Those broken girls they band together. They see the cracks on each other and become so close that an ampersand connects them and will until the end of time because those broken girls understand that cracks don’t always heal, and they are so unwilling to add anymore cracks. Those broken girls find each other and in doing so they think they find themselves, and it has been so long since they have known themselves that they latch onto the cracks in each other with fingernails so long they act like talons, hooking underneath the cracks and pulling up pieces. They are so afraid of being cracked even further, and they think that by holding onto each other that they are healing, but all they are doing is turning those hairline cracks into fractures that break off in the wind. Each crack becomes a gaping hole, and with each hole added those poor broken girls start to turn on each other, thinking that the one person they trusted have turned against them too, and the chilling wind blows into those open wounds turning them cold and bitter, and not just to each other, but to themselves too. The pieces that have fallen shatter and the familiar dance of friends has turned pained as their bare feet crack and bleed. They were supposed to save each other, the ampersand between their names that was once a blessing has turned into a curse because they see no way to undo it without shattering one another, so they continue their dance. Blood gathers beneath them, and they dance through the pain and tears, tearing each other apart until there is only one left. Cracked meets cracked, and they both shattered like glass.

I think I should be the poster girl for suicide. Okay, wait listen, I promise that makes sense. There are a certain number of things that a person may show before the commit suicide. I should not hit as many as I do. Oops. There is a handy little guide that goes by IS PATH WARM, which, let’s be honest, is kinda a dumb acronym, but it does seem to be accurate. Once again. Oops. I is for ideation, which kinda means that I’ve been thinking about it. Now, no one else happens to be privy to my thoughts, so I’ll go ahead and let you know that that is a big old check. S is for substance abuse, now, I used to be straight-edged, but that was before I discovered how wonderful being high was. It feels like the biggest weight in the world has been lifted from my shoulders and I feel, well, normal. Another check. Oops. P is for purposefulness. That means that I don’t see a purpose to living. I don’t. Simple as that. Check. A is for anxiety. Every **** day is filled with what if what if what it, and I can’t see how anyone could love me or how anything can get better and what if what if what if I never become anything, or if I just fall off the radar of everything and what if what if what if I just do it, just let go. Check. T is for trapped. Trapped in life, trapped in routine, trapped in my mind, trapped like a rabid animal in a cage, set to be euthanized. There is no way to get better, there is no way to change, everything day in day out is the same. I wake up the same time, go to sleep the same time. Same job, same friend, same same same. Check, check, check. H is for hopelessness. Golly what it must feel like to have hope. To hope that things will get better and change. I gave up on hope a long time ago. What a silly thing hope is. Check. W is for withdraw. Once upon a time I could laugh and smile with my brother, once upon a time I could run to my father and he would catch me no question, once upon a time I could go to my mother with woes about weight and love and friends and life and and and now I can’t. I ruined those relationships. Pulled away because I could feel myself changing, becoming a darker, altered version of the sister and daughter they knew. They didn’t deserve to have to see that, to carry that burden. No, that burden is mine to worry about. Check again. A is for anger. I have been angry about so many things for so long. It ***** that I have to go through this, that my dad got sick, that my mom works every day and doesn’t ask for a thing in return, that all the friends I have ever had have left me, that people move on and pets die and the world keeps on turning even when I have stopped. I’m dizzy because everything and everyone is still moving and I, I am angry. Check. R is for recklessness. Have you ever walked across the busiest street you live by without checking the traffic, or hovered a little too far over the edge of your balcony, started a fight with someone you have no hope of beating, seeing how long you can stay underwater even though you let out your last breath a minute ago, done so many drugs you’ve forgotten what you even took, forgot what you were drinking three no four maybe it was five shots ago? I’d say I’m a little reckless. Check. M is for mood changes. This one is oh so simple. I used to be happy. Check.

She got a skeleton tattoo on her hand. She looks at it every day and to everyone else she’s a punk *** kid who has some trust issues and “it’s just a phase”, but she didn’t do it to be edgy or punk. To her it’s lost control and counting numbers. To her it’s countless nights tossing and turning as she felt her stomach rip itself apart, but the only tears were ones of joy because all that pain must mean it’s finally working. To her it’s skipped meals and growling. To her it’s apple slices and carrot sticks that replaced potato chips and cookies. To her it’s concave stomachs and ribs that you can count, and it’s so easy to count now. To her it’s hollow spaces and sharp curves. To her it’s every single flaw. To her it’s how quickly something can slip out of hand. To her it’s a reminder, a warning and to you it doesn’t matter, just another punk *** kid.

She thought she loved the cold. It was the one thing in her life that had never felt cold even though it was literally cold. She loved winter and snow and all things frozen. She thought she saw herself in the flakes that littered the ground, and she watched as the world took no notice, and she watched the pretty, pretty snow become hard and packed underneath their feet and decided that she was a snowflake too. She took it to heart and adopted the cold like a warm blanket because it was the first bit of hope that she had a place in this world. She would become the snow, cold and hard and distant, but she was not born to be cold, she was born with a bright swirling inferno within her and her whole **** life she ignored it, desperate to make herself fit into the mold the cold had formed. She was molten metal and she poured herself over the snow in hopes of slowing down, but all she created was a hard stop with nowhere left to go. She thought the cold was saving her, but the cold treated her just like everyone else. Biting and harsh. It ruined her like everything else it touched, she it’s most faithful follower. She hated the cold.

I moved on. It is what you are supposed to do and I already have enough trouble following directions, so I figured this time I would follow the rules to the ******* t. I found a good boy. Oh my god he is good. He does what he is supposed to do and every time I look at him I get butterflies in my stomach, which is supposed to happen, that’s like rule number one. I talked to him, rule two, and decided immediately that he was too good for me. He has a plan, and he is doing everything that he is supposed to do to achieve it. He doesn't drink or smoke, or well, smoke. He hates that I do, but god when I do I forget that he isn't mine. That he is far too good for me, that he does not need a girl who feels pleasure from a blade sliding across her skin, that he doesn't need a girl who smiles at the sight of a flame because it looks and it feels so pretty. He doesn’t need a girl who drowns her emotions with alcohol, her feelings with ***, her hunger with a cigarette. No. He does not need me, but I think he wants me. I think his gaze lingers a little too long on the broken girl with bleeding lips and a wicked smile. I think his touch stays a little too long on shaking hands. I think his brain is a little too preoccupied with a girl like me. Good boys don’t need bad girls and he is the epitome of a good boy. I never have gotten around to rule number three because rule number two point five states that there must be an equality between the two parties. And baby we aren’t on the same level.

I think the worst thing is that I’m always gonna wonder why. I know what you’ve said, and I know what I think, but we’re both ******* liars. We lied through our teeth every second we got, and every whispered I love you felt like razors sliding down my throat. Every time we looked at each other I knew that we were gonna ruin each other, but I never knew how or when or why. But I do know that I never stopped it. You made me trust you and made the lies slow down because I realized that I didn’t need to lie anymore because it was becoming something real. We played games at first and **** am I good at playing the game. I never was good at ending it though. You were. And now every time I think about someone’s hands on my body, I think about how I would rather be anywhere else. I don’t know when I started referring to you as anywhere else, but I did and I do and I wish I could stop because it feels like razor blades again. Every single time.

I don’t know if you know what it feels like to be the last person to join a group of friends. No matter what you do, you feel the least welcome, the most used, the least cared about. It doesn’t matter how right or wrong it is but that’s all you’ll ever think about. When you see them all out together and you smile, but it doesn’t quite reach your eyes and you pray to gods that you will never believe in that maybe, just maybe, you’ll be invited next time. When they make plans in front of you but you know they don’t include you and you smile so wide and say have fun and once they’re gone you can finally scream or cry or just sit because you know none of them will ever experience what you are feeling and you just can’t can’t can’t do it. They will never feel their heartstrings tug because once again you get another picture of them all together and you. You you you are all alone.