I'm fine. I'm fine. I'm not hurting, there is nothing wrong. My life is as perfect as it's ever been. I'm fine! God dammit!

The pencil snapped under the pressure I had applied to it. I flung it as far away as I could, barely able to hear it hit the small window in my room. I stood and dropped the two journals I'd had in my lap. Walking took so much effort. I stood at the edge of the window; my hand gripped the sill so hard it hurt. I barely noticed. That pain was nothing compared to what I was feeling inside now. I looked out in the dark night sky. A few pinpricks of shinning white light in the distance was enough proof that night had fallen and the stars had begun to come out.

"Why. . ." I whispered to myself, knowing there would be no answer. How much longer could this go on? Could I keep lying to myself? I'd tried, it didn't work though. This was ripping me apart, and I'd lost the only person I could trust. Why'd she have to do that? The only person I could trust and the one I had loved. Was it me? Did I push everyone away? No..it was all them. Their fault. They all hated me with no reason.

I could feel sudden pain surging up in my chest. I gripped harder on the sill, with both hands. My hands would soon bleed, my skin was tough, but not that tough. But I didn't care, I held on anyway. I bowed my head as the pain continued to come. What was emotional pain was now becoming physical pain and getting worse by the day. But for some reason the pain, the crying, the silent screaming, and the suppressed tears whenever I was in her presence was becoming a natural part of my life.

"I can't go on like this!!" I screamed to my dark window. The huge teardrops came. I lowered my head even farther and let the pain rob me of my sanity. I opened my mouth to scream, but nothing came out. . . I didn't want my parents to hear my pain. They couldn't help so they didn't need to know.

The memories flooded my mind, her image in each one of them. A toss of her hair, a quiet grin when she thought I wasn't looking. Those gentle eyes. So deep you could lose yourself in them. And I did lose myself in them. Those eyes were just a shade lighter than mine, but yesterday in the mirror I could have sworn I was staring straight into her eyes. I should have known better, she would never give me that kind of a deep look. . . except for that once. . .she must have really cared. . . The pain inside my mind dug into me, I gripped harder and the blood began to flow from my hand. If she had cared she wouldn't have done this to me! Sometimes I felt like some of her own qualities were taking over me, becoming mine, we were so alike, I had shared so much of myself with her, I had felt like we were one....I guess she hadn't felt the same way....

My eyes hurt and strained with the amount of tears welling up within them. There was no more room on my cheeks and huge drops slid down. My face and neck were soon in a flood of tears. A smaller droplet landed on the edge of my lip. For some reason my tears tasted sweet, instead of salty. No surprise though, I'd cried for the last two months or so, every single night, sometimes in the day when I could get away from people, of course there'd be no salt left in my body. And besides, I hadn't eaten much, I could feel myself getting thinner, not that that was a bad thing. I could do with shedding a few pounds. My mom always says that a hundred eighty is normal because of my height, but that's just a mother's opinion. But with the crying, lack of food, and constant tearing pains I felt inside, I was always having a sore throat, and stuffy nose. It felt like a constant cold, but I realized I was weak, my body couldn't take how my heart has been treating me. I was getting sick.

The tears continued to fall, dripping all the way to my shirt. There were tearstains over everything. I withdrew my hands from the windowsill. There were visible cuts on them, my hands stung and there was blood on the window. My tears mingled with blood, everything inside of me hurting. I should have put my wrists on that sharp windowsill and pulled. No! I would never consider suicide as an option! I shook the thoughts away. I was a being worthy of life, I'll have a good future. . . . . or will I... The tears came again. The sobs racked my body, I was shaking. From anger, pain, resentment, depression...I didn't know. My mind was too weak to classify my situation. I couldn't think straight. I couldn't see. Everything was a swimming mess. I closed my eyes and saw her face again.

I reached up and snatched my glasses. I threw them away from myself as hard as I could. I could hear them hit the wall and land on my bed. I didn't care if they broke or cracked. There was no point in being able to see anything anyway; all I could see were memories being played in my head. The good, the bad..the terrible...

"Stop it!!!!" I screamed inside my head. I leaned against the wall and slid all the way to the floor. After a few minutes, though it was probably more like half an hour or so, the tears subsided and I could feel that they had dried to my face making it all stiff.

Quietly I opened the door to my room and peered out to see if my parents were still up or if there was any one else awake in the house. Across the hall I could hear my dad snoring and my mom's slippers were in front of the door. Good. They were both asleep. I sneaked around and found that my little brothers were both asleep. No doubt they'd been that way for the last four or five hours. I decided to check on my sister.

From the top of the stairs I could see, once I squinted, she was still up working on homework and sitting by the computer, her hearing impaired by headphones. Again, good. I slipped into the bathroom and turned on the faucet without having to worry that anyone would hear. First I washed my hands and took care of my cuts being sure to use alcohol swabs on them to prevent infection. I laughed at this. As though I cared. I just didn't want people to see them and 'worry' about me. I'm fine. Hmm, I could probably get away with saying that I'd hurt them when I was working in the garage, I'd get yelled at for being stupid, but no one would know. Slowly I got around to taking a fresh towel and wetting it enough to wipe off all the tearstains.

I stared at the mirror in the semi-darkness. My eyes were completely bloodshot. I was surprised the veins in my eye hadn't popped yet and made them bleed too. Everything hurt. My dark brown eyes seemed darker than ever, hollow pools of pain, even if I would ever really smile again, the smile would never completely reach my eyes. Too much had happened, and there was just too much. I don't think time would ever be able to erase it all. There were deep lines on my forehead and under my eyes. I looked and felt like I'd aged at least five years within this one. Only seventeen and sprouting gray hair. At the edge of my hair line I detected a silverish hair amid the dark brown- almost black- hairs. The only thing I could do was sigh. Suddenly in the mirror I saw her face, looking at me like that will all concern. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"What's wrong?" She stared up at me. Her eyebrows knitted together, worried and trying to figure out what is bothering me. "Jason." A pause. "Please?" Another. "Will you tell me what's wrong? I can help. You know I'm always here for you. Jason?" A long pause. . . . she gives up and turns away.

"I'm fine!" I shake my head, trying to hold back the tears, "It's nothing, really."

"It's not nothing, you're about to cry. Jason, please tell me what's going on. What's wrong? What's going on? You look so hurt."

Inside my head I'm screaming to myself- "You're what's the matter! I've been crying over you, I'm hurting deep inside because of you. Why the hell were you always being so caring? Why the fuck are you still being nice to me??? Can't you see you're only hurting me more? Your touch, your voice, the sight of you, everything hurts me!!!! Stop!! Stop it!!! Please!!! I'm begging, I'll do anything, just let me go! Let me have my heart back. You've broken it so badly, but I don't care! I just want it back again! Why????" To her questioning eyes I give the only response I can. I don't want to hurt her even though she's hurt me so bad. I still love her. I always will, even if she never loved me.

"I'm fine. Don't worry about me. It's all just. . . .nothing. There's nothing wrong." I try to discreetly wipe the tears away, but she can see the drops glistening on the back of my hand and the redness of my eyes.

She gives me a sympathetic look, and I just know she's going to ask me about this again, or at least my sister because they're friends. At least she didn't say anything more at that moment. I was ready to scream, the tears were getting out of control. . . . I turned and ran, not knowing where I was going but somehow ending up at the gate of our church. I sat down on the cool grass and put my head down. I cried and cried for hours, then returned home as normal at five, lying to my parents that I'd been at jazz band, looking across the street and hoping to God she wouldn't say anything different to them. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I pulled myself away from the mirror, her image immediately disappearing. My head was swirling and my legs were shaking. Though for some reason throughout the entire memory I hadn't let loose a single tear. It wasn't until then that I realized my eyes were prickling and I just couldn't cry anymore, at least not for tonight- I'd run out of tears.

Extremely dizzy I made my way back to my dark room.

I sat on the edge of my bed. My mind was completely clouded, but my weak eyes landed on the two journals lying on the floor. I turned away from them and faced the walls of my room. I could hear the clocks gently ticking in my room. I grabbed my glasses from where they'd fallen and cleaned off the dried tearstains. Each clock read 1:13am. I stared at my clocks, watching the time creep by. I was obsessed with Time. If only I could turn back time....maybe then everything would be different...but I knew I couldn't......

Suddenly I felt her presence. But where....?

I looked at my computer screen, I could've sworn I'd shut it off after I emailed Melissa my part of our project. I was still signed onto Instant Messenger and I saw her screen name had just appeared. I grabbed a textbook and slammed it on the computer until the screen went black. "Damn you! Damn you! Fuckin' Ashley!" I screamed in my head, my brain echoed with my silent screams. "Why the hell'd you hurt me!!" I didn't care if I'd broken my computer. I wouldn't be going online anytime soon anyway. Not after that night she told me...I could feel the pain in my hands as they balled up into fists. My whole body was shaking in anger.

It was only then that I realized that my racket had woken my dad. At any minute he'd be coming by to check on everything, to see what the cause of the noise was. I jumped into bed and rolled over on my side, hiding my glasses beneath my pillow. I pretended to be asleep and pulled up the covers so he wouldn't be suspicious if he saw me in my school clothes. A few seconds later I heard him open the door and take a peak at me. When he was satisfied that I wasn't the cause of the nighttime disruption, he left and moved onto the rooms of my little brothers.

I let out a deep sigh and pulled back the covers. I sat on my bed for some minutes, staring off into the darkness. I was breathing heavily; my anger had not departed, it was just momentarily suspended. I stared silently at the dark computer screen. Ashley would know I had signed off, well I had if my computer was off or broken, because she had come online. Too much was hurting inside me just right now. Too much hate. Too much rejection. Why did everyone hate me? Even the ones I love...

I sat on the floor of my room, my back up against my bed. Over an hour had passed. It was only now that my computer-bashing caught up with me. I had been temporarily out of tears, but they were back now. A couple silent tears slid out of my burning eyes and fell down my face. I stared at my hands, which were already healing. Why couldn't my emotions heal like that? It'd already been two months or so.

This time I held to my resolution. I grabbed the two journals and the flashlight, which was under my bed, and got to work erasing the past.

I went to the page I had been on.

I'm fine! This has been such a great week! In fact this whole
year has been the most wonderful year of my life. Everything in
school is just awesome. I have the greatest friends. Everybody
just loves me and I hope they keep it up. I just can't wait
until that get-together the seniors and juniors are having. All
my friends will be there!

I looked at the paragraph I'd written and felt like puking. What a load of shit. I took my pencil and covered everything on the page with "WHAT A LOAD OF SHIT!" in nice big capital letters then I tore the page out and ripped into tiny shreds, dumping it into the wastepaper basket beside my desk.

I sickened myself. As though going through my journal and rewriting it in another, but with all the events being positive, would change the past.

Nothing could change the past. Though maybe it could psych me into thinking I really was fine.