If I Stay✔️

50

trigger warning: dark thoughts, mental illness, suicidal references, marco.

The wind was harsh, the bitter chill causing goosebumps to arise on my skin. I rubbed my forearms hoping to ease the cold before casting my eyes to the building in front of me, the place that would be my home for the next six to twelve weeks.

I couldn't help but frown as I took in the exterior. I don't want to be here, but like always I wasn't given a choice. I'm not sure what I mean by here. Whether here is this house, home, mental asylum. Or if here was simply being alive.

Everything was becoming so overwhelming that I just wanted it to stop. I don't want to be here.
I want to go home. I want to wake up in the mornings with my face buried in Charlie's golden fur. I want the voices to leave me alone. I want Zac to stop looking at me like I'm a fragile doll that will break with one wrong touch. I want to be normal — whatever the fuck that is.

I don't want to be here.

When Zac, Charlie and Dr Owens entered my hospital room four days ago and said I'd be getting treatment as an 'inpatient', I didn't know what to think. At the time I didn't question it as much as I should have. My mind was still somewhat foggy from whatever sedative they'd given me the day before, clouding my judgment and my thoughts that all I could manage was a weak nod. It wasn't until the hazed feeling in my mind passed slightly that I fully grasped their words.

They didn't want me to go home.

They lied when they said they'd be there for me.

They lied when they said they'd fight for me.

They lied when they said they loved me.

They've given up on you. I closed my eyes as the voices merged together. I couldn't blame my family for giving up — not really. I gave up on myself a long time ago, it was only a matter of time before they did too.

As the four days passed by (much quicker than I hoped they would) I didn't speak. Not to Zac, not to Charlie, not to any of my siblings, or my friends — considering they were still banned from visiting me. It was clear now that my family seen me as a crazy broken disappointment. They seen me as all the things the voices said they would — all the things Marco said they would.

Everything was just so confusing. The voices told me one thing, then my siblings actions would somewhat counter their exclaims. If they didn't care — if they truly seen me as a burden — a waste of space: then why over these last four days had they tried so hard to communicate with me? It made me second guess everything. I was grasping onto every single small detail, every single smile, every single laugh — I was grasping onto hope. And I should've known better than to do that.

If they truly did care... then why was it so easy for them to send me away?

Because you're disposable.

I didn't know who to trust anymore: Mama, the voices, Zac, my sister, my brothers, myself?

"So, what do you think?" Zac's anxious voice filled my ears, snapping me from my thoughts and drawing my attention to him.

He looked at me with that same pleading gaze, the one he'd been using for the last four days. His eyes practically begging for me to speak. I stared at him with a blank expression, watching as he shuffled nervously from one foot to the other. I wanted to speak to him, I did. But the voices told me he didn't deserve my words and surprisingly, I believed them. Pulling my eyes away from his, I ignored the way my heart twinged in my chest as I heard him sigh and focused my attention to the the building ahead.