floating | ✓

14| faye

“You don’t know what goes on in anyone’s life but your own. And when you mess up with one part of a person’s life, you’re not messing with just that part….Everything affects everything.”

- 13 Reasons Why

14| faye

It’s 3 am. My windows are open. The night is still. No wind is blowing. There is no sound outside. Everything is extremely quiet.

I am struggling in my bed, trying not to do something I will regret later. Mom and Dad are sleeping downstairs, and I am here, trying not to claw my face, or do something equally horrible. 

I sit up and take some deep breaths. I know what I need to do. I need to cry. Somehow, I need to make myself cry. If I can cry, this squeezing pain in my chest will go away. I will not have this shortness of breath. I will not feel so terrible. I will be able to sleep. I will stop having my spiral days.

I try. I try my best. I think of my worst days. I think of my worst memories, but I can’t. I can’t make myself cry.

I breathe helplessly. My hands shake. I am going to. I am going to...

No, I can’t. I can’t. If I go there once, I will keep doing it, again and again. I will not stop. I can’t do that myself. I will not do that to myself. I promised myself I would never. I need to be strong. This will pass. Tonight is the worst, but tomorrow morning it will be fine again, and I will regret doing that if I do it now. I will regret everything.

I am already in a hole from where I can’t get out. I can’t dig it deeper with my own hands. I will not let my demons take that away from me too. Even if I am hurting like this, hurting so much that I want to do it. Hurting so much that I-

I need to think about something else. I need to find a distraction. How can I find a distraction at 3 in the morning? Nothing can save me. I am awake with my demons, with this deeper-than-black darkness.

But they can’t consume me. I have been here before and I know it always passes. All I need to do is hold on, hold onto something.

Once upon a time, I had a best friend whom I would have taken help from. But Claire went away.

Once upon a time, I thought there was this guy who may have loved me. Dean proved me wrong.

And once upon a time, I had someone whom I called my best friend forever, with whom I shared everything. When she was here, everything was different. I was a different Gwen. I didn’t have spiral days. I didn’t feel like this.

I was a normal girl, with my usual life and nothing much to worry about. Life was way easier.

I had a best friend who was the nicest person on earth.

Faye Thrasher.

But Faye, just like the others, proved me wrong, and she was the first one to do so.

All of this started with Faye Thrasher turning her back on me.

*****

It was the summer before the start of high school. We passed our elementary school together, Faye and I. She was my best friend. In our elementary school, we had this teacher, Mrs. Morris, who made us sit alphabetically in her class. I had my seat next to Faye, and that’s how I met her.

We realized we had so much in common that it almost seemed impossible. Both of us were lazy and we hated waking up early. We were not morning people, we didn’t like unnecessary drama, we didn’t like to wear makeup at school, and we hated boy trouble as well.