A knock at the door startled me awake. I shifted in bed, wincing as dam the had been holding back the pain in my slumber caved under the pressure of consciousness.

"Kaya," came my mother's voice from the other side. I glanced at the red digits on my bedside displaying that it was 7:45 A.M. Only fifteen before I'd have to be sitting in homeroom, if I had actually planned on going in.

"I'm heading out soon, but your father should be back this afternoon."

If the thought was supposed to bring me comfort, it had the opposite affect. What did it matter that he was coming home. He'd proved yesterday, that he didn't care what happened to me. Even my mom couldn't deny it. Making sure to call him my father as if she had no part in the blame.

"Why?" I asked, taking a wild guess. "Team didn't make it to the finals?"

It was the only reason he'd be on his way so soon. My mom avoided my eyes as she pulled an excuse together.

"Aaron wants to come home," she said. "He refused to get off the bench after we told him what happened."

Aaron. The one person I could count on in this family to actually gave a damn.

"I'll give him a call and tell him I'm okay. I'd hate to get in the way of another championship."

And I knew if I didn't, then Aaron would get the worst of it. Another loss all because he was too worried about his careless sister who landed herself in the hospital with a broken useless arm.

"Kaya-"

"Mom, please just stop," the words were out of my mouth before I had a moment process them. "It's true, and you know it. Or else he'd have been here yesterday. But, he wasn't. And he isn't now."

Her knuckles paled white she held onto the doorknob.

"I have to go. Call my direct line if you need anything at all. I'll be stopping by on break."

"Don't waste your gas."

"I almost forgot," she took a few steps forward and laid my phone on the table beside me, without acknowledging that I'd said anything at all. "I found this downstairs. We'll talk about the back door when I return."

Oh god.

I'd completely forgot about the shattered window, and there was no avoiding that conversation once it started. A broken arm was a completely different story without the added edition of a broken window. She turned on her heel, drawing my door closed behind her. My eyes shifted to the device on my nightstand, clinging onto life with a 3% battery charge. The screen was bright with notifications, but Aly's name stood out on top of the list.

Are you coming out? I thought I was giving you a ride today?

Hello? Are you not gonna answer the phone?

If you're not down in five minutes, I'm taking off . I've got one more late slip before Mr. Monroe screws me with a detention.

- Sent circa five minutes ago.

My fingers hovered over the keyboard. Without me in school today, Rachel had a direct trail straight to her. Or even worse...Chase. Whomever she'd come into contact with first, and I didn't even want to take a lucky guess at which one it would be.

But, I couldn't go in like this.

It would raise even more questions that I couldn't even begin to answer. No matter what I choice I made, at the end of the day, they both would know the truth. I had batted myself out and there were no strikes left to give. And the worst part about it – I had zero chance of defending myself. But, I was never very good at that part to begin with, was I? And now, everyone was in the stands, watching me. Waiting for me to exit the stadium now that the game was over.

Why was I still standing there?

The keys clicked as I typed with one hand.

Go ahead without me...

Three dots danced across the screen before her response came through.

You sure? Is everything okay?

I started to type out the menial response, always available on the tip of my tongue like a looped message on playback. The letters flew away, as I held my thumb against backspace key.

No.

I didn't get the chance retract my statement before the phone powered off. I let it drop against the bed, before making a futile attempt to sit forward with my arm following a few seconds on delay. It was close to immobile, set in the very same position that I'd fallen asleep in.

And, all of a sudden that's when I realized.

There was no way I'd be able to pick up any shifts at the bookstore in this condition. Which meant that my position would be terminated before I could even lay my eyes on another paycheck. It was required that I pick up a minimum of eight hours a week to be considered part time, and at this point I wasn't even making half of that.  I'd thrown so many shifts on the trade-board within the last month, it would be asking to get fired on the spot if I dared request anymore time off.

It was the only thing he had left take away from me. It wasn't enough that he'd stolen my past, my future,  my best friend. No. He had to pick apart whatever remained of the ghost identity that I once clung to. The bare minimum of nothing, was still too much for me to hold onto.

I'm all you have.

My eyes settled on the desk across from me, to my journal flipped face down with an entry abandoned midway through. I stood to my feet and walked over, turning it upright to read the words that I'd left for myself merely a week ago. A mess of calligraphy I'd haphazardly trailed across the pages, looping outside of the lines before Aly and Rachel showed up on my front porch to drag me to the nail salon before prom.

I wish I could tell somebody, but there's nothing left to say.. If I begin at the end of the story seeking answers to the questions in my mind, they're going to want to know what happened before, and I can't take them to that chapter. I wish I could rewrite that part. Sometimes I even make up scenes in my head that would fit better. We just weren't very compatible and like any teenage romance...the whirlwind simply carried us away. There was nothing more, nothing less.

Nothing in between.

Before I could process what came over me, the shrill rip of the page, tore through the air. The halves fluttered to the carpet one before the other, landing at my feet. I flipped back to the earlier pages, ripping them from the seams one by one, their tattered remains multiplying around me. I tore through until there was nothing left to bind the book together. Nothing remaining of the story that should have never began in the first place. It didn't exist anymore on paper.

And it wouldn't for much longer anywhere else.

***

Sometimes it was better that my dad didn't care to notice anything about me. Otherwise, I wouldn't be able to do things on my own without having to worry about someone breathing over my neck. I tried to relate, nod my head like I understood whenever Rachel complained about her nonexistent privacy at home. Ranting about constantly having to before slip into the bathroom one of her brothers stole all the hot water.

And empathize with Aly when she sought excuses to avoid another mother-daughter weekend full of lifetime movies paired with tubs of vegan ice-cream from whole-foods. But, I didn't get it. It was completely foreign concept to me. I was used to doing things right out in the open. Nobody would say anything. No one would notice.

Just like right now, as I slipped the key ring between my good thumb a few minutes after the front door sounded, signaling dad and Aaron's return.

I went through the back. Side-stepping the shattered glass that littered the front of the doorway, where Mason had made his imprint. Trucked through the grass as it tickled the space between my jeans and ankle socks. I came around the front, unlocking the doors to the car, and revving the engine back up before it had a chance to catch its breath.

I didn't look up to see if the door had opened behind me. Five seconds too late to catch me halfway down the familiar trail to the very one place that I knew best.

It were as though my mind weren't my own as I took weaved between cars on the road. Running on commands that had been programmed into me. My fingers locked around the wheel as I swerved daringly close to the white lines on the pavement, with only one hand to guide my way.

As I turned into the complex, I didn't bother edging into the empty parking space because trying to back out of it would be impossible. I cut the engine, leaving the vehicle on the edge of the street, and hoping no one would try to test their luck and graze by during the time I was inside.

I ran, nearly tripping over my own two feet as I clobbered to the front door, and wrapped my fist against it. Silently pleading that it wasn't too late. And it would be another thing that I would have to take fault for. Because I knew and I didn't do anything stop it.

Please don't let me be too late.

"Just a second,"

If my ear weren't pressed up against the other side of the door, I would have missed the faint trace of the voice on the other side. My heart rate was still running a mile a minute when the door came open in front of me, revealing a phantom of the women that I'd spent weeks trying to nurse back to life only a couple of months ago.

"Kaya?" She looked at me as though I were the one who was unrecognizable and wearing a a mask for a face. "Shouldn't you be in school?"

"Mrs. Riley," my words hitched in my throat, a few short steps behind the breath stopped that I to inhale. "I have to tell you something."

She back tracked the door, opening it wider for me to step through, or trying to widen the space between us, I wasn't sure. But I followed inside, pressing my good hand against the wall in a futile attempt to stay upright.

"You're not safe," the words fell out of my mouth, one breath at a time. "He's trying to kill you."

From the way she looked at me, you would think words I'd spoken hadn't come out in the right language.

"I'm sorry, what-who are you talking about-"

"Mason. He replaced your medication. He's been feeding you the wrong pills this whole time to make you sicker. And I saw him do it!" I stepped closer as if closing the gap would make my words seem less ludicrous. "He's trying to kill you! Don't you see it? Look at me!" I tried to lift my arm, withholding a gasp as a sharp pain pulsed through my arm at the sudden motion. "He did this to me! And look at what he's doing to you! You're not safe!"

Her fear stricken response fell deaf on my ears as I stormed through the house. It were as though something had taken over me and I was just following through with the motions. But I wasn't in control anymore. I found myself in the hallway bathroom, tearing through the medicine cabinet, knocking medications off the shelves one by one as my eyes scanned medication over labels as if they were barcodes.

I seized the one I was looking for in hand and used my teeth to unscrew the cap, before emptying its contents into the toilet.

It was at this moment Mrs. Riley caught up to me. She pressed her hand against her chest, clasping the fabric of her shirt as she watched me flush the remains of her medication. Wordlessly taking the scene in. She looked close to fainting, and a frightening thought passed through my mind that this was it. The irony of it all. If weren't so damn morbid it would be almost amusing.

That I would be the one to do it. 

It would be me that stripped the air out of her lungs as she stood lifeless, frozen in shock. Her heartbeat failing to keep up with the story that carelessly ran out of my mouth.

How else was she supposed to take this? Her son's girlfriend showing up on her front step in the middle of the school day. Claiming that her very own child was trying to take her life. My god how did I even get here. What was I supposed to do? I couldn't save this woman. I couldn't even save myself.

She lunged towards me, nearly toppling over with unsteady feet to balance her light weight, as her hand grasped at the bottle that I held overhead.

"I'm so sorry," I cried. "I'm so so sorry." I landed against the wall, letting my weight pull me to the ground. The bottle danced across the tiled floor coming to a halt beside the foot of the toilet.

"Leave!" Her shouts were lost in my ear as I pressed my forehead against the wall. "Leave now!"

"I'm sorry."

It was all I could say, because I was.

I honest to god truly was.