-Scars-

2006

I tear my heart open, I sew myself shut, my weakness is that I care too much

For six long years, I was just another cliché- a kid from a broken home on a downward spiral, headed nowhere fast.

Sometimes I wonder if it hadn’t been for her, would I have been okay? If it wasn’t for her I wouldn’t have been that guy, that guy who knew everything and yet nothing at all.

I cared about her too much, that was my problem. I couldn’t cut her out of my life because I wanted her to be safe. So in a way, I guess it was my own fault.

These scars remind me that the past is real; I tear my heart open just to feel.

Those days scarred me, physically and emotionally. The scars I can see are constant reminders of who I was and they are reminders of her. She wasn’t the woman that broke me, but she was the girl who kept me broken.

My name is Tyler Millar, and this is how I fixed myself.

1995

Drunk and I'm feeling down, and I just want to be alone

I trace the shape of the scar on the inside of my wrist and sigh. I hate all my scars, but that is the one that hurts the most. I don’t mean hurt in an “ouch” sort of way, I mean it as an emotional hurt.

That scar is from when I tried to slit my wrists, just after my mother abandoned me seven years ago. My suicide didn’t work, and it still hurts like hell.

For six of the last seven years I’ve had a drinking problem. I used to drink to ease the pain of my mother leaving. I hated my foster family, and I began drinking at the age of 12.

I met Kara when I was 13. She was just like me – a screwed up kid who drank to escape the crap of the world.

But these days, I drink because of Kara. I can’t help it, whenever she’s around her I get the urge to drink and I’m sick of it.

I'm pissed ‘cause you came around, why don’t you just go home?

I hear the front door open and my heart sinks. Its Kara of course, nobody else visits me. She stumbles in, a bottle of vodka in one hand, a bottle of gin in the other and a cigarette hanging out her mouth.

“Hello Tyler” she slurs.

“What are you doing here?” I respond

“Visiting.” She trips over my shoes and lands on my couch. “whoops.”

“Kara, go home!” I'm really not in the mood for her shit right now.

‘Cause you channel all your pain and I cant help you fix yourself, your driving me insane

“What are you talking about? I can’t go home Ty! If I go home he’ll hit me again!” her lower lip trembles and I notice the bruise above her left eyebrow that wasn’t there yesterday.

“Is he still hitting you?” I ask. She nods. “Why?”

“He said…” her voice shook. “He said I drink all of our money and he’s sick of having a drunk slut for a girlfriend.”

I groan. “He” is Chris, Kara’s boyfriend. Chris abuses the hell out of Kara, but she’s way too scared to leave him again.

God I need a drink.

I tried to help you once, against my own advice

I did try and get her out of there once. Kara is my only friend so I had to help her. We got as far as my place before he found us. Chris is a big guy, even I'm scared of him and I don’t scare very easily.

The scar on the back of my neck is from him throwing me through my living room window. It hurt, but I ended up okay. I thought he’d killed Kara though. He’s lucky she pulled through; it took five hours for her to wake up. Even after all that, she still went back to him.

After that night I’ve never tried to help her again.

I saw you going down but you never realised

I watched Kara get herself further and further in trouble. I try to stop drinking, but its hard with her around, She brings me down with her and she doesn’t even know it.

You’re drowning in the water so I offered you my hand, compassions in my nature

I take the vodka out of her hand and she smiles.

“I knew you wanted it.” She says. I lift the bottle to my lips and as I feel the familiar burning sensation in my throat I really hate myself.

There's a small, dirty mirror above the television and I study myself in it. I have so many scars on my body, nearly all of them a direct result of my drinking.

I’ve been in a constant state of drunken idiocy for my whole life – at least, as long as I remember, and I am so, so sick of it.

I know what I have to do. I get up and head to the kitchen. Kara follows.

“Ty, what are you -” she cuts herself off when I smash the bottle in the sink. I grab the gin off her and do the same thing. “Stop it!” she screams.

“No Kara, YOU stop! Stop drinking, stop ruining your life, and stop bringing me down with you! It all stops, from here on in. No more vodka. No more gin. No more of any damn alcoholic drink you can think of. It’s over Kara, I can’t do it anymore!” She’s drunk; I don’t know if she can understand what I'm saying.

To emphasise my point I wrench open the cupboard and pull out all the bottles in our stash. Gin, rum, vodka, beer, bourbon, wine, tequila, whiskey - you name it, I pull it out of that cupboard.

I pour every single one down the sink as Kara cries on the floor.

Tonight is our last stand.

She looks so pathetic as she lies there, sobbing onto the blue and white tiles. Her long black hair is a mess and her dark eye makeup is smudged all down her cheeks.

I feel good about getting rid of the alcohol, and I want her to feel the same. I crouch next to her and pull her into my arms.

“Come on Ka. Promise you’ll quit with me.” It takes a while for it to sink in, but finally she looks me in the eyes and nods.

I don’t know how long we stay there on the kitchen floor, but it feels like hours. I feel like a big weight has been lifted. I'm not delusional, I know its going to be tough, but I also know I have to try. And, at least I'm not doing it alone. If Kara can do it, so can I.

I can’t help you fix yourself but at least I can say I tried.

I should have known she wouldn’t keep her promise. Kara was nowhere near strong enough. I wanted her to be, but she wasn’t. If I wanted to beat this thing, I couldn’t be around her anymore. I had to get out, get away.

I'm sorry but I gotta move on with my own life.

I'm a coward. I wrote her a letter, instead of telling her face to face that I was packing up and moving four hours away. There were too many reminders of her in that small town, too many things that triggered my drinking. I went cold turkey, I went to meetings and in the end I conquered it. I’ve been sober for eleven years.

2006

I tear my heart open, I sew myself shut, my weakness is that I care too much, and my scars remind me that the past is real, I tear my heart open just to feel.

I never saw her again. I married another woman and had 2 beautiful children. I fixed myself and I grew up. From the ages of twelve to eighteen I was an alcoholic. Now I'm twenty-nine and haven’t touched a drop of it since I was nineteen, and I'm all the better for it.

I still have the scars. They remind me of my mother. They remind me of the days when I hated myself. They remind me every day of Kara.

I went back home about four years ago. I wanted to find her, to find out if she turned out okay. After I left, she got into drugs. She died in 1999 of a heroin overdose, she was twenty-one years old. Nobody knows if it was an accident or if it was suicide.

I know in my heart it was an accident. Kara may have been fucked up, but she would never have had the guts to kill herself. She wasn’t strong enough. I had loved her, and I knew she was weak.

I have the words ‘Infractus Parculus” tattooed on the inside of my forearm. That’s Latin for “broken child” and I tattooed it there so I’ll never forget who I was, who I’ve become, and how much stronger I am because of it.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

“Scars” by Papa Roach.

My Level Two creative writing assessment. We basically had to make up a memory, and give it a trigger.

I chose Scars because the video came on c4 when I was thinking about what I could do and I thought it’d make a good story. I checked with my teacher and she said the plot was all good to use.

It's not exactly my best work, but i'm hoping its good enough to pass, i could really use the credits!

Lots of credit goes to the song and video!

Let me know what you think, and even let me know what you’d grade it. Choiiice :D