"Charlie…" Sam whispered. She knitted her eyebrows at me, giving me a look of pure sympathy. I swallowed the overwhelmingly large lump in my throat and looked away. She didn't bother to ask why I did it. She just hugged me, holding me close, easing my pain, even if just for a moment.

Blood stained the white carpet of Patrick's bedroom. I felt the warm liquid dripping from my fingertips, chilling me to the bone, but helping me know that I was still alive.

"I'm sorry…" I whimpered softly. Patrick stood behind Sam, looking at me with those sad eyes. I'd only seen him this upset one other time: right after he and Brad broke up.

"Charlie, are you doing okay?" he asked. I felt my eyes fill with tears. My efforts to hold them back were for nothing. Patrick hugged me, his concern creating a strange atmosphere. I'd never really had people concerned for me before. I cried harder.

Sam simply pulled out a few bandages from her bag and placed them delicately around my wrist. "If you ever feel like cutting again, I need you to tell me, Charlie," she said sternly but caringly. I nodded, feeling so pathetic and stupid.

I hadn't yet told them what Aunt Helen was doing to me. I felt like they wouldn't understand and accuse me of being some kind of sick slut, or worse… They could leave me… Pure panic set in as that thought flickered through my mind. Patrick saw it in my eyes. He cocked his head to the side in a questioning look, but didn't say a word.

I can't survive without them. I can't. Please, please don't let them leave me.

Sam and Patrick let me stay with them that night. I lay on my back on the floor, staring at the ceiling and trying not to think. Aunt Helen would be expecting me home soon, and when I didn't come, she'd get angry with me. That thought terrified me.

I looked over at Sam and Patrick, the two people who mean the world to me. Patrick was cuddling softly with Sam, both sound asleep. I felt tears well up in my eyes again, dreading the thought of them finding out what was happening.

"Shh, Charlie, don't wake your sister." I felt her hands dance up my thighs slowly, and she leaned forward to kiss me. I silently begged Candice to wake up, but I knew she couldn't save me.

I sat as still as I could, trying to give subtle hints that I didn't like what she was doing. I couldn't look at her, or I'd start crying again, and she'd get angry.

"Charlie..." she moaned softly. "Charlie… Charlie." Her words became more and more forceful. "Charlie!"

I bolted upright. "Charlie, what's wrong?" Sam asked, genuine concern radiating in her voice. I realized that I was sobbing uncontrollably, and I couldn't stop it. I just sat there, stunned, with terrorized tears streaking down my cheeks. I couldn't even tell myself to stop crying. I just kept doing it. Bawling on Sam's bedroom floor, I realized how helpless everything was, and how much I wanted to quit. I didn't want to participate at all. I just wanted to be done.

Patrick came to one side of me, and Sam to the other, and they both just held me until the tears finally subsided. I stared blankly at the walls, not having the energy to speak. I could feel both of them looking at me, judging me, but it didn't matter. Nothing mattered, because I knew what I had to do.

"What's wrong with me?" I mumbled. Sam gave me that look – the same one she gave me when I told her about Michael. She whispered something in Patrick's ear, but I barely noticed.

I looked from Sam to Patrick, seeing the love in their eyes, but not knowing that it was actually love I was seeing because it was an emotion I'd never felt before them. To love is a great feeling that anyone can feel. But to be loved is rare, and only a handful of people ever experience what I felt sitting there on the floor at that exact moment. I couldn't connect any human words to what I was feeling. Together seemed to fit, sort of, but it was a bit of a stretch.

Sam and Patrick eventually fell back asleep. As soon as Patrick shut his eyes finally, I kissed both of them in a friendly way on the cheek and made my way to the front door. I didn't walk home; my family didn't expect me to. Instead I marched straight to Aunt Helen's house, crying the whole way.

I would do anything to be someone else, anyone else, and not have to have Aunt Helen in my life. I've asked God to kill her so many times, but my prayers were never answered. I've asked God to kill me, but I'm still living. But I've never asked to swap places with anyone, because there are some things that I wouldn't wish on the most horrible of people, not on Derek, or Craig, or even Aunt Helen herself.

I then decided that I wasn't going to Aunt Helen's. I stopped outside of my own house and pulled out my bag. I kept a bottle of my anti-depressants in my bag for emergencies. The normal dosage was two small pills every morning and night.

I slowly slid one pill onto my tongue and swallowed it. Then came another, and another. I counted up to ten pills, then lost track. I swallowed every pill, feeling a sharp pain in my stomach all the while. The corners of my vision were getting fuzzy, and I started staggering in my footsteps as I walked toward my house. The snow seemed to come down harder.

I fell to my knees on the doorstep and threw up. I felt hollow and empty, without anything inside. I lacked any feeling in my fingers and toes, and soon I was numb everywhere.

Candice opened the front door, holding hands with Derek and smiling. She held a vase in her free hand, filled with roses of every color, from white to blue to red to pink. She looked down, made eye contact with me, saw the puke, and screamed. The vase fell from her hand and shattered at her feet. I felt hands at my sides, trying to pull me up. Then everything went dark.