Control

The liquid metal burned as it poured down her throat. No, that wasn’t the right word. It didn’t burn – it tingled. Ever so slightly, it made her vocal cords tremor with fear of the promise that the liquid held as they gently touched.

Kat let the remains of her body fall into the control of the poison. Her so-called “friends” chanted around her – “Chug.” It was as if she was the marionette, as they pulled the strings.

Kat completely understood the irony of it all. Her full name was Katsumi Beyer. She was of Scandinavian origin, but had a Japanese first name. Her name meant self-control. Her parents found it to be beautiful and desired for their child to grow up astray from the pressures of life.

Oh how wrong they were.

The stench of the grass-like drug that need not to be named for a teenager to recognize inundated her lungs. She felt a belch approach the brim of her lips and she released it. But everyone else was in the same state as her; mindless.

Kat staggered across to her boyfriend, Darren. He was, with no competition, the one guy that every girl at Carter High wanted to date. When Kat began dating him two months prior, every single girl’s heart was torn out of her chest.

As she propped herself upright on the couch next to him, Kat buried her face into his shoulder. He paid no mind to her and continued cheering on the kids at the beer pong table.

“Darren,” Kat stumbled out. “Why won’t you pay attention to me? I love you so much,” she giggled, before her head stumbled into his lap.

“Kat, I’m busy, I’ll talk to you later,” Darren said, a hint of annoyance in his voice.

Even the drunken version of Kat could take the hint. Pouting as much as she could, she took off with a scowl. Although Darren was known as number one hottie, Kat had her share of boys chasing after her too. It took every sober bone in Kat’s body to not grab a random guy by the collar and kiss him hard. That would show Darren.

But before Kat could make a life-changing decision, she felt her legs give way and the last thing she saw was the beautiful chandelier that dangled on the ceiling, swaying back and forth, just barely.

When Kat awoke, the first thing she noticed was the resounding drumbeat in her skull. As she clutched her forehead, she looked around, recalling the events of the former night. Surrounding her was the remains of people’s dinners, as well as their almost-lifeless bodies. But of course, they weren’t transgressing to heaven; merely to sobriety.

As she shielded her eyes from the piercing sunlight glaring through the windows, Kat squinted at the faces to possibly find a friend. Finally, she caught sight of Darren, the same place she had left him the night before when he blew her off.

Tapping his shoulder, Kat braced herself for the awakening of yet another hungover teenager. At seventeen, this was no way for two trust fund teens to be managing their lives and embracing their futures. But at seventeen, they knew no better.

Darren grumbled to the pouring in of light and the image of his girlfriend. The immense pain he felt thereafter could not be described. There was no need to conceal his state of mind so he merely took her wrist in his hand and walked outside. Kat had become used to the aggression Darren showed after a night of hard partying, but it didn’t soothe the pain any better. She got into the passenger seat of his car and, with his pain-driven driving, she arrived at her home safe and sound before anyone in her home even awoke.

Kat crawled into the warmth of her bed and attempted to return to her world of dreams – the one place that she was truly happy. But the headache was taking its toll on her ability to fall asleep and therefore, she underwent the torture of being awake. Kat tried her best to contain the tears that welled up in her eyes.

Yet the effort to control failed. Just as it always did. Because the girl who was the namesake of the power of herself was driven by an entirely different being. One that was nameless to her.