Title: Exit, Stage Left
Summary: Disgust and distain are words nestled deep in my vocabulary. I use them a lot more than I should, but now I'm using them about myself.
I've locked myself away in the bathroom at work. It's stereotypical to say the least, but I can find poor justifications for my actions. After all, I'm not doing it to hide from work. My true reason is tremendously worse, but before I can focus on that train of thought, I sternly remind myself that I have much more important things to be focusing on.
Namely, the blood trickling down my arm.
There is a line of cuts down my left forearm, all in a straight little row and all the same length. The last one, closest to my hand is bleeding more than the others. The other four are bubbling blood lightly that will smear across my flesh, but not stain the thick polyester. The last one is trickling blood, a bit deeper than the others and I'm trying so desperately to wrap a makeshift bandage around it. It's difficult with one hand though.
The longer I struggle with the thin paper that is slowly becoming an ugly red, the more panicked I get. Logically, I should know that I've only been in here for two or three minutes and they wouldn't be curious yet, but my paranoid mind is making me hear footsteps coming down the hallway. I know they're coming, coming to knock on the door and call my name out so sweetly, asking if I'm okay. That can't happen, they can't come.
Because no. No, I'm not okay, but I can't say that, not to anyone. It's too much to bear that I went almost three years without the welcoming embrace of self harm and all that broke because I'm weak. Because I'm stressed and sick and those words that I swore meant nothing meant everything. I look up and stare at myself in the mirror, pressing my lips together in a thin line.
But that weakness and that I crumbled to it isn't nearly as humiliating as the fact that I like it.
Obviously I'd have to, naturally, but it's deeper than that. My mind drifts to the blade I'm keeping tucked in my pocket and I think about it, about how small it is and how powerful it is. I feel a strange surge of admiration towards the sharp metal that can so easily take a life and wonder what that would feel like, having so much power. But the thoughts of bringing the blade to my skin send a different feeling entirely through me.
A deep, hot spike of arousal sends itself through my heart and into my blood, flowing through my veins and to my very fingertips. The heat settles in my belly and I curl in on myself a little, feeling heat rush to my cheeks.
I'm actually aroused, thinking about the power I have over myself right now, even though I've lost all self control. My life, heart and soul are in my hands now, only mine, and it's amazing. I'm so used to giving over control to others, blindly trusting them only to be hurt. But now I'm the only one that can hurt myself, and for now, no one can take this from me.
I am the only one that can draw my own blood. I am the only one that can inflict pain. This is such a rush, so exhilarating and so thrilling that I decide what happens now that I'm almost giddy with excitement. But disgust is going through my head on the heels of the thoughts at how happy I am with the control I have now.
But deep down, I know this is wrong. I shouldn't be so aroused, so excited by my own level of control and I know that I should combat it. I can't let myself lose control again, because what if someone finds out?
The thought sends a cold chill down my spine and my hands start to shake as I pull my sleeve down. I remember the looks I get when people find out, the pity and the horror that the ones I love show to me. It hurts, knowing they'd push me away for this, that they'd condemn and label me. The thought makes me itch to convert that pain into a different kind, but I push this thought away and walk out of the bathroom, smiling a horrible, fake, plastic smile.
Because no one can know that no, I'm not okay. I'm perfectly fine.
"All the world's a stage
And all the men and women merely players…"
-Jaques; Act II, Scene VII