Somebody Else ✔

Butterfly.

Izzy.

Edited.

The decietful thing about Australian Octobers, was that they promised to be apart of spring but hardly ever were.

Those hybrid spring days dragged on with the suffocating heat of summer and I swore they never ended. They suffocated you almost physically, like a tight hand poised, clenching your throat.

Sometimes, in the middle of night in Summer, I woke up gasping and thinking I couldn't breathe. On those nights I would try to shake off the heat and sleep again. But for some reason, the heat always reminded me of death. Well, it wasn't just 'some reason' it was one very fucking particular.

I never realized how afriad of dying I was, until I swallowed a handful of pills at age 16.

I was so petrified I laid on my bed and dry heaved off the side, my body trembling so bad even my vision shook. All the while I was thinking, God, don't let me die. I don't wanna die, I don't wanna die, don't let me die, please, please.

I cried too. I covered my face with my pillow and wasn't sure if I should make myself throw up or not, the heat with its hand around my throat.

No one knew about that, though. About any of that. I hadn't told anyone about the butterflies I swear I saw when my body wrestled with the aftermath of an attempted overdose, either. It wasn't that remarkable. What was remarkable though, was my terrifying regret as I laid in my bed watching the butterflies in my head bounce off my walls.

I went to school after. I walked to school, actually, and as I entered Yorkie's gates, my friends were waiting for me.

When I got home my little sister was waiting for me to watch Christmas movies with her.

And I don't know, but I think a part of me was trying to still deal with the PTSD from a suicide attempt that didn't work and reconcile that with the part of me which was thankful for my second chance - even if I had managed to only fuck it up so far.

I don't know why I was thinking about that at school, the day after Vinnie Abrams killed himself, but I was. All those people waiting for me.

The locker block was full but quiet. I twisted a strand of hair around my index finger as I walked to my locker, my bag heavy on my back.

Corey and Sam were there already and sitting, their backs against our lockers, their heads resting against each other. I emptied my books into my bottom locker

Our teachers locked themselves in their classrooms, and staff rooms. Against the lockers, I could see into one of the
Maths rooms. I thought it was vacant until I saw a flicker of movement, and a group of teachers moved precariously on the edge of the window. Their heads were pressed together and they kept peaking out toward us. One teacher found me staring back and jumped up to close the curtain.

Earlier that morning, Sloane sent a text to us saying Cookie wanted us in the Performing Arts Center for a whole year meeting. We passed it along to the rest of the year, and by the time Cookie sent out a whole year 12 message via the school website, it was old news.

I looked at the message on my phone, and thought good, a grief councilor. Bodhi would be able to talk to someone.

For a moment, I forgot the only time a grief councilor was called to Yorkie was when Reed Renshaw, aged 15, died in a car accident. When the five boys killed themselves, there was nobody.