si

She closes her eyes, and I can see the moisture. She__ deep-breathing again, and I notice her hands are clutched around the opposing wrists, nails digging in deep, hard, scratching. Pain to replace pain.

Every lineament of the girl's wasted body is a testament to her inner turmoil. Willow can only imagine what kind of pain she must be in to destroy herself that way. She knows there's something ironic in her compassion for the other girl, but she can't help feeling that this utter mortification of the flesh is far worse than anything that she herself has done.

I hurt myself,_ Syren bit out. __ make myself bleed and it feels good. It eases the pressure inside me, but it never lasts for long._ His lips trembled. __efore I slept in your bed, I__ never had a full night__ sleep. Before I crawled into your arms I__ never been safe._ He shuffled forward. __ou give me that. You hold that power and you can take it away.

There__ no magical healing in this. I won__ wake up tomorrow fixed and joyful. I__l still hurt and grieve. But moments like this, with Colton? They make it all bearable. He doesn't fix me, doesn't heal me. He just makes life worthwhile. He helps me remember to breathe, shows me how to smile again. He kisses me, and I can forget pain, forget the urges I still have to cut for the pain that erases the emotions.

I stopped. She was bleeding after all. Perfect lines crossed her wrists, not near any crucial veins, but enough to leave wet red tracks across her skin. She hadn;t hit her veins when she did this; death hadn't been her goal.

and afterward, after it was done, it was too much, and I felt like I was going to... I don't know.... explode, and it was just too much, I had to let it out you know? I had to-I interrupted her hysteria It's okay, I understand.That was a lie. I didn't get her cutting at all. She'd done it sporadically, ever since the accident and it scared me each time. She'd try to explain it to me, how she didn't want to die - she just needed to get it out somehow. She felt so much emotionally, she would say, that a physical outlet - physical pain - was the only way to make her internal pain go away. It was the only way she could control it.