Beaten, Bruised, and Kissed

Chapter 5

"Never underestimate the power of human stupidity." Robert A. Heinlein

PLEASE READER AUTHORS NOTE AT THE END

(unedited)

Tiana's P.O.V

Squares, rectangles, circles, many different colors in constantly changing patterns. All so beautiful. I'm light on my feet like a feather floating in the wind. Life is good. I'm free.

A ring echoes in my ears and reminds me of birds chirping. Chirp, chirp.

"Hehe...birds."

People move around me and I decide to jump into this bandwagon. Into my class we go!

Soon enough, another bird chirps and I see a familiar door that says "Photography Class". I slam open the door and make my big entrance, "Mother I'm home!" I scream out, taking everyone's attentions.

"Miss. Richardson, I highly suggest you sit down," Mr. Fahmi said, getting annoyed. His words go through one ear and out the other; I forget them within seconds...well most of the words.

"Sitting!" I shout in outrage. "What is sitting anyways. Like, is my butt made for sitting. Sometimes sitting hurts. Why do we have butts? For poop," I giggle. "Poop! Do do. Shit!" My mouth is covered by my hands. "Opps. Hehe. Oh well. Shit, shit, shit, shit."

I laugh out uncontrollably along with the rest of the class, but Mr. Fahmi isn't amused.

"Are you high, Miss. Richardson?"

"High...," I take a deep inhale of realization. "Like the sky! Yes, then I'm very high. Like the birds in the sky...and in the hallways. Did you know that there's birds in the hallway?"

I opened my mouth to say more, but only mumbles come out; There are tingles over my lips and I hear a sharp intake of breath seemingly in pain coming from behind me. That only means one thing...Ryders hand is covering my mouth.

I always found it weird. Whenever Ryder touches me for a long period of time, it's like I'm burning him. He's supposed to feel a wonderful sensation when you make physical contact with your mate, but for some reason, not for him.

"You should probably shut up," Ryder snarls in my ears quietly, so no one else hears. "I'll take her to the nurse. She probably just fell and hit her head." I'm about to protest, but he already begins taking me outside before I can. He pulls me to the side and searches my eyes. I cringe back from looking at his black eyes. They burn into my mind and remind me of every time his dark soul stares down at me while inflicting pain. This does not go unnoticed by him, but he says nothing. "Are you high?"

"You're high. Maybe everyone one else is high and I'm the only one not not high...no not not not high...yea. Hehe," I giggle. Ryder snarls at me and asks a bunch of questions. When he pauses for a second, I realize something. "Why do you even care?" I ask, though I get a sense that this has been addressed before, but I can't put my finger on it.

His face contorts into one of anger and...pain? "I don't care. Especially not for the likes of you," Ryder spits out with disgust. Even in my unstable state, I can hear the lie in his voice.

He roughly grabs my arm to pull me forward, but jumps back with a hiss. Ryder grumbles for me to follow him, to which I obey his order. There's no reason to anger him further. In the end, I was taken home to wait out the duration of the time for this drug to wear off.

~~~

"Why would someone drug her during school?" Lexus asked in frustration. All of my brothers hair are messed up in every direction from running their fingers through it; a nervous habit they all posses and I do not.

When they came home frantic that I had left school without telling them, I couldn't hid the giggles coming out of my mouth. None of them had virgin eyes to drugs and alcohol so they knew I was high, but to them, little innocent Tiana would never get high on purpose. Which leaves them to the current conclusion.

I yawned loudly. By now, the drug wore off and now I'm feeling the effect of fatigue wash over me. All eyes were on me. I'm lucky that my brothers didn't tell dad. He would probably go n a rampage to find the person who drugged me. That wouldn't be a pretty sight.

"Go to sleep Tiana," Asher orders me. I roll my eyes at the fact that he thinks he can boss me around. He's just lucky that I was about to do that anyways. I give them all a hug goodnight and find some peace in my bed. Hopefully my dreams will take me away from reality to a place where there's happiness and a mate that loves me like I was told he would.

~11:00 P.M.~

The thing about good dreams is that I have to wake up to this nightmare of a reality. When people wake up from a peaceful dream they usually feel happy or lighter. I wake up with the realization that I will never be happy. That my only escape is my dreams, and they can only go so far.

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A wave a depression and sadness washed over me. I feel an itching urge around my arms. The pain of life is suffocating me and I need some sort of release. Something to distract me; something to make me forget.

I'm lucky enough to have a conjoining bathroom, which is perfect for what I want to do. No one will know, so why not? Just like my bedroom, the bathroom walls, cabinets and everything in the room is black.

The urge is getting stronger and I can no longer focus on anything else. I scan my counter before finding the razor I use to shave my legs. My fingers stumble over themselves from nervousness as I take the object apart until I reach the blade inside.

My eyes stare at it. Thoughts run through my head now. Everything else is silent. I know what I am wishing to happen will not. He will not come to my rescue. He doesn't love me. He would probably enjoy this. My mate would probably do it himself if he could.

With this knowledge, I slice it against my left arm; a tally mark. It only burns because I didn't press very hard, but that feeling-that small taste of pain, so addicting-helps me forget the world. Everything around me is forgotten. I have a feeling that I will enjoy this very much.

The effect wears off too quickly, and I cut my skin again. The forgiving pain feels so good that I can't help myself when another reddening mark appears on my wrist. More and more. Everyone in different angles; everyone a different memory. I am so blinded by this wonderful pain that I don't notice the cuts are getting deeper.

Although I really don't want to, I force myself to stop. I may hate life, but I still want to live it.

Blood drips off the blade into my sink. My wrists look very similar. I take everything and run them under water to hopefully clean them.

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I put everything away and slip under the covers. I feel numb, but I still find tears streaming down my face at an unstoppable pace. Before I know it, the darkness takes over and I sleep again. This time, I see nightmares. At least now I won't have hope for a better day.

A/N:

Hey guys. Sorry it's short. I hope you enjoyed. Just a reminder, I don't support cutting or drug use. Get help if you do either of those things. I changed it so the story takes place at the end of the school year after finals testing. Every passed and is graduating. Let's try for 2.5K. Goodbye fellow readers and have a terrific Tuesday!