Savin' Me

"Are you okay?" Lily asked softly, sensing that I was in emotional distress, though I'm not sure she knew how bad it was. Her hand reached forward and landed on my shoulder tenderly.

Instinctively, I flinched away from her touch, as if her hand was freezing cold. "I'm fine," I replied. Everyone always said that, even when they weren't. It was the perfect fall-back plan, really. Fine meant a person was alright, not great, but not horrible. If one was fine, then it meant they wouldn't have to put on any show.

Just act natural. Easier said than done.

"You sure?" she pushed. I could tell she wanted a full explanation, or at least for me to show her my grade, but I refused to do either.

Instead, I nodded casually and sank down in my seat as Mrs. Houston started filling our brains with the words from the next unit of vocab.

Numbly, I took down the words, but didn't process them. It was almost as if I couldn't process anything. A bomb could have dropped on the school, and I wouldn't have blinked.

It was a scary feeling. I needed to be able to feel something. And yet, I was at school, and therefore could do nothing until I got back to the house.

For the rest of the school day, I went through the motions mechanically. My brain formulated different plots on how to do what I needed to do without getting caught. By the time the final bell rang at 2 o'clock, I knew exactly what I had to do.

When I stepped through the door, I realized that I was the first one home. It was the perfect opportunity. Using a change of clothes, I hid my shoe box in my hand, nervous that someone would catch me at the wrong time and call me out on it.

Of course, I had nothing to worry about. I got into the bathroom and locked the door behind me. For a second, I stopped and listened, waiting for the front door to open and for someone to call out that they were home.

But the door stayed closed, and no one interrupted my scheme.

I started the shower, and, after a couple of minutes of it running to warm up, stuck my hand under the spray. The hot droplets stung my skin, so much that the water almost felt cold until the burning sensation kicked in.

Smirking slightly, I opened my shoe box carefully and removed the razor inside. I admired it for a second before putting my arm under the scalding water and ripped the blade across the inside of my arm.

The sharp and burning pains together meshed and I closed my eyes for a second, letting it all sink in. As I reached for a second time to make another cut, which I hadn't done in a long time, the front door opened.

"I'm home!" Soda's voice called out. "Got out of work early!" There was a short pause. "Anyone home?"

Then, before I realized that he was there, there was a knock at the door. "Zoe? That you?"

"Uh, yeah!" I scrambled to clean everything so no one would find out what I was doing. I grabbed a towel from the cupboard under the sink and mopped up the bit of blood that had gotten on the side of the bathtub.

"Are you alright?" Great. He was one of those perceptive people that could pick up changes in vocal tone. Or maybe it was just because I sounded scared out of my mind.

"Yeah, totally," I told him, gathering myself. I tossed my razor toward the shoe box, and it landed inside softly, barely making a noise. "Just...taking a shower."

"Okay. I guess I'll talk to you when you come out." His footsteps started to retreat, and I took a huge sigh of relief. That could have been really close.

I showered really quickly, not turning the cold water up any further so when I stepped onto the cold tile floor, my body was red and raw. After throwing on a long-sleeve gray t-shirt and a pair of plaid flannel pajama pants, I walked into the living room.

"How can you wear that?" Soda gasped, checking out my attire. "It's so hot outside."

Shrugging, I tried to play the whole thing off like no-big-deal. Sometimes, it occurred to me how my entire life seemed like a role-playing game, where nothing that came out of my mouth was the truth. "Really? It seems kind of chilly to me."

"You gettin' sick?" He stepped closer to me and put a hand on my forehead, his eyes dark with worry.

"I don't think so." I scratched at my arm absentmindedly, the cut starting to itch. Then, as if by magic, spots of red were starting to show up on my light sleeve.

My eyes widened slightly when I saw them, and I quickly hid it under the table. "Um...do you have any bandages? Like, the wrap-around kind?"

"I don't think so. Why?"

"Oh, um...no reason..." I bit my lip and watched as the color deepened.

Soda seemed to notice my glare, pretty keen perception, I had to admit, and he jumped into action. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing."

"Zoe, tell me the truth." His eyes told me that there was no other choice. I could feel tears starting to gather in the corners of my eyes.

As I continued to shake my head, a couple of those tears fell down my cheeks, and I sniffled. "There's nothing wrong."

Instead of taking my word for it, he marched over and grabbed my arm. "Sodapop!" I protested, trying to rip my arm away from him.

He had a firm grip though, and my efforts proved fruitless. He ripped back the sleeve of my arm, revealing the various scars that were hidden there, including the brand new bleeding slice.

For a long time, Soda didn't say anything, and I just cried. Some part of me felt relieved because now, someone knew. I no longer had to keep this burden on myself, and I knew that there would come a time where I had to figure out another way to get over my feelings. The majority of me, though, felt betrayed and embarrassed. I barely knew the boy standing in front of me, and yet he now knew a secret that I had managed to keep hidden for years.

All because he was too in-tune to the world around him, too perceptive.

And that was not a good thing for me.