I'm Not Bulletproof

“Wow Triinu, you were amazing!” Anna exclaims while we were walking back to the car. I smile, I know she isn’t lying.

“I am so proud!” Mrs. Laiho says.

Why is she proud of me? I’m not even related to her. My mother never even said those words to me. She tells Katerzyna that she is proud of her all the time. For someone who gets bad grades and is a complete whore she gets praised.

While myself, who gets amazing grades, gets in little trouble, sometimes, and isn’t a whore, I get nothing.

I want nothing.

The car ride back to the Laiho’s was rather short. The whole time Alexi was talking to me about his band. I only paid attention to half of what he was saying. My mind was on other things.

I have a strange feeling about going back to the Laiho’s. And I want to know why they would ever leave my sister alone in their home. That is the stupidest thing to ever do. She probably stole things and I’ll get blamed for it. I would never leave Katerzyna or Drimitri alone at my house. Hell, I used to sleep with a knife in my room only a year ago.

Dimitri threatened to kill me on a daily basis, and he is not one to play games.

There was a strange feeling to the house when I entered. It was dead silent, I know something is up.

I have a special feeling for these kinds of things.

My thoughts were interrupted my cell phone vibrating in my pocket.

I look at the caller ID, it was my mother.

“Hello?” I answer.

“Triinu, it’s your mother,”

“Yes?”

“I just wanted to check up on everything,” she says, “are you behaving for the Laiho’s?”

“Yes,”

“Are you going to school?”

“Yes,”

“Are you doing your homework?”

“Yes,”

“Are you helping with chores?”

“Yes,”

“That’s all I wanted to know,”

Before I can say goodbye, she hangs up. I really couldn’t care either way. I know she doesn’t really care that I am doing fine. All she cares about is the fact that I am living with old friends with her. She doesn’t want to be embarrassed because of me.

When I first learned how to ride a bicycle, she took me to the park, it was very crowed that day, and there were many families. Of course we knew those people, everyone knew everyone in Elva, and I fell off of my bike. I started crying, like any normal child would do after they fall, and she picked me up by my arm and dragged me back to the car, leaving my bicycle in the park. She raised her hand in the air, and hit me directly in my face. While she was hitting me, she said “how dare you embarrass me in front of those people! We know them!”

And that is exactly what she is doing now; she doesn’t want me to embarrass her in front of the Laiho’s.

Maybe she and Mrs. Laiho were in competition with each other growing up.

I walk inside of the house and into my room. I see Alexi standing in the middle of the room, still as a plank of wood. I feel like a weight was put onto my chest, I had that feeling of doom again.

There were pieces of notebook paper scattered throughout the room. Some were even taped to the wall.

I take a closer look at the paper and being to panic.

You know that feeling I have been experiencing?

Well, I was right.

Those papers on the floor belong to my notebook.

I scan the notes once more to make sure that they are mine.

“Braydon cheated on me again.”

“I tried to kill myself today.”

“I haven’t eaten in six days.”

“I hope she fucking dies.”

I freak out. No, I freak the fuck out. I run across the room and tear the pieces of papers off of the walls and I pick up the papers off of the floor.

The whole time I was crying. I already know who did this; there was no doubt in my mind.

Katerzyna.

This is why she stayed home; she must have been planning this since day one.

Alexi just standing there, motionless. He seemed just as shocked as I am, maybe even a bit more.

This is typical Katerzyna. She loves to ruin my life. And I guess I let her.

He looks at me and tries to say something, but I cry even harder. I never wanted this to happen

I don’t even know that if I am angry, sad, or embarrassed. I think it’s all three.

I am angry that Katerzyna would do this to me, I am sad that my notebook is ruined, and I am embarrassed that Alexi knows my deepest and darkest secrets.

“Triinu…” he says quietly. I can’t even bring myself to look him in the eye.

“How much did you read?” I ask.

Alexi was silent for a moment, “just about everything.”

With that in mind, I cry even harder.

I then feel something warm around my body. I collect myself for a moment and realize that Alexi had wrapped his arms around my body. Without thinking I hug back. This is what I need right now, even if it is Alexi.

“You don’t have to feel this way,” he stated while moving back away from me a few feet.

He starts to remove the bracelets from his left arm. One by one they come off.

After a few more bracelets come off, I see rather large red and pink marks on his arm.

I then realize what those marks are and what they are from.

Alexi is cutter.

And those are not your average cuts, they are the really deep ones, the ones that once they heal, they look as if hot wax was spilled on you.

When I tried skateboarding, and I was once very good at it, I broke my leg, and the scar looks like I dropped a candle on my leg.

I am taken back by this. Never in my life would I imagine Alexi being a cutter. Never.

“You’re not the only one who feels like they’re nothing,” Alexi says as he removed the last metal bracelet on his arm.

I take his remark the wrong way. To me it sounded as if I think I am nothing. I am something.

Once again without thinking, I slap Alexi across the face.

“I deserved that,” he says. Damn straight he deserved it, he read my damn notebook…

I feel a little bad for hitting him. I didn’t know what I was thinking.

“I am so sorry,” I cry. He embraces me in another hug.

Maybe he isn’t such an asshole after all.

“We need to talk,” he leads me to his bed. I take a seat next to him.

“Talk,” he says. Where do I begin? He already knows everything about me.

“What do you want to know?”

“Who the fuck is Braydon?” he says with anger in his voice.

I sigh, “Braydon was my first boyfriend for three years,”

“That’s not all I read,”

“He cheated on me with a new girl almost every week,” I say rather fast. Braydon is the reason why I act this way. He made me do this.

I explain that Braydon was much older than I was when we started dating. I was thirteen, he was eighteen. I explain that Braydon had problems with drugs, and I was eventually dragged into that. I explain that he constantly cheated on me with many girls. Not one was the same girl. I explain that Braydon is the reason I am so scared to be around men. I don’t know what will happen if I am with them.

“Tell me why and how you tried to kill yourself,”

“I took a whole bottle of aspirin and Braydon was the cause,” I say matter-of-factly.

“Tell me why you don’t eat,”

“Braydon said I was fat and no one would want me, so I would starve myself for days on end,” I say.

“Tell me why you want to kill Riina,”

“Riina was my best friend,” I pause, “she had been fucking Braydon for the three years I was with him,” I say with venom dripping from my teeth. I am still livid about that. Talk about being stabbed in the back.

I was pouring my life out to this man, I mean, he already knows everything, might as well explain myself.

He grabs my hand and places it in his own. I look at him, my eyes were read and puffy from crying. He looked just as sad as I am. I can see in his eyes that he does care about what I’ve been through, and I can tell he wants to help.

That is a very good feeling. It’s probably the best feeling I’ve had in a long time. And I mean years.

I see him wince in pain and then I realize that my bracelet on my wrist scraped up against his left arm. All of his bracelets were still off, so I must have scraped something. I mouth, ‘I’m sorry,’

I have a feeling that this is the beginning to a new friendship.