Life Changer

She didn't seem special. Nothing about her said "look at me" or even whispered anything as she stood in the line. She wasn't gorgeous, she wasn't stunning, she didn't look any different than the hundreds of other girls and boys that had filed through the line with their posters and pictures and trinkets.

She didn't radiate importance or confidence. She didn't flirt with them or even really look them in the eye. She didn't toss her unbrushed hair or compliment them on a show. She didn't strike anyone as something to be looked at twice or even someone who deserved more than passing glance.

She didn't come off as important. She didn't hold her head high and walk with purpose but rather shuffled her feet. The other fans around her spoke around her as if she wasn't there. She didn't emit pride or excitement, she didn't squeal or jump the closer to the table she got.

She kept her head low and eyes dropped, she kept her hands down and fingers locked. She didn't crack jokes, she didn't try to talk to anyone.

She didn't come off as someone who would do anything. She didn't seem to have the courage to even speak as she spoke so soft the men behind the table barely made out her soft words.

She didn't seem particularly brilliant. She wasn't dumb but she wasn't the type to give life altering words of wisdom or help a troubled youth through the dark times as the Black Veil Brides seemed to have the gift to do.

All that changed though the minuet she stepped in front of Andy.

He glanced up at her with a smile as he did every other fan and then hunched over the table to sign her poster. He saw her wringing her sleeves in her hands.

"Enjoy the show?" he asked figuring the girl was just nervous about meeting a rock star. Who wouldn't be?

"Can I ask you a question, I have a question," she said with a tone that implied she wasn't as thoughtful as she was impulsive with words. He shrugged his shoulders deciding he could spare a moment for the usual questions. What's his favorite song? Did he enjoy their town? Did he have a girlfriend? Would he take a picture? And the like but she didn't ask him anything. Instead she said, "It's an important question, I'd like to look at me when I ask."

He was surprised to say the least. No one had told him to do anything but even in her stated voice the air of pleading hung teasingly. He glanced at one of the large body guards then down the significantly shorter line. He swore he had seen her near the front of the line but who would let others ahead of them just to be near the end?

He looked at her though, a voice so light yet heavy with begging was hard to ignore and with the determination she showed in telling him to look at her, he figured it was a pretty important question. And he prayed it wasn't her way of asking her out.

She wasn't pretty. Blue eyes that were dull and blonde hair dyed black waiting a redo by the thick roots showing at the top of her head. She wasn't a face he'd particularly remember but she licked her chapped lips and kept those eyes on his.

"I was going to ask, what the point of all this was if you just feel like I do all the time," she said steadily. Her gaze unwavering and flashing with curiosity. Andy frowned. He didn't understand and she smiled a bit, "See, that's how I know you live a grand life Mr. Biersack. I know because you look at me with confusion instead of knowing exactly what I mean when I say 'feel like I do.'" Andy looked at Ashley who stood beside him in confusion.

How was he supposed to answer a question she seemed keen on not asking?

She fiddled with her sleeves dropping her eyes for only a second before saying,

"Bullies aren't what kids fear the most. It's not that they are hurt by what the bullies say or do, it's that they hate them. They hate those people for telling them what they are and what they aren't; they hate them for saying they're useless when they know they are very useful. They hate those bullies for saying they're ugly when they know they aren't. They love themselves the way they are and that's why it hurts. That's why those words hurt so much, is because they know the bullies are wrong and just don't know how to prove it. They may hurt themselves but that's because they don't know how else to get back at the bullies for their hurtful words, not because they want to hurt. They don't know that just by being they're better than the bully. They're stronger than the bully because they take what they say with a grain of salt," she looked at him, "That's why you do this, Mr. Biersack. To show those bullies you had that you were worth something, and you could do this. Be this. That you are this and not what they said you were."

"Alright girl do you-" the body guard started but Andy was entranced. She was soft and had a certain lost atmosphere to her. As if she had stumbled into the world and had yet to realize just where she was in it.

"No, let her go on," Andy interrupted keeping his eyes on the girl. She let her eyes shoot to the large guard beside Andy as she licked her lips again and looked back at Andy.

"Bullies don't hate people, Mr. Biersack, and even if they did kids grow up and those bullies go away. Yours did and theirs will. Another year or two and their names will be gone, except for people like me," she said glancing down the table and shifting her feet. "I never hated the people that told me I was stupid; I never hated the people that told me I didn't deserve to live, that I was a waste of space," she licked her chapped lips and looked back up at him, "I couldn't hate them you see, because I agreed with them. I knew those things were true. I didn't love myself enough to let those words hurt like they did you and your other fans."

"I didn't and don't love myself enough to look those people the eye and tell them they're wrong. I don't love myself enough to hurt them. Or to hate them. Or to even let their words sting me so here's my question Mr. Biersack," she shifted and her saw the red on her arms and bandages on her wrists when she leaned up a bit to softly and pleadingly ask,

"Who will love me when even I don't love me?"

Andy stared at her with wide and lost eyes as she slowly leaned back to the flat of her feet and let her eyes fall again. Her dyed curls falling in her face as she grabbed the poster and quietly turned on her heels and walked out.

Andy turned to Ashley suddenly asking him the same question she had with his pleading eyes. None of them looked back with an answer but seemed just as lost as he felt at the moment. Andy looked back towards the door and felt his breath suddenly jump form his chest in a gasp.

He didn't know.

She didn't come off as important. She was just another fan with a poster to sign and a smile on her lips. She didn't come off as righteous or gorgeous; she wasn't beautiful or someone people would look twice at.

But Andy would never forget her question: Who will love me when even I don't love me?