Heal All Her Wounds

"It's finally Friday." Ithil thinks to herself as she looks off into space.

It was the last class of the day and the class she hated the most: geometry. Ithil is not the best at math and numbers were never her friend. Sure she could do the simple mathematics like adding, multiplying and dividing small numbers, squaring the first thirteen numbers of the number line, and figure out simple formulas, but Ithil still claimed math as her enemy due to the low test scores she has always received since the eighth grade when she was forced to take algebra.

"Since it's been a month and some of you are already failing, I'm going to make you do the class work with a partner." Ithil's teacher says, looking directly at her.

Ithil rolls her eyes, and looks down at her notes. She has never been targeted by a teacher before, but from day one she knew that her teacher, Mrs. Long, wouldn't like her. It wasn't because Ithil was dressed like a delinquent or a Satanist from time to time, but because she was fifteen minutes late the first few days because she always ended up getting lost while walking to the hidden classroom.

"When I call out your names, I want you to stand up and move yourself over to the first person that is called." Mrs. Long explains while he kids sigh and begin to pack up their things, ready to move.
Ithil gets ready to stand up, knowing that she's going to be one of the first people to be paired with someone in the front of the classroom.

"Josh Anderson and Ithil Winters." Ithil sighs and stands up from her seat in the back of the class before walking her way up to the front near the door where he sees a tall chunky guy standup from his spot. She sees the face of a familiar wcurled hair boy that she was forced to sit next to at lunch in order to sit across from Abbey yesterday.

"Awesome, it's someone I know." Ithil thinks to herself smiling as she takes her spot and subsequently feeling the warmth from the guy who was sitting there before her.

"Hello, Ithil." Josh says showing off his braces as the teacher began to call the rest of the names.

"Hey, Josh." Ithil says while pulling out her text book and notebook.

“So, now that we’re partners, I guess we’re going to have to spend a lot more time together.” Josh stated as he hid a secret meaning to what he was saying. Ithil didn’t notice it though. Much like many other people, she can’t tell when someone is flirting with her.

“Yeah, I guess so. I hope you’re patient, because I don’t really pay attention to this crap. I just doodle.” Ithil says showing how half of her math notes are just doodles of anime styled cats and chibi-styled Organization 13 characters.

“It’s cool. I have a system that we can use and I’ll try to stop you from doodling in class.” He says showing of his braces more.

“Kay, well I hope that system works.” She smiles slightly and looks at the board noticing how Mrs. Long has stopped calling out names and began the lesson.

The lesson that Mrs. Long began teaching was the farthest thing from Ithil’s mind. Instead, what plagued her mind was the thought that Matt might be taken. After seeing him in graphics design talk to a girl that has been absent the last two days, Ithil was worried that he wouldn’t be interested in hanging out with her anymore, especially since he spent a lot more time talking to the girl than her.

“I bet the only reason he’s been talking to me these last two days was because she wasn’t there.” Ithil thinks to herself while staring at the half-written board.

“Hey,” Josh says quietly while elbowing Ithil, “you should probably write this down.”

Ithil left her train of thought momentarily and began to quickly write down what was on the board in her tiny handwriting before returning to her train of thought.

“I mean, she is a lot prettier than I am…and taller.” Ithil begins to picture the tall girl that laughed with Matt, causing them to get in trouble with the teacher. She remembered how the girl has long brunette hair, light tan skin, the perfect amount of makeup, and showed off her flawless skin with shorts, flip flops, and a short sleeved Aeorpostle shirt. “She’s the complete opposite of me.”

Josh elbowed her again, but this time to show what he had written in the outer margin of his notebook: Why didn’t you eat lunch with us? Matt was looking for you.

Ithil sighs, knowing that she had to lie, but she felt a little better when she found out that Matt was looking for her. She didn’t enter the cafeteria and hid under the bleachers during lunch, not wanting to have to witness the new girl enjoy her time with Matt; she doesn’t like to admit that she’s jealous because it’s her least favorite emotion besides feeling indifferent.

“I was in the metals workshop finishing up my assignment then I went to talk to my world history teacher about our project,” Ithil writes on her margin and looking at Josh.

He just made an O-shape with his mouth and looked ahead at the board. Ithil looks at the board as well and begins to finish writing the second half of the notes. She didn’t understand a thing that was written on the board, but she didn’t really want to understand. All she wanted was to go home and paint, or take MySpace pictures; she just wanted school to end.

Sighing, Ithil has lasted the last thirty-five minutes actually trying to pay attention due to Josh elbowing her every time he noticed her not paying attention and was grateful when the lesson wasn’t over, knowing that there would be no in-class assignment.

“Even though we didn’t finish the lesson, I still want you to work on these problems at home. If you have questions, talk to me before class.” Mrs. Long says while writing the assignment on the board.

Ithil just packed up her belongings and quickly wrote down the page number and problem numbers on her hand before getting up. She notices how people quickly crowds the halls and leaps for the door not wanting to deal with the inevitable after school rush.

“Did you write down the problems, Ithil?” Mrs. Long asks, stopping Ithil in her tracks as she puts her hand on the handle.

“Yes, have a nice weekend.” Ithil quickly replies while opening the door and rushing into the crowded hallway. For a small town, the hallways in the high school with only 800 kids felt as crowded as the hallways in her old high school in Florida that held 2,800 kids.

Walking past bodies and slowing behind the slow walkers, she all of a sudden felt a poke in her side. Jumping a little she looks to see that it’s Matt with a smile and the girl that Ithil has claimed as competition is nowhere to be found.

“Oh hey, Matt.” Ithil greets while pulling out her headphones from her bag as they reached the end of the hall.

“Hey, where were you at lunch?” He doesn’t stop looking at her and manages to use his peripheral vision to dodge stopped people. Ithil told the same story as Josh and Matt just said, “Oh, okay. Well, I wanted to introduce you to my friend Rachael during lunch. She’s really cool.”

“So, she was there. Good thing I didn’t even go into the cafeteria.” Ithil thinks to herself before saying, “Oh, well I’ll meet her next week.” She places a convincing fake smile on her face as they exit the school and walk to the front where they see Jay, Abbey and Abbey’s brother that has slipped Ithil’s mind. Ithil can see a familiar vehicle only a few feet away from them as Jay begins to show off for Abbey.

“They like each other.” Matt says as they closed in on the small group.

“I can tell.” Ithil replies while seeing Abbey smile wide at him as he tries to jump over his leg and almost fail. “Well, I’ll see you next week.”

Just as soon as she began to walk towards the powder blue 1997 Honda Civic, she feels herself be picked up from behind and begins to scream and squirm.

“Put me down, put me down, put me down!” She orders, kicking her legs and moving her arms.

Matt quickly puts the girl down before apologizing over and over as she begins to calm down. Ithil begins to feel embarrassed as people start to look over at them and quickly walks over to the powder blue car without explaining herself.

She enters the car, feeling terrible for causing a scene, but leaves. As much as she wants to explain herself to Matt, Ithil doesn’t feel like she can without breaking down and breaking down in front of people she barely knows makes her feel weak: a feeling that she hates because it makes her feel helpless.

“What happened?” Jane asks with worry in her tone as they quickly drive off.

“It’s nothing.” Ithil replies softly while putting her headphones on and blasting “Suicide Season” in her ears.

Jane didn’t drop it though, and Ithil felt her headphones being slowly pulled down from her head, allowing Oliver Sykes voice to scream into the car.

Turning down the music, Ithil looks at Jane and quickly gives in. “Okay, so Matt picked me up from behind and I freaked out. It was completely embarrassing and I don’t wanna talk about it anymore, kay?”

“It’s okay that you did that, Ithil. You have every right to act that way, especially around someone you don’t really know, but did you tell him why?” Jane looks at Ithil after every few words, knowing that she feels terrible about it.

“No, I’m not telling him why and I just walked over after it all happened. I didn’t want to talk about it, but I feel terrible.” Ithil can feel tears form and cloud her eyes, feeling like the most horrible person in the world.

Before tears drop, she catches them with the sleeve of her Devil Wears Prada hoodie and tries not to cry.

“Shih, it’s okay, Ithie. It’s okay.” Jane rubs her hand along Ithil’s back comfortingly while she drove onto their street.

“It’s not okay. I feel like shit. He didn’t deserve me just ignoring his apologies and I feel terrible for everything,” Ithil hated when people told her that things were going to be okay when they weren’t. “Now he won’t wanna talk to me because I just blew him off when he was trying to apologize.

I didn’t even say that it was okay because I was too embarrassed by what happened. I opened myself up to strangers and I feel embarrassed about it! You don’t understand.”

“Well I’m sorry! I’m trying to understand, but you’re making it difficult to! Goddamnit, Ithil!” Jane yells, obviously upset.

Ithil sighs and apologizes as the car is being parked in the driveway.

“It’s okay, Ithil. I’m sorry for blowing up, but you need to stop being so hard on yourself. I don’t blame you for what happened in Jupiter and I’m sure no one else would either; it was just something that happened and I’m sorry that you feel like you should be embarrassed about something you can’t control; but, everything will truly be okay.” Jane hugs her in the car tightly and Ithil hugs back beginning to tear up.

“I need to tell Matt I’m sorry.” Ithil says while looking down and letting a tear fall from her cheek.

“You can tell him Monday, hun.” Jane says and Ithil just nods.

Getting out of the car, she hears the sound of a bike coming up the street and looks up seeing Matt riding looking a bit distracted and down.

“Fuck, I made him feel that way.” Ithil says under her breath as he rides closer to her house. “The fates have decided that I apologize now.”

“Matt!” Ithil yells as she closes her door and watches the boy look up at her and slowing down. She waves shyly, and smiles a little to reassure that everything is okay between them.

“I’m sorry.” They both say at the same time, but Matt’s Canadian accent was more prominent over her soft voice.

“No, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have caused a scene like that it’s just…” Ithil sighs, not wanting to continue and spill out her past that she really wants to forget.

Matt patiently waits for her to continue as he gets off his bike and looks at her with curious and worried eyes. She looks up at him and can tell that he really cares about her though.

“It’s just that I get startled easily and having that happen makes me freak out. I don’t really want to talk about it honestly, and I wish I could just explain things to you, but I can’t. I don’t know you very well and I just can’t let myself open up to you right now.” Ithil finishes and looks up to him, hoping that he’ll understand.

“It’s fine. I just wanted to say sōrry for scaring you like that, though. I felt bad.” He looks at her and she could tell that he meant every word of it.

“It’s not your fault.” She hugs him out of impulse, really not thinking about it and it stuns Matt for only a short moment before he hugs her back.

“Would you like to come in?” Jane asks from the front door, standing there the whole time and watching things working out between the two teens.

“No, I really shouldn’t. I have to go home and start working on my stuff if I want to hang out with Jay this weekend.” He explains as he lets go of Ithil and Ithil lets go of him, slowly walking back.

“Okay.” Jane says before walking in.

“I’ll see you Monday.” Ithil says before moving aside.

“Yeah, see ya Monday,” He says while getting on his bike. “Bye, Ithil.”

He rides off and she waves good-bye while saying, “Bye, Matt.”

With that, they go their separate ways with Matt riding to his house a few blocks away and Ithil entering the house before she goes into her room and begins her homework.



After going from homework to spending forty-five minutes on MySpace to homework again, Ithil began to give up on doing homework after the sixth time she checked MySpace and dinner was ready.
Yawning, Ithil returns back to her room after eating a serving of mushroom chicken alfredo and a couple pieces of garlic bread. With a glass of water in her hand, she sits down at her computer and refreshes her MySpace home page only to see that she has a new friend request and that her sister is on AIM.

“Fuck! How do people find me? I swear, if it’s another emo kid, I’m gonna kill a baby!” Ithil curses to herself tired of having fake people, or strangers in general, trying to add her as a friend. She has it on her profile that she won’t accept people she doesn’t know, but they never pay attention to that which annoys her.

Clicking the link, Ithil waits for the page to load while she starts a conversation with her sister.

xIthiexKittyx: Hey sis. How was your day?

Within seconds her sister replies, but not to talk for long.

Anne_Bunny_Bby: hey it was good, but i got on to tell you that i wont be on for a week. srry.

And with that, her sister signs off and Ithil sighs, disappointed that her sister didn’t give her an explanation for her absence.

“Where’s my little sketch book?” Ithil asks herself while getting out of her chair and looking for the leather bound sketch book and pen she was given two days ago. It wasn’t that she was going to cut herself over this, but the feeling of being unwanted began to show its ugly head into her consciousness which she knew would lead her into wanting to cut herself to escape the emotional pain that she felt was a million times worse than any physical pain.

After a few minutes, Ithil finds the small sketchbook with flimsy paper on her dresser and quickly grabs it before sitting on her bed. Looking for the red pen, she notices a friendly picture on her computer screen with the name “MattG124” by the picture.

“Oh, Matt found me.” Ithil says smiling happily, feeling like she no longer needs the sketch book.

Usually, Ithil strongly disliked her bipolar disorder, hating the emotional rollercoaster of being the happiest person in the world one minute, then becoming an emotional wreck just seconds later, to back to being at a normal amount of happiness; but, she didn’t mind that the reason she was so happy right now was because Matt took his time to look for her and friend request her.

“Well, I will definitely be accepting your friend request, sir.” Ithil says while clicking accept and pressing the “enter” key.

She wanted to send him a message, but she couldn’t bring herself to do it and instead decided to log out of MySpace before shutting off her computer and getting ready for bed.

Changing from her grey skinny jeans and black and white striped shirt, Ithil puts on a pair of plaid shorts and her black tank top with a small hole on the side on before placing the Devil Wears Prada hoodie back on in case she needed to go down stairs for something or her guardians come upstairs.

Hearing a knock on the door, Ithil quickly places her black hair in a messy bun while letting the orange shape around her face before opening the door. To her surprise she sees Jane holding a small package that Ithil assumed came from her brother.

“Oh! I forgot to tell you that this package came in for you. It’s strange. Usually your brother would leave a return address.” Jane says while holding out the package.

“Eh, he probably got tired of writing it down since he knows I have it written in my contacts book,” Ithil says while taking the package. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” Jane says with a smile before walking away and letting Ithil close the door.

Grabbing her switchblade that she smuggled in to Canada from her nightstand, she cuts the tape and opens the package carefully with a yard stick. Even when they’re packages from her brother, she is paranoid that someone has laced a trap in her packages to kill her, especially after what happened in Jupiter.

Relieved to see nothing pop out at her or that her package didn’t explode, she looks at the contents and sees anything, but the usual tea and daily letters from her brother. Instead, there is a teddy bear with “I love you” stitched on its stomach and a letter taped to its nose.

Ithil begins to get nervous and grabs the box before opening up her window and throwing the contents out. She knew who it was from and she was terrified that he knew where she lived.

“Fuck.” Ithil says, scared and grabbing the sketchbook.

On the first page, Ithil writes the date and begins to draw herself underground in a small home with a tomb stone to make it look like a grave. “It’s my only escape.”