I Am Invincible

I can’t believe it. I cannot believe that I would do something so stupid, so completely and utterly reckless that could not only destroy my physical and mental health, but my relationships with the people I love most if they ever found out what I was about to do.

I was back in the bathroom, not even 20 minutes since lunchtime. I had gone to class like I should have; I had music, my favourite subject. I had been working on a composition on the keyboards silently until Owen Peters began his usual taunting. Since coming back to school, all I’d heard from that dickhead were insults about my sexuality and about how I was "too weak to fight off that other fag.” It had got out around school that I was in a 'fight' that put me in hospital, but they don’t know the half of it. Some days when the teasing gets too much I want to scream at them and tell them what really happened but I can’t bring myself to do it. I don’t want to remember what happened and if I tell anyone other than Zach, Emilie, Hanna or Rach it'll be around the school in no time and the teasing would probably get even worse. Zach doesn’t know about the bullying, and I’m not planning on telling him. He'd probably beat the shit out of anyone who had said even the smallest thing to me that could be classed as an insult. No, it's better that he doesn’t know. And I’m dealing with it anyway.

After escaping from Owen Peters' harsh words, I was standing in the bathroom looking down at a small object on the counter. The shining silver blade gleamed back at me, waiting for me to make the first incision. I picked up the small piece of metal and examined it. The razor sharp edge blinked at me in the dim light, daring me. I placed it on the counter once more, deliberating. Do I really want to do this? I asked myself the question a hundred different ways, each time getting a different answer. In what seemed like a snap choice, I made my decision. I picked up the blade and held it to my fingertip, pressing down gently. A ribbon of red flowed slowly down my finger and landed softly in my curled hand.

Well, it’s definitely sharp enough, I thought as I grabbed some paper towel and wiped of the small trace of blood off the shining silver object, while sticking my bleeding finger in my mouth to stop the blood flow. The coppery taste made me feel sick to my stomach, but I wasn’t going to let that stop me; I was going to do this.

I looked up into the grimy mirror. My dead eyes and pasty skin looked even worse in the dim light of the bathroom. I couldn’t bear to look at myself any longer so I shifted my eyes down to my hands. I held the blade shakily in my right hand. I let it hover over the bathroom counter for a few seconds before pressing it lightly to the milky whiteness that would most likely change my life. I took a deep breath, before putting pressure on the back of the blade, pushing the sharp cold edge into the tiny white tablet that was sitting on the counter. It crumbled. I pushed the blade in again, making parts of the tablet fly in all different directions along the counter. Over and over again, I used the blade to crumble the tablet until there was nothing left but a pile of white dust sitting on the dirty counter. Drawing in a shaky breath, I picked up the straw that those older guys I’d talked to in the lunch line gave me and taught me how to use. I’d heard them talking about ‘happy pills’. Zach had told me on numerous occasions that all he wanted was for me to be happy. Why couldn’t I have a bit of help? I’d asked them about these so-called ‘happy’ pills and they told me to meet them in the bathroom a few minutes later. That’s why I couldn’t let Zach come to the bathroom with me. It would kill him if he knew what I was about to do.

The straw felt funny inside my nose, but I pushed the uncomfortableness aside as I held closed my other nostril, before leaning down over the counter and sniffing hard at the loose, white powder.

The powder stung my nose as it flew back into my sinuses. I started coughing violently and my head began to feel dizzy and my vision was going blurry. My heart was beating a million beats a minute and my forehead felt like it was on fire. I leaned against the wall of the bathroom, breathing heavily.

Immediately, I regretted it. What have I done?