Skin + Bones

♪Drive - Oh Wonder♪

Cecilia's eyes cracked open, wondering why she was waking up. The room was dark, so her alarm hadn't gone off yet. It took her a moment to come to, before her mind registered the buzzing sound from beside her bed. Lazily, her hand slapped onto the cell phone, sliding it off the table and to lift it. Her eyes squinted as the bright light hit her face. She was greeted by Jimin's face.

She hadn't spoken to him in a week and a half. He had tried to contact her, but she ignored him. She was thankful that Jimin had his license now, so he wasn't taking the bus with her. She knew it was stupid, but she was embarrassed and refused to face him. However, she did feel bad for just dropping him like that. Going back to having no one to speak to was strange and she found herself struggling not to text him back. She realized now she should have as she noticed the time, 3:15am.

Why was Jimin calling her so early?

She answered the call but said nothing.

“Cecilia?” He whispered. There was a tone in his voice she couldn't recognize. Something she had never heard from him before.

She hummed sleepily in response.

“I can't sleep,” He said, voice hushed. She'd be lying if she said she hadn't missed his voice.

“Ok,” she responded coldly.

“Please talk to me, I don't know what I did wrong,”

She stayed quiet, her eyes closing again. She heard a quiet sniffle from his end.

Is he crying? She wondered.

“You didn't do anything,” she said quietly.

“So why do you hate me?” He choked out, sounding upset.

Cecilia knew Jimin was very emotional, she just never thought he'd cry about something like this.

“I don't hate you Jimin,” She paused, listening to him breath out a sigh, “I hate myself. It has nothing to do with you,”

He was silent, as if it was an absolutely insane thing she had just said. That it was impossible.

“Don't,” He whispered his voice cracking.

“Don't what?”

“Don't hate yourself,”

Cecilia scoffed.

“I wish it was that easy, Jimin,” She ran a hand through her short hair, encountering tangles. She sat up in her bed, crossing her legs and leaning against the headboard, “You can't just snap your fingers and fix me,”

“There's nothing to fix, Cecilia,” He said sternly.

“There's a lot,”

“No,”

“Yes,”

“No, and don't fucking say it again,” He sounded angry now. She had never heard him swear before.

Cecilia stayed silent.

“Why?” Jimin asked after a moment.

“There's too many reasons,” She sighed.

“I wanna know,” He pressed on, determined, as usual.

Cecilia sat quietly for a minute, playing with a loose thread on her duvet. She thought about what to tell him, weighing the options.

“I don't know,” She sighed, “I'm just not pretty, I guess,”

“Being pretty has nothing to do with your self worth, Cecilia,” Jimin sighed as well.

“No, but it helps,” She responded dryly.

Jimin was silent on the other end.

“I guess I just feel like if I'm not pretty it means that no one will love me,” She admitted, closing her eyes and letting her head fall back against her headboard.

“Don't think that way,” He told her.

“Sorry,”

“And don't apologize for things that don't need to be apologized for. Do you even realize what you're doing when you do that?” Jimin asked, his voice softer now, less angry.

“No..,” Cecilia trailed off.

“Saying something so much can cause it to lose its meaning,”

“Oh,”

“Not only that, but you're making yourself vulnerable. Someone might see how much guilt you feel over the smallest of things and use it to their advantage,”

“...You wouldn't, would you?” She hesitantly asked.

“No. But I know people who would and it makes me sick,”

She could practically hear the disgust seeping off of every word. It sounded like he had more experience with that type of situation than what he was letting on. She didn't push it and ask questions though.

The line between them was silent for a few moments.

“Can I pick you up for school today?” He asked, voice sounding sleepy. Cecilia glanced at her alarm clock. 3:34am.

“I don't know, you need to get some sleep. I'll text you when I wake up,” Cecilia whispered, a yawn engulfing her last two words.

Jimin responded simply with a hum. It seemed as though he had something else to say, but stopped himself.

“Goodnight, Cecilia,” He said, hanging up before she could respond.

Was he mad? She continued to stress about it, tossing and turning the rest of the morning. She knew it was a selfish thing to do, to cut him off and not speak to him simply because of her own self hatred. Yet at the same time, she felt she was doing it to protect him, she didn't want to hurt him and she knew that she had a habit of doing just that, unintentionally or not.