing and chatting away with my friends. Sure, that night I had a montage of shots of round corners and crashing into drunk divers and lights blinding me and dark bushes in my dreams, but after that, I healed and I healed fast.

...

Two years after my first cut, I never expect to be piercing my skin again. We had moved houses, jobs, schools, essentially, a new start. But the parents were still fighting. My sisters were still crying and the only person I could confide in that knew my exact situations, experienced it firsthand and witnessed to my own was my auntie who was always unavailable.

Words began to get to me again and in a sudden draught of depression, out of nowhere, I unscrewed a sharpener blade from a sharpener with the same scissors that I used to cut myself two years earlier and made quick slices; six of them, on my right forearm (left was my dominant hand). It was peaceful, seeing the blood trickle and the pain course through my system.

Then a week or two later, after I slapped my mother in a fight, got a cut on my face from dad's wedding ring getting me, ditched about twenty kilometres from the home and kicked out of the house for the night with my iPad confiscated. I did it again, seven cuts in the left arm this time, sure, not as deep, but still the same.

That was two weeks ago, to be honest, the scars on my arms are almost invisible now, and yet no one has noticed. Maybe they purposely do that. Perhaps I'm not supposed to heal. But I know I need to keep going.

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