Backlash

Elmo is telling kids about how great it is to share. Oh, Elmo, you poor, deluded little red fur ball. You don’t have a clue, do ya, li’l buddy? Kids are way meaner than Muppets.

She’s improving every day.” Considering we’ve just left Lara having to be given something “to calm her down” because she was crying her eyes out, I have to wonder if my mother is living in some kind of alternative reality.

You look like a drug addict,” Mom says. “It washes you out completely.” “Wow. Thanks, Mom,” I tell her, swallowing the lump her words bring up in my throat. “I can always count on you to build up my self-confidence.” “Would you feel better if I lied to you?” Mom asks. “Okay, fine. You look like Miss America. There, happy?

But then I see his face. See the words he wrote. See them on my computer screen. See them etched into my brain. Feel them etched into my heart. Know them deep in my soul. Remembering. Don’t want to remember. Don’t want to live. Tear rolls down my cheek.

Can’t I trust you to do anything right, Breanna?” Mom says in a voice as cold as her anger is hot, completely unmoved by my tears. I’m used to disappointing my mother. It feels like I’ve done it all my life. And I realize in that moment that maybe I am as stupid as she always tells me. Because deep down, I’d had this small shred of hope, some sick deluded fantasy, that she’d say I did the right thing by telling the truth.

Once, I did a halfhearted job of sweeping and mopping the kitchen floor, and that’s the first place she checked because she knew I’d do a lousy job because “that’s the kind of kid you are.” As in I’m not a “go-getter who makes her own luck” like she is, so I’m “never going to get anywhere in this world.” She knew all that because of two missed Cheerios and a small dust bunny.

I need to show on the outside as much as I feel it on the inside.

Emotion pours over me like a tidal wave, drowning me with primitive force.

While I’m counting with the Count, I list the reasons why I wish the pills had worked. 1. I wouldn’t have to face going back to school. 2. I wouldn’t spend the rest of my life being known as the girl who tried to kill herself and failed at that, too. 3. I wouldn’t have to remember, and so, because of that, and here’s the biggie: 4. I wouldn’t have to feel. Anything. Ever again.

He said the world would be a better place without me in it. And now I’m a loser at trying to make that happen. Everyone expects me to be happy that I failed. But I’m not. Which is why I can’t have shoelaces. Or a belt. And they make me open my mouth after they’ve given me my pills to make sure I’ve swallowed them. And they do bed checks every few hours to make sure I haven’t hanged myself with the sheets, so I can’t even get a good night’s sleep. And I want to sleep all the time, because when I’m asleep, I’m not here.

Every time my parents bring up the subject of if I want to go back to Lake Hills or transfer somewhere else it makes me want to take more pills. Like that's even a possibility. Anything that might resemble a pill is under lock and key in our house. The next time I get my period, I'm going to have to ask Mom's permission for a Midol. She's probably going to ration my use of tampons in case I try to make a noose out of the strings.

And if I see you step foot on my property again, I’ll do more than make a phone call,” he says, waving the baseball bat around menacingly.