This Little Game We Like To Play

I stay with both mine and Quinn’s siblings. They don’t understand what’s going on. Dylan, Maggie, and Molly are almost oblivious as they play Hungry Hungry Hippos. Anna sits on the couch and watches TV. She knows Quinn is going away but she doesn’t know where or why.

I stood on the deck and smoke my third cigarette in a row. After a long drag I exhale the smoke and empty a can of beer and throw it over the railing of the deck. My nerves are shot. I want to know how Quinn is. I want to know that she’ll be okay and that she’s going to get better. It would be awesome to know that she might forgive me for everything I’ve done to her.

I hear the sound of my mom’s voice and I rush inside after stubbing out my cigarette. “How’s Quinn?” I ask once catch my dad alone. He sighs deeply and runs a hand down his face.

“She didn’t do so well. She tried to run. A guard had to chase her for a block. I just hope she does better once she’s inside.” he squeezes my shoulder and head off toward his room. Quinn is miserable and once again it’s my fault. It’s always my fault. I feel like someone tightened a belt too tight around my heart. It’s uncomfortable and painful. I need it to stop.

I go upstairs and push my boxers down just far enough to expose my hip. It’s the perfect place to mutilate myself. No one ever sees this spot. No one would ever think to check this spot. I push the blade deep into my skin and clench my jaw, this cut is more painful than any other I’ve ever given myself.

Once I get home from the beach things only get worse. I haven’t been sober in days. I depend on the pills that Alex gives me to numb the feeling of my existence. I just sit back and let my best friend give me all sorts of things to make me feel numb and emotionless. He never asks any questions other than “Do you need more?” or “Want to try something new.”

I always give him the same answer “Yes.”

“Oh, she’s still not eating.” Liz cris as I listen in on the phone conversation. “They thought she was going to eat a grape today but she put in her mouth and then spit it out at her guide’s face.” A smile stretched across my lips for the first time since Quinn went away. “She’s going to have to get a feeding tube if she continues not to eat.” the sick feeling I got the first time I saw Quinn’s sickly body returned.

I hung up the phone and reached under my mattress for the second time today. I can’t stop myself, it’s the only thing that makes the pain go away when I think about her. I ran out of pills and alcohol, I can’t deal with the eternal pain. I press the blade down over the old scars. Scars almost four years old. I let a straggled scream out from behind my gritted teeth. I make three more cuts each one deeper than the last. I throw my blade down onto my desk when I hear someone’s foot approaching.

“Angel” mom starts from outside my bedroom door. Shit, I didn’t lock my door! She enters before I can pull my jeans over the blood seeping through my pickle patterned boxers. Mom slaps her hand over her mouth staring at the blood dripping down my leg and the blood soaking through the white and pickled patterned material of my boxers.

She runs to my side and pull the side of my boxers down and screams in horror at the mutilated mess her son’s hip is. I stand there watching as she yells for my father. I don’t do anything. My mom cries and I watch her. My dad yells at me. I pull my jeans on. My dad drives me to the hospital. I watch as the stitch my four new cuts closed and then some from yesterday.

When they check me into rehab I just smile. It makes me feel closer Quinn. She’s in rehab, I’m in rehab. We’re both in rehab. We forced each other into rehab unintentionally. The same hospital, in different buildings and different floors.