Authors Note: Well…a year ago my best friend attempted suicide and a few month later two girl in my grade completed suicide. They were 14. It shook the entire school. Every day I see what my friends with depression go through and I just wanted to express through Neji and Tenten that suicide isn't the only out. Please enjoy and please take seriously. Depression is not a joke; it's not something people pretend to have for attention. It's a real illness and it's scary. I do not own Naruto. Don't forget to review!

Preface

Lee POV

It all started late one winter's night. Around 11:30pm I got a call from my friend Shikamaru. He was telling me to turn on the news. And so I did.

"Earlier tonight," I heard the news reporter say, "Ms. Elizabeth Yukimura immediately called 911 after coming into her daughter's bedroom and finding both her and her daughters boyfriend lying on the bed with both of their wrists deeply slashed. Both teens were immediately transported to the hospital and checked into the psych ward. Due to the families' requests, this is all we can share with the public at this time. Stay tuned for the weather.

So they did it…they actually attempted to kill themselves.

Chapter 1

Tenten POV

I hated school. The only good thing about it was getting to see my friends and my boyfriend. I used to like school, but then they decided to cut every music program the school had to offer. The first to go were the small clubs scattered around the school, then the rest of the clubs besides the 'important' ones like Yearbook and dance committee. Then went choir, band and orchestra, all gone within a day. We were forced to change our schedules to only 'absolutely needed' classes like math, and English. The ones nobody likes.

I was a good girl, always did my homework always paid attention in class, never smoked or did drugs or stayed out past curfew, I was the perfect daughter. Music was my number one. I always sang, always danced, and always played my piano and guitar. Then my dad left and my mother shut down. She didn't once ask how my day was anymore, or if I got all my homework done, or if my siblings weren't doing anything wrong. I was the oldest. I had to step up to the plate and get done what my mom couldn't. And I did a good job of it too. Then during my freshman year, my childhood friend Neji who I've had a crush on since we were small, finally asked me to be his girlfriend after secretly sharing kisses in the hallways and in the parking lot at school for years. Music slowly became less important.

For four years I kept my family from falling apart more then it already had. But during our sophomore year both Neji and I buckled under pressure. It was too much on a sixteen year old girl to keep her family of 5 together. And it was too much for a sixteen year old boy to live up to his families 'perfect' expectations.

Both of us started to get waves of depression. It would come and go as it pleased, starting off slow at first but growing and growing as time went on with out help. We started to look for ways out of the pain. First it was not doing our homework and ditching classes, then marijuana and other drugs. Then sex, and last was cutting, and we cut deep. Deep enough for our wounds to bleed for hours, deep enough to temporarily cease the emotional pain we were both feeling. We fell out of touch with our friends; we were too busy trying to get rid of the depression to pay attention to them. We started sitting with new people at lunch, people with the same problems as us.

We believed that none of them had it as bad as us. They all still had both of their parents. Neither Neji nor I had our fathers. His was killed and like I said earlier, mine left.

My first attempt to stop the pain forever was during our junior year. I took pills, too many to count. To me, it didn't seem as if I was trying to end my life, I just wanted to fall asleep without crying. I wanted the thoughts in my head to stop, it felt like a migraine. Every pain med in the cabinet I took at least 8 from each bottle.

I started feeling extremely woozy. I was starting to feel my life slip away from me. This pain was just as bad as the pain I felt everyday. I bent over the toilet in my bathroom and shoved my fingers down my throat. Gagging, I threw up every pill I had just forced down. I spent half the night in the bathroom, waiting for the after shocks of puking to subside. Waking up the next morning, it was like it had never happened. Nobody knew about my almost lost life, not even Neji.

It was spring the first time we were caught with marijuana. The one day we leave our weed in our lockers just had to be the day they brought the drug dogs through the school. We were suspended. My mother didn't care; she didn't even try to stop me. Neji's family was a different story. His mother was so disappointed she wouldn't even look at him. His uncle was angry. He took away everything from him, his phone, lap top, television rights, his car, his guitar, cut his curfew from eleven to five, he wasn't aloud to see me outside of school and he even put locks on Neji's windows.

It didn't take him long to figure out a way to sneak out of his room to see me. I always left my window unlocked at night for him. Being snuggled into my warm queen sized bed and then having your boyfriend crawl in next to you, is the best feeling in the world.

It was late on a Saturday night; Neji and I were to return to school on Monday. He was sitting on the love seat that sat on the other side of my room. I was cleaning out the shit from under my bed when I pulled out my acoustic guitar.

"Is that your guitar?" Neji asked me in hushed tones.

"Yeah…" I pulled it out of the case and tuned it.

"When's the last time you played?"

"Freshman year…I forgot how good it feels to hold this thing," I started to play Crazy on You by Heart, my favorite thing to play.

"I can't believe you still know how to play that," Neji said grinning at me.

"Well I've only played it a million times!"

I continued to play my favorite song, and then I got a text.

Hey Tenten, I've been thinking about you lately, how are you?

"Whose it from?" asked Neji.

"Lee." I said solemnly.

The grin Neji was sporting immediately turned in a straight thin line, "What does he want?"

"He just wants to know how I'm doing."

"Why does he care?"

"Probably because he was our best friend and then we decided to ditch him for new friends," I said.

I texted back, he Lee! I'm doing okay, I miss you.

I heard about the suspension, you and Neji okay?

We're fine…He got in huge trouble with his uncle and my mom didn't do anything so…yeah.

So, Shikamaru's having an end of the quarter party…the whole grade is invited. Wanna come!?

I'd love too, but it all depends on if Neji's uncle lets him go. So we'll see.

Alright, see you at school Monday!

Bye!

"We're gonna go to Shikamaru's party this weekend okay!?"

"Why?"

"Uh because Lee just invited us, and incase you forgot they all use to be our friends."

"Yeah…use to."

"Just because we haven't been hanging out with them lately doesn't mean that their not still our friends."

"I'm gonna go now…" he said standing up.

"Why are you being like this!?" I asked.

"What do you mean?"

"Lee texted me and you freaked out! Why?"

"Because…"

"Because why!?"

"I don't know…" he frowned to himself.

"Maybe we should reconnect with everyone…"

"Why…what did they ever do for us?"

"Neji…their our friends…we ditched them, remember!?"

"None of them understand what we're going through…" he turned to my window.

I grabbed his wrist from where I was seated on the floor, "so we'll make them understand."

He bent down next to me, kissing me, "I love you. See you tomorrow, Tenten."

"I love you too."

I closed the window behind him. Shaking my head in annoyance I climbed into bed letting sleep take me.