Hold on for the Ride

Part Eight

After a week of counseling, Ryan seemed to be doing better. He was slowly floating his way back to his usual self. I noticed that he wasn't coming to school with 'fight' wounds, so his dad must have finally realized to lay off. I still can't believe it took Ryan almost dying to enlighten him of this obvious fact. I knew that this had to be hard on the whole family. Mrs. Terry had to be wondering what she had done wrong and Eve was probably sick to her stomach that she almost lost her brother. I wasn't doing so well myself. I was back to eating three meals a day, but I couldn't eat as much as usual. My mind seemed to always be in one of those gazes and I couldn't think straight in school. Somehow I was still doing homework and keeping up with all of the AP classes I was in.

I wasn't going to tell Ryan about all of the struggles I was going through, I figured it wouldn't help with his situation. It's hard enough for a teen boy to go to the doctor for a sports physical without being embarrassed, I couldn't even imagine him walking into an office with some learned psychologist, talking about his feelings. The more I thought about Ryan, the more my mind spiraled into a deep depression. Suicide was always something that I knew was real, and I thought of those people that I never knew who had killed themselves, but it never hit this close to home. Ryan was so miserable that he was willing to end it all. That would be it. He would no longer exist on this earth, he wouldn't got to high school anymore, he would never know if he got that sports scholarship, it would all just be a memory kept alive through pictures and old videos.

One night I was thinking of all of this while sitting on my bed surrounded by books that I needed to be studying. I began to think about the future and where things were headed. I tried to rap my mind around my situation at that time. The point that the school year was only about half way over; I was stuck in eleventh grade. My friend was clinically depressed. I seemed to be heading towards that way and I couldn't find one limb to grab onto before I sunk into that deep black hole. I looked at the clock, it was 11pm already. I wondered why the red numbers appeared blurry once again. Then I realized, I was once again crying. How could I be such a baby when Ryan was literally depressed. I tried to stop, but the hot tears kept streaming. My phone rang and I picked up while trying to stop snuffling.

"Hey, Rose?" It was Ryan.

"Hey."

"So I was thinking that we should-," he paused, "wait a second, are you okay?"

"Yeah, yeah I'm fine."

"No, I can hear it in your voice. Are you crying?"

"I was but-"

"Why? What's wrong?"

I didn't answer, I couldn't just spill all of this over the phone, especially considering I didn't want to do it in general.

"Hold on Rose, let me get on some clothes and I'll be right over."