Page 50 of Every Thought Taken

“Do you, Ander? Do you get it?”

The irritation in her tone isn’t for me specifically. She is just angry with the situation. Angry that her parents got reports back from her teachers and her grades had barely improved. Angry that they’re choosing to put her on lockdown until her grades get better.

I love Helena, but it isn’t fair for her to put her rage on my shoulders. I will gladly share the burden, help ease her through her pain, but I won’t be her punching bag. I’ve been in those shoes at home all my life. I cannot bear being that person with her too.

“Actually, yeah,” I say, harsher than intended. “It may not be my grades that my mom attacks me for, but I get it. I’ve had a target on my back all of my life. Nothing I do is good enough for anyone. So yeah, Helena, I completely understand.”

“Ander…” My name on her lips is an apology laced with pity, and I hate it.

“Maybe you have the right idea.”

A storm brews in my chest. Fury and hurt and heartache swirling in a vicious tornado beneath my sternum. All it does is fuel the bad, the dark, the wrong ideas. The pain is bitter on my tongue but familiar. Comfortable. An old friend.

“What are you talking about?”

“You’re busy. You need to focus.” I close my eyes and grind my molars. “So here’s me letting go. Here’s me relieving you of another burden. Here’s me setting you free… of me.”

“Ander, no.”

I ignore her protest. “It’s done.”I’m done.

She sniffles on the other end of the phone. “That’s not what I want.” Desperation laces her tone. “Please don’t do this, Ander. I love you.” The sentiment is a whispered plea on her tongue.

The backs of my eyes sting. “Love you, too.” I inhale a deep, shaky breath. “But I’d rather love you from afar than be your hurt.”

Pulling the phone away from my ear, she says something else I don’t hear before I end the call.

White hot pain sears my chest. I press the heel of my hand to my sternum, trying to stave off the hurt. All it does is burn hotter, intensify with each beat of my heart, grow exponentially bigger and spread like cancer throughout my body.

Jerking forward, I sit up, grab my phone, and launch it across the room with a thunderous scream. I curl my fingers into a fist, my nails digging deep into the flesh of my palms. The small cuts a reminder I still feelsomething. A reminder of the only feeling that never lets me down. Pain.

I open the drawer in my bedside table, fling notes and photos and false promises across the room, searching for an old friend buried deep in the back corner. I unearth the book, yank it out, and flip through the pages until I hit the one I’m searching for. Shoved in the middle of the book, the metal catches the light and glimmers with an all too familiar promise.

My lungs heave as I stare down at it. My heart hammers in my chest as I brush the worn pages. I take the blade in my fingers and study the sharp edge as memories of all the times I pressed the shiny metal to my skin flood in. The initial sting. The hiss from my lips as it split my skin and released all the hurt in the form of blood and tears.

I close my eyes, hands trembling as I swallow down the idea of adding new scars.

“No,” I whisper to no one as my eyes peel open. “No,” I rasp out with less confidence.

I set the blade back in the book, place the book in the drawer, and slam it shut.

This phase with Helena won’t last. She said hurtful things, I said hurtful things, but neither of us meant them. I am not the source of her pain, but I happened to be in her line of fire when she exploded. Lashing out is all it is from both of us.

This will pass. Things will get better.Wewill get better.

Wehaveto get better.

Knuckles rap on my door, but I don’t respond. The light squeak of the knob twisting echoes through the room as the door opens. I already know who walked in. The same person who’s been checking on me several times a day for weeks. The only person I can count on.

“Baby A, you awake?”

I don’t answer. Don’t move. Don’t acknowledge my sister’s presence in the room, like every other time.

This never stops her. If anything, my silence, my absence, my slow shutdown push her more. Forces her to seek me out and speak to me more often.

She worries. If I were her, I’d worry too.

Stepping around the bed, she sits next to where I’m curled loosely in the fetal position. She brings a hand to my face, brushes her fingers over my cheekbone, my temple, through my hair. I don’t meet her eyes. Don’t lean into her touch. Don’t blink.

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