Breaking Point

Pattie was rubbing Jennifer's wrists, trying to make the dark red scab lines go away with the padding of her thumbs.

"Sweetie, why? We thought you were getting better, we thought your were happy!" Pattie asked, and Jennifer sniffled.

"You see that's just the thing, Pattie!" Jennifer exclaimed, standing up. "I'm not happy! I'm never happy! I don't even know what happy is anymore!" she yelled, and Pattie felt her jaw drop in shock.

The shy, quiet girl finally hit her breaking point.

"He's gone Pattie! Gone! And... he left me, stuck here, not knowing what to do," Jennifer sank to her knees, her anger vanishing. "I don't know what to do. He's gone and... and I don't know what to do. He wants me to move on, he wants me to never forget him. I don't know how to move on. I don't know what to do." Jennifer fell to the floor again and sobbed. Pattie slid over to her and started petting her hair.

"I don't know what else to do but die." Jennifer mumbled in a voice that didn't feel like her own. "I already feel dead inside. Why can't I just be dead on the outside?"

"Don't you go thinking like that!" Pattie scolded, but Jennifer continued to stare off into space. "You're a beautiful, beautiful girl Jennifer. And you'll get through this. In time, you will, I promise. Please, don't think like that."

Jennifer stood again, her anger resurfacing. "You don't understand, Pattie! Jeremy is gone, he's dead, and there's nothing I can do about it! It was my fault in the first place! It's my fault he's dead, and now there's nothing I can do but... wait until I get run over by a train or something!" she screeched, tears flowing freely down her face.

"I can't... do anything... without thinking of him. Everywhere I go, he's there. He's there, Pattie! And I can't do anything about it, but hope that this past year was just a dream, and that he'll come bursting through the door, telling me that he's proud of me, and that he loves me, and that he's sorry for making me wait!" Jennifer continued to sob, and tears were beginning to form in Pattie's eyes as well.

"What can I do, knowing that it was my words that got him into that car accident? I shouldn't have let him walk out of the house, but I was so angry over something so stupid, that I let him go! I let him walk out of my house, not knowing that it could have been the last time I'd ever seen him!"

Jennifer sank to the floor again, her head in her hands. "I waited for him for a week. I watched him go through surgery after surgery. I watched... as he became weaker and weaker after every operation. His heart stopped twice." By then Pattie had went over to Jennifer and held Jennifer's hand in her own.

"Maribelle and I were in his room. We were talking... about something so stupid. I can't even remember," Jennifer said in that same detached voice. "He stopped responding to my voice. He just looked at me, his eyes blank. I thought he was playing a joke on me, because he'd been doing that a lot, and I hated it. He just looked at me. And I knew, he wasn't coming back." Jennifer squeezed her eyes shut, as the memory racked inside her brain, causing fresh tears to fall from her eyes and onto the floor.

"Babe, what should we do when I get outta here?" Jeremy asked Jennifer, who was holding his hand on the side of his bed.

"I don't know. What do you want to do?" Jennifer asked, smiling. Maribelle scoffed.

"Oh my gosh, can you guys just get married and have babies already?" she asked in an exasperated tone. Jennifer blushed and Jeremy laughed.