Do Not Resuscitate

I can’t… How could he… Why… He… Oh my God.

Tightness. In my entire body. My lungs, my stomach, my throat, everything coils tightly until I’m hurting. I can’t breathe. I can’t move. I can’t think. I can’t look away. The only thing that exists is that little pile of razors. And Dad.

He knows.

I’m going to throw up.

“Danny, come here.”

Slowly, reluctantly, I drag my eyes from the blades and meet Dad’s gaze. It bores into me, digs under my skin, injects my veins with discomfort. I know what he’s thinking. His daughter’s a freak. She cuts up her skin. Rusted razors, new razors, razors she’s hidden under her mattress for years, she doesn’t care. Time to nip this in the bud, put an end to her attention-seeking games.

I don’t want to go over there.

I want to gather my supplies from the table and run. But I’m not quick enough to run and I have nowhere to go and getting my things requires getting closer to Dad. The exact opposite of I want to do.

His Adam’s apple bobs when he swallows. He leans back in his chair, places his hands on the table. He doesn’t take his eyes off me.

Stop staring at me.

“Please.”

His deep, rough, rumbly voice cracks mid-word. It’s agonizing. It’s painful. It propels me into movement.

To him.

Pied Piper.

I take the seat next to him. I can’t stand. My legs are shaking. My whole body is trembling and not because I’m cold. He’s not even pretending to smile. He’s not trying to put me at ease. The corners of his lips are pulled into a deep frown. I recognize this frown. This is the Mom frown. The Dannilynn, why are you doing this to me frown. The disappointed frown.

It hurts worse coming from Dad.

“Let me see.”

No.

Seconds tick on. Dad stares at me, and I stare back. Blank. Pretending I can’t hear him and I can’t see him. He shifts in his chair. The faceoff is making him antsy. Do something, Dad, I dare you.

He does.

He takes matters into his own hands. Eyes remaining on me, he reaches over and grabs my wrist. Left wrist. The one with the most scars.

Nope.

I jerk my hand out of his grip. The sudden movement startles him. He blinks. His brows furrow. His hand falls to the table.

“I need to see them.”

No, you really don’t.

“Dannilynn Brianne.”

My middle name isn’t Brianne, Dad. Brooklyn’s middle name is Brianne. After her godfather, her uncle, my step uncle. Mine’s Elizabeth. After Mom’s sister. Who you don’t like.

He doesn’t catch his slip up.

The faceoff continues. He’s not going to let me go until he sees the marks littering my arms, but I don’t want him to see. They’re mine. They’re personal. He has no right to ask to see them.

His face is hard. He holds his hand out, silently demanding I do what he’s asked. He’s going to yell at me when he sees them, to lay out how much I’m ruining his life by doing this, to tell me he wishes he could send me back to Mom’s, to sarcastically tell me to cut down the river. I want this conversation over with. I want to go to sleep.

Dad: 1; Dannilynn: 0.

I roll up my sleeves and place my arms on the table, wrist up. I don’t so much as glance at them. I don’t need to. I know where each scar is. The gouges, the raised, the pink and the white, the one where I cut too deep the first time, the ones where I got nervous and barely made a dent, the scabs from cuts made days ago, the crisscrossing overlay that’s impossible to cut through. I know it all. Dad, he doesn’t. He breaks eye contact in favor of getting a glimpse of my arms.

They’re so ugly.

Shame and embarrassment hit me hard. My face burns. My skin prickles. My eyes start to fill. I want to hide.

Dad takes my wrists gently in his hands before I can act on the instinct to pull my sleeves down again. He lifts them, gets a closer look at the ruined skin. His thumb grazes a set of gouges. I can’t see his expression. I don’t want to see it. I don’t want to finish this conversation after all. I want to take back what I’ve just done, showing Dad the marks made to combat pain.

Way to be a fearless badass.

His body deflates. His shoulders shake. There’s a strangled sound. A weird squeaking noise. From him. He hunches. I jump. Liquid. There’s liquid coming from Dad’s face and plopping into my palm.

He’s crying.

Why is he crying?

He croaks something, shakes his head. I can’t understand the word over the buzzing in my head. Dad is crying. Over my arms. He raises his head, and my breath catches in my throat. The color’s drained from his face. He looks stricken.

“I’m sorry,” he says, voice strained. “I’m so sorry, Danny.”

Sorry for what? Sorry I took a razor to my arms? I did this, Dad, not you. I found a way to ease the pain. I found a way to punish myself. I found a way to deal with not being good enough. You didn’t put the razor in my hand and tell me to do it. I did it. And it was genius. My problem solving skills are off the charts.

You just took too long to notice.

His eyes drop to the scars and scabs again. Like he doesn’t believe they’re there and he needs to keep seeing them to prove their existence. They’re real, Dad. Painfully real.

“Sweetie, why?”

Not the right question. The question is: how did Dannilynn, idiot that she is, come up with something so ingenious?

I picked my lips and dug my nails into my palm when I got anxious. I don’t know why. I don’t remember why. All I know is it felt good. Cutting wasn’t much of a stretch. I wasn’t really all that clever.

Dad’s eyes hit me. Full of pain and confusion and fright and tears. The expression is strange on him.

I’m not effected.

How sad.

“Why are you doing this to yourself?”

Repressed hostility. Daddy issues. A lack of control. For attention. Because it’s the cool thing to do. Is that what you want to hear?

“Danny, talk to me.” He’s begging. Actually begging with tears hanging on his lashes. “Say something.”

I’m going to pass.

Can we get on with this? Breeze through the “blame Dannilynn” nonsense, I have places to be. In fact, I’m late for a very important appointment with my bed.

“You can’t keep this bottled up. You need to talk to me.”

I can do whatever I damn well please.

“I need you to talk to me.”

Yeah? I needed that when I was eleven. Where were you?

Silence. He’s staring at me, gripping my wrists tightly. It hurts, the wrist gripping. Dad doesn’t realize his own strength. He doesn’t realize my bones are brittle. He’d realize it if he noticed how thin my wrists are getting.

Men are clueless.

He takes a shaky, wet, gulping breath. “I don’t know what to do. I don’t how to help you.”

Go back to doing what you’ve done all along. Ignore me.

“Help me understand.”

He’s more persistent than Mom. She’d have given up on this game by now. She can figure out when a cause is useless. And this one, this thing about helping me overcome a cutting problem that isn’t even a problem because I haven’t had the energy to do it in days, is useless.

“Are there more?”

Oh, yes. Burns and cuts and bruises. Skin is skin. I can put them anywhere.

“Can you show me?”

Mind reader.

He only waits a second, seems to realize he is getting absolutely nothing out of me. About time. No amount of pleading or crying or yelling is going to get me to react. I’m too far gone to reach.

“Things are hard. I get that. It’s not easy having me or Mom for parents. But we love you. We want you to be happy. We want you to go on and do whatever it is you love and be successful and happy. Seeing you hurt hurts us.”

Detach, Dad.

“You have no idea how proud I am of you.”

Why?

He thinks that cute, vague statement is going to make me all warm and fuzzy inside. Dad’s proud of me for barely living. Whoop-de-fucking-do. There’s nothing to be proud of. His manipulation techniques are ridiculous.

“You’re beautiful and talented and smart and you have so much going for you.”

Vague, vague, vague, and more vague. Really, Dad, a lead singer should be more eloquent than this.

“What you’re doing is dangerous. You could seriously hurt yourself.”

One can only hope.

“It’s not worth it.”

Could be if I was strong enough to move.

“I want you to stop.”

I want world domination. And cookies. I’m not going to get either of those, now am I?

“I can’t deal with this, Danny.”

Ah and he’s segueing into the “blame Dannilynn” speech. About goddamn time. I’ve been sitting here long enough as is. With my arms on display. He could at least let me have them back so I can sit through this speech relatively comfortably.

My butt hurts.

“I love you.”

He coughs, chokes on what sounds like a sob even though he manages to avoid letting his face crumple. I’m well-versed in the language of sobs, though. He can’t fool me.

“I love you so much. You will always be my baby girl. No matter what. No matter how old you get. No matter what you do. I look at you, and I still see the little girl you used to be.”

No, wait, this isn’t how this speech is supposed to start. I have places to be, Danny. I haven’t been a bad parent, Danny. You’re too dramatic, Danny. Why can’t you get over it, Danny? Danny, if you would try harder, put on a little makeup, smile, do your homework, life wouldn’t be so bad. You’re not an easy child to deal with, Danny. Not this sentimental crap.

“From the moment you were born, from the moment you shaved ten years off my life because you weren’t breathing, you were mine. My baby. This living thing that I helped create. That’s never going to change. Whether you live with me or Mom, you’ll always be my daughter, and I will always love you.”

What am I feeling right now? Regret? Guilt? Mixed with a strange fluffy feeling I can’t place. Whatever it is, it’s welling up in my chest and making me want to cry. I don’t like it. Stop talking, Dad. I need to get out of here. I need to get out of here now.

“I wasn’t ready for a child when you were born. What teenager is? But I will never, never, regret having you. Do you understand me? Never think I didn’t want you.”

He has a funny way of showing it.

“I will want to protect you from the world forever. For always.”

Can’t protect me from myself.

“And seeing this,” he eyes my arms, “is hard because I failed you.”

The words come out on a cracking croak, ring in the dining room, bounce around my skull. I can’t run from them. I can’t hide from them. I can’t figure out how to process them.

“I haven’t been around. Not as much as I should have been. And I’m sorry for that. I don’t know how to talk to you anymore. I don’t know what to do around you. I don’t know what you like. I don’t know anything about you, Danny, and I should.”

His words are confusing.

“I’m going to try harder, okay? I promise.”

He promised to pick me up from school, too. Instead, he sent Val, went through my room, and ambushed me. He’s promise track record isn’t looking great.

I still want to believe him.

I’m such a moron.

He’s said his piece, and he watches me to see if the words have sunk in. They haven’t. I don’t know what to do with what he’s said. I’m tired and hungry and emotional and my brain refuses to function. Wasted words and wasted effort.

“I’m taking these away from you.”

Taking what?

“I know I shouldn’t. You’ll find a way if you’re desperate enough but I can’t let you keep them, Danny. I can’t.”

What the fuck does he think he’s taking from me?

“The knives, forks, anything sharp, it’s all getting locked up.”

Is this a joke?

The tightness is back. Uncomfortable. Painful. Enough to make me want to scream. Those razors are mine. He can’t have them. He can’t do this to me. I need them.

“Your bedroom door stays open. I’ve made an appointment with a psychologist. For next week. You’re going.”

Like hell.

“Don’t be angry.”

Don’t tell me what to do.

“It’s not a punishment. I know it feels that way, but I’m doing this for you.”

You’re doing this to make yourself feel better, to deal with internalized guilt, so you can say you tried when they lower my coffin into the ground. Guess what, Dad, you’re too late.