Jackie sighs as she stares at the assortment of blades laid out across the bathroom sink. She counts them again, trying to remember how she has acquired them all. One, two, three, all from box cutters. Four, an x-acto knife blade. Five, six, seven, eight, taken from shaving razors. Nine, ten, butterfly blades from Kevin's razor. She feels her chest tighten as she palms begin to sweat and it's just like the first time she realizes she has an addiction all over again.
She swears, wiping her hands unceremoniously on her jeans and picks up a blade. She turns it over in her hand, being careful not to nick her fingers, then she laughs bitterly at the irony. Her heart is already pounding.
It was never meant to be this way. Jackie was never supposed to be this way. She was never supposed to leave rehab with her head full of... Full of what?
She had seen the scars that peppered the arms and legs of the other patients, seen the words carved into their skin, seen the scar tissue on top of scar tissue. Jackie swallows hard and brings the blade up to the inside of her upper arm. Her face is stoic, despite the fact that her hands are shaking and her heart is pounding and she can barely breathe and then she feels the pinch and then the tear and then the rush. She does it again, her eyes fixated on the face in the mirror.
She watches as that stranger drags the blade carefully over the soft skin, splitting it open just enough that rubies spill out. Jackie sees this strange woman smile as red crawls down her arm in thin vines. She feels her heart beating regularly again, and takes a deep breath. She looks at the stranger in the mirror one last time before turning her attention to her arm.
It doesn't take her long to clean the wounds and cover herself up, especially since she's had years of practice, on and off, but it's almost noon and Denise and Gloria are waiting for her to meet them for lunch. Jackie's stomach turns and she's already disgusted with herself for doing what she's done. She wants to stay home and wallow, but instead she steels herself for an afternoon of smiling and contentment and God she just wants it to be over with already and she's not even out the door.
The afternoon goes by quickly, to Jackie's relief, and before she knows it, she's walking up the steps to her front door with Denise in tow and they're making polite conversation and with each step that she takes Jackie can feel the anxiety closing in on her. Jackie stares at the door and doesn't realize that Denise is watching her intently until she hears the other woman's voice.
"Jackie? Is everything alright?" Jackie can tell that Denise is genuinely worried which only serves to tighten her throat more, but Jackie smiles and nods a little too earnestly and says that she's fine and decides to invite Denise in. Jackie knows that if anyone was going to find out, it would naturally be Denise, but she decides that she's not going to give up so easily so when Denise is inside the house and settled on the living room couch Jackie excuses herself and tries to calmly ascend the stairs before she slips off her shoes and runs to the her bathroom.
Jackie has no time for ritual. She opens the medicine cabinet and pulls out the opaque pill bottle that she tells Kevin is full of Midol. She opens it, her hands already shaking furiously, and pulls out her favorite blade. She doesn't bother closing the medicine cabinet, or the bottle or even the bathroom door as she lifts up the bottom of her shirt and unbuttons her jeans so that she has easier access to her midriff. Jackie swallows hard and presses the blade into the flesh just inside her hipbone and indulges in the sensation for as long as she dares before she scores her self again, and again, and again until she is sure that she can make it through the rest of her time with Denise. When she is through, her hip is red and raw and bleeding and Jackie is high off of the rush, so she only half-cleans up, leaving her blouse untucked with a few tissues tucked into her jeans to soak up anything that might try to bleed through. She takes another deep breath before she heads back downstairs, not bothering to put her shoes back on.
Denise is waiting on the couch and Jackie takes a seat on the other end, tucking one of her legs under her and trying not to make it too obvious that she's covering her hip with her arm. Jackie tries to make polite conversation, but she can tell that Denise isn't buying it so she closes her mouth and clasps her hands together, pressing her forearm against her hip and trying not to hyperventilate even though it feels like the room is getting smaller and Denise is getting bigger and the air is getting thicker and Denise is saying something but Jackie can't hear her.
Denise's hands are suddenly covering Jackie's and it's only then that Jackie realizes that she's shaking and Jackie doesn't know why because she's been doing this for years and no one has noticed and this isn't even the worst she's gotten compared to the times when she's... but she doesn't go there because Denise's eye are seeking out her own and Jackie can't look away and she drops her arms to her sides and then Denise sees it.
Jackie's blouse has a growing red spot on it and Denise jumps into Nurse mode, pulling the shirt up and gently removing the tissues and then Denise gasps and Jackie wants to look away because she knows that Denise is just going to be disgusted because this is something that teenage girls do and Jackie is a full grown woman and a General's Wife for God's sake but Jackie can't look away because Denise is looking at her with sympathy and sadness and not disgust and Jackie thinks that she might cry.
Denise is still in Nurse mode, though and instead of confronting Jackie, she asks her if there are any other cuts on her body and Jackie nods dumbly because this isn't anything like how she expected it to go. Denise gently pushes Jackie's sleeves up her forearms and Jackie thinks about joking that she's not that stupid but instead she just stands up and leads Denise to the guest bedroom. Denise wants to see them, wants to help but Jackie is still somewhere else because she unbuttons her blouse and discards it on the floor in silence and just stands in front of Denise with a blank expression, like she can't actually believe that this is happening.
Denise's lips part like she's going to say something, but no words come out, so Denise just stands there and takes a survey of all the cuts on Jackie's torso and arms with a look akin to anguish on her face. Jackie suddenly feels very exposed despite the fact that she's still wearing pants and a bra and she want's this all to just stop. She wants Denise to stop looking like that. She turns away from Denise but Denise's hand catches her wrist and Jackie looks over at her, trying to brace herself for the unknown.
"Jackie." Denise breathes, her eyes shining with tears and Jackie shakes her head because Denise can't care this much.
"Denise, please, just..." Jackie hears herself say, but somehow it's like she's watching the stranger all over again because she feels like she's watching this play out from the sidelines. Jackie feels herself start to shake and her stomach turns because she knows for sure that shes going to cry and it's bad enough that Denise has seen her like this. She moves to pull her hand away from Denise's grip but the other woman holds tight and that's all Jackie can handle because suddenly she's bawling like a baby and Denise is holding her and whispering soothing words in her ear and Jackie is sure that if she was capable, she would be embarrassed.
Jackie spends the next three hours on the bed in the guest bedroom with Denise and she vacillates between crying and trying to explain to Denise how it all happened. Denise listens and strokes Jackie's hair and is careful not to touch any of her wounds and Jackie is thankful for that because this is already as intimate as she thinks she can handle but then she wonders what it would be like to let someone else touch them. Jackie looks up at Denise and opens her mouth to speak, but she closes it because it's a stupid question and Denise would have told her if she thought any of them needed stitches anyway, wouldn't she?
Denise notices Jackie's apprehension and squeezes her shoulder reassuringly and turns on her side so that she's facing Jackie completely on the bed and that's enough to encourage Jackie to try again.
"You don't..." Jackie starts and she's caught off guard at how thick her voice sounds from crying. "I mean, they don't need..." She tries again, trying not to sound as small as she feels but when Denise is looking at her like that and she's laying on the bed in her bra and she's so exposed and Jackie tries not to start crying again.
"Stitches?" Denise finishes for her and Jackie is thankful because tears are already pricking her eyes and her throat is tightening and when Denise shakes her head Jackie lets out a breath she didn't even realize she was holding. Then Denise opens her mouth again and Jackie steels herself for the confrontation. "I would like you to go to the hospital though, Jackie." And the panic must be painfully evident on Jackie's face because Denise moves in to envelope the smaller woman in an embrace.
"Please, Denise." Jackie finds herself begging as she clings to Denise. "I'll be fine. It was just a..." Jackie can't bring herself to say 'a moment of weakness' because a moment doesn't last years but she's desperate to keep this between the two of them. "I can't... I can't tell anyone." Jackie decides on the truth because she knows that now isn't the time to start lying and this seems to allay Denise temporarily. Jackie sees the sun setting and knows that Denise needs to get back to her daughter and her husband but she can't bring herself to let go, so instead she pulls Denise closer and buries her face in the crook of her neck and tries to muster the strength to get up and move on.
Denise holds Jackie until she can stand on her own and Jackie didn't know that coming clean could be this exhausting, but Denise is promising to come back first thing in the morning to take Jackie to a clinic off-post where she can get treatment and Jackie thinks that Denise might just be her guardian angel or something like that because when Denise leaves, Jackie grabs the bottle her blades are in and throws them in the trash.
Jackie knows that his road will be bumpy and hard to travel, but she hopes it will be easier with a companion like Denise.