Paint It Black

Waking up was the worst part of the day, a hassle. Surely, you were a morning bird and could wake up at any ungodly hour without complaint or nasty attitude (when did you ever have an attitude?). But you'd open your eyes each day to an empty house or loud, obnoxious snoring in the living room because all you have is a drunk father and your mother and brother only exist in your memories now (but you pretend they're alive everyday) - it'd do nothing to help you put on your morning façade of happiness. You'd wake up an hour earlier than you should because it takes you that long to get ready for school because you have to look perfect and it wouldn't be the same if you didn't.

But it wasn't like any of your friends noticed in the first place. There was an unmistakable sadness in those chocolate brown eyes of yours that glimmered no matter if there was a smile on your face and not one of them would comment on the strange things you blurt out – they would just look at you funny and give you strange faces and you knew what they were thinking.

She's SO w e i r d.

And you were weird but you were different in your own way and that was why your father hated you. He wasn't accepting that you had a problem and he told you somanytimes that he would have preferred that you had died instead of your brother, Lucas – who was only at the tender age of 10 in a plane crash with your mother and you swore that sometimes you even wished that it was you instead too. That Lucas could grow up just like you had and live his life to the fullest. Once, he told you he wanted to be a singer and go to Hollywood arts too.

"Just like you kitty-cat"

You don't know what to say because the gears in your head are work at such an abnormal pace that all you can blurt out is your oh so famous catch-phrase "What's THAT supposed to mean?" because it sounded like he was insulting you and you were oh so easily offended it was ridiculous. Yet at the same time, he seemed more hurt than you.

Then your mother comes into play and you're sitting with her in the kitchen table the day before her flight to New York for a Broadway performance and you so badly wanted to go but you couldn't and she was taking Lucas instead. So you talked and talked about Hollywood arts, almost bragging, and about Sikowitz and how insane he is and your father makes a nasty comment that he was sure this so-called-teacher wasn't as insane as you were (and then a whole fight breaks out and he makes an appointment for your therapist again who shortly after, claimed she was retiring "early" which you of course didn't get). When he leaves the house you beg and beg your mother to take you with her but school comes first – but she'd never leave you forever she said, with that father who needs to learn how to accept that you're manic depressive.

When she promised that three years ago, you were painting your nails yellow and eating a red velvet cupcake and it soon became your favorite snack and color in the whole world.

Your father was absolutely horrified when, a year later, you dyed your hair that red velvet color and the therapy started once again and soon you were being forced to take pills to calm yourself down. So every morning you wake up, get ready and just before you head off to school – a 20 minute walk since you're just 16 and can't drive and he refuses to take you – you go into the kitchen cabinet and grab that ugly orange container that was long abandoned and pop the antimanic pills like they're pieces of candy that make you feel like a different person entirely.

In fact, they made you feel like you were spacing out from everything and everyone and eventually people were, shockingly, starting to notice. You hate these pills because no matter if you have psychological problems you love being happy and you like being who you are. So you stop taking them, and you hide them in your own bathroom closet where you were sure your dad wouldn't look because you had "girl things" in there and he didn't necessarily want to see.

When you came home and the pills were on the counter it was all over for you.

He yelled at you for hours on end it seemed, until his voice ran hoarse and you were backed up against the wall with your hands over your ears and tears streaming down your cheeks because you absolutely couldn't stand yelling and screaming. And then he yelled something at you, you couldn't quite remember what it was but it was rude and made you snap. Your father didn't like it one bit because one second he was screaming, the next he's beating you, slapping you, kicking you and you just want it to bloody s-t-o-p. But he didn't.

You're pretty sure you blacked out because then next thing you know you're lying down in a pile of glass and every inch of your body hurts and you're alone. You sat up, sore and cheeks caked with tears and then the memories of the night before comes back at you, hurtling towards you and it finally hits you like a brick wall. You cry some more, so many tears that you were sure the ocean was lingering in you and immediately you begun thinking about how cool that was. But the pain and the sorrow that night's occurrence overwhelmed it and before you knew it a shard of glass was pressed to your wrist and you slashed and sliced away; pain had never felt so good before.

(When you didn't go to school that day, Jade texted you and asked if you were okay.)

(You "were fine, just sick D:")

In a way, when you reflect on your actions when you were just a freshman in Hollywood Arts, you believe you were trying to kill yourself and do your father a favor. But now you're a junior and the scars are still on your wrists mingling with the new ones because you just can't get enough of it and it feels so damn good you can't stop; yet no one ever notices them. They're a scream out for help, for love and for care that no one hears, no one sees. No one but your father – who still beats you – and sometimes Jade becomes skeptical of you.

You realize you need help.

But you don't want it at the time, so you don't get it.

Today, today is the three year anniversary of your mother and Lucas's death and you're sitting at the kitchen table alone, replaying the last conversation you had with her in your head like a broken record, a red velvet cupcake sitting next to you, rivaling your hair, and two tubes of fingernail polish on the other side. Your father has gone to work and you have 30 minutes left until you have to go to school and you don't feel like going because this day usually occurs on a Saturday or weekend where you can be alone and not have to worry about having your happy-go-lucky mask up. You can sit in your room all day, your ohsocolorful room look at the scrap book you had when you were thirteen.

You had to go. Your father would surely kill you if you didn't.

And you looked at the two rivaling nail polishes – one black, the other yellow. Normally, the color black wouldn't exist on your nails and instead, it would have been replaced by another color that was another 10 bricks in your happy, insane border you had around yourself when with your friends and at school. You want to paint them yellow, because that was the color you had painted them when you were talking to your mother that evening. Besides, black was Jade's thing and not yours. Black was bold, daring and dominant and you were none of those things. But black also emitted sorrow and unhappiness and you figured, what the hell – maybe today…maybe today, it was time to get noticed.

Because people notice what color your nails are when you paint them according to your outfit.

Robbie's grandmother had made a comment that almost sent you in a fit of tears when you had offered to come over her house with him. It rang in your head as well, loitering with that of the fading memories of Carol Valentine and Lucas and every time you hear it, it makes your heart ache and you want to sob all over again but you don't because you couldn't ruin your makeup and have to start over again – you couldn't have your eyes get all red and puffy before school starts because you don't want people to notice right away.

"Don't you hate your mother?"

"I love my mother!"

"A girl doesn't dye her hair that color unless she has psychological problems!"

"My hair color has nothing to do with my psychological problems!"

So this time, you painted them black.

This is going to have a second chapter and depending on if I can think of a solid plot, I might continue further than that. How'd I do on this one? :) I wasn't sure because of the POV I put it in…Leave your feedback!